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starrynite7114 · 4 years ago

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always you (angel reyes)

A/N: Good morning everyone! I know I haven’t posted in a while, and you all know why. Thank you all again for being very understanding, it was a rough couple of weeks, and I’m trying to push through the best I can. This story was supposed to be a one shot for a prompt request I received some time ago, but I’m glad I’m able to finally fulfill it. I wrote out most of it already so it should be posted every 2-3 days. I’m also finishing up Roommates this week, at least trying to!

Hope you all have been having a good week thus far! Hopefully it is also warming up! Exams have been killing me, but my last one is later today, so yay!

The new Mayans trailer looked amazing! Definitely getting the creative juices flowing, even for EZ.

Anyways, thank you all again, you are all the utter best!

Special shoutout: To @blackmissfrizzle, you fucking crazy, violent person, my second brain. Because of you, I got a Tiktok guy on here. But thank you for listening to my crazy ideas about this story, a story that was supposed to be a one-shot turned into a series cause of all of those videos, love you though. And to @angelreyesgirl you’re the one who helped me figure out as to why certain things happen in the story, thank you, I just, I love you, you already know this, no more sappiness from me today, maybe. Also, happy birthday!

Groupchat for updates! Please join since the tags could be a bit iffy at times!

If you would like to be added to the tag list, please let me know! My tag list is a little messy, but please let me know if you want to be added!

Masterlist

Word count: 8657

Warnings: Mentions of stalker behavior, angst, smut

169: “ What a pretty sight. ”

187: “ Already? Do I really have that much of an effect on you? ”

You sighed, the knocks on the door following the call you just received from Coco made you want to pull your hair out. This has been ongoing since you two broke up two years ago. It was routine at this point and you were slightly getting tired of it. He chose to let you go and here you were opening your door so Angel could spend the night after a drunken stupor.

“Sorry again hermana, you know I try to bring his big ass home, but you know how stubborn he is.” Coco assisted Angel inside your apartment with Gilly helping him out.

They assisted Angel down to your couch, he was barely conscious. He had this obnoxious smile on his face as he settled on your couch.

“Where’s my girl?” Angel called out as he grabbed a pillow, resting his head.

Gilly looked up at you and you shook your head. “She’s asleep bro, just go sleep.”

“Okay, I’ll go to her.” Angel attempted to stand up, but Gilly held him down.

“Hey, remember, you don’t like bothering her when she’s asleep.” Gilly reminded Angel.

“You’re right, I just want to tell her I love her.” Angel laid back down, his eyes closing.

Before long, Angel’s soft snores indicated to you all he was asleep. Coco looked at you as you looked at Angel, confused as always as to why he had to come to you whenever he was drunk. They’ve tried asking him, both Coco and Gilly, and whenever you saw him in the morning, you just gave him coffee and chose not to talk to him. He tried to make small talk with you, but you didn’t entertain it.

Angel chose to break up with you two years ago, your year and a half relationship down the drain. You didn’t fight him when he ended your relationship. You accepted it and attempted to move on.

Problem was, Angel didn’t let you go. His presence was still felt even though you didn’t see him. Then three months after your breakup, the drunken visits came. At times, he would talk to you when he would come drunk, but you chose to ignore it and just took care of him.

You wanted to turn him away, but you love Angel. It was hard not to do so. Whenever you would think you had the courage to turn him away, you would let him back in your bed just so you could hold him. It was unfair to you, you wanted to move on, yet, when you had the chance to hold him, you never passed it up. You were addicted and you would break the habit eventually, but Angel was just, well, he was Angel.

“Y/N, we can take him home if you want.” Coco hated doing this to you. He was there from the beginning and he didn’t want to keep dragging you back in Angel’s life. He knew how hard you were trying to move on, but it seemed like Angel held on.

“No, it’s okay Coco, just let him sleep.” You pushed your glasses up the bridge of your nose, sighing as you draped a throw blanket over Angel.

“We can stay if you want.” Gilly offered. Much like Coco, he felt for you. You were a sweet girl, always nice to the boys and never made a fuss when Angel chose to break dates to hang out with them. For him, you were the ideal girl, you were reasonable, beautiful, and a hell of a cook. When Angel broke up with you, they planned to keep in touch, bug you every once in a while for dinner. But then they realized, Angel had no plans of letting you go either.

You chuckled and shook your head. “It’s fine, I’m sure you guys want a break from this guy.”

“We do, we really do.” Gilly agreed. “But we want to be here for you too, why did we bring him here man?”

“You gonna try to argue with Angel? He’s fucking unreasonable when he’s sober, it’s another thing when Don Quixote over here is drunk.” Coco shook his head. “If you need anything, just call me.”

“Call us.”

You nodded your head. You gave the two Mayans a hug before closing the door behind them. When you turned back, you gasped when you found Angel standing.

“Let’s go sleep?” His eyes were opening and closing and he was slightly swaying. You took one of his arms and led him to your room.

This was how it always ended. Regardless if you put Angel in your guest bedroom or the couch, he always ended in your bed.

You assisted him on your bed, going back to close your door. Angel took off his clothes, leaving him in just his boxers. “I love you.”

Your heart clenched hearing him say that. He always told you he loves you. Without a fail, he always did, when he was visiting you intoxicated. Yet, you never felt it, especially with the way things ended. And he never said it when you were together. You did, and that’s when things went downhill for you two. Holding on to the doorknob, you tried to stop the tears from coming. Angel was watching you, waiting for you to come join him on your bed. He just wanted to hold you.

“You coming?”

You nodded your head and went to your side of the bed as Angel scooted up to his. Moving the blanket, you two settled under the blanket and Angel pulled you flush against him. He caressed your face, before leaving a kiss on your forehead.

Looking up at him, he was looking down at you, he was caressing your face again.

“What a pretty sight.” He sighed.

Your head rested on his chest and you eventually heard his breathing even out. You’re not sure how much more you could take of this.

You had to move on.

It was time.

The next morning, you hoped it’s one of the days that Angel left while you were asleep. And he did, which you were thankful for. It was always awkward when Angel was still here when you woke up. Rolling over to the side, you sat up, slipping your glasses back on. Yawning, you checked your phone and had a few messages from Coco and Gilly, one from EZ.

Choosing to reply later, you placed your phone back on your dresser and stood up. Stretching as you let out a yawn, you walked out of your room and froze when you heard movement in your kitchen. Rushing back in your room to get the bat you had for protection, you made your way back towards the kitchen, peaking in and found Angel. You contemplated pretending to go back to sleep, but Angel’s voice stopped you.

“Don’t even think about pretending to go back to sleep, I made you breakfast and you have work in an hour and a half.” Angel called out.

You sighed. Placing your bat at its spot in your room, you go to the kitchen and found Angel making a plate. He handed you the plate and you murmured a thank you. Sitting at the dining table, you made sure to sit on the other side since the two chairs beside you were full of presents you have yet to wrap for Christmas. You still had time, but your dining table was basically full.

Angel smirked when he saw where you were situated. You acted as if he wasn’t with you for four years. He placed his plate down at the other end of the table. Moving your stuff to your coffee table, you opened your mouth to protest, but Angel already placed the presents down.

“You don’t have to move them, there’s plenty of room.” You protested.

“Away from you, yes. But I want to sit next to you.” Angel moved his plate and sat beside you. He shot you a smile before picking up his fork. “Come on, eat up.”

“Angel, this really isn’t necessary. I can just grab something on my way to work.” You didn’t like spending time with Angel, especially in this way since it still struck a chord with you. The familiarity of it was a painful memory of what was let go two years ago.

“It would be rude for you to not eat after I made your favorite.” Angel knew you couldn’t resist a good omelette filled with spinach, bacon, sausage and cheese. “Please, let me do this for you, you did me a solid, again.”

Picking up your fork, you began eating. Letting the silence enveloped between you two. This was better. You didn’t want to talk to Angel. You didn’t want any thank you’s or apologies, you just wanted him to go so you could pretend that the other didn’t exist again.

Angel watched as you ate, keeping your eyes on your food. He hated how he did this to you, how you couldn’t even look at him. Every time he became highly intoxicated, Angel refused to go anywhere but your place, since it’s when he needed you most. Angel hardly drank himself to a stupor, but when he did, he was mostly troubled and was trying to forget the issues that were weighing heavily on him. Even though it’s been two years, you were one of those issues. He saw you around town often and it hurt him whenever he did. You were so close yet so far away. He knew that Coco and Gilly hang out with you every once in a while. Every day, it was a struggle for him to not see you, talk to you, hold you and be with you.

So he came up with this ridiculous plan after you accepted him into your home one night after he got drunk.

Whenever missing you became too unbearable, he got wasted and refused to go anywhere but your place. He was always aware enough to know he would be brought to you. And once he was with you, you would take care of him. He felt somewhat bad, but he didn’t know how else to approach you.

“Are you busy tonight?” Angel broke the silence between you two.

“What?” You had to make sure you heard him correctly. Looking over at Angel, he was waiting for you to reply. “I have a dinner thing.” A lie, and you were almost sure Angel could see right through it, but you didn’t want to think that. You could pull this off.

“A dinner thing?” Angel raised an eyebrow, amused by your choice of words. “Sounds like a fake thing.”

“Doesn’t matter to me if you believe me or not, I have plans.” You had finished your food. Picking up your plate, you placed it in the sink and turned to face Angel who was still sitting down. “Don’t worry about the dishes, I can do them. Also, I’m not really sure why you always decide to keep coming to my place when you get drunk, but I would really appreciate it if you didn’t come here anymore.” Your best friend, Marie had advised you to create boundaries, to tell Angel that you no longer want him coming over whenever he was intoxicated.

That it was time for you both to stay away from one another like you intended to do so when he broke up with you.

“Querida.” Angel stood up, but you shook your head, holding your hand up.

“You wanted to break up, we’re done Angel. As much as I want to be there for you, I can’t keep doing this and hurting myself. You chose to let me go, so go.” You left the kitchen and entered your room, locking the door.

Angel watched as you walked away, telling himself to run after you, but he couldn’t. He’ll let you walk away for now, but after you put such a decisive end to this whole thing, he couldn’t just let go. It may be selfish, but living without you for the past two years further opened his eyes.

He wanted to be with you and just you.

It’s always been you.

=================

A month without any incident with Angel. You're glad he has finally decided to leave you alone. Coco had texted you a few times expressing that he was proud of you about putting your foot down with Angel. EZ has been frequenting the library more as of late, and he’s either had Marie with him, his girlfriend, or he came by himself.

A new year and new decade ushered in a new era for you.

You caught EZ coming in, a smile appearing on your face.

“We got that book you’ve been waiting for, I saved you the copy since it was the only copy we got.” You grabbed the book and handed it over to him.

“Thanks Y/N.” He looked around. “Um, did Coco come? Or any other Mayan?”

“No,” you gave him a confused look. “You’re the only Mayan that comes during business hours. The others usually come when the library is closed waiting for me to make sure I made it home safely when I was still dating Angel.”

EZ opened his mouth to apologize but you held your hand up.

“Ezekiel, I’m not fragile, it’s fine to mention your brother.” You laughed lightheartedly to lighten the mood. You knew EZ tried his best not to mention his older brother. “So you and Marie are getting serious?”

“Something like that,” the sheepish smile on Ezekiel’s face made you want to pinch his cheeks. “Just put a good word for me.”

“A good word? My best friend hates hanging out at the library with me, yet, she comes here to what? Watch you read?” You loved teasing Ezekiel. You were glad when he got out of prison, the way everything turned out for him, it was awful but you were grateful he was getting another chance at life. “You should at least take her out on a date.”

“Look, don’t judge me, I just got out of prison.”

“It’s been two years.”

“Alright, fine, Marie is just intimidating. One day she seems impressed with me, the next she’s not into it.”

“I think you’re reading too much into the situation. You two have been talking for four months now and you still haven’t asked her out. Marie is simple, start with the movies.” You suggested.

“That’s fucking lame though.”

“Okay Netflix.”

“How about the fair? You and Angel can be like our chaperone.” EZ was trying to help Angel, soften you up some, but you were pretty good at blocking EZ’s charm.

You looked at EZ for a moment, a small laugh escaping your lips. “Nice try.”

EZ smiled and took the book to his usual corner at the library. You knew your best friend would be bursting through the door in the next thirty minutes. Marie and EZ have been playing the flirting game for the last year and have been officially talking for the last four months. It was cute and you were happy that Marie found EZ and vice versa.

You got on the computer, trying to organize the library website like you promised your boss that you would do. The door opened and you expected the usual coffee Marie brought you.

“I feel like I should start requesting for a pastry since you two use my library as your hangout spot.” You teased. “I’m glad you’re here, coffee will help me through the rest of my shift.”

“I didn’t bring coffee querida, but I can run and get you some.”

You froze. That wasn’t Marie’s voice. Looking up, you found Angel with his staple kutte on his back along with a navy blue button up. His body has changed over the last two years, his muscles were more prominent. You weren’t blind, you could appreciate Angel taking care of his body.

“Can I help you?” The professional tone killed Angel, but he was determined to break through that.

“Came to check out a book, maybe you can help me?” Angel leaned against the countertop of the kiosk desk. His scent hit you and it made you want to smack him. How dare this man? You wanted to move on, and you’ve been doing so well.

“I didn’t know you could read.”

“You know that’s a lie, I used to read to you while I fucked you.”

“Angel.” You hissed out his name, not wanting to yell.

Angel chuckled at your reaction. “Is it not true?”

“Listen, loitering is not allowed here.”

“That’s literally what everyone does around here.” Angel looked over at EZ and he shot his baby brother a smirk. “Well, I was looking for Stanford, I’ll be seeing you.”

You chose not to reply, saying ‘yeah right’ in your head. Marie walked in coffee and a box of Krispy Kreme in hand. The sigh of relief you let out was definitely noticed by her and her eyes immediately roamed the library to see if your creepy admirer was around, but instead she found EZ and Angel.

“Never pegged Angel as a library type of guy.” She placed your drink on the countertop.

“He actually loves poetry, he really likes the European writers, British novels mostly Pride and Prejudice, Frankenstein, Jane Eyre, Shakespeare.” You mouthed off Angel’s interest which never surprised Marie. When you love someone, you made it a mission to know that person, so you would know their ins and outs. You become invested in any relationship you forge since you rarely make friends as it was. It wasn’t about quantity, it was all about quality for you. A hard lesson you learned over the years. “He’s a big fan of Scarlet Letter and Invisible Man. But he really likes poetry from all generations, when we were still together, I got him a few poetry books from a few authors he liked.” You paused, realizing the tangent you went on. It wasn’t uncommon whenever you spoke about Angel.

Marie enjoyed it because she got to learn about her old obnoxious neighbor that never deserved her best friend. You met Angel through Marie and in some ways, she regretted letting it happen, but when she saw how happy you were, how could she be so opposed? Even with knowing Angel’s history, she had faith. But then Angel decided that the single life was more of a life for him, something you never knew about. You never wanted to know about it and she didn’t push you.

“It’s okay, I love your tangents, even if they’re about that asshat.” Marie rolled her eyes. “So, have you given any thought of going on a date with Tyler?”

“You mean your co-worker you always refer to as a man slut?”

“Bitch, we’re trying to get the pussy wet, not a serious relationship.”

“That’s a no.”

You and Marie jumped, not expecting to hear Angel’s voice.

“Where did you even come from?”

“You setting her up?” Angel ignored Marie’s question. He was going to bug you for the name of that author you always raved about when you two were together, but he became intrigued when he caught the tail end of your tangent about his interests. It was endearing for him to hear that you still knew so much about him, but his mood soured when he heard Marie trying to set you up. “Tyler, the douche that always gets drunk out of his mind at the clubhouse?”

“Again, just trying to get her dry spell to end.”

“I volunteer.” Angel smirked.

“Not interested.” You replied as you turned to face Angel. “We talked about this, please, just respect my wishes. I don’t even know why you’re here.”

“Hate to break it to you querida, the library is public property, unless I’m disrupting the peace, I have every right to be here as much as you do.” Angel placed his chin on his hand, smiling sweetly at you.

You grabbed the coffee and the box of donuts. “I’m going to take my break.”

Your co-worker, Sienna took over the kiosk desk, Marie making her way over to Marie. She knew you needed some alone time. As she passed Angel, she patted his back.

“Give her space, don’t push it.”

Angel wasted enough time. He knew you. It’s not that you didn’t want to be around him, you were just protecting your heart. He gave you five minutes before he followed after you, finding the trunk of your Toyota RAV4 opened. Walking over to you, he opened his mouth to speak, you beat him to it.

“Eugene, please, I’m on my break, I would appreciate it if you didn’t follow me.” Your day was starting to become shit since seeing Angel helped you realize that you weren’t over him. It’s been two years but due to his drunken escapades, it was hard for you to move on.

“Who the fuck is Eugene?”

“No one.” You didn’t want to tell Angel about Eugene. It’s not like he would care, but you haven’t exactly told Angel about how your kindness to Eugene went from endearing to him becoming obsessive. “Can I help you?”

“I was going to take a smoke break then I saw your trunk open.” Angel shrugged, taking note of the name Eugene so he could ask Marie later. “Can I join you?”

“No, I’m done.” You closed the box of donut, picking up your drink as you stood up.

“Come on, throw me a bone here. Can you give me a chance to explain?”

“Explain what exactly? Why you broke up with me? Why you kept me in your back pocket by being your go to house when you're drunk?”

“You gonna let me explain or are you gonna continue interrupting me?”

“I don’t care what you do, just please stay away from me. You’ve made your stance very clear two years ago. I don’t care why you came to me while you’re drunk, but it doesn’t matter. Don’t come to my job, don’t come to my apartment, just please stay away from me.”

“You don’t mean that.” Angel frowned. He didn’t expect things to go like this. Maybe he was an asshole or an idiot, but he expected you to welcome him with open arms.

“I do, I want to move on, build new relationships and be happy. I didn’t break your heart, I didn’t hurt you, if you don’t love me that’s fine. If you feel bad for what happened, you’re good, you’re forgiven.” You pressed the button that automatically closed your car. “I’m suffocating right? I’m too nice right? Then leave me alone.”

“You really just gonna walk away?”

You were about to answer Angel when you heard a familiar voice call out your name. Looking to where you heard the voice, you saw Jay, your ex-boyfriend. Angel cussed under his breath when he saw him. Jay was a sore subject for Angel. You two rarely spoke about Jay and it was mostly due to the fact that Angel never brought him up. When you did bring up Jay, it was a rare occurrence. It’s not that Angel didn’t care about your ex-boyfriend, in fact, he cared too much. Too many times he’s heard people spoke about how epic you and Jay were together. The perfect couple that would have stayed together if you decided to go with Jay to Germany.

“Jay?” You hopped out of your trunk and was in disbelief. Jay, from what you knew, was still in Berlin, and wouldn’t be back for another three years. You kept in touch with him since you had a quite amicable break-up.

You two had dated for eight years before you two eventually parted ways. High school sweethearts, intended to last forever, but forever wasn’t a thing. You two broke up amicably and remained friends. It was hard not to be friends with a person you spent eight years of your life with.

It was your ex-boyfriend.

He couldn’t forget his name, he knew everything about the fucking guy. The first love, the one you would always love, that was the cliche, right? He remembered that he briefly met Jay before he left for Berlin once again. He was bringing you home after a catch up dinner with other friends and he saw just how your smile shone brightly around him. Jay was looking down at you, returning your smile as you animatedly spoke to him about something. You turned to face Angel and what he missed was how your smile changed, it was that smile specifically for your Angel. You had made your way towards him, wrapping your arms around him. Jay first met Angel then and much to your surprise, Jay took a liking to Angel, especially since he was a big fan of his Harley. Angel didn’t show much interest towards Jay, but you knew it bugged your then boyfriend how close you were to Jay.

Angel was not friends with any of his exes, but he also wasn’t with them for a long amount of time. If anything, you were his longest relationship. And seeing you react the way you did with Jay, he regretted it further that he let you go.

“Eugene is still coming here? You told me you handled that.” Jay was annoyed, you told him that you handled your too friendly library consumer. Jay stood at 6’4, 210 pounds, the Marines shaped him well.

