#where to buy loose diamonds

[webuydiamond1]

Discover top strategies for selling loose diamonds and maximize the value of your gems with expert tips on pricing, market trends, and selling platforms.

[wttcsms]

proof of love;

physical traces that reveal just how much you truly mean to him

ft. tobio kageyama, kiyoomi sakusa, atsumu miya

KAGEYAMA, your skincare routine in his bathroom — tobio lives in a stereotypical bachelor pad; you walk into his apartment and it's the very definition of bare-bones. thin, cotton navy sheets line his bed, with one single flat pillow. he doesn't own a dining table, and instead just stands near his kitchen counter to consume his meals. he blushes and tells you that he's just a minimalist. despite it all, though, after fun nights out, you find yourself heading back to his place with him, sleepy and drunk and pouty. you wake up, instantly regretting not washing off your face, moping because "i'm so gonna break out now, tobio!" when kags visits your place, he opens his notes app to get the names of all the skincare products lining your sink. the next night out, you're being carried into his apartment, mumbling drunk incoherencies. instead of setting you down on his bed (which now has two fluffy pillows and a fruit-print comforter that he bought for you), he guides you two to his bathroom where he places you on the counter and starts trying to figure out which steps to do first to help you remove your makeup. drunk-you guides him every step of the way, and the warmth you feel in your chest and cheeks isn't from the drinks — it's from the gentle care of your boyfriend rubbing in an oil cleanser to strip off your makeup.

SAKUSA, your lipstick stains on his water bottle — kiyoomi likes everything in his life to be neat and tidy. he carries a tide pen in his pocket that he ends up using on your clothes more often than his own. he's particular with how his belongings are treated, and you know better than to mess with anything of kiyoomi's. you respect his boundaries and find his oddities endearing, but you feel so much more secure in your relationship when you realize just how loose his boundaries are when it comes to you. on a road trip, you're thirsty and he offers you his water bottle. you don't think too much about it until you finish drinking and instantly widen your eyes at the sight of pink encasing the rim — remnants of your lipgloss. before you can say anything or try to wipe it off, he reaches over and takes a swig from it without a second thought. you try telling him not to drink yet, but he just glances over at you before focusing back on the road. "why would i be bothered by that? i kiss you all the time, don't i?" it's his subtle way of telling you that what's his is yours; you don't need to walk on eggshells with him.

MIYA, a cheap ring that came in a plastic egg — the proposal doesn't go as atsumu plans. things rarely ever go as atsumu plans, but this time — this is the one time he needs everything to go perfectly. and it does: the photographer is well hidden and on time, the decorations came out fantastic, and the ring! the ring is stunning. it's what's on everyone's pinterest boards. the only issue is that he put the ring box in the wrong pants pocket! with sweaty palms and a pink flush creeping from his neck to his cheeks to his ears, he gets down on one knee. he manages to stammer out his proposal speech to you, and you're listening with tears brimming in your eyes and a watery smile on your face, and then, those beautiful eyes of yours widen in surprise when you see, not a velvet ring box, but a plastic orb being revealed to you. he quickly explains that this is not your real ring (no duh), but that in typical atsumu fashion, he messed up. "it's just a placeholder!!! i'll buy you five diamond rings, just don't say no!" you're not marrying atsumu because of the ring, you remind him, but you allow him to slip on the cheesy ring. it's made out of plastic and it's one of those cheap prizes that are available in those weird machines outside the grocery store; the machines where you insert a quarter and twist the knob and a mysterious plastic ball surprises you with a prize. he tells you it took him a dozen tries to get a ring. you're laughing and saying it's meant to be since the ring manages to fit you perfectly. even after getting your real engagement ring, you still keep the cheesy ring to this day. it's evidence that no matter what happens, atsumu will always go the extra mile for you.

[webuydiamond]

The following blog discusses where people can sell the diamond if needed. There are different places around the town where they can Sell Diamonds. The jewellery store can be the first option. The pawn shops also accept buying diamonds. Or they can search online just like everyone else is doing. Everything about these options is discussed and explained in the blog.

[deargojou]

╔══ஓ๑ 𝐃𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐌 𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐄 𝐓𝐑𝐔𝐄 ๑ஓ══╗

∷ 𝙿𝙰𝙸𝚁𝙸𝙽𝙶 ⋯ Gojo Satoru x F!Reader

∷ 𝙲𝙾𝙽𝚃𝙴𝙽𝚃 ⋯ 2.2K // Fluff. Pet names (baby + angel).

∷ 𝚂𝚄𝙼𝙼𝙰𝚁𝚈 ⋯ He proposed to you in his dream, and when he wakes up, you’re officially his—to his confusion and delight.

Gojo slowly blinked open his eyes, gradually emerging from the haze of sleep. He became aware of the warm weight pressed against his side and looked down to see you nestled close, head pillowed on his chest as you continued to slumber. A small, content smile pulled at his lips and he brushed his fingers through your hair, careful not to wake you.

As he admired you in repose, he noticed your hand resting over his heart, fingers loosely curled. The morning sunlight streaming in through the curtains caught on something shiny adorning your ring finger—a delicate band topped with a sparkling gemstone.

His brow furrowed slightly. He didn’t remember proposing, yet here you were wearing what could only be an engagement ring. Carefully, trying not to wake you, he lifted your hand to get a better look at the ring. It was a simple but elegant diamond solitaire on a silver band.

Definitely an engagement ring.

Gojo racked his brain, but he couldn’t recall buying it or asking you to marry him.

A feeling of panic started rising within him. How could he have proposed and not remember it? That didn’t make any sense.

He loved you more than anything, of course, he wanted to marry you someday. But he would never forget something so important.

He glanced back down at your sleeping face, now feeling utterly confused. Where did this ring come from? Did you somehow found out about the ring he hid and decided to just wear it? Or was this some kind of prank? None of the possibilities made sense.

Still puzzled, he sighed and softly set your hand back down and pressed a light kiss to your forehead before carefully extracting himself from your embrace.

You mumbled in your sleep and clutched at the spot he had vacated, making him smile fondly. He tucked the blankets more snugly around you before quietly slipping out of the bedroom.

In the kitchen, Gojo busied himself making tea with tons of sugar cubes and breakfast, all the while turning over the mystery of the ring in his mind. The sizzling of smoked beef and the aroma of fresh tea eventually lured you from bed.

You padded into the kitchen dressed in one of his t-shirts and wrapped your arms around him from behind. “Morning,” you murmured, pressing a kiss between his shoulder blades.

He turned in your embrace and noted the ring still prominently displayed on your finger. “Morning. Sleep well?”

You nodded and smiled up at him. “Like a rock. You?”

“Just fine.” He caresses your cheeks, letting his fingers trail along your jaw. “I couldn’t help but notice your ring this morning.”

“Huh?”

“Where did you get that ring?” he asked.

Your brow furrowed. “What ring?”

Gojo lifted your hand, displaying the diamond ring for you to see.

“Oh…” you finally realize what he’s talking about, softening your eyes as you gaze at the ring. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

“It certainly is. Now, would you mind reminding me when I gave it to you? My memory is a little fuzzy on the details.”

Your eyes widen in surprise. “You mean… you don’t remember proposing to me?”

He shook his head apologetically and laughed somewhat nervously. “I wish I could say I did. I think I’d remember proposing to you.”

You just stare him for a long moment before you dropped your gaze. “I see,” you said quietly.

Immediately, Gojo tilted your chin back up with a knuckle under your jaw. “Hey, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you, baby. I just… I want to remember something as important as asking you to marry me, and it’s bothering me that I can’t.” He caresses your cheek ever so gently. “Talk to me. Help me fill in the blanks?”

You stare down at the glittering diamond on your finger, a slight pang in your chest at the realization that he doesn’t remember proposing to you. You take a deep breath and offer him a comforting smile.

“It’s okay that you don’t remember,” you say gently. “I know you’ve been so busy with work lately. Honestly, I’m just happy you found a chance to surprise me at all.”

You reach to squeeze his hand, hoping your understanding will reassure him. You know Gojo loves you deeply, his forgetfulness doesn’t change that. Still, you had hoped the moment he asked you to be his wife would be seared into his mind just as indelibly as it is in yours.

Gojo frowns, clearly bothered. “I’m so sorry, baby. I wish I could recall every detail. Asking you to marry me should be the most unforgettable moment of my life.” He brings your hand to his lips, brushing a feather-light kiss over the ring. “You deserve to have a fiancé who cherishes that memory as much as you do.”

You shake your head, touched by his remorse. “You do cherish me, even if the specifics slipped your mind this time. It’s really okay.” You squeeze his hand again. “Now, tell me more about this lovely ring. Did you pick it out yourself?”

You try to steer the conversation to lighter topics, but Gojo remains preoccupied. As you chat over breakfast, his responses are distracted, his gaze drifting frequently to the ring that has become a symbol of his perceived failure.

Later, as you clean up the breakfast dishes, he comes up behind you and wraps his arms around your waist. He presses a kiss to the top of your head. “I’m taking you out again tonight to recreate our engagement, exactly as it should be remembered,” he murmurs. “I won’t rest until I’ve made this right.”

You turn in his arms and cup his face in your hands. “Satoru, please don’t beat yourself up over this. I already told you, it’s okay.” You search his eyes, trying to convey your sincerity.

He covers your hands with his own and turns his head to kiss your palm. "It’s not okay with me," he says seriously. “You deserve the proposal you’ve always imagined. I want to replace this memory with one we can both cherish.”

“It’s okay, love. Really. You must have been tired when you—” and he doesn’t let you finish your word.

“No excuses,” he interrupts. “Let me make it up to you today.”

Seeing how important this is to him, you nod reluctantly. “Alright. If it will make you feel better.”

His expression softens. “It will. Trust me.” He kisses you tenderly then sends you off to pamper yourself while he makes plans.

Before you can protest, Gojo whisks you back to bed, insisting you relax while he pampers you all day. He brings breakfast on a silver tray—pancakes drizzled in syrup, mixed berries, and sweet tea.

Wrapping you in a plush robe, Gojo ushers you to the room, where he’s arranged for a massage therapist, manicurist, and hairstylist to spend the afternoon primping and relaxing you. Once you’re thoroughly pampered, Gojo presents you with a gift box.

“Just a little something to complement your existing beauty,” Gojo murmurs.

You start to protest the extravagance, but Gojo silences you with a kiss. “No complaints, let me spoil you today.”

He also takes you shopping and encourages you to pick out anything your heart desires, no matter the price.

At dinner, take you to the most exclusive 5-star restaurant in town. The maître d’ promptly escorts you to the best table, overlooking the cityscape.

He orders a bottle of non-alcoholic champagne (since he can’t drink), and you dine on lobster, filet mignon, and decadent desserts. He insists on hand-feeding you chocolate-dipped strawberries, stealing occasional kisses between bites.

Over dessert, he presents you with a beautiful new silver bracelet to complement your ring. He promised again that he would re-propose soon with a memory to cherish.

“You are too much sometimes. How could I repay you?” you sigh, basking in his treatment.

“Just you by my side is more than enough. Oh, maybe some late-night stress release would be nice,” he bites his lower lip with a playful wink.

After a romantic dinner, Gojo takes you back to the beautiful park fountain where he first asked you out. Under the shimmering lights, he drops gracefully to one knee and pours out his heart, confessing his unwavering love and asking you once more for the honor of becoming his wife.

“My beautiful angel, will you do me the extraordinary honor of becoming my wife? I promise to love, cherish, and adore you every moment of every day for the rest of our lives. What do you say, baby?”

Without wasting a second, you answered. The delight on your face when you say yes again makes his heart swell.

This time as he slips the ring onto your finger, unfallen tears make his eyes glossy. He remembers vividly selecting the perfect diamond, picturing how it would look adorning your hand.

He stands and gathers you into his arms. “Thank you for giving me a second chance to get this right,” he murmurs against your hair. “I’ll never forget a single moment of this night for as long as I live.”

You cling to him, your own eyes misty. “I know you won’t,” you whisper.

Gojo tilts your chin up to meet your gaze. “You’re so beautiful, baby… I love you."

He seals that promise with a long, deep kiss under the glow of the fountain, leaving you both breathless.

Once you both pull away, you smile up at him, but then begin to giggle. He looks at you in confusion as your giggles grow into full laughter.

“What’s so funny?” he asks with a perplexed smile.

You take a moment to compose yourself before answering, amusement dancing in your eyes. “The truth is, you didn’t actually forget our proposal.”

“Huh?” He looked more confused than ever. “What do you mean?” he holds your face firmly like he’s searching for an answer behind your laughter.

“You did it in your sleep!”

His eyes widened in surprise. “What? I sleep proposed to you?”

You grin and nod, taking his hands in yours. “Yes! That night, you suddenly shook me awake in bed. Your eyes were closed but you took my hand and started rambling this utterly romantic speech about how much you loved me and wanted us to be together forever. Then you pressed the ring box into my palm and mumbled something adorable like ‘Be mine always?’”

You have to pause as another fit of giggles takes over while he just stares at you, dumbfounded.

“Naturally, I said yes,” you continue, “because awake or asleep, I’ll always accept your proposal. You slipped the ring onto my finger, gave me a sweet kiss, and then promptly rolled over and started snoring!”

Now you’re laughing so hard there are tears in your eyes. Gojo remains frozen for a beat before breaking into laughter too.

“I proposed to you in my sleep? And have no memory of it at all?” He shakes his head in disbelief. “Well, that certainly explains my confusion this morning.”

You nod, still grinning. “I realized you must have done it in your sleep, but I didn’t want to say anything at first. I thought your dramatic distress over forgetting was too adorable!”

You dissolve into giggles again. Gojo chuckles and pulls you into his arms. “You find my suffering amusing, do you? You act all sad and pouty when in reality you knew about this?” He tickles your sides playfully, making you squeal.

“How was it being spoiled, hmm?” He showers your face with kisses as he tickles your side. He said that as if he doesn’t spoil you often already.

When your laughter finally subsides, Gojo gazes at you tenderly and brushes a tear from your cheek. “I’m glad one of us will remember the actual proposal, even if I was unconscious about it.”

He pauses before speaking again, “Though now I’m wondering if I should redo it a third time?”

You smile and wrap your arms around his neck. “I think twice is enough, don’t you think? Or do you just want another excuse to propose to me?”

You lean in and kiss him sweetly. Gojo hums against your lips. “You’re right as always. I wouldn’t change a thing about how we got here.”

He holds you close, admiring the ring on your finger. “Well, we’re now officially engaged to be married. That’s all that matters.”

You snuggle into his embrace, heart overflowing with love. “So, tell me, what were you dreaming that night when you proposed to me,” you ask with a giggle, finding the situation weirdly funny.

“Oh!” His eyes widened. “That must have been some dream I had.” He chuckles, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly. “I guess my subconscious wanted to make our engagement official before my conscious mind caught up.”

You laugh and hug him tighter. “Clearly your heart knew what it wanted even if your brain didn’t yet.” You pause. “But what made you decide to propose in your dream? We’ve never really talked about marriage.”

Gojo wraps his arms around you. “Honestly? We were on a romantic getaway in my dream. We’d spent the whole day exploring together and I was just overwhelmed by how perfectly happy I felt with you.”

He smiles softly, caressing your cheek with his thumb. “I looked over at you watching the sunset, and it just hit me. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, making you this happy. I realized at that moment that I couldn’t imagine a future without you as my wife. So dream-me proposed on the spot.”

Your smile at his tender words. You cup his face and kiss him again. “Well, I’m thankful for the dream-you were brave enough to ask before real-you.” You grin playfully and chuckle. “Yeah, you might as well be begging dream-me to re-propose in your sleep.”

You snuggle closer. “Maybe we should just let our dream-selves get married too, so both versions of us can be happy.”

He hums thoughtfully. “Not a bad idea. We could have a double ceremony. One dream wedding and one awake.”

“And I can’t wait to spend forever with you, whether you’re awake or asleep when you ask.”

Gojo laughs and kisses the top of your head. “I promise I’ll stay conscious for the actual wedding ceremony,” he teases.

“We’ll see. Maybe sleepwalking Satoru will surprise me again.”

As he gazes into your eyes, his expression becomes serious. “Mmm, marrying you for real is my dream come true. I can’t wait to call you my wife.”

[luvjunie]

— less is more

pairing: e-42!miles morales x fem!reader

contains: some tears, a little misunderstanding but a fluffy ending

summary: miles makes quite a bit of cash from his jobs, and with his love language being gift giving he often likes to spend a lot of it on you. however, you didn’t grow up with much, and this makes it especially hard for you to accept such expensive things from him without feeling overwhelmed. wc: 1,224

a/n: based off this request! some people might find this reader easier to relate to so i definitely wanted to write it

Gifts were something that came with the territory of dating Miles Morales. Big bouquets, flashy accessories, shopping sprees at the mall, and probably every single stuffed animal he’d ever caught you eyeing whenever the two of you went out. If you so much as looked at it, it was on your fire escape the next morning. At this point, you had so many on your bed that you were starting to run out of room to sleep.

And you knew he meant well, and you tried your best to enjoy it the way you imagined you should but it was all so foreign to you. Your life was much different before you met him, and it was more along the lines of nervously checking your bank account to see if you had enough cash to buy a five dollar starbucks drink to ‘treat yourself’, or if you’d have to wait till next week’s paycheck for blended coffee with some whipped cream on top.

Most of your clothes were hand-me-downs from your older siblings, or duds you’d secured from the Salvation Army a few blocks down on the colored-tag sale days, and that was the way you liked it. Humble beginnings is where you came from and humble was the way you intended to keep it.

So now as you stared down at the small jewelry box in your hands, Tiffany & Co embellishing the top in silvered letters, trepidation began coursing through you at the size of the box alone. Anything that came in a tiny package such as the one you were holding was bound to cost more than anything you’d ever managed to buy yourself. You realized you must have been lost in thought as you sat gawking at the untouched gift, because your boyfriend’s voice sounded like it was underwater the first few times he called out to you.

“Baby?”

“Hm?” You blinked, looking up at Miles from where you were seated on his bed to see him leaned against the wall, arms crossed.

“Go ‘head and open it, don’t leave me hanging.” Miles joked, brows bunched slightly in confusion.

“Oh— right,” you laughed half-heartedly. Swallowing hard, you gently pried the small box open with hesitant fingers to reveal the prettiest diamond necklace you think you’ve ever seen. Light glinting off the encrusted jewel, Miles waited with bated breath as he watched your hand tremble towards it, a choked inhale catching in your throat as you felt the weight of the pendant alone.

“Well?” he asked quietly.

“How much was this?” Your throat felt tight; uncomfortably so, like the air in the room suddenly wasn’t the kind you were meant to breathe.

Miles glanced to the side for a moment, then stood up straighter. “I mean, I paid for it if that’s what you’re asking...”

“How much was this, Miles?” Voice trembling when you spoke, you asked again but louder, and this time he knew you actually wanted an answer.

Confused because he didn’t take you for the materialistic type, he racked his brain for the memory of the total the clerk had read out to him and scratched his forehead.

“Like… three hundred and some change…maybe? Probably four? I don’t remember. Why does this matter?” He let out a peeved sigh, eyes widening as he watched your shoulders start to shake.

“Ay, mi amor, ¿que pasa? (what’s wrong, my love?)” Miles asked gently as he rushed to sit next to you, taking the jewelry box from your loose hold. He looked down at it disappointedly, lips pursing at the necklace he’d spent so long picking out. He thought you would’ve loved it. “You don’t like it? I can get you somethin’ better—“

“No, Miles. I… It’s perfect.” Warm tears rolled past your waterline and you wiped them away in a rush, aggravated that you were even crying in front of him about something like this. How could you explain yourself without sounding ungrateful or confusing him even more?

Miles licked at his dry lips as he tried to think of what to say. He was usually so good at reading your body language, but this time he was completely lost. You could see it on his expression when you looked at him that he was having a hard time understanding what was going on, and it only made you cry harder.

“No entiendo… (I don’t understand…)” He set the box down next to him and took your hands into his, head lowered to try and meet your averted gaze. “I’m lost.. If it’s perfect, then what’s wrong?”

