#we aren’t sure if it’s a neighbors or not if it is then we’ve now stolen a chicken and a cat from them

[femme-lovely]

The tiniest black kitten has shown up at our house

[clarisse0o]

Camp Wiegman-Part 62

Lucy Bronze x Ona Batlle

Alternative Universe : Military School

Words : 5K

Masterlist

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Friday, February 26; 9:00 AM - Zoo.

"Come on, hurry up," my brother urges next to the car.

"Joan," I tease. "Stop it, please, and stay here."

"If you don't listen, we'll turn back," Lucy scolds him.

That threat earns a grumpy response from my brother. He turns his back on us, crossing his arms. I smile, keeping an eye on him in case he seriously considers walking away. Meanwhile, Lucy grabs our backpack, which we prepared last night while Joan was already asleep. Since we couldn't go yesterday, we rescheduled the zoo for today. Joan was over the moon once he figured it out. We didn’t talk about it at all yesterday. We were too busy. We ended up at a small fair with our friends after visiting the local market. My brother had completely forgotten about the zoo because of that, and in the evening, when he asked, we pretended we weren't going anymore to surprise him. It worked quite well. He's very excited now. I hope today will be better than the fair. We came home late, in the late afternoon. We offered to have our friends stay for the evening, but they politely declined, likely feeling awkward about being invited again. Perhaps it was for the best. Joan was so exhausted that he fell asleep right after dinner. We managed to get him to sleep in the guest room thanks to that. Sure, he woke up at the crack of dawn this morning and squeezed in between us, but we couldn't hold it against him. At least we almost got an entire night to ourselves. Joan sulked all morning, but it seems like his bad mood has vanished. Now he’s beaming with anticipation.

"Alright, we’re good to go," Lucy announces, shutting the trunk.

Joan spins around excitedly at the news. His smile brightens, and he looks at me, waiting for my go-ahead.

"Go ahead, but stay in front of us, okay? I don't want to lose you in the crowd."

He nods and takes the lead. I smile, following him with my hand in Lucy's. Lucy sighs softly, probably relieved that we’ve finally arrived. Joan was unbearable the whole ride. I've seen him impatient before, but never like this. It felt like he was deliberately trying to annoy Lucy, and he succeeded. I had to keep him entertained, or else Lucy would have lost her mind.

"I hope today goes smoothly," she says.

"There’s no reason it shouldn’t. Though, there are more people here than I expected," I remark. "I didn't think it’d be this busy."

"It's Friday, the last day of school vacation before the weekend. Of course, it’s packed," Lucy replies. "At least the weather is warming up a bit. It’ll be more pleasant."

I nod. It’s still a bit chilly, but unlike what one of Lucy’s neighbors told us earlier this week, the icy wind has finally died down. The snow has also melted, and in a few weeks, the temperature should finally rise. I can’t wait for that. In Barcelona, we rarely experience bad weather, if ever. It’s the complete opposite here. It’ll be tough at first, but I think I can get used to it. There are perks to the snow and cold. First, you can have fun in different ways, and with the cold, you get way more cuddles. Not that we don’t cuddle in Barcelona, but it’s much more enjoyable here, under a blanket. We reach the ticket booths. We wait a bit before it’s our turn. I handle the tickets, not giving Lucy a chance to argue. It’s about time she lets me contribute financially, even though I’m not working yet.

"I could have paid," she says once we pass the security gates.

"No," I reply cheerfully.

"Yes."

"No, and that’s the end of it. Today, it’s on me."

She rolls her eyes with a small smile before Joan reminds us of his presence by tugging on my jacket sleeve.

"Come on, Ona! We need to keep moving!"

"The animals aren’t going anywhere, you know," I say with a small laugh. "Come on, give me your hand. There are a lot of people here."

"I'm not a little kid anymore," she complains.

"That’s not the point. I just said there’s a crowd, and I don’t want to lose you."

I accompany my words with a stern look. He’s been arguing nonstop since we got here, and I’m starting to lose patience. He sighs and eventually gives me his hand. In the meantime, I turn toward Lucy, but I notice she’s no longer beside me. A brief moment of panic sets in until I spot her at a nearby map stand. I sigh in relief before dragging us over to her.

"Hey, if I tell Joan to give me his hand so I don’t lose him, it’s not an excuse for you to run off."

She laughs softly, leaning her head toward me.

"Sorry. I saw the maps and thought they might be useful."

"Haven’t you done the zoo before?" I ask, surprised.

"No. It’s a first for both of us," she says with a little smile.

I return her smile. She finally takes a map and stops when she sees my hand extended toward her. She laughs but takes it without protest.

"Alright, let’s go."

"What should we start with?" Joan asks, looking around with excitement gleaming in his eyes.

"Well, let’s check the map."

As I speak, Lucy unfolds the map. Everything is super organized. They’ve laid it out by zones based on the animals’ origins. My attention lingers on the penguins. Knowing Joan, that’s what he’ll enjoy the most.

"I’d save that for last," I say, pointing to that part of the map.

"Okay, well, let’s start here then," she points to the opposite direction.

"Should we join a tour group?" I ask, noticing one gathering beside us with a guide.

"No, that’s boring," my brother groans.

"Looks like you’ve got your answer," Lucy says.

"Alright, alright," I reply with amusement. "Just us, then."

"Can we start with the lions?" he asks.

"That’s actually over that way. Let’s go."

We move forward through the crowd to start with the African animals. Joan might be excited, but so am I. I love these kinds of outings, just the three of us. I also love animals. We linger at some exhibits and pass by others more quickly. It’s our first time here, but the layout is really well done. I’m sure we’ll come back, just Lucy and me. The zoo is organized like small villages at various points along the path. They’re often animated by staff, and they even offer activities in certain spots. We managed to get Joan to participate in one of them. He didn’t really want to at first, but in the end, he seemed to enjoy it. Then, we had the chance to feed the zebras. We were lucky to arrive at the right time. That was definitely Joan’s favorite part. Of course, the activity was supervised by staff, but they weren’t obligated to involve the visitors. The African section ends with the lions, which he kept talking about the entire time, even after all the things he got to do. I mentally note that my brother is becoming more and more spoiled and that I need to talk to our mom about it. I’m not the one responsible for his upbringing, but it’d be good for her to keep an eye on this not-so-pleasant change.

"What’s the next section?" I take advantage of my brother’s distraction to ask Lucy.

"The Asian animals. Then the Australian ones. But I think it’d be a good idea to grab lunch before that since we’ll be near a restaurant."

"Okay, that works for me," I reply with a smile.

We’ve been walking for two hours now, so that sounds like a good idea. By the time we finish the next section, I imagine we’ll be ready for lunch just before noon. It seems less busy than the one we just completed, according to the map. That’s good news, considering the crowd around us. Lucy was right earlier. The weather is mild, and it’s the end of vacation, so people are making the most of it. We’ll have to consider these factors next time if we want a more peaceful visit. Lucy kisses me and then wraps her arm around my shoulders. I keep an eye on my brother, who’s been ahead of us for a while now. He’s captivated by the lions. He’s holding onto the railing, looking down as if he never wants to leave this spot. Unfortunately, I have to burst his bubble if we want to see everything.

"Come on, Jo, let’s go."

"A little longer, please," she pleads, pouting.

"No, we’re moving on," Lucy jumps in. "Otherwise, you won’t be able to see everything. There are other animals like leopards and jaguars."

"Tigers too?" she asks excitedly.

"Of course. We’re getting to them soon, but we need to keep moving. »

Finally, without further resistance, he complied. He walked ahead of us. From the start, he had been negotiating to stop holding my hand. It must have been torture for her to see the other children running around while he couldn't. I agreed on the condition that he stayed in front, didn't run, and didn't stray too far. I also didn’t want to spend my day holding his back. So far, he had respected my terms, which was a first since this morning. Lucy had gotten so fed up with his behavior in certain situations that she left him to me to handle. She was probably right. I had noticed that the more Lucy got involved, the worse his behavior became. I imagine it will take some time for him to adjust to having someone else in my life. After all, he had never really seen me with anyone before. When I was with Mapi, he was too young to remember, which was for the best. He would probably have made a fuss about us no longer being together, given how much he adores my best friend.

With these thoughts in mind, we continued along, taking our time to observe everything. The scenery was beautiful, a peaceful place where you almost forget the disrespectful kids shouting everywhere. Almost. Lucy might complain, but at least we didn't have to deal with that with my brother. As someone who dislikes drawing attention, I appreciated this.

Finally, it was time to eat. As planned, we arrived just before noon. There was a bit of a wait, but not as bad as it could have been.  

“I’m not hungry,” my brother mumbled. “Do we have to stop?”

“Yes,” I replied. “You’re not alone, and knowing you, you'll be hungry as soon as we leave.”

“But there’s still so much to see!”

“And we’ll have time to see it all.”

“But—"

“Joan, that’s enough,” my girlfriend interjected with a stern look. “My threat from this morning still stands.”

“Oh, stop. He’s been good all morning.”

Lucy raised an eyebrow at me, and I pressed my lips together. Last night, she’d told me it would be a good idea to support her when she said something to Joan, to avoid making her look like the bad guy. Admittedly, apart from a few grumpy remarks, which I had managed so far, Joan had behaved well this morning. My girlfriend sighed softly and turned back to Joan.

“We’re eating now. If you’re not hungry, you don’t have to eat, but don’t complain later.”

In response, my brother groaned, crossing his arms and puffing out his cheeks. It seemed like his favorite thing to do since he arrived, and it was pretty funny to watch.

“Come on, move along,” I guided him with a hand on his head as we advanced in line.

“But I’m really not hungry,” he insisted, looking up at me. “My stomach hurts,” he added, rubbing his belly.

“Really?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

He nodded, eyes filling with tears. I sighed and glanced at Lucy, who shrugged. I knew she was aware, just like me, that this was probably a lie.

“Well, I suppose you can take some medicine beforehand. We brought those dissolvable sachets, just in case.”

In reality, we only had tablets. I would have crushed one if she truly needed it, as he can’t swallow them whole. It’s not like I don’t know how to do that. I also knew he hated it, which was clear when he grimaced at the idea.

“No!” he whined.

“Well, what? You’re feeling unwell, aren’t you?”

“I-I think I feel better now.”

A small laugh escaped me. I shook my head. So the negotiations were working after all. Lucy wasn’t wrong to have me handle this. It seemed effective. We finally reached the buffet, which reminded me a lot of a school cafeteria. I grabbed a tray for Joan and myself, while Lucy took care of hers. We helped ourselves to the food. Lucy and I got chicken cutlets with fries and a green salad, while Joan chose spaghetti Bolognese. For dessert, we picked cookies. I think I also slipped a few snacks into the bag in case we got hungry later. We finished with drinks—iced tea for Joan and me, and water for Lucy. Once everything was ready, I paid, and we found a table. The place was somewhat crowded but not so much that we had to wait for a table to free up.

The meal passed peacefully, with Joan chattering nonstop. It was the first time he’d talked so much, so we let him. He had just started his first year of primary school, and since I no longer lived at home, the change was pretty drastic. Not just in personality, but intellectually as well. This morning, he had fun reading all the signs to me, showing that he could read now.

“And then Paul got a new dog. It’s so cute! I wanted to go to his house to see it, but Mom wouldn’t let me.”

“Really?”

“Mm-hmm,” she nodded with her mouth full. “I wanted to have a sleepover, but we already had plans that day.”

“I see,” I chuckled. “Maybe next time.”

“When are you guys going to get a dog?”

Lucy, who had been silent until now, nearly choked. I stifled a laugh. That question caught me off guard too. I’d forgotten how unfiltered Joan could be. If anything, he talks more now than before.

“Why do you think we’d get a dog?” I asked, once I composed myself.

“Well, I already asked Mom, but she said no. So now I’m asking you guys. It’d be great! I could take care of it when I visit.”

This time, I laughed out loud. It wasn’t like he would be spending half the year with us. Besides, knowing him, even if we had a dog, he wouldn’t actually take care of it when he was here.

“We’re not getting a dog, Jo, I’m sorry.”

“But why?” she pouted.

“Well, we’re hardly ever home right now. It just wouldn’t work.”

"Home." The word slipped out before I realized it. It didn’t seem to bother Lucy, though, as she kept watching us with a faint smile. I cleared my throat and continued, giving a more realistic explanation that Joan could understand.

“Don’t you think a dog would be miserable, locked up in an apartment all alone? And dogs require care, which we wouldn’t be around to give since we don’t live in the apartment during the week.”

“Or on weekends when you don’t have leave,” Lucy teased, continuing to eat as if nothing happened.

I stuck my tongue out at her in response. She had said that on purpose. The worst part was that she was the one who enforced this “punishment.” It was funny, though, and I appreciated that she still saw me as the person I was before we got together. It meant she hadn’t labeled our relationship or changed how she viewed me. Now that I think about it, our behavior toward each other hadn’t changed either. Joan’s voice brought my attention back to her.

“But yeah, not now, duh! You could get a dog once you’ve finished school and have a house. You said you love Lucy, so that’s what will happen, right? You could have a dog then, and you wouldn’t even need a baby!”

Lucy burst into laughter—literally. Meanwhile, I died of embarrassment, hiding my flushed face behind my hands. I couldn’t believe he had the nerve to say that in front of my girlfriend. I could feel Lucy’s eyes on me from across the table, but I couldn’t bring myself to look at her. I forced myself to, though, and saw her smiling at me with amusement, clearly expecting me to respond.

“You’re really talking nonsense. We don’t know yet. And who says we won’t have a baby, huh?”

“Well, I’m already here. You don’t need one. And besides, you can’t have one anyway. I’ll just move in with you.”

Once again, Lucy snickered softly. Joan, who seemed very sure of what he was saying, pouted and crossed his arms. I bit my lip to hold back my amusement. He was definitely giving me plenty of stories to remind him of later.

“All that, huh?” I asked.

“Isn’t it a good idea?”

He was sulking. I recognized the tone in his voice when he did that.

“Where did you get all these ideas, huh?”

“Well, my friends say two girls together can’t have a baby.”

I ran a hand through my hair. He must have talked to them about me. I knew he often mentioned me to them, so it wasn’t impossible. Poor thing must have a lot of questions if he’s already discussing this with his friends—or anyone else, for that matter. It must be tough for him to understand everything at his age. I couldn’t wait for him to grow up, if only to understand this better.

“They’re right,” Lucy said. “But there are other ways.”

“That’s true,” I confirmed. “Like adoption, for example.”

I gave him the simplest version of the truth, something he could grasp. Lucy and I hadn’t had the chance to talk about it yet; it was way too early for that. But if I were to give my opinion, adoption wasn’t something I’d want to prioritize. Joan seemed to latch onto the idea instantly, and his reaction caught me off guard.

“Then you can adopt me!”

I rolled my eyes playfully and grabbed a napkin to wipe the tomato sauce covering his face. A few more seconds, and it would have dripped onto his clothes.

“And why would we adopt you, huh? You have a home with two parents. Adoption is for children who don’t have that, you know?”

I can see through his eyes that all the hopes he had thought so much about have evaporated. I don't like seeing that glimmer. I feel bad for him.

“So, you don't want me?”  

“We didn’t say that,” Lucy responds. “You can come see us as often as you want, and we’ll visit you in Barcelona too.”  

“But… I want to stay with you! You’re way too far from home, and Mom and Dad aren’t around much anyway.”  

I give him a sad smile. I know what that’s like, unfortunately. I run my hand through his hair before pulling him into a hug. He lets himself go without any fuss.

“I know, sweetheart, but we can’t do any better. It’s not that we don’t want you, but you can’t just leave home like that. Besides, Lucy and I will probably have another busy year ahead. Even if we wanted to, we couldn’t take you in permanently.”

I think about the opportunity at the Art school for me and the opening of the gym for Lucy. This upcoming year will be just as busy and complicated as this one, if not more. I dread it as much as I’m excited to see what the future holds. I’m still waiting on a phone call, and I’m starting to worry that I haven’t heard back yet. Lucy says it’s normal, and I hope she’s right.

“Hmm… I would have preferred to live with you anyway,” he admits.  

I don’t know what’s going on at home, but there’s clearly something wrong. I think I’ll call my mom when I get the chance. If Joan isn’t feeling comfortable there anymore, I need to know so I can get my mom to react. There’s no way I’ll let him go through what I went through. I know how that ends, and if we don’t find the right person to help, things can go very wrong.

“Alright,” Lucy interrupts. “We should finish up quickly if we still want to do everything.”

This news brings a small smile to my brother’s face before he quickly resumes where he left off before our conversation.

“Slow down, please. Otherwise, you’ll really get a stomach ache.”

He nods but doesn’t slow down, which makes Lucy and me laugh as we exchange a glance. She may not have said much at the table, but I know she heard everything. I’ll ask her what she thinks about it all when we’re alone. We finish dessert, then head off to explore another area. Even though Joan claimed he wasn’t hungry, he still ate well. The day goes on, and surprisingly, Joan has become calmer than before, which delights my girlfriend. It’s understandable. As much as he pushes her limits, it’s annoying to have to constantly put him back in his place when we’re supposed to be having a good time. He must have realized that his tantrums don’t work with us. Maybe I should call Sofia as well to see how she reacts to his. Unlike my mom, I don’t doubt Lucy knows how to manage him as I do. It’s just that my mom doesn’t have patience for this sort of thing, so it’s very hard for her to react calmly. She loses her temper rather than defuse the situation.

“Hey,” Lucy calls out after a while. “Stop worrying. It can’t be that bad.”

“I don’t know,” I admit with a small, anxious smile. “We’ll see. I’ll call my mom tonight. I need to know what’s going on.”

She nods understandingly before giving me a soft kiss. Unfortunately, it’s the moment Joan turns around. His new habit is to let out disgusted noises whenever he sees us. But it seems he didn’t hear the rest. We change the subject as we finish this park, which Joan seems particularly fond of. It’s true—it’s very well done. We’ll definitely come back.

Friday, February 26th; 9:00 PM – Lucy’s apartment.

We’re back home. Everything is peaceful. It was six o'clock when we got back. The day was good. We all enjoyed it, especially Joan, who has already showered, eaten, and even gone to bed. He fell asleep in the guest room without even protesting. In fact, he went there on his own with his new penguin plush. We managed to finish the park, and it seems I was right—Joan loved it, and I couldn’t resist buying him a plush when he asked for it. He earned it with how well he behaved in the afternoon. As for Lucy and me, I had just settled on the couch with Netflix on in the background. I had already showered, and Lucy should be joining me soon. I hadn’t heard the water running in the bathroom for about five minutes. Now that everything is calm, I wanted to call my mom. Joan’s behavior wasn’t normal. I knew he had behavioral issues, but now we needed to figure out why. Nothing ever happens for no reason. It seems like everyone’s already forgotten what happened with me. I’m not going to let them forget. Just as I was about to call, an unknown number appeared on my screen. I don’t recognize it, but it seems to be from here, from Manchester. I frown, intrigued by the late call. Could it be Feli? Would she really come here? How would she even know where I am? The thought makes my stomach knot. I inhale slowly, glancing behind me to check if Lucy is around. Not yet. She’s still in the bathroom. After the fifth ring, I force myself to pick up.

“Hello?” I answer cautiously, my voice uncertain.

“Miss Batlle?” a voice asks.

“Yes...?”

“Hello, this is Bennett Fields! I’m sorry to call so late. I lost track of time,” he says with a small laugh. “Am I disturbing you?”

Bennett Fields, Bennett Fields... Oh! He’s the gallery director. I immediately sit up straighter on the couch, as if he could see me from afar.

“No, no! I’m at home,” I tell him.

“Good.”

If he were in front of me, I’m sure I’d be able to see his smile. It’s amazing how you can read him so well.

“How are you?”  

“Well, I’m pretty nervous now that you’re on the line,” I admit, which makes him chuckle. “And you?”

“I’m well, thank you. I apologize for not contacting you sooner. I had a rather busy week. I know I said I would get in touch with the person who sent me your drawings, but I preferred to speak with you directly.”

“No problem.”

In any case, I would’ve gotten the answer tonight since the other person is also in this apartment. I now understand why he asked for my number at the end of our meeting. He seems to like dealing with people directly, which is completely normal.

“I’m calling to follow up on our meeting.”

“I figured,” I reply with amusement.

I like the way we talk. I should be stressed, but he puts me at ease. His laugh is contagious.

“You impressed me a lot, Ona. Certainly not by your lack of experience, but by your undeniable talent.”

Blushing, I feel flattered to hear that from a professional.

“So, here’s the thing. I have a proposal for you. Of course, as we discussed, it would mean going back to school. Are you still okay with that?”

“Of course!”

We haven’t discussed next year much with Lucy yet, but we both kind of know what to expect.

“Good. However, the offer wouldn’t be for the Manchester gallery…”

“What do you mean?” I ask, feeling a bit worried.

“Well, here’s the thing. My gallery is expanding. I’m developing new locations in the region. I’m about to open one in Cardiff, and I’m putting together a team. I think you’d be a great fit there, under the direction of my new manager.”

Cardiff? The news leaves me speechless. What should I say to that? I definitely can’t accept such an offer on the spot. My lack of response prompts him to speak.

“I know it’s a big decision to think about. You’ve already traveled a lot, but this would be an excellent opportunity for you.”

“It definitely requires some thought…” I murmur.

“I didn’t expect an immediate answer. I’ll give you time to think it over. Just so you know, there’s also an Art school there, and the program can last two to three years, depending on the student’s choice.”

Two to three years? My vision blurs. There’s no way I’m staying away from Lucy for that long!

“If you’d like, we can schedule another meeting in two weeks. Do you think you could get some time off from school for a weekday meeting?”

“I-I’ll have to check.”

“Well, call me when you know. That way, we can set up a time to meet and talk face-to-face. Can we do that?”