You looked at Angel and Jay did as well.

“If you’re going to bother her when you’re drunk, you should at least get rid of her stalker.” Jay didn’t have a problem with Angel, but he knew Angel had a problem with him. He could see it when they first met. He couldn’t blame him, he rarely knew of exes that were friends, but Jay couldn’t exactly let you go.

You two grew up together, you knew him best.

“Excuse me? Who the fuck do you think you are?” You saw how quickly Angel’s face turned sour and you knew you could have a fight in your hands.

“Aright, let’s not do anything crazy.” You got in between them, with you facing Angel. “We’re done.”

You locked your car before making your way inside the library once again, dragging Jay with you, and leaving Angel to his own devices. The broken look on your face, he wanted to take that away, especially since he caused it. He loves you, he really did, he was just an idiot.

The fact that Jay was seemingly back in town, Angel had to make a move.

And you should know better, Angel was anything but a quitter.

=================

Angel walked in the library and found you talking to one of your co-workers. He saw her nudge you and your eyes met. Quickly you looked away, shushing your co-worker. Angel took his usual spot opening the book he had borrowed earlier in the week. You weren’t surprised Angel burned through books, people counted him out due to his affiliates, but you knew better than to judge a book by its cover.

Jay hasn’t been back since he saw him two weeks prior. Angel frequented the library and never saw a sign of him.

“You look beautiful Y/N.” Eugene, a regular at the library, complimented you. What started off as you being kind, feeling bad for a man who appeared to be a loner, was starting to make you feel uneasy. For the last three years, he progressively became bolder and you could tell that he was getting to the point where aggressive behavior was going to come out. Regardless of how nice you were, you always made sure he knew that you two were friends.

“Thank you Eugene.” You faked this small smile on your lips, but you didn’t want to provoke him. Sienna stayed beside you, she was more straightforward and had no problem telling Eugene to fuck off.

“Have you thought of my invitation for dinner tonight? My mother would love to meet you? I speak about you often with her.” The uneasiness at the pit of your stomach was unexplainable and Angel noticed the change on your face.

Sienna looked at you, her eyes slightly widening. She’s had enough of Eugene. It was small talk at first, but as of late, the man was beginning to be more bold. Starting with grabbing a drink or coffee, it evolved to having dinner at his place. You never entertained the idea and always let him down, but he wasn’t understanding.

“I’m sorry Eugene, I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“Why not?” You saw how his face slightly scrunched up, his voice slightly raising. A few of the library patrons looked over before going back to their book. “Stop being such a tease and just go to my place.”

Both you and Sienna were appalled by his suggestion. You never teased him.

“Excuse me? I’ve never done such a thing.”

“Oh please, with the skirts and dresses you wear, how do you expect anyone to not be teased by your clothing. Mother is right, you’re a slut, but no mind, I can repent you.”

Angel heard enough. You saw him from the corner of your eye.

“Call security, I’ll handle Angel.” You walked out of the kiosk and intercepted Angel.

“Let go of me, he’s not going to get away speaking to you like that.” The restrained tone in Angel’s voice made you nervous for Eugene.

“Please, Angel.” The way you whispered his name with a plea, it made Angel sigh deeply, his tongue darting out to wet his lips as he looked up at the ceiling.

“Make sure he’s gone when we get back.” He instructed Sienna. You led him to the restricted area of the library which was situated at the back. Older books or original versions of books were kept here, with only employees having access and at times guests who were accompanied by employees.

When you two were all the way at the back of the restricted area, you leaned against one of the bookshelves as Angel paced back and forth in front of you.

“How long has he been harassing you?” Angel questioned, continuing his pace.

“Angel.”

“How. Long.” He let out through gritted teeth. There was no argument. He let you take him away, you owed him this.

You didn’t want to tell Angel, it didn’t matter anyway. All you knew was that you had to take care of this, he was making your anxiety spike up. “Three years.”

“Three years?!” Angel’s voice echoed throughout the library.

“Angel.” You hissed, keeping your voice low.

“Are you fucking kidding me? And you never told me?” Angel didn’t heed your warning. He was livid. How could you not tell him, especially while you two were together?

“Eugene is harmless.” He shot you a look and you sighed. “He was harmless.” You amended your statement. “Angel, please, it’s okay.”

“No the fuck is not, the way he spoke to you?” Angel felt his temper rise again. Fuck security, he would beat the idea in to Eugene that he was to never breathe the same air as you again. “Wait, Jay knew? And you didn’t tell me?”

You cussed under your breath. You accidentally told Jay about Eugene. He was FaceTiming you when Eugene came in after hours. You were able to shoo him away since Jay was on the phone. You never even thought of telling Angel, you didn’t want Angel to make a big deal out of it and you honestly thought you were reading too much into it.

“I,” you sighed. “It wasn’t on purpose. Jay was FaceTiming me when Eugene walked in after hours.”

“Did you have him pretend to be your boyfriend?” Angel knew he was being unreasonable, but it irked him that your ex-boyfriend knew about your stalker and he didn’t. He was the one who was in Santo Padre. He was the one who could deal with it.

“No, Angel, it was years ago.”

“My fucking point exactly, it’s been years and you never told me. I was your boyfriend then, not him. How could you not tell me?”

“I don’t know, it was harmless, I didn’t want to make a big deal out of nothing.”

“Out of nothing?” Angel exclaimed, shaking his head at your ridiculousness. “We’re gonna fucking talk after this, this should have never been an issue.”

Before he could leave, you blocked his way.

“Move.”

You shook your head.

“Don’t act like I can’t just lift you out of the way.”

You weren’t exactly the lightest, and hardly looked like any of Angel’s previous girlfriends. You had meat on your bones and some people may poke fun at your weight, but Angel always made you feel like a queen. He loved your curves, kissed and worshipped every part of your body. Well until he broke up with you.

“Angel, please, just stay with me.” You wrapped your arms around him and he wrapped his arms around you.

“No, he’ll never learn his lesson unless,”

You cut Angel off by bringing his lips down to yours. Whenever Angel became irritated or upset, small touches or kisses from you would always calm his anger. You took a chance knowing Angel doesn’t exactly want you anymore, so you’re not sure what this would do for the situation, but you had to try. Angel immediately responded to your kiss, his hands cupping your face. One of his hands slid down to your neck, slightly moving you so you were against the bookshelves. His hand moved down, brushing against your breast causing you to moan. Angel’s tongue slipped in, deepening your kiss. He pressed you against the shelf, pulling away and pressing his forehead against yours. The anger that had overtook his body was gone, and was now replaced for a burning desire for you.

“You still taste so good.” Angel kissed you again, your back arching so your front was pressed against his front. One of his hands was sliding under your skirt, causing you to pull away.

“No Angel.” You shook your head, moving away from him to fix yourself.

Angel groaned, his dick was hard and he was at a library with no means of relieving it. He thought of anything that could help his erection to go away, his third grade teacher who was horrific to him did the trick. Turning to face you, he found you looking around before you took his hand and led him further down the restricted area of the Santo Padre library. It was an old library, built by the Spaniards when they were doing their missions along California. Bringing him to the last row where you knew there was an entrance to the inventory the library had for the restricted section. You knew no one ever went in there till closing. You didn’t want Angel to do anything to you, but you could definitely help alleviate some of his anger.

“Querida, where the fuck are we?” Angel looked around and the shelves were against the walls, a few shelves were in the middle of the room, otherwise, there were books everywhere. You led him to a desk that Sienna used to organize the unlabeled books. You pushed Angel down onto the office chair. He watched as you sunk to your knees, your eyes focused on unbuckling his belt and unbuttoning his jeans. “Hey, you don’t have to do this.”

“I know, but I want to.” You lifted your eyes to meet his and the softness in his eyes was such a stark contrast from earlier where they were dark, anger obviously apparent. Now, it was adoration and lust that clouded his iris. You tugged on his jeans, which Angel assisted you with, lifting himself up so you could pull down his jeans and boxers. Smirking, you wrapped your hand around his semi-hard cock, using some of his pre-cum to help your hand glide down with ease. Angel groaned, leaning his head back. It was his weakness, watching your beautiful lips around his cock, trying to take in as much of his cock, he was a goner whenever you did that. The way your eyes would water, your cheeks hallowed, your mouth full of him, the image alone could make him cum. But he always held back, letting himself enjoy you.

“Fuck, look at you mi sol,” he watched as you spat down on his cock, holding his thick member with one hand. Placing a kiss on the tip of his cock, you looked up at Angel as you opened your mouth to take him in. Just as he taught you, you took Angel until you could not take any of him anymore, moving your head back up, his cock sheath with your saliva. You took him in your mouth once more, Angel gathering your hair in one hand. He loved your eyes on him. Those hooded eyes under those thick black rimmed glasses of yours. You move your mouth up and down his cock, hollowing your cheeks and swallowing around him whenever his tip reaches your gag reflex. You let go of him with a pop, your hand replacing your mouth. “That’s right baby, take your dick and let me fuck that pretty mouth of yours.” Angel tried not to lose himself with you, but any part of you that was connected always felt so good for him. He didn’t know what it was but everything he did with you was a hundred times more intense when compared to others.

Placing two hands on his cock, you had your mouth on the tip of his cock, running your tongue over and over again over Angel’s sensitive cock. He moaned out your name, gripping your hair tighter. You were licking his cock like it was a tootsie roll lollipop and you were trying to get to the center. You moved so that your tongue was moving up and down his shaft, getting to the top and engulfing his tip with your mouth. Angel groaned, throwing his head back, licking his lips as you continued to bob your head up and down. His hand assisted you, the tip of his cock hitting the back of your throat, swallowing around it.

“Holy fuck princesa, keep going I’m about to cum.” Angel moaned. “You want me to cum in your mouth baby? You gonna swallow daddy’s cum?”

You chose not to answer and continued your ministrations. Just as you felt Angel’s cock pulsing in your mouth, you pulled away, placing a kiss on his cock. Angel slammed his hand on the desk, grabbing your hair.

“You really want to play with daddy?” His face was so close to you, your hand still around his cock. You tightened your hold, moving your hand up and down causing Angel to close his eyes. He moaned out your name, further dampening your panties. “Put your mouth back on my cock so I can fuck that pretty little mouth of yours.”

You followed Angel’s instructions, taking him back in your mouth. Angel began to thrust up in your mouth, tears forming in your eyes as he moved in and out of your mouth. Your hands rested on Angel’s thighs, your nails digging into his skin. He chanted your name before he came in your mouth, holding your head against him. You swallowed some of his cum, keeping some of it in your mouth. He let go of your hair, saying how much of a good girl you were for swallowing daddy’s cum. His cock was still semi-erect and you smirked, dropping some of his cum on his cock, making Angel groan as he felt himself hardened again at the sight of you using his cum as lubrication, moving your hand up and down once again.

“God, my dirty little librarian.” Angel always fantasized doing numerous things with you in the library. You weren’t opposed to it, but Angel hardly came to pick you up from your work. And now, Angel regretted that.

You placed a sweet little kiss at the tip of his cock before you stood up.

“Stay here, I’ll get you some paper towels.” He grabbed your hand, pulling you towards him.

“Let me make you feel good.” Angel smirked when he saw your breast just calling to him. You balanced yourself on the arm rest of the arm chair. Your dress was sinful since it was this black cami dress that you usually wore a cardigan with. He knew without that cardigan, all those fuckers that pretend to go to the library for books would be staring straight at your ample breast. And even though you were wearing leggings under, the imagination was running wild. “Where the fuck is your cardigan?” He hated how your breasts were just out in the open, even though your dress did cover your cleavage well, Angel had fucked you too many times in this dress, pulling the top down, watching as your breast bounced up and down as he fucked you.

“No, it’s okay, I just wanted to make you feel good.” In reality, you were ashamed you let this happen. For two years, you did nothing with Angel besides cuddling and now you not only kissed him but you gave him a blowjob. The only reason you did it was because seeing how protective he became over you, it made your heart melt. “I left it on my chair.” You bit back a moan as Angel grabbed your breast.

“What did daddy say about this dress?” He pushed one of your straps down, licking his lips as his eyes focused on your beautiful skin, calling him to mark it.

“Angel,” you whimpered as he pulled a part of your dress down, your naked breast immediately greeting him.

“Where the fuck is your bra?”

“It has a built in one.”

Angel wrapped his hand around your throat, making you look at him. He growled, squeezing your breast, taking your nipples in between his fingers.

“I’m gonna ask you one more fucking time, what did daddy say about this dress.”

“Not to wear it unless you’re with me.” You gave in and you couldn’t even be angry. Angel was doing a number on you. But you had to snap out of it, pleasuring him was one thing, but you didn’t want to go back there with Angel. “But we’re no longer together.” You moved away, fixing yourself. You were so wet, but you couldn’t give in to Angel.

“I can change that.”

“I’ll meet you at the kiosk desk.”

When Angel eventually joined you at the kiosk desk, you were surprised when he sat right beside you. Sienna threw you a smirk before finishing a few things around the library since you were set to close in forty-five minutes. Eugene was escorted off of the property, but you knew he would be back. You should really be more stern with Eugene, but at the same time you knew he found solace in the library since it was his time away from his mother.

You were organizing a few things at your desk, trying your best to avoid Angel and making yourself look busy. His eyes were on you, you could feel them.

“We’re closing soon, you should go.” Boundaries, you shouted that in your head. Boundaries. You had to set up boundaries or you would be in this endless loop with Angel. There was no future between you two, there was no point of prolonging the inevitable.

“I’ll wait just in case he’s waiting for you outside.” Angel’s voice was strained. You knew he was upset about your comment earlier.

“He won’t be, this isn’t some crime drama.” You tried to lighten the mood, but that seemed to upset Angel further. “I’ll be safe, I promise.”

He leaned in, so only you could hear his words. “Stop it, I’m not leaving you, I’m going to make sure you’re fucking safe. You chose to hide this from me for years and now that I’m in the know, you’re not going to be a fucking statistic.” He took the cardigan that was resting on your chair, and placed it over you. “Wear your fucking cardigan. You think just because we’re not together you’re no longer mine?” Angel chuckled. “You’ll always be mine, you can fight it all you want, but you shouldn’t fight the inevitable.”

“I’m not yours, there’s no fighting anything. We’re not together and it’ll remain that way.” You moved away from him, focusing your eyes on the computer in front of you once more.

The library was finally closed and as Angel promised, he remained by your side. You stood up gathering your things and you saw Sienna making her way towards the door.

“Hey! Are we still meeting at that new Thai place?”

Sienna was about to confirm your plans when Angel shook his head behind you. She refrained from smiling and shook her head.

“Sorry babe, my man just texted me. He’s having some technical difficulties at home. Rain check?”

“Sure.” You smiled and waved her goodbye. You could feel Angel behind you, his heat was just radiating. “Hey, so, I have to do inventory. You can sweep the parking lot to see if he’s there, but otherwise, we’re good. Thanks again for standing up for me.” You didn’t want to face Angel, you were nervous about what you would see. Resisting Angel was difficult and you just had so much willpower left. You never felt your dry spell, it never bothered you, until today. Now you really had to get laid.

You felt Angel box you in, his front against your back. You felt his hot breath against your skin. “Are the cameras on?”

“Huh?” Being in such close proximity to Angel, you wanted to close your eyes, bask in the feeling, but you have to set up boundaries.

“Are the cameras on?” Angel repeated his question.

“No, Sienna turns them off, only the outside cameras are on.”

“Good.” Angel placed his hand on your breast, grabbing it through your dress. Placing your hand on top of his, you incidentally intertwined your hands, with your hand on top of his as his other hand slid down your dress starting from your chest down to your abdomen and under your dress, pulling down your leggings. You felt him smile against your ear when he felt just how dampen your panties were. “You’re so wet, is this all for daddy?”

You whimpered when you felt Angel press against your clothed pearl. He squeezed your breast making you let out another whimper. “I didn’t hear an answer.”

“Yes daddy.” Your other hand grabbed Angel’s before he could move your underwear to the side. “Angel, let’s not do this.” Your mind screamed boundaries while your heart said fuck it.

“Why baby, you let someone else touch my pussy?” Angel swatted your hand, slipping his fingers under your panties. “I’m gonna make you feel so good, stretch out this pussy.”

Your phone began to ring and you immediately grabbed it. It was Jay, your ex-boyfriend. Angel saw the name and growled out your name.

“If you answer, I’m gonna make sure to make you come while he’s talking to you.” Jay was a sore spot for Angel. He was your high school sweetheart. The one that supposedly got away. Fuck that, Angel refused to acknowledge that. Jay was a part of your past, one he never wanted to address since he made him feel even more insecure about your relationship.

Angel ran a finger up and down your slit, slipping it past your entrance shallowly, moving his finger tip in and out. It was just enough for you to feel him, but not enough.

You let your phone ring, focused on the sensations or lack thereof that Angel was providing.

“You want my finger all the way, so you can feel my rings against that pussy?”

You nodded your head, loving the feel of Angel’s hand against yours. His hands were always so fucking big, it made yours feel small.

“Naw, I know you got a voice,” he kissed your ear, nipping at it. “Fucking use it.”

“Yes, please daddy.” You begged.

Angel chuckled lowly and slipped his finger further in, adding a second finger. “Tight as always, no one touched you baby?” His thumb landed on your throbbing pearl, tapping it.

“No daddy, just me.” You didn’t want to disclose with Angel that Marie’s words were true about your dry spell. You felt him add a third finger and you threw your head back, your head landing on Angel’s shoulder.

Angel wrapped a hand on your throat, chastely kissing your cheek. He kept his lips on your cheek, his breath against your skin further turning you on.

“Did you use that toy I got you?” He questioned. He was rubbing his clothes erection against your back, the friction was amazing, but you knew it would be so much better when it was his bare skin against yours.

“Yes daddy, I did.” You were clenching Angel’s fingers, his fingers tightening around your throat.

Just as Angel was about to unzip his jeans to slide on home, the door opened. You tried to move away from Angel, but all he did was fix your dress and kept you pressed against him. Jay looked at you, the swollen lips, the disheveled state and the smug look on Angel’s face gave it away.

“Was I interrupting?” Jay questioned, walking further inside the library.

“No.”

“Yes.”

You and Angel answered at the same time. He looked down at you, but you kept your eyes on Jay.

“You said you wouldn’t be back till next week.” You really wished Jay didn’t come, but at the same time you were glad he came. You were going to cave to Angel and that was the last thing you wanted to do.

“I decided to surprise you.” Jay leaned against the kiosk desk once he arrived, smirking. “You could have continued Reyes, I don’t mind watching.” The smugness on Jay’s face irritated Angel.

You sighed and pushed Angel out of the kiosk desk. “Go home Angel.”

“I’m not leaving you with this guy.” Angel stood his ground. Jay wasn’t your man, and he never would be again.

“She’s safe with me, go back to your little club, fix bikes, fuck bitches, and sell drugs.” Jay knew what the Mayans were, he’s had his fair share of run ins with them over the years. He was friends with Neron, a gym buddy of his you could say and he served time with Johnny in the Marines.

“Jay!” You hissed.

Angel just smirked and shook his head. Jay wasn’t worth it, not yet at least.

“I’ll see you later querida.” He brushed past Jay. It took every fiber in his body to not knock him out.

There was a time and place.

His main goal right now was to get you back. You two had plenty to talk about and Angel planned on discussing things with you. He wasn’t going to let Jay weasel his way back in, especially since he may never let you go again.

Angel understood he fucked up.

He made a hasty decision.

But, it was a new year.

It’s 2020.

A brand new decade.

Your past grievances could be left behind in 2019.

Valentine’s Day was around the corner and he was determined to spend it with you.

Angel was more determined to win you back. That kiss, he knew he wasn’t the only one who felt that undeniable spark between you two. And the sexual encounters you two just had, it left Angel wanting more, as he always had.

But he had to take care of Eugene and then Jay.

