#why can I only have thirty tags??? that’s bullshit

[blessedbucky]

based off my own thot because i saw a lack of tentacles in the satosugu/reader tag and took that personally! (i wanted this posted because the brainrot is real right now so apologies if there are any mistakes!)

pairing: satoru/suguru/reader

word count: 1.3k

warnings: TENTACLES BABY, so...shibari-ish by proxy?, vaginal, oral, anal, this throuple do be a little fucked up but that's just jjk territory, satoru and reader seeing orders to kill suguru on sight and straight up saying "that sign can't stop me because i can't read!", some jealousy, a mention of exhibition, suguru lowkey being a daddy, i think that's everything

my thanks to @firefly-graphics for the header! i'm tickled pink by it!

I hate you!

There’s a hum, but you’re still not looked at. “Why, my dearest, are you looking at me like that? I don’t think it was me that put you in this situation.” Suguru flips to the next page in his book. His face hasn’t shifted once since this all started. He still wears that same blasé expression, as if he couldn’t be bothered with any of this. “If anything, I’m helping my sweet girl by teaching her a lesson.” Your adrenaline spikes when you watch him raise a hand. “You need to have a stronger backbone, dear…”

Just as you feared, Suguru flicks his fingers. The cursed spirit shifts as it’s commanded to, and the inky black tentacles move deeper. You didn’t even think that was possible! You breathe harshly through your nose as the heavy weight of the tentacle pushes further down your throat. You still gag. Tears blur your vision but it’s not enough for you not to see that Suguru is finally watching you.

Then, Suguru smirks. It’s that shitty, smug one. It’s bait, of course. It always is. That smirk is always followed by something said that’s so egregious that it makes you act up. And, sure enough, “You can’t keep letting our darling Satoru have his way.”

You’re letting him have his way right now, Suguru!

“Ooh, I know that look.” Suguru reaches out. You think that this is it! He’s finally going to touch you! Instead, he lovingly pets at his new favorite cursed spirit. “Let me guess—you think it’s only him that I’m indulging, is that it?” He chuckles at the widening of your eyes. “Aw, that’s cute. You really thought I wouldn’t find out about what you two little perverts are watching and getting off to together.”

Stalker, you think at him as if he can read your mind. Though, with how deep in your guts his curses are, you’d think that he’d be able to do that. Creep. Pervert. It’s not like these things bother you. You’re as half-mad as Satoru. Suguru makes you both so fucking stupid, so you two get home to your apartment, feeling Suguru’s residuals, and think it’s romantic. Right now, you’re just on the verge of breaking down because Suguru won’t touch you.

“I don’t like this attitude,” Suguru remarks. “Satoru is usually the bratty one. Look at how good he’s being right now.”

Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit! This is bullshit! The only reason he’s being so good right now is because you fucked him stupid, and you know it!

Satoru started this whole thing and he’s getting the praise now?!

In the middle of keeping your face pinned down against the mattress by the back of your neck and snapping his hips against your ass, that bastard had leaned over your back and started whispering in your ear. Let’s drop in on Suguru, hmm? It had been over three months since either of you had seen him. There was always this…unspoken rule that you and Satoru do not interfere in Suguru’s world. But then Satoru said, I hear he hired some bitch to be his assistant. We should totally fuck somewhere that she’ll find us. C’mon, baby, let’s make him pay attention to us.

Alright, yeah, maybe you do need to grow a backbone.

Though…it was really worth it to see that bitch’s face when she walked into Suguru’s office to find your head hanging over the edge of his desk while Satoru ruthlessly pounded into you. It was made all the better when Suguru slammed open the door about thirty minutes later and snapped at her to leave him alone. No matter how close his little cult followers or family get, he’ll only ever be fake smiles with them. And you’re as much a greedy little hedonist as Satoru is, so it’s nearly orgasmic to know that only you and Satoru can see every side of Geto Suguru.

You don’t quite remember what Satoru said when he mouthed off to Suguru. All you remember is that beatific smile of Suguru’s and his sugary sweet voice when he said, I see. I’ve been neglecting my darlings. Let’s go to my room, shall we? If you wanted to see me so badly, I’ll let you see me as much as you want.

Unlike Satoru, you had some sense left for you to nervously think, I’m in danger! Common sense flew out the window when Suguru slid one of those obscenely big hands of his under his yukata to tug it loose, though. You and Satoru followed after him like bitches in heat.

Let you two see him, Suguru definitely has done. You see each other, too. Satoru is the picture definition of lewd right now. You don’t want to imagine what shape you’re in yourself. You’re mirror images. On your knees, kept in the perfect pose by the one tentacle that’s wrapped around your ankles and wrists. It forces your backs to arch, putting your breasts on full display. A tentacle didn’t waste time before it was wrapping around your tits, too. Satoru got tentacles locking around his chest, squeezing so hard as to bring attention to Satoru’s pecs. Sensitive little Satoru started having the suckers of tentacles pluck at his nipples and the strongest sorcerer of the modern age turned into a whimpering mess.

The strongest sorceress of the modern age lost every thought in her head when all her holes got filled. A tentacle down your throat, one of the bigger ones thrusting inside your pussy, and another carefully pushing inside your ass. No prep. Even with the tentacles lubricated with something almost sweet, it burned. That just makes it better. Rough is the default setting when you three have sex. Gentleness only comes when you’ve all burned out that pent-up aggressive energy.

You and Satoru were okay with it, at first. That tentacle monster bursting onto the scene behind Suguru was like a wet dream come true. Hell, you didn’t even complain when Suguru propped himself up against the headboard with a book. None of you are a stranger to some edging.

Then, you and Satoru were two orgasms in, and the tentacles hadn’t budged. Suguru was making no move to do so, either. It’s become clear that Suguru’s affection is a double-edged sword. Suguru will spoil you and Satoru…and will turn right around and mercilessly abuse that gift to punish you both. Because Suguru knows how tactile you and Satoru are. You two crave touch, especially Suguru’s. To be denied it for so long…

Satoru’s lashes are clumped together from his tears. He’s overstimulated, exhausted, and silently begging Suguru with those shining blue eyes to end his suffering. You get pissy, though. The defiance and anger are meant to goad him because even a rough touch is still a touch.

“Ngh!”

Suguru isn’t falling for any of it. He snaps his fingers and the tentacles that he’d forced to stop moving about ten minutes ago start thrusting inside you. Satoru’s shout is muffled by the tentacle he’s been deepthroating. The tentacles go from zero to a hundred, pumping inside you at a pace that you both relish and aren’t ready for. Your eyes roll in the back of your head. Just before you come so hard that you’re convulsing and liquid gushes from your pussy, you feel the splatter of Satoru’s hot come across your thighs.

“Alright. No more playing.” Suguru gets on his knees, shuffling forward. He shoves his pants down in one fluid movement, his thick, massive cock slapping against his abdomen. He grips the base of it, holding it out in Satoru and your direct lines of sight. “Suck me off.” The tentacles in both your mouths slips away, leaving you and Satoru drooling and panting. “If you two can work together and make this real good for me, I’ll come in all your holes. How’s that sound, my loves?”

[runninriot]

Even Heroes Fail Sometimes

written for @steddieangstyaugust day 17

prompt: "keep breathing, please" | wc: 4.657 | rated: M | cw: blood and injuries | tags: canon divergence, vecna is defeated, hurt/comfort, confessions, angst with happy ending | complete fic on ao3

Thirty-five, thirty-six, thirty-seven,-

Thirty-eight seconds since Eddie last opened his eyes.

Steve doesn’t know why he’s counting. Maybe he just needs something to do, something to distract himself from the horrors with. From the frightening noises of the Upside Down slowly falling apart and the smell. He’s got blood sticking to every part of his body, some is his, some is not. Most of it is Eddie’s, gushing out of too many wounds.

    Fifty-seven, fifty-eight, fifty-nine,-

Steve keeps counting.

Maybe the doctors will need to know how long he’s been unconscious when they get him to the hospital.

Because they will get him there, no matter what Eddie said.

    ‘Jus’ leave me ‘ere. You- you’re better off without me.’

They would never leave him behind, they couldn’t. Steve couldn’t. Because Dustin needs Eddie. Needs to know that at least they tried.

No matter how hopeless it seems.

No matter how slim the chances are that he’ll make it.

They have to try.

    Sixty-three, sixty-four, sixty-

   “S’eve?”

He’s never been happier to hear his name, to hear Eddie’s voice, despite how broken he sounds.

   “I’m here, Eddie. I got you. Just- hang in there. We’re almost there.”

Technically, it isn’t even a lie; the gate is already in sight, gleaming and moving, frayed edges blazing like flames.

They’re so close, just a few more steps. Eddie doesn’t need to know that the hardest part is yet to come.

   “’m not gonna make it, Stevie.” Eddie’s voice is so weak, so small compared to what he usually sounds like.

This is wrong. This is not how it’s supposed to be.

   “Bullshit!” Steve protests, forcing his legs to keep going, forcing his arms not to loosen their grip around Eddie’s mangled body.

This is not the time to give up, not when they’re almost out the gate. They just have to make it to the other side where Nance is waiting with the caravan to get them to safety.

   “Even heroes fail sometimes,” Eddie whispers and Steve can hear that he’s smiling.

Why is he smiling?

   “We’re not gonna fail! We’re gonna make it and you will be fine! We’ll get you to the hospital and they’ll-“

   “Thank you, S’evie. F- for tryin’”

Eddie’s body goes limp in his arms.

    Three, four, five-

He’s unconscious again, that’s all.

He’s not dead. Eddie is not dead. Steve can feel that he’s still breathing. That’s not just his imagination, right?

   “Come on, Eddie! Keep breathing, please!”

Steve tries not to panic but it’s hard not to. With Eddie hanging motionless over his shoulder, he can’t see his face, and there’s no time to stop and take a look at his wounds. They’ve got to keep moving.

Steve feels like his heart is trying to break through his ribcage and his lungs feel like they’re about to collapse. Everything hurts. His own wounds sting and itch, and his muscles tremble from overstrain.

    Please, Eddie. Please don’t die.

---

Steve doesn’t remember how they made it through in time before the gate closed behind them. But they did, all of them.

Poor Robin seems to be in shock. She’s in the front seat next to Nancy, hasn’t said a word since they got out.

Nancy is trying her best to concentrate on the road, doing everything to keep a straight face while Dustin is crying and screaming at her to ‘Drive faster!’

The boy is completely out of his mind, probably in pain – his leg really didn’t look good – and he must be so scared, so worried about his bleeding friend in the back.

Steve hovers over Eddie’s lifeless body, helplessly pressing pieces of cloth against the worst of his wounds. There’s blood everywhere and he still hasn’t opened his eyes again.

   “Come on, Eddie. You can do it. I know you can.”

Steve has lost count, has lost every feeling for time and space, can only focus on the shallow up and down movement of Eddie’s chest.

He’s weak but he is still breathing, still holding on.

That’s good, right? Means he’s still got some fight left in him. That maybe, despite all the fucked-up shit going on, he’s still got something worth living for.

   “You can’t die, Eddie. Dustin needs you.”

    I need you.

   “Alright, Steve, get ready! We’re here!”

The caravan comes to an abrupt halt with the tires screeching as Nancy steps hard on the breaks.

And then, chaos unfolds.

   “Help! We need help!”

It’s good to hear Robin’s voice even if it pains him how broken she sounds, how he can hear the tremble in each word – he knows she’s only barely holding on, knows her good enough to know she’s near tears, on the verge of letting it all out.

But she’s a fighter, Robin is.

His best friend in the world is so brave and so, so strong when it counts. You’d think her clumsy, rambly nature is an act when you see her on the battle field.

She shouldn’t have to be strong. None of them should. They’re fucking kids, for fuck’s sake! All of them. Dustin and his little friends, obviously. But also him, Robin, Nance, Jonathan, Eddie – they’re hardly what you can call young adults and yet, they’re forced to fight like fucking soldiers in a war against powers none of them can even understand.

But it’s what they do.

What most of them have been doing for years now.

They’ve lost so much already and every time evil comes back to haunt them, the losses become greater, harder to deal with.

They’ve lost people they knew, people they loved – not again.

Not this time.

They will not lose Eddie.

---

continue reading here

[annaphoenix1994]

Triangle Betrayal

Previous Chapter - Masterlist - Next Chapter

»»-------¤-------««

Simon watched Kiera carefully as she focused on the task at hand. She stayed in her vehicle, focusing on her laptop as she looked at the photo of Isaac's license plate on his phone, her eyes darting back and forth, her jaw dropping slightly before immediately reaching for her phone to call Laswell, sitting back in the driver's seat as she took a selfish drag from her vape pen. "What is it?" Simon asked. 

"This is all a big triangle," She sighed. "Now I know why Isaac didn't tell me his last name when he came up to the ranch yesterday." 

"Why?" 

She looked at him, turning the laptop around for him to see for himself, "His last name is Graves." 

Bloody fucking hell, he grimaced as she faced the laptop back towards her, putting the address on file into her GPS. "He lives only thirty minutes from we're at right now. I'm going to drive by and get a layout of the place. I'm willing to bet that we can find both Shepherd and Malcolm there." 

"Considering they're both wanted men, I doubt they're in the same place." 

"I'm going to correct you on something: they're both stupid men. They're probably holding each other's dicks while they pee." 

He chuckled, loving her foul mouth just as much as he enjoyed the feeling of it on him - both lovingly and intimately. "You're probably right." 

Kiera dialed Laswell's number, putting it on speaker before it rang four times, Laswell answering with haste. "Kiera. Manage to scramble anything?" 

"I think so. Does the name Isaac Graves mean anything to you?" 

She sighed, "Partially. If it's the same person we're thinking of." 

"Well, I can't see much background on him from my computer, so I'll give you his name and license plate number. His driver's license states he's a resident of Arlington, Virginia, but the address is invalid since his plates are in Wyoming. The Wyoming tag pulled up a completely different address, so me and Simon are going to drive by and see what we're working with." 

"I'll get to working on it now. I'll call you back once I find something." 

"Thanks." 

'Starting route to 555 Wyoming Pike Drive' her GPS alerted her after she had started the route, excitement coursing through her veins as she had finally seemed to pick up a trail to Fernando's kidnappers. "We'll go get supper after this, okay?" 

"Supper?" He chuckled, the phrase being foreign to him. 

"Right. I keep forgetting you're British. It means dinner, babe." She poked. 

"Keep poking at me. You still haven't been to my 'neck of the woods' yet." He arched his brow, using a familiar phrase he had heard her say a few times, desperately trying to mimic a nearly southern accent, but he failed. 

Instead, they both laughed at his attempt. 

"Oh, I'm eager to let my freak flag fly over there. Are there any good bars?" 

"Pubs - yes," He corrected. "I don't trust you in a bar - nothing ever good happens with you and that word in the mix. Though, you're going to have a hell of a time over there and I'm sure my sides will be hurting after laughing at you trying to pronounce words with your cornbread accent." 

She scoffed, "Cornbread? What?" 

"That's what Teeter said she had. You two sound almost the same." He poked. 

"Bullshit. Teeter speaks gibberish! I speak English!" 

"Your English and my English are two completely different things, love. I don't know what you're going to do without Dr. Pepper over there." He smirked. 

"You're lying. You can get Dr. Pepper anywhere-"

"Sure about that? There's no sweet tea - garbage. Might as well drink sugar water. Scones for breakfast and tea. You'll be living like a posh lady for two weeks." He teased, knowing the word "posh" was not in her vocabulary. 

"What the fuck is that?" She grimaced, making him laugh. God, I can't fucking wait to get her over there, he thought, amazed that he was looking forward to something recently. 

"You'll see." 

She smiled, shaking her head as she continued to drive following her GPS's directions, the drive being roughly forty minutes from their current location before her phone rang again. "Yeah?" 

"Here's what I found. Isaac was Shepherd's right-hand man in the D.C. office - I've confirmed that. He fled when Shepherd did. He managed to get a car from a drug cartel member, running on stolen plates between various checkpoints-" 

"So is the car he's driving now stolen, too?" 