“Yes, we can do that. I’ll call you then.”

“Great! Well, I wish you a good evening. Talk to you soon.”

“Talk to you soon, Mr. Fields.”

I hang up, completely overwhelmed by the conversation. Damn it! I think I’d have preferred if he’d just rejected me rather than making me face such a decision!

“Who was it?”

I jump, not having noticed Lucy’s presence. I turn toward her as she slowly approaches to sit beside me.

“Ona?” she calls gently. “Is everything alright?”

“I think we need to talk…”

Concern flashes across her eyes. Oh yes, she has reason to be worried. If she only knew how I’m feeling inside right now... I almost feel like crying.

[lacedinweb22]

♱ Vampire Next Door ♱ Miguel O'Hara x reader

Ch. 13: A… vampire ♱❦︎₊° prev part

“Vel, keep him down!” 

“I am!” Velvet’s claws are digging into yet another agent hunting down Miguel. She’s on her knees, constraining the huge man, as Miguel punches and slams him down, questioning and cursing at him.

“He’s tracking you!” Vel nods at his neck. Miguel ignores this, too caught up in the violence.

“Last chance. Who sent you?!” he growls, slamming the agent down again. 

“They’re onto you, Miguel. You can’t run forever,” he grins, blood covering his face. 

“They’re tracking you, Miguel. Cut it out, or I’ll tear it out!” her claws are on his neck, nails beginning to pierce his skin. 

The crimson in his eyes glows brighter; he knows what he has to do.

His fangs rip into his neck; he spits the tracker out onto his palm. A puddle of blood begins to surround him.

****

Once again, the noise from the other side of that wall kept you up: Slamming, yelping, and shouted conversation.

You contemplated knocking, you paced in the hall between your doors, and you thought about everything you’d witnessed up until now. But the stubborn voice in your head demanded you go to your fire escape, demanded you look through his window, and creep on your neighbor, something you were sure he’d done before.

To your luck, it was raining, but from what you could see through the glass, two figures hovered over one, slamming and fighting with the one being pinned on the floor.

Is it him? Could he be the one being beat into the ground? 

You slowly, carefully slid the window up, the beating rain covering up the noise you made as you slipped inside. 

You know you’re in the wrong, you know you might end up pinned on the ground beside him, but it’s instinctual. Your body is on autopilot, out of your control, and now,

you’re here 

looking onto the bloody scene. Vel looks up at you, but she’s quickly absorbed into the background. All you see is Miguel, blood smeared across his face after he just ripped that man’s neck out. 

You try to catch your breath, your thoughts race as you try to make sense of how it all led to this. You knew he was different, but this was the cold, hard truth cruelly slapped into your face.

 He looks up, blood dripping from his lips. 

The bloodthirsty creature you just watched tear up a man, becomes human, his face softens, looking across the room at you. 

You stumble back, losing balance, vision becoming blurry.

Then Velvet comes back into view, now right in front of you. 

“Sorry, pretty girl,”

And the blur becomes black.

****

You hear them before you see them. 

“What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“We had a mission and she interrupted it! I already told you! I needed her to sleep for a bit so we could finish up. Come on Spidey, look, wow, how convenient: we’ve cleaned up a bit, you had some time to gather your thoughts, and now, perfect, we can properly inform her.”

“What about her? Was she given that same time to gather her thoughts? That same consideration before you knocked the shit out of her? And there’s no ‘we,’ you already fucked this up. Pinche idiota.”

“Stop calling me that!”

You open your eyes. Miguel and Vel look down at you. You move your fingertips against the material you’re lying on, trying to gather some sense of awareness: Miguel’s couch. 

Finally, you manage to get a few words out. 

“Miguel, you– oh god, my head.”

You feel an ache in your arm. You look down at it, your elbow is wrapped up.

“I know, Y/N. I gave you some injections to help with your head. Just a few precautionary measures in case it is a concussion. Velvet hit you hard. I’m sorry, and she’s sorry, aren’t you, Velvet?” he turns to her, anger in his eyes. 

“Super.”

“It pounds,” you mutter, trying to sit up.

“Still got it. Thanks for the feedback,” she grins, proudly, insensitively. 

You glare up at her. 

“It was a heat of the moment thing,” she whines in defense, then looks at you sympathetically, “I am sorry, babe,” she whispers, stroking your hair. 

“‘Sorry, babe’ que nada. You’re such an asshole,” he swats her hand away.

He slowly drops to his knees, and puts his hand to your back, effortlessly helping you sit up. He grabs the glass of water on the side table. 

“Drink some, please,” he mutters, nodding, holding the glass to your lips, as you struggle to hold it yourself. 

The memories start to come back, but they’re all fuzzy.

“It feels like a dream. Please tell me that was a dream. Please–” 

He brushes your hair out of your face.

“I wish it was a dream. I’m sorry, Y/N… Vel, I need you to leave for a second, dios, make that forever,” he mutters before turning back to you.

Vel rolls her eyes then walks out. 

“If that was real…” you exhale, 

“I guess I really know now… know what you are.”

He pauses, then sits up straight, “What?”

“I’ve been thinking… about school, back then. You’ve changed so much since then. And if I’m remembering it all correctly: your eyes, your fangs, the blood. I mean come on, Miguel, I know. You’re a… vampire,”

“Wait… what?” 

He looks confused, offended even.

“A vamp– you know what, I can see how you would think that.” 

Confusion is wiped off his face, replaced with amusement. You stare at him, waiting for more.

“So you can see how– are you denying it or…?”

He runs a hand through his waves. 

“I can see how you would think that. I know how it looks,” he laughs, looking down, then he sees you’re serious, so he gets serious.

“I had an accident at Alchemax, uhh last year. Someone sabotaged my work, and it mutated my genes. I’m just… mutated,” he nods as if it were as simple as that.

“And all of that?” you ask, pointing to the mopped up floor, wanting more. He ignores you, and continues,

“This is beyond confidential. This is life or death. I’m not even supposed to be– they’ve been after me before. They either want to kill me, or they want me as their soldier, I mean this isn’t… I shouldn’t even–”

“So you don’t… drink blood?”

He scowls at you, then stands up, towering over you, “No, I don’t drink blood. I mean sure, sometimes I have frenzies that make me think I need blood, I mean the spider part of me, but– I just, I take care of it, I manage.”

“I’m still considering you a vampire–”

“No more questions; you’d just become more of a liability. I don’t want them to have the option of torturing it out of you. That’s it. I’ve said my piece.”

“Torture?” 

He nods. You sit in shock, trying to process all of it. 

“Spider?”

“That’s enough for today. You shouldn’t have been there, I never wanted you to see me like that, I already knew being this close, living this close to you would be a risk… But seriously, you’ll stumble upon it when it’s time, trust me–”

“It? Mig, if there’s more, I’m here now, just–”

“That’s enough for today,” he asserts, shutting you up effectively. 

You lay back down, massaging circles into your temples.

“God, excuse me for asking. I’m sure if you had claw marks slashed across you, and heard someone screaming bloody murder night after night across the hall, you would be this curious too, I mean–”

“Claw marks? Where?”

“No, I was just saying–”

He’s still towering over you, intimidating you, questioning you now.

“Where.” he demands.

“My hips, okay. Jesus, my hips.” You nervously pat your side. 

He drops back to his knees. Your stomach does flips. 

He looks down at your sweatpants, then back up at you, fingertips in your waistband.

“Can I?”

“Yeah, sure,” you exhale nonchalantly, trying to catch your breath, and act unfazed by the way his touch makes you feel. 

He slides your sweatpants down slowly to your mid-thigh, your underwear is exposed, but he pays no attention to it; he looks at the side of you, the healing claw marks, worry in his eyes.

He lightly drags his fingertips across them, then looks up at you. It’s gentle, and caring, and soft, and it goes against everything you saw a few hours ago. 

You exhale, and run your fingers through his hair. This is going to be complicated, but you know you care about him, and you feel he cares about you, and you can’t walk away from him, not when he just found his way back into your life. 

His eyebrows are still furrowed, looking down at all of the damage, thinking of all the damage.

“I was just trying to check on you. I thought you were the one being pinned down. I just… I wanted to make sure you were okay. Now I’m just… traumatized,” you exhale.

“Me? Being pinned down? That’s funny. I’d never be in that position,” he shrugs, you smile, then slowly bring your sweatpants back up. 

He hangs his head low, exhales, then nods, and looks up at you. “But I’m sorry. I get it. I would’ve done the same for you, in a heartbeat.” 

“It’s okay,” you whisper. He looks down at your hips, then back up at you, and stands up again. 

“It’s not. I know that was a lot. I’ll make it up to you, this whole night, all of it, I’ll make it all up to you. But for now, rest, process. I can stay here with you,” he whispers, sitting beside you. 

You both sit, quietly, processing, absentmindedly watching the cooking show he’s put on.

****

Going to post Vampire Next Door exclusively on w*ttpad now because I feel discouraged everytime I post VND chapters on here (it’s just a personal mental thing) and I think tumblr is just better for shorter, sweet and simple works. Thank you for the love *ੈ✩ 

[wylanzahn]

New-ish post, kinda posting this on different platforms and getting a general vibe check for some ideas I have. But basically this Halloween I want to actually do something for the TTRPG and Actualplay world (oh yeah I’m into those kinds of things). I want to try and get both players, GMs, and casual viewers alike something fun to look forward to this especially spooky season. I’ll probably talk a little more when we get closer to the actual season of scare-giving but just know that if you’re interested I’m still looking for people to join in!!

As my team and I’d first debut we’re going to try and do a two to four session actual play, which will probably be released in the weeks leading up to Halloween. We’ve had a couple good friend way in on the matter of “setting” but now I come to you fine folk. Mind you this is a horror campaign/arc so if…

Isn’t your thing, keep on a moving.

But without further ado here are a couple of the possible settings for our players, and myself, this coming espookee season…

1.) Somewhere off the coast of Florida, 1926 end of the first major housing boom in the state, a small island which calls back to the Spanish Empire, is Isla Boñyela, a small port made tourist location during the boom of disposable wealth in 1920s America. A small group of friends from the northeast tag along down for the perfect paradise vacation. Only to discover the island is much much older than anyone could have ever assumed. Whilst dealing with upstart gangsters, unnerving US soldiers, and the terrified locals they find something older than even undead conquistadors.

While I don’t have a working title, this is an old project in the running which I’ve had a few attempts at revamping over time. Its previous title was “perfect paradise vacation,” and runs on the Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition game. Anywho it’s a blast of fun with Caribbean lore, tone of anti-imperialism, and something dark lurking beneath the waves.

2.) 1950’s America, the nonexistent state of Mid-Atlantia (DMV coded) in a small suburban neighborhood where nothing goes wrong… it’s almost “All-Hallows-Eve” and little Johnny and Susie want nothing more than to trick or treat this year with all the big kids, Dad’s finally getting the big promotion at work, and Mom just got a new waffle iron! Sure everything is neat here in America. Heck you just got new neighbors! Newlyweds in fact from somewhere big and fancy, they sure aren’t like any of us in our simple town. But… and you can’t say exactly why but things are different. Or perhaps they’re all too the same? Everyday a repeat of ever other bland day that followed you over and over and over and over… and you could swear, while no one may listen to you there’s someone out there. Stalking you from outside your own home- or- perhaps, he’s just your friendly new neighbor welcoming you… to the end.

Ahhhhhh! I’ve also been working on this one for a sec and god writing it out does excite me. This is also a Call of Cthulhu game but modified/homebrewed to have a uniquely 1950s horror feel. This is definitely one of the more unique games I’ve written and am truly interested in seeing where it goes (even if we don’t choose it). This is for those who feel like isolation, fear of the unknown, fear from within, and liminal space horror comes best into play! So whadya say neighbor?

3.) The Enemy of My Enemy is My Friend, or How I Learned to Love Strahd, okay so this one is a lot less horror-y and falls much more under the comedic spooky category, just so yall know. Deep in the middle of Barovia, the ancient kingdom of Vampires, meets a council of Count Strahd von Zarovich's greatest commanders and lieutenants to hunt down Strahd's greatest enemy Rudolph van Richten and his party of heroes known as "The Grape-Smashers." Strahd's lieutenants have been gifted powers greater than any mere mortals, but are these gifts enough to stop Van Richten, or even enough to stop the personal ambitions of each other? Come find out in "How I Learned to Love Strahd."

Okay, as much as this may seem like a joke suggestion it cracks me up and I feel like it would be ill-advised of me to not at least mention it. In an era where "The Curse of Strahd," is well-overdone at this point, it's worth a take from an all evil "revenge story." Obviously this will be in Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition, which, in my opinion, is really hard to use for horror, but this is a nice go-around. Come for the evil PCs, maybe a PvP battle or two, and a game of intrigue in the shadows of Barovia! All that and a buff Van Richten.

4.) Before Annapolis was ever called such it was known as Providence, a settlement of exiled Puritans in the Province of Maryland, but these early days were no easy set-up for the far-flung protestants... in the mid 1600s the English Civil War spilled out into their holdings across the waves as brother turned on brother, clan erasing clan, and something from the shores of the Old World would arrive in the New. When around every corner could be someone you've known your whole life, what's stopping them from hunting you in the depths of winter. All matters made worse when rumors of a witch begins circulating your small home.

Think "The VVitch" (2015) meets "A Field in England" (2013) meets Atun Shei's recent film "The Sudsbury Devil" (2023). It is the unexplored wilderness of early colonial Maryland, but the hateful warmongering that slowly builds that makes the horror and tension so clear. Unsure of what system we'll be using, but maybe the new Regency Cthulhu system.

5.) The Great Baltimore Fire of 1904 destroyed some 140 Acres of Baltimore proper... and in it's rubble awakened something far worse. But you and your fellow survivors are just trying to get by in the aftermath of the fire... only for something to call out, whether some strange magicks or perhaps just a sickness... but sickness doesn't even linger like this... it doesn't call to you...

Some more local history, aspiring from the actual Fire of 1904 things quickly devolve from there as rumors of a cult begin to spread along the streets of Rosland Park... a mysterious illness leaving even more dead... and the death of an eclectic professor. Definitely using the Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition for this one.

Aaaaaaaand that's it! Let me know what y'all think!

[imaginidol]

Jongho: Only Us

“Jongho?” You look up to your close co-worker as you made your way out of the private, tinted-windowed SUV. Jongho hops out first, turning to extend his arm in your direction to help you out of the vehicle.

“Yes?” He answers gently, looking down fondly as you clumsily made your way out.

“We’ve got separate rooms, right? I wouldn’t want to cause any scandals,” you say.

“Yes, don’t worry. I triple-checked to make sure they’re two rooms.”

“Okay,” you smiled widely, excited to be invited for the first time ever to one of your closest co-worker’s business trips.

When the opportunity had come up for you to be his personalized assistant for the trip, you knew you couldn’t turn it down. Jongho was, in fact, one of your favorite people to work with at the company, and you always enjoyed spending time with him, especially when it concerned his music-related projects and photoshoots. He was just so talented, and secretly your favorite member of ATEEZ. You could never get enough of this fantastic artist.

“You can sit on the lobby couch and get comfortable while I check us in,” he says. You agree, and sit back to admire the elegant interior design and decor of the well-kept, high-end hotel.

Your eyes make way to Jongho, his tall figure standing handsomely as he leaned against the counter.

He’s so…

Your thoughts travel at the sight of his perfectly-styled hair, his dark and sophisticated outfit, the sound of his huskier voice as he slowly became more and more tired as the evening progressed…

“Here’s your room key,” he smiles, flinging the magnetic card in your direction. “Don’t sleep in.”

You take the card from your lap and almost secretly regret asking for a separate room.

“You coming?” Your thoughts are interrupted by the sight of Jongho already standing in front of the elevator with both his suitcase and yours.

“Oh, right,” you say, walking into the opened elevator doors first, at his insist.

He presses a button close to the top, just about half a dozen floors under the rooftop.

“You got us the nice rooms with the pretty views? Aren’t those, like, way super expensive?”

“You’ve always liked those kinds of views,” he smiles.

He remembered that I do, you think to yourself, recalling a time when you’d mentioned it only once to him before.

“Thank you,” you offer him your warmest smile. He nods, and places a hand against the side of your arm. You feel him slightly turn your attention to the wall behind you, and you gasp at the sight of the clear elevator wall showcasing the rising city view all around you.

You gasp in amazement at the sight of the beautifully lit city underneath, feeling yourself becoming dizzy as the ground grew more and more distant. You wobbled and took a step back to catch your balance, but Jongho was right behind you to place a reassuring arm around your shoulders.

“Don’t faint on me now,” he teased.

Soon you’re both making ways to your neighboring hotel rooms.

“I can’t wait to see mine first,” you say excitedly as you scan your card against the door scanner. You hop inside and sprint to the window, admiring the gorgeous city view in awe underneath the darkening sky.

“This is so cool,” you say, turning toward the door. Jongho hasn’t walked in, but he’s holding your suitcase in his hand.

“You can come in, you vampire,” you tease, sprinting back to the door to take your suitcase. “Come,” you say, grabbing his hand and pulling him behind you. “You’ve got to see this view!”

“You know that I have the same view in my room too, right?” He giggles, letting you drag him to the other end of the room alongside of you.

“Yeah, but it’s funner when we get to admire it together,” you say.

“Right,” he smiles. Your attention is turned towards the distant flashes of car headlights, lit-up building windows, microscopic street lamps, and more. His attention, however, was fondly turned towards you.

The way you lovingly looked at the cityscape view beyond the window brought Jongho a peaceful joy. He liked seeing you happy. The gentle admiration for you had grown closer the more you two had spent time working on projects at the company, and simultaneously gotten to know bits of your lives along the way.

You turn your attention back to him, noticing his eyes were already on you. Not knowing what to say, you turn towards the door where your suitcase sat.

“I guess I should let you get some rest,” he says, making his way towards the door. “If you need me to call you in the morning to make sure you’re awake, just let me know,” he smiled.

You nodded, tracing his footsteps as he made his way towards the door.

You didn’t know what to do or what to say. Seeing him walk out almost made you… upset.

Not in an angry way, but more so, a disappointed feeling at the sight of seeing him leave. You wanted him to stay.

It was at this very moment that you finally realized,

I like you, Jongho.

From the ways you listen to me in every one of our conversations, to the ways you remember the little things about me. From the ways you make me feel comfortable before you, to the ways you respect me and everything in between.

I miss you because I feel safe around you.

I feel safe with you.

“Uh,” you hear your voice croak through the dark room, “Jongho?”

“Yes?” He turns to face you by the doorway, pulling the last of your suitcase into your room and smiling warmly in your direction.

“Uhm,” you hear yourself start boldly, probably about to say something you knew you couldn’t regret. “I just wanted to thank you… for all the little ways you look after me. I appreciate you. I feel safe… with you.”

His loving gaze meets and locks with yours. In this moment, you finally understand: this boy likes you, too.

Jongho smiles warmly, a small laugh escaping his lips. “I’d do anything for you, you know that?”

You smile. I do.

more ateez here: mingi san yunho hongjoong

[insomniac-dot-ink]

Stories for the Salt

(Genre: Spooky campfire story urban fantasy, wlw background romance)

Summary: A daughter is visiting her mother to help pack up her house and move her out of the mountains. Instead, she encounters a bedraggled hiker that appeared from the woods.

PART 1

Casper had heard two things since she arrived at her mom’s house: "Don’t touch that." And "Fresh air is good for you." Emphasis on the good like Casper had yet to fully grasp the concept. Casper, however, was discovering a limit for how many times you could stand on top of a mountain and contemplate the meaning of life. Then again, maybe that's what is “wrong with city people.” City people were the third topic Casper was hearing all about since her arrival. 

She sat on the counter, collecting plates from the top shelf of the cupboard, valiantly ignoring the eyes boring into the back of her head. Their cat, Cassie, was unhappily somewhere else and no help whatsoever--sibling solidarity a lost cause.

Her mom cleared her throat. “I love you so much, honey bee. And I am so proud of you.”

Casper groaned at the ceiling. Where was that cat?

“But,” her mom punctuated the word like an airsoft gun release. “I have decided to cancel the movers.” “The movers aren’t canceled, mom.” Casper had checked this morning.

Her mom sat at the dining room table with one foot elevated. Pillows and ice packs cushioned the sides of a gauze-strangled ankle. Casper’s mother crossed her thin arms over her chest. One set of crutches leaned against the table next to her and her other foot was shoved into a muddy boot.

Casper desperately wanted to pack the woman’s hiking boots first, but forced herself to finish with the delicates. She wrapped a plate without looking up, her mom’s eyes weighing her down like cement.

“I’m sure the movers haven’t started up the mountain yet,” she enunciated each word. “Three more weeks, honey bee. The doctor said only three more weeks–that will go by in a blink of an eye.” 

Casper groaned again. Is this what dad had felt like?

She plastered on a smile. “The doctor said some distractions might help too. You know, there’s this great little Greek restaurant that opened up near me. I know how you like Greek food.”

Her mom snorted. “Better than Angelo’s? Have you met my neighbor Angelo? He’s from Greece originally and his wife is from Belgium. Lovely woman and you wouldn’t even notice the false eye. They invite me over some nights in the summer, it’s a summer home and they check in on me now and again . . .”

Ah, Casper noted her mom was returning to her other favorite topic: daughter, there are neighbors. Stop worrying. Casper also wished she could stop worrying. 

She finished wrapping the last of the plates and faced her mom.

“Do Angelo or Martine have medical degrees? Mom, we’ve talked about this. This whole mountain is nearly empty. There isn’t a hospital for forty minutes. People die alone out in the woods like this.”