You inhaled a wavered breath, the feeling of his thumbs rubbing the backs of your hands serving as encouragement for you to go on.

“I just…” taking a breath, your shoulders shrugged weakly. “You spending money on me like this, I— It feels like I’m using you. You should be spending your hard earned money on things for yourself, or… saving it for better things, not spending it on me.”

“Money is nothing to me when it comes to you.” he denied immediately.

“I know, and that’s the problem.” Your lips trembled, but thankfully you were able to prevent more tears from coming.

“Y/n, I—“

“Just, please. Let me finish.” You pleaded quietly, looking up to see him slowly nod at you. “I love you, Miles, and that means I love everything you do for me as well. But I’m not used to things like this.” you looked in the direction of the overturned jewelry box. “It’s a lot.”

Silence filled the space around the two of you. You felt incredibly guilty for even bringing it up, it was never your intention to make him feel this way. There was an energy shift and you could sense him regressing back to the version of him that once didn’t know how to express his love for you.

“I’m sorry.” he murmured simply. He didn’t know what else to say, he didn’t even understand, but he offered it to you anyway.

“No no no, Miles,” You guided his doleful eyes back to you with a hand on his cheek, your tone sincere. “I love the way you love me, really, I do. You don’t have anything to apologize for. It’s not your fault— I’m just not that kind of girl and I don’t know if I ever will be. But the way I grew up and the things I’m used to have nothing to do with you, and everything to do with me, okay?”

He frowned slightly. “So… No more gifts, then?”

You shook your head. “Giving me nice things is how you show your love towards me, I know that, and it would be unfair for me to take that from you. I’d be crazy to not appreciate how you’re always thinking of me wherever you go.”

Chewing on your thoughts, you contemplated the best way to give your answer.

“Okay, so it’s like this,” you sat up a bit. “You could give me a rock, and I’d cherish it like it was the best thing in the entire world, simply because you gave it to me. What I’m trying to say is how expensive the gift is doesn’t matter, all that matters is that my wonderful—“ your head dipped to meet his avoidant eyes. “caring, and thoughtful boyfriend got it for me. I don’t care about the money, I only care that it came from you.”

Miles brightened a little at that, and started to put things together after your explanation. “So, I can still get you nice things, but… less is more?”

A melancholic smile touched your lips before you pecked his cheek. “Less is more.”

He picked the small jewelry box up from the bed. He understood you completely now, but was still a bit bummed. “Does that mean I have to return this?”

You immediately shook your head. “Of course not, baby. I love it, and I think it’s beautiful. Just keep what I said in mind for next time, okay?” He nodded and you turned your back towards him so he could put it on for you.

“Good, cause I kinda lost the receipt.” Miles smiled coyly at the slightly shaky laugh that sounded from you as he unclasped the necklace, draping it over your chest and fastening it.

You peered down at the gorgeous piece around your neck, gently gracing over it with your fingertips. Your heart warmed at the thought of him picking it out for you, how he spotted something this beautiful and needed you to have it. You had to admit, it was absolutely stunning and you didn’t think you’d be taking it off any time soon. Even if the price of it had almost sent you into shock, you were more than grateful to have a boyfriend like him.

“Thank you, Miles. I love it, really.” You faced him once again with your confession, the sincerity laced in your tone accentuating the adoration in your eyes. Your hand caressed the apple of his cheek, it raising when he smiled contently and leaned into your palm. “But I love you, more.”

[hxltic]

Where Are You? NANAMI KENTO

There hadn’t been a day at work this long since the last Christmas. Corporations all decide they want to reward people they owe at the same time, and with the help of other departments, your job is: finalizing these payments, ensuring the calculations are right, and ensuring the people they are paying are actually doing what they’re supposed to.

This is done with three other previously mentioned departments, and even though you were the youngest compared to the middle-aged and older people around you, you were the only one who technically knew how to do all the jobs. Unfortunately, that meant you had to pick up some slack.

Sighing, you pull into the garage, letting the large door descend behind you. When you hop out of your SUV and turn the doorknob to the house, it’s pitch black.

The only noise comes from the clacking of your heels against the hardwood floors and the shuffling of items in your purse. You can almost hear your own thoughts.

“I’m home,” you call out, notifying your husband of your arrival.

There’s no response. You continue your scout for him, walking through the house leisurely, half-expecting him to be in the movie room upstairs or maybe the master bedroom you share, but you’re stumped when you don’t find him in either. His car was in the garage, so where was he?

Finally, it dawns on you to check his office. You make your way down the hallway and turn the corner into the last door, calling his name, only knowing the house is habited by the faint, golden light emanating from the doorway.

“Kento?”

Gently, you guide yourself past his bookcases, warily eyeing him down when you finally spot him. You’d expected him to be reading, or deep into his desktop, but he wasn’t.

He’s behind his dark, mahogany desk, leaning back far into the swivel chair. There are papers strewed around his usually pristine workstation and an empty mug of coffee resting on it. There’s also a low lamp that glows on the end of the surface, illumining his face as well as some of the office.

His expression is distant. His hair isn’t the gelled perfection it usually is. As you walk closer, your eyes dart to the clear glass in his scarred hand, sloshing some burnt-colored liquid in it. His reading spectacles rest nearby on the papers, not even on his face.

He moves to take a sip, lazily bringing the coolness to his lips, and only then does he notice you standing there. His eyes flicker to you, taking in your form before him. It’s odd, you think. Your husband has the keenest senses of anyone you know. He did hear you coming, right?

His tie is loose around his neck as if he were tugging at it previously, and his dress shirt reveals more of his chest than he likes when he’s working. The few buttons undone from the collar was doing absolute wonders for it. You swallow, the unwanted idea of your own workday completely forgotten.

“Kento.” You speak again—not too loud as if it would disturb the quiet atmosphere. He doesn’t provide a response this time either, but his eyes do glance up from your lower half to your eyes, and now, focused on your lips.

Your lips. That fucking red lip. That deep, red color that you wear to the office with your tights and pencil skirt and heels. Everyday, he curses that you’re blessed with a larger chest, because that cleavage you leave with makes him want to buy out your entire fucking office and monitor all your meetings himself. He’s seen the old dickheads on your floor, probably eyeing you as you walk by, comparing you to their own wives. And if not them, the forty-year-olds that that just can’t wait to peel his fat diamond ring off your finger as if they could take better care of you. Pay for your nails and hair and the Louboutins you strut in wearing.

He feels himself not only growing in his pants just looking at you, but frustrating himself as he imagines anyone else doing the same. Maybe it’s the alcohol in his system that’s fucking with his senses. And is it fucking with them, or just simply bringing them forth?

Relatively, your husband sports a rather stoic expression. But now, you’re watching the furrow in his brows deepen as he gazes pensively at your body, the glimmering watch on his arm ticking by in the silence.

When you’re scanning him back, you hadn’t even realized he’d finally reverted his attention to your eyes.

“How was work?” He inquires, his voice deep and rough. He shifts slightly, adjusting his position.

Swallowing, you force your stare to him. “Fine.”

There’s a beat of silence, the tension palpable in the air.

You finally break it, nodding to his untidy desk, “How was work?”

He takes a glimpse of it momentarily, swishing the liquor calmly before downing it in one go. He places the glass back down beside the bottle of what you now see is whiskey, his pace and demeanor like the calming serenity before a storm.

Shrugging nonchalantly, he answers. “Fine.”

You hum in acknowledgment, now taking casual steps around the wood to him. His eyes follow you like a cat to a laser, and his chair twists in correlation.

When you finally come to a stop before him, he allows your fingers to delicately trail up his collarbone, all the way around his neck as he blinks at you through his lashes. He always makes a point to pamper you; to be touching you in some way but not yet. His hands strain hanging over his lap.

You can’t tell if he relaxes or tenses when the pad of your thumb brushes along his cheek. His orbs remain stuck to yours, low and searching through your soul as the light adds a hazy hue to his face.

Under your fingers, there’s the growing stubble that he often punctually shaves off. As you brush along it, his eyes flutter shut, only to reopen like he remembered he preferred to look at you.

“You’ve been drinking.”

He doesn’t respond to your observation. His expression remains the same, his mind too fixed to process your words.

His tongue does prod at the inside of his cheek though, his gaze dropping below your face, then lower, and lower, until you’re slightly coming forward, his hands finally releasing from their spot to cup behind your thighs.

His fingers pinch at the tights you have on and he exhales, letting them go and caressing the skin above them instead.

When you don’t think he is going to say anything at all, he grumbles. “You wore this?”

Your brows come in to crease as you tilt your head at him. He’d never been controlling with what you wear. In fact, he dared another man to say anything to you, because if they did, there’s no question they knew you were married. Nanami was not an unknown name, and once again, the shiny ring. “Yeah, why?”

“You look beautiful,” he sighs, but it’s almost a grumble.

He’s addressing you directly until his attention shifts back to the tights you’re wearing, and the subtle sincerity in his expression disappears. “Thank yo–”

“Burn these.”

He hates them. How they hug you just right. How they don’t actually come all the way up. They stop right where the fabric of your work skirt begins, so it’s only covered completely when you’re standing up straight. When you’re walking—or worse, sitting—it’s like a visible garter.

Meanwhile, you huff on your way to complain, but out of curiosity, you ask slyly, “Why? They’re my favorite.”

Because your thighs fill them out. Because he knows other men imagine running their fingers along the supple skin underneath.

You feel soft massages just under your cheeks. And then you gasp when something is being pulled tightly against your skin, followed by the loud sound of tearing fabric.

Suddenly your tights are no longer tights—they’re split largely down your legs.

“Because they’re my favorite too,” he says casually, rubbing the affected area. “I’ll buy you new ones that I don’t like as much.”

As if punctuating his statement, he finds his way up your skirt, grabbing a handful of you in the process and pulling you down onto him. When you’re perched on top and your hands relocate to his shoulders, he moves his own to cup your face just as you did him. His thumb innocuously glides along your skin until it drags down your lip, smudging the red lipstick there.

The action inches a smile onto your face. After a beat of watching his distracted silence, you grab his attention.

“What, you miss me?” You tilt your head.

He will usually shut his eyes to mask when he’s rolling them, but he doesn’t this time. He knows you can tell just by the state he’s in. “Brat.”

With a teasing giggle, you begin to kiss his face, your red lip marks covering his light skin. When he can’t take any more, despite how calming it usually is, he grabs your chin and pushes his lips to yours, ignoring the remnants of your lipstick that will taint his own.

Should I make a part 2??

©️hxltic

[simonisferal]

𝚂𝚌𝚊𝚛𝚎𝚍𝚢 𝙲𝚊𝚝 — Interactive Follower Event

chapter one: black cat, green eyes

notes: sorry for not posting since may 😭, i forgot it existed and i had to make a 4 page google doc for it 😋 do NOT stay with heizou / also i didnt know that my little dividers stopped??? like huh???

masterlist

1.4k words

…Yes. I’ll take it as an apology for the way he acted yesterday.

Ignoring the confident look he gave you after you took his coffee, you take it and have a small sip. It was lukewarm, like he decided to buy it and then contemplate whether or not to give it to you for a few minutes. A very specific taste you’ve learned to like. You locked the front door and went with him.

You two don’t talk as he opens the passenger door for you and he walks over to the driver seat. You sit down, setting the coffee cup in a cup-holder and closing the door. 

Some blood drips down from your nose and you realize you probably look like a mess. You look to the side-view mirror, catching a small glance at yourself before seeing that Scaramouche was looking at you.

He snorts, holding back a laugh you could assume would be about your appearance and leans in. He takes a band-aid out of it before quickly shutting it back up with force, getting a yelp from you.

”So dramatic. It’s not like I’m gonna kill you or something.”

He opens the bandaid and covers your nose with it. It doesn’t really help with the faint bleeding but it’s better than a swollen nose. You hesitate to touch it, long after his hand has already backed away and is on the steering wheel, scared that it’ll probably hurt.

You touched it and it did. It’ll make a bad bruise soon but nothing too bad.

The car ride was silent besides the occasional static on the low-volume radio he had. His car was nice, not expensive but still something much better than your small Toyota you got from your friend's neighbor. You would scroll through social media if you had your phone.

You noticed around five minutes in the ride that you weren’t going to the department. The turns became more narrow and the streets started looking unfamiliar. “Where are we going?”

”A new case popped up. Turns out another murderer is on the loose.” He doesn’t look at you as he continues driving but you can’t help but notice the way his eyebrows furrowed.

”Sounds scary.” You say. Scaramouche scoffs but you catch the small smile on his face. “Sure.”

”Hey! Glad you guys could make it.” Shinobu welcomes you to the scene. It was in a moldy alleyway with an ill stench reaching your nose. There was a tarp over the victim and only a few cops around holding the crowd back. There were a few guys from your station, some from another’s and a few reporters, like Charlotte, that you saw blocked by the ‘DO NOT CROSS’ tape. Your partner went under it, gaining small cheers from the reporters. “Yeah. Who are the other guys?”

“They’re 724’s guys,” Kuki explained. They were honestly an average group of detectives but there was a diamond in the mud.

Shikanion Heizou.

He doesn’t really need an introduction, almost everyone in the force knows who he is. He’s almost too good at his job—the only reason he hasn’t been promoted or fired was because of his off-the-book investigations.

”Those guys? Please, it’s probably not that serious.” Scaramouche crosses his arms like he was offended. He was probably right, Shinobu did enjoy extra precautions and calling another department was a hobby of hers. She only sighed and looked at you.

She opened her mouth and before she could speak, someone else spoke. Speak of the devil…

“Oh, hey (Y/N)! I’ve been looking for you.” Heizou had a smile on his face and he reached his hand out to shake. His hand was gloved, and soaked in blood from probably touching the victim (even though everyone tells him not to).

“Oh! Uh…” You sheepishly smile at him back while sweating profusely, eyeing his hand and Scaramouche’s coat pocket. Your partner sighs, as if knowing what you’re saying, and takes out a random napkin from his pocket. He hands you it and you use it to ‘shake’ Heizou’s hand. “Yeah, nice to meet you too…”

Heizou backs away his hand, taking off the blue glove alongside the napkin and tossing it somewhere on the crime scene. Kuki gives him a side-eye glare and he brushes it off. “Relax! Me and the guys already took pictures and sent things to forensics. There’s nothing of importance here.”

Both Scaramouche and Kuki grumbled at his backhanded compliments towards his work.

”Anyways,” Heizou clapped his hands together, trying to rewind. “It would be most appreciated if (Y/N) comes with me, back to my department. I got something for them there.” His moles moved as he smiled. He was trying to convince you to go with him, you figured.

Kuki held your shoulder, “Come on then. Let’s go.” You, without much thought, let your department manager drag you into a van without letting you inspect the scene properly.

It was dirty, as if someone lived there, but it smelled rather nicely. One seat didn't even have a seat belt—instead duct tape and a magnet that probably wouldn't give you any form of protection in a car accident…

You made Scaramouche sit in that seat.

Unlike the previous car ride, Heizou and Kuki made some small talk about personal matters. They seemed to be close. "Co-workers or cousins?" You mutter.

"Might be both."

"Welcome to our department, 827. We hope to cooperate nicely." A woman, taller than both you and Scaramouche spoke. She had raven hair and the eyes of a hawk. She stood proud until she saw Heizou. A scornful look covered her face and she crossed her arms. 'Was she Shikanion's manager..?’

Heizou steps past her, "That's the Captain. Kujou Sara, meet Shinobu, Scaramouche, and (Y/N). You three, Sara." Everyone exchanges vague greetings and a short handshake before the burgundy hair detective grabs your hand. "I got something for you. It's important, 'kay?" He gives out another smile.

You sweat again. "Uhh, sure." You could trust him, right..? Some other guy, a blue-haired fellow with a mole under his lip, dragged Kuki and your partner away for something else. Scaramouche gives you a glance before following the guy.

"What's it about?"

The smile that once held itself on Heizou's lips shrank. "Can't say it out here, you know. It's like you've never been told a secret." He jokes but something tells you it's probably bad.

Like once before, you let yourself get dragged into an office. You internally curse yourself as he locks the door. He checks the blinds on his door, closing them but ignoring the outdoor windows’. What was such a big deal?

He sits down once he makes sure everything is secure, his eyes closed and his hands clasped together over his desk. He takes a deep breath. His demeanor went from the care-free cop you thought he was to a serious detective as he locked eyes with you. "What I say can't leave this room, (Y/N)."

The room instantly became cold and you felt a shiver down your spine. "Uhmm…what is it?"

Heizou pauses. He eyes you up and down, watching for any shift in your body language. "I, unfortunately, have a reason to suspect that our soon-to-be-serial killer might be going after you."

You blink. "...What."

"The murderer from the alleywa—"

He tries to speak but gets interrupted by a loud knock on the door.

The blinds shake and you let out a small scream, surprised.

"(Y/N)!" It was a voice you knew—Scaramouche's. "We're going back to our department." You don't know whether or not to feel relieved or even more scared.

Heizou groans, standing up and walking over to his office door. He unlocks it and stares dormantly at your partner. "Must you go so soon? (Y/N) and I were having a pleasant conversation." He smiles as if teasing the indigo-haired man.

"Yeah. I don't wanna be in this dumb department, let alone with the Kamisatos over there, when we have work to do and a case to solve." He snarls and he looks at you. "Come on. Let's go."

You tense up and freeze. Why did God always give you two options?! Although you'd love to leave and forget what shocking news Heizou told you seconds ago, if it's real…you can't risk dying because of your cowardness. Or maybe Heizou was wrong, in the one and a billionth chance he is.

Kuki was behind Scaramouche, a frown on her face. You didn’t know if it was towards you or Shikanion. “Heizou, leave them alone. You know they scare easily.”

“Oh, come on! I’m just kidding!~” His smile didn’t falter but his voice did crack, though you doubt someone else heard it. He held out his hands in defense as if he were joking before sliding them around your waist.

His voice lowered as Heizou whispered in your ear. ”What do you wanna do?”

masterlist — prev — next

[sunshine-and-moonshine]

Pregnant Cod Men

Requested: Kinda? I did a poll if I should do this or not and the answer was yeah. I’m counting it as half a request.

Warnings: Pregnancy (duh), Pre-eclampsia (Price’s), pregnancy anxiety (König’s)

Price

Good. Fucking. Luck. Price is someone who has a very tough time with the whole pregnancy thing and unlike Simon, there is no point in his pregnancy that you won’t be fighting with him to sit down and just watch the telly for a bit. It’s also made worse by the fact that he has pre-eclampsia and is told that, in no uncertain terms, is he to be exterting or stressing himself under any circumstances. And he looks at that like a challenge, constantly waddling to his office to try and get some work done. It gets to the point that you have to lock his paperwork away only to come home with his favorite biscuits just to see him digging the papers out from where you hid them, brown furrowed said he grumbles to himself about muppets. At this point you might just have to chain him to the bed, for his own sake.

Gaz

HNGGGGG!!! I’m telling you right now that Gaz is the fucking cutest when he’s pregnant. He’s constantly carrying around the weirdest little supplies like one of those belly bands that plays music. Says he needs to teach the kid what proper music is before they come out. And he spends weeks agonizing over what color to paint the nursery, torn between two very similar shades of light purple that leave you confused on what the difference even is. Insists on driving around to TEN different toy stores to find the perfect plushie that is equal parts soft and durable. Will start tearing up when he finds what he thinks is the best one, holding it close to his chest as he looks at you and asks if he can buy 5 of them because he’s afraid that just one will get lonely until the baby gets here. You don’t have the heart to tell him no when he’s looking at you like that so you do, indeed, walk out of the store with 5 of the exact same plushie and a very happy crying Gaz.

Ghost

For the first two trimesters Ghost insists that he can still do everything he normally does. Go to the gym, go on missions, stay up for days on end, brew coffee and tea in the same pot then chug the mixture. It’s a fight to get him to actually settle down and sit for any length of time. In fact it’s almost worse then when he wasn’t pregnant, like he feels that he needs to prove he can still do everything that he’s used to doing. But as SOON as that third trimester hits he is lounging around the house in nothing but a loose Diamond Head T-Shirt and his headphones, eating strawberries out of the carton, his feet propped up on the sofa arm and his head nodding along to the beat of whatever he’s listening to. Always palming his belly, never telling you when the baby moves but you can tell by the way his eyes soften just the slightest bit.