"No, it was purchased without a loan from a dealership in Montana. When I kept digging, I found out that Shepherd threatened to set him up if he didn't help him flee. And Kiera, Isaac was responsible for the explosive launched at you in Chicago." 

Simon shivered. 

"W-What? How did you find that out?"

"Phone records. He and Shepherd talked on the phone a lot between these last few missions you were on. You were their target the whole time, I'm afraid. He got wind that you were going to Mexico to investigate Graves."

Kiera scoffed, her hands gripping the steering wheel before Laswell continued. "And...," Laswell sighed. "He's Commander Graves' brother, Kiera. What he's doing is personal, now." 

Both Simon and Kiera looked at each other in shock, Simon watching her take a long drag from her comforting tube of nicotine as it was visible that she was under immense pressure. "Between him, Shepherd, and Malcolm, they all have blackmail on each other. Each of them ping-ponging between threats of exposing the other in exchange for freedom." 

She chuckled, "That won't last long." 

"You have full authority, Kiera. I can issue the warrant." 

"Please do. Issue it for all of them. I'll talk to the Sheriff here and have him issue me one, too. I'm going to do this my way, especially considering Fernando is at stake." 

"I'll forward them to state authorities at the local office. You'll be able to pick them up before five." 

"I'll get them on my way home. I'm going to drive to the address I found for Isaac and I'm going to make my move by tomorrow." 

"Be wise about this, Kiera. With these three at each other's throats to take you out, they're going to do everything they can to ensure their mission is complete." 

"I have a plan already. I'm going to take them out. One by fucking one. And I'm starting with Isaac. With some... persuasion, he'll lead me to Malcolm and once I get him, I'll get Shepherd." 

"We're all standing by you. Keep me updated."

»»-------¤-------««

'In three quarters of a mile, the destination is on your right.' The GPS sounded, spiking Kiera's attention as she pressed on the brake pedal, slowing down to see two patrol vehicles sitting at the gate of Isaac's home. "What the fuck?" She scoffed to herself, recognizing them to be Richards' deputies. 

"Can I help you?" The deputy questioned, walking up to the truck as she rolled down her window, presenting her badge just in case the decals on the truck wasn't enough to prove that she was an agent. 

"Why'd Richards send you here?" 

"He didn't," The deputy replied. "The homeowner requested his home to be secured. We don't know what's going on." 

"Of course you don't. You do know you two are guarding a wanted man, right?" 

The deputies looked at each other, "Do you have a warrant?" 

She smirked, "I'll be back tomorrow." 

»»-------¤-------««

Once the deputies left the scene to exchange for another pair of deputies, they returned to their headquarters, seeing that Richards was still active at the station. "Shahan, Dylan," Richards addressed them by their last names, nodding his head toward his office. "A word?" 

"Sir?" Shahan said, Dylan walking in behind him. 

"It has come to my attention that an officer approached you on the scene today-"

"Yeah, some woman with a man in her passenger seat. Showed me her badge and said we were unaware of the wanted man we were guarding." 

"I know," Richards sighed, looking to his feet. "When she comes back, don't ask any questions. Understood?" 

"It seemed odd, sir," Dylan added, tension in his shoulders. "She seemed like she wanted to do harm by how she was acting." 

"Son, she works for the C.I.A. She will have a warrant by tomorrow. Just... Just stay out of her way, okay? This fight isn't in our hands anymore." 

"Isn't that against our code?" 

"Yeah. By the book is what you've always told us." Shahan added.

"Being by the book has nothing to do with a federal agent. They play by their own rules," Richards grumbled, wanting nothing to do with intervening with a federal agent's work. "You two be on site until she gets there. When she does, you two leave. Got me?" 

The pair of deputies nodded, "Sir." 

Shahan and Dylan shared a look between each other as they proceeded to their vehicles to head home for the night, Shahan offering a cigarette that was much needed after a long day of patrol. "Something bad is going to happen." Dylan sighed, exhaling a cloud of smoke. 

"Yeah, but I don't want no part of it. Makes me wonder why they only have one federal agent instead of the F.B.I. out here." 

"That is odd," Dylan furrowed his brows. "Maybe Richards knows more than what he's telling us." 

Shahan scoffed, "And you think he'd tell us? We're nowhere near his tier, buddy." 

"Well, no, but at the same time, if it's a criminal that has an active warrant, then why isn't he leading the raid on this one?" 

"You're asking so many questions," Shahan chuckled, watching Dylan pull out his phone, assuming he was texting his wife that he was heading home, thinking nothing of it. "If a federal agent is going after this guy, it's best we stay out of it. That guy has gotten himself into some trouble. I'd hate to be him." 

"Yeah," Dylan replied, looking down at his phone as he typed into the message box, remembering the three thousand dollars Malcolm slipped him to swear to secrecy as well as to have a reassuring person to keep guard on the entry of Isaac's home. Dylan then sent his warning text:

[arctic-hands]

What MP3 player? And is it still available! I hare having to muse my phone, and all modern ones require WiFi and that defeats the object of a portable music player!

So about 4 years ago I decided I too was sick of streaming, ads, and algorithms, and was running out of space on my phone for all the songs I wanted to play on the VLC app, so I got a SanDisk/Sansa Clip Jam (the little one on the left)

[Image Description: two MP3 players, next to a hand for scale. On the left is a very small blue one, with a very small and simple white-on-black screen, and a physical button pad underneath the screen. The player on the left is much, much larger, with a larger screen capable of showing color images, and touchscreen buttons underneath. Both players are open to LP albums, but the one on the right actually shows the album art for Churches. End I.D]

Now the little Clip Jam was good for a while and I was glad to have it, but it did have some drawbacks that became clear. Mine was used but I believe these are still being made/marketed. It was twenty bucks used.

Pros (aside from the big one of owning your own media without ads/algorithm

Ultra portability

MicroSD slot for more space

Audiobook-capable, Audible compatible once you register it to Audible

Physical buttons

FM radio

Shuffle capable

NO WIFI, plug in and drag-and-drop uploading

Neutral:

no Bluetooth capability

Has stopwatch

The "clip" in the name refers to the clip on its back, which lets you attach it to clothes and such

Immediately apparent drawbacks:

No external speakers, must have wired headphones to hear anything. They use your standard jack, so I'm assuming you could use compatible external speaker but I never had one to try

Sometimes chapters of audiobooks don't go in order and you have to go in with tag editor software

and sometimes the books upload as one big file, meaning you have to go in with another software to break it up

Thing that made me fully disgusted with the thing after a year or so of frustration:

The HARDware capabilities of the Clip Jam mean that it can only handle two thousand LINES. Not files, lines. Meaning the Artist counts as a line, the Album counts as a line, the songs each count as a line. This is bad enough with just putting music on, but when you add audiobooks to it, the titles of the books and every chapter counts as a line. With an SD card you can add about another two thousand lines. When you use up your line capabilities, the data will be on your device/card but the player won't show it or let you access the files at all.

SANDISK NEVER TELLS YOU ABOUT THIS. It was not in any of the listings for it, it was not in the manual. At. All. I only found out by chance by finally coming across a years-old forum post talking about it after months of frustration while I tried to figure out why half my files (mostly audiobooks by this point) weren't showing

So I started looking for a new one.

...for the life of me I don't remember how I came across the Phinistec Z6, prolly saw it mentioned on the r/DigitalAudioPlayer while trying to come up with a new one to buy for cheap. The brand seemingly came out of nowhere, but it had what I needed. I got it thirty dollars used from ebay. They were still being sold new as of a year ago, I just prefer getting li-ion battery things used.

[Image Description: the players again, the Clip Jam is showing the SD card option, the Z6 is showing a list of Music/Folder/E-book/Bluetooth/Recorder. End I.D]

I don't have an SD card in either and the option only shows up on the Z6 if you have one in.

Pros for the Phinistec Z6

No bullshit line limitation

MicroSD slot for added content

Maybe just a pro for me, but this thing is HEFTY. Not heavy, but dense enough I'm worried you'd crack a skull if you threw it at someone. Wonderful tactile weight in my case.

Long battery life. I think I've had to charge it 5 times in the year I've had it.

External speaker

Wired headphone capable, as well as Bluetooth capable

FM radio (only works when wired headphones are plugged in, the dongle acts as an antenna. This is pretty standard, it used to be that way on phones too)

Audiobook capable. This isn't advertised but it can save your story place in the middle of the chapter. I didn't use this feature too much tho, I got an e-ink reader a few months after. I don't think it's Audible compatible, but there are workarounds for converting those to MP3

NO WIFI, plug in and drag-and-drop uploading

Neutral:

Can read written books for some reason. Not sure why anyone would want to on a screen that small, but it exists

So-so voice recording capabilities

A crappy photo camera for some reason?

Touch screen buttons

Cons:

It doesn't ship with current software, and for the latest update you have to email the company for the download link. Kinda sketch, I'm prolly some Chinese corporation's data bitch now, but seeing as I'm American I'm used to being a corporate (and government) data bitch for my own country anyway

Also had the problem of songs not playing or being listed in the right order. The listing was fixed with the update, but even after tag editing the songs were PLAYING in the wrong order when accessed under MUSIC. When accessed under FOLDER songs play in order, but artists are listed in order of upload then, not alphabetically, so it can get tedious when trying to find the artist you want if you've got a lot of artists on there. Not a deal breaker, just annoying.

No shuffle, but because of the above if you want to shuffle on a specific album just access it thru the MUSIC function

While screen brightness can be turned down, the backlight behind the buttons is blinding white no matter what you do which sucks in the dark if you have sensitive eyes

Isn't as portable as the Clip Jam if you've got small pockets (looking at you, women's jeans)

The external speaker is a bit tinny and higher notes can get a bit staticky (especially a problem when you listen to LP)

Virtually no information out there about Phinistec

I vastly prefer the cons of the Z6 over the hardware limitations of the Clip Jam, all things considered.

[ursulanoodles]

@molliehaswords tagged me in WIP Wednesday (whenevers day rather lol), so why not?

A random unedited tidbit from a yet-to-be-named upcoming Shane fic that probably won't be posted for another century at this rate.

Meet Briar J. Talbot:

She sprinted through the doors and onto the streets, the cold March morning sunshine blinding her as she turned toward the subway station. Her lungs burned, and her calves were on fire as she jogged down the city sidewalks in her black suede pumps.

“Stop! Police,” a man’s voice boomed behind her, shaking her to her core.

Briar had never meant for things to go this far, but she was at her wit’s end with Joja, with corporate bullshit, with capitalism– all of it. Her outburst had been unexpected even to her, yet here she was running from the fucking cops. She knew she should stop running, yet when she caught a glimpse of the large man hurling himself toward her like a cannonball, her heart jumped into her throat, and she ran even faster.

The subway station would be full of people and she knew if she could make it there and get into a car, she might have a chance of escaping. She bolted across the street, dodging cars as drivers honked at her and screamed out of their windows, and she ducked into the subway station across the street. The stairs were slippery and she weaved around people and swiped her card as she barged through the turnstile. Unfortunately for her, there were no trains and she could barely breathe as a stitch in her side formed into a painful ball that felt like it was stabbing her every time she inhaled. Everyone in the station was gawking at her and backing away, and she realized she must look like an absolute lunatic and tried to calm herself.

“Police,” the same male voice boomed, and she looked up to see him thunder down the steps and jump over the turnstile, an impressive feat for such a large man. Briar panicked, yet again, and headed for the farthest corner, toward a group of people.

“Oh no you don’t! Uh-uh,” a woman said, shaking her head. “She’s over here! I ain’t want nothin’ to do with this crazy bitch,” she yelled.

Briar bolted back toward the turnstiles to see the officer grab something from his belt. For a split second, she thought it was his gun, and her brief thirty years of existence flashed before her eyes until a searing pain jolted through her body and she hit the pavement with a sickening thud as every muscle in her body became incapacitated at once. The electric shock stopped as soon as it had started, and the police officer hovered over her as he flipped her onto her stomach and yanked her hands behind her back, handcuffing her. The cool metal cuffs dug into her wrists and she wanted to cry and kick and scream, but she knew that would only make things worse for herself. This wasn’t her first rodeo and it probably wouldn’t be her last.

“Briar Talbot, you’re under arrest for the vandalization of Joja Corp property. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you. Do you understand the rights I have just read to you?”

[juls-writes]

find the word: combined edition!

I've got lift, blossom, lashes, and dust from @pinespittinink and shrug, see, short, sure, and sign from @awritingcaitlin - thank you and consider this a tagbacksies if you like :3

snippets continue under the cut, all from Bastards Wip! I'll tag @legiomiam, @celestepens, @ceph-the-ghost-writer, @mjjune, and anyone else who'd like to play! Your words, should you choose to accept, are drape, empty, care, lips, and sideways

lift

“What’s going on?” Delano presses, his saintly patience driving me up the fucking wall. For just a moment, I miss when we were trying to kill each other. It was easier to deal with him then.

“You saw the duel,” I counter, standing up straight and turning to look at him. “I won. I can stay.”

Delano’s head tilts in a way that says bullshit.

“For a while,” I amend.

A tired smile lifts his cheeks. “There it is.”

blossom

After my tea, I’m feeling better, so I head back outside to finish what I started. The garden is already looking better, but there’s dead blossoms to rid of and weeds to prune.

His footsteps come so calmly at first through the trees that I don’t pick up on it until a moment too late.

“Quaint."

My breath catches. I’m half-obscured in delphinium, one foot in the mud and one on a footstool, garden shears in one hand and a basket in the other. Standing on the path leading out of my garden is Delano.

lashes

I imagine the feeling of the cool morning air against his skin, separated from the warmth he’s exuding; his lashes look all the longer pressed against his cheeks; and his skin up close is ochre and sun-kissed. There’s age on him like there is on me, but he makes it look good. He suits himself far more than he did when he was younger. I envy the way he’s grown into himself – being a man is so effortless to him, and even though I have zero desire to look like him or have his body, I have a moment of distrust to my own experience.

dust

The top of the tower is nondescript. One might wonder why such a room needed a guard at all. The curved walls are lined with curved bookcases, made custom to suit the room, and they’re shrouded in cobwebs and a thick layer of dust. Tattered tapestries shrug off the wall, revealing rain-stained, sun-bleached windowpanes half-cracked and shuddering. At such a height, it seems a miracle the entire tower hasn’t simply filtered away in relentless wind.

shrug

“So I’m a stranger now?” I ask, fighting to keep my composure straight. I can’t forget the reality of my situation.

“You could be,” Delano says with a shrug, then leans in even closer. “You already know I’d call you any name, Yero.”

see

I can still see him standing there in the centre of it, staring out to sea. He’d stepped so as to avoid the lavender and thyme sprouting defiantly from cracks in the bridge, their roots hanging free on the underside. We were 15 then. My father had just passed. I didn’t know that within a week I’d be moving away. I thought I was going to watch Delano fall to his death crossing the Leap, because no one crossed the Leap, and in my mind that meant the first person to try would die. Those were the grand sort of life lessons my parents taught me growing up; one warning after another not to test fate.

short

“That isn’t true,” Ivos says, but I’m right and he’s wrong and there’s this beautiful bit of doubt in his eyes that makes up for him wasting my morning with such godawful conversation. “That’s not true.”

I gesture to the door, raise my eyebrows, and stand from the bed to stare down at him.

“Then by all means, go speak with him.”

Ivos stands. He’s only an inch shorter than me, but it’s all it takes. He glares – doesn’t say a word – and as he leaves, slams the door shut so hard the room shakes in static.

sure

We’re the same age after all, and mid-thirties feels pretty good. Between the two of us, it certainly looks better on him. If anything, he’s in his prime, whereas I’m not sure such a state exists for me. Sorcerers have a tendency of getting stronger and stronger until they plateau, then wither away to nothing.

sign

That’s what every word that describes Delano has in common. Pirate, viking, bounty hunter: danger. Delano: danger. The heat between us is nothing more than a warning sign telling me to stay away. It’s the flash of a cougar’s eyes, the vibrant stripes on a snake’s scales, the sinking sensation in your stomach when staring over the edge of a cliff. And yet I find myself clinging to that heat like I’m freezing – I need it like a hypothermic wants their whiskey – to warm me up, or otherwise burn me from the inside.