“Only if they’re dumb. Do I look dumb to you?” Her mom barked, utilizing one of her well-worn Mom Jokes: “Okay, don’t answer that. The point is, I’ve been getting along out here for longer than most ‘solo travelers’ have been alive.” “And even well-equipped and intelligent people make mistakes. When alone. In the woods.” She gestured to her mom’s ankle swollen up to a grapefruit.

“I could just as easily take a fall in the city.” She waved Capser off. “What are we supposed to be so scared of?”

“Bad Cell service.”

“Gloria got taken for all she was worth by a phone scammer just last year. They’re targeting old bags like me, safer to be away from all that.”

“No wi-fi!”

Her mom nodded sagely. “Safer.”

Casper rolled her eyes and started listing, “a fall off the mountain. Stalked by mountain lions. Gas leak. Contaminated water–”

“Honeybee, you must think I’m dumb.”

“Bears!” She threw her hands up. “Eaten by bears!”

Her mom tightened her arms over her chest and made a guttural noise in the back of her throat. “Better than being taken out by serial killers in the city. Or eaten by them! I’d rather be eaten by bears. At least you know what they are thinking. Bear spray works a lot better than pepper spray anyway. Do you know, most attackers use the stuff back on the woman?” Her mom clicked her tongue. “Bears don’t have thumbs.”

Casper collapsed back against the cabinet. She grumbled under her breath like she was a surly teen again, “Not yet they don’t.”

“You know something about bears I don’t, missy?” Her mom raised one eyebrow. She took a deep breath. Casper was in for it. The gusto entered her tone. “You know, last year I saw a mother and two cubs. Right by the Hand Bone's trail. And I said to myself, Isla, you're only going to see this once in a lifetime. Once! You better stay right there. I didn't move a single muscle.

I wouldn’t take the bear spray out for the life of me either. She knew–that momma knew–I had my own two cubs of my own and nothing less.” The chair creaked as her mom sat up straight in it, getting into her primary story-mode. “And you know what?”

Her mom gestured. One of the ice packs dropped to the floor. Casper jumped down from the counter. She grumbled, “You saw them again the next week.”

“Once in a lifetime I told myself, only once, but what do you know, that exact mother and her cubs were crossing Jay Road the next week. I was in my car this time, much safer, but I must’ve stayed parked there for thirty minutes.”

Casper gentled her voice. “You have lived a magical life out here, mom.” And now it’s come to an end.

“No where else like it!”

Casper picked up the ice pack and tucked it against the bandages. Her mom’s ankle was still the size of a small melon and she winced when Casper adjusted the position. 

Mugs and cups next. Shoes and winter coats and sweaters after that.

“It might do you some good to spend some time out here . . .” Her mom commented, probably noting the sheer number of wallowing noises Casper had been making.

Casper tilted her head all the way back and stared at the ceiling. She gathered her strength. “There’s a huge community garden right next door to me. You’ll love it. . .” Her mom gave her plaintive look and Casper mirrored it. “I don’t want to be the bad guy. You know I’d move up here if I could– or get Joey to.”

Her mom patted Casper on the sniffed and sniffed. “Would you?”

“The movers are coming in the morning.” Casper finished lamely. Her mom took her hand back. 

“You both think you know so much more about what’s good for me,” the sour-ness leached through her mother’s words–like they had been a lot lately. Less poetry readings like from Casper’s childhood or bird identification out in the yard.

“And what happens if you get in trouble and I can’t get up here in time?” Casper said quietly, heart squeezing. We could read poetry in Denver, she wanted to say. I could find you birds in the rafters.

But Casper wasn't 9 anymore.

Her mother snorted. “You mean if you can't get up here in time to wrap my plates or hand me two ibuprofen . . . The city? Really? You don’t have to go back either. There’s nowhere like this in the world, honeybee.” Her eyebrows arched. “You might even meet someone.” 

Casper pushed to her feet. “It’s getting dark. I’ll get the cat in.”

“There are plenty of people out here! I’ve been asking around for. Hen, my neighbor with the chickens of all things, has a granddaughter like that." Her eyes sparkled, she laughed. "Gay I mean. Oh, I used to have trouble in polite company, but age cures all foolishness. Gay, lesbian, is your daughter a homosexual? My neighbors, the Dutch woman and the Greek, looked like they’d seen a ghoul when I asked, but they admitted it’s easier to be plane once you’ve started–”

“Love you mom!” Casper called over her shoulder. “Super proud of you. Going to text the movers now.”

She heard her mom groan in the background. 

---------------->

PART 2

When Casper was younger, age seemed to stretch out into infinity. When you are ten there is no such thing as twenty-five and when you’re twenty-five thirty feels like an entirely different planet. You never really expect when your mom gets old enough to hurt and you have to help her to the toilet in the middle of the night. Thirty-two snuck up on Casper.

She ran a hand through her hair, squinting out over the mountains. The peaks were covered in scraggly pine trees and washed-out summer skies. More than a mile high and the air was thin and chilled in her lungs. The sun dipped behind the far mountains and the gorge lit up in oranges and pinks. Dipping and rising, the mountains rolled like ocean waves. Clouds like tides nestled between the teeth of the land, glowing a sun-dipped rose color.

Has anyone else ever felt so miserable staring at something so beautiful? Casper sighed.

Maybe her 16-year-old self had been right. There is something wrong with you. Casper chuckled at the thought. At least she never had to be 16 again.

One or two houses dotted the mountain, but mostly there was nothing but sky and trees clinging to the side of slopes. Pockets of real estate had managed to establish summer homes and outdoorsy Airbnbs, but they were far between. Jay Road wasn’t even called Jay Town after all these years. The neighbors her mom prattled on about lived a mile apart each and some of the cabins didn’t even have running water, just outhouses and wood stoves. Which was fine. It was all fine.

But she was Casper’s mom. Brilliant and impractical. Affectionate and painfully honest. Chatty and yet obsessed with being alone. She was her mom and Casper had to do something about the distance to the hospital. Had to do something about the number of accidents piling up. Had to do something about the isolation.

Casper had unfortunately inherited her dad’s careful nature instead the ability to jump off cliffs into waterfalls or hitchhike across countrysides.

A fire lit in Casper’s belly. Her brother said he’d be back when he could. Australia didn’t have great cell service. Rescheduling flights was complicated. Mom would be fine, she was tough. It was only a few more months.

Casper started walking in the opposite direction of the gorge. She had always been proud to be called “mature for her age” and puffed up when her brother was scolded, told to act “more like your sister.” But it turned out nine-year-old maturity wasn’t something you got dividends on. Figured.

Casper trudged down their long driveway. Gravel skidded with each step and Casper called loudly, “Cassie!” The sound of her voice echoed from somewhere. “Here kitty, kitty!”

For all her mom’s monologuing about the virtue of living by herself, it had not escaped Casper’s notice that she named her cat Cassie. Granted, the cat’s full name was Cassiopeia and her last two cats were Orion and Ursa Major.

“Cassiopeia!” Casper was already going hoarse from yelling. She walked all the way to the road. It was all gravel and dirt and potholes, and the only details of humanity were janky mailboxes lined up in a row. Their wooden posts decaying and metal sagging inward.

A hush settled over the twilight and Casper found herself wandering aimlessly. Tiny stars popped out. She wound all the way toward the cowpaths through the woods–makeshift trails that were more like dusty grooves through the pine needles. They were called Desire Paths for those with a romantic bent.

“Cassiopeia! Cas! Here kitty.”

The pine trees had a malnourished look, thin and brittle, spread far apart from one another like estranged cousins. There wasn’t enough air or water this high up for green grass or big shrubbery and she could see her house through the trunks.

Casper kicked a stray pinecone and gave herself a little lecture: Breathe in the summer pine air. Listen to the birds. Feel the crunch of needles under your boots. Be present.

It was no use, of course, whatever she was supposed to feel out here, Casper didn’t feel it. Plus, there were mugs to wrap and dinner to cook and mom’s impossible house to finish packing up.

A soft meow cane from up ahead.

“There you are!” she called. A small black cat trotted through the trees. Casper knelt down and Cassiopeioa purred loud enough to wake the dead. The cat had a narrow elfin face and impossibly thick whiskers like an old man’s wiry beard. She was a small thing, but could generate a truly astounding loud rumble– a tiny motor trying to terraform the dusty landscape.

“Don’t tell the others,” Casper whispered. “But I always knew you were the smartest.”

Her mom trained all of her cats to come in by dark, but Cassiopioa was the only one that came when you called by name. Her rumble vibrated through Casper’s palm and there was a temptation to just . . . stay there. She could squat in the woods until her heart stopped squeezing and the world stopped spinning.

She scratched the cat behind her ears. “Sorry, bud. The cat carrier won’t be any fun but I promise it’ll be short.” Casper shook her head “Well. Let’s get today over with.” She stood. “Come on, sweetie.”

The cat trotted at Casper’s heel. She was a slow walker and would stop to sniff the ground or pretend she wasn’t following you around at all. Casper wasn’t in a hurry, though.

Twilight left ribbons of pink and purple through the sky and Casper forced herself to think about art and love and buying more plants for her apartment. She tried to listen to the music of nature or whatever it was. Casper stopped. Her skin prickled, the forest was quiet. Birdless. The cat let out a low growl and Casper jerked around.

A hiker stood behind her. The woman was pale and bedraggled and staring straight ahead. One of the hiker’s hands was outstretched behind Casper’s neck, fingers hooker, poised behind her collar.

Casper let out a muffled sound and jumped back, the cat scrambling out of the way behind her.

The hiker’s lips were cracked to the point of bleeding, the skin around her mouth chapped and red all the way to her cheek bones. Her eyes were bloodshot. A red windbreaker clung to her in damp splotches. An enormous pack hung off her shoulders, depleted and torn in parts. She was breathing hard.

The woman’s knees buckled inward. She fell to her knees.

The hiker rasped, “help me.”

---------------->

PART 3

Casper staggered, sweat beading on her brow. The hiker was limp against her side—head lulled onto Casper’s shoulder and eyes half-lidded and empty. Holding most of her weight, Casper was lucky the woman was light as a large pile of sticks.

Gravel crunched under Casper’s shoes and her mother’s robin-egg-blue house drew near. The cat was lashing her tail back and forth at the back door, waiting, ears pressed to her skull.

Casper side-eyed the hiker, dragging her to the door. She wet her lips. “How long have you been out here?” she asked in soft tones, gentled into a nursery-rhyme rhythm. “Do you know where you are?”

The woman’s eyes remained half-open and unseeing. Her lips were parted and cracked to bleeding. Casper winced.

“I’ll get you some water the moment we get in,” she hissed, and the woman closed her eyes.

They crossed the lawn and the hiker managed to prop herself up as Casper ran to get the door open. The cat darted into the house the moment the door was cracked, and Casper called through the hallways.

“Mom!” Casper was suddenly glad she had her mother. “Can you get the first aid kit?”

“What’s that?” Thumping sounds answered and soft “ow.”

Brine filled her nose. Casper swung around and the woman was standing behind her, eyes bloodshot and wide. “Um,” Casper flattened herself to the wall, mind racing. “Do you want to wait outside actually?”

The woman swallowed several times and pointed to her mouth.

“Right, right, right.”

Her mom rounded the corner, crutches clattering against the hardwood floor, expression pinched.

“Who is that?”

“Mom! Stay with, uh, her. I’ll be right back.”

They got the hiker into the house despite Casper’s worry flaring like a rash. She supposed there was no point in talking about the importance of having neighbors if she refused to be neighborly. Her mom shot off questions and then petered off when the woman coughed into her fist, whole chest shaking.

“Where did she come from?” Her voice shook and Casper paused. Isla, of all things, was not known for being fearful.

“I don’t know. I picked her up in the woods.”

The hiker leaned against the doorframe, eyes fluttering shut and muttering strings of hoarse words. Casper darted to the kitchen. The nearest hospital was a long way away. She filled up an enormous glass of water, remembering to add some electrolytes.

“Good lord is that woman alright?” her mother muttered. She stood in the hallway, eyeing the stranger.

Casper glanced between them, her mom’s crutches, the woman’s ragged form. The timing couldn’t be worse. It was just Casper.

“Mom, I may need to borrow the car–”

“Who is that?” Her mom repeated, staring.

“She’s not well. I don’t think ambulances come up this way–”

“They don’t. Casper! Who is this?”

Casper strode into the living room, mimicking how she imagined the ER doctors held themselves upright. Grabbing the couch cushions from the unwrapped furniture, she lined them up on the floor. She tuned-out her mom’s questions and guided the woman across the room.

“Here, ma’am, please lie down.” The woman stammered something back and Casper held her breath. The hiker smelled overwhelmingly of stale sweat. Casper ignored how her own shirt was damp from holding her up and eased her down on the makeshift mat.

The woman pointed at her mouth again and Casper held up the glass, tipping her chin up. “Just a small sip.”

Water dribbled out of the side of hiker’s mouth, running down her cheek. She closed her eyes in the next second and collapsed back. Casper exhaled. Well. Shit.

An image flashed in her mind’s eyes. The woman, standing behind her, hand outstretched, fingers hooked near Casper’s neck and a shine in her eyes. Casper shook her head as to dislodge the thought. She worked in a hospital, even if it was just administration. She knew better than to expect shock to look the same on everyone.

Her mother cleared her throat. “So. Where in the woods?”

“Nearby. She was looking for help.”

Casper stood, knees cracked and back straining. Food would probably help. More water.

“She must’ve gotten lost from one of the trails.” Casper silently urged her mom to not mention solo hikers being “dumb.” She glanced between them. “Or from that big gorge one.”

Her mom pursed her lips, brow furrowing. She looked coolly over Casper’s shoulder. “Dear, which trail were you on? Do you remember?” Casper whipped around and the woman’s eyes were open wide. “What happened to your gear?”

The hiker shook her head, shaking. Casper knelt without thinking and handed over the water. “Here. A little more.”

The woman grabbed the glass in both hands. She tilted her head back and drank like a racehorse, glugging and noisy. Water spilled down her front and Casper politely looked away, some sense of propriety surfacing.

Casper willed her brain to work. Twilight was descending and the roads were awful to drive on at night—she’d have to do something quick.

“Mom, let’s go talk in the other room.” She stood, whispering, “is the truck filled up?”

“The truck?” Her mom frowned. “This young lady should get to decide whether she wants to be forced off the mountain.”

Casper rubbed her temple. “What?”

“She survived this long. Some people don’t like quitting halfway through.”

Casper narrowed her eyes to slits. She couldn’t be serious.

“No!” The hiker spit-up water down her front. “I can’t go back. Look, it’s dark.”

They studied her. The woman’s entire front was wet, straight black hair plastered to her cheeks and chest heaving.

“Easy now,” her mom put out a hand. “We won’t force you. I understand these parts. We can take you wherever your party is or down the road to the sheriff–”

The woman shook her head vigorously. Her pupils seemed to pulse, and she spoke in rapid gulps, “Not back. Not down that way. They’ll come from there.”

“Okay.” Casper put her hands up like calming a spooked animal. “We don’t have to go anywhere just yet. You can rest here, you’ll be safe.”

“No!” The hiker gnashed her teeth and the alertness returned to her gaze. She glanced around, faltering upright and falling back down again. “Where are we?”

“You’re near Hand Bone’s peak. Off the main road,” her mother said slowly.

“Do you know how you got here?” Casper added at the same moment. This might be a worse case than she thought.

“How late is it?” the woman’s chest started rising and falling rapidly. “How big is the moon . . .?”

Casper and her mom shared a look. Her mom recovered first.

“Want some more water, dear?”

The woman pressed her palms to the floor and lifted herself up in a painful lurch. Casper put a hand on her shoulder.

“You’re not well,” she murmured. The woman’s shoulder was chilled and shaking under her touch. “Can I get some more water? A blanket?” Casper ran through her mental list: blanket, first aid kit, maybe some bread, a call down the mountain.

Then packing the house. Somehow.

Her mother gasped and Casper wanted to shout, “what now?!” The woman had wrenched the sleeve of her jacket up. Her arm was covered in purpling bruises.

“Casper!”

“I’m on it.” Casper fumbled for the first aid kit her mom dragged out. The hiker went very still.

“It’s quiet,” she said, eyes roving over the room and body taut. Casper remembered the hand behind her collar. “Where is your cat?”

Shock looks different on everyone.

Casper held herself motionless, mirroring the young woman. “What’s your name?”

The hiker’s eyes narrowed. She growled, “Who are you? Whose house is this?”

“Easy now,” her mom repeated. “It’s mine. You’re not feeling very well right now. Would you like some aspirin? We’re going to call someone to help you feel better.”

The woman's forehead was slick with sweat. She itched at her arm and Casper forced down bile. The odd bruises covered her forearm like an abstract painting, purples and yellows molting together.

Casper tore her eyes away and took deep even breaths. The moon was enormous through the window, a perfect yellow disc through the trees.

The hiker’s breath came in rapid bursts and Casper forced herself to grab her shoulder again and ease back down.

“My name is Casper Lake. Do you know what year it is?” Casper asked clumsily. “Do you know your name?”

“My name is Maya,” she said through gritted teeth, lips bleeding sluggishly. “And I am trying to get out of here.”

“We’ll try and help y—”

Maya jerked forward to her hands and knees all at once. Casper put a hand on her back and then recoiled, falling to the floor and paling. Clear water poured from the woman’s open mouth as she puked an endless stream on the floor.

---------------->

[orion4ever]

Cove Holden x mc? Cove gets heatstroke when surfing with mc, and mc and cliff take care of him? Thanks 😊

Author’s note: I actually got heatstroke once while at a flea market , I had to sit down on the concrete lmao! I kept the step ambiguous enough, it could either be Step 2 or 3 depending on what you want! ^^

late note: i got this request so wrong 😦, I thought it said mc gets heatstroke..Whoops! Thats my mistake

Pairing: MC x Cove Holden

🐚

He starts noticing instantly if you start showing signs of suffering a heat stroke.

Leaves you alone when you wave it off as the sun just making sluggish.

If you look like you’re about to pass out then expect Cove to guide you to a chair and give you some of his cold water.

He gets so worried about you and thought it was something more serious :(

Luckily both him and his father are both very sweet.

It was the hottest day of summer, at a more populated beach there was a surfing competition where you and Cove would be competing.

The two of you were very excited about it, you had been practicing together every day that you could and were confident that you would OBLITERATE every surfer there!

Cliff had been the first to volunteer to drive the two of you out of town to the beach in the neighboring town to compete.

You all sat in the car, Cove tapped his fingers on his thigh as he looked out the window.

You leaned on your side of the car and stared out the window too.

Cliff was keeping his eyes on the road but decided to start a conversation.

“So, you two excited?” He asked with an easy smile, already knowing the answer. Cove turned away from the window and gave a half excited nervous smile.

“Yeah. It’s going to be great” he said with a chuckle. “This would be the first time I will be surfing with other surfers though. What if I do badly” He asked, rubbing his nape.

“Don’t be so down on yourself, we’ve been practicing every day. Even if we aren’t as good, we made an effort!” You had encouraged, giving him a pat on the shoulder.

“You basically live in the ocean” You had added with a chuckle.

“Hey.” He said with a raised brow.

“MC is right, Son. What matters in the end is that you have fun.” Cliff added, peering into the rearview mirror to look at Cove.

“I guess you two are right. I am feeling a bit better about this.” Cove had said, now with a more sure smile.

That's the spirit, Bud. And perfect timing too. We’re here.” Cliff finished, now pulling into the beach parking lot and finding a spot.

The three of you filed out of the car and stood around. Cliff pulled out the beach bag your moms had prepared for them. (knowing him, he’d probably sit on the sand and forget to pack sunscreen)

“Okay, guys. Let’s put on some screen and Zinc…?” He questioned the last thing when noticing a small new packet of Zinc Surfer Sunscreen.

Before Cove could comment or protest, his dad squeezed a good chunk of it in his hands and covered Cove’s nose and cheeks with it.

“Ah-“ he said startled but accepted his fate of being properly sun-screened.

When Cliff was done he motioned for you to take the zinc and sunscreen so that you could apply your own.

You shook your head. “Nah. It's good. It’s even that sunny today.” You protested. “I barely wear sunscreen or ‘Zinc’ anyway.” You continued, you didn’t like how either of those felt on your face.

“I dunno…” Cliff said a little hesitantly.

“Mr.Holden, I promise I will be fine.” You tried and reassured with a laugh.

“Well okay then. You know what works for you. Tell me if you wanna reconsider later though, okay?” Cliff caved in.

“Of course! Now come on, we got a surfing competition to win.”

-

It had been three hours of the surfing competition. You and Cove were able to get first place in your age category and were rewarded with a humble-sized trophy.

Since the three of you drove out here, you may as well enjoy this new beach until it was time to go home.

While you and Cove talked, you began to feel a little lightheaded and your vision began to feel like you were spinning. You began to fan your face a little, maybe thinking that your surf suit was making it feel hotter.

“MC, are you ok?” Cove asked, noticing your behavior change.

“Yeah... I think the sun is making me sluggish or maybe I am just tired from the competition..?” You questioned.

“Do you want to sit down?” Cove asked.

“Nah. I am good. Let’s keep going, I think they’re giving out hotdogs over there.!

-

The sun was trying to boil you alive today.

Maybe this was the sun’s revenge on you, for not heeding your neighbor’s warning and putting sunscreen on.

You swayed and held your head, you felt so dizzy and nauseous. You decided that you needed a break and flopped onto the warm sand.

“MC?! A-are you ok?” Cove asked, turning around to see you helplessly lying on the ground.

“Ughhhh…” you groaned, feeling Cove’s arms on yours and hoisting you up as best as he could before he put you on his back for a piggyback ride.

“It’s fine, it’s fine! Let’s go get my dad” He tried and reassure you but you could hear the panic in his voice.