Soap

R.I.P. to your sleep because Johnny is one of those pregnant people that gets the most random cravings in the middle of the night and cannot go back to sleep until he’s eaten whatever it is he wants. Will give you the biggest saddest puppy eyes while rubbing his belly. Tells you he can go get it himself but he doesn’t want to go alone. It’s an entirely frustrating experience to lose so much sleep but it’s worth it to hear his excited giggling and watch his proud penguin waddle as he makes his way back to the car with his food. Will try and make you have a bite of whatever concoction he’s come up with. His most frequently returned to craving is marmite spread on biscuits then dipped in coffee, which he insists is the best thing he’s ever had in his life and swears that he’ll keep eating even after the baby is out.

König

König has a rather…nonchalant pregnancy? For the most part. Half the times it seems to you like he’s forgotten that he’s even pregnant. Which is partially true, and it’s so incredibly easy for him to do so because he doesn’t experience any of the usual pregnancy symptoms at all. If anything, he seems to just be more energized and ready to take on the world. He doesn’t even start showing until month 6 and reality doesn’t slap him in the face until month 7 when you both go in for an ultrasound and see that it’s triplets, in which he’s silent for a good minute before asking if it’s possible for you both to trade places. The Doctor has to leave the room due to laughing and you have half a mind to follow her. Probably would have if not the truly panicked look on König’s face as he stares at the ultrasound pictures, calling his mom to ask how big his head was when he was born, looking like he’s gonna cry when he gets his answer. Pregnancy is a mess of anxiety for him for the following months, please be sure to comfort him with many blankets and his favorite comedy movies.

[raapija]

For the pookie au, how did Nando propose? Were Carlos, Oscar and Lando around for it? Did he discuss it with them? Did they help him plan it? I would love to hear your thoughts

[This turned into a whole thing again, so... You're welcome? 😭]

They're all on a family vacation in somewhere like Greece or a Spanish island and at the beach.

Lance is draped in towels and has a sunhat and shades on. He's lounging under a massive umbrella to try and keep his sensitive Canadian skin from burning in the sun. Everyone else is beautifully golden brown and enjoying the beach and sea.

Fernando stumbles over, bringing Lance a new bottle of cold water and slumps down beside him on the sand.

"Here, cariño." he says while giving the water to Lance, who snakes a hand out from underneath the towels and rests the cold bottle against his chest to cool down.

"The guys seem to be having fun." Lance says and they look over towards the shore, where Carlos, Lando and Oscar are trying to drown each other in the shallow water while manically laughing and scaring the other beach-goers.

"My boys." Fernando says proydly. He then digs a loose piece of dried up seaweed from the sand and starts to fiddle with it.

"Next time we go somewhere like Sweden. Or Antarctica. Somewhere cold." Lance quips and takes a swig from the water bottle, enjoying the coldness going down his throat. Fernando humms and keeps fiddling with the seaweed.

"I'm going to get a heatstroke, then burn to a crisp in the sun and ultimately die and you all look so comfortable." Lance nagged. "I don't get it. Is it the Spanish genes? No, Oscar is Aussie... Or is it hot in Australia, too? I don't fucking know... You're all freaks."

"Here," Fernando interrupted his rant and stretches his hand towards Lance. Lance moves his shades up to see what he is offering. "For you."

"For me? What is this?" Lance asked and studies the tiny seaweed creation Fernando had fabricated. He had somehow managed to weave it into a perfect little loop.

"Will you marry me?" Fernando then asked and Lance snorted, amused at the sudden question. It must be a joke, so he laughed and put the seaweed ring on his left ring finger.

"Wow, this is beautiful." the Canadian said, half impressed that it actually fit and half mockingly because it was so dumb.

"I'm serious, Lance." Fernando said with a little more gravity in his voice. "I want you to marry me."

Lance looked at him, eyes big and in shock. But Fernando's expression didn't crack, he was serious. Lance swallowed and then continued:

"Really?"

"Sí, really."

"Okay..."

"Is that a yes?"

"Yeah."

Lance was a bit flustered. He hadn't expected this at all. Sure, he and Fernando had been together for a while, but this? Yeah, it was still sudden. He didn't mind it, though.

"Tomorrow we go buy you a nicer one. Gold. A diamond, whatever you want." Fernando smiled and Lance huffed. Fernando would always buy him something super expensive only for Lance to lose it somewhere or wear it once.

"Buy a nice ring for you, how about that?" Lance said. Fernando chuckled and nodded, climbing back up and dusting sand off his legs and butt. He then leaned down once again to plant a big, wet kiss on Lance's lips and ran off back towards his kids. Lance sunk deeper into the towels around him and looked at the seaweed ring.

"Hmm..." he hummed and trailed a careful finger over it. Married. Sure. That could be fun.

[thehighladywrites]

this is not a request just. thinking. ik you’re writing the boys as plugs but have we considered. the women.

elain would %100 make her own edible pastries and give them to you in those colourful baggies with a bow. she’d invite you over to “make sure the new recipe I use is good for the next batch.” the watch movies and end up napping on the couch type

feyre would be the best if you’re a newbie and ever curious about anything. %100 is a bit of a push over for you and sometimes gives you a lil gram extra and offer to smoke with you. she would probably teach you (if you dont know) why you should put ice in your bong. i just know she smokes and paints. probably does art nights with you.

Nesta is pretty abrupt, definitely a one and done we dont small talk plug, but she is there for you if you need (like if you’re a newbie and greened out or paranoid or whatever) because she knows how scary it can be to feel out of control with your body. (replace her trouble with canon alcoholism with getting high every night. she knows how it can get to you.) tells you to drink water and sleep it off but is still hanging around when you wake up ‘just in case’.

mor is the plug thats more like a friend. would end up smoking half of the stuff she just sold you because you guys wanted to sesh and hang out. probably gossips about her other customers when you two get really close

idk anything for amren she probably only uses like cbd oils idk :/

anon i dont even know what else to add, this is so perfect😭😭😭 yess i’m agreeing with everything

also amren would probs smoke joints. i imagine her having one between her long manicured nails, she probs use magic on them to make them even more strong/she mixes in some crazy shit orrrr she has a cart, a fancy ass pen with diamonds and gem stones. when she offers u a hit, ur high for hourssss her shit goes crazy tbh, it’s probably borderline venomous

elain would have her own garden where she grows her supply, i imagine she’s a girl plug who have the cutest packages, they’re all pink with cute stickers that say “thanks for supporting my small business”

feyre is the curious one, down to try literally anything. so down to earth and would get high with you and paint you naked. she has one of those loose shirts with buttons and a pair of shorts, her hair is loosely braided as she mixes her colors, she’s so hot i literally need her rn

nesta is so real, like the helping out when u green out part is so accurate. ut her fav customer and she wants to make sure ur okay, she says it’s because she doesn’t wanna loose clients but in reality she likes u. she also throws in extra g’s but doesn’t say shit ab it

mor is forsure the friend turned plug, she put you on to her supply and ever since u buy everything from her. fav activity is eating infused food in public/meetings and trying to act normal. like at the high lords meeting, you eat a shit ton of edibles and then try to concentrate but it’s very obvious bc you both look stoned and you’re paying too much attention to peoples words, it’s not natural

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

Comet Donati [Chapter 8: Fool’s Gold]

Series Summary: Sex, drugs, boy bands. You are a kinda-therapist recruited (via nepotism) to help Comet Donati through a recent crisis. Things are casual with Aegon, very not-casual with Aemond. Loosely inspired by One Direction.

Chapter Warnings: Language, references to sexual content (+18), drugs, alcohol, smoking, Aemond being very horny for one person in particular, mental health struggles, pregnancy, bodily injury, illness, death, a Targaryen family reunion, the tragedy of a hammerhead shark.

Selected Chapter Quote: “Do you love him?”

Word count: 9.9k.

Link to chapter list (and all my writing): HERE.

Taglist: ​​@doingfondue​ @catalina-howard​ @randomdragonfires​ @myspotofcraziness​ @arcielee​ @fan-goddess​ @talesofoldandnew​ @marvelescvpe​ @tinykryptonitewerewolf​ @mariahossain​ @chainsawsangel​ @darkenchantress​ @not-a-glad-gladiator​ @gemini-mama​ @trifoliumviridi​ @herfantasyworldd​ @babyblue711​ @namelesslosers​ @thelittleswanao3​ @daenysx​ @moonlightfoxx​ @libroparaiso​ @burningcoffeetimetravel-fics​ @mizfortuna​ @florent1s​ @heimtathurs​ @bhanclegane​ @poohxlove​ @narwhal-swimmingintheocean​ @heavenly1927​ @mariahossain​ @echos-muses​ @padfooteyes​ @minttea07​ @queenofshinigamis​ @juliavilu1​ @amiraisgoingthruit​ @lauraneedstochill​ @wintrr13​ @r0segard3n​ @seabasscevans​ @tsujifreya​ @helaenaluvr​ @hiraethrhapsody​​

Only 2 chapters left! 💜

“I could love you for more than a day,” you tell Aegon, smiling, drowsy, sipping you blush-pink Salty Dog at the rooftop bar in Kansas City. It’s June, tornado season: a clashing of contradictory air currents, quintessentially American destruction.

“Yeah?” he says, daylight spilling out of his gaps under the night sky: the gleam of string lights reflected in his cobalt eyes, the white of his teeth, the eternal-summer warmth of his voice.

“Yeah. Not on this planet, maybe. But on another, very similar planet.”

He clinks his glass against yours; grains of salt pop off the rims and land on the table like snow, like infinitesimal diamonds, carbon shaped by pressure and time and deadly heat into something cherished. The wind tears through his nearly shoulder-length blond hair. “To other planets, and other lifetimes, and other dimensions where we are all the least-damaged versions of ourselves.”

“Aegon,” you say, and you wait until he’s done downing his Salty Dog and is looking at you again. “Someone’s inability to love you has nothing to do with your merit to receive it. It’s about them, it’s not about you. And that’s especially true when it comes to parents. If your father can’t be there for you in the way that he should, that’s his deficit, not yours. He’s the one missing pieces of himself. He’s the one who has failed. You can’t use his inadequacy to measure your worth. You should be proud of yourself for succeeding in spite of him. You should be proud of the person you are.”

He’s spinning his empty glass between his palms, amused, perhaps somewhat anxious; he is afraid of the answer. “And what kind of person am I?” He waits for one of those familiar soulless tropes to resurface, the disaster playboy, the hot loser, the paradoxically remiss eldest brother, the addict, the slut, the comic relief.

You say instead, somehow knowing that it’s true: “A good one.”

~~~~~~~~~~

Takeoffs and landings, highways and streetlights, tarmacs that stretch into the hallways of five-star hotels. You order virgin drinks when no one else is around to hear you do it. You buy prenatal vitamins and stash them in an Advil bottle. You sneak off to see a doctor while Comet is in Boston; yes you’re pregnant, yes everything looks good so far, yes you need to stop eating sushi and lifting heavy luggage. You stay out of hot tubs. You try to dodge secondhand smoke. You follow the band from city to city like children hopping on couch cushions strewn across a floor they say is lava. And now: cold porcelain, too-bright lights, crumpled on the bathroom floor of your suite in the MGM Grand. Sin City, they call Las Vegas. Like it was made for you.

You hear the swipe of a keycard and approaching footsteps, clop clop clop. When he appears in the doorway, you moan and try shield your face with your hands. You finally got your splint off last week in San Diego. “Please go away. Please.”

Aegon doesn’t listen. He gapes at you, chomping noisily on cotton candy flavored Bubble Yum. You can smell it; the sickening sweetness twists through your guts. “Damn, Stargirl. You look terrible.”

“Thanks.” You retch unproductively into the toilet bowl; there’s nothing left in your stomach to rid yourself of.

He’s wearing khaki cargo shorts, a neon green tank top, and—eternally, faithfully—matching Crocs. “Is it food poisoning? I don’t remember you being fucked up last night.”

Not that he’d know; he spent most of it snorting lines with Cregan. You lower the toilet seat, cross your arms over it, and take a deep breath. “Okay. I’m going to tell you something. But you have to not panic.”

“Sure.”

“And you have to not get wasted and accidentally announce it to everyone either.”

“That was not me talking. That was the Icelandic beer. And we’re not in Iceland anymore, so, yeah. Problem solved.”

“I didn’t want to tell you,” you say weakly, haltingly. “Not yet. Not like this. But I need somebody to help me hide it.” Just like Cregan needed someone to tell about Iris. And he chose Aemond. “Baela’s working on her ballet school applications, and I can’t burden Rhaena with something like this, and…wait…one second…” You yank up the toilet seat and heave into the bowl until the wave of nausea passes.

Aegon rubs your back, gentle and sympathetic. “Would weed gummies help?”

“No, Aegon.”

“Percocet? Oxy? Valium? I know where to get heroin in Vegas, but I wouldn’t want you mixed up in something like that.”

You gaze pathetically at him. “I’m eight weeks pregnant.”

“Oh, fuck,” Aegon gasps.

“It’s Aemond���s.”

“Oh, fuck! How…? When…?!”

“Tokyo. Club Camelot. Just once. And then we never talked about it again.”

“Jesus Christ, you love a spontaneous bar bathroom hookup.” He blinks a few times, processing this revelation. “You don’t have to have it, you know. If you don’t want to. You have options. Maybe you wouldn’t back in Kansas, but—”

“Missouri,” you whimper, staring miserably down at your silvery reflection in the water.

“Whatever. But we could fly you anywhere. If you wanted to not be pregnant anymore. If you decided to…uh…serve it an eviction notice.”

“I’ve thought about that,” you say, but it’s not quite true; you thought about it as an option, but not one of your options. “I know, logically, that’s probably the reaction that makes the most sense. But it’s not what I want.”

“Okay.” And if he has an opinion one way or the other, he’s doing a very good job of not showing it. “So what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to resign at the end of this leg of the tour, and then I’m going to go home to Kansas City to raise my fatherless, clandestine bastard child.”

Aegon raises his eyebrows, chaotic blond hair falling in his face.

“That came out weird,” you admit. “But it is essentially accurate.”

“You’re just going to leave? You’re going to do this alone?”

“My parents will help me. They’ll be kind of horrified at first, but…they’ve been through worse. They’ll come to terms with it. They’ve been begging for grandkids since I was eighteen.”

“But you can’t leave,” Aegon says. And his large, murky, deep blue eyes are glistening.

“I have to go home. I have to build a life for myself. I can’t follow Comet around the world indefinitely.”

“But…but…so you’re eight weeks right now, right? So you have, like, I don’t know, over six months until the baby is born? That’s forever, Stargirl! That’s half a year! You could come to the fall shows in South America, and then visit London over the holidays, and…and…I mean I don’t even know what’s next for Comet after that, but you sure as hell don’t have to leave right now—!”

“Aegon, I could have complications because of the blood clotting gene thing. I could have a stroke, I could have a miscarriage. I need to be going to doctor’s appointments and taking leisurely afternoon walks and, like, eating vegetables and grilled chicken, not flying to a new city every couple of days while surrounded by booze and cigarettes.”

“Okay, okay, I get it.” He sighs and sits down cross-legged on the bathroom floor beside you, rubbing his face with his hands. He looks at you from between his fingers. “One of our last U.S. stops is in Kansas City. You want to get off the ride there?”

“I think that would be for the best.”

Aegon says suddenly: “Let’s get married.”

“What?” Your nausea is now secondary to your shock. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah. I’ll give you healthcare and child support and whatever.”

“You genuinely think that me marrying a cokehead sex addict is the solution to this problem?”

“I’m not a sex addict. I’m a sex enthusiast.”

“Aegon, I’m not going to marry you.”

He is wounded, pouting, childlike. “Why not?”

“Because I don’t want some arrangement. No matter how well-intentioned or generous it is.” I want real, constant, conventional love.

Now he smiles, faintly, sadly. “And you want a different Targaryen.”

You grab the can of ginger ale you left on the bathroom sink and sip it tentatively, averting your eyes, not answering him.

Aegon says: “Aemond doesn’t know?”

“No. He has no idea.”

“You have to tell him.”

“There is a zero percent chance of him taking this well.”

“You have to tell him,” Aegon insists, pointing to your belly, not showing yet but soon, soon, so soon. “If you’re keeping it, then that’s my family in there. You can’t just haul it off to the hellscape that is the American Midwest and push the rest of us out of its life. It can’t be a secret forever. Aemond would want to be involved. I want to be involved.”

“I’ll tell Aemond,” you promise. “But not yet. Not while I’m still on tour, not while I can’t get away from him if he…” You hesitate, not knowing what you are trying to say. Aegon waits. “He’s going to think I did it on purpose. That I was trying to use him or fix him or something. He’s going to hate me.”

“You can explain,” Aegon says, but doubtfully.

“Explain what? That I stopped taking the pill, but then forgot I’d stopped taking it, and then remembered right after we had unprotected sex that I initiated, whoops, oh and also Plan B apparently doesn’t fucking work?”

“His super sperm work, that’s for sure,” Aegon mutters. “Hope mine aren’t that energetic.”

“I’m a nobody,” you say. “And I have a lot to gain from this, even if that’s not how I see it. And Aemond…he’s so goddamn mistrustful. He’s so convinced that no one could want him or believe in him in a way that is pure. I’m afraid to tell him. I’m afraid he’s going to say things in the heat of the moment that I won’t be able to forget.” Like when he called me a slut. Like when he said he loves me.

“The getting pregnant thing sounds bad,” Aegon concedes. “And, yeah…he will most likely not react in an even vaguely sane way. Because he’s Aemond, and that clown from the It movies lives in his brain. But he’ll process it for a few weeks and then he’ll come to the right conclusion: that you wouldn’t deliberately do something to hurt him, and that he wants to be there for you and the kid. And I’ll vouch for you.”

You shake your head, your eyes faraway. “I wish I could wait to tell him until he’s in a better place emotionally. Until he has something…anything…to latch on to…a plan for what to do with his life…”

“Hey,” Aegon says. Gingerly, he turns your face towards his with one hand. His cheeks are splotchy with pink sunburn. He’s sweating out White Claws and Coppertone Sport. “I know you think you’re doing this alone, but you aren’t. I’m going to take care of you.”

You look at him with tears brimming in your eyes, hot, ashamed, blurring out your vision. “You’re so different than Aemond. You’re weightless and warm like daylight. You glow. But you do that for everyone, not just me. And I can’t count on you.”

“I love you,” Aegon says. “Not in a Jack and Rose on the Titanic way. In a different way. But I’m never going to forget about you, Stargirl. I get that I might disappear for a while, but I’m never going to not come back someday.”

You fold into him: softness, effortless proximity, cotton-candy-scented kisses smacked onto your temple, arms that circle protectively around your waist. “I love you too, Aegon.”

“Think you’ll be able to walk over with us to the aquarium at the Mandalay Bay? Criston got everyone tickets to feed the zebra shark.”

“When?”

“Um, soon. But I can buy you some time. I’ll text them that I’m busy FaceTiming Selena.”

“You’re a saint.” Patron saint of mayhem. You groan as you crawl out of his grasp and towards the shower. “I might be okay in thirty minutes. Let me try to start feeling human and wash my hair and stuff.”

“You want some help?”

You stare at him from where you are kneeling on the cold tile. “Really?”

“Yeah. You look…wobbly. You sit on the shower floor, I’ll wash your hair.”

“But I’ll be naked.”

He grins, holding up his hands in a blithe shrug. “I’ve seen it all before, Stargirl.”

“You’ll be naked too.”

“Don’t think you can tempt me into any unwholesome activities, you unwed knocked-up vixen.”

You laugh; it feels incredible. “I will gratefully accept your offer. I might not have a choice, actually. I don’t think I can keep my arms above my head for that long.”

Aegon stands, walks into the shower, starts reading bottles. “You want to smell like Japanese cherry blossoms or a coconut?” He pauses. “A fatherless clandestine bastard child conceived in Tokyo. Cherry blossoms it is.”