[grison-in-space]

I'll just fill out my own read more here, @gosuperdonnie: I never mind things being out in the open, but I deeply appreciate the care for privacy and I want to make sure I can respect yours back by redacting anything you'd like. Anyway, none of this is going to make any sense without the context of your bit. I heavily encourage my followers to read your full post.

No, really, doxxing holds no terrors for me: I write here under the cheerful assumption that I can be easily identified with the right context, and the main reason I have switched names even ONCE since 2007 is that I, uh, very publicly flipped off a pack of MRAs using both my real name and my last pseud, it got pretty viral, and I was kind of concerned it might get big enough that some chucklefuck might try to SWAT me or dig out the AO3 account to wave at a boss. Never happened, and I care even less now. I get the doxxing concerns and I am gratified by the care and kindness with which you've approached me, a stranger, after I was rather rude to you: I totally did use your comment as a launching pad to think about the shared sphere of our work, invoking both of our shared communities, and then I plastered it all over everywhere you'd be likely to see assuming we shared the same primary social network (ie tags, which I almost never do). Which I did not consider because, frankly, I'm a thirty something millennial who had long since assumed all the youths had decamped to cooler, greener pastures. This says way worse things about my manners than yours.

Truly. I get exactly why you were embarrassed and pissed. I did, without thinking about it, a pretty rude thing socially! For that, I apologize.

Okay, that little mortification out of the way:

My memory is also awful, but what you're saying sounds about right to me. I think you did provide that context about IDD spaces, because I was smiling and nodding along to it and thinking about how true it is: how even among those of us who can contort ourselves into passing without supports or even acknowledgement, I have seen a lot of neurodivergent people just collapse out of graduate programs, usually either from burnout or (disproportionately commonly) being actively targeted for bad treatment by a mentor. I've been around the block a time or eight and I have observed a lot of bad behavior in a range of fields.

Academia is not exactly an accessible profession. It relies incredibly heavily on the affirmation of relational networks and requires a level of investment that presumes a full time spouse-caregiver, a role for which it does not pay. Those relational networks are prone to abuse and distortion at the best of times. My PhD left grievous scars because my relationship with a supervisor crashed and burned for reasons impossible to untangle from our mutual neurodivergency. Like most people, I find myself hyperattuned to my own experiences and viewpoint, you feel? So that's what I was talking about as I was thinking out loud to myself.

The things you're hearing in your IDD/higher support communities come from true experiences, too! That's actually a branch of neurodiversity politics I happen to share! Like, that's the political end of the quote unquote movement that I align with, thanks. I'm uncomfortable with my animal research models self on that panel, too! The only reason I was willing to go into this field while, I have to stress this very much, desperate, terrified, and in the most severely damaged mental health of my life is that my PI agrees with me that most of the animal autism model work is bullshit and frequently goes on rants about marble burying!

Here's a little of my context: I've been consciousness raising and trying to build networks of support among disabled academics for something like seven years. The past two years of my postdoc have been literally the first time in my life that hasn't involved tightly compartmentalizing my life about my neurodivergence and closely guarding who gets to know what. Fuck, it's been like desperately pretending not only to be straight around all the other players in the professional women's soccer team, but also pretending that there are no other queers in the league either!

The observation you were making was poignant, accurate, and clear. Your broader point was eminently understandable and relatable. Let me just underscore that again: that context is important and worth discussing. I picked up the tip of that glacier that set me thinking and toddled off with it because your critique was true, valuable, and not new to me: I was chewing my thoughts over, and it didn't occur to me to go over the parts that I had already integrated. That does not mean that it was a bad idea to make that critique again. Not everyone has heard it yet, and not everyone understands its implications. And being reminded is always useful, too.

I also agree wholeheartedly that the project of including more IDD folks in the room is a wholly different thing from just throwing more neurodivergent folks at it. In no way do I want to dismiss that! You have zero reason or context to know this about me, but I believe strongly that passing is an important inflector of marginalized experiences because it's a powerful tool that comes at enormous cost. So if you want to understand marginalization from all angles, you need to be talking to people with a wide range of options to pass: people who cannot pass tend to be more keenly attuned to the consequences of being perceived as marginalized while people who can act so tend to be more attuned to the consequences of being isolated from anyone who could perceive them. Do you see what I mean?

And that means that you have to be including people who can't pass long enough to make the credentials at every level of your field, including conceptualization of the goals of the field of study. Which is what I pulled from your commentary, and—yes! Of course! So obvious that it was just a pleasure to hear it articulated and agree!

When I was a kid, the decision my mom made was to literally train me like a performing seal if that was what was necessary to avoid anyone Finding Out about me. I was explicitly and repeatedly scolded for even talking about it well into adolescence. I used to have a lot more brainpower at my disposal, so I more or less could, up until I hit my thirties right into COVID... when I hit burnout really, really bad. I am actually coping with becoming significantly more visibly disabled because I can't always maintain passing anymore, and that's always a journey. I have been performing that mask nonstop for long enough to be hitting the long slumps and crashes that many of my peers describe. It's a mask that must be glued to the face each day and ripped off at night, leaving irritation and exhaustion in its wake, but it lets me go places and achieve things I might not have been able to do otherwise.

Unrelated, but I was just complaining the other day that no one seems to know about Jim Sinclair these days. What a clear eyed, clear headed writer and thinker they are. I should try to knock together some kind of neurodivergence reading group again; I haven't had a chance to try and organize such a thing in Psychology but I had a really wonderful conversation last spring with Dr Williams over in the CDSC and it would be so nice to connect more directly on a regular basis...

Losing it is terrifying.

Also, let's be frank: I assumed you were talking way more to your classmates, continuing with them on a meta-conversation that a random like me doesn't have full context for, than like. TO me.

Your program of research sounds, bluntly, desperately needed and incredibly valuable. And way, way more likely to change things immediately for the positive for folks on the ground than mine. I'm so sorry people have told you that your work isn't worth doing or interesting; I won't pretend I'm surprised but I want to underscore that those people are fools. I'm incredibly glad and gratified that folks like you are here. I thought about working on autism from a psych or neuroscience perspective before I graduated undergrad, but I decided against it then and went for animal behavior because I found the experience of reading the autism literature too dehumanizing. I am so genuinely delighted and impressed that you can be here, getting your foot in the door to do this work. If I had any connections to people who know what they're doing re giving your precious, precious perspective a place to set root, I would give them to you immediately.

The work I'm currently doing mostly involves building up enough expertise and credit with mainstream "autism researchers", especially in the animal model world, to carve for myself a platform upon which to perch while I shriek invective at much of the rest of that field. I think it's necessary work, too—they do have a lot of money and power—but it's a longer game and it also relies on not collapsing and letting the academic PTSD win.

But yes: I am so sorry I didn't craft my post with the understanding that you might see it and correctly recognize yourself in mind. I would have provided a lot more context, for one thing! I hope that gives you context for the direction of my commentary the other week. Regardless, thank you for all the subsequent food for thought and for such a gracious comment in an awkward situation.

yesterday's talk to the neurodivergency activism program also included a fun "ethics in research on neurodivergence" panel conversation at the end when one person expressed this real frustration with the academy: that it's so unfriendly to neurodivergent people who can't navigate the social structures of academia, and it is so frustrating to this person to know that they want to go back to school and get the PhD but it's so unfriendly to neurodivergent people--

bear in mind, I'm the only openly neurodivergent researcher on the panel and by far the most junior (the others are all established faculty), plus I do animal research which is probably as far from the rather clinical focus of the folks in that program as humanly possible. and I've discussed openly how relational academia is, and how much it relies on the approval of your supervisors. we've even had a nice conversation about the same thing in clinical practice.

but I'm sitting here going... you know what, the interpersonal fuckery that almost ended my career actually was a result of blundering into another neurodivergent person's unacknowledged shame spiral, actually? you know that neurotypical research PIs are a distinct minority in my experience? you know that this is an incredibly dysfunctional institution, I ain't arguing that, but it's also one that has been by and large built for, by, and around neurodivergent people's needs and desires?

it's just they don't know it, so if you talk about it openly you get panic reactions. but it's so, so, so funny to see. (as I expanded on this theme the lady I liked best, a black woman working on intersections between developmental disabilities, race, and access to health care, is just grinning SO wide and almost giggling to herself.) you label yourself and people go OH NO A LABEL but if you know how to see the shape of the thing the label is supposed to describe, you can see that they oughta have a label, too.

so on the one hand, real consequences for being too open about yourself, but on the other hand, things actually have gotten so much better in the last 5-10 years. and on the gripping hand, just being in a space with only other neurodivergent people does not necessarily fix the problem of inadequate communication, hurt feelings, bad relationships with power, and weird insecurities. it just doesn't fix it. what works is understanding how to resolve conflicts, building structures that are less reliant on single dyadic relationships, and finding alternate ways to make connections with scholars in your field.

dammit, this means I should probably poke my bluesky again. fff.

[m-jelly]

Hi jelly how are you? Hope you are ok.

What about Levi and Reader where there's an age gap not that creepy but she's in her early twenties and he's in his early thirties and nobody knows that there's something going on 👀 and I don't know hahaha something more funny and fluffy plis have a nice day!🤭😘

Hiii! I'm good, thank you. I do hope you're alright too! Ten years year gap is not a problem (thank you for saying the reader is in her 20s).

It's a secret.

Pairing: Levi x Reader

Genre and tags: canon AU, romance, secret love, fluff, Hange is the only suspicious one, stealing moments together.

Concept: You and Levi seem to get on well and you're close, which has Hange wanting you two to be together, but you both keep proving her wrong. Hange sees you and Levi around other people and her suspicions about the two of you slowly vanish. However, she is right. You and Levi are in a passionate relationship, you're just very professional in front of others and Levi really enjoys winding Hange up.

18+ stuff below. On top of the clothes things, teasing and a lot of swearing.

You walked with Hange as you looked through your papers for Levi. You glanced up at her and raised your brow. "Why are you following me?"

She huffed. "I know you are dating someone! I know it. I can feel it in my bones."

You shook your head. "I'm not dating anyone."

"You've had sex recently."

You smirked. "Maybe I'm just very good solo."

She blushed bright red, then hummed. "Maybe..."

You approached Levi as he shouted commands at the cadets as they trained. "Levi, I have some papers for you."

Levi put his hand on your upper back and looked at the work. "Tch, more bullshit?"

"Don't shoot the messenger."

He took the papers and sighed as he looked them over. "Oh, you've broken it down for me."

You nodded and pointed at different parts and explained. "Sound good?"

He hummed. "Yeah. Tch, still bullshit. Alright, I'll implement the changes."

"Appreciate it. I don't want my ass to be chewed because you don't want to follow the rules."

Levi glared at you as you walked off. "Tch, oi! Watch your fucking mouth, you pencil-pushing brat!"

You flipped him off. "Go fuck yourself."

He stomped his foot. "Get back here and say that to my face!"

Hange frowned a little at how you and Levi were. "Wow. I didn't know you two were at each other's throats."

You hummed as you walked with her. "Well, seeing me means paperwork. I'm your communication line. You give me stuff for the other squads and the crown and they give me stuff. I get so much shit that when someone is like that asshole, I just tell them to go fuck themselves."

Hange pouted a little because she was really hoping that you and Levi were a couple. She followed you for the rest of the day and joined you for dinner. She stared at Levi next to Erwin, then she looked at you across from her as you ate and signed papers.

Hange sighed, then groaned and said your name after. "You sure you're not dating Levi?"

You nodded. "Very sure. He and I would never work." You looked up at Hange. "Would you like to date a stressed out, barely sleeps, grumpy, and tea obsessed virgin?"

Levi slammed his fist down. "Says the work-obsessed, stuck up, pompous, snot-nosed brat. I wouldn't touch you even if my life depended on it."

You smirked. "Well, thank the heavens it doesn't. You don't even know what a vagina looks like, so I'm good."

Hange slammed her head against the table. "I'm wrong. I'm wrong. I thought...what a fool I am."

You watched Levi get up and walk off. "It's okay to be wrong." You finished your work, then cleaned up. "You walking me back Hange?"

She grumbled. "Sure." She dragged her heels as she walked with you. "Stupid."

You hummed a laugh. "You can't win everything. I'm flattered that you think I'm with humanity's strongest, but I'm too young for him. Go get some rest."

"Okay."

You let her walk ahead of you. You gasped when a hand covered your mouth, then you were yanked into a closet.

Hange stopped and turned. "Hey, so..." She frowned and said your name. "Must have forgotten something."

You breathed heavily through your nose as your back was held against a familiar warm chest that you loved exploring. You moaned when a loving hand popped a button, then slipped into your shirt and ran over your sensitive skin. You shivered when you felt a crotch rub against your bum. You were on fire with desire.

You turned your head and gazed at your lover, Levi. You hummed at him to release your mouth. You smiled when he moved his hand, then he kissed you. "Levi."

He nipped your neck making you giggle. "You know, I should punish you for all the shit you said to me."

You hummed a laugh as you reached back and tangled your fingers in his hair. "You were just as bad."

He turned you around, then shoved you against the door. "Was I now?"

You nodded as you nibbled your lip and felt a fire burn inside you. "I was a little hurt."

He pulled your shirt from your trousers, then pushed his hands up your waist. "Tch, least I didn't call you a tea obsessed virgin."

You wrapped your arms around his neck. "It was just playful banter. You and I both know that you are far from a virgin."

He pushed one hand up to your breast and massaged. "You've taught me well."

You panted and hummed as you felt heat build up between your legs. "You just listen to my body and me. You're a good man and I love you."

Levi kissed you, then nipped your lip and pushed his tongue into your mouth. He took your breath away as his tongue moved with yours and explored your mouth. Your head was fuzzy from the passion and love that came from him. It didn't help that he pressed his knee against the door right between your legs.

You pulled back from his lips and smiled. "I've always loved you and you know that."

He tapped his forehead against yours. "I love you too. I'm hopelessly in love with you, but Hange can never know."

You snorted a laugh. "Deal."

[kpop---scenarios]

Cravings || One

Pairing: Vampire! Hongjoong x Reader

Warning: None Yet

Word Count: 3.1k

A/N: If you would like to be tagged, let me know!

"Babe, hey babe." Your boyfriend, Chad calls out to you, as you're sitting at the kitchen table, running over over bills again and trying to figure out how the fuck you're going to try to pay everything. You worked damn hard, and barely had anything to show for it. Ever since Chad had moved in a few months ago, without an invitation, you were stressed. Everything had gone up and doubled since he hadn't left, and he also hadn't contributed anything financially towards the household. You paid for rent, utilities, groceries and you even paid when the two of you went out for dinner. Chad worked full time, but where his money was going, you had no fucking idea. He constantly went out with his 'boys' , often coming home obliterated, and just expecting you to have your legs spread open for him when he rolled in, apparently that was your duty as his girlfriend, according to him. As if not contributing and acting like a man child was such a turn on. Not to mention the countless hours he spent on your gaming console, yelling and talking to his friends, leaving you no time to play any games that you like, unless you wanted to wake up a few hours before you had to work to sneak on it. But by the time you got home from work, cleaned up the messes he made throughout the day, made yourself dinner, showered and got into your PJ'S, you were too damn tired to do anything. You knew you had to wake up the next day and do it all over again, so any sleep you got was precious. 

A part of you often wondered why you were in this relationship with him. Maybe you were scared to be alone, maybe you didn't think you could do any better than him, but you stuck with him, because for some reason, you loved the guy. 

"What do you want, Chad?" You sigh, walking into the living room where he's sprawled out on the couch, headset on and his match paused. "I'm trying to figure out bills, you know that thing that keeps us warm, and with light and hot water, that you said you'd help pay and haven't." 

"Yeah, babe, can you go to the corner store and get those Takis, you know the ones I like? The not so spicy ones though babe, cause remember I have acid reflux, and a diet coke." He says, turning back to the screen, laughing at something said through his head phones. 

You could feel the rage building up inside of you, awfully quick, and it was seeping out of you even quicker.

"Are you going to pay for said snacks?" You ask, trying to keep your voice calm. 