He carried you to where his dad had set up base, sitting on a towel that he had placed under an abandoned umbrella. When Cliff felt eyes on him he turned to Cove jogging towards him with you on his back and instantly got up.

“What's wrong?” He said, worried. He moved out of the way so that Cove could lay you on the towel. “I think they got heatstroke..”

Cliff got right into the action. “Cove stay here with them. I am getting a bucket of ice and water.” He instructed before quickly sprinting off to whatever lifeguard tower he could find.

Cove sat next to you and used the corner of the tower to wipe the sweat from your forehead. “Were you feeling sick earlier?” He asked, earning a slight nod from you.

“It's ok. We will uh get you something cold to drink, maybe you should unzip the top part of your surf suit.” Cove suggested.

You agreed and shed off the top layer of the suit, leaving you in your swim top/bare chest. Cliff had made his entrance again, this time with three bottles in a bucket of ice and a towel.

“I got the stuff- and good job. They need as much cold air as they can get.” He commended Cove before kneeling next to you and opening a cold bottle of water. “Here, make sure to take big gulps,” Cliff said, leaning you on the beach bag so that you could properly rehydrate.

It was just you sipping as much water as you could while Cove drenched the towel in the ice water and placed it on the back of your neck, after a while you felt much better.

Cliff had joked that the sun was trying to turn you to ash while Cove kept asking if it was you not wearing the sunscreen or if it was you not getting enough cold water in your system.

You felt better but you felt even more better knowing you had amazing guys around to help you.

[scary-grace]

Love Like Ghosts (Chapter 16) - a Shigaraki x f!Reader fic

You knew the empty house in a quiet neighborhood was too good to be true, but you were so desperate to get out of your tiny apartment that you didn't care, and now you find yourself sharing space with something inhuman and immensely powerful. As you struggle to coexist with a ghost whose intentions you're unsure of, you find yourself drawn unwillingly into the upside-down world of spirits and conjurers, and becoming part of a neighborhood whose existence depends on your house staying exactly as it is, forever. But ghosts can change, just like people can. And as your feelings and your ghost's become more complex and intertwined, everything else begins to crumble. (cross-posted to Ao3)

Chapters: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21

Chapter 16

The knock at the door comes as you’re putting on your shoes to leave, bright and early when the sun’s barely risen. Your mom calls out for you to go get it, since you’re closest, and you open the door just in time to get one of the nastiest shocks you’ve ever gotten in your life. “What are you doing here?”

“Good morning to you, too,” Hizashi says. He’s wearing a leather jacket with spikes on the shoulder pads and horrible triangular sunglasses, tinted yellow. “As to why I’m here at your parents’ house, I wouldn’t be if you’d stayed in your hotel like you were supposed to.”

Tomura did this. Why did Tomura do this? You hear footsteps down the hall and your mother almost knocks you over in her attempts to get a look at who’s at the door. “Are you Tomura?”

As pissed as you are that Hizashi’s here, the look on his face when he realizes he’s been mistaken for Tomura cracks you up. You lean against the doorframe, wheezing, while Hizashi tries to recover. “No, ma’am. I’m one of their neighbors.”

“Oh,” your mother says, puzzled, while you pray to every deity you can think of that she hasn’t realized that “they” refers to you and Tomura. You and Tomura, living together. “You’re a ways from home.”

“I’m on a mission! See, my husband’s a novelist – Aizawa Shouta, best of his generation – and your daughter agreed to take a research trip up here for him! But it looks like there’s going to be a lot more research than we thought, so Shou sent me up here to help out!” Hizashi gives your mother a smile that would probably be winning if it wasn’t so sharp. “Plus, I’ve got a car of my own. That way we can get back to the neighborhood tonight!”

You can only see your mother in profile, but you see her face fall. “You were supposed to meet the neighbors –”

“Oh, we can stay for that,” Hizashi says before you can say a word. “We won’t leave until after the party! Isn’t that right?”

He’s looking at you. You look back, wondering if he knows just how badly you want to kill him right now. “Right,” you say. You put your hand on your mom’s arm and she looks at you. “I promise I’ll stay for the party.”

She smiles at you, but there’s a line drawn between her brows, and you don’t know what to do about it. Not reassure her, that’s for sure. Hizashi clears his throat from the front step. “We’ve got lots of paper to go through. Let’s rock and roll!”

Your departure’s interrupted by your dad, who’s spotted Hizashi’s goddamn sports car and wants to ooh and ahh over it. Because your parents are both on the curb, you have to wait until you’re around the corner before you unload on Hizashi. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Ask your boyfriend,” Hizashi says. His smile’s gone. He looks just as pissed as you feel, except you’re a human and he’s a way-too-powerful former ghost who really doesn’t like you. “Two seconds after you left, he started putting the screws to every ghost in the neighborhood, trying to make somebody follow you.”

“Why?” you ask, baffled. “Nobody out here is looking for me.”

“They aren’t looking for you, and they can’t sense you at a distance, but if they come across you at close range they’ll know exactly what they’re looking at,” Hizashi says. He taps the horn at a moped and nearly scares the driver into a crowd of pedestrians. “Your weak human senses won’t let you see them coming, either, which is why I’m here. Call me your early warning system.”

“Okay, but aren’t you going to attract a lot of attention all on your own?” You really don’t like the fact that you’re in Hizashi’s car right now. As far as you can tell, the two of you are still headed for the museum, but you could veer at any moment. “You’re the most powerful one in the neighborhood next to Tomura. People can probably spot you from miles away, and when they come looking for you, they’ll spot me.”

“Not until they’re up close, and I’ll know they’re coming. Plenty of time for me to hide you somewhere.”

The way he says that, it sounds like he’s talking about hiding your dead body. “Why are you doing this? You don’t even like Tomura. Why would you do what he says?”

“So he’d stop trying to bully Shou into it.” Hizashi’s grip on the steering wheel is white-knuckled. “That, and one other reason. If anything happens to you away from the neighborhood, he’ll blow that house apart and come looking for whoever did it.”

And all Hizashi cares about is making sure Tomura stays in the neighborhood, stays a ghost. “You’re manipulating him.”

“As if. If anything, he’s manipulating me!” Hizashi scoffs. “I told him to send somebody else – somebody without kids, somebody who’s got free time on their hands – and he wouldn’t. Of course, his other option was Dabi, so that was never going to happen, even though Dabi owes him for sheltering Keigo during the Garaki thing – I swear, nobody does dick-measuring contests like live ghosts who are insecure about their humans –”

You’re pretty sure Dabi’s not insecure about Keigo. You hope Tomura’s not insecure about you, and even if he was, you’re pretty sure he could beat Dabi in a dick-measuring contest. Every time the two of you hook up you’re a little taken aback by how big he is. This isn’t a great time to be thinking about that. Luckily, Hizashi’s not paying attention. “But no! Instead of sending the neighborhood’s least favorite burnt marshmallow, he sends me. He must be really worried about you if he thinks it’s worth trapping us together in a car.”

You scrunch down in your seat, more than a little pissed off at Tomura. He might not know what Hizashi said to you the day of the fight with Garaki, but he knows it hurt you, and even if Hizashi’s changed his tune towards you, you doubt Hizashi actually cares whether you live or die. What Hizashi cares about is his family. His family, who will be under threat if Tomura destroys his house and leaves. His family, who Tomura will almost certainly kill if Hizashi lets anything happen to you.

There’s only one thing that can be said about it. “This sucks.”

“For once we agree.” Hizashi’s fingers drum against the steering wheel. “What’s the point of going to this museum again?”

“It used to be an asylum. The conjurer’s younger brother was there, and he died under questionable circumstances,” you say. “But he was there for a while before that. There are lots of records of him, and I want to see if he had anything to say about his brother.”

“Sneaky,” Hizashi remarks. “What are you hoping you’ll find?”

“I don’t know. Something. Anything I can use.” You scrunch further down in your seat. “I was useless fighting Garaki, but the stuff I found out about him helped us get ready. This is the only thing I can do that might help Tomura win.”

“You could always die. He’d be so mad about it that his conjurer wouldn’t stand a chance,” Hizashi says. “Of course, he’d probably take half the city out along with him.”

You decide not to dignify that with a response and resign yourself to an hour and a half of Hizashi picking on you, trying to get you to lose your temper. Your phone pings and you pull it out of your backpack to find Tomura’s contact number. He’s texting you. Is he there?

He’s not even pretending he didn’t do it. My parents thought he was you. You hesitate a moment, then send another text. I don’t need a babysitter.

You didn’t need to leave, either. Tomura discovers the emoji keyboard and sends you twelve in a row, none of which make any sense. Tell me if he does anything to you. I’ll kill him.

It says something about you that you honestly think it’s sweet of Tomura to offer, but it’s long past time for you to fight your own fights with Hizashi. You interrupt him in the middle of a lengthy digression about why Tomura chose poorly when he chose you as his human and drop the conversational equivalent of the atomic bomb. “You know, I used to wonder if you forced Aizawa to marry you.”

Hizashi nearly drives off the road. “You what?”

“Yeah. The way your meet-cute went, it sounds like he didn’t really have a choice,” you say. Antagonizing Hizashi is a stupid move, especially when you’re stuck in the car with him, but you’re tired of being his punching bag. “Did you ever wonder about that? Do any of you ever wonder if your humans really wanted you?”

“Watch it,” Hizashi warns through clenched teeth. “If you keep running your mouth off –”

“You say this kind of stuff to me all the time,” you point out. “Except you say worse things about Tomura than I’d ever say about Aizawa. I’m not taking it lying down anymore. So either we keep going like this and I give as good as I get, or we accept that we’re stuck together for the next eighteen hours and call a truce. Your choice.”

Trying to be reasonable with a ghost who doesn’t want to understand is like smashing your head repeatedly against a brick wall. But you can see that Hizashi’s thinking about it. He doesn’t like having his bullshit turned around on him, and he knows he can’t retaliate worse. And you are stuck together for the next eighteen hours. “Tell me about humans, then,” he says finally. “Since you know so much.”

“Can’t you ask Aizawa about humans?”

“There are things he says I won’t get. That he knows I won’t get, because my frame of reference is wrong.” It sounds like it bothers Hizashi. Like it bothers him a lot. “I’m two hundred and nineteen years old. My frame of reference is pretty fucking broad. But apparently it’s not broad enough to get it.”

“Get what?”

Hizashi doesn’t answer. “Here’s the deal. I’ll tell you everything you want to know about ghosts. The kind of shit your stupid brat ghost won’t say. You tell me what I want to know about humans. That’s our truce. Take it or leave it.”

“I’ll take it,” you say, wondering what Hizashi thinks Tomura won’t say about being a ghost. “What does Aizawa think you don’t get?”

“Sacrifice,” Hizashi says. You blink. “If he had to save me or the kids, he’d save the kids, and he thought I’d say the same thing. Like it’s a no-brainer. Why?”

“I don’t have kids,” you remind him.

“The way he reacted, it’s not a parent thing. It’s a human thing. You’re supposed to choose the kids,” Hizashi says. “Why?”

“Um –” You really don’t want to wade into this, but you also don’t want to spend the rest of the day going back and forth with Hizashi to see who can be the bigger asshole. “It’s – when you have kids, they’re here because of you. The only reason they’re here is because you wanted them to be. So a lot of people think your responsibility should be to them over everything else. Over you and over your job and over the stuff you own – and over your spouse.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Hizashi says flatly. “I love my kids. I’d do anything for them. Except let my human die.”

With Hizashi’s conjurer and Eri’s conjurer both dead, this little hypothetical is probably never going to come to pass. But you’re thinking of something else, something Aizawa said about how to convince ghosts to change their behavior. “Think about it this way,” you suggest. “If you saved Aizawa and let the kids die, he would never forgive you.”

“If I didn’t, he’d be dead. It wouldn’t matter.”

“Nobody knows what happens after you die.” You shrug. “It might be nothing, but you might see him again.”

Hizashi glances sideways at you. “It’s not nothing,” he says. Your stomach lurches. “The world we come from is called the world between for a reason. It’s our entire world, but it’s nothing more than a pathway for your kind. Sooner or later, you all pass through.”

You’ve seen into the world between. It’s horrifying. “Pass through to what?”

“We don’t know,” Hizashi says. “I’ve followed those paths. Most of us do, if we stay there long enough to grow up. We can’t cross over, so we don’t know for sure. All I can tell you is there’s something there.”

You think of something Tomura said a long time ago: They embodied themselves so they could follow their humans. Wherever they go. Even after they’re dead. Hizashi laughs quietly. “One of these days I’ll find out.”

He sounds pretty unconcerned about the possibility. Then again, he’s never said he’s scared of dying – only of outliving Aizawa. You don’t want to talk about the afterlife anymore. “Did I answer your question?”

“Close enough.” Hizashi merges onto the freeway and accelerates. “Your turn. Got any ghost questions for me?”

Just one. “What happens if a ghost kills their own conjurer?”

“Nothing good,” Hizashi says. Your heart sinks. “First of all, it’s hard. They’ll draw on their other ghosts to fight back, and you’ll have to blast through those ghosts, too. If you’re permanently embodied, it’s not possible. They’ll just kill you. If you aren’t embodied and you take out your conjurer personally, you’re breaking your link to this world.”

Aizawa told you there was only one way out once a ghost has been summoned. Probably because he never expected things to go like this. “It sends them back?” you ask. “Every time?”

“Every time I’ve seen, which isn’t many.” Hizashi shrugs. “Theoretically he could fight it. If he took out the other ghosts, drained his conjurer, and embodied himself, he’d have a chance. But he’d have to want it. More than –”

“He’s ever wanted anything else, in all his existence.” You don’t need to fill in what you and everybody else in the neighborhood have figured out already: Tomura doesn’t want to be human. “This is more important than I thought, then. If you want him to keep protecting the neighborhood, the rest of us have to figure out how to kill his conjurer.”

You and Hizashi spend the rest of the drive to the asylum talking about conjurers. As the oldest ghost you know of, Hizashi’s seen a lot as far as conjurers go, and he even met some of the other ghosts Tomura’s conjurer summoned. You ask him what they were like and watch his expression turn grim. “By human standards, I’m a monster,” he says. It doesn’t weird you out even slightly to hear him admit it. It’s more of a relief than anything else. “Compared to those ghosts, I’m nothing. We’re lucky none of them are left.”

“If none of them are left, then what’s Tomura’s conjurer going to bring as backup?” you ask. “There’s no way he’ll come alone.”

“More Nomus, maybe?” Hizashi runs a red light and waves cheekily at the semi-truck he just cut off before roaring into the museum’s parking lot at full speed. “Let’s hope this place helps us figure it out.”

The old asylum looks exactly like what it is – a place built hundreds of years ago to imprison people who just needed help. You don’t pick up anything at all from setting foot on the property, but Hizashi hesitates to get out of the car, and once he does, his face goes pale. “You’re not getting that? Damn. I guess if his aura didn’t put you off, this wouldn’t either, but – damn.”

“No, I feel it.” You do, not on the grounds, but with every step you take inside the museum. There’s something about this place – not scary, but sad. From your research, you know this was the kind of the place where people locked up their family members and threw away the key. You imagine being dragged through these doors, never to come out alive, and feel your stomach lurch. “It’s – not good in here.”

“Yeah, no shit.” Hizashi leans against the wall and takes out his phone, only looking up when he realizes you’re staring at him. “This is your party, not mine. Get to work.”

“Oh, fuck off,” you mutter. Of course he won’t make himself useful. You square your shoulders and head for the front desk alone. “Hi. I’m here about Shigaraki Yoichi.”

“Yes, the curator warned me you’d be coming.” The docent looks you up and down. “What’s your interest in this former inmate?”

“I’m, um –” You should have thought of an excuse ahead of time. “I’m –”

“Sorry, she’s a genealogist. She doesn’t get out much.” Hizashi’s there, suddenly, his arm slung around your shoulders and his mouth running a mile a minute. “We’ve got this client, see – old family, not much to go off of, but he’s pretty interested in his family history. It took us a lot of legwork to find this place! We think this Shigaraki guy might be the missing piece in our client’s family tree, so we’re here to check into it. How about we get started?”

In spite of his bizarre outfit, the docent clearly finds Hizashi a lot more credible than you. It bothers you. “What happened to ‘your party, not mine’?”

“The faster we get this done, the faster I get back to my husband and kids.” Hizashi is all business as the two of you step into the archive room and stare down at the table full of documents that awaits you. “All right. Divide and conquer. I’ll take everything on the left, and you can –”

“I’ll take the left side,” you say. The right side has a lot of photos, and you don’t want Hizashi hovering over your shoulder while you’re trying to read. “It’s still my party.”

You’re expecting Hizashi to bitch about it, but all he does is ask you for a pen and one of the notebooks you brought, which you’re happy to provide. Shigaraki Yoichi’s files don’t have an organization system, or if they did, it vanished sometime in the two hundred years since he died. You resign yourself to starting from scratch, pull on the mask and pair of gloves the docent provided, and get to work with the first set of files.

You were worried there’d be nothing useful, but it turns out that this asylum was pretty on top of things as a function of serving mostly rich families. The Shigaraki family was absolutely loaded for the time period, and if Akira’s managed to hang onto even a little bit of that wealth through the ensuing centuries, interest rates will have turned it into a fortune. With this kind of money, Shigaraki Akira could erase his own identity and recreate it a thousand times over, pay off anyone he needed to pay off, make anything that could be traced back to him disappear. With this kind of money, it’s a miracle you found anything about him at all.

But you’re not focusing on Akira right now. You take a few notes based on his brother’s admission paperwork, then open the folder containing the medical chart.

Shigaraki Yoichi was ill almost from birth. It looks like tuberculosis. That’s what the autopsy report says, anyway, and you’re not a doctor, so you can’t come up with another reason why his lungs might bleed. His mental health looks like it was normal for the first few years of his life, with an episode of some kind occurring when he was eight. When he was eight, and his brother Akira was sixteen. Yoichi is described as being tormented by nightmares, even in waking. He’s quoted as raving about cold places in his home, of unseen things touching him, of feeling constantly, unceasingly watched. Reading over it sends a faint chill down your spine, and cold certainty settles in the pit of your stomach. Yoichi might have been crazy. But he was definitely being haunted.

He had a pet – it doesn’t say what kind – that died, withered into a husk as it slept next to him on the bed. The family appears to have seen it as a small sadness, nothing worth crying over for more than a day or two. Yoichi saw things differently. He swore up and down to anyone who would listen that his older brother killed his pet. His older brother, and his friends.

The doctor or worker or whoever was taking Yoichi’s history took the time to point out that all of Akira’s friends, and Akira himself, were confirmed to be elsewhere on the night in question. But not all of Akira’s friends, you don’t think. At least one stayed behind. At least one couldn’t leave.

Your first big shock comes when you learn that Yoichi begged to be sent to the asylum, that he was happy to be there. He kept a journal during that time, too, and you turn the ancient pages carefully, reading the words of a long-dead man who, for the first time in his life, sounds completely sane. It doesn’t take you long to realize what must have happened. Yoichi figured out at some point that the ghost his brother summoned to haunt him was tied to the house. All he had to do to escape it was to leave.

Yoichi lived in the asylum for seven years before anyone from his family came to visit him. The notes say that after a visit from his brother, Yoichi’s mental health degraded significantly. It shows in his journal, too. He draws things – shapes in the shadows, in the smoke from a candle, in the steam – and with every page you turn, he sounds more and more desperate, more and more hopeless. He writes about marks that appear on his body, marks only he can see, and the slow, suspicious deaths of every friend he’s made. In the notes, he’s described as paranoid, fixated on his brother. In his journal, he’s perfectly clear: I will not survive much longer. I want it known to whoever reads this that he did this to me. But I will not go quietly. I will resist him for as long as my spirit holds out, in life and in death. For all his power, he cannot touch the souls of the dead. It is my turn to haunt him.

You tap Hizashi on the shoulder, and he looks up, annoyed. You ignore it. “Can humans stay behind?”

“What?”

“After we die,” you say, and understanding crosses Hizashi’s face. “Can humans stay behind?”

“In theory,” Hizashi says. “Why do you ask?”

You slide Yoichi’s journal carefully across the table to him. Hizashi reads over it. “It’s possible in theory,” he says again. “In practice, your kind’s souls leave this world like they’re being fired out of a cannon. It would take an insane amount of willpower to hang on without a living body as an anchor. I’ve met maybe two humans – ever – who could pull a move like that. Did this guy really want vengeance that much?”

“Not vengeance, I don’t think.” Your eyes catch on one word in the journal entry. Resist. “He knew what his brother was. He wanted to stop him.”

You look around the archive room, a thought crossing your mind. “Do you think he’s still here?”

“Doubtful. If he really stuck around, he wouldn’t have been tied to this place the way a ghost would be,” Hizashi says. “If he stayed behind and if he went anywhere, it was probably after his brother. Or after anybody who could deal with his brother.”

Somebody was dealing with his brother – Mr. Yagi and his master. Hizashi glances over at the journal again. “How does it say he died, anyway?”

The entry you just read is the last entry in the journal. You reach for Yoichi’s chart again and come face to face with the causes of death: Starvation and dehydration, both severe, with no other complicating factor. You recall a coroner’s report saying Yoichi starved himself to death, and the chart says he stopped eating, but one of the people who cared for him added a note of their own. They said that Yoichi ate and drank as normal, but it didn’t matter – He withered away before my eyes into a shell of himself. Withered. Just like the pet that was killed by the ghost did.

You don’t realize you didn’t answer until Hizashi leans over your shoulder and reads for himself. “This whole thing smacks of Tomura,” he says aloud. You glare at him. “No, I know this wasn’t him. But Shigaraki here has a type of ghost he prefers. They don’t just kill, they torment. They destroy.”

“Isn’t that what you did?”