~~~~~~~~~~

A series of walkways connect the MGM Grand to the Mandalay Bay. Comet moseys through faux cobblestone streets in the New York-New York, complete with steam-wheezing manhole covers and operational storefronts of pizzerias, delis, bakeries, Irish pubs. The band narrowly avoids being trampled by droves of exuberant children—and you are looking at children more closely these days, watching how their parents corral them, noticing what makes them happy or sad or afraid—in the strobing, bleeping arcades of the castle-like Excalibur. In the Luxor, modeled after the pyramids of Ancient Egypt and featuring the largest atrium in the world, Criston begs everyone to pose for photos in front of sand-colored statues of sphinxes and pharaohs. “Smile big for your mom, Daeron!” Criston orders between pictures. Shelby, as always, is wearing her camera-ready, gloss-and-veneers grin. She’s also wearing a stunning floral-print maxi dress with a slit up to her thigh, looking glamorous and graceful and very not-pregnant. By the time Comet arrives in the sleek, golden, tastefully nautical corridors of the Mandalay Bay, you are exhausted and dangerously nauseous. You try your best to conceal it.

“Are you okay?” Baela asks. She is scrutinizing you as you stand in the shark tunnel of the aquarium, bathed in rippling sapphire-blue light. Overhead the captive ocean swims by: sea turtles, sawfish, Galapagos sharks, blacktip reef sharks, sand tiger sharks (hideous, in your humble opinion), stingrays, horseshoe crabs, a metallic rainbow of shimmering fish.

“Stargirl!” Aegon scolds mildly, ambling over to massage your shoulders. “I told you not to eat all those New York-New York corn dogs!” He shakes his head and smiles casually at Baela. “You can’t take these Midwestern girls anywhere. They see battered meat on a stick and lose all control.”

“How many did you eat?” Baela says, studying your sweated, queasy, generally unwell appearance.

“I don’t remember. I don’t want to talk about corn dogs right now.”

“You think it might be food poisoning?” Aemond asks. He has appeared in the shark tunnel with a plushie grey beast clutched in one hand. He’s lurking several yards away, but his forehead is creased with curiosity, with concern. His right eye flicks to where Aegon’s hands rest on your shoulders—disapproval? appraisal? fascination? envy?—and then back to your face.

“No, just gluttony.”

“It’s one of the seven deadly sins, you know.” Aegon counts on his fingers. “Gluttony, and pride, and lust, and…uh…uh…oh, right, greed…and uh…”

“What is this, Bible study?” Baela says.

“You’d know all about gluttony, you whale,” Jace tells Aegon.

Aegon shouts back: “I am like a whale, Jace! I am a rare and celebrated mammal!”

Jace mimes shooting Aegon with a harpoon. And then, when Cregan turns to glare at him, he grabs Baela’s hand. Jace’s face is at last fully healed and he has no interest in jeopardizing that. “Come on, baby. Let’s go see the Komodo dragons.”

“Don’t vomit on any sea creatures!” Baela chimes as they leave. Soon only you, Aemond, and Aegon are left in the shark tunnel. Rhaena and Luke are petting stingrays at the touch pool; Cregan, Daeron, and Criston depart to take their turns feeding the zebra shark. And Shelby is…actually, you’ve lost track of where Shelby is. Hopefully getting mauled by something.

“You should see a doctor,” Aemond tells you, stepping closer, although gradually, meanderingly, as if by happenstance. “You look…not great. You might need IV hydration or something.”

“Seriously, I’m okay. I’ll live.”

Shelby peeks irritably into the tunnel. “Honeybunch! Hurry! We have to take a selfie with this fish in the background so I can caption it I’ll love you inFINitely!”

“Will you give me two seconds, please?” Aemond snaps. She retreats with palpable unwillingness. Then Aemond offers you the plushie: a hammerhead shark, you see now. Aegon takes a few steps away from you both and pretends to be enthralled by a sawfish as it glides over the dome of the tunnel.

“What is this?!” you exclaim, delighted. Your nausea has momentarily abated.

“It’s your souvenir for Las Vegas. You can keep it right beside your sika deer from Japan. Hopefully they get along.”

“It’s so cute, Aemond! And very unexpected. Thank you.”

“No big deal,” he says. “I saw it and thought of you, that’s all.”

You pet the tiny hammerhead shark, downy and soft and grey like a storm cloud. “These were in the other tank, right?”

“Those were scalloped hammerheads,” Aemond corrects you. “This is a great hammerhead.”

“Wow. Pretentious.”

He laughs, a miraculously beautiful sound. And as you gaze at each other, painted in sapphire light and the shadows of fish, you remember everything about Aemond, the way he tasted, the sounds of his whispers and his moans, the indescribable fullness as he eased himself carefully into you. And you think: What would happen right now if there was no Shelby, no Aegon? Would he touch me? Would he kiss me? “There are actually no real-life great hammerheads in this aquarium. Not anymore. They don’t do well in captivity. One was flown here back in 2001 and she was on display for a while, but then she died unexpectedly a few years later.”

“She died?” You cradle the plushie shark in your arms. Suddenly, without warning, there are tears welling up in your eyes. You are distraught. You are consumed by irrational pregnancy hormones. “And she was the only shark of her kind here? So she didn’t have anyone who could understand her? She must have been so lonely.”

“Um, yeah, I guess. But sharks really don’t have emotions like people do, they’re mostly brainstem.”

“It’s still awful.” A tear slips down your cheek and falls onto the plushie shark before you can swipe it away.

Aemond is alarmed. “Are you…crying? About a shark that died like twenty years ago?”

“It’s sad, bruh,” Aegon sniffles, conjuring up some tears in his large, oceanic eyes. “The only one of her kind, bruh.”

“Honeybunch?” Shelby whines, appearing once again at the mouth of the tunnel. “Honey Bunches of Oats?”

Aemond sighs. “Yeah. On my way.” And he goes to meet her. A squall of giggling, bewitched children rush into the shark tunnel, pressing their eager little palms to the glass. Aegon’s manufactured tears have vanished and he is typing out a WhatsApp message to someone.

You think, picturing Shelby’s Vegas-themed fingernails skating across Aemond’s skin, flaunting parts of him while shunning others: I hate her, I hate her, I hate her.

~~~~~~~~~~

When Comet returns to their floor at the MGM Grand, there are three strangers waiting for them. Strangers to you, rather; not strangers to anybody else. Certainly not to Criston. The middle-aged woman—auburn hair, vast dark eyes, high cheekbones—rushes to throw her arms around him.

“Thank you for taking care of them,” she is saying, as Criston holds her and blushes a dark hectic pink. Then she turns her attention to Daeron and Aemond, touching their faces and their hair, asking if they are sleeping well, what they have been eating, what their favorite parts of the tour have been thus far. Aegon has not moved from your side. He fidgets awkwardly, shuffling in his Crocs, slurping on the Double Chocolatey Chip Frappuccino he bought from a Starbucks in the Excalibur. One of the strangers—a weathered older man in a grey suit, tall and vigilant like a wolfhound—examines him with a cool pale gaze. Aegon evades it.

The third stranger, oddly, comes directly to you. She is delicate, nimble, light eyes and hair like watercolors, soft and edgeless. She makes you think of birds: sweet songs, hollow bones. She takes your hands in hers and beams like she’s known you for years, like you are old friends. “You must be the one Aemond has told us so much about.”

Aemond? Me? You smile apologetically. “I think you mean Shelby. She’s over there.”

“Here I am!” Shelby waves from where she is parked determinately beside Aemond.

“No, I know who Shelby is,” the stranger says; and her dreamy, girlish voice is perfectly neutral. She might as well be making some throwaway comment about a squirrel in a tree, a fish in a koi pond. “I mean you. The girl made of stars.”

He talks about me? To people back home? Aemond turns away when you glance at him. Shelby is simmering. You tell the stranger: “That is very poetic. And flattering.”

“Stargirl, this is my sister Helaena,” Aegon says. Then he gestures to the others. “And that’s my mother Alicent, and the frightening bloke who looks like a mob boss is my grandfather Otto.”

“What on earth are you drinking?” Otto chides Aegon, wrinkling his dignified nose.

Aegon is stung, although he tries to hide it. “It’s a Double Chocolatey Chip Frappuccino. It’s delicious.”

“It’s a milkshake for adults. It’s diabetes in a cup. Put some effort into taking care of yourself for once, it’ll make you feel better.”

Aegon says flatly: “Yeah, I’m so glad you guys stopped by.”

“Are you here for the concerts?” Daeron asks, buoyant as usual.

Alicent looks to Criston; he smiles bashfully in return. “Well, Criston mentioned that you’d be in town, and your father just so happened to have a convention to attend here over some of the same days, so I figured…why not drop in and surprise my wonderful, accomplished, handsome sons?” Her prominent umber eyes drift to you. Helaena is still clasping your hands. “And their…friends.”

“Dad’s not around?” Aegon says cynically.

Alicent stalls. “Well…honey, you know how he is. He’s very, very busy. But he promised he’d try his best to make it to one of the shows.”

“You know, it’s strange. He never seems to be busy when Rhaenyra has her little art gallery openings.”

“So!” Alicent chirps, deflecting. “Criston said there was a pool. Is there a pool?” She pats the massive beach bag slung over her left shoulder. “We brought our swimsuits!”

The MGM Grand has an extensive pool complex featuring drink bars, multiple whirlpools, a waterfall, and a lazy river. Even in September—those last gasps of summer in the Northern Hemisphere—the temperature in Las Vegas hovers in the 90s. As you slather on sunscreen and nibble sparingly at an order of fries, Alicent and Helaena cannot disguise their interest in you. Alicent asks about your hometown, your family, your education, your time with Comet. She seems puzzled by your unmistakable fondness for Aegon, but otherwise smiles pleasantly and chuckles at your (carefully selected, intentionally tame) stories from the tour. Alicent strikes you as someone who is composed and warm on the surface but a jumble of frayed threads below; if you tugged on the right one, she’d unravel until all her seams split open and secrets poured out like dark water. Helaena doesn’t say much, and what she does say is strange, truthful but disjointed, like a line from a poem or a song; but she keeps touching you, a hand on your wrist or on your ankle or absentmindedly tracing the lines of your palm. From several chairs away, Shelby watches this with a toxic glower, for surely she as Aemond’s aspiring baby mama should be the beneficiary of his family’s attention. From behind his sunglasses, Aemond tries to act like he’s not staring as you spread sunscreen over your collarbones and chest and thighs.

“I’ve got drinks!” Aegon announces, appearing with a loaded tray. He weaves between chairs to deliver the beverages. “A pina colada for me…a strawberry daiquiri for Rhaena…a Twisted Pink for Luke…a margarita for Mom…no!” he barks at Daeron as the youngest Targaryen (for now, for the next approximately seven months) tries to grab a red slushie. “Not that one!”

Daeron is confounded. “But it’s a strawberry daiquiri. Isn’t that what I ordered?”

“Yeah, but that specific daiquiri is Stargirl’s.”

“What makes it different?”

“Extra whipped cream,” Aegon says without missing a beat. He passes it to you. Nonalcoholic is what it actually is: sweet and refreshing and without any bite whatsoever.

“Why are you being helpful?” Criston asks Aegon suspiciously, squinting, full of dread. “You’re never helpful.”

Aegon grins. “I’m just a helpful guy.”

“You’re freaking me out,” Criston says. “Cregan? I’m scared. What’s he up to?”

Placidly, sucking on a frozen hard lemonade through a hot pink straw with multiple loops, Cregan shrugs. Sunning themselves beside him are three Victoria’s Secret models. “Cregan?” Romee Strijd croons, reaching over to comb her fingers through his hair. “Could you rub more sunscreen on my back, please?”

Otto is stretched out on a pool chair and reading the Business section of the New York Times. Jace, Baela, Luke, Rhaena, and Daeron are gathering up their inner tubes and heading into the lazy river, a swift crystalline blue current that reminds you of Aemond’s clear right eye. Alicent gets up to go talk to Criston; they speak in low voices, less secretive than sacred, like each believes the other to be a relic necessitating great care. Shelby is now scrolling through her iPhone. Aemond is still watching you. The speakers are playing Somebody’s Heartbreak by Hunter Hayes.

“I was hoping you could fix me,” Helaena says suddenly.

You don’t understand. You think you must have misheard her. “What was that, Helaena?”

“Aemond says you fix people. That you’re a saint.”

“I’m certainly not a saint.” I’m just an unwed mother from Missouri. Who wears Cookie Monster pajama pants. “And even if I was, I don’t think anything about you needs fixing.”

“But I’m not normal.” And her eyes glisten with it: this knowledge that can’t be escaped, a lifetime of whispers and rumors and being hopelessly misunderstood.

“No, you’re not.” You won’t lie to her. What good would that do? What cure can come from dishonestly, even when spun from compassion? “But Freddie Mercury wasn’t normal. Neither was Jane Goodall. Einstein, Montessori, Dali, Tesla, da Vinci, Curie, Shelley, Newton, they were all extremely, undeniably not-normal. And guess what? Aegon’s not normal either. And neither is Aemond. And neither is anyone else in Comet. They might not be the same brand of not-normal as you, but I can guarantee you they are all bona fide freaks of nature. Because that’s what it takes to make something new, to leave a beautiful mark on the world. Being not-normal is painful sometimes. But that’s not a reflection on you. It’s an embodiment of how small-minded and cruel all those normal people can be. You don’t want to be like them. You’re above them, you can see things they can’t. You keep flying. Don’t worry about the dirt down here on Earth.”

And only now do you realize you have an audience, peering over with wide eyes: Alicent, Criston, Shelby, Aemond, Aegon, Cregan and the Victoria’s Secret models, Otto wearing the first smile you’ve ever seen from him. Helaena, calmed and content, goes to sit by him; he begins braiding a green ribbon into a lock of her hair.

“For the record,” Aegon says. “I am definitely dirt.”

You laugh as you gaze up at him, shielding your eyes form the sun. “No you aren’t. Not even close.”

He offers you a hand. “Ready to get in the lazy river?”

“Yeah, I think so…” You finish your daiquiri, climb off your chair, shed your black swimsuit coverup, and walk over to the pile of inner tubes that Criston collected for the band. You can feel Aemond’s eyes on you as your bare feet pad across the cement. He moves a towel over his swim trunks and then stares at the palm trees, trying to appear nonchalant.

“Honeybunch, let’s go in the water too,” Shelby says.

“Um. In a minute.”

The rushing current has brought Jace, Baela, Luke, Rhaena, and Daeron back around again. From his inner tube, Jace splashes you and Aegon as you approach the steps that descend into the lazy river. “Finally daring to enter my watery domain?! I’m the king down here. I’m Poseidon. But if you want to battle me for my throne, you’re welcome to try.”

“Don’t you start bumping people!” Aegon yells, jabbing his index finger at Jace. “You keep your little scrawny chicken limbs to yourself!”

“Aww, someone call Greenpeace, we’ve got a beached whale over here…”

“Careful,” Aegon says, grabbing your arm to stead you on the steps. “They’re slippery.”

And Aemond observes this, lighting one of his Benson & Hedges cigarettes and inhaling a deep breath of smoke, his face lined with scars of the past and furrows of worry for the future.

~~~~~~~~~~

Twenty-four hours later, the band is enjoying dinner down the strip at the Wynn’s buffet: eccentric modern art and elaborate fruit sculptures, prime rib and crepes made to order, gelato and pasta, sushi you can’t eat. Alicent, Helaena, and Otto are here with Comet. So are the Victoria’s Secret models. So is Selena Gomez. She sits next to Aegon, teaching him the Spanish words for various foods and giggling as he butchers them. When Justin Bieber’s Sorry comes on the speakers, she rolls her eyes and stabs aggressively at her shrimp.

You were violently ill until 3 p.m. and then mercifully improved. Upon arriving at the buffet, you caught a whiff of the Alaskan king crab legs and were at once ravenous for them. You demolish plate after plate, sucking hunks of meat out of cracked shells, licking up dribbles of drawn butter from your fingers and wrists. Aemond—relegated mostly to fresh fruit, chunks of bread, and a vegan ratatouille—ogles while trying very hard to act like he’s not. Jace pulls one-dollar bills out of his wallet and throws them at you.

“You could have an OnlyFans,” Baela says. “Forget a real job. Make millions splattering yourself in crabmeat and butter for sad horny men. You could do a whole series…shucking oysters…dismantling lobsters…”

You imagine your child in kindergarten: So where does your mommy work? She stays home and films herself eating seafood in her underwear. “I don’t think I have the disposition for a celebrity lifestyle. You know I’m always hiding from the paparazzi.”

Alicent chuckles as she takes a bite of her roasted quail. “Yes, I remember the photos! Always tucked behind Cregan or Aegon. Except those times when you were walking with Aemond. That was so sweet of you, encouraging him like that. I’m sure it meant the world to him. Ever since…well, you know…it’s a more stressful experience for him now.”

Aemond, self-conscious, busies himself with stirring his ratatouille. “It was really my pleasure,” you tell Alicent.

“Pleasure, huh?” Jace teases, wiggling his eyebrows.

Baela asks you once again if you’ll ride the New York-New York rollercoaster with her tonight. You pretend to be terrified of rollercoasters. She counters that you definitely rode rollercoasters at Grona Lund when the band was in Stockholm. You try to gaslight her into thinking she has misremembered this. Aegon jumps in with (doubtlessly fabricated) statistics about how many people are killed in rollercoaster accidents.

“Really?” Baela says. “Five million people die on rollercoasters every year?”

Aegon knows he’s made a fatal error, but he is committed. “Yup.”

“You’re telling me that more people are killed by rollercoasters than live in the entire state of Oregon? And no one has addressed this problem? This epidemic of amusement park calamities?”

Aegon shakes his head spiritedly. “Nope.”

Now Shelby is saying something to Alicent at the other end of the long table. You don’t listen too closely, because you’re in the habit of mentally muting her. Still, you can’t help but catch snippets. It’s about the importance of public figures being good role models. “…So it’s probably for the best that she’s not interested. Young girls are very impressionable, you know.”

“Oh?” Alicent is replying, polite but noncommittal, perplexed. Criston brings her a miniature creme brulee from the buffet’s sprawling dessert section.

“Don’t you agree?” Shelby asks you, and the table goes quiet. She smiles sweetly, innocently, all beachy waves and highlighter sheen.

You lower your crab leg. “What exactly am I agreeing with?”

“That people who accept the responsibility to be in the spotlight should be the sort of role models that the youth can look up to.”

“Um, not really, no. I think a popstar’s job is to be a popstar, not to impersonate Mother Teresa or stop global warming or anything. They’re not running for president. But I mean, yeah, I guess they shouldn’t be murderers, so I agree like 1%.”

Aemond glances over at where Shelby sits beside him, not knowing what she’s up to, not especially invested. She sniffs, a dismissive, haughty little sound, like can you believe how uncivilized this bitch is? “Well, I suppose it doesn’t matter since you aren’t planning to pursue fame anyway.”

“Lovely Shelby,” Jace says, taunting her. “Are you implying that our supernaturally poised and responsible Stargirl would set some sort of nefarious example for the little girls of planet Earth?”

“Yeah. That’s exactly what I’m saying.” Now Shelby is staring fixedly at you, cold like deep water.

You glare back defiantly. She couldn’t possibly have found out about the baby. Aegon would never have told her, and no one else knows. “Because…?”

“Because of what happened when you were in high school.”

Nothing changes for almost anyone else at the table, but it does for you: your mind goes blank, your skin goes cold, your stomach lurches, you are fifteen all over again. It’s not the fear that anyone in Comet would think less of you for it; you don’t think they would. Alicent might, Otto almost certainly, Cregan’s flock of models could carry the gossip anywhere—and surely this is Shelby’s design—but Comet would not condemn you. No, what paralyzes and disgusts you, what empties your veins and fills them with ice, is the truth that you are not the one choosing if and how to tell them, you are once again powerless and exposed, you are the curves and hollows of bare flesh they’re reading like a newspaper headline.

How…? Aemond…? But no: he looks just as horrified as you do, this is the last thing he expected, he didn’t think she knew, his eyes fly to yours and stay there, frenetic blue emotions but no words.