=================

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#angel reyes #angelreyes #angel reyes x reader #angel reyes fanfiction #angel reyes fanfic #angel reyes fic #mayans mc fanfiction #mayans mc imagine #mayans mc fic #mayans mc fanfic

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binunus · 4 years ago

Text

college bf!bin

a/n the duality of this man??? i’m deceased...anyway i did not think this would go this long but uh my hand slipped...happy birthday binnie!

word count: 5k

genre: fluff, smut, (tiny) angst _________________________________________________

ugh yo

bin is so??? infuriatingly hot??? yet cute at the same time

major: exercise science

and because I love mermaid prince/the beginning, he’s been on the swim team since first year college

swam varsity starting his second year

besties with eunwoo, they were roommates their whole college career

alright so bin loves making friends

he’s so playful and talkative once you really get to know him

but his aura?? tbh very intimidating

like he has an rbf and just like he’s so tall, broad shouldered, built, like he just carries himself very strongly that you will get intimidated when you first meet him

very well known in the university

literally has a professional photographed banner of him hanging in the athletic building with the gold medal he won freshman year

a little embarrassed about it

not really, only when the boys (as in literally the other five) tease him

myungjun: woOoOw bin that guy on the banner really looks like you, don’t you think?

rocky: we geeeeet it you’re a star athlete

blah blah blah you know the vibes, they’re endearing

so how do you meet bin?

basically you’re a friend of a friend—you’re eunbi’s (sinb) friend

you’ve only met bin briefly from time to time, but otherwise you never really had any reason to get acquainted with him

your only encounters of him are when he wants to annoy eunbi and she immediately puts him in his place

but then suddenly in the spring semester of your 2nd year, you and him are in the same 8 am

a boring statistics gen ed class that everyone needs to take in order to graduate

you were running a bit late during the first class meeting—you woke up 30 minutes after your alarm and literally rushed out of your apartment—you made it to class with 2 minutes to spare

most of the seats were filled up already, except that one seat in the back left corner by the window next to the one and only moon bin

oh would you look at that

you felt a bit relieved honestly, you didn’t know anyone else in that class so at least you saw a semi-familiar face

he grinned at you when you sat down

“hey y/n”

you were a bit taken back, “you know my name?”

he laughed a little, “yeah of course, you’re one of eunbi’s really good friends, why wouldn’t I know your name?”

before you could respond, the professor started class and ceased your conversation

one thing you realized as the weeks start to go on

you and bin could not give any two fucks about statistics

no offense to stats lovers

every 8 am on mon/wed/fri, neither one of you would pay attention in class

you both enabled each other to not pay attention basically

so when the professor announced the content and date for the first exam

you and bin literally looked at each other with the same expression

you were both fucked

after class was dismissed, instead of the two of you quickly packing your things and fleeing the room immediately, you both lagged a little bit

you: so...do you know anything that’s going to be on the exam?

bin: uh...no? y/n you’re literally right next to me, you know I don’t do jack shit in this class

you: well fuck, how are you gonna study then bin?

bin: I was probably gonna ask my roommate to help me, he passed with a 96 when he took this class

you give him the best puppy dog eyes you could muster up, you lean in and clasp your hands together like you’re praying

“can he help me too...? please?”

bin’s eyes go a lil wide bc you were a bit closer than he was used to and shit was his heart racing rn?

bin: uh...yeah...sure, i’ll text you to come over when we’re gonna study

you beam at him and like in your excitement you give him a hug

“thank you thank you thank you! i literally cannot fail this class. I’ll see you on friday bin!”

with that you grabbed your bag and just left, leaving bin shocked

he’s surprisingly a shy boy okay!

he always thought you were cute from when he first saw you hanging out with eunbi, but ofc he never thought any more of it

until you guys had this class together and he started to think every day, that wow you are really cute

bin texts you the next day

coincidentally, eunbi texts you too

bin: hey this is bin, if you’re free in an hour my roommate’s gonna help me go over the material in ch. 1

eunbi: why did bin ask for your number

you to bin: yes! send me your addy and i’ll be there :)

you to eunbi: we’re in the same stats class lol and we’re gonna study for our exam next week

eunbi: lol moon bin studying? you might wanna bring some wine with you for emergency y/n

you: lol what do you mean by that?

eunbi: binnie hates studying, but good luck!

ahh, eunbi becomes unhinged when it comes to bin

but you know it’s bc they’re that close, they’re literally childhood best friends, more so like siblings

still, studying w him couldn’t be that bad right?

spoiler alert, it went alright

you felt bad showing up to bin’s apartment empty handed so you picked up some coffee before you arrived

you officially meet bin’s roommate, eunwoo, and you’re floored for like 2 minutes bc literally how can a man like him be real?

cue bin being a bit jealous bc yeah he knew his roommate’s perfect but like damn did you have to be affected by him too :(

eunwoo’s a good teacher alright? you actually understood the material from him

you: idk what eunbi’s talking about, you’re actually not that bad at studying bin

bin being offended: oh god what did eunbi say about me

eunwoo smirking: maybe it’s because you’re here y/n, bin usually doesn’t focus this much when it’s just me trying to help him

you: ???

bin in his head: i can’t trust anyone huh

before you left his place, you and bin planned to meet up and study one more time before your stats exam

it was just you and bin this time

although you’d never admit it, yes you tried to look good for meeting up with him

yeah he’s a friend?? at least you think you were at that level?? but still, he’s a cute friend and you really didn’t want him to see you looking crusty

you and bin end up studying for a whole 5 hours

granted, half of that time you two were messing around, eating food, trying to procrastinate for as long as you could

bc even though you two had a good handle on the material now—thanks to eunwoo—you both still hated statistics

you knew bin started to get more comfortable with you bc he started teasing you

it made you happy hehe so ofc you started to quip back at him

not at the intensity that he and eunbi do but it’s enough for you :)

he walks you back to your apartment after your study session

wow what a gentleman

bin waving bye at your door with the cutest smile: see you in class y/n :)

mayhaps your stomach did a little somersault

anyways

on the day of your exam you were freaking out

you have test anxiety ah ha ha

you woke up at 5 bc you were paranoid about being late to class

you’re like hastily looking over the notes again when you get to class like are you really prepared omg you’re psyching yourself out hella

bin comes in with 2 cups of iced coffee and he’s like woah are you okay

you: i woke up at 5 bin, idk if i can do this omg

you are like visibly in distress rn and he feels like a pang in his chest

he was gonna mess with you and say like “bet im gonna get a higher grade than you” but he smartly decides against it

instead, he just takes your hand and gives it a little squeeze: y/n, take a deep breath. you’re going to do great, you studied your ass for this and we both know that you got this material down—even eunwoo hyung said you were gonna ace this exam. just trust your instincts, okay? breathe with me.

he was staring at you so intently and genuinely when trying to calm you down

your anxiety yeeted and suddenly you felt shy

you: th...thanks bin...

bin was worried about you while taking the test rip, he kept secretly glancing at you (while also trying not to make it look like he was cheating) just to make sure that you were okay

he walks you to your next class after you both finished your exam

bin: you sure you’re okay? you said you woke up at 5, did you even eat breakfast? let’s get food after your next class.

you were feeling better after the test but like you got so endeared at his fussing

yes you and bin got lunch that day

your exam results were uploaded the next day

you immediately called bin: I GOT A 95

bin: i told you that you would ace it! i got a 90 hehe

you: bin i literally owe you and eunwoo my life, lemme buy you guys food or something

you hear a little bit of bickering over the phone and suddenly you’re talking to eunwoo

eunwoo: i would love some sushi, but since bin can’t eat seafood, why don’t you come watch his swim meet this weekend :)

you: o...h...o-okay yeah i’d love to watch, what time is it? :)

eunwoo: it’s saturday at 10 am

you: okay! i’ll see you there bin

bin already planning on drop kicking eunwoo

cha eunwoo—best wingman™

you basically beg eunbi to go with you to bin’s swim meet

eunbi: i know bin can swim, why do i have to watch him flounder around under water

also eunbi: faster bin! don’t you fucking dare lose!

bin places first this meet

are we shocked? no

okay you mentally prepared yourself for seeing him shirtless, but clearly you didn’t prep enough bc you’re on the cusp of drooling when you’re watching him from the bleachers

and let’s face it, you’re not subtle and eunbi knows everything so she’s literally closing your jaw for you and like messing with you

eunbi: y/n, you’re really sure you like bin? he’s a good guy but c’mon, i think you deserve better

you: since when did i say that i like him ???? and what do you mean ??? i think he checks...all the boxes...for me...

eunbi: maybe it’s bc i’ve known him since when he used to wet his pants so i don’t understand why people are attracted to him, but like...really, you’ve been checking him out since he removed his shirt. even the ref can see that you’re simping over him

you and eunbi meet up with eunwoo and the rest of bin’s friends—that you haven’t met yet but know of

jinjin: oh so you’re the y/n that bin’s been talking about *wink wonk*

baby you’re blushing

even more so when bin comes up to your group

mmm middle parted wet hair, muscle tee and white sweats, towel around his shoulders

he’s so hot ???

you’re all congratulating him blah blah, but like bin keeps glancing at you and all you can do is just smile and like nervous laugh

sanha: y/n! eunbi noona! you should come eat with us to celebrate bin hyung’s win

eunbi glances at you, little smirk on her face: i have plans, but i know y/n’s free! bin you make sure they get home safe after y’alls dinner plans :)

hwang eunbi—best wingwoman™

dinner with the boys was chaotic, you were talking and joking around with them as if you didn’t just meet them today

*you about to get your wallet*

bin, not even able to look at you: it’s okay y/n, i got you this time

cue the boys teasing

astro: kings of making fun of each other

rocky as the group is splitting up: walk y/n home safely hyung :) don’t stay out too late

bin: sorry about them, they’re a bunch of loud idiots...ah haha...

the walk back to your apartment is actually pretty sweet

he didn’t know if you would actually come watch his meet or not but he was excited when he actually saw you

you talk about small random things about yourselves, but it’s not like useless information, you bet that both your subconsciouses are keeping track of whatever y’all are talking about

you give each other a “friendly” hug goodnight...that lasts like a minute or so

and while you’re hugging, bin just can’t help but think that wow you fit so perfectly in his arms

and on the other hand, you’re thinking he feels so warm? so safe? you don’t want to pull away?

but ofc the hug has to end and you’re thanking him for walking you home and he’s like glued to his spot waving goodbye sweetly and waiting for you to go inside so that he knows you’re safely in your apartment before leaving

bin sighing dreamily as he walks back to his and eunwoo’s place

eunwoo waiting on the couch with a glass of water: how was your date ;)

bin: it wasn’t a date, i just walked y/n home

eunwoo: yeah, but you want it to be a date

bin: ...shut up

god why is the pining stage so long

alright everyone knows you and bin like each other

it becomes pretty obvious after the swim meet

you and him fall into this little routine of switching who buys coffee for your 8 am

and then he’d walk you to your next class afterwards

you both still don’t pay attention in stats, sorry

but that means more outside study sessions dates

you come watch his swim meets, whether astro’s there or you’re just watching by yourself

and then you and him get lunch?? early dinner?? right afterwards, it depends on whenever his meet ends

but like??? neither of you have confessed your feelings for each other

even though you both have like a little hint that yeah the feelings are mutual

you and bin are literally like this for 3 months, like damn the semester is almost over

eunbi and eunwoo are tired of your shit, they’re both just like: when the fuck are they getting together? we’re sick of this.

alright so the masterminds literally pay one of eunwoo’s friends from his major to ask you out while you’re studying with bin

let’s do mingyu why not, he was in your korean history class last year

you and bin are in the library, half studying half goofing off per usual

eunwoo, eunbi, and mingyu are at the opposite side of the floor

mingyu: u sure bin won’t clock me for trying to ask out y/n

eunwoo: probably not??

eunbi: just do it please

mingyu giving them both the finger before walking up to your table

“hey y/n...i was wondering if you’d like to get dinner with me...as a date?”

you: o_o huh?

mingyu: i always thought you were cute from when we had class together last year, but i never had the balls to ask you out or anything...you’re not dating anyone, right?

you glance at bin to find that he’s already looking at you with an expression that you don’t really know how to read

you: um...well no I’m not-

bin: actually, we’re dating so y/n can’t go out with you mingyu, sorry.

mingyu’s not even phased, he just gives you a thumbs up and then leaves

you’re confused like literally what is going on—and then you process what bin said and you whip your head to look at him

bin: sorry i said that...i just felt...jealous i guess when mingyu asked you out

you: I wouldn’t have said yes anyway...I sorta like someone else

bin: fuck it, the topic already came up...y/n I’ve liked you for a while now but uh...I don’t know I guess I was scared to tell you because I’m scared of rejection

you just laugh, but not mockingly! more like bin you’re so cute wtf

“bin, why would I reject you when I’ve literally been into you for the past four months?”

it’s safe to say that you and bin officially began dating after that

eunwoo texting in their gc: bin and y/n are finally together

myungjun: fucking finally

bin: how...did u know that eunwoo...?

*eunwoo has left the chat*

alright but bin’s charm?? flirting?? teasing?? sweetness?? up 1000%

bin is touchy y’all, in private his hands are always on you, whether it be sexual or not sexual is up to you

he restrains himself in public ofc, the most he does is put a hand on your waist or hold your hand

eunbi threatens bin early on in your relationship: bin you’re like my brother, but y/n’s one of my dearest friends and if you as much make them cry i will kill you

ofc bin is still eunbi’s punching bag, but when you three are hanging out, he’s dramatic and acts like he’s hurt so he’s like whining to you

sometimes you play along and coo at him like: aww binnie, where does it hurt baby?

other times you’re like: you really think i believe that?? with the size of your biceps??

eunbi: excuse me while i vomit

okay but binnie? bestest sweetest boy

yes he looks all big and intimidating

but he’s soft—especially for you

your nicknames for each other are either “bub” or “baby”

yes will join in making fun of you with the boys, but when you start pouting he’s a goner and will defend you

bin is also a big cuddler, but i mean you’re not complaining hehe

he’s the big spoon, no questions asked

okay but being in bin’s arms is like your favorite place in the world

his frame literally just envelopes you and all you can feel and smell is him and it’s so??? content, you feel at home with him

you feel bad in the morning bc like his arm has to be sore from your weight so you try to like get out of his grasp, but he literally just whines and hugs you tighter

okay but just imagine you and bin napping and his arms are around your waist, his nose is buried in your neck and he wakes up like nuzzling his face in your shoulder like a puppy

im soft

one week you’re staying over at bin’s apartment and then the next week he’s staying over at yours, the cycle goes like that

if you’re one of my ladies with a ~vagíne~, he will buy all your cravings and your tampons/pads, literally anything you want that week, it is yours

doesn’t really get jealous now that you two are official, he knows that you’re his and he’s yours

you two lightly bicker like friends, but you’ve never had a terrible fight before

you were really close to though—or...like you did?? but it was resolved really quick

one of the only problems of bin is that he hates showing weakness and it takes him a whole lot to truly fully 100% be vulnerable with someone even if it’s someone close to him

he pulled a muscle in his arm and it cost him one of his swim meets

he had to go to rehab for like a month and you knew that mentally he’s been off bc of it

you try to ease talking him into telling you about how he’s really feeling but he just kept dodging the subject

one night after one of his rehab sessions, he came back to your place and you’re just like

“hey bubbie, how was rehab? how are you doing?”

and he just snaps at you: stop asking me how I am, y/n, it’s getting really annoying

you’re taken aback, like what the fuck where did that come from?

your eyebrows furrow and you cross your arms bc you are not going to get spoken to like that

“so me worrying about you and wondering how your recovery’s going is annoying? that’s what a partner is supposed to do, moon bin. what’s going on with you?”

bin: you’re being suffocating! it’s the only thing you ask me about nowadays, sometimes I—

oh boy you got mad

you: I ask you because I know you’re not telling me things! I know you’re suffering by yourself and I want to let you know that I’m here for you, I want to help take some of the pain away or at least help you deal with it because I’m your partner! but how can I if you can’t even let me in?? we’re fucking dating moon bin, we’re supposed to go through rough times together. and you call me suffocating...?

bin’s silent and he’s looking at the floor

you sigh, tears are building in your eyes because you’re frustrated and a bit hurt by what he said, and your voice cracks when you speak again: if i’m suffocating you, then you should leave. text me or something when you can breathe again, I don’t know.

there’s a bit of spite in your words, hidden by the pain

bin sees the tears rolling down your cheeks and that’s when he knows he fucked up

he’s never seen you cry before—besides like from a sad movie or something

so like the fact that he made you cry and hurt you with his words? damn he hates himself rn

he immediately wraps his arms around you, and you like try to push him to get away bc why is he hugging you? didn’t he just say that you were suffocating? why is he confusing

bin: baby, I’m sorry...I shouldn’t have taken out my frustrations on you, you’re not suffocating me I promise...you’re right about everything, I should be sharing things with you and telling you how I’m really feeling...I’m sorry.

you don’t say anything and just like sniffle and he picks you up and brings you to your bedroom and then he just lets it all out

he tells you how rehab is hard and like yeah his muscle pain is going away, but he doesn’t know if he can swim as fast as he used to and that scares him

and he tells you that sometimes he’s thought of giving up swimming since his injury, but then he thinks of you and that’s how he’s still going through with rehab

you’re his motivator and comfort but he doesn’t want to show you his weak side bc he hates that part of himself

and at this point, bin starts tearing up and you’re like stroking his hair to try and comfort him

bin: I’m not good at telling my feelings baby...probably why I didn’t tell you I liked you until 4 months later...but I promise I’ll work harder and at least try and tell them to you.

ugh pain

anyway your communication with serious things got better after that encounter

eunbi finding out that you and bin argued and he made you cry and she literally punched his stomach

you: omg eunbi stop

bin: it’s okay...I sorta deserved that

eunbi: why...are you not swearing at me? shit, bin are you okay?

he nods to the girl and just puts an arm around your shoulder: we talked things through, don’t worry. I’m all good now, but I did deserve that punch because I hurt y/n when I promised you I wouldn’t

bin ends up having a full recovery and bam his first swim meet after he got the clear from the PT, he gets first place again

all the boys and you and eunbi were there supporting him

bin was hella nervous before the meet started, but you gave him a little good luck kiss and was like: I believe in you bub, no matter the result, as long as you give it your all and don’t hurt yourself again, you’ll be the winner to me :)

this was actually when the first “i love you” was said

after your little pep talk in the locker room, bin’s just hugging you and holding you for comfort

and he just went out with it

“I love you y/n”

you blush hella hard bc you were not expecting that

obviously you’ve been feeling it like yeah your feelings for bin have grown into love for a while now

you just bury your face in his chest and hug him tighter

“I love you too binnie, now go get em bub.”

he smiles and kisses you and tells you that he’ll see you after the meet is over

you come back to the crowd where the boys and eunbi are and you just have a huge smile on your face, you’re literally glowing

myungjun: please tell me you guys didn’t fuck before his swim meet

speaking of fucking

okay let’s get down and dirty ladies and gents wink wonk mmm grr bark bark

bin is so sexy y’all like i dont need to tell you that

he’s 100% a tease

you have a little muscle kink hehe

which bin very much uses to his advantage

if bin is wearing a sleeveless shirt, you bet he wants to smash that day

will walk around shirtless after a shower or after a workout just to turn you on and then depending on his mood, he might tease you for like an hour or you’ll just get right to it

he’s very proud of his body and the work he put into it and knowing that you get turned on from one look of it?? gives him an ego boost, he loves it

one time at a party, he wore a crop top (mm hello bad idea bin) and you literally went feral

you dragged him inside the nearest bathroom and just started making out

he’s an ass guy

...all of astro are ass guys, it’s just obvious with how much they slap each other’s asses and poke each other’s assholes

okay you know how he’s touchy right? i mentioned that earlier

he always wants you on his lap

even if there’s a space available, nope your seat is his thighs

ofc when the situation allows, like you’re not gonna sit on his lap in class duh

most of the time in public like if you’re hanging out with the boys or something, it’s innocent

but if he wants to be a tease, he’ll literally just tighten his grip on your hips and grind you down onto his cock

subtle, he won’t straight up thrust into you

just enough to get his dick stirring and make you feel the outline of it through your pants

and then he just stops and hugs your waist again?? wtf

his major’s exercise science right? will ask if he can practice on you for anatomy and physiology, but you know after touching you in a couple places, y’all will just end up fucking

likes to bite and mark

very proud seeing the hickeys he leaves on you

you can bite, but you can’t bruise, idk his upper body is exposed a lot bc swimming so you can’t really leave any marks on him unless it’s the off season

foreplay’s cool, but he prefers the main event, he just wants to be in you

as much as he loves doggy, his fav position is the hook

(it’s when your legs are on his shoulders ohoho and it just lets him fuck you in a deeper angle mmm)

also in the hook, he can choke you

if i have a choking kink, you have a choking kink

okay little tangent, choking is so hot?