“Artfully,” Hizashi says. He slides the notebook he’s been sketching in across the table to you. “There’s nothing artful about this.”

You take one look and recoil. “I did this off a sketch in there, since we can’t take photos,” Hizashi says. He turns the page quickly, but the image of Shigaraki Yoichi’s twisted, shriveled corpse is going to stick with you for a long time. “Check this out, though. Shigaraki Yoichi, age twenty-five. Who does he look like?”

Tomura. He looks sort of like Tomura. “What are you saying?”

“Nothing,” Hizashi says innocently. “We’ve got no control over what we look like when we materialize, by the way. It just happens, and not everybody gets blessed with my good looks.”

“Why mention it, then?”

“It’s just funny,” Hizashi says. “How Tomura’s the only one who didn’t go completely fucking batshit crazy, and how he’s also the only one who looks like his conjurer’s crazy little brother.”

“He doesn’t look that much like him,” you say. You pull your phone out of your pocket, realize that you get approximately zero reception in the archive room, and stand up. “I’ll be back. I have to make a call.”

Hizashi shoos you off, and when you glance back over your shoulder on your way out, you see him peering at your notebook. Fine. It’s not like there’s anything in there you aren’t planning on telling the entire rest of the neighborhood once you get back.

The instant your phone gets reception back, you get a truly insane pileup of texts – from Magne, Himiko, Spinner, Keigo, and even Aizawa. But even all their texts together are still dwarfed by the sheer number of texts you’ve gotten from Tomura. You can only stare in horror, and as you watch, another three texts come in.

Two of them are from the ghost friends groupchat. Aizawa’s direct-replying to Keigo. What on earth possessed you to use that word?

It’s just a word! How was I supposed to know it would make him worse? Keigo’s indignance is leaking through the phone. ‘Dead zone’ is metaphorical! It’s not –

You stop reading and call Tomura before he can text you again or blow up the house. “I’m fine,” you say the instant he answers, and before he can say a word. “There are places where phones don’t get good service and the room the documents are in is one of them. That’s why your messages weren’t going through.”

“Then why is it called a dead zone?”

Tomura sounds stressed. You haven’t heard him sound like that since the time he conference-called the ghost friends while you were sick. “It’s just a turn of phrase,” you say. “Humans use ‘dead’ a lot to mean that something doesn’t work. Like something being dead in the water means it’s stopped working. Somebody being dead weight means they’re not helping as much as they should. The slowest runner in a race is dead last. Does that make any sense?”

Tomura’s quiet for a moment, then renders his verdict. “Humans say ‘dead’ too much.”

“Maybe,” you say. Tomura makes an irritated noise. “Hey, can you relax? I don’t know what you were doing to the house, but whatever it was, it probably scared Phantom. She doesn’t like loud sounds.”

“She’s fine. I wasn’t being loud.” Tomura still sounds guilty, which means something got damaged, and based on the fact that the entire neighborhood was texting you, it probably had something to do with the lights. You wonder how many lightbulbs you’re going to have to replace when you get back. “You should have told me about the spots with bad service.”

“I would have if I’d known you were going to freak out.”

“I’m not freaking out,” Tomura snaps. “Did you learn anything? Was there any point to you going?”

“Yeah, I learned some stuff,” you say. “I’ll know more once I call my boss.”

“Is that why you looked at your phone? To call him?”

“I was going to text you, too,” you say. Tomura hasn’t been this clingy in a while. It’s getting annoying – except last night you were upset because he hadn’t called, so you’re clingy, too. “I didn’t come here to get away from you, Tomura.”

“I know,” he says. “I didn’t think you ran. I thought – I don’t know. He didn’t pick up, either. I thought –”

He thought something happened to you. “Nothing happened,” you promise. “I’ll be home late tonight or early tomorrow. Everything’s fine.”

“I should have gone with you.”

Your stomach clenches. “Don’t be stupid. We wouldn’t have anywhere to live if you’d gone with me.”

“That’s not what I’m saying.” Tomura doesn’t follow up with what he’s actually saying, which is good, because you already know. This fight’s been brewing for a month, and you don’t want to have it over the phone. “Just go call your boss.”

“Okay,” you say. “I’ll message you when me and Hizashi are done. I –”

You cut yourself off one word into the slip-up. You haven’t come that close in a while. “What?” Tomura asks.

“I miss you. Bye.”

You hang up the phone, cursing the near miss. You have a rule about telling Tomura you love him, which is that you don’t do it. You call Mr. Yagi instead, and even though it’s Saturday, he picks up right away. “Sir, did you and your master ever encounter a spirit? A human spirit?”

“A human spirit,” Mr. Yagi repeats. “In what sense?”

“Something – friendly,” you say. “Or maybe not friendly. Just not harmful. To you.”

The instant you say it, you realize how similar it sounds to the way you originally thought about Tomura. Dangerous, but not dangerous to you. “I would not have called it human then,” Mr. Yagi says, “but for a time, early in our hunt for Shigaraki Akira, a presence accompanied my master and I. Neither she nor I had words for it. It was not something either of us had encountered before.”

Hizashi said it would be rare, if it was even possible at all. Mr. Yagi’s voice is wary when he speaks. “Why do you ask?”

“Shigaraki Yoichi. In his last journal entry, he swears to stay behind after his death and oppose his older brother,” you say. You hear Mr. Yagi suck in a breath. “Could it have been him?”

“If it was, the strength of his spirit must have been immense,” Mr. Yagi says. “Human souls were not made to dwell here without bodies. To remain with us as long as he did would take a tremendous act of will, and to provide any kind of strength – he aided us in our battles on more than one occasion.”

“So he had power.”

“Great power. Human souls aren’t fragile the way the souls of ghosts are,” Mr. Yagi says. “They cannot be blasted apart. In our early battles, this spirit – Shigaraki Yoichi, if you’re correct about this – shielded me from errors that would have killed me otherwise. Instead I was able to learn from my mistakes. By the time the spirit departed, I was more than able to fight for myself.”

So Yoichi’s mission did succeed. He was able to resist his brother. “Do you know why he left?”

“I assume that once we no longer needed him, his will to remain in this world was no longer sufficient to resist the pull of the world beyond,” Mr. Yagi says. “To resist as long as he did was miraculous.”

“How long ago did he vanish?”

“That will take me a moment. My memory is not what it once was.” Mr. Yagi speaks up again after maybe two seconds. “Between a hundred and a hundred and twenty years ago.”

“Okay,” you say. “Did he ever say anything to you? Were you able to communicate with him at all?”

“I was not, but my master was. I’ll check her journals and let you know what I find.”

You thank Mr. Yagi and hang up the phone. Before you go inside, you text an apology to the ghost friends groupchat for whatever nonsense Tomura pulled. And then you sit there for a second, trying to figure out how to respond to the pileup of crazy texts Tomura sent.

You try to put yourself in his shoes, think about what this looks like from his side. The person you care about has left. They gave you a phone so you could talk to them, only they’re not answering, and the person you sent with them to protect them isn’t answering, either. You know the world’s dangerous. You’re worried that the person you care about will leave you for good. You don’t understand enough about the outside world to come up with alternate explanations for the undelivered messages. Thinking about it like that, it’s not a surprise that Tomura panicked.

It's not your fault, but you still want to make him feel better. Feeling twenty kinds of crazy, you snap a quick selfie and send it to him. Then you send a message – thinking about you – and add a heart emoji to go with it.

It’s not a lie. You are thinking about him. The heart emoji isn’t a lie, either. But it feels weird. This is the kind of thing you’d do with a boyfriend, and Tomura – you remember last night and wince. The two of you defined the relationship. He is your boyfriend. Which makes it not weird at all, except for the part where your boyfriend’s a ghost.

Ghost boyfriend. You have a ghost boyfriend. The thought’s so absurd that you’re still giggling about it when you get back to the archive room. Hizashi looks up, scowling, as you step through the door. “What’s so funny?”

You put your mask back on and make an effort to get your shit together. “I talked to my boss. He says that there was a presence following them – helping them – from the time they started fighting Shigaraki until about a hundred and twenty years ago. After that it vanished. He said he thinks its will just ran out.”

“Huh,” Hizashi says. He doesn’t look convinced. “You know what else happened a hundred and twenty years ago?”

“You got an ear piercing you regret?”

Hizashi’s scowl deepens. “I know you’re not this stupid, human. What happened a hundred and twenty years ago that’s relevant to you, specifically?” You get the answer, but not fast enough for Hizashi’s liking. “If you’re right, if Yoichi stuck around, if he was helping your boss and his master, and if he fucked off purposely a hundred and twenty years ago, where would he have gone except straight to that house?”

“What would have been the point of that?” You look at your notes, then at the pile of papers left. Then at your watch. “Let’s just copy the rest of these word for word. We can go through them when we get back.”

“Fine by me.” Hizashi picks up his pen again.

By the time the two of you leave the museum for good, you’ve copied down everything including the photos, courtesy of Hizashi’s apparent skills as a sketch artist. You’ve also got a bunch of texts – from the ghost friends groupchat accepting your apology for all of Tomura’s nonsense, from your mom wondering what time you and Hizashi will be back, one from Spinner that’s just a list of crazy things Tomura’s been naming his Pokémon. One from Mr. Yagi, telling you that he and Izuku are compiling every mention of the spirit from his master’s journals. A bunch from Tomura that are just pictures of empty space, in various spots in the house, occasionally with Phantom in the background.

It’s so weird that you eventually have to show it to Hizashi, who takes one look and cracks up. “Idiot,” he cackles. “He’s trying to take a selfie.”

Live ghosts don’t show up clearly on camera, even when they’re embodied. Tomura figured that out about twenty photos in. Hizashi, who’s still got your phone and is refusing to give it back, reads the texts aloud. “I’m materialized so it should work. This is stupid. You’re gonna forget what I look like.” Hizashi howls with laughter. “It would be cute if it wasn’t so pathetic.”

You snatch your phone away from Hizashi before he can read any more of your texts. You read the remaining messages from Tomura in silence. Phantom misses you. She keeps going from room to room and crying. That’s not a surprise – Phantom’s barely been away from you since you adopted her. It makes sense that she’d be worried about where you are. You said you were thinking about me. What are you thinking about?

A lot of things. You’re not sure how to break them down, but somehow it feels easier to talk to Tomura by text than in person. He can’t see your face like this, read what you’re feeling from it. He only knows what you tell him. Different things. What you and Phantom are up to. What we should do when I get back. Whether you and Tomura have been sharing space with the spirit of Shigaraki Yoichi all this time. If it was really necessary for you to send Hizashi up here after me. That kind of thing.

It was necessary. So you’d be safe. Tomura types fast. Are you coming home yet?

In a couple hours. I have to meet my parents’ neighbors first so they’ll know my parents weren’t lying about having a daughter.

That was mean. You shouldn’t have said that, but you’re tired and stressed, and you wish more than anything that you were already home. Tomura responds. When are they coming to meet me?

You almost choke on thin air. You don’t want to meet them.

I’m supposed to. That’s what happens with boyfriends in those dumb romance movies.

It’s been a while since you wished you’d been more careful about what you let Tomura watch. You didn’t miss the feeling, and you’d love to never put your parents and Tomura in the same room – but your parents know Tomura exists, and they want to meet him, too. We can talk about it when I get back.

Tomura’s only been texting for twenty-four hours, and he already has some bad habits, like hopping subjects whenever he feels like it instead of in any way that makes sense. Send me another picture.

You’ve created a monster. You sigh and send another selfie, and in the driver’s seat, Hizashi snorts. It bothers you for some reason. “Do you have a problem? How did you get pictures of Aizawa?”

“Took them myself,” Hizashi says with a shrug.

“Did he know you were taking them?”

Hizashi waves one hand. “Technicality.”

“No, it isn’t,” you say. “What did he say when he found out about you?”

“Who are you and what the hell are you doing in my hospital room?” Hizashi says, and you muffle a snicker. “But I’d just saved his life. That bought me a whole lot of goodwill. How did your gloomy brat introduce himself? Flopping face-first in your lap and begging for attention?”

“No,” you say. You’re not about to say that your first official introduction to Tomura occurred in your bathroom right after you stepped out of the shower. “A coyote broke into the yard and attacked me and Phantom, and he saved us.”

“Huh,” Hizashi says. It’s quiet for a second. “People are going to ask how you met him. If you want them to like him, tell them that.”

You sit there, your mind blank. “Say it was on a walk or something,” Hizashi continues. “Don’t tell them he was in your yard.”

“That’s good advice,” you say after a moment. “Thanks.”

By the time you get back to your parents’ house, their party is in full swing. You knew that they invited you for a reason, and that the reason was to prove that they definitely weren’t lying about having a daughter. You know that. And still, it’s – nice. It’s nice that your parents want to brag about you, to introduce you to their neighborhood as their daughter who’s got a job and a boyfriend and a house of her own. It’s nice to hear them talk about you like they’re proud of you.

You’re conscious of Hizashi lurking at the edges of the party, and Hizashi’s words never really left your head. Mommy and Daddy didn’t love you enough. Maybe they didn’t. There’s nothing you could have done to change the way you grew up. But you’re okay now. You’re happy now. If they want to be proud of who you’ve become, that’s fine with you.

It’s fine with you, but you’re still glad to be out of there when it’s time. Your parents are worried about you and Hizashi driving home so late, but Hizashi’s wide awake, and you don’t think there’s any way you can fall asleep in his presence. You’re pretty sure he won’t kill you, but still. “Here,” your mother says, pushing a travel mug full of coffee into Hizashi’s hands. Hizashi protests that she should keep her mug, and she shakes her head. “I’ll pick it up later. We’ll be coming down for a visit soon.”

It’s a good thing you’ve already said goodbye and gotten in the car, and that Hizashi’s car has tinted windows. You’re pretty sure all the blood drains right out of your face.

Even if your mom didn’t see it, Hizashi does, and he spends the first fifteen minutes of the drive laughing about it. “You should throw a party just like they did. Let them meet the whole neighborhood at once, and maybe they’ll be so distracted by the cute kids and what Dabi looks like that they won’t notice what a crusty goblin your boyfriend is.”

You scrunch down in your seat like a twelve-year-old. “I’ll just tell him to stay invisible. And I’ll tell them he’s out of town.”

“Good luck convincing him to stay invisible. They might be the two people in the world he’s actually interested in meeting.” Hizashi gets his snickering under control and sobers up slightly. “What is it with you humans and wanting to hide us from your families, anyway? We’re important, but you all do it. Why?”

“We’re used to you guys. They aren’t,” you say. “Even when you’re embodied, there’s something a little – off. More than just your eyes.”

It’s hard to explain what it is, but there’s something with every ghost you’ve met other than Mr. Yagi. Maybe if you’d known about ghosts before you met him, you would have been able to spot it with him, too. “Besides, I don’t get the sense that a lot of us have families we want to introduce anybody to.”

“That’s sort of a theme. Shou’s theory is that most people who end up hanging with ghosts have had some pretty bad experiences with humans.” Hizashi flips on his turn signal, hops in the high-speed lane, and floors the accelerator. “Your parents aren’t bad. A little cold, maybe. Definitely not bad enough to make hanging out with Tomura the better offer.”

He’s throwing out bait, waiting for you to jump on it. You’re not going to. You sit quietly as five or six miles zoom past, and Hizashi speaks up again. “What, you’re not going to defend him?”

“Nothing I say is going to change your opinion about me or about him,” you say. “Nothing you say is going to change my opinion about him, either. So there’s no point.”

“Stubborn, huh?” Hizashi chuckles. “I like that in a human. You probably could have done better than him, but he could have done a hell of a lot worse than you.”

Any compliment from Hizashi’s sure to have a backhand to it. You’re just tired enough to take this one at face value – ignoring the fact that the person giving it hates you, ignoring the fact that Tomura’s never going to embody himself permanently, ignoring the fact that you’re most likely walking into a fight you’ve been putting off for a month when you get home. You give up on scrunching down and roll your seat back instead. “Thanks.”

[triplexdoublex]

Promise

Pairing: (Virgin) Chase Hudson x (Virgin) Reader

Warnings/tags : virginity, loosing virginity, mild blood, Sharing past memories of them being just friends as children. brief mention of underage drinking (Chase and reader DO NOT par take), brief off page mention of them kissing and getting to 2nd base( kiss/touch breasts) in the past prior to them turning 18. , NO SEX including ORAL happens before they are 18 only after!!!

“Pinky Promise,” you and Chase said in unison, hooking your little twelve year old pinkies together. “And I promise to never break a promise… EVER!” You both followed, in tradition with your usual promise making ritual the two of you had developed over your lifetime of being neighbors and best friends.

********

And you never did break a promise to each other, not once… and you certainly weren’t going to start now.

“Ugh, if I could go back in time and punch twelve year old me in the face right now I would!” Chase grumbles in sexual frustration, pausing his steamy make out session with you, and moving to sit at the end of his bed before things go any further. This is the closest the two of you have ever been to breaking the promise you made to eachother that fateful day after watching a video on STDs and teen pregnancy in sixth grade health class.

“I’d punch twelve year old me too, if I could,” you match his level of frustration. You grab your bra and fasten it back on before joining him at the end of the bed. “I should have known coming over here when your parents aren’t home was gonna make it nearly impossible to stick to our stupid ‘no sex until after highschool graduation’ pact.”

“If we’re being honest you should probably punch yourself twice,” he elbows you playfully.

“Oh yeah, and why’s that?”

“Because you’re the one who decided we should add ‘no oral sex or touching below the waist’ to the pact.” He runs his painted fingertips through his deep brown hair.

“It sounded gross at the time!” You exclaim in playful defense. “Plus neither of us knew we’d end up together.” You add. “It wasn’t until we were fifteen when you kissed me during our weekly Friday movie night that I even knew you liked me like that. I still remember the surge of electricity that went through me the second your lips touched mine, and how it made me lose my grip on the bowl of popcorn— what a mess!” You smile at him.

“Yeah,” he smiles back at you, reminiscing. “We kissed until the credits rolled. I still don’t know how ‘I’m Thinking of Ending Things’ actually ends.” He laughs.

“It ended with your tongue down my throat,” you giggle. “But it’s three years later — we’re eighteen now — and that’s still all we’ve really done, besides you kissing and touching my breasts. There’s gotta be something we can do to get some release without breaking our promise. The overwhelming desire to make eachother cum, is absolutely killing me lately.”

“It’s killing me too—Fuck, especially hearing you talk like that— you’re not helping you know,” he jokes, adjusting himself in his pants.

“Sorry,” you blush. “But ummm, I think I might know something we could try though,” you say softly, hesitant to admit what you’re about to.

“Please, What? Anything!” Chase practically begs.

“Ok, I’m kinda embarrassed to say this, and you’re probably gonna think I’m weird but umm…so obviously, sometimes I masturbate thinking about you, and I’m sure you do it thinking about me too—” you pause to take a deep breath. “—but sometimes it’s not enough so i’ll like hump my pillow and pretend it’s you and- and, I can get off like that,” you hide your face in your hands.

“Hey, you don’t need to be embarrassed,” he peels your hands away from your face. “I actually think that’s hott as fuck. I’m honored. He smiles, blushing. “I’m not sure how that helps us now though?”

“Y-you can be like my pillow — we’ll both keep our clothes on of course, well the necessary ones anyway.

“Ok, I’m totally down to try that,” he says with a flirtatious smile as he scoots himself back on the bed and lays down. “I’m all yours,” he smirks, gripping his erection through his tight jeans.

The depths of your abdomen are already warm with desire as you straddle him. As luck would have it, you’re wearing a skirt; the thin fabric of your panties are the only thing separating your plump and eager clit from the hard bulge of denim beneath you, as you begin the slow roll of your hips.

“Mmmhahamm,” Chase moans out a satisfied, smug, little laugh as he slides his hands up your thighs and under your skirt to grip your hips. “This just might be the best idea you’ve ever had,” he smirks, using his grip to push and pull you against him, intensifying the friction for you both.

The feeling is far more intense than the soft cushion of your pillow and you relish in it, appreciating the way his twitching cock excites your sensitive bud.

“Goddd, I wish you were inside me right now!” you whine out, adding a slight bounce to your movements so you can pretend.

“Trust me, I know, I wish I was too,” he bucks his pelvis up to play into the fantasy of it all.

The only thing missing is a fullness inside of you and a tight warmth around Chase, but this will do for now. You can feel how slick you're getting and wonder if Chase can feel the dampness through his denim. And as if he can read your mind he slides his hands back down your thighs to the hem of your skirt, lifting it up to take a peek underneath.

“Mm-Fuck that’s so hott! You’re soaking through your panties babe,” he exclaims, watching in awe as wet spot blooms.

“That’s because this feels s-sooo fucking good, baby! Mmmhhm.” You moan, looking directly into his gorgeous blue eyes.

“Yeah?” He asks rhetorically and bites his lip, as his body moves in unison with yours. “Let’s get this back off you, huh?” He sits up slightly supporting himself with one hand as he expertly unhooks your bra with the other . It’s one of the only things he’s been allowed to take off of you for the last three years, so of course he’s mastered it by now. “Fuck, you’re so gorgeous,” he sits up fully now, gently cupping your face with partial sweater paws —his painted finger tips resting gently on the apples of your cheeks. He pulls you in and begins kissing you, your tongues embracing each others in sensual rhythm.

You grab the hem of his oversized sweater and begin to pull it up, only parting your mouths long enough to tug it over his head. The second it’s discarded, you’re at it again; desperate, hungry kisses moaning into eachothers mouth.

“C-can I try be-being on top now,?” he breaks the kiss to ask, panting and out of breath.

“Of course,” you roll off him and lay on your back, letting him climb on top.

Somehow this position makes everything feel more real; the weight of him between your legs; the skin to skin contact of your bare, sweat-slicked chests gliding against each other with every roll of Chase’s hips.