The others peer around the table. Aegon is frowning at Shelby, but he doesn’t know what she means, he doesn’t know how to help…because you’ve never told him. “What about high school…?” Luke says uncertainly.

“It’s not difficult to find,” Shelby tells you. “All someone has to do is Google your name and Kansas City, then comb back through a few pages. There are old Tweets and Facebook posts about it. Pictures, even, if you search long enough. Can you imagine how parents would feel about their daughters’ favorite boy band associating with someone like that? Popularizing that sort of behavior? It’s unacceptable. It destroys innocence.”

Your hands are shivering violently. You take one deep, shaky breath. “Actually, what happened was—”

Aemond lunges to his feet. “Don’t,” he commands you, holding up a hand. Then he turns to Shelby. His voice is deeper than you’ve ever heard it, stormy, cutting, wrathful. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“Aemond!” Alicent gasps.

Shelby blinks up at him. She is bewildered; she has miscalculated. She had no idea he knew. Her eyes dart from Aemond to you.

“No, don’t you dare look at her,” Aemond seethes. “You don’t look at her. You look at me.”

It takes effort, but Shelby manages to comply. She gawks at him, dismayed, flinching away from his rage, his scar, his sightless left eye like the lethal atmosphere of Neptune. She cannot hide how she truly sees him, how she will always see him. As something broken, pitiful, less.

“What the hell does she have to be ashamed of?” Aemond asks Shelby. “She doesn’t use people. She doesn’t sell false versions of herself. She is kind, and wise, and forgiving, and beloved. And what are you? A professional liar. A manipulator, a snake. Someone who knows how to pity but not how to cure.”

“Aemond—”

“Stand up.”

Shelby is petrified, shellshocked. “Why?”

“Because I’m going to put you in an Uber, and it will take you to the airport, and I honestly don’t care where you go from there. But you can’t stay in Vegas. And I never want to see you again.”

“Aemond, please!” Shelby cries. She still hasn’t moved from her chair. There are tears flooding down her cheeks: despair, defeat. You could almost feel sorry for her. Almost.

“And if you fight me,” Aemond says. “Or if I hear a whisper of you trying to disparage anybody at this table, I will end you, Shelby. Every app you use to edit your photos, every so-called friend you’ve worked to sabotage, every sponsorship you haven’t disclosed, I’ll expose all of it. I’d call up the fucking Rolling Stone if they cared enough about you to publish it. I will end you. Now stand up.”

Trembling, sobbing, this time Shelby obeys. Aemond and a flock of security guards—two of Shelby’s, two of Comet’s—escort her out of the buffet. He is only gone for a minute or two; the table is silent except for slurps of drinks and the occasional squealing of silverware against plates. When Aemond returns, he immediately goes to you. He rests a hand on your shoulder—gently, protectively, the same way Criston does—and murmurs so no one else can hear. He is so close the air you breathe is filled with him: smoke, cologne, dissipating fury.

“I am so sorry. I had no idea she would do that. I don’t think she’ll speak of it again. Are you okay?”

“I’m okay,” you reply in a stunned little squeak.

“Good.” Then he looks fiercely around the table, pausing to lock eyes with every single person. His meaning is clear. You will not ask questions. You will forget this happened. He sits back down beside Shelby’s vacated seat and pops a red grape into his mouth.

“Damn, Stargirl,” Jace says after a moment. “So you’re a serial killer.”

Everyone laughs, and the nightmare is over. It breaks open like dropped glass. “Don’t worry. I only murder obnoxious, curly-haired brunettes.”

He winks as he licks chocolate mousse from his spoon. “I wouldn’t mind being added to your body count.”

“Shut up,” Baela groans. “Shut up, shut up…!”

You excuse yourself. You walk out of the buffet. The Wynn has a gorgeous hallway that passes through a garden of whimsical ornaments, flowers, trees, and string lights. Too suddenly for you to change course, you realize what’s going to happen; you stumble into the greenery and vomit five plates’ worth of Alaskan king crab onto a Ficus tree.

“Need a napkin?” Aegon asks; he has followed you. “I don’t actually have one. But I could take my shirt off and give you that.”

Still hunched over and spitting, you shake your head. “No, I’m okay. I’ll use a leaf.” You don’t make eye contact with him. You don’t want to invite unwelcome questions.

“Relax,” Aegon says, rubbing your back. “I’m not going to ask.”

You are relived but skeptical. “You’re not curious?”

“I figure if it was something you wanted me to know about, you would have already told me.” He smirks. “I do think it’s interesting that Aemond knows something about you I don’t.”

“He gets one secret, you get another. You’re even.” You thought you were done. False alarm. You resume vomiting on the Ficus tree.

“Goddamn, that is disgusting. You want a Percocet or something?”

“I think that would be less than ideal for the baby.”

“Oh. Right.” He considers you with great sympathy. “A lot of discomfort over something that’s the size of what, a chicken nugget?”

“Yeah, probably.” You rip a leaf off the tree, wipe your lips, trudge back to the buffet bathroom to sanitize yourself as best you can.

When Comet’s fleet of Escalades arrives back at the MGM Grand, you loiter in the lobby hoping for Criston to appear. You shoo away the band when they try to wait for you, and once Aegon catches on he ensures that they file into the elevators and zoom up to their floor. You need a minute alone with Criston. You need to arrange your imminent departure from the tour. Criston, oddly, does not come inside. You give him five minutes and then head back out into the arid Vegas heat, dry, ancient, barren. One of the Escalades is still idling in front of the hotel. You open the door. Criston and Alicent are in the back seat: he’s on top of her, her legs and arms curled around him like ivy, the hem of her chic mom-appropriate sundress pulled up to her waist, her lips famished and moaning against his.

You scream, they scream, you slam the Escalade door shut. Seconds later, Criston bursts out of it. He is wearing only his hastily pulled on boxers and a half-unbuttoned white shirt.

“I’m sorry!” you blubber. “I, uh, I didn’t see anything! Um, I mean, I didn’t see that much—”

“You can’t tell anyone,” Criston pleads.

“I definitely will not.”

“Her husband…he’s…he’s not a great guy, you know? And Alicent, she’s…she’s so…she’s so incredible but so sad, she’s been through hell this past year, and after Aemond was hurt we…uh…well we spent a lot of time in hospital rooms together…and I just love her hair and her eyes, and her devotion to her family, and the way she smells…”

“I really, really, really do not feel entitled to nor desire the details that you’re sharing with me right now.”

“Okay.” Criston tugs at the collar of his shirt, catching his breath. “What were you doing out here anyway?”

“I have to talk to you about something, but it can wait.”

“You’ve already interrupted us at this point. Just go ahead.”

“Alright. Well. I’m leaving Comet.”

“No!” he cries, distressed. “Really? Why?! Is it something Jace did? What did Jace do? Because I can let Cregan know and he’ll—”

“No no no, nothing like that. It’s just time for me to go figure out my own life now.” Time for me to find a permanent job, have my baby, re-traumatize my parents, the whole American Dream thing.

Criston sighs. “I was hoping you’d stay on through the South America dates.”

“I can’t, Criston. I appreciate all that you’ve done for me and how welcoming everyone has been, this has been a fantastic experience…um, overall…but I really do have to go home now. Can we fill out the paperwork and make the Kansas City shows my last stop with Comet?”

He nods reluctantly. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll get it taken care of. We can do signatures in a few days.”

“Aegon is the only other person who knows I’m leaving. I don’t want anyone else told yet.”

“Got it. You keep my secret, I’ll keep yours.”

These secrets are multiplying, you think as you enter the MGM Grand and Criston climbs back into the Escalade. Like cells, like storm clouds. Upstairs in Comet’s hallway, Selena Gomez is in a war with the vending machine; it has snagged her Starbursts and refuses to release them. You don’t offer to help her shake the machine—heavy lifting, not good for the littlest Targaryen—but you do use your flip flop to reach up inside the machine and knock the Starbursts loose.

“You’re the best!” Selena high-fives you. “Aegon tells me you’re a really talented therapist.”

“Oh no, no way, not yet. I mean I’m really new at it and I don’t have a lot of confidence in my abilities but I am learning a lot and maybe one day—”

“The work you do is very important,” Selena says; and she seems to mean it. She is so beautiful in a vulnerable, benign way. It is difficult to not be starstruck.

“Thank you,” you manage.

“Watch out for him,” she says quietly, discretely. “Anytime his parents visit, he’s a little extra fucked up for a while.”

“I’ll do my best.”