"What?" He laughs. "Babe, no, come on. I'm broke. I don't get paid again for two weeks. You know this." 

"You just got paid yesterday." You breathe through gritted teeth. "Where the hell did all your money go?" You ask, your hands balled into fists. 

"You know babe, I had the fantasy football league entry, plus I owed Kyle money for the keg bomber last weekend, and I took the boys out for supper yesterday. Shit adds up." He says, never looking at you, only focusing on the game. 

"And that's my problem, why exactly? Why is it always on me just because you're not financially stable. Grow up, you're 35 for christ sakes!" You yell. You stomp to the kitchen, grabbing your purse and slipping on your shoes before heading back into the living room. 

"Yeah, she's got her shoes and purse." He laughs. "She's definitely going to get my stuff." 

"You know what Chad? I'm definitely not going to get your snacks, get your own fucking snacks, Chaaad. I'm going for a drink, with my own goddamn money." You spit, storming out of the house. 

You're wandering down the street, like you had been for the last thirty five minutes, and finally you found somewhere that looked decent enough. You walk in, and the lights are on very low, the place is almost dark, had it not been for the red lights swinging above tables, or the string of red lights wrapping around the ceiling. Your eyes wander the open floor of seating as a soft beat vibrates through the building. Every person in here who was sitting with someone was leaning closely to that person, seemingly having an intense conversation. The vibes felt dark and eerie, but you welcomed it, you enjoyed it instead of being around Chad's fuck boy mentality. You walk towards the bar, sliding onto one of the empty bar stools and setting your purse on your lap. Your eyes were looking down when you felt a presence standing in front of you. You look up and see quite possibly the most beautiful man you have ever seen. 

"What can I get for you?" He asks, his voice is deep, yet so smooth and calming.

"Double vodka and coke please, and for the love of god, keep them coming." You sigh. After your comment you see the slightest hint of a smile appear on his lips, disappearing even quicker than it came. 

"Bad day?" He asks, beginning to pour your drink. 

"Bad relationship." You groan. He nods his head as he slides your drink towards you. 

"Wanna talk about it?" He asks, leaning on the bar with his chin resting on his hands as he waits for you to speak. You look into his eyes, and they're so warm and mesmerizing, you felt safe and secure, like you could tell him anything. Which is exactly what you did.

"What's your name?" You ask. 

"Hongjoong." He replies. "You?" 

"Y/N." 

"Okay Y/N, what's bothering you?" 

"My boyfriend, we've been together for just over a year, and well.. he's something, and not the good something like people usually say. He moved in with me, without even asking me if I wanted to, and I just kind of accepted it. He doesn't pay anything, no bills, rent, groceries, nothing. It's all on me, even though he does work full time. He forgot my birthday, went out and got absolutely plastered with his 'boys'. On Valentine's Day, he took me out for dinner, and can you guess who was there?" You ask. 

"His boys?" He answered. 

"You sir, are correct. I was ignored the entire evening, and then he and his boys left, I ended up paying the bill, and I had to uber home because he had driven us there. Not to mention the fact that he assumes I'm just there for his pleasure, expecting me to be spread eagle for him whenever he decides to show up." You finish, chugging your drink as you try not to gag on the strong taste of vodka. 

"Why are you with him then? He doesn't sound like he contributes to the relationship at all, so why do you stay?" He asks. 

'Honestly, I'm not entirely sure." You answer as he slides another drink in front of you.

"Now that's a bullshit excuse." He replies. "There's a reason that you clearly don't want to admit." 

"Do you ever smile?" You ask him. 

"No." He answers. "Now, why won't you leave him?" 

"Because it's safe, I guess? I don't know if I can do any better than him." You shrug. 

"Y/N, you have no idea how much better you could do." He says. 

** 

From the moment Hongjoong had a whiff of the scent that was coming into his bar, he knew that it was the scent of the one. He intensely watched the door, waiting for the one it belonged too to walk through the door. As soon as you did, it was almost as though his heart could have started beating once again, the ice cold blood that ran through his body could have turned warm just by the sight of you. He isn't sure what it is about you, but he had always been told that he would know when he found the one, and having been alive for over a century, he had just assumed that it wasn't in the cards for him, and now he knows why. Because all his life he had been waiting for you. The person that he would do anything for, the person that he would be anything for had finally walked into his life, and for once he felt an ounce of hope, until, you had mentioned the filthy human you were in a relationship with, not to mention one that treated you like absolute garage, and you had assumed that no one better would love you, but shit were you ever wrong. He was standing right in front of you, and though you had just met him, he loved you with everything he had and would do anything and everything to protect you. 

**

"I appreciate your advice, Hongjoong, but it's getting late and I have to work tomorrow." You sigh. "How much do I owe you?" You ask, grabbing your card from your wallet. 

"It's on me." He tells you, grabbing your empty glass.

"Well thank you." You smile. "It was nice meeting you." You tell him as you slide off the stool. 

"You too." He says, watching you walk away from him. 

That night when you got home, you couldn't get Hongjoong off your mind, a smile spread across your face as you walked through your front door, and headed into the living room, then it instantly dropped. Chad had not moved from the spot you had previously left him in a few hours ago. "Oh, babe." He says, sucking the cheeto dust from his fingers. "Kyle brought me some snacks, since you threw a huge temper tantrum about my snacks, you can just venmo or cash app him, k?" He says, going back to playing his game. 

You went to bed that night, dreaming of one man, who was not your man. 

**

Over the next few weeks, you had absolutely no desire to be at home. So you headed to the bar that Hongjoong worked at, everyday after work for a drink, or two, or four. In those weeks the two of you spent an ample amount of time getting to know each other, you were sure he knew you better than Chad ever did.  You didn't want to see Chad, you didn't want to be near him and it was bad enough that he constantly texted you throughout the day, sending you lists of things to buy from the grocery store, as if he wasn't able to do it himself. But much to your surprise, he didn't text you when you never came home with his snacks, he didn't check in with you throughout the day, and honestly it no longer bothered you. 

You felt your feelings for Hongjoong deepen with every encounter the two of you had, every time you saw him it was like nothing you had ever felt with Chad, your emotions were amplified around Hongjoong and you weren't sure how much longer you could keep them hidden. 

"One more." You tell Hongjoong, as you set down your fourth glass. 

You can tell he wants to smile, but he's too good at controlling his emotions. "You've had enough, I'm cutting you off." He tells you. 

You pout, trying to give him your best puppy dog eyes, but absolutely nothing got to the man and it was frustrating as fuck. 

"A bad storm is coming, you should probably get home." He tells you, drying off some glasses. 

"I don't want to go home, he's there." You scoff, just thinking about Chad made you want to vomit. "I guess I could just get a motel room, at that place across the street." You say, pointing over to the run down motel, that had flickering lights, and probably a rat and cockroach infestation. 

"You will do no such thing." Hongjoong replies. "You can stay at my place." He says. "Give me a minute." He walks from around the bar, towards the back of the building, and you can't help but to turn in your stool and watch him walk away, damn he looks good. 

Within seconds he's back, grabbing your bag and scooping you up into his arms as he effortlessly carries you out the door. 

"I can walk." You object. 

"I know." He says, his face stone cold. 

"You're very pale." You tell him, as if he didn't know. 

"I know." He replies, unlocking the door to his car. 

"And you're very cold." You say. 

He sighs. "I know." He finishes as he slides you into the passenger seat of his car. 

As soon as he started his car, the rain began pouring as thunder and lightning jolted the sky. 

"You were right, there's a storm." You say, watching out your window. 

"I know." He replies, this time it sounded different. You turned to look at him, hoping you'd catch him smiling but no such luck. 

He continues driving, taking you out into the middle of nowhere, out of city limits, this was it, this was probably when you died. You panicked slightly but you felt it in your entire body that he was not going to murder you, at least not that night. 

Hongjoong pulls up to a gate, punching in a few numbers to open the gate, which just blocked off a winding road. You squinted as you tried to see where you were going but it was far too dark for you to see anything, until you pulled up to a beautiful mid-century mansion that made your mouth drop. It was absolutely stunning and you couldn't believe that he lived there. 

"Seriously? This is where you live?" You say. 

"MY family, but yeah." He answers, parking the car near the entrance. 

He hops out of his seat, walking towards your side to open the door for you, pulling you inside before you get too wet. He dragged you up a large flight of stairs, not letting you admire the inside of his house. He put you inside a large room, with a large bed and a bathroom ensuite. "There's towels if you want to shower, I'll be back in a bit to check on you." He says, avoiding all eye contact before walking out of the room. 

You let out a deep breath as you take off your heels, unbutton your pants and unhook your bra, placing it all next to the bed. You sit down on the bed in your underwear and t-shirt, wondering what to do, until your phone rings. 

Looking at the caller ID, you didn't want to answer it, but you felt it would be unfair for you to do so. 

"Hello?" You answer. 

"Hey babe, it's me.. it's Chad." He says. 

"I know who it is." You sigh. 

"Look.. I know you've been terrible, oh, wait, I mean I've been terrible in our relationship lately but I want to make almonds." He says. "No idiot, it's amends." You hear from the background. 

"Are you kidding me right now? Do you seriously have Brad over to help you?" You yell. 

"Well yeah, he noticed that we were drifting apart and offered to help me get you back." Chad explains. 

You get up off the bed, pacing on the hardwood floors as you tried to process what he just said to you. 

"The fact that you didn't even notice that we were drifting apart is all that I need to hear. You know what, Chad? I'm done. I'm done with this relationship, I'm done with you. Just get out of my apartment, I'm over it." You yell, hanging up the phone. 

You stand there, taking deep breaths as you replay the conversation you just had, he didn't even care enough to notice that you'd been pulling away. That kind of hurt, but then again it was Chad. He was never very perceptive. 

A knock at the door before it suddenly opens, reveals Hongjoong, walking into the room. He tried to play it cool with the fact that you were practically naked in front of it. 

"I heard yelling. You okay?" He asks as lightning strikes, causing the power to flicker. 

"Chad called, he had his friend Brad over to feed him lines because Brad noticed we were drifting apart." You explain. "But I did it. I ended things." You proudly admit. 

"Good for you." He says, staring at you, while you stare back at him. A crack of thunder hits loudly, making you jump, and within seconds Hongjoong's arms are wrapped around you, like he was protecting you. You look at him and he looks at you, and before you can tell yourself not to, your lips are pressed against him, and he is kissing you back. 

The kiss turns passionate and needy in seconds, both of your desires for one another coming out without any control. He moves you both to the bed, laying you down as he hovers over you, his strong arms keeping him above you. You wrap your arms and legs around him, pulling his body closer to yours, feeling him near was all you'd wanted. His ice cold fingers touch your stomach as he begins to lift your shirt up, you can feel his cock slowly becoming harder. You begin lifting his shirt, when his phone rings. He stands up, whispering an apology before answering his phone, barely speaking any words. 

"I'm so sorry, Y/N. I have some things to take care of." He says. 

"Oh, yeah, no problem." You say, sitting on the edge of the bed. 

"Get some sleep." He tells you before walking out of the bedroom door, leaving you alone once again. 

You tried to fight the exhaustion you felt, but it was far too hard. You got snuggled underneath the blankets, watching the door, hoping he would come back but your eyelids got too heavy for you to keep open, and you swiftly drifted off to sleep, finally feeling some peace. 

**

The warm sun was shining into the room, waking you up. You let out a little stretch before opening your eyes, only to see five men standing around you. You sit up, moving to the wall, as these men stare at you. You looked at them all, and they all looked similar to Hongjoong. Pale skin, dark eyes, dark head, blood red lips. 

"Who are you?" One of them asks. 

"Y/N." You whisper. 

Another one speaks up, looking at the other four men. "Who the fuck brought a human home?" 

[tchallasbabymama]

Don't Forget About Us

Hello, my lovelies. Here’s my contribution to @nahimjustfeelingit-writes smut challenge (the prompt is in bold!) Let’s see what Erik’s up to now, shall we?

Don’t forget to check out my masterlist to read my other stories and oneshots. Your comments and reblogs mean the world to me, so make sure to let me know what you think! And let me know if you want to be tagged in any of my writing. Enjoy😘

Word count: 5,595

CW: smut...duh.

“So, what do you do for a living?”

Kayla sighed internally at the question and took a sip of her Pinot Grigio. She hated first dates with a burning passion, but unfortunately, that was the only way to find a man around here. She went through the motions of politely answering his questions, barely asking any of her own. She didn’t care. Even just fifteen minutes in, Kayla could tell he didn’t excite her, and she lamented the waste of a good outfit as she listened to him drone on about his life. Every now and then, he’d stop and ask a question about her, but she could tell he was only asking so he could talk more about himself.

How many siblings do you have?

What’s your sign?

Why did your last relationship end?

Her mind traveled to her ex-boyfriend, Erik Stevens. They had spent six blissful years together, and Kayla thought he was the one. She wanted them to get married and start a family, and she thought he did, too, but every time she brought it up, he’d find some excuse to change the subject. At thirty years old, Kayla wasn’t getting any younger, so she grew tired of his avoidance and eventually cut him loose. She needed more out of life, but the guy currently sitting across from her certainly wasn’t it.

“We wanted different things,” she answered vaguely and took another sip. It would be a long night with what’s-his-name. David? Devon? Whatever. At least he had money and took her to a nice restaurant.

Darryl took the opportunity to bore her with the details of his job, which Kayla already knew. He was a colleague of her best friend, Carina’s husband. They worked at the same law firm, and Carina decided to hook them up after tiring of hearing Kayla complain about dating apps. As much as Kayla hated Tinder, she would’ve much rather been at home on her couch swiping left on the cesspool of single men Oakland had to offer. Every few dozen swipes or so, she’d find a cutie, but his bio would be abysmal, or his conversation skills would fall flat.

Despite the fact that their relationship just couldn’t make it, Kayla still thought of Erik as the gold standard. Just thinking about his dimples and his struggle beard made her smile dreamily. His big, strong arms would wrap around her and hold her tight at night, and she’d trace her fingers over the intentionally placed keloid scars that held his darkest secrets. She missed retwisting his locs and the way he always smelled like sandalwood and warm vanilla. Kayla didn’t want to admit it, but she still loved him. No man could compare to her Erik.

“Hello? Kayla?”

“Huh? Oh, sorry. Can you repeat that last part?”

“Uh, yeah, sure. What’s got you so distracted, babygirl?”

Kayla fought the bile rising in her throat. She wasn’t his babygirl. It didn’t even sound right coming from his mouth. Maybe it was the thinness of his lips. They weren’t “white man” thin, but they couldn’t hold a candle to the juicy pussy pleasers she had grown accustomed to.

“Nothing, just thought I saw somebody I know. You were saying?”

“Just that you look beautiful tonight,” Damon attempted to flirt with her.

Kayla wanted to roll her eyes but thanked him instead and smiled politely again. Of course she looked beautiful; she had pulled out all the stops for what she had hoped would be a good night out. Kayla had squeezed her thickness into a lavender satin dress. The way the dress’s skirt cinched on the side kept it snug around her plush waist, but the high slit that traveled up her thigh was the main attraction. The strappy silver heels on her feet showed off her matching pedicure that contrasted beautifully with her glistening brown skin, and her makeup was flawless. Her outerwear for the night, a cropped fur jacket that had found its way to the coat check when they arrived, was the icing on the cake. Her outfit deserved the appreciation, just not from Deshawn.

The waiter saved her from having to focus on her date when she brought out the food they had ordered. Since Kayla knew Derek had money, she had ordered the whole lobster, and she fought her mouth from drooling too much as the waiter set it down in front of her. It laid on a bed of forbidden rice, and the side of roasted brussels sprouts and cremini mushrooms looked heavenly. The ramekin of drawn butter off to the side tempted her as it sat next to the minuscule seafood fork. She may not enjoy her company for the evening, but Kayla damn sure was going to enjoy her meal.

“Looks good,” Dominic called from the other side of the table, breaking Kayla from her trance as he cut into his wagyu beef.

“Sure does.” Kayla wasted no time before digging into her meal. Not only was it the perfect excuse to avoid conversation, but it was perfect, period.