like just imagine you and bin are making out, he pushed you against the wall, literally grinding his hips into you, and his hand just comes up and squeezes your throat? that’s so sexy

likes butt stuff oops

i don’t make the rules, he just does

daddy kink, but no power play

will not degrade you (even if you really just want him to call you his dirty slut) bc he really values seeing you as equals

seeing your face when you cum is a must

almost always: you cumming → bin cumming

nothing gets him off more than knowing that he’s making you feel good

after !! care !!

sweetest boy!!

will clean you up with a warm towel after sex

and if you’re one of my ladies, he will always remind you to pee so that you don’t get a UTI

if y’all had a marathon or something, he will draw a bath and carry you to the bathroom and you will bathe together, so soft

always ends sex with an i love you :’)

okay let’s get back to the soft stuff

special thing about swimmer bin: pool dates

sometimes when he’s practicing and it’s just him, he asks you to come to the aquatic center and you two end up splashing around and being cute together

he like knew that you were the one for him some time during senior year

it was the holidays and his parents invited you to spend christmas with their family since your parents were out of the country this break

his parents and sister liked you immediately—which you were so scared about, but bin just knew

you woke up early christmas eve (and bin was out like a rock) so you just went downstairs to brew some coffee or something and you saw that his mom was already starting on making food

naturally, you offered your help and she was like no, you’re a guest y/n, but obviously you started helping

bin comes downstairs like an hour or two later to see you, his mom, and his dad just cooking and listening to christmas music and talking and his heart just like swells??

you: morning binnie :)

his mom: how can you be sleeping when y/n’s here helping us with christmas dinner

his dad: what kind of boyfriend are you, son?

just kidding all jokes

but that’s the moment when he knew

best boyfriend bin ugh

he becomes a legend in the school for swimming

but doesn’t continue after college, he’s all about becoming a physical trainer after graduation

he goes to grad school, while you’re out working in business

bin moves in with you after graduating, it was the obvious next step

you do talk about the future together, but obviously bin’s still in school and you’re both fresh from undergrad so there’s no rush yet to tie the knot

doesn’t stop his or your parents from talking to you two about marriage tho oops

ugh but the domesticity after bin moves in with you? superb

like yeah obviously you both basically lived together anyway when he still roomed with eunwoo just from how much you and him spent at each other’s places

but like your apartment is now both of your place and it’s like your home is finally complete

your apartment becomes the reunion place for the boys and eunbi

at this point everyone knew you and bin were gonna get married eventually

eunwoo and eunbi: we did that ;)

and that’s how you and your college bf!bin live happily ever after uwu

happy birthday binnie moonbob ♥

1-25-21

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dimigex · 4 years ago

Text

New Altered Reality Chapter!

A03 / FF

I think it’s been like . . two years since I updated this story XD oops. The story is linked at the top if you want the full chapter and/or story. This is only a portion of the new chapter because it’s over 6k words

"Why don't you go train for a little while? It might take your mind off things." Rin made the suggestion as gentle as possible, ignoring the frustration that seethed just beneath the surface of her calm. She wanted the apartment to herself for a few hours and desperately needed Kakashi to stop fussing over her. Then, she'd be able to relax the way that she was supposed to. The man's constant attention put her on edge.

Since the doctor's appointment four days ago, Kakashi had been acting like a brooding hen. When Rin stood up to get her book from the bedroom, he'd jumped to his feet and offered to go instead. He didn't want her standing long enough to cook or clean, so he'd taken over those duties as well. While Kakashi was decent in the kitchen, he'd kept everything bland and refused to add any salt to the dishes. If the man mentioned her blood pressure one more time, Rin was fairly certain that hers would rise to dangerous levels when she yelled at him.

At Rin's words, Kakashi glanced up from the book in his lap. The man's brow furrowed as he marked his place with a finger. "What if you need something while I'm gone?"

"Then, I'll get it myself," Rin answered. She moderated her tone to placating rather than annoyed. It was more difficult than she expected. "I'm hardly an invalid, you know?"

"The doctor said you needed rest." Kakashi argued for the umpteenth time, as if Rin had forgotten it, as if he would give her a chance to forget it.

Rin held up her hand to stop Kakashi's next arguments before they could form. Slowly, she counted to five under her breath. The idea of laying in bed or on the couch for even one minute longer made her physically ill. She had done everything that she was supposed to: drinking glass after glass of water to keep herself hydrated, keeping the lights dim and the room quiet, resting on her left side whenever possible. There had been a dozen tiny things that might make a difference, or might not.

While that scenario would sound like a dream for some women, to Rin, it was a nightmare. She missed the days when training and missions kept her mind and body racing. When she was in the village, Rin kept herself busy wherever the hospital needed an extra set of hands. She hadn't chosen her specialization yet, but she was leaning toward pediatrics. Most medical nin worked in triage and emergencies, but there were plenty of quiet days as well. Rin liked the idea of helping children feel better rather than focusing on battle injuries.

Rin realized that her mind had drifted from the topic at hand and brought her eyes back to Kakashi. She couldn't help but appreciate the changes in her husband in the past few days, even when they annoyed her. In some ways, he was more like himself and others, he was totally different. Rin could manage the symptoms of her pregnancy; she'd done that when morning sickness left her more or less living on the bathroom floor for two months. But, she couldn't handle the hovering worry that radiated off of Kakashi.

"Why don't you go see if Minato has an update on your team?" Rin suggested, pushing into a sitting position.

Apprehension entered Kakashi's eyes. The man still hadn't been able to explain his nervousness over the chunin exams, no matter how much he tried. Rin almost felt bad for bringing up the memory, almost. Team Seven was the only distraction that could get Kakashi out of her hair for an hour or two. Sensing the man's wavering resolve, Rin pushed. "I'm just going to take a bath anyway. A cool one," Rin amended when Kakashi opened his mouth. He had been reading one of her many books about the dos and don't of pregnancy; Rin wished that she'd thrown them out once she finished.

"I'm sure he would have sent someone if there was news," Kakashi countered. His voice lacked its usual certainty, however. He wanted to know what was happening with his students as much as Rin wanted some time to breathe.

Rin nodded, running a hand through her hair. "Probably, but it would be good for you to get your mind off this mess." She gestured around the apartment. "Besides, if I need you, I can create a clone to find you. I still know how to do some things."

Over the past few months, Rin had been developing her chakra control. Once her pregnancy had been confirmed, she'd been removed from active duty. With missions off the table, she spent more time at the hospital. Even so, Rin was only permitted to assist with certain cases, so she spent her free time working through exercises that improved her control. Hopefully, that would allow her the freedom to study more medical ninjutsu after the baby was born. If she'd learned anything from being on a team with hotheaded Obito and reckless Kakashi, it was that a medic was always necessary.

"You promise you'll come find me if you need anything?" Kakashi's voice held a note of uncertainty that surprised Rin. When she nodded, he tucked a strip of cloth into the book on his lap and placed it on the table. "I won't be gone long, but maybe you're right. I'm sure there are rumors about teams finishing the second exam by now."

"Take your time," Rin offered, schooling her face to impassivity. If she looked hopeful at the free time, Kakashi would see the trap. He stood, stretching the stiff muscles in his back, then glanced in her direction. A slight frown appeared on his face.

He's debating whether or not to kiss me, Rin realized with a start. While Kakashi had changed significantly over the past few days, the hesitancy about displaying emotions with her remained. Honestly, it didn't bother Rin as much as his lost memories did. Kakashi had always been private and reserved with his affections. Deciding to meet him halfway, Rin caught his hand with hers and squeezed. Kakashi exhaled in relief.

"Go on," Rin prompted, dropping her fingers away. "I'll be good, I promise."

A smile tugged at the corners of Kakashi's mouth as he stepped closer. To Rin's surprise, he leaned in and pressed a warm kiss to her forehead. An unfamiliar explosion of heat washed through her chest at the gesture. "I'll bring dinner home," Kakashi continued, completely unaware of the effect he had on her. "Don't even think of trying to make it while I'm gone."

"Promise," Rin laughed, hoping that her smile disguised the fact that she had just been considering that very thing.

When the door shut behind Kakashi, Rin glanced at the calendar on the wall. She calculated how much longer she'd have to endure Kakashi's worrying before life could get back to normal. If everything went perfectly, they would meet their son in twelve weeks; Rin could hang on that long. She didn't have a choice.

When a brief knock sounded on the office door, Minato glanced up from the paperwork in his hand. Shikaku slipped through before he had time to answer, and Minato's heart leaped into his throat. "Has there been news?"

The second chunin exam was coming to a close, and there still hadn't been any word of Naruto's team. Minato knew that his son and his teammates were talented shinobi, but the exams were designed to be taxing. He'd seen just as many groups fail because of bad luck as poor skill. With the relative peace in the shinobi nations, fewer genin were advanced to the next rank. Minato agreed with the changes, but he could still remember all too well how quickly the ninja wars had started.

Shikaku shook his head as he shut the door behind him. "None about Team Seven."

Minato understood what the man wasn't saying; there were more important things to worry about than Naruto's advancement. Shikaku's son was also competing in the exams, he had to be wondering about the same things as Minato, but Shikaku remained detached. He stayed focused on the other matters that required his attention to keep the village running. Shikaku had been an excellent pick as Minato's second in command, and Minato didn't know what he would do without him most days.

Dipping his head in understanding, Minato pressed a thumb and forefinger against his eyes to stave off a headache. It had been a stressful week. When he wasn't torn between worries over Kakashi's memory and Naruto's performance, Minato had been dealing with chaos of having multiple villages together. There had been half a dozen fights to break up, tempers that needed soothing, and the exhaustion of hosting delegates. He cringed. "What is it this time? A broken nose over which kage is the strongest? Blood feud over the death of a distant relative? A comment taken the wrong way?"

"None of the above." Shikaku didn't crack a smile at Minato's attempted levity. Whatever he had come to say must be bad. Minato waited in silence. "I wasn't sure what to make of the report, so I brought it to you immediately. Someone made an attempt against the village barrier."

Minato shifted, mind flashing back to Kakashi's warning about Orochimaru. Even so, he forced himself to think logically rather than responding with a knee jerk reaction. "Did the Anbu tasked with that portion of the village find anything out of the ordinary? Which team was it?"

Again, Shikaku shook his head. "Obito's team deemed it a false alarm, something bound to happen with this many foreigners in the village."

Minato nodded without answering. Technically, his advisor shouldn't know the names of the men and women in Anbu, but Obito's presence hadn't been easy to hide, especially from someone who worked closely with Minato. Shikaku had been an effective jonin commander because he knew the strengths and weaknesses of every jonin in the village. There were few who weren't under his purview at some point, but Minato had no doubt that the man knew them as well. He wouldn't be good at his job if he didn't.

"Was there any evidence to suggest otherwise, anything at all?" Minato hated asking the question, but he couldn't afford to be lax with village safety during the chunin exams. There had been too many warnings to write this off as a coincidence. Though, he knew that if Shikaku had more information, he would have supplied it already.

Shikaku's sigh spoke volumes. He'd been under the same pressure as Minato the past couple of weeks. "No, everything appears to be in order."

Minato wondered if Shikaku had been thinking about Kakashi's warning when he brought that message. As much as Minato wanted to, he hadn't been able to keep that solely between himself and Inoichi. He relied on Shikaku too much to withhold such critical information. Even so, he held back as much as he could about Kakashi's memory loss. Until he figured out the cause, the less that everyone else knew, the better.

Tapping long fingers against the polished wood of his desk, Minato considered. He wanted to hear the report from his Anbu, but that would require summoning Obito. Or, perhaps, he could get by with asking Tenzo about it. The remorse that Obito had shown for what he did to Kakashi wasn't enough; the boy needed to realize that his behavior would not be tolerated. Minato decided to summon Tenzo once Shikaku left and get the full report on the disturbance. Though, he suspected it was a false alarm.

Sensing that he'd only skimmed the surface of Shikaku's reports, Minato nodded. "What else?"

A wry grin twisted the jonin's commander's face as he glanced down at the notes in his hand. "Uchiha Fugaku has requested a private meeting with you." Minato's eyebrows rose at that, wondering who Fugaku would want to talk about, one of his sons or Obito. It wasn't like the clan head to meet with Minato for something minor.

Minato dipped his head in understanding, then Shikaku continued his thought. "He requests a private meeting in the Uchiha compound."

The locale didn't surprise Minato. Fugaku must have found out something about the mystery surrounding Kakashi, but it wasn't something he wanted to risk being overhead. Which meant that it probably touched on some clan secret. Having the Hokage come to the compound instead of the other way around would raise the clan's opinion of Fugaku, at least. There were still some people, particularly in the Uchiha clan, who wished that Fugaku had become Hokage instead of Minato. Hopefully the man's information would be worth the hassle.

Minato glanced at the clock. It wasn't quite noon, and he was already longing for home. "When am I supposed to be there?"

Shikaku consulted his notes to be sure he was correct before speaking. "Tonight. Your schedule was too full to allow time during the day, and with the second exam ending in the morning, there wasn't another opportunity."

Fugaku didn't want to wait that long, Minato realized after a moment. He dipped his head in understanding; there were a million loose ends that needed to be tied up before the final exam could begin. Even problems as important as this one had to wait. Minato rubbed at his temples in frustration, then gestured for Shikaku to continue. "What else?"

(Full chapter and story available on A03 and FF, linked at top of the post)

#Dimi writes #Altered Reality Update #KakaRin #Kakashi #Rin #Full chapter available on Archive and Fanfic #This update is ridiculously old and I'm sorry #Hopefully this will give me inspiration to keep going

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polaristranslations · 3 years ago

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Yotsugi Buddy Episode 2

The long-awaited summer break has begun! Yay!

Now, what kind of fun should I have with everybody?

...Of course it wouldn't end up being like that. It wouldn't end with that sort of development, and it certainly wouldn't feel like it—as if I would let it. It was just a troublesome matter. "How did things turn out like this?" was practically my favorite phrase at this point, but I particularly thought so for this particular matter. I was sure I didn't make any mistakes up to this point—or perhaps, should I have not responded to the summons from the professor at all?

As if I could have known that that professor would disappear right after talking to me... How was I supposed to know that I would be the last person to see her? I hadn't had a bad feeling about it at all. Perhaps I hadn't introduced myself yet, but I was a former vampire, not a prophet. I couldn't, and didn't want to, say anything that would make it seem as if I'd seen into the future, like some middle-aged guy in a Hawaiian shirt who was off wandering about somewhere.

A university professor went missing right after exams. Naturally, the campus would be in an uproar, and it would be a big deal... As a matter of course, various places also came to ask me about the situation. Well, I pulled through it decently enough... A decent amount of deception was basically my specialty, and I wasn't so inconsiderate as to tell others about the state of the nursery in Room 333 without the owner's permission. First of all, how was I supposed to tell someone about something I didn't even understand?

It seemed the exams were graded by one of the office aides or the professor, so my exam paper was safely returned to me—apparently, the disappearance of one person was not enough to hold up the academic institutions of the present. In other words, there was no job that could only be done by one person in particular. Incidentally, I received a grade of C and the corresponding number of credits. Although that was the last thing on my mind at the moment.

If I wanted to interpret this situation realistically, without bringing in any oddity phenomena like spiriting away or the "replacement child", then... Associate Professor Iesumi, who sent me to check on her house, belatedly regretted her actions, which could only have been an expression of unsound mind... The most likely explanation would be that she feared that the abuse of "her own child" would become public and cause a fuss, and she thus made the decision to "flee".

It wasn't a crime to abuse a handmade doll, and it wasn't a crime to stab that doll in the back—so, even if I were to find out and spread that information out to the world, there was no need to run away out of desperation, but that was just in legal terms. And, as Ononoki-chan said, it was unclear to what extent Associate Professor Iesumi was self-aware.

Her symptoms and awareness could have varied depending on the day, as well—so perhaps I shouldn't be trying to force some sort of consistency, when both the request and the escape felt illogical.

This wasn't a mystery novel. Nor was it a game to find the culprit.

There were some absurd conspiracy theories being whispered around at the university that the professor had been abducted by a special agency because of her top-secret research that had been commissioned by the state, but if I had to guess normally, I would say that Associate Professor Iesumi had simply left all her memories behind and returned to her birthplace of Switzerland... She'd said that she'd come to Japan to escape from her parents, with whom she'd had a bad relationship, but even if she went back, there must be a way to avoid meeting them.

I could even force myself to imagine a happy ending where they let go of their differences and mended their relationship.

The power of one's imagination was limitless, for better or worse.

Especially for worse—even though there was no need for me to do so, when I imagined Associate Professor Iesumi running from one place to another, it wasn't exactly relieving for me... No, in the end, no matter how I interpreted it, when I thought that I could be the direct cause of her disappearance, well... It left me depressed.

It left me empty inside.

In theory, I knew. If I, a "specialist of child abuse", had refused her request, Associate Professor Iesumi would have simply reached out to another student who would have listened to her, and the situation would have converged towards something similar...In the end, everything, including her abusive behavior towards her "three-year-old daughter", was really just her one-woman show.

From beginning to end, the control of the story had been firmly within her grasp.

But that was just in theory. My emotions were different.

So, instead of a glorious start, my first summer break in college got off to a rather unpleasant start... I wouldn't go so far as to say that it was hellish, but the trip to Hokkaido with Hitagi, which I'd made plans to make plans for, had to be postponed once again.

We'd met briefly to discuss it, but as expected, she was very astute and didn't fail to miss my lack of excitement.

Well, in the first place... The promise was that we'd go in winter, when it was crab season.

With that, if I had been left alone, I could have spent the entire summer brooding over Associate Professor Iesumi, but my socializing ability had become better than it was before, so it was hard for me to be left alone.

How wonderful.

So, that morning, I received a message on my cell phone.

It was from a high school girl and my friend, Higasa-chan.

"Araragi☆senpai☆we☆are☆having☆a☆girlsbas☆senpai☆kouhai☆social☆at☆the☆Naoetsu☆High☆gym☆from☆one☆pm☆today☆and☆you'll☆be☆extremely☆popular☆if☆you☆came☆as☆a☆guest☆!☆First☆let's☆meet☆up☆at☆Ruga's☆house☆!☆GO☆GO☆right☆now☆!☆☆☆☆"

It was hard to read.

With her name meaning a rain of stars, perhaps she was trying to make a meteor shower occur in her messages, but in the first place, wasn't this pretty hard to type out?

I tried deciphering it... Hmm... A senpai-kouhai social...? It seemed that, within the span of a few months, the Naoetsu High girls' basketball team, which had been on the brink of collapse, had finally gotten back on its feet enough to do something like that.

Since I'd helped to the best of my limited ability, it was great news to hear, and I would be happy to visit my alma mater if my attendance at the meeting would bring the club any closer to what it was in its heyday.

No, I wasn't expecting anything about popularity, and to be honest, I didn't want to take one step inside my alma mater again...

But I guess it could be a change of pace.

It wasn't because I'd screwed up on a mission, but I still wanted to feel like I was being useful to someone—oh yeah, speaking of deciphering.

I wonder how that "thing" I gave to Meniko was going? I hadn't heard anything from her since then... Since it was her, it was possible she forgot about it.

Well, it didn't hurt to give it a shot.

If it didn't work out, then that was fine. I would almost prefer if it didn't work out.

The first thing to do was to meet at Kanbaru's house (did she even get approval for this? Higasa-chan did have the habit of using a friend's house without permission), so I got changed and went downstairs in order to leave the house.

And, at the entrance, I ran into Tsukihi.

My sister in a kimono, Araragi Tsukihi... My smaller little sister changed her hairstyle from time to time, and her current hairstyle such that all her hair, including her bangs, was tied up in one big ponytail.

Her forehead was cute, to the point that it made me irritated.