“Mmmhm— Fuck, baby! Can’t wait to do this for real,” he kisses the words into the flesh right below your ear; he knows it’s your favorite spot. As usual it sends a wave of pleasure straight to your core.

“Fuck, I’m so close, Chase! Don’t stop!”you cry out. But your words excite him too much…

“Shit! No no no no NO! Not yet!” He pleads with himself, shortly following with a defeated “I’m cumming.” With a heavy sigh he rolls off of you. “Fuck, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay, Chase, don’t worry about it, besides I can take care of myself,” you reassure him, giving him a peck on the lips, and shift to get out of bed to head to the bathroom.

“Wait!” He reaches out grabbing you by the wrist. “I wanna watch …if that’s ok with you of course.”

“Umm.. yeah, okay,” you reply timidly, knowing you're about to star in a private show of one of your most intimate moments; all eyes on you, even if they are just Chase’s.

You position yourself back on the bed—legs spread and skirt lifted for Chase’s viewing pleasure— and slip your hand into your panties. It was never an official part of the original promise you made, but at some point in your relationship it became like an unspoken rule that seeing those parts of each other were off limits until after graduation as well. Your fingers move in circles over your clit, shielded only by the thin, delicate, wet fabric of your panties. It doesn’t take long before Chase is hard again; his own hand tucked into his boxer briefs, as he watches you.

“So sexy, playing with yourself for me,” he stares in awe. “Thinking about this dick inside you baby?” He says, as he strokes himself, his jeans now unzipped to allow him more range of motion.

“Mmmhm, you know it, Cha—“ your orgasm cuts off your words as it surges through you. Chase can’t take his eyes off you as your legs tremble and thighs clamp close around your hand— he’s never seen anything so arousing in his life.

“Baby, give me your hand,” he requests, when your body stops seizing in pleasure. You give him a quizzical look. “Trust me,” he elaborates. And you do—you trust him, you trust him with every cell in your body —so you extend your free hand out to him , the other still resting lazily in your panties. “No, the other one,” he specifies. In confused silence you pull out your hand—fingers still sleek with your essence—and give it to Chase who brings it to his lips. “Wanna taste you,” he takes two of your fingers into his mouth, his tongue swirling over, around and between them.

His dick twitches at his first taste of your flavor. You feel the buzz of his moans briefly around your fingers before they fall from his slack jaw as he cums hard in his pants, again.

“Can I?” You ask, nodding down to the mess seeping through his boxers.

He knows exactly what you’re asking and thumbs a drop of cum from his tip, and brings it to your lips. You open your mouth and he pushes his thumb in allowing you a taste of his salty release.

“Do I taste good, baby?” He asks. With his thumb still in your mouth you coyly nod yes. “You do too,” he smirks before slipping out his thumb. “God, I can’t wait until graduation.”

************************

By the time graduation rolls around the two of you have practically worn a hole in the crotch of every pair of pants and underwear you own.

After diplomas are received and caps thrown you sneak off to a hotel party with Chase, telling your mom you’re at sleepover with your friend, because even though you’re eighteen your moms one of those ‘you live under my roof, you live under my rules’ kind of mom. Technically you’re not really lying since your friend is here at the party too, but you doubt anyone’s gonna be sleeping, unless they just blackout; Another friend's older brother is stupidly supplying alcohol. You and Chase will not be partaking — another sixth grade health class promise to each other— no drinking until the legal age of 21.

Chase has been acting slightly off all night, he seems distracted, like his mind is completely somewhere else right now. It’s so unlike him and you're a little concerned.

“Earth to Chase,” you call out, grabbing his attention. “You okay? What’s going on in that head of yours?”

He takes a big breath before answering “Sorry it was supposed to be a surprise after the party but I can’t get it off my mind …..I got us our own room,” he says handing you a key card.

“Oh..OHH!” It suddenly hits you as to why he’s been acting so odd. “I’m gonna go tell my friends I’m not feeling well, so we’re leaving early.”

***********

Once alone inside the room with Chase, your nerves start to kick in but you try not to show it. You and Chase are on the bed— still fully clothed sans socks and shoes— kissing softly when he pauses to ask…

“So how do you wanna do this?”

“Umm, however you want to I guess.” You respond sounding unsure.

“Are you okay? We don’t have to do this tonight if you’re not ready yet,” he says sensing your nerves. “I’ll be just as happy sleeping next to you as I’ll be sleeping with you. No pressure.”

“Yeah, I’m okay. Everyone makes such a huge deal out of virginity , I think I’m just psyching myself out even though I know it's just a social construct. I’m mostly just worried about it hurting,” you admit.

“Promise I’ll be as gentle as possible, and we can stop anytime you want or need too,” he reassures you. Just let me know—I’m your best friend before anything else, before being your boyfriend, and certainly before my own pleasure— the last thing I wanna do is hurt you in any way shape or form.

“Thank you, I really appreciate that. You make me feel so safe, I couldn’t imagine doing this with anyone but you,” you give him a slow, sensual kiss, before pausing to speak again, “I really appreciate you going to the gyno with me to get birth control last month too,”

“Of course, birth control is just as much my responsibility as it is yours—which reminds me, I wasn't sure if you still wanted to use condoms or not, but I brought some,” he reaches into his small cross body bag on the floor by the bed and pulls out a three pack. “Completely up to you, I’m fine either way.”

“I’m okay doing it without one. I mean, I’m on birth control and we’re both virgins.”

“ That’s what I was thinking too, but I wanted to bring them just in case you didn’t feel the same way,”

“You’re the best,” you smile at him. “So umm I was thinking like, missionary— at least to start.”

“Whatever you want, baby.”

“And umm, if you don’t mind, can we like skip the other stuff for now? I’m just really anxious to finally have sex with you,” you blush.

“Same,” he smiles. “I’m completely fine with that,”

Slowly, you begin undressing each other: first tugging Chase’s form fitting black T-shirt up and over his head, followed by him pulling you to your feet so he can unzip the back of your dress. He stands behind you, kissing the base of your neck before taking his time lowering the zipper, and continuing to kiss down your vertebrae as he goes. Once fully unzipped you shrug the garment from your shoulders, letting it cascade down your body and pool at your feet. Chase lends you a hand, helping you step out of the swirl of fabric and then gently lays you down on the bed. You’re only in your panties; your graduation dress not requiring a bra. Chase stands at the foot of the bed and begins to unbuckle the belt of his dress pants. It’s by far one of the hottest sights you’ve ever seen, reminiscent of the cover of one of your guilty pleasure steamy romance novels. After he’s fully removed his pants, he climbs onto the bed, the both of you in just your underwear.

“Can I take these off you?” He hooks his thumbs under the skinny strap of fabric at your hips. You respond with a nod and your bottom lip tucked tightly between your teeth. You lift your hips for him as Chase makes quick work of tugging them down and off. He marvels at the sight before him; you completely nude for the very first time in his presence. “God, you’re so fucking beautiful,” he lightly traces a single finger over your slit, just barely parting your lips. “Ready for me?” He strokes himself through the confines of his boxers and then quickly removes them when you respond with another nod. He spreads your legs then positions himself between them. “Try to relax for me, okay.”

He attempts to run his tip through your folds to lubricate himself before pushing in but it seems your arousal isn’t quite as plentiful as the times that the two of you have simulated sex. You can feel the friction from the lack of wetness as Chase tries to navigate his way through your folds, and embarrassingly, you know he can feel it too.

“I’m sorry,” you cover your face in shame. “I want this. I’m in the mood and everything, I swear. I’m turned on, you turn me on—-” you ramble in a panic, thinking Chase is going to be offended.

“Shhh, baby, it’s okay. I know it’s probably just because you’re nervous. Don’t worry about it, I brought some lube, just in case,” Chase reaches down to his bag once again, and pulls out a small colorful bottle. “Is it okay if I rub some on you?”

“Of course,.………Chase,—I love you, seriously, you’re the best.” You’ve heard some of your other friends' first time stories and you know how lucky you are to have someone who cares as much about your level of pleasure and comfort as their own.

“I love you, too,” he smiles, giving you a kiss on the forehead. “I know you said you wanted to skip the other stuff for now, but I think it might be a good idea if I get you warmed up with my fingers a little first. Are you okay with that?”

“Yeah, go ahead,” you involuntarily squirm with anticipation.

Chase cracks open the bottle of lube, and squeezes out a moderate amount onto his fingertips. He warms the clear, cool, jelly between his thumb and forefingers before gently applying it to your opening.

“Ready?” He waits for your nod of approval before sliding a slicked finger inside of you. The sensation causes you to softly breathe out his name. “You okay?” He asks, sounding concerned.

“Yeah,” you whisper. “Keep going.” And he does, working them in a ‘come hither’ motion and adding a second finger when you say it’s okay. You wouldn’t say it hurts by any means, but you can definitely feel the pressure and stretch of his long, slender fingers working inside you. But the pleasure is there as well; that special spot you also learned about in health class—Chase has undeniably found it. “Mmmm, Chase—fuck…so good — kiss me.”

“Anything you want, baby,” Chase leans over your body— his fingers still getting you ready for him— and connects his mouth to yours, devouring your moans. Every kiss fills you with the same electric surge as it did during that Friday movie night, three years ago. That’s how it always is with you and Chase; every kiss feels like the first time —everytime.

“Want you…now,” you whimper as he moves the kisses to your neck.

“I’m right here, baby. I’m all yours,” he breathes against your flesh.

“Inside me,” you clarify, grabbing his hard dick.

“Yeah?” He perks his head up smiling at you. “Think you can take me now?”

“Yeah, go slow though,”

“I will, baby,” he slips out his fingers and uses the mixture of lube and arousal to coat himself before lining up between your legs again. “Let me know if I’m hurting you or you need me to stop, okay.”

“Okay,” you take a deep breath and slowly release it, trying to calm your nerves, while he lines himself up again.

This time he’s able penetrate you, and delicately begins sinking further in. He places his hands down on the mattress near your shoulders to support himself and you instantly grip his arms, slightly digging in your fingernails.

“You alright?” He pauses pushing in.

“I’m ok… k-keep going.”

“You sure ?”

“I’m sure.”

He continues to caringly inch his way inside you until his pelvis is flush with your body.

“Mhmm—fuck!.. i-it’s, it’s all the way in, baby. Feels so good…too good. Mmmmh, shit, gimme a minute.” He closes his eyes and sinks his teeth into his lip.

“It’s okay, I need one too.” You distract yourself from the twinge of pain between your legs by fiddling with one of his necklaces. “I still can’t believe you’ve kept this all these years,” you say, holding the dog tag that hovers above your body like a pendulum at rest; Chase’s name engraved on the front.

“Of course I do. You gave it to me,” he strokes the side of your cheek with the back of his hand.

“Yeah, for your tenth birthday!” You giggle.

“I loved you then—even if I didn’t know it yet—and I love you now,” he leans down, kissing you softly. The cold metal of the tag now touching your breasts excites you, and you let out a small moan that buzzes against Chase's lips. “I should be good now, are you?”

You silently nod and Chase—paying close attention to where your bodies are joined — slowly draws his hips back and gently pushes in again, but this time when he pulls back his hips he notices a bright red streak down his length.

“Shit, you're bleeding!” he sounds panicked.

“Fuck, I’m so sorry!” You go to cover your face again, but Chases intercepts, instead, interlocking your fingers together

“Baby, it’s okay. I know it’s common the first time. I don’t care about the blood, I’m worried I’m hurting you.”

“I mean yeah, it hurts a little, but it's gonna hurt whether we do this now, later, or another year from now; It just comes with the territory. I trust you and I know you're being as gentle as you possibly can. I’ll be okay, I promise.” You reassure him. Besides, from what your friends have told you it should begin hurting less and start to feel good soon.

“Soo continue?” He asks, to be sure.

“Yes, make love to me, Chase!

With his hands still interlaced with yours, he resumes the slow and careful roll of his hips and gently pins them to the mattress just slightly above your head. It’s not a dominance thing though , it’s not like the movies, or the spicy romance novels you read — it’s an assurance thing, a silent way of letting you know he’s got you, you’re in good hands and he’s gonna take good care of you. He dips his head, planting a garden of kisses along your throat as he delicately pivots his hips. It takes a bit to adjust to the intense stretch but Chase coaches you through it—reminding you to breathe, and distracting you with sensual praise and eye contact— until the ache eventually fades away. The sensation that replaces it is akin to the feeling of the way your heart skipped a beat the first time Chase said ‘I love you.” The memory of it playing on repeat inside of you everytime he glides over your g-spot.

“Ohh… Chase!” You pant breathily.

“You alrig—?“

“ You feel so fucking good,” you cry out, cutting off his question of concern.

“Mmmghh, he grunts at the pleasure your words bring him. “Happy you… mmhm finally get to enjoy this as mmmuch as I am,” he speaks through broken moans. “Don't know how mmmuch longer I can last though”

“Ss’okay, babe. It’s your first time too, I-I understand.”

T he next few minutes are filled with mutual pleasure, love-laden moans and passionate kisses. And even though a part of him is literally inside you, and your bodies are pressed together, you desire him impossibly closer still; your hands gripping and grabbing at his slender body as if you could just crawl into his chest and stay there for all of eternity. You call out his name as a familiar feeling begins to brew within you. But before you can reach your climax …

“Can I… in you?” Chase asks through heavy breathing. And with your nod of consent, he begins to pulse inside you, a warm sensation filling you up. “Ughhm, Holy Fuck!” Chase calls out, a shiver of ecstasy running through his body. He collapses on top of you, boneless as a jellyfish while he comes down from his high and catches his breath. “That was the best orgasm of my fucking life!” He manages to lift himself up to speak, making eye contact with you. “Wanna make you feel good too, Can I finish you off?” He sensually runs his tongue over his top lip.

“I’d like that,” you squirm, on the brink of orgasm already.

With no prior experience with oral sex you silently wonder to yourself if he’ll be able to make you cum, but the second his tongue traces a counter-clockwise half circle around your clit, you know he will—and soon! He continues licking a stripe down the side of your sensitive bud, then halfway back up, over and down. When he circles your clit next, you realize what he’s doing before he even finishes the letter.

“Chase!” You blurt out as if you were supposed to guess the word his tongue is spelling out in calligraphy.

Your hand rides atop his head as he softly zigzags the letter ‘S’ over your clit. Somewhere in the middle of the final letter your body starts convulsing in pleasure and Chase proudly wears your thighs as earmuffs as he makes you cum.

“God, I fucking love you,” he kisses his way back up your body, when your thighs finally release their hold on him. He gives you one last kiss on your mouth before he settles down on his back besides you. He takes your hand in his and brings it up to his lips placing a gentle peck on the backside. “That was amazing,” he says with his head turned, looking in your eyes as he softly strokes your hair. “Finally getting to be with you like that after so long was….was everything!” He struggles to find a word special enough to encompass the way he’s feeling. “I swear the wait just intensified the experience as a whole; so many new and exciting sensations we got to explore together for the first time ,” he kisses you lightly on your forehead.

“I agree, and I’m so lucky to have a man so deserving of sharing my body with. I felt so safe, respected and loved the entire time; so thank you for that.”

“Of course,” he gives you another forehead kiss and starts to get up.

“Mmghh,” you grumble playfully “Where you going? Stay with me.”

“I’m gonna draw you a nice cool bath, it should help with any remaining soreness…and here take two of these,” he pulls out a travel size bottle of Tylenol from his bag.

“Thanks,” you smile, getting up from the bed and grabbing a water from the mini fridge. You wash the pills down your throat with a sip of water, and make your way into the bathroom.

“Oh, and don’t forget to pee!” He calls out as you close the bathroom door.

“Okay, you reply, laughing to yourself. You think it’s adorable how he obviously did his research; from the lube, to spelling his name between your thighs, the Tylenol, the cool bath, and reminding you to empty your bladder. You wouldn’t dare call him out on it though.

**************

After your bath, you wrap yourself in the white robe provided by the hotel and open the bathroom door only to find Chase sitting on the bed in his boxers, a bleach pen in hand, scrubbing at the small— mostly gone— crimson patch on the sheets.

“ You can sleep on that side. I’ll sleep on the wet spot… think I got it out though.” Chase says, tucking the stain remover back into his little ‘first time’ kit.

“Oh, Chase, you say playfully. You’re such a dork sometimes, but I totally love you for it,” you pick up one of his balled up socks off the floor, and throw it at him.

“Hey, what was that for!” He smiles at you, tossing it back.

“Nothing,” you say, not wanting to embarrass him. “I just appreciate everything that went into tonight,” you leave it at that, and take a seat on the bed.

“Wait, hold that thought,” he sounds both elated and nervous all of a sudden. “I have one more surprise for tonight.” He pulls a small wrapped box out of his bag and hands it to you. You look at him quizzically. “Go ahead, open it!” He’s so excited that if he were a dog, his tail would be wagging. You removed the wrapping paper to find a black velvet ring box.

“Chase,” you let out in a barely audible breath, your eyes already welling with happy tears. With unsteady hands you pry open the hinged box to reveal a conservative sized diamond ring. You drop the box into your lap and throw your arms around Chase. “Yes, yes— a million times yes, baby!”

“Sorry, I couldn’t get you anything bigger right now, it’s just a promise ring but I didn’t wanna wait any longer trying to save up, I figured tonight would be the perfect night to ask you.”

“ It’s beautiful, Chase, I love it!” You retrieve the box from your lap to admire the dainty melee diamonds that surround a slightly larger Marquise cut diamond in the center.

“Here, let me put it on you,” he gently takes the box from your hand, removes the ring and begins sliding it on the ring finger of your left hand. “A promise solidifies the bond between two people and with this promise ring, I vow to honor that bond forever. This ring is a symbol of my love for you and my promise to marry you… after College graduation,” he adds with a laugh.

“Oh we’re playing that game again?” You return his laughter.

“It will be worth the wait, just like it was this time, promise.”

[edosianorchids901]

A Spring of Love

Ace Omens Hugfest 2024 prompt - "celebratory hug"

“Ooh, did you see the butterflies?”

“Yup,” Crowley said without looking up from his trimming. He’d seen plenty of butterflies already. “They were mobbing me while I was planting flowers yesterday.”

“Oh, how lovely,” Aziraphale said in his dreamiest tone. “I should like to be mobbed by butterflies.”

Crowley snorted and trimmed another scraggly branch off the bush. “No, you really wouldn’t. It was like something out of a horror film.”

“Crowley, you old silly. Butterflies aren’t horrifying.”

“They are when they cover your face so thoroughly that you can’t bloody see.” After a wary glance around for more butterflies, Crowley moved back and studied the bush. He clipped one more bit for symmetry’s sake, then grabbed his cane and hauled himself upright. His hips screamed in protest about the time spent on the ground today, but it had been worth it. “Now, we gotta make sure we really tackle the horror show of weeds. I can’t believe the state of this garden.”

He headed for one of the flowerbeds, but Aziraphale caught his arm. “My dear, we’ve been working for hours, and it’s awfully warm today. Let’s go to the shade for a bit.”

“Nnnnh.” Biting his lip, Crowley cast a longing look at the tangled mat of weeds. “But I gotta make progress.”

“You have in fact made plenty of progress.” Aziraphale tugged on his arm again, not quite hard enough to pull him completely off balance. “And you can make more after a break. But really, my dear. Can’t we enjoy our new garden?”

“I am enjoying it,” Crowley said stubbornly, lodging his cane on the edge of a stepping stone so Aziraphale couldn’t budge him. “I’m enjoying fixing the damn thing.”

“Well, perhaps you could take a break from that and enjoy simply looking at it for a bit, with me?” Aziraphale put on the big pleading eyes and pouted a little. “We’ve been working so hard on moving in and remodeling and ‘fixing’ the garden that we haven’t had any time at all to celebrate!”

Crowley hissed, and the pout intensified. Well. It looked like he wouldn’t be able to get out of this one. “Okay. Fine. If you insist, you bastard.”

“I do,” Aziraphale said happily. He tugged on Crowley again, and this time Crowley yielded.

They retreated under the dappled shade of some really pitiful birch trees that Crowley was thinking of tearing out. Their new cottage was in a terrific location, no close neighbors at all, and right by some beautiful walking trails. It did have a downside, though—mostly, that it hadn’t been the slightest bit maintained for decades.

He raked a critical gaze across the garden, cataloguing everything that he still needed to do. Weeding for sure, plus more trimming of virtually every bush and tree. Should probably just rip out everything in the flowerbeds he hadn’t touched yet, honestly. They were a tangled mess, and he had so many transplants that he could definitely just—

“Crowley.”

“Hmm?” Crowley asked, mentally planting new flowers.

“You’re supposed to be enjoying looking at the garden with me, not plotting the demise of half the plants.” Aziraphale collided with his side in an enthusiastic hug, and Crowley steadied himself with his cane. “It’s celebration time.”

“Is it?” Crowley wrapped his free arm around Aziraphale, trying and failing to downshift his mind. “Thought we already had that last week when we did the whole toasting thingy. To our new home, so on and so forth?”

“Well, yes. But one hardly needs to be restrained to celebrating a momentous occasion once!” Expression warring between bliss and an attempt to keep pouting, Aziraphale squeezed Crowley tightly enough that his ribs ached. “We ought to celebrate all the time. Ooh, we could celebrate every week! Weekly anniversary of moving in.”

“Er. Normally, I’m all in favor of celebration.” Crowley struggled against a smile as Aziraphale kissed his shoulder. He turned to nuzzle into the light fluffy curls, unable to resist his angel’s affection. “But weekly anniversary celebrations seem a little bit excessive. Wouldn’t have any time to fix the place up if I was stopping all the time for drinks.”