A slight chill permeated the air as the door swung open and the crisp January air entered the small restaurant. Kayla shivered as she complained internally about being forced to sit near the door, but that shiver intensified as she heard a voice. His voice.

“Reservation for Stevens, please.”

Kayla stilled.

“Of course. Right this way, sir,” the maitre d’ responded, and Kayla heard three sets of footsteps coming her way.

--------

“Babe, let’s go!”

“Yell at me one more time, woman,” Erik warned as he came around the corner into the living room, fastening his watch.

“I swear, you take more time getting ready than I do.”

“Whatever, Mo. You ready?”

“Nigga, I been ready!”

Erik rolled his eyes and grabbed his keys. It would be a rough night, and things were already starting off on a bad foot. He and Monique had been seeing each other for the better part of a year, and he’d finally reached his limit. She was overbearing, rude, and just after him for his money, but he hated being alone, so he put up with her bullshit. His cousin, T’Challa, had tried to hook him up with a few ladies back in Wakanda when he went to visit after his breakup, but nothing stuck. Almost immediately after coming back to the states, Erik met Monique at a charity event for the Outreach Center. She had the singing voice of an angel and had been booked as the entertainment for the evening. Erik was drawn to her like a sailor to a siren, and she immediately sank her teeth into him. Past her vocal talents, Monique wasn’t really anything special. Her personality left a lot to be desired, she wasn’t the sharpest crayon in the box, and she just wasn’t her.

The moment Kayla ended their relationship a year ago, Erik’s whole world shattered. He had lived a life full of pain and loss, but Kayla had been his lifeline. She pulled him out of the dark and made him revel in the sunshine. Hell, she was the sunshine, but now he had settled for a UV lamp at best. Kayla had wanted a life that Erik was too scared to give her, but that fear became his downfall. He still missed her most nights. He was lonely, and Monique was there to keep him company, but that wasn’t enough for him anymore. Erik craved a connection that Monique just couldn’t provide. So he decided he had to break it off and figured that doing so in a public place would probably be best. She had a tendency to throw things when she got angry.

The car ride to Chez Martine was tense. Monique had been angry all day because Erik had taken back his credit card even though she wanted to buy a new dress for their date. Her lousy mood almost made him dump her back at his condo, but Erik kept a cool head and stayed focused on the plan. He ignored the way Monique complained the entire time she got ready, reluctantly putting on a dress he had seen her wear before. It didn’t matter to him; he knew what the night held.

When they walked into the restaurant, Erik’s heart dropped into his stomach. He’d recognize that shoulder blade tattoo anywhere. She had cut off all her hair and lost a few pounds, but he knew for sure that he was looking at Kayla. His Kayla. He forced himself to look straight ahead as they passed her table and prayed that the maitre d’ didn’t sit them where she could see him. Unfortunately, he had no such luck because the only open table for two was directly within her line of sight. He prayed again that Monique would sit on the far side of the table, but Bast ignored his pleas once more. He had to sit facing her, and as soon as he got comfortable in his chair, her gaze slyly trailed over to him. They locked eyes across the room, and Erik’s heart stopped. She was just as beautiful as the last time he saw her all those months ago, but who the fuck was that sitting across from her?

“What are you looking at?” Monique’s abrasive voice cut through his eardrums.

“Nothing. Just thought I saw someone I know, that’s all.”

She cut her eyes at him and turned around to look as he buried his face in the menu.

“Quit being nosy,” he complained.

“I just wanna see who’s got your attention, that’s all.” Monique turned back around with a sour look on her face. “It’s probably that fat girl with her cleavage all out.”

“Mo, just look at the fucking menu and act like you got some sense.”

“Fine.”

Monique pouted until the waiter showed up, but she plastered a fake smile on her face as he took their order. As usual, she ordered the most expensive thing on the menu, and it bothered him to no end that she was hellbent on spending all of his money. Of course, he had plenty, but she felt entitled to it. Kayla never cared about him being rich. Hell, when they got together, she didn’t even know he was a prince, but he loved to spoil her nonetheless. He loved the look on her face when he’d buy her things or take her on the expensive trips that she more than deserved. Kayla appreciated everything he did for her with all her heart, but she’d say the same thing every time.

“Thank you, baby, but you’re all I need.”

Erik smiled fondly at the memory of when he bought her a diamond tennis bracelet from Wakanda for their second anniversary. She was so excited to have diamonds that weren’t marred by exploited labor that she damn near dropped the box when she saw what was inside. It had been a rough year for them, what with him disappearing for a couple of months to seize the Wakandan throne and all. She certainly had plenty of colorful words for him when he came back. He’ll never forget the look on her face when he showed up at her door. He had brought T’Challa for backup just in case, but she looked right past the king as tears welled up in her eyes at seeing her Erik, alive and well.

Erik’s eyes started to get misty as he thought about the way she kissed him with so much emotion...then slapped him across the face for leaving. His gaze wandered back over to Kayla and he noticed the light bounce off of something on her arm. She was wearing the bracelet.

As if she felt his glare, Kayla shifted uncomfortably in her seat, so he averted his eyes back to Monique, who had caught him staring again.

“Why don’t you go say hi?” she asked sarcastically, making him roll his eyes so hard they almost got stuck.

--------

Erik Stevens. Here, of all places. He just had to be here.

Kayla noticed that he didn’t seem to be enjoying his modelesque date’s company any more than she was enjoying Darwin’s, and the pang of jealousy she felt at seeing him with another woman went away. She knew she had no right to feel any kind of way about it, especially since she was the one that broke things off. That didn’t make it any easier, though.

Dylan was too wrapped up in his steak to notice her wandering eye, but it seemed that Erik’s food was as uninteresting as the woman across from him. Kayla watched as he half-heartedly pushed it around his plate, but he certainly kept his favorite whiskey coming. She wanted to chuckle but didn’t want Daniel to think he had anything to do with her levity. They were both drowning their dissatisfactions in their alcohols of choice, and Kayla got a phantom taste of Uncle Nearest 1856 on her lips as she watched him take a sip. When he set the glass down and licked his lips, Kayla felt flush. She missed those lips…

“So, how about dessert?” Damien asked as he leaned back in his chair and rubbed his stomach. “I hear their creme brulee is amazing.”

“Uh, sure, why not?”

“You know,” he began as he leaned in and reached for her hands. She allowed him to take them, but the softness of his hands disgusted her. No callouses, no roughness, not even a firm grip. “I’ve had a great night. I’d love to see you again.”

Kayla chuckled nervously, unsure of how to proceed.

“What are you doing next-”

“Are you fucking kidding me?!”

A shrill voice pierced the air as Erik’s date bolted up from her seat. Desmond, and the whole restaurant, turned around to see what was going on, and Kayla took the opportunity to remove her hands from his.

“Keep your voice down,” Erik sneered through his teeth. “We’re in public.”

“So?! You bring me out here just to dump me? To dump this?!” she gestured at her slim figure, and he rolled his eyes.

“You ain’t even all that,” he waved her off. He was tired of playing nice, and Kayla could see the exasperation written all over his face.

“Excuse me, miss-” the waiter attempted to calm her down, but the crazed woman cut him off.

“Stay out of this!”

“I’m so sorry,” Erik mouthed to the poor man who would absolutely be getting a monstrous tip later.

“Oh, you’re sorry for him, but not for me?”

“Mo, just sit down. We can finish our meal like adults-”

“Fuck you, Erik.” She threw her dirty martini at him, soaking the front of his all-black ensemble.

Kayla could damn near see the steam coming out of his ears as his apparent ex stormed out of the restaurant. Erik locked eyes with her across the room, and when he saw the concern written all over her face, his softened.

“Whew, poor fella,” Dexter commented as he turned back around. “Where was I? Oh-”

“Excuse me, where’s your restroom?” Kayla interrupted him as their waiter walked by.

“Right down there.” She pointed at a set of stairs off to the side, and Kayla thanked her as she slid out of her seat.

“I’ll be back, Darius.”

“It’s Denzel.” He deflated.

“Fuck,” she froze. She had been sure it was Darius. “Still, I’ll be back.”

“I’ll be here,” he responded, obviously upset by her slip-up.

Kayla hurried off down the stairs and leaned against the wall as she waited for either of the single-use restrooms to open up. She took a deep breath and opened her clutch, reaching in to pull out her phone with a shaky hand and typing in his number. It was one of the few she had memorized, just in case.

“You ok?”

Her thumb hovered over the send button, but she couldn’t press it. Her heart nearly thumped out of her chest at the thought of starting a conversation with him, but something within her said that she should. It would be weird not to say anything after all that, right?

“Hey-”

“Shit!” Kayla dropped her phone when his silky baritone graced her ears.

“My fault, ma.” Erik leaned over and picked the phone off the floor, checking it for cracks. He saw she had typed a message out to him and smirked before handing it back to her.

“T-thanks.”

“No problem. And, yeah, I’m ok.”

“Huh?”

Erik pointed at her phone screen.

“Oh! Right. Um, well, that’s good to hear.” Kayla attempted to push her hair behind her ear out of habit, forgetting she had just cut it all off a week ago.

“What about you?”

“What about me?”

“You ok? You don’t seem to into ole dude out there.”

Kayla sighed and rolled her eyes, “Oh, him.”

“Damn, it’s like that?” Erik laughed, and she slapped his arm. That slight contact was enough to spark a flame in them both, and Erik’s face turned serious. “For real, though, not going well?”

“Better than you, it seems,” she quipped as she eyed his wet shirt. That was a bad idea because his first three buttons were undone, and she caught a peek of the raised scars that she missed so much. And that broad chest, and the chain with his father’s ring that he always wore. He’d let her wear it from time to time, and she always felt like it was such an honor. He trusted her enough to let her wear it. He loved her enough to-

Kayla pried her eyes away and made yet another mistake: she looked up at him. Those eyes still looked like sweet, sweet molasses, and even though his locs were braided back, she could tell he was letting them grow out. She momentarily wondered who was retwisting them nowadays, but her train of thought was cut short by the scent of sandalwood and vanilla. Kayla’s mind went blank as she inhaled slowly.

“Heh, yeah. That was...that was pretty embarrassing. Not even gonna lie.” Erik looked away shyly, unable to hold her gaze.

“I guess you’ll need to find a new date spot, huh?”

“Nah, I think I’m good on dating for a while.”

“Same,” Kayla sighed. “Dating sucks.”

“Yeah…”

One of the bathroom doors unlocked, and a middle-aged white man stepped out and passed them on the way up the stairs.

“Well, I should-”

“Yeah, go ahead.”

Kayla walked towards the bathroom, but before she could reach the door, she felt a light tug on her wrist. His touch still gave her goosebumps, and he noticed her raised skin as she turned to face him.

“I just, uh...it was nice seeing you, Kay-kay.” Erik smiled at her, and she nearly melted. She missed when he called her that, too. “You look good.”

“Thanks, E.” She smiled back. “So do you.”

He let her go, and Kayla disappeared into the bathroom. When she closed the door behind her, she took a deep breath to center herself. After all these months, Erik still took her breath away. He clouded her senses and scrambled her mind. Even as she took care of business, her brain replayed their short interaction on a loop.

Kayla locked eyes with her reflection as she dried her hands. How could she go back up there to- what’s his name? Oh, yeah, Da- Denzel. That’s it, Denzel. How could she go back up there to his mediocre company when the man she still loved had made her feel so alive with just one touch. That was the magic of Erik, his magnetism. When they were together, she couldn’t help but be drawn to him, even when she wanted to slap him across his beautiful face. Those were some of the best times, though. If she was angry at him, he knew exactly what to do to calm her down. To put her in her place. To remind her-

Kayla’s daydreaming was cut short by a knock at the door.

“Occupied!”

It came again.

“I’ll be out in a minute!”

She reached for another paper towel to dab off the sweat that had started to pool on her skin at the thought of Erik’s dominance when the door opened.

“What the f- Erik?!”

He pushed inside the bathroom and locked the door behind him.

“You need to start locking doors, Kay.”

“I- what do you want?”

“I want to talk to you,” he spoke as he moved closer to her.

“Here?!”

“Yeah, here,” he chuckled.

Kayla rolled her eyes and tried to push past him.

“Now is not the time or place-”

“When is?” he blocked her exit, and she crossed her arms in defeat, looking up at him through her lashes as she leaned against the sink. “Look, I just need to say something real quick.”

“Fine,” Kayla sighed and gestured for him to continue. She knew there was no use fighting him. She wasn’t leaving that bathroom until he was good and ready.

“Kay,” his voice softened, and she looked away only to have her face pulled back in his direction. “Kay-kay, look at me.”

She made the mistake of doing just that, getting lost in his eyes again.

“I miss you,” Erik murmured.

“Erik-”

“Look, I know, ok? I know. And I’m sorry, Kay. I really am- no, look at me. I’m sorry I wasn’t enough for you...but I miss you, girl.”

Kayla’s eyes welled up with tears that she tried her hardest to blink away, but one had the nerve to fall. Erik wiped it away, and the next one, and the next one. A sob wracked Kayla’s body, and he wrapped his arms around her body.

“Don’t cry, babygirl. I know you worked hard on your makeup.”

Kayla laughed through her tears, but the emotions washed back over her, and she buried her face into his chest. It was already soaked with gin, so what harm would a few tears do?

He held her and rocked her softly from side to side as she cried, and after a couple of minutes, she found the will to look up at him again. His cheeks were wet, so she reached up and swiped her thumbs over them as she held his face in her small hands. He nuzzled into them and kissed her wrists.

“I miss you, too, E,” she croaked.

“I know, babygirl.”

He leaned in to kiss her forehead, and she closed her eyes as his soft lips caressed her skin. They stayed intertwined for who knows how long until Erik felt Kayla begin to pull back. He looked down at her, and the two of them locked eyes. Before they knew it, their lips had met in the middle in a passionate embrace. They got lost in each other for a moment until common sense returned to Kayla, and she pushed him off.

“We can’t-”

“Why not?”

“Because…”

“Because what, Kay?” Erik’s voice rumbled as he closed what little gap was between their bodies. He left soft kisses on her temples before working down to her cheeks, then her jawline, and eventually the column of her neck. She let out a soft whimper when his teeth grazed the crook of her neck but pushed him back again before he could continue any further.

“Erik, I...I still love you, and-”

He attacked her lips with his, hands feverishly gripping her waist as he pushed her further into the sink. She had nowhere to go, and she was ok with that.

“I...love you...too...babygirl,” he whispered between kisses.

Kayla’s mind went blank as he lifted her up on the counter and pressed himself between her legs. She could feel him, all of him, and damn did she miss that monster between his legs.

“Erik,” she moaned as he nipped at her earlobe. He still knew how to play her body like a violin.

“Mmm, say it again.”

“Erik!” she squeaked as she felt his strong hands grip her thighs.

“Just like that,” he groaned, and she flooded her already wet panties.

“Baby-”

He connected his forehead to hers and stared deep into her eyes. “You miss me?”

“Mhm,” Kayla nodded with her lip between her teeth.

“I miss you, too, baby. I think about you all the time. Every day,” he pecked her lips, “every night. I miss everything about you, Kay-kay. Your off-key singing, your horrible cooking-”

“Shut up,” Kayla giggled as his hands traveled up her dress.

“Your body…fuck I miss this body. I miss how you smell, how you taste...how that tight little pussy feels wrapped around my dick.”

Kayla widened her legs for him as his fingers found their way to the seat of her panties, stroking up and down her slit. Erik kissed his way back down her face and over to her ear, his warm breath sending chills down her spine.

“Do you think about me when you touch yourself? Because I do. You’re all I see when I stroke my dick...wishing it was your hand...your lips...this fucking pussy.”

Erik pushed her panties to the side, and his nimble fingers circled her clit. Kayla let out a small moan that was music to his ears, making fingers move faster and her breath grow shallower with each rotation.

“Answer me.”

“Mhm.”

“Come on, babygirl, you can do better than that. You think about me when you play in your pussy? This pussy right here?” he asked as he slapped her vulva, her wetness sticking to his hand.