"My, my, if it isn't onii-chan. Just the right time. Have you seen my precious stuffed doll?"

"Stuffed doll—"

Ononoki-chan, huh.

That tween girl must have gotten fed up with being used as a dress-up doll again and evacuated from my sisters' room... If so, she might be rolling around in the back seat of my New Beetle again, but I didn't care how much Tsukihi was my beloved sister—I couldn't let her know that.

I'd caused a lot of trouble for Ononoki-chan, so I wanted to at least protect her from the clutches of my little sister... In the end, I didn't talk to her at all about the incident with Associate Professor Iesumi, but being a doll herself, Ononoki-chan may have had her own thoughts when she saw the doll stabbed in the back.

Well, it was just that we didn't discuss the case of Associate Professor Iesumi. We talked as usual about TV dramas or the new Häagen-Dazs ice cream, so there was a strong possibility that Ononoki-chan decided to leave the case as "settled".

At any rate, there was only one answer I could give.

"Sorry, I have no clue. I don't know everything, I just know what I know."

"Whose line was that, again? I feel like I've heard it before."

Even though you adored Hanekawa so much last summer, you've already forgotten about her... I was a little jealous of her refreshingly forgetful nature.

I wished I could split my low spirits with her.

"Oh, whatever. Forget that stuffed doll. It's about time to buy a new one, anyway."

"That's a little too refreshing!"

"So, onii-chan. Where are you headed, all dressed up like that?"

"Oh? This area’s famous fashion advisor, Tsukihi-chan, thinks that I'm dressed up?"

"Yep. It looks like you've dressed up to get high school girls to fawn over you."

How shrewd.

I'll take it as a compliment.

"I'm going to meet Higasa-chan."

"Ah. Her. Hasn't she been coming over, like, three times a week?"

It seemed they'd become acquainted.

Well, she was coming over three times a week.

"Incidentally, about her given name, you write it as 'rain of stars' [星雨], right? But how are you supposed to read it? Seiu? Hoshiame?"

"Either way is fine, she says. It's the same as how Abe no Seimei can also be read as Abe no Haruaki."

"Is, is that allowed...?"

"And where are you headed out to? That kimono is for outdoors, right? Patrolling with Karen-chan?"

"It's been a while since the Fire Sisters broke up, onii-chan. For me, that's just one of my past hits. Karen-chan's gone hiking with her high school friends, and I'm going hiking with my middle school friends."

Hiking?

Is that a trend with middle schoolers right now?

It was hard to catch up with the trends of youngsters these days.

In Karen-chan's case, I could bet that it was some severe mountain climbing again... But Tsukihi shouldn't have been the outdoors type?

"Right. Y'see, I heard a rumor that there was a dead body buried deep in the mountains of a neighboring town, so we all decided to go check it out. Like, pretending it's Stephen King's The Body."

"...The Body?"

"Yeah. I'm a fan of the original work."

How pretentious.

Well, maybe it was a little healthier than the Fire Sisters pretending to be heroes of justice... As an older brother who had just had an adventure that could have led to the discovery of not a dead body deep in the mountains, but the body of an abused child, it was somewhat difficult to rebuke her.

In my case, even my companion had been a corpse... But, seeing as how Tsukihi was also looking for Ononoki-chan, she might have been planning to go hiking with that stuffed doll in hand.

Perhaps that could also be her shrewdness.

It was like equipping yourself with jewelry to go on a treasure hunt.

In any case, after becoming a college student, I shouldn't meddle too much with my little sister's behavior... Being swept up in such inappropriate gossip was also a part of youth.

It was also a good thing that the two sisters, who had a very close relationship, were now taking a healthy distance from each other after being separated by middle school and high school.

"But if you actually find a corpse, then make sure you call the police, okay?"

"Of course. Who do you think I am?"

"Tsukihi-chan, of course."

Hm.

But with all three kids going out on their own, the Araragi household was at peace—at the very least, none of them were locked in cages.

"Tsukihi-chan. We're truly blessed, you know."

"Hmm? What are you saying, all of a sudden?"

"I mean, we didn't have to worry about what to wear, what to eat, or where to sleep. Maybe I should be more grateful to our parents."

"What's the matter? What happened to that onii-chan that would run off somewhere every Mother's Day?"

"I didn't run off anywhere this year! As promised."

"You weren't here for Father's Day. Neither hide nor hair."

"I didn't promise anything for Father's Day."

I haven't exactly become upfront about my feelings regarding my father yet.

Well, putting Mother's Day and Father's Day on the same day was something I'd already discussed with Ononoki-chan, so I wasn't going to repeat myself here.

"Well, there was a bunch of stuff like you jumping off rooftops and being kidnapped by a group of delinquents."

"There was, wasn't there."

"But I'm really thankful that our house is at peace."

I'd experienced things like a hell of a spring break and a nightmare of a Golden Week, but basically, all of those had happened outside my home.

It wasn't like my home became hell or my family became a nightmare... No matter how bad the parent-child or sibling relationship got, I never felt like my life was in danger.

I'd always had a seat at our dinner table.

The filial piety that Senjougahara Hitagi was forced to show her mother; the fact that Hanekawa Tsubasa slept and woke up in the hallway; those were things I still couldn't digest very well... No matter how close we cuddled, no matter how harshly I was yelled at, I would never truly be able to understand their suffering.

Even when I was confronted with an incident that put me close to death, it was still just a temporary accident—a limited-duration tragedy, so to speak.

It wasn't anything like an unforeseeable eternity where I wouldn't be protected by a guardian.

"That's true. If there were problems at home, then Karen-chan and I wouldn't have had to go out to look for evil, would we? The only problem that the Araragi family has is that the older brother looks at his younger sisters in a sexual way."

"That's too big of a problem. And I don't do that. I look at you with contempt."

"I should be grateful. Well, I'm sure parents remember the joys of parenthood, so I guess you could say it's mutual."

"That's not something you can say. You're on the children's side."

"I swear that when I'm reborn, I'll become a mother to Mom and Dad, and take good care of them!"

How complicated.

Well, when you in particular talked about rebirth, there was a fair amount of truth to that... Considering you were a cuckoo.

A shide-no-dori.

And—a phoenix.

"In that case, Tsukihi-chan. Shouldn't you be saying that when you're reborn, you want to be a daughter to Mom and Dad again?"

"For sure! I'm really glad I was born into the Araragi family! I'm so happy to be born the daughter of Mom and Dad and the sister of onii-chan and Karen-chan! I never asked to be born, though!"

"You said a little too much, there."

"If I’m going to be greedy, I'd like to be reborn as your older sister, onii-chan! I want you to be my little brother that I can pick on!"

"Again, a little too much."

I could do without being on the receiving end of your abuse.

010

I figured that I would go along with walking to my alma mater as the athletic types would, but, as a non-athletic type, I decided to drive to our first meeting place, Kanbaru's Japanese mansion (I may have wanted to show my juniors my driving skills). And to my surprise, there was no Ononoki-chan in the back seat.

So she wasn't taking refuge here...? Then, perhaps she had gone to play at Sengoku's place... She sure was active for a corpse.

Oh well, regardless, it wasn't like I could take a tween girl to a girlsbas social... So, if things proceeded according to schedule, I was supposed to meet up with two of my juniors from Naoetsu High, Kanbaru Suruga and Higasa Seiu, but...

"Well, well, it has been a while, Araragi-senpai—how have you been? It's me, Suruga-senpai's biggest fan, the second-year, Oshino Ougi."

The junior who greeted me at the huge gate of the Kanbaru residence was, astride a BMX, the high school boy version of Oshino Ougi—since the Kanbaru residence was Kanbaru Suruga's territory, it seemed he was in boy mode.

As usual, he showed up with that sort of self-introduction.

How tactful of him.

"...What about the two high school girls?"

"It seems that they were delayed in shopping for the party, so they left me to watch the house. With Suruga-senpai having so much faith in me, isn't it obvious that I was instructed to keep Araragi-senpai company?"

It was hard to believe Kanbaru would entrust Ougi-chan—er, Ougi-kun—with watching the house, but if it was obvious, then I guess nothing could be done.

It was obvious, after all.

"I also had some business to attend to with Suruga-senpai, so it was perfect timing. No need to worry, as I won't do anything like follow you to that social. How about it? While we wait for those two to return, why don't we form a duo and clean up Suruga-senpai's room?"

"Two boys shouldn't mess around in a girl's room while she's out..."

"Aah, Araragi-senpai, so you actually are conscious of Suruga-senpai as a girl? Have you been looking at my Suruga-senpai in that way?"

"......"

Boy mode Oshino Ougi was hard to deal with. No, I guess he was like this even when he was a girl? Either way, it felt pretty fresh for me, seeing as I never really had the chance to talk with other high school boys when I was in high school.

It was like, there was no need for Araragi Koyomi to stand firm against Oshino Ougi.

"Although, I'm secretly in the Higasa-senpai camp," said Ougi-kun. "So no fighting over her, okay?"

"Even though you keep going on about Suruga-senpai. That's way too secret. And fighting over her [toriaikko]..."

"Ha ha. Then, would you like to trade and make your fave a 'replacement child [torikaekko]'?"

"...Haha."

I couldn't let my guard down.

Even if "Ougi-kun" was the darkness in Kanbaru's heart, he was still the exact same as the "Ougi-chan" that was the darkness in my heart, so I should've expected him to see through me to this extent.

Since he was Oshino Meme's niece—Oshino Meme's nephew.

"No, no, I don't know anything. You're the one who knows, Araragi-senpai."

"I wish I did. I said this to Tsukihi-chan earlier, but I only know what I know."

"In that case, how would you like to complain to your devoted junior the circumstances that you know of? Just use that power dynamic to make me quietly listen without resistance."

"Do I look like the kind of senior that would perform such a power play?"

Especially since you weren't the type to listen quietly.

All you did was resist.

But, well, rather than wasting time in front of Kanbaru's house, I may as well bring up child abuse and the professor's disappearance as the topic of the conversation.

If I made the mistake of complaining to Kanbaru or Higasa-chan, it would do nothing but put a damper on the senpai-kouhai social... This wasn't the fable of "The King with Donkey Ears", but if I chattered away at Ougi-chan... er, Ougi-kun, then perhaps it could lift my spirits.

With that excuse in mind, I summed things up as concisely as possible and bared my emotions to Ougi-kun—something like this was like talking to myself to the extreme, but, well, it was a tradition of Araragi Koyomi to be loose-lipped when Oshino Ougi was his conversation partner.

"I see. A threefold locked room. That makes me really happy. These days, we don't hear much about locked-room tricks anymore, do we?"

"There's no need for you to act all innocently happy about that. There may have been locked rooms, but none of the doors had any tricks on them."

Ever since then, I'd been keeping the key to the professor's apartment in the pocket of my pants, and shrugged my shoulders with that in mind—she'd disappeared before I could return it, but that didn't mean I could throw it away, so I'd been carrying it around with me the whole time.

Maybe that was a bad thing.

"Not to mention, Ononoki-chan kicked down the second door."

"Indeed. To put it in a rather dull way, producing impossible crimes such as locked-room murders is probably not what intellectual criminals do. Although there is no occupation more intellectual than a university professor."

Said Ougi-kun with a smirk.

Even when he heard a story full of heavy words like "abuse" and "disappearance", he didn't waver a bit—regardless of his gender, he had to be like this, huh.

"So, what do you think? Ougi-kun."

"And what do you mean by what I think?"

"About the contradiction. Of the right and wrong behind the action of stabbing a cloth doll that looked like her own child, and then locking it in a cage."

"If it's a question of right or wrong, then it's most certainly wrong. And if it's a matter of the contradictory spear and shield, then I would say it's the shield."

"The shield?"

"It's self-protection. Defense. For reference, the spear would be aggression based on resentment and murderous intent."

"...Stabbing a defenseless doll in the back is self-protection?"

"Yes. A cowardly crime, to kill before you yourself are killed."

He'd said it wasn't something an intellectual criminal would do, but a cowardly crime... His criticism of Associate Professor Iesumi was pretty intense.

Was that coming from my inner psyche?

But Ougi-kun was different from Ougi-chan in that the origin of his existence was based on Kanbaru... But, in terms of what lay beneath Kanbaru's surface...

"Oh please, Araragi-senpai. I'm not criticizing Associate Professor Iesumi at all."

"Eh?"

"After all, there's no evidence—we can't assume that Associate Professor Iesumi is the one who stabbed the defenseless doll in the back."

Innocent until proven guilty—said Ougi-kun.

Of course, as a resident of a constitutional state, I was certainly aware of that rule... But, huh?

It was true that there was no evidence. Now that he mentioned it.

It wasn't as if forensics came in and checked the fingerprints on the fruit knife, and more importantly, they didn't perform any interview of the person in question... It was all something I'd just come up with on my own.

I was the one who knew—

"There was no criminal investigation performed. If I had to say it, then what was performed was simply media manipulation."

"......"

Hold on. I had to think about this properly.

It was a matter of civil rights... It wasn't the first time for Ougi-kun to jump on one of my carelessly-made comments, but if it became a hotbed for false accusations, then it needed to be examined seriously.

Right.

It was a contradiction.

I had felt very uncomfortable in the nursery because I'd felt that the act of stabbing in the back the abused doll that resembled one's child was inconsistent, but if I interpreted it in parts, the contradictory spear and shield would not clash.

As for the "truth" that she locked her "three-year-old daughter" in a cage at home, she'd confessed that in her own stammering words when she made the request to me... So when I saw the blade stuck in the doll in the cage, I didn't hesitate to accept that it was also the work of Associate Professor Iesumi.

"However, you just went and felt uncomfortable all on your own, didn't you? When people feel things like, 'This is weird,' or, 'How did this happen?' or, 'Why did things turn out like this...', it's usually because multiple people were rampantly involved from multiple directions. That's why it goes beyond your comprehensions."

Multiple people—multiple culprits.

No, that made it sound as if there was an accomplice, but in this case, if this was a complete division of labor by individual people with no communication...

A system where confidentiality is maintained by dividing the work into small segments and assigning them to large numbers of disparate people so that no one can see the big picture—a system where not only outsiders, but also the people themselves, didn't know what they were doing.

To put it simply.

I hadn't considered at all the possibility that the "culprit that had encaged" Iie-chan and the "culprit that had stabbed" Iie-chan were completely different people.

The act of abusing her, and the act of murdering her.

The pieces of the puzzle seemed to sit right next to each other, and yet they did not need to be joined together.

"......"

But... It raised some other questions.

First, if we adopted the idea that there was a child murderer in addition to a child abuser, then the question was, who and where were they?

And how did they manage to carry out the crime?—was another question. That was what good old-fashioned mysteries were about. Threefold secret rooms and impossible crimes.

Most of the logic that was based on the fact that the crime scene was Associate Professor Iesumi's home collapsed, and the killer's image, motive, and trick became inexplicable.

"Not quite."

"What do you mean, Ougi-kun?"

"That sort of typical assistant role doesn't suit you, Araragi-senpai. I don't know anything, so please use your brain cells to think about the main point. Your little grey cells, that is."

How shameless.

But I couldn't get used to relying on this kid—I'll stretch out the wings of my imagination as far as I can so that I can get to say the phrase that suits me: "It's elementary, my dear Ougi-kun."

Putting aside the motive for now. Not like I was the queen of motives. In the case of Associate Professor Iesumi, whether it was abuse or murder, "because she is my daughter" (which should be the reason to protect her) could paradoxically be connected to the motive... If there was another culprit, then there were infinite variations on why people would kill other people.

"I dunno about that. Most of the time, people kill for love, grudges, money, or war. If you include accidents, then there are only five patterns. You can count them on one hand."

It seemed that Ougi-kun took on the role of my assistant, but he was quite the nasty assistant... He was just making fun of me instead of supporting my detective role at all.

He should never take charge of the narration.

"When it comes to a reason to kill a three-year-old, perhaps we should include perverted sexual desire as a motive. Not to mention, it would be a doll."

What the heck.

Anyway, putting the motive aside... What about the locked-room trick?

The bolt lock on the cage wasn't a problem. It didn't even require lockpicking. However, the only one who could unlock the nursery door, as well as the front door, was the homeowner, Associate Professor Iesumi, herself—

"I wonder about that. After all, the first door was unlocked by you, Araragi-senpai, and the second door was magnificently broken through by Ononoki-chan, correct?"

With superficial politeness, my assistant's verbal jabs did not stop—but see, I could respond to that. After all, the second door was broken through, as if knocked down with a battering ram.

Rather than magnificent, it was destruction I would rather not look at.

Even I could only open the first door because the homeowner had entrusted me with the key, and without it, it would have been impossible to get into that locked room—or did the culprit have a spare key?

Perhaps they temporarily borrowed the house key from the professor's key ring... Or they stole the master key from the apartment's management...

"Huh? What if... they didn't have to go that far?"

What if it wasn't a spare key?

If it wasn't—then the locked-room nature of the second door, and the problem of the motive that I had set aside... Frighteningly enough, they could all be solved in one fell swoop.

"Wh, wh-wh, what do you m-m-m-mean? Th, th-th, that they didn't, didn't, didn't, have to go that f, f-f-f-far."

"Don't start pretending to be an assistant now."

That assistant was trembling way too much. He's so out of his mind he's acting like a DJ.

Why couldn't you do things properly?

No, the one who couldn't do things properly was me—this deduction was something I should've come up with when I was right there.

I opened my mouth.

If it wasn't a spare key, but a legitimate key that the owner had proper ownership of.

"It's not necessarily the case that the estranged husband left his keys behind when he left that apartment, right?"

011

Saying that it wasn't necessarily the case [kagiranai] that he left his keys [kagi] behind sounded like a bad pun, but please ignore it—sometimes I'm the one that's out of his mind.

Originally, I was selfish, had few friends, tended to be at odds with others, and was not very good at working with others, which was why I couldn't come up with such an obvious idea, but the fact that I had overlooked the possibility that the crime scene was a joint effort between the couple was an embarrassing blind spot.

I'd paired up as buddies with a vampire, a corpse doll, a god, and the darkness in my heart, though... However, although the term "collaboration" may sound appropriate, it was still a misnomer.

The mother who committed abuse. The father who committed murder.

Because the process was so disjointed, the scene of the crime looked so inexplicable—if the husband came home while Associate Professor Iesumi was away, and then stabbed his wife's handmade work in the back.

With the motive of "because she was his daughter".

Was his wife's behavior, which was also the cause of their separation, too unpleasant to watch—or did the husband also think it was "his child" and stab the doll for that reason?

The extreme possibility was that he felt sorry for her because she was locked in a cage, so took pity on her and put an end to her... Did he stab her in the back because he couldn't kill her while looking at that "henohenomoheji" face in the eyes?

There could be infinite variations on the motive.

No, no no, this was still just an assumption. The wings of my imagination were flapping too much. It wasn't right to be so insistently suspicious of the husband who I'd never met, the husband whose name I didn't even know. The freedom of my inner heart should be used for little girls, tween girls, and young girls, not for suspecting someone of trespassing or murder.

"Although, it would be his own home, so it wouldn't be trespassing. And it was a doll, so it wouldn't be murder,"

said Ougi-kun.

"But, even if you don't have proof, that doesn't mean you don't have a basis for that reasoning, right? When it comes to the uneven results of that doll, as you said yourself, Araragi-senpai. The difference between that balloon-art-like form and the roughly scribbled 'henohenomoheji' face... You could think of it as the professor being better at sewing than she was at drawing, but you could also see it as each task being assigned to a different person, right?"

"......"

Group work—division of labor.

Handmade.

"If so, then I wonder what the circumstances of that were. I don't mean to be presumptuous, but Araragi-senpai, shouldn’t you start the investigation all over again? With this, it might even change the nuance behind the professor's disappearance."

"......"

I didn't think it would change anything.

If there was something to think about divided into parts, then we should also split up her disappearance into parts... Ougi-kun seemed to be pushing me towards the idea that the husband was involved in the professor's disappearance, but even in the unlikely event that that was the case, that was a job for the police to investigate.

In the first place, I didn't even have any investigatory power.

If it was an oddity phenomenon—if the "replacement child" phenomenon was involved, then as someone who's had some experience with the matter, I would not be reluctant to interject a few words of caution, but if not, then playing detective without discretion would be an illegal act.