Aziraphale kissed his shoulder again. “You stop all the time for drinks anyway. These would just be celebratory drinks, just as this is a celebratory hug.”

“Is it?” Crowley had almost gotten completely distracted from the garden, but a flash of color pulled his attention back. “Whoops. Looks like we’ve got a celebratory butterfly, too.”

“Oh, do we?” Aziraphale twisted to look, not letting go of Crowley. The butterfly hovered in front of them, and Aziraphale cooed at it. “Oh, how lovely. See, my dear? Nothing like out of a horror movie.”

Crowley smiled at Aziraphale’s petulant tone. Then he stopped smiling. “One might be innocent enough. But there’s not just one.”

A horde of butterflies descended, fluttering around them. Crowley hissed and shook his head in a vain attempt to dissuade them from landing on him. One perched on his nose.

“Ohhhh…” Aziraphale gave a delighted wiggle. “Isn’t that the most delightful thing? The butterflies love you, my dear!”

“Terrific. So, between you and the butterflies, I’m never gonna get anything done again.”

“Oh, don’t be so sulky.” Chuckling, Aziraphale rested his head on Crowley’s shoulder and watched the swarm of butterflies. “They just want you to enjoy the moment, as I do.”

Crowley briefly considered whacking the butterflies with his cane, and decided against it. He leaned into Aziraphale’s embrace and sighed. “Right, right. For now, you and the butterflies win.”

[brightdarkness-2013]

Chapter 26: Onward!

Summary: Prowls first day of language school.

“Day three without food or water and the task is seemingly impossible. I’m not sure how much longer we can last out here like this.”

“Oh would you quit it with the voice over. We’ve barely started, we just had breakfast, and there’s water Everywhere.”

“This is my movie preview voice and it makes everything sound awesome, Blaster.” I spoke in a matter of fact tone.

“Great. Wonderful. Now are you going to help me teach Prowl or not?”

“Yes.”

“Then get off the floor and come up here.”

I looked up from my spot on the floor. Both Blaster and Prowl were watching me. Prowl was looking rather confused and Blaster was looking at me like I was an idiot. I stood and began my climb.

“With one final push-”

“Stop. I swear I will slap you.”

“It’s fun. Ya should try it.”

“No thank you. Ok so lets get started before Prowl decides that we aren’t worth this.”

“I was just having some fun before we got down to being serious.”

“And Prowl might start thinking you’re going crazy or dying because you keep changing your voice.”

“Che. Prowl doesn’t care.”

“Really? To me it looked like he was looking at you like you were an idiot.”

“How do ya know what he was thinking?” I challenged.

“If he didn’t care he wouldn’t have looked at you in the first place.” Blaster answered without pause before going back to opening the little box we brought along.

We had brought along some flash cards, a notebook, a few pencils, and plenty of items that were common in the ocean. The page that had the alphabet on it was in a ziplock bag to protect it and folded to fit.

“Ok, Prowl. Lets get started.” I announced with a grin.

Prowl looked at the items curiously. First up was showing him the notebook and how the pencil worked via demonstration. Next was showing him the page with the alphabet. Through this simple step Prowl just simply watched us as per usual. Then I pulled out the seashell and set it before him. He turned it over as if looking for something before giving a confused expression. Like he was asking me what he was possibly supposed to do with it. I took it back and set it next to the notebook where Blaster wrote out the word seashell slowly for Prowl to watch.

“Seashell.” I smiled as I pointed to the word and then the shell.

And there was that look again. The one that plainly said that I was an idiot. I sighed dramatically before pointing out each individual letter on the protected sheet and the word on the notebook to show him where we got our little ‘symbols’ though he still didn’t lose that look. This was going to be harder than we thought.

4444444444444444444 The Fours Are Gaining Followers!44444444444444444444

Day by day we worked on trying to get him to understand while his neighbors still struggled for his attention. The day that he was to be brought into the merger tank was rapidly approaching. We were still working on getting him to understand just One word. Just the fact that we had our own language and that this was how we got words. How we wrote them and blah blah blah. But no he was looking at me like I was the one who didn’t understand.

“This isn’t that hard. Ok maybe it kinda is. Languages are hard, but you’d think ya would have one word down by now.” I sighed and Prowl hadn’t bothered to move.

“Things like this take time.”

“Yeah yeah yeah. I know. Ok lets take this from the top. Ya know what this is. This is a piece of coral, but this is how we spell it. C- O- R- A- L Coral.” I spoke out loud as I wrote each letter down. “So- hey! Don’t roll your eyes at me.”

“Jazz-”

“No. He rolled his eyes at me. Ya didn’t see it because he isn’t facing ya.”

“I don’t think he rolled his eyes at you. And if he did we have no clue if it means the same thing where he comes from.”

“Well he could have picked it up from being around us for so long. Hey hey hey! Where are ya going? We’re not done here.”

Prowl ignored me and slipped off the stand and into the water.

“Well. I think you offended him.”

“Me? He’s the one who rolled his eyes at me and has been looking at me like I don’t have a brain since we started this. If anything I am the one who should be offended.”

Our little argument was cut off when Prowl returned with a larger piece of coral. He settled back across Blasters lap and started scratching at it.

“What are ya doing now?”

All I got was a slight growl before he went back to scratching at it. When he was done he showed it to me. There were three little symbols scratched into it. He then pointed to the symbols and then to the coral before crossing his arms. One looked like a lowercase A with a circle in it. The next was two matching squiggles that looked like waves and the third looked like a two intersecting triangles. We both took a second.

“Oh… my…” Then Blaster burst out laughing.

“What?!”

“He thinks you’re a moron.”

“Oh shut up.”

“No he thinks you’re so uneducated that-”

“Shut up. I can see that.”

Well in a way this was progress. Also this was solid proof if there was any that they did have a written language. If only we could get him to understand. So far all he was doing was acting like I was the one who wasn’t getting it. Blaster was absolutely no help. All he was doing was laughing at me and when I made to smack him Prowl growled at me. Why couldn’t things ever go my way? Also getting him to stop looking at me like I was an idiot would be great too.

Next

First

Masterpost

[pepperonijem]

vii. a dream within a dream || all my love

"All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream ." - A Dream Within a Dream; Edgar Allan Poe

Summary:  bucky barnes ocassionally lives out his dream of being a hallmark holiday movie protagonist. only on weekends. Pairing: Bucky Barnesx f!Reader Warnings: food mentions Word Count: 2.8k A/N: sorry for the random hiatus. it has been a very difficult last two weeks, with school, the passing of one of my favorite artists, and just general business of life... but here y'all goooo

previous chapter || back to library || next chapter

“Bucky,” Steve sighed in frustration. “You’ve missed the turn three times already. We’ve been circling this block for twenty minutes.”

“Steven, with all due respect, please shut up so I can see better.”

“I’ll shut up when you finally make the –” Steve was cut off by Bucky making a sharp left turn and he grabbed the handle above his window. “Oh my god, this isn’t Mario Kart, use your brakes.” 

“Well I made the turn didn’t I?” Bucky huffed at Steve as he readjusted his wheel. Thankfully, the streets weren’t too busy at this time of night. Bucky glanced over at Steve who let out a chortle of disbelief.

“I guess that’s true,” he admitted.

“So why was everyone being so weird earlier?” Bucky asked, referring to the weird shift in events that occurred when he stopped at Scott’s house.

The question seemed to catch Steve off guard as he let out a surprised cough. “Weird? What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about why Natasha seemed to be hauling your ass to the front door, and how Wanda suddenly got food poisoning less than half an hour after I called her,” Bucky said flatly, glancing over at Steve, who was staring outside of the window, pretending to be interested in the empty and clear night sky.

“Oh that? You know Wanda has IBS, she’s really sensitive about it,” Steve replied a little too quickly.

“Okay…” Bucky dragged out. He very well knew that Wanda did not have irritable bowel syndrome, having eaten many meals with her. 

Steve turned back around to face him. “Why did you only ask Natasha and Wanda to go with you?” he asked in return.

Now it was Bucky who was caught off guard. “Well, they’re uh… they’re the most entertaining people to roadtrip with.” The words left his mouth a little too quickly and Steve responded with an unconvinced nod.

“Oh, I’m sure Sam would be happy to hear that,” Steve teased. Bucky rolled his eyes with a huff. 

“What are you doing right now?” Bucky asked as he noticed Steve rummaging through the glove compartment of his car.

“Looking for snacks,” Steve replied, as if it was obvious. “I didn’t get a chance to eat dinner.” As if on cue, Bucky’s own stomach began to rumble. He hadn’t really had the chance to eat all day, choosing to spend all of his time planning this surprise rather than making meals. He was slightly annoyed, but saw that they managed to make up for some time and had a bit of lee-way before they needed to be at the airport.

Without looking down, he reached down and handed his phone to Steve. “Look for a fast-food place and we can grab something to eat.” Steve hummed in response, unlocking Bucky’s phone.

“Uh, Bucky,” Steve announced, looking up from the phone with a hint of panic. “You have a lot of missed messages and calls from your roomie.”

“Shit,” Bucky cursed under his breath. At the next stoplight, he grabbed his phone back to check the messages, and sure enough, there was a slew of notifications all from you. 

neighbor 💩 (8:10 p.m.): jimothy where r u rn

neighbor💩  (8:10 p.m.): if you’re out can u pick up mcdonald’s pls, i’m craving chicken nuggets

neighbor💩  (8:13 p.m.): nvm, i think i actually want taco bell

neighbor💩  (8:15 p.m.): OR ACTUALLY, aren’t u hanging out with everyone tonight? Can u bring home some of the soup wanda makes? it’s the only thing keeping me sane rn

neighbor💩  (8:35 p.m.): Why is my dad calling and asking me where you are

neighbor💩  (8:37 p.m.): Why is Wanda saying you’re not at Scott’s house and that you and Steve are taking a roadtrip together

neighbor💩  (8:39 p.m.): if you are with Steve tell him to answer his phone before I find him and leave him stranded in the woods myself

(3) Missed calls from neighbor💩 8:40 p.m.

Neighbor 💩  (8:50 p.m.): James Barnes i swear to god… i can’t believe you didn’t tell me my dad’s coming in!!

Neighbor 💩  (8:51 p.m.): u better be driving safe… that’s precious cargo

Neighbor 💩  (8:52 p.m.): anyway i haven’t decided if i’m mad or happy that you planned this whole thing without telling me… find out on the next episode of Dragon Ball Z

“By any chance,” Steve started sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck as he looked down at his own phone. “Is this supposed to be a surprise?”

“That’s correct,” Bucky confessed, setting his phone down as the light turned green once again. “It’s supposed to be a surprise.”

“Well, not anymore,” Steve said sheepishly. 

Bucky looked at him, eyes wide with panic. “You told her?” He asked loudly.

Steve raised his hands in defense. “I didn’t know! You know I’m terrible with secrets,” he pouted. 

Bucky took a deep breath, calming himself down. “It’s fine,” he said. “It’s fine. I mean, it’s fine. It’s fine right?” 

Steve nodded back. “It’ll be fine,” he echoed. “At least we’re almost there.”

After a half an hour, the boys finally arrived at the airport.

They were greeted by the familiar figure waiting at the curb with an excited smile and a friendly wave. As Bucky pulled the car into a stop, he took a deep breath before getting out of the car to help his guest load into the car.

“Bucky!” your dad exclaimed as he pulled him into a warm hug that Bucky wasn’t really expecting. “Nice to see you.” He peeked over Bucky’s shoulder to see Steve waving to him from the passenger’s seat.

“Steve, is that you?” He asked with a cheerful smile as Steve nodded sheepishly. He too received a hug through the window, before entering the car himself.

As they headed home, the three boys in the car found themselves in pleasant conversation as they caught up on life.

“How’s your application going, Steve?” Your father asked from the back seat.

Steve hesitated, looking out the window as he finally answered. “I uh, I sent it in last month. Just waiting to hear back from them.”

As if noticing a shift in Steve’s demeanor, he switched his focus to the boy in the driver’s seat. “What about you, Bucky? What are your plans for next year?”

Just like Steve, Bucky hesitated before answering. “I think I’m going into education,” he exclaimed, as if the words surprised him as well.

“Oh education?” Your dad hummed thoughtfully. “Your dad always thought you would go into engineering or something science-y. What made you decide on education?” 

Bucky smiled as he replied. “A good talk with a good friend.” He didn’t miss the way Steve looked at him with an eyebrow raised, but decided not to mention it.

An hour later, Bucky pulled into the driveway and put his car in park. He hadn’t even opened his door before the back seat passenger door was being swung open and he heard your voice ring in his ear.

“Dad!” you called, pulling him out of the car and into a warm embrace. As Steve and Bucky got out of the car you immediately latched on to both of them as well, surprising Bucky. Maybe hugging runs in the family? He thought.

“Bucky,” you said firmly, now pulling away from him. Your eyebrows were furrowed together and your eyes looked glassy and— were you mad?

“I’m so sorry, I’m sorry, I’m— I thought it would be a cool surprise and I—” 

“Why are you apologizing?” You asked incredulously. “This is the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me.” Now you had wrapped him into another hug, but Bucky let himself relax, relieved that you weren’t pissed off at him.

Before he could say anything else, you had already moved on to Steve, joking with him about how he sucks at keeping a secret, and inviting him to stay just a little bit longer before heading home. Steve nodded sheepishly, even after seeing the 11:57 p.m. blare at him from his phone screen as he checked the time. 

Bucky bit the inside of his cheek, thinking to himself that it was weird for him to find your mix of emotions and giddy excitement so endearing. However, he found himself still leaning against the car, in awe that he managed to pull this surprise off. Part of him felt like the protagonist of a Hallmark Christmas movie, moving heaven and earth for the girl he lo– 

Bucky let out a cough, not letting himself finish the thought.

As he watched you drag Steve into the house, Bucky found himself alone with your dad who was still gathering the last of his things from the trunk.

“Oh, let me get that for you,” Bucky insisted as he grabbed one of the bags. 

Your dad thanked him as he shut the trunk, turning to face Bucky but making no effort to move toward the door of the house.

“Bucky,” he called, his voice much softer than it was at the airport. “I’m guessing she’s the ‘good friend?’” he pat Bucky on the shoulder as he nodded sheepishly, looking down at the ground.

“Let me give you some advice, kiddo. Don’t think too much, life is so much better when you don’t.” With that, he also made his way inside, leaving Bucky alone in the icy chill of the night. 

What did he mean by that? Bucky thought. I think a healthy amount, no more and no less, in fact, if I wanted to stop thinking right now I could. See? I did it. For a whole 5 seconds I stopped thinking. Or maybe he—

“Penny for your thoughts?” Bucky’s ears perked up at the sound of your voice. You walked over to where he was leaning against the hood of the car, looking into the night sky. 

“I’m not really thinking about anything,” Bucky shook his head. “At least, nothing important.”

He looked down as you handed him a blanket. 

“Well if you’re gonna sit here and think about nothing important, you should at least stay warm,” He unraveled the blanket, placing one side around his shoulders and extending his arm as an invitation.

“Join me for a bit?” Bucky surprised himself as he asked the question, and had to resist the urge to tense up when you shifted closer and allowed him to wrap the other side of the blanket around your shoulder. 

Thankfully, the silence that followed was peaceful, and when you broke it with a quiet voice, he found himself leaning closer to hear you.

“Thank you,” you whispered. 

“For what?” He asked, giving you a gentle nudge, inviting you to speak up.

“For everything,” you answered. “For every late night study session, for bringing me back tea and croissants when you go to the cafe, for bringing my dad here. I feel like you’ve done so much for me, and I’ve just been kind of… a parasite since the beginning.”

Bucky felt his heart lurch at your words. A parasite? How could you think of yourself that way?

Your father’s words echoed in his head once again. Stop thinking so much, he told himself.

So he turned to you, and told you exactly how he felt. “You’re not a parasite, you’re a catalyst.”

You scoffed out a laugh, playfully punching him on the shoulder. “What does that mean?”

Bucky rubbed his arm, pretending to be in pain as you rolled your eyes at him. “It means,” he began. “That the moment you walked through that door, everything changed.”

“For the better, I hope,” you added.

“Well, for reference, I was finally invited to one of Tony’s exclusive karaoke parties. He said I’m a lot more fun these days. I even sang a song.”

You raised your eyebrow at him in curiosity. “Oh? What song?”

He shook his head, refusing to tell you, until you poked his side and he all but fell. “Dancing Queen by ABBA,” he admitted in embarrassment. “Don’t laugh.”

“I’m not laughing, I didn’t laugh,” you said with your lips pursed tightly together, trying hard to fight a chuckle. “What did you score?”

“100.”

“No way.” 

Bucky nodded sheepishly as you finally let out your laughter.

“Okay, okay, I believe you,” you relented with a nod. “The Bucky I met in August would have vomited at the thought. I guess I may have rubbed off on you a little.”

“See? This is a symbiotic relationship.” Bucky chuckled, playfully punching your shoulder.

“Alright, alright,” you relented, pulling the blanket off yourself and turning to extend your hand to Bucky. “Now let’s head inside so we don’t freeze.”

A cozy meal and a few board games later, the clock read 4 a.m. and everyone was starting to lose it. Your dad had turned in two hours ago, after the first round of Monopoly ended with you claiming total domination and Steve and Bucky going bankrupt. After you begged your father to stay up, he promised he would only take a nap and that he’d be up by seven a.m. to get breakfast with you.

Still full of energy from the day’s excitement, you forced Steve and Bucky to stay up with you to play a round of Catan, only for you to be falling asleep halfway through it. 

“Steve,” Bucky groaned sleepily as he lazily dropped the dice out of his hands. “Make us more coffee–”

He was cut off by Steve slapping his hand over his mouth. “Shhh.” Bucky sat up and slapped his hand away. “She’s finally knocked out.”

Sure enough, your soft snores were coming from the couch as you lay there peacefully, giving Bucky and Steve time to finally escape. Steve got up first, trying his best to move silently.

“I’m gonna make a cup of coffee before I head out,” Steve whispered to Bucky who nodded.

As Steve headed to the kitchen, he tried to stand up carefully from his spot on the floor in front of the couch you were on. He didn’t make it very far before he heard you call out to Bucky.

“Stay?” your voice came out with the softest puff of air, and he wondered if he imagined it.

If Bucky had any more self control, he would have walked away.

But when you reached your hand out in search of his, how could he bring himself to leave?

So instead he knelt back down beside you and decided that once again, he would stop thinking and let himself be in the moment. And in that moment, he was well aware of how his heart hammered against his chest and how his lips were quirked into a smile. Have you always been cute, or was the lack of sleep finally getting to him? Chalking it up to his sleepy deliriousness, he allowed himself to be just a little reckless. 

He looked down at where your hand was still in his, and with his free hand reached up to brush a hair out of your face, his hand freezing when he felt your hand twitch in his. Your face grimaced just a little bit at the disturbance and he finally let out a breath when it settled back into a look of peace. 

“Sleep well,” he whispered out before giving your hand one final squeeze as he pulled away, taking note of how cold his hands suddenly felt. He balled his hand into a fist and quickly opened it again, aware of all the blood rushing back into his fingertips. 

As he stood to drape a blanket over your sleeping figure, he noticed Steve had returned from the kitchen.

“She’s out,” Bucky informed Steve who nodded back absent-mindedly, not quite looking at him. “Do you want a ride back to Scott’s?” 

“Hmm?” Steve hummed before finally turning to Bucky. “Oh, no it’s fine, it’s a short walk and the weather is nice tonight.”

“You sure?” Bucky asked with his hands in his pockets, stifling a yawn.

“Yeah,” Steve nodded back with a small smile. “The coffee woke me up.” 

Bucky relented and walked Steve to the door before finally making his way into his own bed. Against his better judgment, he found himself replaying the few minutes you sat outside with him, looking at the stars. 

He let out a sigh, reaching for the book that rested on his side table, Pride and Prejudice, untouched since the day he read it at the cafe. However, he did not grab the book itself, but rather the bookmark that kept his page – a pink envelope still sealed, addressed to him. 

Maybe one day I’ll open it, he thought to himself. But not today. 

And with that, Bucky slipped into a deep slumber. 

Maybe I’ll dream of you.

[sunshine-gumdrop]

Guess which team I support!

I saw the post about complimenting other teams, so here's mine!

Anaheim Ducks: Still ducks, but at least they’re not waddling anymore. Slowly growing those wings.

Arizona Coyotes: At least they have a loyal fan base, even if it fits inside a Starbucks.

Boston Bruins: Great season, but that playoff curse is harder to shake than Brad Marchand’s chirping.

Buffalo Sabres: Always the underdog, but hey, they're like the Oilers pre-McDavid—on the rise, baby!

Calgary Flames: Flames? It's more like a flicker compared to the Oilers' firepower. It’s OK, Alberta’s still ours.

Carolina Hurricanes: Fast, sure, but they’ve got nothing on McDavid’s warp speed.

Chicago Blackhawks: Bedard is fun, but we’ll remind you that it takes more than one superstar to rival our McDavid and Draisaitl.

Colorado Avalanche: Mackinnon’s great, no doubt, but if McDavid turned up the speed any higher, Nate might need a head start... and a jetpack.

Columbus Blue Jackets: At least they’ve got the coolest name in the league... and, um, yeah, that’s it.

Dallas Stars: Stars may shine, but our Oilers are burning brighter. Yee-haw!

Detroit Red Wings: Historic? Sure. But our present is more exciting, don’t you think?

Edmonton Oilers: We’ve got McDavid, Draisaitl, and enough offensive firepower to make the league tremble. No bias here, just facts.

Florida Panthers: Sure, you had your Cinderella run, but your glass slipper cracked—better luck next time.

Los Angeles Kings: Kings? More like court jesters when McDavid’s on the ice. But hey, we appreciate the entertainment!