“Y-yes, baby-”

“Uh-uh, you know who I am. Say it,” Erik commanded as he snuck three fingers inside her wetness, making her moan loudly in his ear. “Shhh, you gotta be quiet, babygirl. You don’t want people out there knowing how much of a slut you are, right?”

Kayla shook her head no.

“That’s what I thought. Now, I asked you a question, Kayla,” he reminded her. His gruff voice made her weak, and the fingers that were steadily speeding up inside her certainly didn’t help. “Answer me. Who am I, babygirl?”

Kayla tried to hold out as much as she could. She didn’t want to say it, too proud to give in, but the way he was currently stretching out her pussy and curling his fingers inside her made her cling to his shoulders. The bastard knew what he was doing, and she didn’t want to let him win. But then, he played dirty and bit down on her neck. She cried out, and when he pulled back to look at her, the ferocity in his eyes drove her up the wall.

“I said, who the fuck am I, Kayla?” Erik growled. His hand sped up, making her weak with every thrust. She couldn’t hold it anymore and came undone around him, her mouth betraying her as his name fell from her lips.

“Daddy!” she gasped as her pussy spasmed, and he chuckled darkly.

“Damn right I am,” he kissed her lips, “now gimme that pussy. Daddy missed his pussy.”

Kayla heard a rip and felt the cool air between her legs as he tore through her panties to get to her treasure trove. She reached down between them and grabbed his clothed erection in her hand, making him groan as he bit down on his luscious bottom lip. She undid his belt buckle and slowly unzipped his pants before reaching in and pulling out his throbbing dick.

The longing in her eyes told him everything he needed to know, so he pushed her legs back and tapped his head on her clit.

“You want daddy’s dick in you?”

“Mhm,” she whimpered.

“Good.”

He pushed in and groaned at the feeling of her pussy walls gripping him as he sheathed himself inside her.

“Fuck, you feel like home.”

Kayla moaned into his neck in response and wound her hips against him, meeting him thrust for thrust as he stroked into her slow and deep. She couldn’t form words. He felt so damn good inside her that Kayla’s brain had short-circuited. Erik’s dick hit spots that she could never find herself no matter how hard she tried. Even in her dreams, he drove her body wild. She had spent the last year trying to find somebody, anybody who could make her feel that way, but nobody could compare to Erik Stevens.

Erik and Kayla panted heavily into each others’ mouths as he made love to her body, and as soon as Kayla started to tense up, his thrusts grew harder.

“I-I-”

“I know, babygirl. Daddy feels it,” he groaned as he nipped at her bottom lip. “Cum on my dick like a good girl.”

His words sent Kayla into overdrive, and her body shook as she spilled over him. Her spasming walls hugged him tight, and she wrapped her legs around his waist, begging him with her eyes.

“You feel amazing,” she moaned.

“Mhm. I know them other niggas wasn’t hitting it like this. I just know it. Look at you, cumming all over daddy’s dick. Look at it!” He grabbed her chin and made her look down at her throbbing pussy as his dick slid in and out of her.

“We look so good, daddy!”

Erik slammed into her, and she bit into his shoulder to keep from screaming. He gave her his all over and over, rocking the countertop in the process.

“We’ll look even better if you let me cum in this pussy. Mix my cum with yours-”

“Yes!”

“Yes?” He chuckled. “You want it that bad, huh? Nasty ass, in here getting fucked while that bum ass nigga’s waiting for you upstairs.”

“Mmm, I want it.”

“Want what, babygirl?” Erik teased as he brought his thumb to her clit, strumming it slowly as he thrust into her.

“You. I want you to cum deep in me.”

“Shit,” Erik groaned. “You want it deep in there?”

“Mhm. Put it where it belongs, daddy.” Kayla licked up the side of his neck, making his knees buckle. “Cum in your pussy.”

Erik lost all sense of control and pounded into her tight pussy, somehow getting even deeper in preparation for his release. Kayla held on tight as she felt him begin to spasm inside her, and she released around him again as his deep moans tickled her ear. Erik thrust extra deep and held his dick in place as he emptied his balls into her warmth, whimpering lightly as she rubbed his back to soothe him and bring him back down.

“I missed you, babygirl.”

“I missed you, too, daddy.”

They stayed like that, wrapped up in each other until their breathing slowed. Erik was the first to move, slowly pulling himself out of Kayla as she whined at the loss of contact. He kissed all over her face before planting a slow, sweet kiss on her lips.

“I can’t let you go again, Kay-kay,” his voice cracked as tears threatened to fall from his eyes again.

Kayla pulled him back in and kissed him so deeply that she nearly lost herself in him again, but he pulled away and looked her in her eyes.

“I’m serious, girl. I’ll do anything. I’ll marry you, give you as many big-headed babies as you want. Just, please, Kay-” she cut him off with another kiss to shut him up.

“We should go back to my place and talk,” she whispered, and Erik’s face lit up. Something about the way she said it, the way she kissed him, the way her body still responded to his...it gave him hope. Kayla smiled at him and pecked his lips once more before hopping off of the sink. He had to catch her because her legs were wobbly, and she stumbled a little in her heels.

“You aight?” he laughed.

“No, nigga,” she slapped his chest, and the two of them got caught in a laughing fit. They had really just fucked in the bathroom at Chez Martine. Kayla was on cloud nine until a thought occurred to her, and her face fell flat. “Oh, shit.”

“What?” Erik’s face turned serious, and his eyes scanned over her body, looking for whatever the problem was.

Kayla started giggling again, and he looked confused.

“What is it?” he asked, barely able to keep a straight face. Her laugh was always so infectious…

“Demetrius.”

“Who?!”

“My date.”

“Girl, don’t worry about him. He probably thinks you dipped out anyway.”

Kayla shrugged and fixed her dress as Erik stuffed his shirt back in his pants. They checked their reflections in the mirror, and Kayla was pleasantly surprised that her makeup was still intact thanks to that setting spray she had splurged on the other day.

“Ready?” Erik asked as he admired her beauty. Kayla nodded, and he unlocked the door, opening it to find Duncan leaning against the wall with a sour look on his face. Kayla’s eyes blew wide as she tried to figure out what to say to her date for the evening.

“Heyyy, um…”

“Denzel,” he seethed.

“Yeah, sorry. So, um, we’re-”

“Sorry, bruh,” Erik clapped him on the shoulder, “but we heading out. Bathroom’s all yours, though.”

Erik pulled Kayla along, and she sent Deion an apologetic glance before following Erik up the stairs. It seemed the whole restaurant knew what had occurred, but neither one of them cared. They were just happy to be around each other again. It had been entirely too long.

Taglist: @ladymac82, @kitesatforestp, @harleycativy, @raysunshine78, @maddeningmayhem, @theblulife, @motheroffae, @love-mesome-me,@toni9, @bribrisback, @impremenior, @blacklytical, @uzumaki-rebellion, @honeyandpeaches, @cecereads209, @wakandama2,

[snelbz]

Life As We Know It {Chapter 19}

Summary: After the sudden deaths of Nesta’s sister and Cassian’s best friend, they gain guardianship of their nephew, Nyx.

Based on Life As We Know It (2010) and a prompt sent in by anonymous for our Nessian fanfic contest. This is a modern au.

Instead of doing a tag list for this story, we have decided to have a set posting schedule. Chapters will be posted weekly on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays. Occasional surprise chapters could be posted at miscellaneous times. Chapters will be posted on both my and Tara’s blogs! >> @tacmc.​

Life As We Know It Masterlist

Shelby’s Masterlist

Tara’s Masterlist

A/N: Well, we promised a chapter today, so we decided to follow through on that. Even if we did post a surprise chapter last night. Oh, well. Enjoy! 🙃✨

Cassian sighed as he opened his eyes.

Another year older, another year wiser.

Well.

Another year older, anyway.

He blinked as he looked at the alarm clock on the nightstand. 7:58. Two minutes before his alarm would have gone off.

He hated when that happened, when his mind woke him up just before his alarm went off. There was no time to go back to sleep, it was perfect sleeping time wasted.

It was bullshit.

With a yawn, Cassian swung his legs over the side of his bed and got up. He stumbled to his dresser and pulled on a pair of sweatpants, just in time for his alarm to go off.

“Fuck you,” he muttered, quickly turning it off before flinging open his bedroom door.

It smelled delicious.

He meandered down the stairs and into the kitchen, where Nesta was icing a giant cake.

Her eyes darted to his.

He blinked.

“Get out!” she ordered.

“What the hell are you-.”

“Out!” she ordered, yet again.

Nyx babbled something at the top of his lungs that closely resembled, YEAH!

He did as he was told, blearily blinking as he stumbled back into the living room. He dragged a hand down his face. “Can I at least have some coffee?”

“In a minute!” She called and he heard quick footsteps, followed by the back door opening and closing. It opened again and she said, breathlessly, “Okay. You can come in now.”

Tentatively, Cassian rounded the corner and he found Nesta placing a platter of cinnamon rolls on the counter in place of the—

“Where did the cake go?” He asked, raising an eyebrow as he poured himself a cup of coffee.

Nesta was lifting a cinnamon roll onto each of the plates in front of her, cutting the one for Nyx into tiny bites for him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He blinked again, half-wondering if he’d imagined the decorated monstrosity he’d seen on the counter, but he sniffed, smelling the air again.

It mostly smelled like the sweet and spicy scent of cinnamon, but—

No, that was definitely cake he smelled.

“Right…” he said, pulling forks out of the silverware drawer and setting one next to each plate. “You’re up early.”

“Had a lot to do before renovations start this morning. I’m meeting Helion and the contractor at the restaurant at nine.” She sipped her own coffee, not looking at him. Mixing truth and lies, it seemed, since he knew she was meeting the contractor this morning. As for a lot to do, he knew everything at the restaurant was already taken care of. She cleared her throat. “I wasn’t expecting you to be up so early either.”

Cutting into the gooey cinnamon roll, he said, “I gotta be at the bar in an hour. I’m talking with Kallias this morning before my shift starts.”

She set her coffee down and finally looked at him. “You have to work today?”

“Yeah,” he replied, popping the bite of pastry into his mouth. He resisted the urge to moan. “It’s Tuesday. I always work on Tuesdays.”

She hesitated, deciding whether she should speak or not. “But it’s your birthday.”

He couldn’t stop his smirk. He knew there had been a cake.

“And who told you that?” He asked, leaning over to wipe Nyx’s face off. The poor kid had icing all over his face, all the way up into his hair.

“That’s not important,” she said.

“Elain, then,” Cassian went on with a grin.

Nesta pretended like she hadn’t heard him and took a giant bite of her cinnamon roll.

“I’ll take Nyx with me to the bar,” Cassian said. “Viviane texted. She has the stomach flu.”

Nesta cringed. “That sucks. I...wait - you’re taking a baby to a bar?”

Cassian shrugged. “He’ll be fine. I only have to stay until two or so.”

“A baby,” she repeated, blinking. “To a bar.”

“You prefer to take him into a construction zone?” Cassian asked. “One that you’re in charge of? That sounds stressful.”

Nesta’s eyes narrowed. “I can ask Elain to watch-.”

“I’m taking him with me and he’ll be fine,” Cassian said, shaking his head. “I promise.”

Nesta narrowed her eyes. And he held up both hands. “I promise,” he repeated.

“Fine. But call me if you need to and I’ll come get him,” she sighed, shaking her head. “I’ll be in my office most of the day, so it’s not like he’ll be running around in a construction zone.”

“And I’ll take the carrier and physically wear him all day, so it’s not like he’ll be running around the actual bar.”

Nesta groaned. “Fine. Fine. But take the pack-n-play, his monitor and toys. He can entertain himself well enough.”

“Okay,” Cassian nodded, finishing off his cinnamon roll. He pulled Nyx out of his high chair, who was now playing with and wearing most of his food, rather than eating it, and said, “I’ll give him a bath while you get ready.”

“Okay.” He was nearly in the living room when he heard, “Cass?” He turned and looked back at her, still not completely used to the familiar nickname from her. She was blushing slightly. “Happy birthday.”

Smiling, he said, “Thanks,” and turned to head up the stairs.

Maybe today wouldn’t be so bad after all.

*

“Any birthday plans?”

“You’re looking at it.”

Kallias chuckled as he observed Cassian, a wiggly baby strapped to his chest, counting the liquor bottles that lined the wall.

“How old are you anyway?” he continued, wiping down the bartop. “Thirty? Thirty-one?”

“You wound me,” Cassian muttered, scribbling a number down on his clipboard, not bothering to tell Kallias just how close to thirty he was getting to.

“I would say we should do shots to celebrate your big day,” Kallias began, taking Nyx’s outstretched hand. “But, I think your little housewife would disapprove.”

Cassian snorted. “If Nesta Archeron ever heard you call her such a thing, you’d lose a very important body part.”

“Not interested in that, thank you very much,” he muttered. “She ever gonna stop in, so I can see this terrifying woman you’ve told me about?”

“About that…” Cassian pulled Nyx out of the carrier and carried him into the back office, setting him down in the play pen. Grabbing the baby monitor, he made his way back into the front room.

Kallias looked up from where he was cutting limes at the bar. “About what?”

He leaned a hip on the bar and crossed his arms over his chest. “Nesta is going to be expanding the restaurant, adding a bar. That’s actually where she is right now, why I’ve got the kiddo with me. Didn’t really want him in a construction site.”

“Hot nanny couldn’t keep him?” Kallias asked, grinning.

Cassian rolled his eyes. “No, she’s sick. But, uh-.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m gonna be leaving and going over there, managing for her.”

Kallias eyes widened. “Oh. Shit.”

“Yeah. And I’d like you to come over there with me. Be my assistant manager at the new place.”

Kallias stopped cutting, mid-lime. “You do realize we are two out of five people that work here, right?”

Cassian nodded, slowly. “Yeah, I do. And I also know we can hire more people here.”

Kallias looked back down at his half-cut lime. “Assistant manager, huh?”

“It’s in a great part of town, we’d get amazing tips on top of already being paid more,” Cassian said. “It’s an amazing opportunity.”

“So I’d be stupid to say no, then?” Kallias asked, continuing to cut his limes.

“Incredibly stupid,” Cassian agreed.

Nyx’s happy babbling came through on the baby monitor.

“I’ll think about it,” Kallias said, at last.

“Think about it, then tell me yes, because I’m not going there without you,” Cassian said.

Kallias snorted. “You’re a shitty liar. You’re going, whether I go or not.”

“And why wouldn’t you come with me?” Cassian asked, facing his friend. He and Kallias had worked together for years, since Kallias came in at twenty-one, during his senior year of college. “You want to be stuck in this dive bar forever? I know you. You’re a creature of habit. If I leave you here, you’ll be here for the next twenty years.”

Kallias didn’t bother telling him it wasn’t true. He just shook his head. “I guess we better start interviewing people, then.”

*

The day did not go as planned. Cassian had to stay and help out until nearly five-thirty, and by the time Cassian walked in the front door, Nyx was knocked out cold in his car seat. He gently set it down and unbuckled him, carrying him into the kitchen. It smelled divine, like roasting herbs and cooked veggies, even if he couldn’t see anything radiating the delicious smells.

Nesta was also nowhere in sight, so he took Nyx up to his nursery and laid him down, setting the baby monitor back up where it usually sat. He slipped the screen in his back pocket and made his way back downstairs, hurrying out to his truck to get Nyx’s diaper bag and the folded up playpen.

As he was setting it back up in the living room, he heard the sliding glass door open and close and made sure he was making enough noise to alert Nesta of his presence.

“You’re home,” she said, leaning on the doorway. “Nyx asleep?”

“Out like a light,” he said, tossing the few toys he’d brought with him back into the pen. “He had fun though.”

“Good. Dinner is almost done,” she smiled. “I hope you’re hungry.”

“Starving,” he sighed and took another deep breath in. “It smells amazing.”

Turning, Nesta walked back into the kitchen. “Steak, garlic mashed potatoes, roasted carrots and green beans, and homemade rolls.”

He watched as she took the carrots and green beans out of the oven and placed them next to a plate of steak she must have just brought in from the grill.

Cassian’s mouth was damn near watering.

He looked at the spread as she spooned the mashed potatoes onto his plate. “I think I’m in love with you.”