Just as Ononoki-chan had admonished me, I should remember to rely on the police.

Or so I said, but an hour later, I was parked in the parking lot of Associate Professor Iesumi's apartment building, not near Naoetsu High's gymnasium, the venue of the girlsbas senpai-kouhai social.

Without waiting for Kanbaru and Higasa-chan to return from their shopping trip, I left a message with Ougi-kun, turned the steering wheel as far as it could go, made a U-turn, and revisited the Iesumi residence.

It's because I nonchalantly act with such ingratitude that it's been hard to make friends even in university, but I'd have to wait until next time to get pampered by high school girls.

This was urgent.

No, I wasn't pretending to be a great detective who was caught up in intellectual curiosity and impulsively embarked on a guessing game... In fact, I was the exact opposite, the type of person who avoided murder scenes, even to the point of taking detours. I sounded like I was trying to be understanding, but I honestly didn't understand why Tsukihi would go hiking with her friends after hearing a rumor that a dead body was buried there.

What the hell was she doing?

Even if it wasn't a murder or a crime, the reason I dared to revisit the apartment—where not only the act of child abuse but also the feud between husband and wife had appeared—was not out of intellectual curiosity but, dare I say it, the shield, as Ougi-chan... Ougi-kun had said.

In other words, self-protection.

It was something I'd remembered as I was speaking with Ougi-kun about the threefold locked room. Or rather, it was something I realized. Not the lock to the cage, which could easily be opened, nor the lock to the front door, where the husband might own a key—but the lock to the nursery, the second door.

As for that lock, it would not be surprising if the husband (who used to live in the house) knew where the key was, which means it wasn't necessarily a locked room... When I thought as much, I realized something.

I'd magnificently broken through it—a battering ram.

Ononoki-chan had kicked down the door, but wasn't that kind of yikes?

It had to be yikes.

Since I was entrusted with the key, I'd been confident that I wasn't trespassing this time, unlike the case with Benikujaku-chan, even though we hadn't been told we could destroy the room—the sight of the doll in the cage with its back stabbed must have confused me more than I thought, as I completely forgot to clean up the mess.

Neither the act of abusing a doll nor the act of murdering a doll was a crime, but the vandalism of the interior doors of another person's home certainly was.

Ononoki-chan...!

That girl had no hesitation in her destruction, or, being Yotsugi [余接], it was like she had no other ideas [余念]... With such a docile expression (or rather, no expression at all), she sure was good at destroying things without batting an eyelid... Speaking of which, in Benikujaku-chan's case, she'd also broken the window to the apartment without compunction.

She would probably answer proudly and without shame that she was a tool with that sort of function, but it always ended up being me that had to clean up afterwards.

It's like how, even though it's the heroes who defeat the demon king, it's the ordinary people who have to rebuild the world after it was destroyed in battle—no, this was not a story with that sort of lesson. This was simply a matter of a lack of discipline. After all, the original owner of that Ononoki-chan was that violent onmyouji... Not to mention, the current owner, Tsukihi, was not the type of person who lived for tidiness, to say the least.

Whatever it was, I hadn't thought about it enough.

It was quite the awful nursery, so the destroyed door fit right in, but even in a room that looked like the remnants of affection, that didn't mean that the door should also become remnants.

It may not be a problem or an incident at the moment, but if the disappearance of Associate Professor Iesumi continued for a long time, then someone, some party, would enter that room at some point—the management company, or even the police.

Although her whereabouts were unknown, it only meant that she did not show up at work and could not be contacted, not that she had been reported missing—the people that would likely file a missing person report, her family and parents, were probably all living in Switzerland. At the moment, the authorities did not seem to be taking any action, but even that had its limits.

If the rent wasn't paid on time, the apartment would have to be vacated at some point—and if that nursery was seen, that would cause a huge scandal. No doubt, it would be linked to her disappearance, and how would the destroyed door be seen then...?

Maybe, as a coward, I was being overly cautious—if the judiciary was going to arrest her for that level of destruction, Ononoki-chan would have been arrested a long time ago (she had once smashed the front door of the Araragi house to bits, as well as my sister).

I could assume that the person usually in charge of cleaning up after Ononoki-chan was the influential administrator of the specialists, Gaen Izuko-san—she was good at that sort of subterfuge, that "onee-san that knew everything".

Subterfuge against sabotage.

However, as my relations had currently been cut off with that onee-san, I couldn't rely on that possibility anymore... Now that I'd realized, I had to do something about it myself.

If I hadn't realized it, I could have just let it go... Even though I was supposed to be having a change of pace having fun with high school girls, switching to going and covering up a crime was quite the rollercoaster.

If the rent is withdrawn from her bank account, even if she's not there, then the payments wouldn't be delayed right away (though it depended on her bank balance), but it was better to take action as soon as I could—you could say it was fortunate that I kept the key in my pocket instead of getting rid of it... Although, if I had just thrown it away, I wouldn't have even been able to consider performing a cover-up, and may have just given up. Actual crimes were probably exposed as a result of such unimportant lapses of memory...

Life just didn't go smoothly, did it.

But I was glad that I realized at the point that Ononoki-chan was away... A former vampire under surveillance, acting arbitrarily of my own accord, could get me killed yet again. Even though I was trying to clean up after Ononoki-chan's behavior, I wouldn't accept if Ononoki-chan were to clean me up, instead.

And so, after going to a home center and picking up carpentry tools meant for repairs along the way, I revisited the Iesumi residence.

012

If I fixed the broken door quickly enough, perhaps I would make it in time for at least the afterparty of the girlsbas social—at least, that was the sweet-sounding plan I tried to devise, but that plan went awry.

Of course, I was making it sound like I was dying to attend that social, but I wasn't exactly a sociable person in the first place, so no matter what the purpose was, I wasn't exactly good with parties... When it came to the Fire Sisters' disbanding party, that troublesome guy who attended only reluctantly? That was me.

That was a party of middle school girls, huh... Well, I could do something about my social skills while I was still in college, but it seemed that I'd have to give up on attending the social altogether.

Because the door to the nursery was damaged beyond repair, so much so that I couldn't do anything about it—no, that wasn't the reason.

If that had been the case, then ultimately, I could've used my secret trick. I could have relied on the former legendary vampire Oshino Shinobu's—the former Kissshot Acerolaorion Heartunderblade's—"matter creation ability" to perfectly reconstruct the door from nothing... Although one condition was that I would have to wait until nightfall, but if so then I could simply have gone to the social while it was still daytime (maybe I did want to go after all?) and then come back to this room at night.

I would also have to pay compensation (in donuts)... However, that carefully thought-out plan ended up being useless. The state of that second door was such that it perfectly suited my independent spirit in wanting to resolve things on my own if at all possible... It was probably a good thing that Ononoki-chan kicked the door with her bare foot. If she had been wearing her usual boots, or if she had gone and used her "Unlimited Rulebook", then a hole could have been formed in the door itself. But the only damage that had been incurred was a faint footprint on the door and a few broken screws—even the hinges were mostly intact.

This was a level of DIY that I could manage with my skills—but then, why was it that I couldn't go and gleefully get pampered by high school girls?

The situation wasn’t that complicated, but it was very important, so allow me to explain it step by step—about this development that was less of a situation [jijou] and more of an anomaly [ijou].

Even though I'd been given a key, that didn't mean that I had nothing to hide, so I snuck in through the back door of the building as if I was trying to avoid the security cameras (which made me even more suspicious), and took the stairs instead of the elevator to the third floor, room 333—after all, with the homeowner missing, I didn't want anyone to think the kidnapper had come back to destroy evidence. I could say that I hadn't kidnapped anyone, but the facts were extremely close to that scenario, and that closeness could be a problem... My behavior was becoming more and more suspicious.

Well, it's impossible to avoid the cameras completely unless you become a complete vampire (then you won't be reflected in mirrors, so you'd be safe except for mirrorless cameras. Mirrorless was probably fine, too), so at some point I just had to take a "so-what" attitude... And apart from that, there were other precautions I needed to take.

Now that I'd arrived at the possibility that the separated husband was the "child murderer", I most certainly needed to be cautious that Room 333 might not necessarily be empty when I came... You might say that something like that was going a bit overboard, but I had to say that it was entirely possible for me to bump into the husband that had returned in the nursery.

It would be a terrible scene to be found in.

Even though I'd never gone through such a sad state of affairs with my actual girlfriend, why should I have to suffer like some married woman's secret lover?... However, since I, the breaker of the door (rather, an accomplice), had made my triumphant return here, it wouldn't be unusual if the husband were to return for the second time.

Not to mention the possibility of it being a situation like that Russian movie, The Return... The idea that the husband was the "child murderer" was, at present, simply my (and Ougi-kun's) own conjecture, so even if he weren't, it's conceivable that he might return home out of worry for his missing wife. In that case, we would not be of equal status. I would one-sidedly be guilty of breaking and entering.

It'd been tense when I'd opened the front door imagining a locked-up abused child, but it was also quite thrilling to open the door imagining that the father might be there.

So, after much deliberation, I decided to ring the intercom... And there was no answer. No reaction. Could I feel relief from that?

Nope, I should take precautions over relief.

Because there was one more development that I needed to take into consideration. That was the possibility that the heart of the problem, "the missing Associate Professor Iesumi herself", was simply holed up in her house—instead of disappearing or returning to Switzerland, what if she was just not contacting her work or friends, not leaving her apartment, and not using her answering machine?

It seemed like a classic trick that was often overlooked, but it was actually a stay-at-home policy that was possible because of modern society. Any necessities of life could be delivered through online shopping... Well, there would eventually be a limit to it, but even so, a person could easily spend their life like this for a week or so.

This was assuming she had the strength of mind to remain stubbornly silent even when university officials and friends were visiting her incessantly... Meanwhile, I was feeling so guilty after canceling on the social last-minute.

Oh yeah, once upon a time, I'd locked myself in the gymnasium storehouse with the intention of disappearing (please don't ask me for details), but a single message from Hanekawa was enough to shake me... So, if Associate Professor Iesumi was responsible for her own disappearance for whatever reason, I had to think that the possibility that she was hiding in her home was rather thin.

Even the possibility of exchanging greetings with the husband was clearly higher—but if I didn't properly simulate the pattern of reuniting with Associate Professor Iesumi after a few days, I figured I'd get flustered... Could I say something like, "I've come to return the key"?

Or should I just pretend to be a great detective and say something cool, like, "I knew you were here all along..."?

All the while, making an expression of understanding.

In any case, there was no answer when I pressed the intercom—from here on, my role was not to be a visitor, but to be a repairman.

Though it wasn't necessarily the home of a person I knew well, it was still my second visit to the house, so I wasn't going to get lost just from walking down the hallway of this apartment—no need to invoke the god of lost children—and I soon arrived at the nursery.

I should add that there was no sign of anyone from the living room or the first door in the hallway (most likely Associate Professor Iesumi's bedroom)—thus, the theory of the university professor having become a shut-in had all but disappeared. Rather, I should reflect upon my apparent carelessness in having left the door to that bedroom open the other day.

The second door was more than simply left open... but the extent of the destruction was such that it could be restored to its original state by hand, as I'd already mentioned.

Let's just rejoice in that.

However, the thought of rejoicing didn't pass through my mind at all, because it wasn't just the door to the nursery that had been broken.

"...Huh?"

The big problem was—the door to the cage in the corner of the nursery was broken. The other day, when I viewed this room with its blackout curtains drawn, the door of the cage had been properly bolted—but now, it was broken in a way that was almost irreparable.

It was as if it had been a cage to confine some sort of monster, and that monster forcibly pried open the iron fence from the inside... It had been warped like candy. Rather than saying the door had been broken, it was more like the door had been melted—but, needless to say, there were no monsters inside that cage.

And.

The abused doll that had been stabbed in the back with a fruit knife had also disappeared from the cage. Like her maker, she had gone missing—

013

Hm? Hmm? Hmmm?

What was going on here?

I decided to temporarily set my toolbox down on the nursery's floor... This might have been a mistake, as any sensible person would have turned on his heel immediately.

But, being a considerable fool, I couldn't help but inspect the cage. Without thinking, I chose to think—well, well, let's at least calm down.

I figured that someday I would fix my bad habit of staying in place when surprised... If I were to assess the scene objectively, it might look as if the doll escaped from the cage of its own volition, but I couldn't take that as fact just yet.

No need to panic.

I only got such a first impression because I happened to know an extreme example of an autonomously moving doll, a corpse doll... But as long as we followed common sense, dolls did not break out of prison.

Just as everyone knows well.

So, if there was someone that destroyed this cage in the past few days, it should be easily assumed that it was not the work of the trapped doll, but of someone who visited the room during that time.

It may look like it had been pried open from the inside, but maybe that was just how it looked, you know?

It appeared that Associate Professor Iesumi was not at home, and so I could make any number of hypotheses that she could have returned home temporarily after her disappearance—and when she did, perhaps she took that handmade doll with a profound level of emotional attachment with her. A similar hypothesis could easily be made in the case of the husband.

Maybe he regretted stabbing the doll that his wife "adored"... Um, maybe he took it to be repaired?

It could even be surmised that he took the doll to destroy evidence after his wife's disappearance, just as I had visited the Iesumi residence to do so.

...But, was that really the case?

Even if it wasn't the Iesumi couple, assuming a human being took that creepy doll... Who in the world would go so far as bending an iron cage to do that?

Even the shikigami and god of destruction who kicked in the second door, Ononoki-chan, would probably unbolt the cage when opening it... It was a simple mechanism that could be opened by even a kindergartener who had never seen something so ancient as a bolt lock in their life.

Yes, unless you were a three-year-old that hadn't yet entered kindergarten...

First off, it was a cage meant for animals. It wasn't some run-of-the-mill toy. What kind of force, and at what angle, would cause an iron rod to twist in such a ridiculous way?

At least with my arm strength, it would be impossible. Of course, in my vampire days, neither iron nor diamond would be anything special, but with my current arm strength...

But really, what about it?

No matter how innocent I pretended to be, I'd traveled through time, and I'd both destroyed and saved a parallel world... It made no sense to be so distraught over the escape of a doll.

But... even the "precedent", the corpse doll Ononoki-chan, needed to be used for a hundred years in order to become a tsukumogami, right? And for her to move so freely and openly, Kagenui Yozuru and Teori Tadatsuru had been burdened with the incomprehensible curse of "not being able to walk on the ground"—Ononoki-chan was a corpse doll with that much time and compensation needed.

For a stuffed doll, which had only been a stuffed doll last week, to escape from prison by force on my next visit... Was it really so simple?

"...No."

It wasn't just a stuffed doll.

It was handmade, made in place of one's child.

It had been hurt.

And it had been stabbed in the back—even though it hadn't been long, the passion put into it was certainly not superficial. It was a level of passion that would make you think, "If that much wasn't enough, then how much passion would you even need?"

I would even venture to say that there was the possibility that my visit to the nursery was a trigger... It was entirely possible that I, with my wealth of experience in strange things, had some influence over it. In the same way that the Kitashirahebi Shrine, which used to be a gathering place for "bad things", played such a role with the jagirinawa—perhaps I had become a walking attraction for those "bad things".

A magnificent self-made problem.

In order to prevent this from happening, Gaen-san should have completely sealed away the influence of the former Kissshot Acerolaorion Heartunderblade, but I suppose even the most skilled of experts could make mistakes.

If that was the case, then I couldn't help but feel responsible... If I was not only the trigger for the disappearance of Associate Professor Iesumi, but also the trigger for the jailbreak of the abused doll, then—no joke—I couldn't complain if I was blasted to death by Ononoki-chan.

That girl was always no joke [joudan].

She was always a ghost story [kaidan].

However, even so, this situation was no longer something that I could cover up... I had no choice but to report to Ononoki-chan, even if it meant preparing myself to get killed. Unlike the second door, the only way to fix this warped, twisted cage back to normal would be to call in Shinobu, but if there really was a leak in the influence of that loli slave, then we couldn't easily rely on vampire powers.

I was at a loss...

In any case, whether it was my fault or not, I couldn't afford not to search for the stuffed doll that escaped from the cage, and if it came to that, then the help of a professional like Ononoki-chan was essential—as I thought that, I approached the cage and looked inside from above, just as I'd done the other day.

No matter what direction I looked in from, there was no space to hide in an empty cage... Even the fruit knife was gone.

Could it have escaped while stabbed?

If that was the case, that fugitive would be dealing with a serious injury... Could I think of it like that? Or was I empathizing too much with a lump of cloth?

But it's because of the emotional investment that that doll—let's call it the Iie-chan doll—was able to escape from the cage, wasn't it?

"Um... But, if it escaped, then where did it go?"

I voiced the question that naturally came to mind.

Of course, I would go look for it together with Ononoki-chan—well, I highly doubt it ran to the children's welfare center—but what I was referring to came before that.

I had come in through the front door. Using the key, I'd unlocked the door.

In other words, the door had been locked—if the Iie-chan doll had left from the front, from that doorway, then wasn't it strange that the door was locked?

Unlike the husband, it was hard to believe the stuffed doll possessed a key... Not many parents would entrust their keys to a three-year-old, even if the child was alive and not abused.

To examine the problem from all angles, even assuming that the Iie-chan doll still had the key... If "she" couldn't figure out how to open a bolt lock, how could she possibly know how to close a dimple lock?

In other words, roughly speaking, the Iie-chan doll didn't go out the front door... Then, could it have escaped by breaking the glass of a window somewhere? But when I entered the room, the air felt the same as when I'd been here the other day, and it didn't seem like it had been ventilated in any way...

"...It may have escaped from the cage, but."

Perhaps, the Iie-chan doll.

Was still in this apartment?

014

Surprisingly enough, I hadn't been able to quickly deduce from the warped frame of the cage the possibility that the Iie-chan doll's escape had just taken place—I hadn't imagined that the Iie-chan doll could still be at home, or even that she could still be hiding in this very nursery.

While there was certainly no place to hide in the empty cage, when the playing field consisted of the entire house, there would be plenty of hiding places for a stuffed doll the size of a three-year-old.

I was suddenly very nervous.

It happened at quite the accelerated rate, especially taking into account the fact that the fruit knife was also missing—a doll capable of irreversibly destroying a cage, while also wielding a knife? That was more than enough of a threat.

It was threatening [kyoui], and it was terrifying [kyoufu].

To think that it was not Associate Professor Iesumi but the Iie-chan doll that was holed up inside this apartment... Even though it was able to escape from the cage, did it stay in here because it couldn't figure out how to get past the front door? At the size of a three-year-old, it wouldn't be able to reach the thumbturn, either... If it had the strength to bend bars of iron, then it would be strong enough to break a window, but the question was whether or not a three-year-old understood what the substance of glass was.

For example, adult dogs were said to have the intelligence of three-year-olds, but supposedly they often ran headfirst into windowpanes... It was bit different from the concept of the mirror self-recognition test, but it wouldn't be a surprise if the Iie-chan doll couldn't conceive of breaking that transparent glass. In the same way you can't break air, which is transparent and not visible... Damn, this was making me glance around for no reason.

To think that after just barely registering the fact that a doll had escaped, I would be devising plans for my own escape... However, if I wasn't being too cowardly and the Iie-chan doll really was still inside this apartment, then you could say that there was a successful lockdown in place.

In specialist terms, a barrier.

If I were to open the front door to escape, it would result in the barrier being lifted... Of course, if I closed the door immediately and locked it tightly, then I could probably get away with it, but that couldn't be guaranteed... It was even possible that the escapee was waiting to take advantage of when I would make my escape.

So here I was, feeling a sense of responsibility and trying to figure out a way to settle the matter of this barrier... Although, if the doll had already escaped ages ago, this would just be tilting at windmills.

It wouldn't exactly be a reprehensible double standard if a stuffed doll that could pry open an iron cage with its monstrous strength could also pass through walls.

Even though I knew that very well, I still had to do whatever I could... Because if I let the Iie-chan doll leave the house right now, I had no idea where it would go off to—well, no, I did have an idea.

My idea was that the abused "three-year-old daughter" would go looking for the missing "mother" or perhaps the estranged "father"—with unexpected superpowers, that is.

That's why I had to stop it.