She smiles, lays a palm briefly against your cheek, floats down the hallway and is gone.

~~~~~~~~~~

On their last night in Las Vegas, Comet adds a cover to their usual lineup of songs: Animal by Neon Trees. It was Luke’s idea, which means it was probably Aemond’s. Aemond wanders the lofty catwalks and shadowy hallways making his notes, his comments, his white amendments on night-black paper, stars freckled across the void. Alicent, Helaena, and Otto join you, Selena, Baela, Rhaena, and the Victoria’s Secret models in the front row. Otto dances with Helaena, spinning and laughing; Alicent cheers for Daeron and watches for glimpses of Criston as he studies the performance from just off-stage. Aegon fumbles no less than five lyrics. Cregan has come up with this new trick where he can remove his boxers on-stage while keeping his pants on. He gifts the aforementioned boxers to a group of soccer moms who in the commotion rip them to tiny, sweaty, treasured shreds.

After the show, Alicent, Helaena, and Otto catch a flight back to London; Selena takes a limo to Los Angeles. Jace’s suite at the MGM Grand, per tradition, is soon engulfed in voices and music and smoke and amply flowing alcohol. Criston is chatting with Aemond, who has a Bramble in one hand and a smoldering cigarette in the other. Cregan and the Victoria’s Secret models are playing Jenga with Luke and Rhaena. In Baela’s absence—she’s working out in the hotel gym—Jace is consoling himself with plentiful Vespers and some barely-legal fangirls; he is introducing his tattoos to them one by one. Daeron is toasting Yuenglings with friends at the bar. And Aegon is like he always is: here, then gone, then here again, and finally gone, like a comet, like a tornado that touches down without warning and vanishes just as quickly. You lose track of him. It’s not your fault. He comes and goes like an act of God.

In the hallway, several suite doors are open, including Aemond’s. You slip inside; no need to watch out for Shelby anymore. You find his notebook on his nightstand—the same place you keep your souvenirs in your own bedroom—and you engage in your least-honorable hobby. You’ve been sneaking looks at his lyrics since Paris. You open the notebook and rifle through onyx pages to the most recent, starlight-hued entry:

I was closest to the sun, like Icarus, swimming in your light

You are the only person I’d let melt my wings

Worry a line into your face, I think about it for days

Don’t talk to me about what the end of summer brings

“He’d kill you if he saw that,” Luke says from the doorway, grinning. “Well, he probably wouldn’t kill you. But he would not be thrilled.”

You snap the notebook shut and place it back on the nightstand. “Please don’t tell him. I am but a humble fangirl.”

“I won’t tell him. But you should ask permission.”

“I don’t think he would give it to me anymore.”

Luke is gazing at the notebook now, his face distant. “It’s screwed up, right? I only got into Comet because of Aemond. He fought for me and he won. But when he was the one who needed help, I couldn’t do the same.”

“Luke…” You open your hands: sorrow, futility. “You must be the least blameworthy person in this whole goddamn mess. You tried to fight for Aemond when no one else would. You make him feel valued. Every single day I watch you remind him of his place here in Comet. You’re the only person who does that.”

“I can’t do this without him,” Luke says softly, fearfully. “I don’t know how to write a song without his advice. I don’t know how to end a show without being able to ask him what I did right or wrong.”

“I think you’re more capable than you believe you are.”

Luke is troubled. “Am I hurting him by wanting him to stay?”

You contemplate this for a while before you choose your words. “In my opinion, Aemond needs to know that his contributions to Comet were real and they he will always be welcome here. But he also needs to find a new purpose. He’s a guest in the band. He’s not a part of it anymore. He can’t go back to who he was before the accident, he’s learned too much about how people treated him when he was hurt. Even if he got up on stage again for a farewell performance—which I think would be beneficial for him—he’s never going to be a full-time popstar again. He needs something else. I don’t know what that thing is, but he needs to be free to find it.”

“I understand,” Luke says. He’s quiet, mulling it over. And then, brightly: “Want to play Jenga with us? Cregan is so bad at it. Or he’s letting us win, I’m not sure which.”

“That’s super sweet, but I think I’m going to go lay down. Maybe take a half-hour nap and then see who’s still conscious for me to hang out with.”

“Are you okay?” Luke asks abruptly.

“What? Yeah, of course, I’m just exhausted. I think the tour is wearing on me.”

“You haven’t looked good for a few weeks now,” Luke says. “I don’t mean that in a rude way. You just seem sad or sick or something. Or both.”

You give him your best reassuring smile. “I’m okay, Luke. I promise.”

He smiles back. “Good. Enjoy your nap!”

“Enjoy your Jenga!”

You drag yourself back to your suite, a human-shaped pile of concrete and lead. What had Aegon said? A lot of discomfort over something that’s the size of what, a chicken nugget?

“We’ll be back in Kansas City in a few weeks,” you whisper as you collapse onto the bed, one hand resting on your not-showing-but-soon belly. And as your eyes drift shut, you realize how good home sounds, better than it ever has before. Is that nesting? Is that just getting older? You don’t want to leave Comet. But you do want your real life to begin.

You are nearly asleep when you hear him come in: the swipe of a keycard, the clopping of Crocs, a clumsy dive onto the bed that rocks the whole mattress.

“Hey,” you say, eyes still closed.

Aegon doesn’t answer. You sit up and look at him: sprawled face-down, hair in disarray, sunshine yellow Crocs still on his feet.

“Aegon?”

He doesn’t reply, doesn’t move. You reach out to shove him. His eyes are closed; he is limp. He’s not breathing.

“Aegon?!” you shriek, shaking him, hitting him. There’s no part of him that is glowing now. The sun has set, but the moon is full: his skin is silvery-white and bloodless. You’re screaming for anyone who will hear you.

Cregan is the first to arrive; he was out in the hallway leading all three of the Victoria’s Secret models back to his suite. And then it all happens very quickly. Cregan is dialing 911, Aemond is dragging Aegon off the bed and onto the floor, Criston sprints to get something from his room and returns with two small white devices that he’s ripping out of their packaging. Aegon’s skin is turning blue. Criston feels for a pulse, doesn’t find it. He’s telling Cregan what to relay to the 911 dispatcher: no breathing, no heartbeat, Narcan being administered. Criston cradles Aegon’s head and tilts it backwards so he can dose him with the nasal spray. Then Criston looks at his wristwatch and begins chest compressions. You are pinned by shock and horror to the wall. You can hear people out in the hallway, voices and footsteps, clamoring and rumors.

There is Jace’s frantic voice: “Is he okay?!” Cregan pushes him back outside.

“Come on, Aegon,” Aemond is saying, patiently but firmly, slapping at his brother’s face, pinching his cheeks. No blood rushes in to darken the battered flesh. “We’re all here. We’re all waiting for you. Come on back.”

“One minute,” Criston notes as he glances at his watch. Forever, it feels like.

“I’d give him another,” Aemond says.

“Second dose of Narcan,” Criston tells Cregan as he stops compressions and administers another round. And that does it: Aegon gasps, jolts, comes alive again. His skin transforms from blue to white to pink. “Jesus fucking Christ,” Criston hisses, and buries his face in his hands, trembling with relief and adrenalin. Cregan is informing the 911 dispatcher that the patient is back from the dead.

Aemond lifts his brother so he’s sitting upright and holds him, smoothing back his hair, murmuring to him words too hushed to understand. Aegon says, dazed: “Did I do it again?”

“Yeah. Yeah you did. But you’re back now.”

“I’m sorry, Aemond.”

“Stop—”

“I’m so sorry. I should have been at soundcheck.”

“Stop, Aegon. It’s over, it’s done. None of us knew what would happen.”

There are glittering, glass-like tears on Aegon’s face. His voice is choked and heavy, so heavy. “I’ve never wanted to hurt you.”

“You’re hurting me now.”

“One of these times you should just let me die.”

“But then who would torment Father? I don’t have nearly as much talent for it.”

Now they are both laughing, and you see that Aemond has a few tears of his own: only from his right eye, only from the one that fate spared.

Criston says, almost apologetically: “Aegon, we have to take you to the hospital to get checked out.”

Aegon sighs. “Yeah, I know. I remember how it goes.” Aemond and Criston help him to his feet. He can’t walk on his own; they half-carry him out into the hallway where EMS is just arriving. And once Aegon is on the stretcher and being ferried away—with great fanfare, everyone gathered in the corridor to wave him off—Aemond comes back for you.

Together you ride in one of the Escalades to the hospital and stand outside the transparent windows of the room while a lethargic, irritable Aegon is hooked up to machines and Criston talks to the doctors and nurses, vigorously reprimands him, makes a phone call to Alicent so she hears it before TMZ can report the story.

“I haven’t helped him at all,” you say to Aemond. “Not last June. Not now. Never.”

“That’s not true. You don’t know where he started.” He watches you, this man who sees so much and yet so little, who maybe loves you but sometimes hates you and is the father of a soon-to-be child that you already feel you know. “Do you love him?”

“Yes. But not in the way you mean. I would kill for Aegon, but I’d never marry him.”

Aemond chuckles, like this is a ludicrous combination of words. “Has he asked?” And then when he sees your face, too exhausted and woeful to censor itself, his jaw drops open.

“He wasn’t serious.”

“A strange thing to joke about.”

“Not for us.” It would be strange if Aemond joked about it. Because I could actually see myself marrying him. Not in another world, in this one, if only the stars aligned just right.

“Look, I think I have to apologize,” Aemond says. “Because I might have…misinterpreted things. The way you make me feel is…I can’t describe it, you know? It’s like, light, and warmth, and music, and I made the mistake of thinking that was only for me. But you do that for everyone, right? It’s not just for me. It’s never been just for me. And you’ve been so goddamn gracious. You’ve never asked me for anything. You’ve never put yourself in a position to use or take from me. You knew what I needed and you tried to give it to me. So thank you. I know I said that I understood you better in Reykjavik, and I was wrong then. But I understand you now. You help people. You heal people.”

You turn to him, startled. “You aren’t like everyone else. That’s not how I think of you.”

He is intrigued, perhaps hopeful, perhaps too afraid to hope. Pity is familiar. Love would be something else. “No?”

“No.” Truths, like birds with clipped wings, struggle in vain to take flight. “I have to confess something.”

“Go on then.”

I want you. I love you. I want to have this child with you. But I’m so fucking scared that you won’t be able to handle it. And at last, cowardice: “I’ve been reading your lyrics.”

He smiles. “That’s fair, I guess. Everything I’ve written since June has been about you anyway.”

Criston emerges from Aegon’s room. His dark hair sticks to the sweat on his forehead; his eyes are damn near vacant. He looks like he’s aged ten years in the past hour. “He wants to talk to you,” Criston tells you. “I don’t think he’ll be awake in five more minutes, and he might not remember any of it anyway. But he is insistent.”

“He usually is,” you say, and go in.

Aegon is dressed in a pale blue hospital gown, no neon. His feet are bare; you can tell because one of them is sticking out from under the blankets. His hair is slicked back from his face. He is afflicted with a slew of twisted wires and beeping monitors. But he is still Aegon: beautiful, bright, generally harmless to anyone except himself. He blinks blearily up at you. “No one has ever loved me, and it’s because I don’t deserve it.”

“Millions of people love you, Aegon. I love you.”

“For more than a day?”

“For all of them.”

He grins, then presses his right palm to his chest. “Starboy,” he says. Then he points at you. “Stargirl.” His gaze drops to your belly. “Starbaby,” he declares at last. “Not my Starbaby. But a Starbaby nonetheless.”

“You can’t leave me,” you say softly, tears falling down onto his blankets. “I can’t do this without you. Not just the tour. Everything. I can’t live in a world without you in it. You can’t leave Comet. You can’t leave me.”

And Aegon murmurs, petulant like a child as he drowns in sleep: “You’re leaving me first.”

[mermaidgirl30]

✨Crimson Tango: A Dance of Diamonds and Revenge Chapter 3: How Wonderful Life Is While You’re In the World✨

Series Masterlist

A/N: I hope you are enjoying our Moulin Rouge au that me and @mountainsandmayhem have created! Cheers to another chapter and please let us know how you liked it ❤️

Chapter Summary: Your feelings for Joel are growing faster than you imagined, but you have to deal with Terrance. The man you can’t stand to be alone with. Will Joel be able to save you or will you have to suffer alone while he watches helplessly?

Pairing: Joel x fem! reader

Rating: Explicit (18+ Only)

Word Count: 10.2k

Chapter Tags: Reader buys a new dress, mutual pining, feelings, smut, oral receiving (fem), secret date, angst, desire, longing, Joel teaches reader guitar, reader shows Joel how to dance, reader is a sex worker who’s put in a position from Terrance and his friends that involves nonconsensual touching so please read at your own risk

Dividers by @saradika-graphics

Even though you’ve calmed down a bit, you practically stomp back to your room as your high heels dig deep into the floor. You’re feeling every single emotion that you can possibly feel right now. Obviously mad after the screaming match with your uncle, but also sad and scared about what you have to do with Terrance. Not scared in the way most would be, that some man they don’t know is about to own you and your body completely, but scared to lose Joel. That kiss is still burning on your lips and your body is aching for more of him. Worst of all, you’re scared for your heart. Your poor battered heart. You’ve ignored it for years, and right when you open it up it’s about to be absolutely obliterated.

When you open your bedroom door, you see Joel under your sink replacing the pipes. This might be your only chance to be alone with him again. A little voice inside your head tells you to be selfish, just this once. So you listen.

You saunter over to him and hover above him, one foot on each side of his body as you smirk down at him flirtatiously.

He turns his head slightly and smiles warmly as he sees you standing above him. “Whatcha doin’ up there, darlin’?” Joel asks, grunting as he tightens the pipes.

You slowly lower your knees to the ground, hiking the skirt of your dress up as you sink down to hover right above his lap. “I wasn’t expecting you,” you say seductively.

He glances out at you as his eyebrow raises high on his forehead. “I can’t, in good conscience, have you in a room without working water, baby.”

“It’s the middle of the night,” you giggle, “where did you even get the parts or -” You cock your head slightly to be able to see his face and wave your hand around under the sink.

His hand lightly circles your wrist and he moves it out from the cabinet chuckling slightly. “I’m working here, baby girl. There’s an empty room down the hall. I took them from there, and I’ll replace them tomorrow.”

You're silent for a while as you straighten your neck to look at the edge of your countertop. The bitter biting feeling floods your thoughts as no one has ever treated you like this, gone out of their way to fix something for you. But Joel does. He’s probably exhausted, but he’s here, happy to be here in fact, fixing something for you, so you can have basic comforts. Pushing his own comfort of sleep aside for you.

He puts the wrench down gently on the ground, keeping his eyes fixed on the pipes above him. “Everything okay out there?” he asks as he continues tightening the loose pipes.

You shouldn’t be doing this. You can’t be with him, but fuck you need him. You know he’d treat you properly, but you also know that as of tomorrow you belong to fucking Terrance. You bite your lip nervously and decide you can’t go the rest of your life not having this moment with Joel. He can’t possibly feel the same way you do, it’s illogical of you to say that you’re in love with a man you don’t even know yet. Joel seems level headed, he’ll just think he got a night like you give to everyone else. You wouldn’t even be surprised if he tried to pay you after.

You swirl your hips, just grazing against his hardening cock as you moan at the thought of having him. “Yes,” you whisper.

He sucks in a breath and moves his hands to your thighs as you feel his calloused fingers brush lightly over your exposed legs. “Careful, baby girl.”

You grind down harder, hands falling to the bottom of his shirt as you slide your fingers up along his soft, warm skin. You say his name with a moan. Joel lifts you slightly and slides his body down between your thighs.

“No,” you whine, already missing the feeling of his bulge pressing against your needy center.

Joel continues sliding down until his face is in line with your pussy. He looks up at you, his lust filled eyes blowing out as they meet yours.

Fuck, he’s beautiful.

“Don’t whine, darlin’. I got you, if that’s what you want.”

“Please, Joel.” It comes out airy and breathy, much needier than you intended. Your breaths are coming in rapidly as you cup one of your breasts in your hands, desperate for any sort of touch you can get.

Joel traces a thick finger up your inner thigh slowly as your body writhes with anticipation. “Sshhh, sweet girl. Relax.”

“I can’t,” you whine, your body twitching with every little touch he gives you. “Please Joel, I need you.”

Joel moves your skirt out of the way, his fingers finding the center of your wet panties, lightly tracing up and down your slit. The fabric is soaked and his touch is causing more slick to build between your thighs. Joel is growing painfully hard, the zipper of his work pants pressing into his cock that’s already fully hard for you. Joel Miller is a lover though, and that’s exactly what he plans to do. To love you, to show you just how a man should treat someone as beautiful as you.

“Relax,” he says with encouragement. “You can do it. Take a deep breath, baby.”

He continues his ministrations, adding just a bit more pressure as he slides his thumb against your aching clit. You cry out with a plea and then follow along with what he says. You close your eyes and take a slow, deep inhale, releasing your breath as everything seems to go quiet around you. You don’t have a single thought or any emotion, there’s nothing in this room aside from you and Joel but thick tension that sits in the air. As the trembling in your body slows, you soften around him, letting out a deep moan that seems to set you on fire.

“That’s my girl,” Joel praises.

You smile a look down at him, just able to see his blown out pupils from in between your thighs. You take another breath while holding his gaze, seeing his amber eyes start to glaze over into deep black pits. You’ve never been looked at quite like that before. It’s not lust, it’s something much, much more. You return the look at him, biting the inside of your cheek to stop a smile from breaking the surface.

“Darlin’?” Joel asks, his voice deeper now, more sensual.

“Yeah?”

“Grab onto the edge of the sink with both your hands.”

You keep eye contact, raising one eyebrow before reaching up and wrapping both hands around the sink. The steel of the sink is cold, it only helps draw you deeper into the heat of Joel’s body, his mouth just a hair away from your clothed core. Your panties are soaked through with your arousal after he teased you with his finger.

“Good girl,” he growls. The heat of his breath hits your clit and you cry out just a little, hips bucking towards his face as your clit drags against the edge of his hooked nose, causing you to cry out again in awe. You manage to regain your composure, Joel’s thumb hooking your panties and pulling them to the side hurriedly. “So gorgeous, baby. You tell me if you want me to stop, got it?”

“Oh my God, Yes. Yes, just please - please, I need it.”

“I’m gonna give it to ya, darlin’. Hold on tight,” he instructs with a deep growl.

Joel dives in like you’re his oxygen and he’s fucking drowning in your air. He has always liked doing this, making women feel good with his experienced tongue. It feels sensual and intimate to get to see someone like this, to have them trust him like this. But with you, he really fucking loves it. The feel and taste of your sweet arousal on his tongue is euphoric to him, angelic. If he was on death row, he’d ask for this for his very last meal.

You cry out loudly as his tongue expertly teases your clit, alternating between tight circles with the tip of his tongue to long, flat licks. Your arousal leaks down his throat, and he swallows you down eagerly as he tastes the honey-like flavor hit his tastebuds. He moans loudly as he licks and licks, sending warm sparks up your lower regions.

“Joel, Joel, Joel,” you repeat his name over and over like a holy prayer, and your orgasm builds faster than you thought possible. He pulls away for a second, bringing two thick fingers up to your wet folds as he slides them back and forth slowly. He moves them up and down teasingly, coating his fingers with your sweet juices.

“Can I put my fingers inside of you, baby girl?” His voice is full of lust. Hot, hungry, needy.

“Yes,” you say quickly, “yes, please, Mr. Miller.”

“Let me hear you say it,” he instructs, his deep breath coming out scratchy and so fucking hot.

You bite your bottom lip as you taste your cherry flavored chapstick. You’re good at teasing men, doing things for them, but not for you. And now Joel wants you tell him what you want, and it shouldn’t be so fucking hard.

“You can do it, just say the words.” His fingers are still lazily running along you, slowly teasing as he makes more slick run down your center.

“I - I want…” your cheeks flush and you throw your head back in mere frustration. Why the fuck can’t you just ask for what you want? Why was that so difficult for you?

Joel can sense your frustration, or perhaps discomfort with the situation. He stops what he’s doing and softly says, “Hey, look at me, baby.” When you look down his face is soft, big brown eyes staring up at you. “You don’t have to say it if it makes you uncomfortable. I’m sorry if I pushed you, but you don’t have to hold back from me. Anything you want, ask. Ask and I’ll do it.”

You swallow hard. You’re in love, so very out of this world in love, and this is your only chance to do something about it. You can’t spend the rest of your life with Terrance regretting not saying a few simple words. You have to do this. Say it.

Your eyes dance around Joel’s face before you whisper, “I want your fingers, please. I need them inside of me.”

Joel lets out a deep moan and growls, fuuuuuuck.

He latches his mouth to your clit again, gently pushing his index finger into the sensitive entrance of your needy pussy as you writhe in pleasure. He pushes his fingertips slowly in and out a few times before pushing it all the way in, hooking his fingers up into that spongy area that sends you gasping for breath. You moan loudly, one hand falling from the sink to grab his tousled curls. The second you make contact with his head everything stops - his fingers are gone, mouth pulled off your clit with a loud pop.

“No!” you cry, needing him to continue as your insides ache for him.

“I said to grab onto the edge of the sink with both hands,” he demands, his eyes narrowing up at you.

You shakily move your hands back to the sink.

“Be my good girl and keep them there, understand?” The lust filling his eyes and deep gravel in his voice are almost enough to make you come.

“Yes,” you coo, leaning forward to get closer to his mouth.

“You let go, and I’ll stop.”

Your back arches more, trying desperately to get the attention that you think you might die without. Joel moves in again, lapping at your clit before sliding two fingers all the way inside you. You're tight and warm around his fingers and he has to remind himself to slow down, be gentle with you. He wants you to savor it just as much as he wants to savor you.

He curls his fingers inside you and he feels your pussy flutter slightly, he knows you're close. You squeeze your eyes tightly, gripping the edge of the sink like it’s the only thing keeping you alive.

“There she goes,” he says, “let me see it, baby.”

Your moans turn desperate, but you aren’t sure what you’re more desperate for. If you come he’s going to stop, you aren’t sure if you want him to stop, but fuck do you need to come. Your walls start to flutter around Joel’s fingers again, feeling that warm sensation building in your spine.

“Show me,” he praises, “be my good girl.”

That’s what does it, the sparks in your belly radiate out to every limb. The waves of pleasure weaken all your muscles. You feel your arms giving out, but there’s no way you’re going to let go of that sink. Screams and moans fill your room, “F-fuck, Joel. Oh, fuck.”

He praises you as you shamelessly grind your hips down onto his face. “You’re so fucking perfect. Take it, baby girl.”

Before the pleasure becomes overstimulating, Joel slows his fingers inside you and pulls his tongue away from your swollen bundle of nerves. He works his fingers slowly, placing an occasional light kiss to your pussy and slowly you start to come back down to earth.

You’re trying to catch your breath as Joel slides out from under you and then scoops you up into his arms. You wrap your arms around his neck, breathing him in as he walks you towards your bed. He places you down gently, one of his big hands coming to cup behind your head until it lands softly on your pillow, and he covers you with a soft fleece blanket. No one has ever tucked you in before, at least not that you can remember. A simple act, filled with so much love and tenderness. You reach out for Joels hand, and he doesn’t hesitate to grab onto you.

“Stay,” you whisper, suddenly desperate for his warmth.

“I’ll get fired, darlin’,” he whispers sadly, sitting down on the edge of your bed carefully. You roll onto your side and move close to him, reaching one of your arms out as you grab onto his wrist.

“Stay,” you repeat again, your eyelids starting to become heavier as the weight of your orgasm takes its toll on you.

He places a light kiss on your temple and whispers gently, “I’ll stay until you fall asleep.”

You melt into his kiss, lips tasting like coffee and sunshine. “Will you come back tomorrow?”

He brushes your hair back, and one finger trails down the bridge of your nose lightly. You close your eyes, a little smile lifting your lips. “I would love that, baby girl. You can teach me how to use that pottery wheel.”

A small ‘okay’ leaves your lips as he kisses your forehead again. “Go to sleep, my love.” And so you do, drifting off to sleep with the brush of his calloused fingers running along your upper arm and his smooth lips trailing kisses against your cheekbone.

You wake up to sunshine on your skin and the feeling of fresh slick between your legs. Dreams of Joel invaded your sleep last night, and all you could think of was his warm tongue sliding up and down your drenched center. You blush at the images that paint your mind and look over to the other side of your bed. You frown when you realize Joel isn’t here, but he did stay till you fell asleep. You wish he could’ve stayed the entire night, holding you in his strong arms, drinking up his mahogany scent that haunts your memories. You want him here, need him here, but he said he couldn’t stay. He said he’d be fired.

Why would he be fired? Your uncle said you could have anything. And you want Joel. You want him. He couldn’t be fired, he wouldn’t be. Unless…. unless your uncle gave him strict orders that he couldn’t touch the dancers, that he couldn’t touch you. Would your uncle really do that? You’re starting to realize he would.