Nesta tensed, then something like nervous laughter sputtered out of her mouth. “Well, I had to cook red meat for you on your birthday.”

“Does that mean you’ll be having yourself a steak, Archeron?” he asked, taking the full plate from her outstretched hands.

She gave him an amused look. “Hell no. You get both. I have a chicken kabob on the grill.”

Cassian licked his lips as he took his plate to the table. “Consider me a lucky man. Thank you.”

“Of course,” she said, clearing her throat. She piled her plate high with potatoes and veggies before going onto the deck and coming back with a grilled chicken kabob on her plate. She sat across from him. Cassian’s mouth was already full.

“How is it?” Nesta asked, cutting up a carrot before popping it into her mouth.

“Delicious,” Cassian said, mouth full. “So good.”

“If you don’t slow down, you won’t be able to enjoy the flavor,” Nesta said, knowing full well that he wouldn’t listen. Cassian practically inhaled everything on his plate within minutes.

He moaned, stretching back in his chair before running a hand through his hair. “I must say, Nes, you really outdid yourself.”

“Well, it was the least I could do after you worked and were on baby duty all day,” she said, popping a few green beans in her mouth.

They talked about their days as she finished eating. He told her about Kallias’ agreement to move to the restaurant, she told him about the beginning of construction.

They’d kept half the restaurant open, putting up a temporary wall to keep as much noise and dust out as they could, but the sooner the build was done the better. They both agreed on that.

“So, despite your switch with the cinnamon rolls this morning,” Cassian said from where he sat as she rinsed off their plates, “I’m fairly sure I saw a cake when I came downstairs.”

“Really now,” she said, and he saw the small smile on her face.

“Mhmm,” he nodded. “And, you know, I like cake.”

“And why, exactly, would I make you a cake?” She crooned, that little smile remaining.

“Because I’m the world's best roommate and uncle, obviously,” he said.

Nesta laughed as she stood. “Yeah, whatever.”

After exiting through the back door, she returned a moment later with a big, homemade cake.

It was exquisite.

Perfectly decorated and topped with vanilla and buttercream frosting, it read Happy birthday, Cassian!

As Nesta placed it on the countertop, Cassian asked, “Nesta, when the hell did you find time to make this?”

She shrugged. “Stayed up later and got up early. Didn’t have to be too early since you decided to sleep in today, but…” Her words trailed off. “I figured it was the least I could do.”

His mouth tightened, emotion he wasn’t expecting hitting him and he cleared his throat. “You gonna sing to me?” He asked, cracking a joke to break the tension that was slowly growing.

Nesta threw her head back and laughed. “Absolutely not.”

Cassian bit back his retort and the monitor in his back pocket went off, crying coming from upstairs.

“I’ll get him,” she said, standing up. “I’m sure he’s hungry. Will you cut up green beans and carrots for him?”

He nodded, the cake forgotten as he did what he was told, and Nesta returned with a bleary-eyed Nyx a few minutes later.

“Hi buddy,” Cassian said, chuckling at Nyx’s hazy expression. He was already sitting at the table with a plate of cut up food.

The second Nyx saw the display, he was whining and reaching for it.

“Slow down, you need to be buckled into your seat first,” Nesta said, shaking her head.

“I can’t blame him,” Cassian said, as Nyx was strapped into his high chair. “I’m starving when I wake up, too.”

Nesta rolled her eyes. “Men.”

The second Nyx’s diapered butt hit the seat, he was stuffing his mouth.

“I guess we should wait for him to eat the cake,” Cassian said, looking longingly at the cake.

Nesta chuckled. “No patience?”

“When it comes to homemade baked goods?” Cassian scoffed. “No.”

She snorted, which had Cassian raising an eyebrow. She looked at him. “What?”

“Nothing,” he replied, shaking his head. “That was just…cute.”

Nesta didn’t reply, but he swore she could see her cheeks heating as she turned to put the leftovers from dinner away.

Once Nyx’s plate was cleared, Nesta cut three slices of cake. One was barely a sliver, one was mostly icing and one was damn near a quarter of the cake. She took the one with extra frosting for herself, placing the small one in front of Nyx and the larger one in front of Cassian.

Again, Nyx wasted no time scarfing it down. Cassian didn’t either, helping himself to another, much smaller piece afterwards, but not touching it yet.

“You sure you don’t want to sing to me?” He asked, taking a bite of the cake. “It would complete my day.”

Nyx, an impending sugar crash, was already dozing again. Apparently, his day with Uncle Cassian had well and truly worn him out.

She rolled her eyes and wiped the excess cake off of Nyx’s face. Pulling him out of his high chair, she said, “No, I think I’m good.”

“I’m just saying,” Cassian pushed. “If you wanted to really wish me a happy birthday, a song would do.”

Nesta snorted, taking Nyx in her arms and swaying, back and forth. “You’ve never heard me sing.”

“If your singing is as good as your cooking, it must be amazing,” Cassian promised.

Nesta rolled her eyes. “Have I told you that you’re full of shit?”

Cassian pretended to debate it. “Maybe once or twice.”

Nesta chuckled, and said no more about it. “Finish your cake, Nazari. This little monster is ready for bed. I’ll put him down. It’s your birthday.”

It wasn’t that putting Nyx to bed was exhausting. Although sometimes it could be a chore, Cassian nodded and took another bite of his cake as Nesta and Nyx disappeared.

In their absence, Cassian cleared his plate.

The cake was delicious.

He knew Nesta was an amazing cook, but didn’t know that her baking skills were just as good. It was the best cake he had ever eaten. He was even considering getting himself a third piece, but decided against it as she rounded the corner back into the kitchen.

She sighed, falling into her chair. “That may have been record time to get him down. He was practically asleep before I’d even pulled the curtains shut.”

“He had a big day,” Cassian said, eyeing the piece of cake on her plate that she hadn’t even touched. “Taught him how to make a mojito. He’s a pro. Maybe we should hire him on at the bar.”

Shaking her head, Nesta cut into her cake and took a bite. She chuckled. “I’m sure that doesn’t violate any labor laws.”

“Nah, we’re his guardians,” Cassian said, waving a hand. “We can certainly get some free labor out of him.”

She rolled her eyes. “I honestly can’t tell if you’re kidding or not.” She took another bite of cake, and Cassian’s eyes dipped to her mouth. He was quiet for long enough that she asked, “What?”

He hesitated but said, “You’ve got a little—”

He didn’t finish his sentence, instead he leaned forward across the small space between them and swiped the frosting that was on the corner of her lips away with his thumb.

Nesta didn’t move.

She didn’t push him away, didn’t tell him to stop touching her, either.

Cassian’s thumb lingered against her lips, and when she looked up, he was already watching her, quietly.

She opened her mouth to say something.

What? She wasn’t sure.

But, when her lips moved, Cassian’s did, too.

He kissed her, softly, slowly, and Nesta melted right into it.

[tibbinswrites]

Day 2 - No Vacancy

“Are you freaking kidding me?” Dean groused as they passed yet another No Vacancy sign. “That’s the fourth one in a row. Is Elvis back for a concert or something?”

“Elvis is dead, Dean.” Cas said calmly from the passenger seat. His head rested on his palm as he looked out the window, his elbow lengthways against the pane. It looked ridiculous. Dean jerked his head back to the road.

“Then why the hell is everywhere full? Sam and Jack didn’t have this much trouble, they’re in that Blue Crescent place two stops back.”

“Sam and Jack came down yesterday,” Cas said pointedly. “You were the one who insisted we watch that All Saints’ Day marathon in high definition. We warned you it’d get busy.”

Dean didn’t have a retort to that, so he just repeated Cas’ words in a high-pitched, mocking tone, to which Cas rolled his eyes.

“At least we won’t be too far out,” Cas said, pointing. Finally. Dean made the turn and told Cas to text Sam the name of the motel.

Unfortunately, when they went to check in, there was a problem.

“I’m afraid we’re all out of twins.” The woman at the desk said. She did look apologetic, her big cow-eyes blinked at them from behind thick-rimmed glasses. “Out of almost everything actually. We do have one room, but-”

“We’ll take it.” Cas cut in.

The woman (her name tag said Cheryl), blinked again, rather rapidly. “Of course,” she said after a moment, sliding across a check in form and a card machine. “If one of you will sign here.”

Dean groaned when they pushed open the door.

“It’s a single,” he said, tossing the bags onto the table and stepping aside to let Cas in to survey, as he had, the one, small bed.

“I don’t sleep,” Cas reminded him, draping his coat over the rickety looking chair before unbuttoning his cuffs. Dean had noticed him doing that more lately, tugging at his collar, foregoing the tie, getting comfortable. It was nice in a way that Dean couldn’t articulate.

“Bullshit.” Dean said, keeping his voice gentle as he said it. Cas got a little funny whenever his failing powers were brought up. Dean avoided the topic whenever he could, but they had hunt tomorrow and Dean didn’t want Cas running on fumes. “You don’t sleep as much but that doesn’t mean you don’t sleep. And neither of our backs can handle that sofa.”

Cas quieted a moment and looked at the moth-eaten maroon fabric of the ‘sofa’. The cushions looked threadbare and the frame even poked through in places. Plus they were both too tall to be able to stretch out.

Ten years ago, hell, even five, he would have shrugged his shoulders and dealt with the sofa. But he’d been spoilt by the bunker, and every uncomfortable motel room only reminded him that he wasn’t thirty anymore. If he twinged his back in the wrong way at the wrong time, it could get him killed, and he wasn’t willing to take that risk for the sake of pride.

“We’re just gonna have to cuddle,” he declared, as though it was the only obvious solution. He was pretty proud of himself that his voice didn’t shake, and he hoped that the shitty bulbs were dim enough to hide any redness that might otherwise show in his cheeks.

Cas squinted at him, as though waiting for the punchline. When it didn’t come he simply raised an eyebrow and nodded.

“Fine,” he said. “We’ll… cuddle.”

[emotionallyits2009]

deancas fic rec list!

hello everyone! happy christmas to those who celebrate it, my gift to you is my fic rec list that i said i would make like a month ago. the only thing it is organized by is canonverse vs alternate universe. tried to cover a variety of subjects but there are in particular many fics of the genre “postcanon where cas is human and he and dean live together and slowly finally get their shit together” because i know what i’m about, son. HOPE U ENJOY. and if you wanna talk about any of them or rec me other fics please do. :) 

Canonverse:

where the weeds take root by deathbanjo, 30k, explicit “Are you happy? Y’know. Just—being here,” Dean says, gesturing to the yard with his beer bottle. “Being with—I mean, you used to fight in celestial wars and—and save the world. Now you’re growing vegetables and talking about chickens.” There are many fics set in a post-canon universe where Cas is human and he and Dean live together and slowly fall into a relationship. Imo this one is the best of the best of that genre. This was one of the first fics I read back in July when I was getting Back Into Supernatural where I was like oh fuck I’m like in this. Dean builds Cas planters and bookshelves and a chicken coop and they fight and work through it.

Cuckoo And Nest by komodobits, 10k, explicit For a long time, Castiel thought that every earthly possession other than the immediately necessary was excess to requirement. But Dean – Dean who named his car, who keeps a photograph of his mother in his wallet, some thirty-plus years after her death, who still has the crumpled ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign with a sleeping pelican emblazoned on it from the Microtel outside of Roanoke where he first kissed Castiel, clumsy and unsure, under the unsteady fluorescence of an exhausted bathroom bulb – is sentimental. It puzzles Castiel, where Dean draws the line between what is meaningful and what it is worthless. Really Gets the dynamic of Cas doesn’t think Dean wants him to stay/Dean thinks Cas will leave the first chance he gets. Also a nice example of Cas thinking he’s not wanted if he’s not useful/powerful and being told otherwise. Another all-time fave!

lonely hearts by outphastthemoat, 4.5k, gen He thinks he might give up having his own anything just to be able to step foot inside the room next door and sit on the edge of Dean’s bed instead. This one is for the CAS GIRLS who know what LONELINESS feels like.

Helionneiros by aeli_kindara, 24.2k, mature In which Dean visits his mother, and Claire takes Cas on a hunt. I’m always on the lookout for more fic with Claire and Jack. Jack doesn’t show up until the end here but the relationship between Cas and Claire is really nice.

Crawl by aeriallon, 11k, explicit It’s been almost four years since Castiel left Kansas; he'd eventually settled in an island town where he has a job, a house, and a life without the Winchesters. Every winter, Dean drives down to the coast to see him. Another fic where Cas is human but in this one he took some time for himself and got some distance from the Winchesters! He gets to be competent and weird as a human and we love that for him. I must warn you all that this fic contains one use of the phrase “making love” which would normally put me right off but it’s still worth reading. The first of a three-part series.

home where you hold me by microcomets, 1.6k, gen Cas and Dean, in the moments between their battles, ache for quiet spaces. Technically this is a coda to 10x20 but you don’t need the episode for context. Short and very sweet.

Build a Home by domesticadventures, 20.1k, teen After they save the world, Dean expects Cas to come back to the bunker with them. He doesn’t. This one is so cute it’s like what if once they were done saving the world Sam and Dean actually invited other hunters to move into the bunker with them. Obviously Dean wants that to include Cas but doesn’t know how to use his words.

the taste of gravel in the mouth by deathbanjo, 22.4k, explicit This is what Cas gave up Heaven for: greasy diner food, shitty motel rooms with even shittier cable, long car rides spent in complete silence except for the same six tapes playing over and over again, and a burnt-out husk of a man who can barely hold a conversation anymore. Angst fic! They go on a road trip and Dean is severely fucked up post-Mark of Cain.

Unknown Quantities by xylodemon, 8.6k, explicit No one ever tells Dean anything. Another nice getting-together fic.

Creature of Habit by trinityofone, 5.2k, teen The more you love someone, the more you want to kill them. Or: How Cas developed some bad habits, and Dean coped surprisingly well. This one is ancient by destiel standards (written during season 5) but it manages to nail the married couple vibes they give off in later seasons. Cas is a bitch and Dean likes him so much. <3

The (Mostly Accidental) Courtship of Dean Winchester by Tuesday, 11.2k, mature Angelic marriage rites were never intended to go quite like this. Another old one that is a lot of fun! They get Accidental Angel Married and if you don’t enjoy dumb fanfiction tropes like that I don’t know what to say to you.

Vena Amoris and Other Old-Fashioned Bullshit by pyrebi, 4k, teen In which angelic marriage bonds are apparently stupidly easy to trigger, Cas wages multidimensional war in Heaven, Dean can't catch a break like ever, Sam rather enjoys being a dick, love saves the day, and nobody consummates anything. The OTHER accidental angel marriage fic written in 2010. 

Crazy Diamonds by pantheon_of_discord, 24.8k, explicit A week ago, Dean was pulled out of Hell. Now, he’s apparently woken up in 2018, and the angel that a mere twenty-four hours beforehand had threatened to chuck him back into the pit is sleepily pouring himself coffee and wearing Dean’s second-favourite Zeppelin shirt. It all seems like a perfect happy ending, but with Hell’s scars still so fresh, Dean can’t imagine how he could have possibly gotten there. At the same time, the Dean who went to sleep in the bunker, right next to Cas, wakes up on Bobby’s couch in 2008. He’s instantly bombarded with questions by a Lilith-obsessed brother and a man who’s been dead for years, and must decide between keeping his finally-perfect life intact, and the lives he could save by re-writing history. Regardless of these choices, both Deans are trapped in the wrong decade, and their only way back lies with a Castiel still very much under Heaven’s thumb – one who might find the future Dean describes difficult to believe. Time travel is FUN. There’s an excellent part where (minor spoilers) future!Dean is like, “Guess what, asshole? You like me so much you marry me!!!!!!!!!!!” to 2008!Castiel that made me laugh out loud the first time I read it. Also just a good reminder of how most problems in life are temporary and if you could go back in time to talk to your younger self you’d be like, “Hey man. Chill out. You get through it.”