If it was still in here, I couldn't let it escape.

If only I had the skill to detect oddities like a radar... If it were Shinobu, she could probably do it... However, as far as I could tell from my glancing around, it seemed it wasn't still in the nursery. I also astutely made sure to look at the ceiling, but there weren't any mobiles hanging from it.

It wasn't as if I looked that carefully at the living room or the associate professor's bedroom when I arrived, but thinking about it, the most suspicious room had to be that third room, right? It seemed that the time had finally come for me to muster up the courage to enter into the estranged husband's room—a room I had not yet seen. I took one last glance at the crib to see if the doll would actually turn out to have been sleeping peacefully there, but of course, it was empty, just like the cage.

No, strictly speaking, it wasn't "just like" the cage.

Without exaggerating, the cage was completely empty, but the crib was a bed, so naturally there was a blanket inside—a blanket?

"!! Urk—!"

By the time I thought of it, it was already too late.

The blanket that flew out from the crib wrapped around my neck—with an intense power that could even bend iron.

015

I'd been calling it a lump of cloth—in other words, looking down on the fact that it was supposed to be a doll—and it was as if I was receiving retribution for it. Even though it didn't even need a change in thinking to see that the Iie-chan doll, which had been formed like a balloon animal, had untied itself and hid itself in the crib.

I promised to write a letter of reflection, about the length of this book, for my lack of consideration and inadequacy at a later date, but right now, considering the situation he was currently experiencing, what Araragi Koyomi should be writing was a letter of warning.

I wasn't saying this out of spite towards being strangled by a blanket... But if it had the ability to arbitrarily return from the shape of a three-year-old to the shape of a flat blanket, then why even bother bending the cage to escape from it?

It could just slip through the gap between the bars.

By untying itself and thinning out.

It was plausible to assume that it didn't do so because it couldn't do so at the time... It was only after escaping that it acquired the ability to "blanket-ify", if you will.

Should I say that it learned—or should I say that it grew up, like a three-year-old would?

Its growth rate, its growth potential.

As an oddity, its danger level was way too high—even though I was "former" in more ways than one, the fact that it could entrap the thrall of the King of Oddities in such a skillful way was all the more impressive.

It was probably reading too much into it to say that the doll was waiting all this time for a guy to arrive, who could teach it how to open the door—I thought I'd been plenty nervous, but it seemed I didn't have enough of a sense of urgency.

So it would not have been a surprise if I'd broken my neck here, and that would have been extremely appropriate as retribution—but it was only by sheer luck that I was here now, speaking the words of a disgraced loser.

And, if you could believe it, I was now chewing on that good fortune inside a cage—yes, the very cage that the Iie-chan doll had been confined in.

At present, I was being confined.

I'd been grabbed by the neck by an old-looking magic blanket and thrown into the cage—and, whether or not that was also something it had learned, it freed me just before I was about to faint, wrapped itself around the pried-open part of the cage, and pulled it back into its original shape.

Perhaps by coincidence or perhaps on purpose, it also twisted the bar of the bolt lock so that it was all warped and twisted—thus, I was rendered unable to escape from the cage.

I'd been locked up.

The blanket, having successfully neutralized its prey, fluttered out of the nursery without giving me so much as another glance.

After that, judging from the sounds coming from down the hallway, the blanket seemed to have opened the front door and left... The situation I had feared had easily become a reality.

If it could become a flying blanket, then the problem of its height was easily resolved, and the barrier turned out to be one that could simply be unlocked... If it had been locked in the room because it couldn't figure out how to turn the thumbturn, then I had broken that seal when I arrived to destroy evidence.

Oops.

When I came in, I really should have locked the door properly, and even set the chain lock...

At any rate... The escape of an abused doll, huh.

It was like I could kind of understand how it felt. Of course you'd want to run away after being a locked in a cage this small, right?

The sheer number of things I'd have to think about after this made me feel fed up, but first things first, I had to figure out a way out of this cage... The bolt lock had been twisted and tied to be immobile, and pulling off a stunt like warping the iron bars was impossible for (the current) me... Which meant that, good grief, I would have to come up with my own locked room trick.

How thrilling.

It had been a year since I was last confined.

Last summer, I had once been trapped in an abandoned building by Senjougahara Hitagi, who I had just started dating—at that time, she had prepared food and drinks for me, but I couldn't exactly expect anything like that now.

The blanket had escaped, and the homeowner was missing.

I could carelessly act as if I'd managed to survive, but at this rate, I was going to die of hunger in three days.

It was easy to say that people who have never been abused would never know what it felt like to be abused, but I never thought I would experience the same thing as the Iie-chan doll...

Was that also on purpose? Was it revenge?

If so, then all I could say was that it was taking revenge on the wrong person. But that didn't mean I could allow it to take revenge on the right person, either.

I had to become an escape artist.

Fortunately, I had two rough plans in mind.

Plan number one... Wake Shinobu up. The day was still long, but Shinobu wasn't exactly a vampire but the remnants of a vampire, so daytime activities were still possible with some negotiation.

Plan number two... Call Kanbaru or Ougi-kun over LINE. Fortunately, the modern convenience that was my cell phone had neither been stolen nor destroyed—Ougi-kun already knew about this apartment, and if I asked for help from those two that were familiar with oddity phenomena (especially since they appeared to be working together on some suspicious activity), they could not only help me break out of this cage, but also with the subsequent search for the Iie-chan doll.

Neither plan was that bad, but the common disadvantage that both plan one and plan two had was that they were both "super uncool"... If any of them saw me locked up in an animal cage like this, I would never be respected again, as a master or as an upperclassman.

I'd be looked down upon for the rest of my life.

Or even just abandoned.

You'd probably say something like, "I couldn't care less about your trivial sense of pride," but without that trivial sense of pride, my sense of duty towards capturing the Iie-chan doll that I'd let escape would also vanish.

If I had to resort to calling someone out from their precious daytime nap or from a big senpai-kouhai social, I had to at least escape from the cage by myself.

Seriously, I wanted to cry.

I'd experienced hell and I'd experienced nightmares, I'd traveled through time, I'd destroyed and saved a parallel world, and now I was struggling to figure out how to get out of an animal cage... But, well, in the end, it was just a cage for wildlife. Powerless before the wisdom of humanity—well, I wasn't exactly wildlife, but one of those wise humans that had ended up being confined by a blanket, but there was no need to be vain about it in this unwinnable scenario. In fact, Shinobu had seen many more shameful things in my life...

Sure enough, thanks to some sort of divine providence, there was currently a toolbox full of do-it-yourself tools in this nursery. Some idiot must have brought it in order to repair the door in order to hide evidence.

But what that idiot was about to do now was the exact opposite—using the tools to break down a door. You could compare this situation to the reality that technology developed to enrich people's lives could be used as weapons of war in the future, but putting that aside.

I reached for the toolbox through the gap in the iron bars, but alas, it was too far—and my legs fit only up to my knees. Well, thighs are called thighs [futomomo] because they are thick [futoi]. So I decided to use my head a bit and take off my trousers.

Not because I thought it would make my thighs slimmer, but because I was going to use my trousers as a lasso—first, I would take my pants out of the cage, hold the left and right cuffs with my hands through the gaps in the iron bars, and flap the trousers in the direction of the toolbox.

It was on the third try that the toolbox was successfully caught in the crotch area—all I had to do was pull it in.

If I stopped to think about what I was doing in someone else's house with my pants down, it would be a defeat for me... But it was still too early to think that I was done.

This was where the real work began.

Now, in the toolbox, which was on sale for 2,980 yen, there was... Yes, a coping saw! Just what I needed! That was what I cheered to myself, but unfortunately, it was not exactly what I needed—I only realized after I started, but it would probably take me around five years to cut the iron fence with a coping saw.

And it wasn't like I could just cut a single bar and escape. That would be the way of a true escape artist.

Then, could I use a screwdriver to dismantle the cage...? That didn't sound so easy without the assembly instructions, either... And then, it hit me.

At the bottom of the toolbox was a hammer.

DIY.

Destroy It Yourself.

Five minutes later, I succeeded in performing my trick to escape from the locked room—a quicker escape than waking Shinobu up during the day or calling Kanbaru or Ougi-kun on the phone, as it turned out.

According to my calculations, I hadn't even been trapped here for half an hour, but still, there was a real sense of liberation.

I almost wanted to express my joy through song.

With that, I wondered what the Iie-chan doll was feeling now... Right, I couldn't waste time basking in my sense of liberation.

I had to go after the blanket that had escaped.

It couldn't have gone very far yet—clinging to those thoughts, I ran out the front door, but I couldn't find the blanket or the doll anywhere.

Then, could it have figured out how to use the elevator? Or perhaps, the fire escape—no, it was a flying blanket, so I suppose I could skip those formalities. The corridor in front of the entrance faced the sky, so once it was out, the Iie-chan doll was free to go.

I tried to lean over the railing to get a better look, but I didn't see any blanket dancing in the wind... It didn't seem there was any chance of bringing out the punny phrase, "The futon flew away! [futon ga futtonda]", that I had prepared for when I found it.

Still, I had to keep going without losing to my despair—urged on by my frustration, I ran down the stairs. It was not for the sake of being cautious towards the security cameras, like I had done on my way up, but the result of impatience that prevented me from waiting for the elevator. I could at least say that I was rational enough not to dive from the third floor into the parking lot.

And then, with no particular destination in mind, I jumped into my New Beetle and drove off—or so I planned, but...

"Whoa!"

I yelled.

Despite the despair I was facing, what leaked out was not an expression of grief, but an exclamation of astonishment—the four tires of my beloved car had all gone flat.

Or I should say, they had been forced to go flat... It looked like the thick rubber had been torn apart with brute force, leaving the wheel's rim almost bare.

I'd been trying to go anywhere while chasing after the flying blanket, but this meant I could go nowhere—how clever of you, Iie-chan doll.

Fifteen minutes ago, it had carelessly confined me without taking away my cell phone, but now, it had obtained the judgment to precisely take away my means of transportation—I had no idea how it was able to determine that the New Beetle was my car, but that three-year-old sure was growing up fast.

I was excited for this one's future prospects.

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red-talisman · 4 years ago

Text

An unbetaed piece of a coffee shop AU based on conversation that happened on the 18+ 2Ha Discord. ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

_____________________

There are only three reasons that Mo Ran continues to risk ulcers by frequenting the Red Lotus, and it’s not because the coffee is actually good.

For one thing, the coffee shop is within reasonable walking distance of Sisheng University. It’s not the only coffee shop nearby, taking clear market advantage of the sleep-deprived university population, but it is the one that best understands what students are looking for. This leads into the second reason: the coffee is strong enough to strip paint. No sugar, no fuss, just a suckerpunch straight to the central nervous system on the third day of final exams.

(The Pre-Med kids have a running bet about whether or not they could reanimate one of the lab’s anatomy corpses with it; none of the Humanities majors have been willing to dismiss the rumor entirely as a joke, but the other science departments are a little too intrigued by the discourse to be trusted as allies on the ethics boards.)

The third reason that Mo Ran continues to risk meeting his ancestors earlier than the deities have planned is sitting at a corner table when Mo Ran pushes through the door, hunched over scattered papers and pushing ink-stained fingers through long hair with visible frustration.

“Good evening,” Mo Ran calls out. He automatically heads towards the counter with a glass-fronted display of deceptively edible-looking pastries and an antique register. There are no other people in the shop and the overhead music is some kind of quiet guqin album, and yet his third reason for self-inflicted punishment doesn’t appear to notice Mo Ran’s existence at all. Mo Ran crosses his arms, leans a hip against the counter, and watches Chu Wanning irritably shove at the hair escaping its high ponytail again, failing to notice the ink he leaves behind on a high cheekbone.

“Help, I need service,” Mo Ran murmurs to no one. He knows his fixed stare is bordering on grounds for a lawsuit, and he tries, and fails, to tone it down. “Will no one provide legal vices in my time of need. Alas. Woe.”

Chu Wanning mutters something to himself, grabs one of the many pens perpetually stashed around his person, and furiously scribbles something out.

Eventually, however, not even Mo Ran can ignore the need for coffee in favor of staring at the most beautiful man that’s ever blessed his vision, and he knows from past experience that nothing short of actually grabbing the papers will get Chu Wanning’s attention when he’s like this. Doing so, however, will result in casualties (again).

“Chu-laoshi?” he tries anyway. “Chu-laoshi!”

For all that Chu Wanning reacts, Mo Ran may as well just be another creepy wooden doll sitting on the high shelf against the far wall. Mo Ran looks at the various coffee-related machines stacked on the other side of the counter, looks at Chu Wanning, and looks back at the machines. (The machines are shining, obviously well cared for, unlike the rest of the café’s weird, antique shop chic.)

“Last chance, Chu-laoshi,” he says loudly.

Twenty minutes later, Mo Ran is sitting across the same table as Chu Wanning, enjoying a thick espresso and the delicate spread of Chu Wanning’s eyelashes, when Chu Wanning finally surfaces from mental depths. Mo Ran watches him blink in confusion first at Mo Ran himself, then at the cup of tea steeping off to the side of his papers. “Mo Ran?” he says, with the kind of croak in his voice that indicates he probably hasn’t communicated with another living person for a while now.

“Hello, Chu-laoshi,” Mo Ran replies amiably. “I hope you don’t mind that I helped myself. I left the money behind the counter.”

Chu Wanning turns to look at the register. No answers magically appear from that direction. Mo Ran, however, is pretending to take a deep sip to hide what he knows is an utterly besotted smile over the adorable (sexy, hot, please fuck me no wait respect him damn it!) daze that seems to be hanging persistently over Chu Wanning’s expression.

“You don’t work here,” says Chu Wanning. His brows are pulled together in confusion, eyes a little narrowed and a lot focused, and Mo Ran has to bite the inside of his own cheek to remind himself to fucking behave, you’re not a goddamn dog.

“Might as well, at this point,” he quips. Before Chu Wanning can take strips off of him (don’t think about stripping!) he adds, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen coffee machines so clean. You obviously care for them.”

“Well, yes,” Chu Wanning says bluntly. “Machines stop working if you don’t.”

Ouch. Mo Ran should’ve known better than to try using an oblique angle to lever open some personal discussion. He nods at the papers on the table between them. “You were pretty engrossed in those when I came in. What’re you working on?”

Chu Wanning glances down at the papers, snaps his gaze back up like he’s trying to find the trick in the question, and finally looks back down, avoiding Mo Ran’s gaze. “Nothing. It’s just for Sisheng’s Astronomy department.”

“Astronomy? You do astronomy?” Mo Ran blurts out before he can stop himself, and Chu Wanning visibly bristles.

“Yes. Why is that so shocking?”

“It’s not! I mean, not for bad reasons! Shit, I just mean, you…I knew you were affiliated with the university, obviously, Uncle’s talked about you often enough, but I kind of assumed you were in Literature or something.”

“Dear gods, why?” Chu Wanning asks, looking horrified.

Because you look like a gay man’s ideal of the noble scholar, he doesn’t say. Because I have some very specific fantasies about you sitting on my cock and me trying to make you come before you finish writing a formal letter to your very boring, very conservative colleagues.

“Because of the, y’know. Books,” he manages to say instead, waving an arm vaguely at the variety of books crammed beside random objects on the café’s many shelves.

Chu Wanning just lets out a soft, “Hmm,” and seems to relax a little. The silence stretches, but before Mo Ran can break it in another attempt to force conversation, Chu Wanning says, “With the increase in…the traffic of objects orbiting Earth, there’s more interference in the data collected by our ground-based telescopes. I’m trying to help improve the software for better filtering.”

That sounds – well, really fucking boring, in Mo Ran’s honest opinion, but who is he to judge? He’s the one too stupid to have figured out anything he’s actually good at, and he’s a postgrad because he doesn’t know what else to do. “Why astronomy?”

He keeps his tone light but not irreverent, and when Chu Wanning doesn’t immediately scoff or go mulishly silent, Mo Ran feels his heart pick up a little.

“The stars are the source of…everything.” He pauses. “Everything except for the few lightest elements. Everything that makes life possible came from the intensity of the cores of stars and the violence of their deaths. Our universe is such an unimaginably vast entity, with galaxies and clusters shaped by the literal echoes of creation – and with hypotheses on the likelihood of other universes alongside our own – wouldn’t it be a sad thing if our own hubris blinded us to that?”

Chu Wanning is looking at him with a face that’s forgotten to keep itself guarded in this moment, and Mo Ran stares, long enough for the walls to go back up. Chu Wanning turns his face away with a humiliated flush and a sharp, “Why are you looking at me like that?”

You’re beautiful. “That was beautiful.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s just fanciful nonsense – “

Chu Wanning cuts himself off when Mo Ran very gently puts his hand over Chu Wanning’s, stopping him in the middle of pushing his papers together into a messy stack. “I mean it.”

Chu Wanning keeps his face tilted down, a flush working over his cheeks and the bridge of his nose.

#2ha #2ha fic #ranwan #jukebox fic #i'm clowning myself #i worked on a chapter outline for the novel so i could write 2ha fic #and the first and so far only thing i manage is a goddamn coffee shop AU #( ﾉ ಠдಠ)ﾉ︵┻━┻

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pink-peony-princess · 4 years ago

Text

I'll Always Be There for You

“Rise and shine Miniture Mendes,” I heard my older brother’s voice somewhere at the end of my bed.

I didn’t answer immediately, hoping that if I ignored him, he would go away. Realistically I knew I was kidding myself, and this was confirmed moments later, when I felt him sit at the end of the bed, poking my leg until I finally let out a grunt of annoyance.

“And she lives!” he cheered, as if he was commentating a grand final sports match.

“Shawn, it is seven. In the morning. On a Saturday, you better have a good reason for being in my bedroom, annoying me this early.” I warned, pulling the pillow over my head.

“Sure do,” he chimed, fighting to pull the pillow away from me. “Get up, get dressed, you have your yearly check-up today.”

The reaction was instant, and he was quick to notice it. “Don’t start Hailey, we went through this last time you had to come in,” he cautioned, and I could see from his face, that there was going to be no changing his mind.

“Shawn!” I groaned, whacking him with the pillow I had just had over my head. As much as I loved my brother, I hated him equally at times like this. He had just qualified as an attending paediatrics doctor, and was now working at the local hospital with a bunch of his friends. “I’m sixteen, can’t I look after myself?” I begged.

“Nope, last time I let you do that, you nearly ended up dying on Connor's O.R. table, because you thought that appendicitis was ‘nothing’, ” he reminded me, using air quotes for effect.

“Ahhh, don’t remind me. Fine,” I conceded. There was no point, I knew that. It wasn’t even that I really disliked the doctors or the hospital for that matter. I just really didn’t like having my brother in my medical care. I found it awkward, something which he would remind me constantly that wasn’t the case at all. Well even that was a lie, it did come in helpful sometimes.

“Be ready in twenty minutes,” he spoke, getting up, straightening his scrubs, and walking out.

Sighing, I sat up, grabbing my phone. Help! I wrote, sending it to Dave one of Shawn's friends, and a fellow doctor. I had known Shawn's friends, Dave, Brian and Connor since I was little, and considered them to be adoptive brothers.

There was a ping from my phone, as I was in the bathroom, cleaning myself up. He told you then. <3 was the response. I cursed internally, if Dave knew, then it meant that Shawn was serious. After all, most of the time Dave was the one in charge of my medical care.

Dumping my phone back on the bed, I went to the wardrobe and grabbed the most comfortable pair of track pants I could find and paired these with a crop top and a parker. I spent another few minutes faffing about in my room, trying to find ways out of this, but when I heard Shawn grabbing his coat and keys from the hallway, I made my way down stairs feeling defeated.

“I hate you,” I spoke, pushing past my brother and stepping out the from the front door. Only to hit a body, hard.

“Easy there Little Lady,” Dave spoke as he caught and steadied me. “What’s up? Those were some fighting words!” he let my arm go, stepping back to look at me.

“Don’t start D, I hate you too, you knew and you didn’t tell me!” I accused, stepping around him and heading for his car, which he and Shawn usually car-pooled to work in.

“She’s been like this since I woke her, she’s tried to get out of it more than once already,” Shawn fixed me with a stern stare, silently warning me not to cause mischief.