A light knock on the door shakes you out of bed, and you pull on a long pink robe and tie it in a tight bow. You pace over to your large door and open it up to find your uncle leaning up against the doorway with a huge grin on his face. He barges right in and brushes past your shoulder as you close the door behind him and turn his direction.

“Today’s the day, petal!” he almost yells as his green eyes beam down at you with a stupid grin that takes over his wrinkled features.

“Today’s the day?” you ask confused, then suddenly realize what he’s so jolly about.

“Terrance! Remember? He’s going to be here this evening, and he expects to see you,” he replies, eyes gazing into yours as you nearly revolt against his wishes.

“Oh, right…” you say quietly as the weight of his words settle in on you. Maybe when you’re eighteen, you can join them. The words make you sick, make you want to push him in the chest and tell him no. You want to scream, throw your lit up lamp across the room and watch the glass shatter into a million pieces, but you can’t. You can’t.

Your uncle places his hand under your chin and lifts your eyes up to his. “Now, now. Don’t be like that, petal. He’s paying us well. The Moulin Rouge is saved. We don’t have to worry anymore,” he encourages as he smiles down at you with enthusiasm spilling over his tongue.

He’s paying us well. The words sound like long nails running down a rusted chalkboard, filling the room with a deafening noise as you cringe at the words. He was not the one being sold to Terrance, you were. You were the one that had to entertain this man for God knows how long. It was you that had to pretend, not your uncle.

“He’ll be here around 7:00pm sharp. I want you down there no later than that, understand?” he asks as he looks over you slowly, making sure you don’t make a fuss.

“I’ll be there, uncle. If I must,” you say with a slight huff, trying to keep your spirits up for him.

“Here,” he hands you a crisp one hundred dollar bill and places it in your hand as the material crinkles together under your touch. “Go buy yourself something nice. Maybe a pretty dress for Terrance. His favorite color is red.” He places a light kiss to your forehead then pads off to the door, leaving the room feeling hollow and empty as his footsteps trail down the hallway. You stand there gawking at his vacant shadow.

Go buy yourself something nice? His favorite color is red? Who the fuck does he think he is?

The words make you feel cheap, the money makes you feel used, dirty. You don’t want the money. You want to run out of the room and throw it back at him, make him regret ever selling you to a rich prick who only wants you for your body. You don’t want to fucking do this anymore! But what choice do you have? The deal had already been made…

You throw your hand out and hit the wall hard as pain radiates down your arm like fire running through your nerves. You wince and shake it out, letting the pain simmer away as you walk into your lit up pink bathroom and run the shower water, staring at yourself in the mirror until your face is lost in fog. How poetic, you think to yourself.

You peel off your robe and let it land in a heap on the floor, stepping into the heat as you let the scalding water cascade down your porcelain skin, washing away the scent of regret and anger. You lather the shampoo through your long locks, run the citrus soap over the entirety of your body until it drowns you, rinsing it off as you watch it run down the drain in swirling colors brighter than your own future.

After sulking in the shower for nearly half an hour, you dry your body off with a fleece towel and throw on a soft pretty flamingo colored dress. You dry and curl your hair, applying red lipstick to your soft lips and mascara to your long lashes.

You take a second to look at yourself in the mirror, examining every feature as you see sadness in the soft glow of your eyes, holding back tears as you hold your chin up and wipe away a distant tear. Time for you to take a walk.

You close up your room as you shove the hundred dollar bill into your scarlet purse, feeling dirty for even having it in your grasp. You shake your head and walk down the lit up halls of the Moulin Rouge, passing some dancers as you saunter out the front doors and into the sunlight.

You let the glow of the sun warm your cold soul, let it fill you with ease as you walk down the crowded streets to one of your favorite dress shops. As soon as you step in, you’re met with a busy seamstress and a batch of dresses that hang loosely over manicans and display on long hangers.

“Anything I can help you find, miss?” the petite blonde asks as you enter the store.

“Just looking around for the moment,” you say as you gaze around at all the colorful, fancy dresses.

“Just let me know if you need anything,” she says as she turns back to the cash register.

You pace around the room, trailing your hand on various types of fabrics as you circle the large shop. The colors go from deep purples to ombré to bright shades of yellow. Almost any color you can imagine fills the room, giving you a ton to choose from. It’s almost overwhelming.

You see a long, luxurious dress that sits in the middle of the room. It’s a deep crimson color, one that Terrance would probably kill to see you in. You roll your eyes and walk past it, you’re not getting that one.

You look through the rack of dresses, assessing each one as none of them stick out at you. You’re about to give up when you turn and see a deep blue colored dress that sits displayed behind a hidden curtain. You pull it back and gasp at the beautiful dress that seems to call your name.

The dress is as blue as the depths of the sea, the fabric of the skirt reaching the floor as a long slit divides the left corner of the dress, leaving an opening to show off your long legs in. It’s sleeveless, and the material making up the low cut front shimmers against the glistening sun. It’s absolutely perfect. You think Joel might love this, might run his fingers up the slit to feel the smooth skin of your leg, might lose his voice while he mulls over how it fits your curves, might want to rip it off you so he can see what’s underneath…

Without another thought you take the dress to the counter, taking out what feels like hush money and pay for the dress. The dressmaker wraps it in a nice box for you, and you grab the handle and step out into the sunshine. You know you should go back, but the walk here helped clear your mind and you aren’t ready to go back and face your future quite yet. You spin the opposite direction of the Moulin Rouge and come face to face with the one man you want nothing more than to be with. Joel.

“Hi,” he says, blushing slightly.

You bite your cheek to stop from smiling, he’s so fucking beautiful that it almost hurts. “Hi.”

“Whatcha got there?” he asks, nodding towards the box in your arms.

“Oh no no, the Sparkling Diamond never reveals her secrets,” you smirk, curling your red lips up into a playful smile.

“I’ll tell you a secret of mine if you let me peek in that box.”

You stare at him for a second contemplating. Joel Miller is definitely flirting with you.

“You go first,” you say with a giggle.

He steps into you, placing his large palm on the small of your back, his lips close to your ear and whispers, “You were beautiful coming apart on my tongue last night.”

You feel your cheeks and chest redden at his confession, and your clit twitches with the memory of how he felt lapping at your center. You’ve had all sorts of sexual experiences before, but he seemed to know exactly where to touch you without any help. That was the first time in a long time that you didn’t feel like you were going to have to fake an orgasm.

He steps back and taps the box, and you generously open it a little as his eyes widen. “Wow, that's, wow.”

You smile to yourself triumphantly. He’s already speechless, and it’s still in the box. “What are you doing here?”

“I just live right over there,” he says as he points to an old brick building. “I was running some errands before my shift tonight.”

“You’re coming to see me after, right?” you ask shyly, fluttering your long eyelashes up at him. He seems to melt at the weight of your eyes.

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world, darlin’,” he replies, lowering his voice and adds, “especially if you’re going to be in that fucking dress.”

You gasp at his words. That fucking dress. “Guess you’re going to have to come find me to find out then,” you wink, flashing him your best smile. He smiles back, and it sends warmth flooding through your lower regions.

“You busy now? I could show you my place, if you’d like,” he says shyly, running a hand through his tousled curls as crimson flashes across his cheeks.

He’s so fucking beautiful.

You flick your eyes up to the tall brick building and contemplate your options. You want to, you really want to, but you can’t. You need to get back to the Moulin Rouge and get ready to meet your awful date.

You sigh and shake your head sadly. “I’d love to, Joel. I really would, but I have to get back. I have a busy day.” You see his Adam’s Apple bob up and down, and you want so badly to run your fingers through his hair and press your lips up against his. Sooth him over. Not here though. Not where your uncle or Terrance could see.

“Another time then?” Joel asks with a hopeful glance your way.

You nod in response. “Another time.”

He grazes his hand against yours and discreetly entwines his fingers with yours. It feels so good, so safe, so right. You can’t wait till the night is over, until you can be in Joel’s arms again. That’s where you belong, where you want to be.

You slowly squeeze his hand and then let go, letting your fingers fall to your side against your silky dress. “I need to go. I’ll see you tonight, handsome.”

“Tonight,” he promises. With that you turn and go back to your demise, to the Moulin Rouge.

Joel arrives at the burlesque twenty minutes before his shift. He sneaks in the back door and tucks his guitar away in the maintenance closet and then goes to find Edward. He finds him at the front, in the same pressed, crisp suit from last night. He’s greeting men with enthusiastic handshakes and seems happier overall tonight.

“Joel!” He calls from across the hall, “great to see you, son.”

Joel gives him a tight lipped smile, stuffing his hands in his pockets and heading over to Edward. The men who turned their noses up to him the other night glare sideways at him. He still can’t believe that he’s considered the scum in this place.

“We are using the VIP area tonight after the Sparkling Diamond performs. It hasn’t been used in a while. Can you go up there and check the lighting, make sure the tables and chairs are set up? Also need someone to help the bartender bring up everything.”

His throat tightens at the thought of you having to be up in that room with some of these men. He replies through gritted teeth, “Of course, sir.”

He wanders up one of the spiral staircases off the main dance floor, men clamouring around trying to get the best seat before the girls come out for them to grab at. The VIP area overlooks the burlesque, there’s a private booth along the back with a curtain that the guests can draw closed. Bile rises in his throat at the thought of you being back there, but he knows what you do for work, and even though he knows that he’s madly and wildly in love with you. But it doesn’t mean that you feel the same way. You invited him over tonight, you sat on his lap last night, so he’ll take this at your speed and maybe one day he can get you out of here.

The two tables along the shiny black railing have chairs tipped up on them, so he flips them and places them on the ground neatly. He tests to make sure the tables aren’t wobbly before moving over to the private bar and picking up a knocked over stool.

“Are there any thirsty gents out there tonight?” Edward’s voice booms over the burlesque. Men cheer and whoop in anticipation. “Get ready boys, a little teaser with the Diamonds before your - err umm - the Sparkling Diamond comes out.”

A bartender comes up with a big box full of glasses and alcohol. “Thanks umm…”

“Joel,” he says.

The bartender reaches out his hand and they shake. “Pierre. Thanks for this. Terrance is gonna be up here soon though so you better go.”

“Yeah, the light above the booth is out so I’m gonna change that.”

Pierre laughs to himself, “I wouldn’t bother man. I’m sure whatever woman he takes in there will want it to be dark.”

Terrance, who the fuck is Terrance?

Joel heads down to the main hall when he hears there’s an issue in one of the bathrooms. He sighs and then races off to assess the damage.

You slip the silky blue dress over your body and then slide your feet into sparkly high heeled shoes. The bedazzled strap of the shoe goes up your strong calf, and even though you’re nervous and shaky at the thought of being alone with Terrance in the VIP area tonight, you’ve never felt stronger or sexier than you do in this look. Joel’s flirtations from earlier wash over you and make heat rise in your cheeks. As long as you’re wearing that fucking dress.

You’re not looking forward to Joel seeing you with him tonight. Maybe you should have told him, but you’re just not ready for your time with him to be up yet. Just the thought of not getting him to your room again feels like someone is clamping clothespins along your insides as pain starts burning there.

You slide on some red lipstick and flick your eyeliner out in black sharp lines. As soon as you put the eyeliner down you hear your uncle’s booming voice on the microphone, asking the men to call you to the stage. You take one last look at yourself in the mirror, but you don’t recognize yourself anymore. This painted woman, not even a name or a face on the other side of that curtain. But in your room with Joel, you’re his person. Someone he wants to cherish and care for. You’d do anything for him to feel the same way and take you away from here. Maybe one day he would.

The band starts your music slowly and you act almost robotic as you take the stage, a puppet on a tight string where the men call all the shots. You practically disassociate, letting muscle memory take over as you start to move. It brings you to the stage, pulling you into the bright lights of the large room as the men stand and wait. You point and flirt, spin and tease the men with the long slit up your leg, exposing soft skin that the men practically claw at. You bend and push your cleavage together towards the faceless men in the audience, hating that you have to do this night after night.

After your music ends, your uncle comes out with the other Diamonds. “This little petal is spoken for tonight, gents,” he calls. They groan as their hopes and dreams of getting alone time with you fly out the window. You can’t believe there was a time when that made you feel good about yourself, now it makes you feel cheap and used. “But I have some lonely Diamonds that could use some polishing, if you know what I mean,” he says with a wink as the men cheer at his announcement, already reaching for the other dancers.

Your uncle leads you off the lit up stage and pushes you towards the spiral staircase. “Make him happy, petal.” You groan as you climb the winding staircase, dreading what you know is about to come.

You didn’t look up during your performance once, not that you would have been able to see with the bright lights shining in your eyes, but when you reach the balcony you’re shocked to see Terrance with five of his friends. They whistle and catcall as you appear, and you feel hot bile rise in your throat.

“There you are. Gents, this is my girl. Give them a little spin,” he says with a greasy grin. You spin slowly, one of the men grabbing at your ass when your back is to them. You cringe at the unwelcome hands as they claw at your dress.

“Hey, hands off,” Terrance growls. For a second you’re grateful for him, until he opens his mouth again. “Unless you wanna pay me for her.”

His small, cold hand wraps around your wrist and he pulls you over to sit on his lap. His leg is bony and uncomfortable, but he pins you to him. The men order more bourbon and talk while your mind wanders to Joel. He doesn’t have bony legs, no. They’re thick and muscular, filling out his work jeans nicely. You find your eyes scanning the Moulin Rouge looking for him. You need to see him, you need that reminder of what you have to live for.

That dreadful feeling hits you again, weighing you down as cold air floods your insides. You don’t want to do this anymore.

After what feels like hours, you finally see Joel coming out of the men’s bathroom with his metal toolbox in hand. You look away from him, scared that your gaze might somehow attract his, and you can’t bear the chance of seeing any sort of hurt in his eyes that you might be causing him right now.

The men around you have gotten increasingly more drunk and sloppy, hands reaching for you clumsily. Terrance’s hand roams up the bodice of your dress, and your stomach clenches as you feel a heavy weight in your chest start to burn. He grazes your breast slightly before pushing your hair out of the way and places a wet, slobbery kiss to the back of your shoulder. You swallow hard, fighting the urge to retch.

“So, we can pay you then?” One of them asks Terrance. They’re talking like you’re not even here, like you’re mute and unable to do anything of your own free will.

“I don’t like to share what’s mine, but look at her.” His hand comes back to your breast and squeezes hard, making you bite down on your tongue as you taste blood run down the back of your throat.

“Let me see her, decide if I want to get out my checkbook or not,” another one says raspily.

Terrance tries to lift you up off him. You stand begrudgingly as he shoves you towards his friend. The other man gropes at your waist and pulls you roughly into him. You stumble, ripping the skirt of your dress as you fall into his lap. You let out a little squeal at the impact, the slit of your dress falling open to expose your upper thigh.

“I think she likes it,” he laughs, one of his hands grabbing a lock of your hair as he takes a strong whiff of your citrus shampoo. The other lands on your soft milky thigh as he adds, “You definitely picked the best whore in the house, Terrance.” Whore. The word makes you tense up and makes you feel completely disgusting. He goes to cup your breast and slowly slides the top of the dress down, exposing your breast completely as he kneads at it while the other men howl like wild dogs.

You feel the sting of tears in your eyes, feel one roll coldly down your cheek as it splashes against the wooden floor. Terrance just sits there, marveling at your body as he watches his friend ravish your bare skin. You try to get up, but he holds you down. “Where do you think you’re going, gorgeous? We paid for you, don’t think you’re going anywhere else tonight,” he smirks, his lips running hastily down your neck as you cringe away from him.

“Alright now, that’s enough. Give her back now,” Terrance demands as he yanks you off his friend and sits you back in his lap. Now it’s his turn to pry his cold hands over your body.

He slides his hand up to cup your exposed breast, softly kissing your earlobe while his wet mustache tickles your skin. One of his other friends bends down and picks up your leg where the torn slit sits, running his hand up your exposed thigh. A second friend grabs your other leg, parting your thighs and exposing your lacy panties. You freeze, there’s no stopping it, this is what you must do to save the Moulin Rouge, so you just sit there and take it, letting another hot tear run down your face as it lands with a splash on your ruined blue dress.

Maybe when you’re eighteen you can join them.

The room seems to blur as your wet eyes gaze at the ceiling, looking anywhere but at the men that take and take and take from you without any say from you.

Joel… Save me…

Joel's eyes scan the crowded room, looking past flirtatious dancers as they flock around handsy men in expensive suits. When he doesn’t find you anywhere on the dance floor, he lifts his eyes slowly to the balcony, praying he won’t see you in that dark booth. His gaze stops cold as he sees just what’s happening. You are in the booth and there are six men feasting their eyes and hands on you, devouring you up as they take and take and take from you without any remorse on their sly faces.

He sees the way you close your eyes and look away, sees the hot tears that roll down your face as they paint the front of your dress wet. Something in the depths of his stomach snaps. Pure red hot rage blinds him as he drops the heavy toolbox on the ground, grabbing the hammer and clutching it tightly in his fist like a drawn weapon. He squeezes the metal handle as he flares his nostrils and clenches his jaw, snarling his teeth so tight that he swears he’s about to break them. He’s going to fucking kill every single man up there that has their grimy hands on you. He’s going to destroy every last one of them.

He takes one step forward and feels a hand pull him back into the shadows. He turns around as fast as lightning and finds one of the dancers shaking her head at him. “Leave it alone, Joel. Do not go up there and bother them,” she warns with red matte lips and purple eyeshadow that cakes over green eyes.

“What do you mean don’t go up there? Look at her, she’s crying and looks like she wants to die!” he yells, anger seething him as he looks back up to see your eyes open, staring at him as if you’re screaming for him to come save you.

He parts his lips and furrows his eyebrows together, watching the man who’s beneath you kiss down your neck with a sloppy tongue while his other hand kneads your exposed breast. It makes Joel sick, makes his hand tighten around the hammer that much more as he takes another heavy step forward.

The dancer stops him once again. “You don’t want to do that, Joel. That’s Terrance.”

Terrance. Ah. That’s who that fucking is. He wants to murder Terrance slowly and painfully, make him suffer for everything he’s done to his girl.

“Who the fuck is Terrance?” Joel growls as his teeth gnash together.

“Terrance is filthy rich. A powerful man you don’t want to cross. He’s given this place a lot of money, invested a ton in the Sparkling Diamond. Do not fuck this up, Joel. Leave it alone. Leave her alone,” she warns.

Leave her alone? He can’t, he won’t.

“Fuck that, I’m going to make him pay,” he growls.

“Joel!” She says his name loud and firm, digging her long nails into the skin of his wrist. He has no choice but to turn and look at her.

“Look, I can see what’s going on. I see the way you look at her. I saw the smile on your face last night when I caught you leaving her room. You need to be more careful. You’re not supposed to be seeing her, remember? If Edward were to find out you’d be…”

He cuts her off before she can finish her sentence. “What, fired? Don’t you think I know that? Do you think I don’t think about that every fucking minute of the day? But you know what? I don’t care anymore. Because I… fuck, I think I fucking love her.”

The words hang heavily between them before he continues. “No, I know I do. I love her, and if you want to tell Edward then be my guest. I’ll somehow manage without the job, but I can’t manage without her.” He points up to the balcony to make a strong statement and watches as you keep your eyes fixed on him. You need him. You need him.

“Joel…” the dancer says quietly. “I’m not going to tell Edward. She’s basically a daughter to me, and I hate what’s happening up there just as much as you. Just please, be careful. Watch your back and don’t get yourself caught. I’d hate to see what would happen if you did,” she says sadly, eyes gazing back up at you as Joel’s eyes follow.

They watch together as you get torn to shreds, your beautiful dress absolutely ruined by those starving pigs. Joel can’t remember ever being this angry, so very angry. He feels hot lava run through his veins, feels his lip quiver as he watches defenseless. He can’t save you right now and that alone kills him the most.

You nod slowly at him, eyes still wet with tears, but you tug a small smile on your face and mouth ‘it’s okay’ to him. But it’s not okay, it’s just fucking not.

His hand clenches around the base of the hammer, and he has to steady himself as he feels anger, sadness, and helplessness wash over him. He can’t do anything right now which makes him feel like he’s fucking drowning underwater. He hates this, hates you having to sit there and take it. He can’t watch anymore. It’s too much, this is too much. He bends over and picks up the heavy toolbox again and takes one more glance in your direction, eyes locking for a few seconds before he turns the opposite way and heads down the hall.

“I can’t watch this anymore, just tell me when it’s over,” he sighs as he leaves the dancer’s side and trudges down the dim lit hall, away from the men that paw you like starving animals. He can’t do this. He can’t do this. Not when he loves you so goddamn much. It kills him, this kills him. So he decides to go drown himself in work just so he won’t have to see it anymore, won’t have to see your pleading eyes as they stare at him helplessly, begging him to rescue you.

You sigh when you see Joel disappear down the hall, almost cry out his name as they continue to bleed you dry. You need him. You need him.

Come save me, Joel. Come back, come back.

Another hot tear falls and splashes to the floor as you turn your head back to the men as they have their fun with you. This isn’t worth the money, this isn’t worth anything. You’d rather be standing out on the streets than be ravished by disgusting men. You’d rather be with Joel in your room, getting lost in his velvety lips and soft brown eyes. After this you would, after this he’d be yours. You just had to hold on a little longer, give these men what they desired most, which was you. You just hoped Joel still wanted you after seeing you like this…

“More bourbon!” Terrance calls to the bartender as he watches his friends do vile things to your partially naked body.

“Sorry, sir, but we appear to be out.” The bartender says sheepishly.

The men groan, one of them saying, “Let’s go then gents.” Terrance and his disgusting friends grumble about the horrible service and leave you laying there, exposed and raw on the seating of the dark booth. Your body is slick with your own nervous sweat, as well as the clammy sweat of those men's hands and only God knows what else.

“Come on, kid.” The bartender says, helping you up and wrapping you in a silky red table cloth. “Let me take you to Edward.”

“No,” you breathe out, shaking your head quickly. He's just as responsible for this as Terrance. You want to be alone or with Joel, not around money starved pigs. “I’ll get myself to my room, thanks.”

You walk quietly across the balcony, feeling like your legs will give out at any minute. You place your shaky hand against the stair rail and descend the curvy staircase. You see the men downstairs staring up at you, feel their eyes devour you as they see you wrapped in the red tablecloth. You know what they think of you, know what they’d like to do to you as well. You just gulp down a whimpered breath and continue on to your room, ignoring every catcall and question thrown your way. You just want to be alone, to be away from all this loud madness. You want Joel, need him like you need air to breathe.

When you open your heavy door, Joel is already there. Sitting at the small bistro kitchen table, elbows propped against the edge with his head resting heavily in his hands. You swallow loudly and clear your throat carefully. “I’m sorry,” you apologize quietly, fidgeting with the red tablecloth that wraps around your shoulders.

Joel’s head whips up fast, tears running down his face as his wide eyes lock on yours. “How? Why? I - I thought you weren’t… I didn’t know you were entertaining other men.” He looks so sad. So very sad, and it nearly shatters your heart into pieces.

“It’s complicated,” you say as you stare at the floor, tightening the table cloth around your body a little more.

“Don’t do that, don’t shut yourself off to me.” Joel gets up and walks over to you slowly, lifting your chin to meet his gaze. Your mascara is smudged, lipstick stained across your chin, and you’re sure your hair is a mess. “I’m not blaming you, just please tell me how this happened?”