Minnesota Wild: A solid team with strong defense, but they sure aren’t ready to face our playoff onslaught.

Montreal Canadiens: Young team, lots of history, but it’ll be another century before you catch our firepower.

Nashville Predators: Cool jerseys, great fans, but you’ll need a lot more to take down the Oil.

New Jersey Devils: Fast and flashy, but McDavid could still skate circles around them blindfolded.

New York Islanders: Defensive wizards, but offense wins games. You’ve seen our highlight reels, right?

New York Rangers: Great in theory, but let’s be honest—nobody’s pulling the spotlight away from Edmonton.

Ottawa Senators: Keep rebuilding, maybe by the time McDavid retires, you’ll be playoff-ready.

Philadelphia Flyers: The Broad Street Bullies are more like baby bulls next to the Oilers’ charging offense.

Pittsburgh Penguins: Old guard, meet the new era. Your time was great, but it’s McDavid’s league now.

San Jose Sharks: Shark Tank? More like a kiddie pool.

Seattle Kraken: Second season was fun, but Edmonton’s got a dynasty in the making—good luck keeping up.

St. Louis Blues: Still riding that 2019 wave, but the tides have shifted north.

Tampa Bay Lightning: The storm’s fading, Tampa. There’s a new powerhouse in town—guess who?

Toronto Maple Leafs: Sure, you have history and a massive fan base, but when was the last time you outscored the Oilers?

Vancouver Canucks: At least the jerseys are nice, right? Yeah, we’re taking that playoff spot.

Vegas Golden Knights: Congrats on the Cup, but let’s be real, you had to avoid us to get it.

Washington Capitals: Ovechkin’s a beast, but nothing out there scares our Oilers’ scoring squad.

Winnipeg Jets: Close neighbors, but we’re the big brothers on this block, and it shows every game.

I couldn't tag dallas and Detroit...

[nessiesspeakeasy]

Kinktober Day 03: Hate Sex

Bess and Oukraz have been neighbors and rivals for six years. Finally one night, everything comes to a head.

Rating: Mature. Hate sex, rivals.

You can read this on my AO3.

“Hey, boss, we got several one star reviews and they all seem to say the same thing.”

Oukraz frowned and maneuvered his large, manticore body through his bakery to his employee. He stared at the phone, glaring and scrolling down.” He breathed heavily through his nose. “That… competitive…” He growled quietly and made sure his wings would not move in an erratic way. He did not want his customers to hear or see. He nodded. “I will get this sorted.”

He didn’t know how it began, but a rivalry had started between his bakery and the cafe next door. Him and the owner had gone at each other for years. He was getting tired of it. When he closed the store, he went next door, where the coffee shop was. He’d offered to provide food for her once, but that had spiraled into their first argument. He took a deep breath and walked in, spotting the redhead immediately.

Bess was sweeping. She’d had an incredibly long day. They’d had to ban someone from her cafe and it had chased away customers. She’d bought this shop on a whim when her son had moved out, but now, she was tired of the customers. She didn’t know if this flash of independence was worth it anymore. She’d been at it for ten years and, forty-six, while still young, was starting to show the softer sides that chafed against being a business owner. She’d worked two jobs while she’d raised her son, so she was used to the work, but being a business owner needed one to be invested all the time and it was hard to do when there was just her.

When the door chimed, she turned to say they were closing, but the overshadowing stature of Oukraz was there. He turned her sign to closing before facing her fully. Her chest fell as he did so. She wasn’t in the mood to deal with him. “I don’t want to talk,” was all she could muster to say.

He snarled. “I know we’ve had our rivalry, but you’ve sunk low this time, Bess.”

She rolled her eyes. “What nonsense are you on now? What other random act of violence have I done this time?”

He stood over her, glaring, wings flapping open as his anger grew. His tail swished back and forth in agitation. “Don’t act like you don’t know! How did you find the time!?”

“Oh for goodness sake, Oukraz, out with it, I’m not in the mood for your riddles.”

“I’m not a sphinx!”

“I didn’t say you were!” She glared, setting the mop down. “Sphinxes aren’t the only beings that can speak in riddles! Jeez,  you’re sensitive tonight!” She had the shortest temper with him and it surprised her, even tonight when she was supposedly too tired to argue.

“SENSITIVE!? I wonder why!” He thrust a phone at her.

She looked at it. “Wow, your bakery’s not doing good.”

He pulled the phone back. “My bakery’s fine! But these are going to tank it! Why’d you write them!?”

She scoffed, too surprised to really react. “What do you mean!?” She glared at him, but more than anything, she felt strangely hurt. “You think I would do something like that?”

“Did you!?”

She scoffed again. “Oh, now you ask? I’m not going to answer you when you come in throwing accusations around without any evidence! Or asking!”

He growled. “You stubborn woman! Just tell me the truth and then you can make it up to me!”

“You are so dumb sometimes!” Her heart rate was rising and she was going to lose control, but after the day she had, having to keep it all in, Oukraz was providing a nice outlet. She moved within reach of him. “Sometimes you make me want to-” She screeched angrily.

“What? You want to hit me?” He leaned down to her height. “Do it. Hit me.”

She didn’t hit him. She had never been one for violence. Instead, she pulled him into a kiss. She didn’t know why when she’d finally exploded it was with a kiss, but there she was, kissing someone for the first time in twenty-eight years.

Without hesitation, Oukraz grabbed her and lifted her up, kissing her back. His kisses were incredible and out did hers by miles. He moved them through the cafe to her back office, slamming the door closed. The room was small, but he had enough room to reach around her and push papers out of the way on her desk.

Bess clumsily undid her pants and tugged them off. He yanked them all the way off, throwing them across the room. He shoved his down to his knees. She got only a glance of his cock before he was against her again and rubbing her pussy with it. It seemed to move on its own as he ground against her.

They had been quiet the whole time, but now she moaned. He rested his hand on the wall above her head, caging her in as he rubbed her to an orgasm. It surprised her how fast he’d gotten her to cum. He slipped his cock in now that she was wet enough. He was large and stretched her some, but it made them both sigh in pleasure.

He pressed his hand on her back so when he fucked her, she didn’t move. She rested on a hand behind her while the other gripped his shirt, stretching it in her fist. Her forehead pressed against his chest, his head ducked down over hers, breath hot on the back of her neck.

It was hard, rough and made her orgasm twice more before he growled loudly and his tail pierced the wall loudly with a loud thud! He pulled out to cum on her thigh.

Oukraz breathed heavily, watching the thick stream of his cum lace over her soft thigh. This was not where he’d expected things to go. He hadn’t thought she’d kiss him in a million years and even more shocking was that he’d kissed her back. His frustration at the woman manifested again as he watched his cum begin to drip down her thigh. He put his cock away and zipped his pants back up and growled at her, annoyed at she’d gotten to feel anything towards her. He slammed her office door, leaving her alone in the cafe.

He spent the rest of the night making loaves of bread. Beating the dough, his mind churning their encounter over. He could still feel her head pressed against him and how she’d tugged on his shirt. He stared down at it. She’d balled it in a tight fist and he could still see the impressions of her fingers.

He slammed the dough on his counter, anger coursing through him. He was furious that she’d manipulated him into sex just to avoid talking about the reviews. He was furious at the reviews. He was furious he hadn’t spent more time with her. That last one was hard for him to handle. That he wanted more of Bess. So, he took it out on his dough and ignored it.

--

Bess blinked as Oukraz slammed her office door. Her body tingled and then started to ache. She stared up at the wall where his tail had punched through it. She was going to have to hide that. She looked at all the papers on the floor under her clothes. She sighed and slid off the desk and found something to wipe herself off. She felt more relaxed than she had in years, but she also felt tired. If this is what things had become, she was going to sell her cafe. She gathered the papers to organize at home.

It had taken no time to put everything back in order. Which was not what she’d wanted. She showered and made dinner with a glass of wine. She scrolled through her phone at the reviews. She hadn’t written them, but as she stared at the usernames, they became familiar.

“Shit.”

She called her son. He answered in his normally warm tone. “Hey, Mom!”

“Please tell me you did not spam Oukraz’s bakery with negative reviews. I recognize these from when you lived at home.” When there was silence she dropped her head onto the counter. “Vergil!”

“I’m sorry! I just got sick of how he treated you!”

“We’ve treated each other with the same amount of distaste! And as sweet as it is that you were trying to protect me, my personal issues with him have nothing to do with his business.”

“But if he’s crap to you, then he’s crap to others!”

“We don’t know that. I’m crap to him and am I crap to others?”

There was a long sigh. “Alright, what do you want me to do?”

“I want you to take all of them down right now.”

“Fine.”

“And I expect you to apologize to him. Tomorrow.”

“What!?”

“In person.”

Virgil relented. Once she hung up, she created a profile for her cafe and wrote a five-star review, going into detail about all the pastries and the employees and the owner and how it had been such a pleasure to work next door to him for six years. It had been hard, but not as hard as she’d have thought.

Writing out everything made her realize just how right it was. He was an incredibly good boss and just as good of a baker. And how many times had she found herself pausing as she walked by to watch him work? She smiled at she submitted the review with a plan to try to find some reconciliation between them.

--

The next day, as they were closing, Bess slipped into the bakery with a tray of different drinks. Her chest tightened when Oukraz saw her and frowned. He was on the other side of the counter, body stiff, wings tucked as close to his body as possible. She wondered if things had finally gone too far and he wanted nothing to do with her now.

“Uhm…” She spoke cautiously, trying to smile politely. “I just wanted to give these as an apology. I don’t know if I can ever make up for what my son did, but-”

“I didn’t know you had a son,” he said.

“Oh… Yes,” she laughed nervously. “My one and only. I didn’t know how protective he was. I’m really sorry-”

“You must have had him when you were young.”

She faltered, unsure what he was getting at. Was he winding up for a hard blow.

He shrugged at her silence and took his apron off. “Something he said made it seem like that.”

“Oh. I didn't think he'd say that much. He told you that?” 

Oukraz hummed. He was not looking at her. She didn’t like how quiet he was being.

She nodded and spoke to cover the silence. “I had him when I was eighteen. His father was a piece of shit and left the moment I told him I was pregnant.” After a long pause, she continued, “Well, I hope these are good enough, I don’t know what you or your employees drink, but they should keep until tomorrow. Again, I’m so-”

“That must have been hard.” He came out from behind the counter and sat in the chair closest to her.

She frowned. “What?” 

“Raising him on your own. Working two jobs.”

She blinked and frowned. “What did you two talk about? Did he tell you our life’s story?”

He shrugged. “Mainly that my behavior wasn’t okay.”

She scoffed. “I talked with him about that. I’m just as much to blame. My temper has always gotten the better of me.” She set the drinks on a table. “I’m sorry if he lectured you. Anyway, I’ll… Get out of your hair.”

“I hate fighting.”

She stopped and sighed. “Honestly, I do too.”

“I used to fight in the manticore wars. After all that, settling down to the quiet life started to kill my sanity. The bakery helped fill the day with something to do. I had been a baker before the wars so it came naturally.”

She nodded. “I opened the cafe to assert freedom and independence. You did it for mental health and to reclaim what you’d lost.” She smiled. “Thank you for sharing that with me.” She hesitated. “I hope… We can start mending this feud between us…”

He tapped the lid on one of the drinks. “What are each of these?”

She quickly told him.

He took the sweetest one and sipped it. “This is really good. They’re going to be jealous I had a fresh one.”

She waved his comment away. “No, I’m sure my cafe isn’t nearly that good, but you and your employees are welcome to a discount if you ever decide to get anything from there.”

“I’m sorry.”

Bess fell silent. She nodded.

“Your review has brought in a lot of customers.”

“I thought it was the least I could do, I’m glad it’s already helped.” When he fell silent again, she couldn’t help herself any longer. “Are you alright? I’ve only known you yelling, I don’t know if this is your actual norm or if something else is bothering you.”

He finally looked at her. “Bess…”

The tension turning her insides to knots was too much for her. It booked over and she kissed him. Immediately, she pulled away. “I’m so sorry!” Her cheeks grew hot. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me! It's been so long since I've been intimate with anyone, it's like I forgot all decency. You just looked so serious and forlorn…”

He stared at her. “Do you regret what we did last night?”

She shook her head. “No. I mean, I’d have preferred it to be more meaningful, but we both seemed to need to blow off some steam. I had to ban a customer and threaten to call the authorities and I’m sure those reviews were devastating to see.”

He nodded.

She sighed. “What’s really going on? What do you really want to say?”

When he looked away, returning to a passive, unsure version of himself. She frowned, her frustration getting the better of her. She snatched his drink from his hands and held it behind her back. “Tell me and you’ll get this back.”

He finally looked at her and frowned, reaching around her back to grab it. He pushed his arm against her back, making her step closer, his tail wrapping around her legs . “I want to get to know you more. I’ve been next door to you for six years and never knew you had a kid.”

His arm was strong and warm on her back. She’d forgotten what it had felt like to be held. ��What do you mean by get to know? What exactly do you want?” Her grip on the drink tightened.

He sighed. “I want to go on a date. See if we have more in common than just arguing.”

She let go of the drink and he removed his arm, taking a drink.

“I like that idea.” She smiled.

For the first time, he smiled at her. “Yeah?”

She nodded.

“Good, I thought we’d go to the park.”

“No nice dinner?”

He stared at her. “I think we both know we’re too picky to go to dinner.”

She laughed.

He smiled again. “That’s the first time I’ve ever heard you laugh.”

She rested her hand on his arm. “I like when you make me laugh. I hope you do it more.”

[mage-ical-character-person]

Fandroid lore bits from the last two streams compiled

Me rambling about things under the cut. Feel free to add on.

So the first clip. He says he’s been dead before? And he can’t be talking about in the game because they just started playing and well. You don’t get dead in that game you get “downed” so like? He has died before. When? How? Maybe in the war he mentioned on Twitter. Maybe something else. I don’t know.

ADHOC is compared to Hogwarts. I’ve never read or watched Harry Potter (too busy with warrior cats at the time it was popular and I’m not gonna read it now) so I’m not sure what to make of this. Someone else might though

QUALIA mention! Very cool but without knowing the ways that this map is more like QUALIA than ADHOC it doesn’t tell us much. Again, someone who knows more about this game and this map please weigh in

Ah the spiritual successor to Fandroid rambling about his father and fidget spinners while playing Hello Neighbor. A lot less negative this time though, and while the Hello Neighbor dad thing was about when he was “a little human boy-child” this one’s obviously about him as a robot. Both are of questionable validity in terms of is it lore or is it a joke. This one especially, he leads with “before I ventured off into the world” and honey you aren’t allowed out of your room. Still, I thought I’d include it

Melody just. Has infinite battery life? Near infinite? I guess.

Melody and other Drone Buddies are waterproof. Nothing groundbreaking but worth including here I think.

Okay! The Beep-0 stream! This is where things get interesting. Right off the bat, we learn that Fandroid is removing annoying flesh eating viruses from his body. Now, this is not how viruses work. At all. Viruses don’t eat anything. There’s flesh-eating bacteria! But not viruses. And you can’t manually remove them because they’re too small. Nothing about this is normal. Why are there flesh eating viruses at ADHOC. What are they doing there, that’s not natural.

Melody has advanced forcefield and hover technology. Explains how she can survive a nuclear blast (which Fandroid brought up way back in that stream where she dropped a toaster on him). Honestly if Beep-0 got his way and got to launch a missile at Melody I don’t think it would do much. Speaking of Beep-0, Melody says he’s got a Matrix-type, botnet superbrain. I’m not entirely sure what this entails

Beep-0 is a security system/smart thermostat/missile manager. Good for him. Not much to say here other than who’d trust him with missiles.

OKAY. This one’s a lot. Let’s break it down. Beep-0 stands for bypass portals. Ignoring for a second where you get Beep-0 from bypass portals. (Seriously where’d the ee come from) This does mean something that I can’t quite wrap my head around at the moment. Basically though he’s like a souped up VPN that ADHOC used to get past security restrictions? I think. This lines up with what he says about interfacing with security protocols yada yada. Next up, Beep-0 claims that everything done at ADHOC had to go through him. I feel like he might be overselling himself a bit, but he obviously had a not insignificant degree of control over the facility. Why he was given this control when every piece of Beep-0 content we had before this stream indicated that he was. Not very loyal to ADHOC is beyond me. We’ve also got the use of the past tense here, which seems pretty significant considering According to Beep-0 all the humans at ADHOC are dead I’m almost certain that Beep-0 himself, “the war” and/or that flesh eating virus that’s bugging Fandroid is involved somehow. Of course a lot of humans died at ADHOC, but all of them? Gone? We know they were around before Fandroid initially went inactive, so this had to have happened during that time.

ADHOC is underfunded, QUALIA is ridiculously wealthy. This lines up with what we know. Honestly this clip isn’t anything groundbreaking but Business Bot mention! Business Bot mention that implies only one Business Bot when we know from the RP that there are (were?) several

Anyway that’s about it from me on this for now

[skylarmoon71]

Eobard Thawne (Flash) - Extra 2

Even though Eobard no longer had memories of his time with you, the mere fact that he’s here is proof enough. He’d given up his mission, his plan built on hate and vengeance. Walking into the lab every morning after that was the best thing. You would catch glimpses of him in the neighboring labs. He was a scientist with many talents, so everyone wanted to work with him. He blended in pretty quickly.

The times you were able to see him, it was just little glances and bashful smiles that he always returned. You felt a bit ridiculous. You’d literally jumped a much more intimidating version of this man. 

So why were you acting like a giddy school girl? 

It has only been a week and you hadn’t truly worked up to really having an actual conversation.

“You have a crush on the new guy.”

Jimmy’s words made you choke on your juice. Eobard’s eyes caught you from a table next to your own and you turned your head as you glared at Jimmy, wiping your mouth with a napkin.

“Sorry, it’s just so obvious. You’ve been staring at him for days. He can’t seem to stop looking at you either but none of you are brave enough to make the first move. I thought I was in a rom com for a second.”

“You being the annoying friend.” Jimmy grins.

“You know it’s the truth though. Just talk to him. It’s clear that you’re both into each other.” You try to steal another glance at Eobard. He’s talking with some people on his team. You place your cheek in your palm.

“It’s not that simple..” You mumble.

“Why not?”

You wish you could explain why it was so hard. Something along the lines of he was an evil speedster and you managed to change his ideation with the power of love and a really great night of passionate, explosive sex.

You let out another heavy sigh.

“You wouldn’t get it.”

So you look back down at your lunch with a frown.

Jimmy just rolled his eyes.

“If you’re just going to sulk then I have to live up to the role I’ve been appointed.” You aren’t sure what that means until he stands with his lunch.

“Hey guys can we join your table!”

You panic, shaking your head vigorously.

“No, no!”

You continue to mouth, but he ignores you.

“Sure, come on over.” They offer.

Your shoulders drop in defeat when he begins walking over. You can’t just sit there, surely they’ll think that you hate them. So you grab your lunch and move to have a seat. Your intention is to take the empty space that isn't close to Eobard. That way you could avoid further embarrassing yourself. Jimmy beats you to it and you almost hiss at him. So reluctantly, you move to Eobard, planting yourself down as you try to remain as quiet as possible.

That doesn’t work, because he smiles at you.

“Hey, (Y/N) right?”

“Yep, that’s me.”

Oh how you want to disappear.

“I don’t think we’ve actually had a chance to talk. I heard that you saved the lab. That’s amazing. You also created the new prototype that detects and eliminates cancerous cells. You’re a genius.”

You’re a bit flattered that he’s done so much research on you and your work.

“I heard you’re a genius yourself. Most of us have specialties but you’ve been bouncing around in every field. “

“Definitely a genius.” He jokes.

The rest of the lunch is the table going back and forth. Every now and then you can feel Eobard’s eyes on you, but you don’t confront him. You just try to keep the conversations around your little group going. Lunch is over and everyone is dispersing. You mean to meet up with Jimmy to walk back, but he’s already gone. Eobard however is right next to you, throwing away the trash in his tray as he turns back to you. You’re a bit stiff, even when he sends you a little smile. You walk back in silence and Eobard finally feels the need to make a statement.

“I don’t know if I’m reading this wrong but do you dislike me?”

You stop, shaking your head.

“Of course not. Why w-would you think that?”

“Well you barely look at me and you get guarded whenever I’m around. I’m no profiler but it seems like you don’t like me.”

Your head lowers.

“I..like you..” You say softly.

He takes in the subtle tint on your cheeks, and his grin is wide.

“I like you too.”

Your heart is racing a beat too quickly. Neither of you realize that the room is empty. Not that it would make much of a difference. Since you’ve gotten this far, might as well just dive in.

“Would you like to come over some time? You seem to be new in the city, I can give you a download of all the sights. Maybe we can check them out together. “

“I’d like that.”

He’s fully turned in your direction, and you're both just standing there just gazing at each other.

“This might sound weird but there’s something about you that just..” 

His gaze drifts to your lips. You’re barely keeping it together as it is. This situation isn't helping at all. Eobard takes a step.

“W-What are you..doing?” You ask.

He shakes his head.

“I don’t know.”

He leans in, pressing a kiss to your lips and your hands automatically pull him closer. His brows knit in satisfaction, hand circling your body. You wish this will last forever. He pulls back, and when his eyes meet your own, there’s a faint glow in his irises that vanish as fast as they appeared.

“(Y/N).”

His tone sounds different, if you didn’t know any better, you would have actually thought this was…

“Eobard?”

Your hesitance shows, and he licks his lip in that irresistible way. That devilish grin on his face is a sight you truly thought you would never see again. You jump into his arms, hugging him tightly.

“EOBARD!!”

He lifts you off the ground with a laugh.

“I hate to admit it, but you did win."

You laugh along with him, taking his face into your hands as you kiss him happily.