“You make out like I’m such a bad patient, you’re such a drama queen!” I laughed as we buckled in and made our way down the street.

“Maybe you are.” Was the only reply I got. The rest of the car ride was quiet, I couldn’t help but sulk at my predicament.

When we finally got there, I trailed behind the guys, listening to them discussing their schedules for the day. Most of which consisted of making sure that their interns and residents were doing what they should be. I couldn't help but feel a little proud of them as I thought of how far they had come.

“You ready Little Lady?” Dave's voice, pulled me from my thoughts, and it was only then that I noticed that we had made it inside to the front desk, where Amy, the receptionist, and one of my favourite people resided.

“Hi Hailey, how are you sweets?” she asked as she typed on the computer, before addressing Shawn “All good, it’s all set up for you.”

We made our way to the exam room quickly, Dave unlocking the door, and dumping his belongings on his desk and switching the computer on, no doubt so he could check my records.

“Do I have to?” I asked, eying the bed off furiously, once again frustrated at Shawn for making me do this.

“Yes, you do pretty girl, why don’t you just take a seat next to your bro for now, I’ve just got some questions for you first. Grumbling to myself, I slumped into the seat next to Shawn, resting my head on his shoulder.

“I thought you hated me?” he laughed, somewhat confused, but rubbing my scalp comfortingly anyway.

“I do,” I agreed. “But if I’m asleep, you can’t start the exam, because you must have consent to do anything,” I explained, trying to hide the smirk that was now forming at my genius conclusions.

“Touché What you failed to mention though, was that the parentals have given me autonomy over your medical care in their absence since you’re still under eighteen. So right back at you sister,” he sassed, clearly proud of himself.

“Okay, okay, it’s too early for me to have to adjudicate a fight between you two!” Dave laughed, turning to face me. “Okay, Hailey, some of these questions may be a little embarrassing, but answer honestly okay?”

I nodded, feeling apprehensive.

“Do you smoke?” he asked, pausing to look at me. I fixed him with a glare, making him laugh. “I’ll take that a no.”

I put up with the questions, most of them not as bad as I had imagined, until he asked the dreaded one. “What about your period?”

I turned to Shawn, silently fuming at him. “I had to Hailey, you’ve been struggling for months with it.”

“No! You didn’t actually, last time I checked, I was the one bleeding,not you!” I yelled, moving to get up and walk out.

“Hailey, wait honey. I know it’s awkward, but if you can tell me what’s been going on, I’ll be able to fix it,” Dave, tried to reason, waiting for me to sit back down before continuing. "Shawn said you get bad cramps?” he prompted.

“Bad, bad doesn’t even to describe it. I can’t move without feeling like I’m going to faint or be sick,” I told him honestly.

“Last night, I found her curled up in tears because of the pain, I had to get her some fairly strong stuff,” Shawn added, grabbing my hand and giving it a squeeze.

I shuddered thinking back to the previous night.

... Shawn had come home late, and came in to check on me like he always did, but instead of finding me in bed reading like normal, I was curled in a ball in my bed practically rocking as I tried to get the pain under control.

"Again?" he'd asked looking at me with pity.

I nodded, "It's so bad Shawnie," I hiccupped, tears flowing unchecked down my checks and landing in small pools on my bed.

"I'm going to get you some pain relief okay," he'd spoken, moving to brush some of the hair out if my face. "I know it hurts, but try not to get too worked up, the more upset you get, the more pain you'll be in," he explained gently, getting up and going to my bathroom. I could hear him searching through my cabinet before he asked, "What have you taken today Poppet?"

"Just Tylenol," I groaned out as another wave of pain hit me.

"Here take this." he held a blue packet out for me to take.

"What is it?" I asked, not recognising the packaging.

"It's called Napropgesic, it'll help with the pain. It'll help to block the release of some of the hormones that are making you feel so sick and sore," he explained, grabbing the water glass from beside my bed and handing it to me. "Take two," he added.

"Will you stay with me?" I asked, catching his hand as he went to leave the room.

"Of course, honey," he'd said, coming to lay next to me on the bed, allowing me to cuddle into his chest.

"Get some rest," he murmurned, kissing the top of my head.

...

“Okay, so you have it now. Is it like that every time?” Dave asked seriously bringing me back to the present,typing as he spoke.

I nodded, feeling the tears welling up, I was so over having to deal with it, I didn’t even care anymore if I had to tell them embarrassing stuff. “It’s okay Little Lady, we’ll get it sorted, how about we get the rest of the exam done, and then we can get this sorted for you okay?” Dave came to give me a quick hug.

“Hop up on the bed, yeah.” I did so, sitting waiting for him to tell me what to do.

“Right, I’m just going to listen to your heart and lungs,” he told me, after washing his hands. “Just lift your shirt a little,” he told me as he rubbed the bell of the stethoscope to warm it up. “Deep breathes,” he instructed, listening.

Turning my head, I saw Shawn watching intently, sending me a ‘thumbs up’ when he saw me looking at him. “Nothing out of the ordinary there, that’s always good,” Dave spoke, moving to take my pulse.

He was quiet again for a minute, watching the clock. “Hmm,” he finished,"Shawn come here for a second.”

Getting up, my brother made his way over, taking my pulse as Dave had only moments before. I let out a whine at the fact that I was being fussed over, causing Dave to take my hand.

"Your pulse is fast," Shawn spoke, stepping back to look at me.

"And?" I asked, looking between the two doctors.

"Well, it could be a couple of things," Dave started, going to get supplies from a cupboard above his desk. "It could indicate Anemia, which would help to explain some of the period issues, but it could be something like an infection too. And that my dear is something we don't want, especially with you having had your appendix out only a week and a half ago. Just lay back for us," he instructed.

Shawn helped me lay down, before pulling my clothing away from where my scar was on my stomach.

"Ow!" I whimpered as Dave removed the dressing, exposing a red, and somewhat oozy looking cut.

"Sorry Hailey, normally this wouldn't hurt so much, but this is infected."

"Look at that," Shawn pointed out, having gone to get gloves on himself. "That looks like she's had a reaction to the sutures."

" I'll get Connor in here after to assess it, he may want to try leaving in open for a little."

"Open?" I squeaked, shooting up from the bed.

"Hailey!" Shawn grumbled, " What have I told you? Slow movements!" He looked somewhat grumpy, but I didn't blame him. He had already had to repair the stitches once for me.

After explaining the fact that open only meant that they would pack it with medicated gauze, Dave left the room, stating he had to, "Get some supplies."

When he came back I let out a loud groan, in his hand, he was holding supplies for a blood draw. "Come on Hailey, you'll be fine," he encouraged, prepping me for it. " I'm going to let Shawn do it as he's a pro," he told me, moving to sit beside me on the bed.

"Don't look Hailey. Sharp scratch," he warned as Shawn inserted the needle. I couldn't help myself though, and found myself watching the red liquid being drawn from my arm. I could feel myself getting faint at the sight, and before I knew it, darkness hard over come me.

I woke to a light tapping sensation on my face, and someone's fingers pressed to the inside of my wrist. "Welcome back," Shawn spoke, somewhat sarcastically. "I thought we told you not to look."

"I couldn't help myself." I pouted, excepting Dave's help in sitting up.

"Just sit for a second, we don't want you fainting again," he laughed, before walking around his desk and picking up the phone.

Minutes later, the door opened and Shawn and Dave's friends and colleagues Brian and Connor came into the room.

"How's out favourite patient?" Brian asked coming over to hug me.

"You look pale," Connor noted, standing beside Shawn at the bed with a frown.

"She just fainted at the blood draw," Shawn explained, rolling his eyes playfully.

Neither one of them responded, instead sending me sympathetic smiles.

"So, Dave said you've been having sereve cramps with your period?" Brian asked, without a fuss.

I stayed silent for a second, before sighing, and nodding. I loved the guys like I loved my own brother, but there were some things I just wanted to keep private. Especially as Brian was an obgyn. " Where is the pain mostly?" He asked coming over to rest his hand on my lower back. I nodded again, causing him to press with only slight pressure. This slight pressure though, sent pain radiating throughout my whole abdominal area, and into my back, nausea hitting me like a ton of bricks.

"I'm gonna be sick!" I gasped, leaning over the pan that Shawn had rushed to grab off the shelf.

"I'm sorry Sweet Pea," Brian apologised, rubbing my back. "Well I can tell you now, that it's referred pain that's causing you all the problems. Basically, all the ligaments are attached, and as the uterus contracts, you get pain in other places. Some girls get it worse than other's though."

"And the vomiting?" I asked once I had recovered a little.

"That will be the hormones, it's not dissimilar to a pregnant woman and morning sickness," he explained. "Lots of rest, fluids, heating pads, pain killers and some ice cream should do the trick." he winked.

"And iron tablets," Dave added, coming back from the desk where he had remained since the phone call. "Your iron levels are dismal Little Lady, it's no wonder you're having such a bad time of it!"

Lastly it was Connor's turn to check on me. "Just lie down for me again darling," he spoke, getting a set of gloves on. He only had to look at the incision for about thirty seconds, before nodding. "That's infected alright. I'm actually surprised you're not getting other symptoms. When did you first notice it?" He asked as he replaced his gloves, and went to get antibacterial solution and more gauze.

"I hadn't until Dave took the dressing off, but it's really hurting now."

"We'll get it sorted for you, and get you some pain killers and antibiotics just to ward off further trouble. This is going to sting a bit honey," he warned as he dabbed the liquid onto the wound.

"Ah," I hissed, reaching for my brother's hand.

"Nearly done sis," Shawn encouraged, stroking my hair.

When Connor was done, he gave me a shot of fairly strong antibiotics and pain killers, telling Shawn to take me home and watch me closely for any signs of fever, which of course, he knew. I did try to tell them I was fine, but they shut me down before I even got a chance to finish the sentence.

" Hailey, your stitches are infected, meaning that your immune system is compromised, you're clearly in pain, let your brother do his job, and take you home," Dave interrupted seriously. I felt guilty after that, and so didn't complain when Shawn put his arm around me as we made our way back out of the hospital to get a cab home.

When we got there, he set me up on the sofa, with blankets and pain meds, telling me to give him a yell if I needed anything.

"Shawn?" I called, as he made his way upstairs to the office. "Thank you, and I'm sorry I'm a difficult patient," I told him sincerely.

"Don't mention it. I'll always be there for you, " he replied, coming back down the stairs and shifting me onto his lap. That was how I spent the remainder of the day, cuddled up to my brother, knowing that if I needed anything he would do it without question.

#shawn mendes #shawn mendes imagine #shawn #shawn mendes fanfic #shawn mendes imagines #shawn peter raul mendes #shawn mendes blurb #doctor!shawn #mendes triplets #werewolf!shawn

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bound-writings · 5 years ago

Note

hello there, glad to see another writing blog for this fandom! i hope you don't mind me requesting something? my request is kou and yashiro ( separately ) cooking with their s/o, if that isn't too much?

omg yes,, i love them so much,, i hope you likes these!! *sobs at how cute they are*

Kou And Yashiro Cooking With S/O

Kou,, he just wants to show off his amazing cooking skills,,, and hear you praise him,, (he is just babey,,) You never expected someone like Kou to be so good at cooking, after all, he is quite rowdy and loud-mouthed. But he is literally Gordon Ramsay but very smol, blushy, and patient when he’s in the kitchen. Cooking with Kou is always very lighthearted and fun. It’s usually in school or at his house (but he very much prefers his house because you can stay the night for cuddles) and he’s always down for what you want to make. Sweets? Sure, he’s great at those! Maybe an actual meal like sushi? Of course he’ll teach you! Donuts? Yes, that’s his specialty!

If you ever get the slightest bit injured, even if it’s just a little nick by the knife, he is running up the stairs into the bathroom for the first aid kit, making a huge fuss. Whenever you get hurt Kou can never keep his cool, even if it has nothing to do with him. So sometimes the cooking date turns out into a “let me baby and take care of you” date. Oh yes - the COOKINGS DATES!! Cooking dates are always Kou’s favorite times because he likes to show off his expertise in the subject, and impress you by showing how good his food is. Kou doesn’t even realize it but half of the time he somehow ends up behind you, one hand around yours, helping you beat the batter (or whatever y'all are making) and the other wrapped around your waist, while he murmurs how to correctly cook it. It’s best not to say anything if you want these moments to last, because the moment you mention it he’ll jump back 10 feet and apologize over and over again.

He talks a lot during cooking!! He doesn’t like the silence and prefers to fill it with your sweet voice. Whether it’s ranting about Hanako or complaining about his final exams coming up, there’s bound to be happiness with a delicious aroma in the atmosphere. If you’re Teru-level bad at cooking, he’ll make sure to never let you in the kitchen or just let you sit at the table all the time, his eyes on you all the time. If you’re the kind of person who just eats microwave food all the time, he’ll 100% teach you how to make some actual good healthy food and share his recipes with you!! Cue Kou making bentos for you every day with your favorite foods in it-

After you guys are finished cooking, it’s likely that you taste test the food, and that’s where the supreme cuteness and fluff ensues,, cue you trying to feed Kou the food and Kou going all tsundere and blushy and gently demands you should try it first,, but of course you feed him anyway. And this boy blushes so hard and weakly gives a thumb ups as he tries to recover from how cute you are… Even more bonus points if you wipe the crumbs off his face and this boy literally faints,,

You guys cuddle a lot after while Kou tries to recollect his thoughts,, he is babey,, and loves you a lot,, 🥺🥺🥺

This little daikon babey,, she literally cried of happiness when you invited her to a cooking date,, literally she thinks you fell out of the sky wearing shining armor on a white horse and came to save her from being single for the rest of her life. Apparently Yashiro is actually pretty good at cooking considering she can make donuts so y’all would actually have a pretty good time! She LOVES cooking with you. It always takes her mind off her troubles and just de-stresses her; being with you never fails to make her happy. Frequently while you guys are cooking, she rants a lot about how Hanako gets on her nerves and stuff like that, often leading to her furiously stirring the batter or whatever y’all is cooking. So,,, do y’all remember the thing Kou did when he cooked with her?? If you come up behind her and hold her while showing her how to do it the correct way, she will literally faint,, I’m not kidding,, she will become redder than a tomato and probably just collapse in your arms. (You have to postpone the cooking for a while until she recuperates and comes back to Earth.)

If you’re Teru-level bad at cooking she will genuinely kind of be scared about the mess you made. Once she left you alone in the kitchen for less than a minute and it nearly caught fire. Let’s just say she now never leaves you alone in there. But hearing you praise her at her cooking skills makes her feel so much more confident,, will most likely surprise you with your favorite sweet or something and literally cry when you accept and eat it. Once she realizes you actually like her food she will go out of her way to make you food as much as possible (she just wants all of your love..) If you’re better than her in cooking she’ll definitely have these sparkles in her eyes!! And be like,, “(s/o),, you’re so cool,, love you bb 🥺🥺.”

If you feed her afterward she will definitely not say no,, will be all blushy about it and be like “aha, (s/o) you don’t have too…” but she LOVES it and encourages it but tries to do it discreetly. Her fantasies run wild y’all,, she’s dreamed of this day for years I tell you..

She is just so cute and babey,, what else can I say,, guys please love her…🥺🥺(I have literally watched the episode with her and Kou cooking together so many times-)

#tbhk x reader #toilet bound hanako kun #tbhk #jshk #jshk x reader #jibaku shounen hanako kun #kou minamoto #kou minamoto x reader #yashiro nene #yashiro nene x reader #kou x reader #yashiro x reader #toilet bound hanako kun x reader #jibaku shounen hanako kun x reader

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pinkpeonyprincessblog · 4 years ago

Text

I'll Always Be There For You

“Rise and shine Miniture Mendes,” I heard my older brother’s voice somewhere at the end of my bed.

“And she lives!” he cheered, as if he was commentating a grand final sports match.

“Shawn, it is seven.In the morning. On a Saturday, you better have a good reason for being in my bedroom, annoying me this early.” I warned, pulling the pillow over my head.

“Sure do,” he chimed, fighting to pull the pillow away from me. “Get up, get dressed, you have your yearly check-up today.”

“Nope, last time I let you do that, you nearly ended up dying on Connor's O.R. table, because you thought that appendicitis was ‘nothing’,” he reminded me, using air quotes for effect.

“Be ready in twenty minutes,” he spoke, getting up, straightening his scrubs, and walking out.

There was a ping from my phone, as I was in the bathroom, cleaning myself up. He told you then. <3 Was the response. I cursed internally, if Dave knew, then it meant that Shawn was serious. After all, most of the time Dave was the one in charge of my medical care.

“I hate you,” I spoke, pushing past my brother and stepping out the from the front door. Only to hit a body,hard.

“Easy there Little Lady,” Dave spoke as he caught and steadied me. “What’s up? Those were some fighting words!” he let my arm go, stepping back to look at me.

“Don’t start D, I hate you too, you knew and you didn’t tell me!” I accused, stepping around him and heading for his car, which he and Shawn usually car-pooled to work in.

“She’s been like this since I woke her, she’s tried to get out of it more than once already,” Shawn fixed me with a stern stare, silently warning me not to cause mischief.

“You make out like I’m such a bad patient, you’re such a drama queen!” I laughed as we buckled in and made our way down the street.

“Maybe you are.” Was the only reply I got. The rest of the car ride was quiet, I couldn’t help but sulk at my predicament.

When we finally got there, I trailed behind the guys, listening to them discussing their schedules for the day. Most of which consisted of making sure that their interns and residents where doing what they should be. I could help but feel a little proud of them as I thought of how far they had come.

“Hi Hailey, how are you sweets?” she asked as she typed on the computer, before addressing Shawn “All good, it’s all set up for you.”

We made our way to the exam room quickly, Dave unlocking the door, and dumping his belongings on his desk and switching the computer on, no doubt so he could check my records.

“Do I have to?” I asked, eying the bed off furiously, once again frustrated at Shawn for making me do this.

“I thought you hated me?” he laughed, somewhat confused, but rubbing my scalp comfortingly anyway.

“Touché What you failed to mention though, what you failed to mention was that you need to be seen. So I'll just wait all day if I have to. So right back at you sister,” he sassed, clearly proud of himself.

I nodded, feeling apprehensive.

“Do you smoke?” he asked, pausing to look at me. I fixed him with a glare, making him laugh. “I’ll take that a no.”

I put up with the questions, most of them not as bad as I had imagined, until he asked the dreaded one. “What about your period?”

I turned to Shawn, silently fuming at him. “I had to Hailey, you’ve been struggling for months with it.”

“No! You didn’t actually, last time I checked, I was the one bleeding,not you!” I yelled, moving to get up and walk out.

“Bad, bad doesn’t even to describe it. I can’t move without feeling like I’m going to faint or be sick,” I told him honestly.

“Last night, I found her curled up in tears because of the pain, I had to get her some fairly strong stuff,” Shawn added, grabbing my hand and giving it a squeeze.

I shuddered thinking back to the previous night.

... Shawn had come home late, and came in to check on me like he always did, but instead of finishing me in bed reading like normal,I was curled in a ball in my bed practically rocking as I tried to get the pain under control.

"Again?" he'd asked looking at me with pity.

I nodded, "It's so bad Shawnie," I hiccupped,tears flowing unchecked down my checks and landing in small pools on my bed.

"I'm going to get you some pain relief okay," he'd spoken, moving to brush some of the hair out if my face."I know it hurts, but try not to get too worked up, the more upset you get, the more pain you'll be in," he explained gently, getting up and going to my bathroom. I could hear him searching through my cabinet before he ssked,"What have you taken today Poppet?"

"Just Tylenol," I groaned out as another wave of pain hit me.

"Here take this." he held a blue packet out for me to take.

"What is it?" I asked, not recognising the packaging.

"Will you stay with me?" I asked, catching his hand as he went to leave the room.

"Of course, honey," he'd said, coming to lay next to me on the bed, allowing me to cuddle into his chest.

"Get some rest," he murmurned, kissing the top of my head.

...

“Okay, so you have it now. Is it like that every time?” Dave asked seriously bringing me back to the present,typing as he spoke.

“Hope up on the bed, yeah.” I did so, sitting waiting for him to tell me what to do.