You wet your lips nervously as he continues staring at you intently. It’s almost overwhelming when he’s looking at you the way he is now. All soft and concerned. The wet trails down his cheeks feel like a hot stake to your heart. “Edward sold me,” you whisper sadly.

“What?” he gasps, eyes wide and mouth agape.

“He sold me,” you repeat as shame crosses your face.

“Why would he do that? Why!” His voice is angry, hurt. He doesn’t understand, so you’ll have to tell him everything.

As you tell Joel everything that happened the other night he leads you to your kitchen, pushing back a chair as he sits you down slowly. He crouches in front of you, rubbing his warm palms over your chilled skin, and it feels good. So good.

“That’s,” he breathes out in disbelief, “that’s awful. I’m so sorry, baby. You don’t deserve this, being treated like this by your boss.”

“My uncle,” you correct, eyes dancing along his concerned face.

“What?” this time it’s not a gasp, it’s anger. Pure wretched anger. “Edward is your uncle? Your uncle sold you? Your own family, someone who is supposed to protect you, sold you!” he asks angrily, eyes darkening as his nostrils flare uncontrollably.

He stands and starts pacing around your room, clenching his fists beside him as he can barely keep the anger in any longer. He’s going to fucking murder him, too.

“Please calm down, Joel.”

“Calm down? Calm down! This is vile. Cruel. Abhorrent. This is, there’s no words for what this is!” He’s raising his voice, and you start to feel yourself putting up your walls again as you jump onto the defense.

“Why did you even come here tonight if you’re just going to yell at me?” you ask shakily, standing up and dropping the table cloth to the floor as you expose your torn blue dress. The skirt of your dress is almost fully detached from the bottom of your hips and wet patches of spilled bourbon stick uncomfortably against your skin. His eyes widen as he takes in the torn dress, eyes turning to sadness as he sees the beautiful material ripped to shreds.

“I’m not yelling at you. I’m just,” he pauses, running his hand over his patchy scruff in frustration, the other falling to his side defeatedly. “I think I’m - well I…” He stops his sentence and drags his eyes over your ruined dress. “Baby, your dress…” he says quietly, eyebrows knitting together in full concern.

You lower your eyes and run your hands over the torn material of silk, see the way the sparkly material hangs like a ripped up washrag. This was your favorite dress, too…

“I know, I know. They just couldn’t help themselves, could they?” Your eyes flash up to his, and you see sorrow in them as soft brown eyes search yours carefully.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart. You sure did look beautiful in it, too. So very beautiful. My Sparkling Diamond…”

Both his hands fall to his hips as you walk over to him. You need to know what he was about to say before he changed the subject. Save me, tell me you love me, you think to yourself. “What were you going to say to me, Joel? You stopped your sentence,” you coo, eyes flicking up to his softly. Finish what you were going to say.

“Nothing. It’s not your fault, I don’t want to make you feel that way.”

“This can be our space, Joel. What happened tonight is part of my job, but I can endure all of that if it means that we get this. Can you?”

He looks at you carefully, weighing his options. But it doesn’t take him long before he pulls you into his arms, one hand landing on your lower back as the other cradles the back of your skull. You relax into his touch, sinking all your weight into him. You you can endure anything as long as it brings you back here. To Joel. To the man that you are sure loves you just as much as you love him, even if neither of you have dared to say the words yet. You know. This is it for you, Terrance or not, this is where you belong.

“Yes, darlin’. Even if it kills me to see it, I’ll always be here for you.” He presses his lips to the top of your head. “Go take a shower, baby. I’ll be right here waiting. I brought my guitar if you want to play?” he asks with hope in his large brown eyes.

You smile into his chest, wrapping your arms around his waist tighter. “I don’t really know how. I only managed to learn a little…” you say quietly.

He laughs a little and pulls back to look into your eyes. “You have a guitar in the corner of your room,” he chuckles softly.

“I know,” you say, laughing back at him, “I want to learn more. Will you teach me?”

He lowers his head to press his lips gently to yours. “Go shower and I’ll teach ya.”

“Alright.” You brush past his hand and feel the warm heat inside you as you walk away towards your lit up bathroom with beads of pearls strewn across your wide mirror. You turn back to see him watching you, and you smile shyly as you close the door and disappear from his view.

You unzip your torn to shreds dress and let it fall in a heap on the ground, climbing into the shower as you let the warm heat rinse away the taste of regret on your sweaty skin. You take the dusty pink washcloth and soak your skin with vanilla soap. Making sure to scrub off every inch of bourbon and dirty fingerprints that those nasty men had left on you.

You watch the dirt fall down the drain, feel your skin come back to life as the clean skin seems to glow. This is how you’re supposed to feel, not like how you felt up there on the balcony with those savages. You felt used, like a dirty ragdoll that they could do whatever they wanted with you, but you wouldn’t let them do it again. You’d rather ruin your chances with Terrance and watch the Moulin Rouge fall apart than be back up in that dark booth again where no one could save you. Where your silent screams couldn’t be heard.

When you finish with your shower, you cut off the water and dry off quickly, wrapping a pink silky robe around yourself as you comb through your curls and put on fresh red lipstick. You pucker your lips together and spray a dash of sweet smelling perfume on your neck. As you take one more look at yourself, you pull the sliding doors open and walk back into the room to find Joel sitting on the window seat by the open balcony strumming along softly on his guitar.

You watch the way his thick fingers graze gently along each string, watch him hum to the beat of the song he plays quietly. He looks so good, so beautiful sitting there in the moonlight with his tousled curls falling gently over his eyes. You think you see heaven in those soft brown eyes of his, think you see the man you want to spend forever with.

When you pad across the wooden floors, he looks up slowly and smiles at you as his lips curl into an infectious grin. “There’s my girl. C’mere.” He curls his index finger toward him and coaxes you to follow. You do so without hesitation.

When you make it over to him, he puts his guitar to the side and spreads his thighs to make room for you. As you turn around, he pulls you up against his broad chest and places the guitar in your hands, hooking his arms around you as he puts his hands gently over yours and guides them to the strings. Your breath hitches at the contact.

“Is this okay, baby?” he asks. You nod your head before he continues. “Let me take you through all the basic chords, then I can show you a simple song or two.”

He grazes his calloused fingers over yours and slowly takes you through each cord, careful to explain each note and how to be gentle with it. It doesn’t take you long to pick up on what he shows you and takes less time to actually teach you the first song.

“Alright, go slow,” he instructs, keeping his hands on yours as he talks you through the notes. “Yeah, just like that. There ya go. Doin’ so good, sweetheart. You’re a natural,” he praises as he brushes his lips against your jawline, dragging it down slowly as he places a gentle kiss against your cheek. You about melt at the sweetness of it all, of him.

“You really think I’m doing good?” you ask with a giggle, feeling his right hand trace lines up and down your right arm as you continue to strum along the taut strings.

“Think you’re doin’ amazing, darlin’. Such a good little guitar player,” he praises as he places another kiss to your jawline. You nearly fall apart every time he praises you, kissing you like you’re the sweetest thing he’s ever planted his lips on.

When the song ends, he places the guitar to the side and wraps his arms around your waist as he entwines his fingers with yours. He makes an assessment of the bright walls that are covered with pink wallpaper and jewels and looks down to take in the soft pink robe that’s latched around you.

“You sure do love pink, don’t ya?” he asks with a soft chuckle that sounds like music to your ears.

“Mhm,” you hum as you lean against his broad chest and melt into his touch.

“That your favorite color?” he asks gently.

“How could you tell?” you ask with a playful smirk.

“Lucky guess,” he laughs as he grins down at you with soft brown eyes.

“And yours? What’s your favorite color?” you ask as you turn to face out the window, looking upon the lit up city as it sits below your view.

“Blue. Not just any blue. A deep navy blue, like the color of your dress. That’s my favorite color, the one you picked out at the dress shop. Thought I was having a heart attack seein’ ya in it tonight. You looked beautiful, just like a rare precious diamond. But you are a diamond, aren’t ya? You’re the rarest Sparkling Diamond I’ve ever laid eyes on,” he breathes out quietly as he trails a finger along your jawline, gently pushing a curl behind your ear as you turn around to face him.

You look up into his eyes and all you see are warm flecks of sunlight that shine down upon you, sinking into your eyes as you let your arms hook around the back of his neck. You think you see love in his eyes, and you’re sure he sees it there in yours, too.

“Joel Miller, you’re the sweetest man I’ve ever met. The most handsome, kind, and gentle man I ever laid eyes on. You know that?” you ask with a smile as he cups your chin and raises your face to his, just inches from his lips.

“Yeah? You think so?” he asks with the corners of his mouth curling up into the prettiest smile you’ve ever seen.

“Mhm,” you nod as your fingers wind around the curls on the nape of his neck.

“Does that mean you’re mine?” he asks quietly as he traces his thumb against your lower lip, making butterflies flit down in the pit of your stomach.

“I’m all yours,” you answer. And that’s all the answer he needs as he falls into your lips and kisses you deeply as his fingers curl around your long locks and his other hand pulls you tight to his chest. He tastes like heaven, smells like his acoustic guitar, all woodsy and mahogany. And you think you want to stay right here in his arms forever.

“Good, I’m yours, too. Ain’t nobody gonna hurt you again.” The two of you sit quietly, tangled into one another, almost as if you’re trying to become one. “So? You gonna teach me something now?”

You giggle into his skin, contemplating what you should show him. You don’t have any clay, but you planned to pick some up tomorrow on your day off. “Hmmm, we will have to get up if you want me to teach you something.”

He loosens his grip on you, wrapping his hands around your waist and helps lift you up. You spin gracefully towards him and grab his hands, tugging him up to his feet. He looks at you with one eyebrow raised as you place one of his large palms on the small of your back, your hand trailing up his strong forearm and bicep before finding a home on his shoulder. You place your other hand in his and hold it out to the side of your body.

“What are we doin’ here, sweet girl?” Joel asks, slightly nervous that you’re about to see him make a fool of himself.

You smile up at him, stepping in so close that your breasts are pressed up against his broad chest. “I feel sexiest when I’m doing the waltz.”

Joel feels his stomach drop. “You’re gonna be the death of me, you know that right?” You giggle a little as he adds, “But anything for you, always anything for you.”

“I promise it’s easy, the tempo is slow-slow-quick-quick, you repeat it twice in the shape of a box.” Joel looks at you like you’re speaking a different language, confusion furrowing in his brows and you can’t stop the smile that lights up your face. “Just follow me.”

Joel can’t tear his eyes off you, trying to follow but bumps into you and presses his toes against yours instead. You carry out a loud laugh. “Joel, look at your feet until you get the hang of it.”

“Can’t,” he says, “you’re too pretty.”

You stop moving your feet and look up at him. “Kiss me then.”

His lips come down to yours gently and he brings the hand he’s holding to rest on his shoulder, sliding his hand down to your waist gently as he hooks his arms around you tightly. You hum into his kiss as he starts to sway from side to side. He might not be able to waltz but this feels better, so much better.

You break the kiss hesitantly and look back up into honey colored eyes. “Please, stay the night. The club is closed tomorrow, Edward is leaving for the day. Please, Joel?”

He kisses you again slowly as his lips graze softly against yours. “I can’t say no when you say please like that, darlin’.”

You kiss him again, curving your lips up into a tight smile as his lips mould against yours. “Then it’s settled then, tonight you’re mine.”

“Tonight I’m yours,” he whispers back as his forehead leans against yours and his fingers entwine around yours.

Minutes later you’re tucked snuggly under the fuzzy fleece blanket, laying against Joel’s chest as he wraps his arms around you and combs his fingers through your smooth locks. You sink into his space, feel yourself get lost in his savory scent as your fingers trail up and down his inner arm as you trace each vein like they’re the map to his heart.

You could stay here forever in his arms, get lost in each other as you both breathe each other in again and again and again. This is where you belong, in Joel’s arms. This is right. This is home.

You let your eyes fall closed as he continues to soothe you to sleep with his warm touches and gentle kisses. “Goodnight, sweet girl. I’ll be here when you wake up.”

You let his words bring you peace as you feel yourself fade off into the dark. The last thing you remember is him kissing the top of your head and whispering words you can’t quite make out.

Home. He’s home.

[kandlewick]

bites my hands bites my hands i cant keep myself from posting previews ok i cant i need the serotonin of posting something or ill die so heres a glimpse at my long cater fake dating fic where he uses you for clout OR DOES HE??????????? this dude is so emotionally constipated i am in love with him

"You haven't even told me what I'm agreeing to, Cater." You quickly avoided his eyes, mentally slapping yourself for the momentary weakness as your words made Cater freeze and advert his eyes as well, a small chuckle escaping him in a fit of nerves. He hid his mouth behind his phone but you could tell his lips were set in a nervous smile as he at least attempted to look embarrassed. You raised your eyebrow at him "What? Is it like, super embarrassing?"

Cater hummed, twirling a loose strand of hair between his forefinger, "I mean, I guess, yeah? It's nothing like, totes awful or anything but you're literally the only one I could ask to do this. Asking anyone else is a total no go and Cay-Cay needs the engagement. My numbers have been so awful lately and It's driving me absolutely cray-cray."

Cater looked almost cherubic with how he kept batting his eyelashes at you. It was extremely annoying how cute he looked when he was like this, like he knew he could get away with anything as long as he knew how to press the right buttons. With a heavy sigh, you slumped your shoulders and gestured for him to continue. He let out an excited whoop as he smiled, the diamond on his cheek crinkling with delight.

"Aaah~ My favorite freshie to the rescue! I owe you one~!!" Cater grinned, taking your willingness to hear him out as a sign of acceptance. He pulled you close by the shoulder and swiped at his phone with practiced precision, pulling up Magicam within seconds. You glanced up at him as his eyes seemed to gleam in excitement, his eagerness almost infectious, "So there's this fad going viral right now with this local cafe nearby that has a couples special! It's this super cute dessert that's all the rage on Magicam and I neeeed it!"

"Why can't you just get it yourself?" You ask, watching his phone screen as he continued to scroll down his feed. You noticed as well that nearly every other post was about that supposedly super cute couples only dessert and couples sharing it between quick kisses. It was almost voyeuristic with how many couples openly shared their PDA with strangers on the internet. Cater was quick to roll his eyes and tap the screen again with his finger.

"I told you, it's couples only! You have to prove you're a couple and act all lovey-dovey for them to even consider handing it over!" He pouted, "Look, you know that I can't stand sweet stuff so when we're there, I'll buy you however much you want in exchange. You can even eat the special dessert! All I want is one little photo and a small itty bitty teeny weeny lil smooch~"

[bullet-prooflove]

Choices!Series Part Two: Compromise - Vostanik Sabatino x Reader

Tagging: @kmc1989 @novamariestark @words-and-seeds @thiashazzywriting @whateversomethingbruh @a-noni-love @reneejett4

Choices!Series

Part One: Diamonds - An undercover op makes Nik ask a question.

You’ve forgotten how good Sabatino is at playing a role. Tonight he's the rich, doting husband. Possessive over his woman, willing to give her whatever she desires. His thumb chases across your lower back, tracing over your bare skin and it sends a flush of heat chasing through your body. It’s an intimate gesture, one that makes it very clear to everyone else in the room exactly who you belong to.

You lose him in the raid, one minute he’s beside you, securing the suspect and the next both him and the painting have vanished. You wish you could have expected something different. It’s not the first time he’s pulled something like this. You guess the painting will go back into circulation; GPS tagged so they can track the next round of terrorist funding.  

When you return to the office you find the matching wedding band that he was wearing, sitting upon your desk.

You know you won’t be seeing him tonight, that he needs the space to lick his wounds.

As you study the platinum ring between your fingers you wonder if this is the choice that Sam was talking about.

“There comes a time when you just can’t bend any further, there’s no more flexibility. You and Sabatino are going to get to that point and when you do one of you will have to make a decision. It’ll be make or break.”

You’re there right now, you can feel it in your heart. Marriage is the one thing that you can’t compromise on and now he knows it.

***

Sabatino goes back to his hotel room that night, the one the CIA hire out for him whenever he’s in LA. He hasn’t told them that the two of you are living together, they don’t even know that he’s in a relationship because if they did, you’d be seen as leverage.

He lies down on the bed, still clad in his suit and he thinks about that moment, the one when he slipped the ring onto your finger. He didn’t realise how much he wanted it until then, how much it meant to him.

If he does this, if he choses a future with you then he has to be done with the CIA and that comes with stipulations, ones that he has to fulfil if he wants them to cut him loose.

“I think your job allows you to have one foot out the door.” You had told him.

He understands that’s what it must look like to you, that he’d not entirely invested, that he’s always ready to leave but the truth is he’s scared. He knows his value as an operative, that The Agency won’t want to release him. He’s terrified of what they might do if they find out that you’re the reason he’s putting in his papers.

His thumb plays over the empty space on his ring finger, the one where up until a few hours ago a platinum wedding band resided. He’d liked the feel of it, of belonging to you, of other people knowing that. You were right when you said there’s a security in being married.

The problem is the stability. He wants to be around more, to be involved in your life but his job prevents that. You can go months at a time without seeing each other, barely communicating if he’s in deep cover.

He wants to be there in your day to day, to hold your hand on the way to brunch, to get up at crazy o’clock to go running, to cuddle up on the couch scaring yourselves silly on the latest Netflix documentary. He wants a life with you, a whole one, not the one he’s been living for the past four years.

There’s only one person who knows what he’s going through, who can shed some light on his next steps and that’s Michelle Hanna. He resolves to visit her the next morning.

Maybe between the two of them they can figure something out.

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[happenstnces]

MISC. HEADCANONS: EMILY PRENTISS ✧˖*°࿐

✧ bonus: this song.     emily prentiss x gn!reader ! hcs

syn. a collection of random emily headcanons in & out of a relationship. warning ! mentions of alcohol & smoking.

      ೃ⁀➷ masterlist ! add yourself to the taglist here

can they use chopsticks?

definitely. she’s got pretty good hand-eye coordination so she picked it up relatively quick, and every time the team gets takeout where chopsticks are involved, she, inevitably, ends up trying to teach spencer how to use them until he gets too frustrated and ends up using a fork.

what do they do when they can’t sleep?

it depends where she is, she usually doesn’t have any problem falling asleep if she’s home & in bed with you. if you’re next to her, she’ll play with your hair or rub your back until she feels herself start to drowse off, but if she’s away on a case, she’ll pour herself over case files or (finally) get a start on the book she’d stashed at the bottom of her go-bag until she’s on the brink of passing out.

what do they impulsively buy at the grocery store?

cheap, boxed wine & chocolate covered almonds. occasionally, she’ll sneak a bag of uniquely flavoured chips into the cart just so she can say she’s tried them; you’ve turned finding the most unusual chip into a competition.

what’s their coffee order?

if it’s hot, nothing but two splenda. if it’s iced, vanilla syrup and oat milk.

what sort of apps do they have on their phone?

the basics: texts, facebook, and scrabble. once she saw you playing episode and decided to try it for herself, and before she knew it, she had love island and too hot to handle downloaded, too. story games are her guilty pleasure, and even though she says she only plays them on the jet to pass the time, you’ve rolled over in bed and caught her furiously muttering about how she has to ‘buy diamonds to make the story interesting’ quite a few times. she’s also very partial to paint by numbers & sudoku.

what do they watch on tv when they’re bored and nothing they really like is on?

hells’ kitchen or the real housewives of new jersey. they’re always her go-to’s when she’s in a hotel with basic cable and she doesn’t have any good connection to stream something she actually likes. if she can’t find either of those, she’ll look for any horror movie made before 1995 and let it play purely as background noise.

do they remember names or faces easier?

names—she is SO bad with faces. on a couple occasions she’d been talking about someone at work who had pissed her off with them literally within the circle of people she was talking to because she has such a hard time matching the faces to the names—especially with summer interns.

on an average day, what can be found in their pockets?

a handful of pens (half of which don’t work), bobby pins, a lighter, a few loose cigarettes (she is a stress smoker) and maybe some gum, if you’re lucky. sometimes she forgets to clean them out before shoving everything from her go-bag directly into the washer, so you might find the odd trinket she’d subtly collected from different cases—a local detectives card, a pebble, a motel room key she’d forgotten to return.

an. i have sooo many random emily hcs that don’t rlly fit into any category, might expand on a few of these eventually :-)

tglist. ( open ! you can request to be added or removed here ) @mylilenbyheart @storiesofsvu​ @mickey-gomez​​

[se7ens-oc-heaven]

if there was some kind of Legendkeepers Halloween Costume Party, what would everyone dress up as? and who would put the least/most Effort into their costumes?

I honestly don't have clear ideas on What Specifically people would dress up as, so I focused more on effort/approach!

Sumire - She'd probably pick something that seems like an easy grab, in the vein of "going as a ghost just so it's a sheet over the head and something everyone Gets", but she does put some effort into it so it actually is pretty well done. Might be like, instead of just a grey sheet for duskull, she makes a point of having the skull mask, loose "sleeves" for the hands, bones on the 'back', and she'll make a point of keeping her arms folded behind her or hanging in front of her.

Maciel - lowest effort, he doesn't feel comfortable spending money on stuff like that. He'll do it, partially due to Lena's prompting and partially because he would like to join in, but it involves a lot of thrifting and/or creative/generous interpretation, probably on the level of "wearing a black shirt with a gold ring on it and claiming it's Umbreon" for example. (Though with Lena pressuring him it'll be more involved than that)

Lena - puts a lot of effort into it, but is also indecisive - she doesn't remember her halloweens and loves the idea of getting to experience it, but can't figure out what she wants to do most. Probably does several costumes, depending on how many events she gets to go to

Satsuki - while she'd like to dress up, she's too busy with various events and having to present certain ways for them - as the champion, as a contest idol, as the person who saved Hoenn from drastic flooding... her outfits for these events match the theme and her role but just have generically spooky touches to them rather than being all-out costumes.

Ren - some sort of goofy food costume. He dresses his pokemon to match too, and posts photos on his pokemon photo blog はい、チーズ ! ("ok, say cheese!", but also known as "Hi, Cheese!")

Aya - I can't see her enjoying the celebrations much, but I can see her wearing ears/wings/tail accessories during the season for fun.

Ritsu - ok actually wait maybe he's the lowest effort. Just wears the diamond clan uniform he was gifted in Hisui as being a "surprisingly historically accurate costume". (He just likes having an excuse to wear his old garb again)

Touya - not sure why but I could see him go for a profession-based costume, like wrestler or doctor or something. Just goes for something quick and storebought, nothing too fancy

Kimmie - probably goes for some sort of cute pokemon thematically, but rather than more literal she probably goes for like cutesy clothing that evokes the imagery more indirectly - like if you had a pink cutesy dress with a jigglypuff face printed on the front. May buy the base outfit but she further accessorizes by herself.

Xav - if you can convince him to go out, he'll wear one of those "artistic halloween costumes" where it's done more to rise to the fashion challenge than just a simple, store-bought costume. Involves precise makeup work, attention to detail, the whole nine yards. Puts the most effort into it - IF you can get him to go out somewhere for it, that is.

Rex - depending on where on his timeline he is, I could see him dressing as his favorite superhero! He'd probably go for storebought (I can't imagine him making it himself and I don't think he knows anyone who could) but then 'erm actually' every off detail about it if it came up.

Aspen - indecisive and also a bit shy, worried others will think they're being "childish". Most likely to do matching costumes with his friends. Drawn towards pokemon-themed costumes the most, likes them when they look more directly like the pokemon.

Natsumi - since they're in charge of the lousy three, they decide to dress up to match - as Ogerpon, naturally. That, or they convince Aspen to be Ogerpon while they're Pecharunt. They put a good amount of effort into making sure the costume is readable, but don't worry too much about the quality of it so much - so if cheap plastic masks or slightly off stitching or something is in there, it's fine. It's only meant for limited time usage after all.