The Path of Fireflies by museaway, 63.7k, mature After his humanity is restored, Dean wakes up in bed with Castiel, a wedding ring, and no memory of the past twelve years. There’s a lot of amnesia fic and djinn fic out there were Dean wakes up ~suddenly together with Cas~ but I like this one in particular because he’s initially very confused and kind of a dick about it until he acknowledges that being with Cas makes him happy.

take the long way home by dothraki_shieldmaiden, 95k, explicit Three months ago, when Dean decided to retire, he thought his life was going to end up differently. He'd thought that he might get to have it all, Sam, Cas, Jack, and nice little place to live. Instead he gets Sam and Jack off on their Summer of Love Tour, radio silence from Cas, and a never-ending road trip consisting of himself. Still reeling from the loss of his grace, Castiel travels the country in search of hunts. Driven by a need to prove his usefulness, he pushes himself beyond all limits of endurance. Together, with the help of a few friends, a crumbling Victorian house, and a stray cat, Dean and Castiel patch themselves back together and create a home together. Do you wanna read almost one hundred thousand words of Dean and Cas having extremely intense feelings but refusing to voice them aloud? Haha of course you do that’s why you’re here. There’s also a lot about Cas adjusting to being human and being depressed about it which might resonate if you’ve ever felt weird about having a body. To be honest the author could stand to use a few more commas but there were also half a dozen moments that made me put my phone down and drag my hand slowly over my face and whisper “oh my god” to myself which is like, the ultimate measure of a good fanfiction so it gets to be on the list.

like moses and batman and james dean by saltyfeathers, 31.6k, explicit dean used to turn tricks. over a decade later, he met cas. Have you seen the fanon (apparently pioneered by Mr. Jackles “Original Deankin” Ackles himself) that Dean used to prostitute himself to feed himself and Sam when they were younger? Are you interested in exploring that concept in fanfiction? Well, this is the only fic you need. Mind the tags on this one! It’s not what I’d call happy but it’s good.

Some Assembly Required by narrow_staircases, 47k, mature It’s September of 2005, and Dean Winchester, in an attempt to outrun old mistakes and painful memories, finds himself in southern Kentucky on a wild goose chase. He’s completely certain this weird religious movement he’s “investigating” is a hoax, despite the miraculous healings people report, and he’ll be back on the road in a day or two. Things are looking up when he meets Cas, an awkward (and gorgeous) graduate student who’s actually doing honest-to-god research into the local tent revival meetings. When that research takes a weird and personal turn, Dean’s left to face two very serious realities: one, this may be a real case after all, and two, he’s fallen way harder for Cas than he should ever have let himself. Stanford-era AU of Dean trying to avoid his father and getting in over his head on a case.

Alternate universe:

And This, Your Living Kiss by opal_bullets, 57k, mature Only a very few people in the world know that the celebrated and reclusive poet Jack Allen is just Kansas mechanic Dean Winchester, a high school dropout with a few bucks to his name. Not that it matters anymore; life has left him so wrung out he never wants to pick up another pen. Until, that is, a string of coincidences leads Dean to auditing a poetry course with one Dr. Castiel Novak. The  professor is wildly intelligent, devastatingly handsome...and just so happens to be academia's foremost expert on the poetry of Jack Allen. Mundane AUs in this fandom have to be really, really good to catch my attention and this one is! It’s exactly what it says in the summary and the characterization is spot-on. 

Out to Drift by deathbanjo, 20.9k, mature Dean drives a black car with a loud engine. He lies too easily. He keeps a gun in the back of his jeans, and Castiel isn’t sure, but he wouldn’t be surprised if Dean has killed someone before. Two people in fucked-up unstable situations meeting and forming a connection. Honestly guys I really just love deathbanjo.

[calif0rnia-lovers]

#1: the proposal | plan b.

pairing: angel reyes x black!reader | chapter rating: 💙

total # of parts in series: 10

join my gc for updates since tags are acting weird

I keep falling for boys and mistaking them for men

series sum: After several failed relationships, you decide that you’re over waiting for Mr. Right to come around and help start a family. In a drunken ramble, you ask your best friend if he’ll be your donor. You didn’t expect him to say yes. As you and Angel enter uncharted waters, you both realize neither of you fully thought the initial proposal through.

words: 1.8 K

What is it they say…hope breeds eternal misery.

Or, as Angel Reyes likes to say, “I don’t know why you’re wasting time on that asshole.”

Asshole is the nicest term you can dub your boyfriend--correction, your ex-boyfriend.

Ex-boyfriend.

It’s strange how quickly two letters--a simple prefix--can change your life.

One minute, you’re joining your boyfriend and his family on a getaway to the beach. The next, you’re being kindly escorted out of a restaurant for tossing a drink in his face.

When you’d left Santo Padre Friday afternoon, you had a single thought in your mind. He’s finally going to propose. The nervous behavior, the talks about moving to a bigger apartment, him inviting you to a weekend getaway with his family.

How else would a rational person explain this behavior?

Well, according to Michael, all of those things do not add up to a proposal. They add up to “softening the blow."

As you sit on the curb waiting for your uber, with Michael's big splurge of the evening in hand--a bottle of Cabernet, you realize his explanation was complete bullshit. How is dragging you to Santa Monica for the weekend "softening the blow?" If he was going to break up with you, he could have done it in Santo Padre.

As you double-check the ETA on your uber, you remember.

Michael didn't drag you to Santa Monica to break up with you. He dragged you to Santa Monica to ask you to "take a break."

Apparently, there's a difference.

As Michael put it, with his birthday fast approaching, he'd had an epiphany. He needed time to "get out there" and "explore" his options.

"We're in our thirties," he'd explained. "We only have a few years left before we're expected to settle down, have kids. I think we should take this time to get everything out of our system, so by the time we come back together, we're ready to start that family you're always talking about."

The nervousness you'd seen the past two weeks? Had nothing to do with hiding a ring, or trying to find the perfect opportunity to pop the question. The nervousness was Michael trying to find the right time to ask you not to renew the lease of the apartment, you share, at the end of the month.

The talk about upgrading to a bigger apartment? Had nothing to do with having an extra room for the kid you've both talked about having. It was so that he could move in with his two best friends.

Michael’s epiphany left you in shock. You were caught between realizing the entire revelation wasn’t a complete joke and realizing you were expected to ride home with his family in the morning. The drink tossing didn’t come until Michael rubbed his hands together, a knowing smile sliding onto his face.

Taking your shocked silence as a lack of protest to his idea, Michael nodded over his shoulder. “You wanna head back up to the room...have some fun our last night together?”

The weight of Samantha--wait. No. Savanna...Sabrina? No, Salena.

The weight of Salena’s body presses Angel into the mattress. Her body is nearly directly on top of his, her face nuzzled into the warmth of his neck.

He’s not used to women sleeping over. Angel has one rule. He wants to sleep alone. Translation, be gone when he wakes in the morning.

That’s why, when he wakes to the sound of a slamming door, Angel is pissed.

His initial thought is that Salena let the door slam on her way out. The only problem is, Salena is still in bed with him--sleeping soundly. If she wasn’t, he would have been up able to react quicker. Because if it’s not Salena leaving, it means that someone is coming in.

“You need to go,” Angel mumbles as he manages to escape her grip.

Salena responds by rolling over and ignoring his request.

When he leaves his bedroom, Angel finds his entire house in darkness. His hand runs down his face as your voice fills the air.

"Ow--shit!" Your keys and purse fall to the floor as you bump into the coffee table.

"Y/N, what are you doing?"

“What are you doing?” You counter the slurring of your speech causing Angel’s head to shake. “...standing in the dark like a fucking creep.”

“Are you drunk?”

Your head shakes. Even if half-asleep, Angel knows you’re not drunk. You’re hammered, at least by your standards. He’s known you long enough to realize you’re a lightweight. A two and a half-hour ride with a bottle of Cabernet meant you were well past your limit.

“And why are you back early--did you drive here?”

“No,” you scoff. “I took an uber obviously--”

A second trip into the coffee table silences the rest of your response.

“Alright, come on--” Angel takes your hand in his, preventing you from falling forward.

“I don’t need your help.” Yanking your hand free of his grip--with more force than necessary--you stumble backward. Between the late hour and his body still attempting to shake off its grogginess, the action is too fast for Angel to predict. “Or any man’s help for that matter...fucking men--always thinking they need to save me--”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about you--and fucking...fucking Michael--that piece of shit...” Despite your previous attempt to escape him, you turn on your heels causing Angel to bump into you. Instinctively, his hands find your waist. An innocent attempt to help maintain your balance. “--I said I don’t need help walking, Angel--”

“Clearly.” The smirk on his lips narrows your eyes.

The pathetic attempt of a shove you apply to his chest is enough to tip your already unsteady balance.

In his defense, Angel isn’t used to “rescuing” you from a drunk faceplant. Usually, the roles are reversed.

It may not be the smartest move, but it’s the quickest way to prevent another one of your escape attempts. Angel tightens his grip on your waist, pulling a small yelp from your lips as he lifts you off the ground throwing you over his shoulder.

The sudden shift in your posture blurs your vision--sending the room spinning. The rush of blood to your head causes your palm to come down hard in frustration against Angel’s back.

“Put me down…” Angel’s head shakes as your slurred speech trails off for a moment. Seizing the break in your resistance, he carries you across the darkened room towards the security of the sofa. “...what the hell are you doing in my house anyway?”

“This is my house.” Angel huffs as he lowers you onto the sofa. “If you get up, I’m not stopping you. I'm serious, I'll let you bust your ass this time.”

But moving from the sofa has already left your mind. Instead, your focus has drifted. Scanning the living room as Angel disappears. Despite his words, you're still not sure why you've ended up at his house and not yours.

“Here drink this,” Angel sighs as he returns. He hopes the glass of water will miraculously sober you up. Between failing to kick Salena out, and you showing up drunk at 3 in the morning, Angel is considering giving up women. At least for a few hours.

Angel’s steps come to a slow halt as he rounds the sofa to find you gone. Somehow, in the time it took him to fill a glass with water, you have slid down to the floor. Your back against the sofa, you’ve given up the impossible task of unfastening your heels. Instead, you’re tugging at them. Groans of frustration fill the air once the heels remain in place.

The shaky breaths and trembling of your fingers widen Angel’s eyes.

“Shit--are you crying?”

“I’m not crying.” The shaking of your head only seems to push the tears out faster. The blurring of your vision makes the task at hand impossible. “I’m not crying.”

“My bad, you’re not crying,” Angel repeats, hopeful it’ll make the crying stop. Handling a crying woman is not his strongest suit. In fact, he tries to avoid crying women at all costs. He focuses on the easier task of removing your heels. He offers you an encouraging smile once he’s done. “See, you’re all good.”

“No, I’m not.” Reaching forward, you grab the nearest heel, launching it as hard as you can. “Michael got me these.”

You manage to grab the second heel before Angel can. You launch it in the same direction as the first.

“I’ve always hated those ugly fucking shoes.”

The second heel doesn’t land in the middle of the floor like its predecessor. Instead, it flies straight into Salena’s arm as she rounds the corner.

“Ow--what the fuck? Angel!”

The overhead light cuts on, temporarily blinding both you and Angel. When you open your eyes, you find a half-dressed Salena standing over you. Your discarded heel in her left hand, her narrowed eyes focused on you.

"So, this is why you wanted me to leave? Your girlfriend is home?"

"Neither of us is his girlfriend, sweetheart." you correct.

“I’m not sleeping in your bed ever again,” you clarify, your voice muffled against your palms. “Not until you wash your sheets.”

In the time it took to get Salena out of the house you’ve found that your body has begun to crash. The idea of laying down the only thought of your mind. That’s why the moment he’s settled alongside you on the floor, Angel’s shoulder becomes your pillow.

“Please don’t say I told you so.”

Passing up the opportunity to be right, is not in Angel’s nature. But one look at you, he’s biting his tongue.

“I never liked him.”

“You've never liked anyone I’ve dated,” you laugh quietly.

“That’s because you only date assholes.”

“Takes one to know one.”

“Exactly.”

Angel's arm drapes around you, the gentle squeeze he gives bringing a weak smile to your lips.

“That’s it,” you sigh. “I’m done dating. Forever.”

“Dating is overrated,” Angel notes.

It’s a phrase Angel has told you nearly a million times over the years. Typically, after you’ve watched him ensnare yet another naive woman with his smile. You typically roll your eyes at Angel's mantra, but right now, you don’t even bother.

“I’m serious, if you see me even blinking at the same guy twice grab me.”

“Yeah, okay,” Angel chuckles.

He knows there's no point in taking the promise any further. If Angel is a cynic when it comes to dating, you’re the poster child for hopeless romantics.

When you fall in love, you fall hard. When you get heartbroken, the fallout hits the hardest.

“I can’t wait until my forties to have a kid.”

“What?”

“I’ll be in my sixties when they graduate high school--my sixties!”

“That’s what this is about?”

“...he doesn’t want kids...at least not right now...he wants time to explore other options before being shackled to me forever.”

“I’m going to kick his fucking ass.”

“When you do, can I watch?”

“Fuck that, you’re getting in a few hits.”

“I can’t believe I wasted three years on him, thinking he was going to help me start a family,” you groan. “When I could’ve just asked you.”

Angel laughs, his smile growing as you giggle.

“I’m serious. Definitely would’ve happened faster.”

“If you want to have sex with me, there are much easier ways--”

“Shut up, it is not about sex,” you assure him as your eyes drift shut. “I actually pride myself in being one of the few women in this town you haven’t slept with. Being immune to your charm is a superpower.”

“You still ended up here tonight,” Angel grins.

You softly smile.

“That’s because you’re my best friend, and you always give the best hugs when I feel like shit.”

series taglist: @youlovetkay @mochachocolatteyaya @chaneajoyyy @sesamepancakes

angel + all mayans tags: @turn-thy-paige @finalgirlhales @jadesid @poetically-0riginal @diaryofkali @babaohhhriley @katastrophic04 @partypoison00 @rose-bliss @mayansxlover @joannasteez @headrushxreeta @brwnlikefoxy @nemesis729 @destiny-tsukino @inyourbackpocketisbutterflies @straightestgay-voice

all stories: @rosieposie0624 @amberritonicole @agoldin @est1887@toni9 @chaneajoyyy @relaxing-najee @awkwardtayler @siempremamita @seize-the-droid @glimmerglittergirl @cutiebubbleboo @pearlkitten33 @tian-monique @megapeacelovemusic-blog @sincerelykas @brattyfics @ladyofsoa@browneyes912 @beiroviski @sadeyesgf @mrsmarvelous1995 @everyhowlmarksthedead @ourlittlesecretsoveragain @demonquartz @appropriate-writers-name @ughdontbeboring @cocotheclown @thesandbeneathmytoes @queenbeered @starrynite7114 @wiccanmetallicrose @tomhardydallasstarsgirl

[nagdabbit]

MY GIRLFRIEND'S COMMENTARY WHILE WATCHING HER FIRST AEW PPV

"my entire fitness goal is hook's shoulder-waist ratio, but with taz's extremely dense neck."

"the funniest thing about wrestling is that this fucking company is trying to make something called a stadium stampede sound both cool, AND serious."

gf: "if you cry listening to a crowd sing judas again, im divorcing you." me: "so that means youre gonna marry me." gf: "i've been bamboozled."

about brian cage: "this man is a huge dork. like, literally, i could fit me in him."

"i dunno what it is, but i would die to protect mr. hangman. he hunk, but he also baby."

thoughtfully, "i bet i could just catch you out of the air like that. i mean, i can squat you, i could probably even curl you like that, too."

because she is deeply in wrestling twitter now: "HOOK! babe, look, its hook! hook hive, rise up!"

"what i love about this feud is that all these men are fuckin' idiots. no brain cells, just shoes and fwiendship."

"what do you mean their tag team isn't just the wild boys, wtf? missed opportunity."

"those kicks are ugly, but i would steal them, too, honestly." *thirty seconds of silence layer* "for you, babe. i'd steal them for you, i mean."

"jon, no, the germs, jon, jesus christ, please dont drink that jon you dumbass."

"i love eddie, but i'm pretty sure we should never hang out. too much extremely new york energy, we would get arrested in like ten minutes. possibly less."

"diorsday device is the funniest shit ive ever fucking heard, how goddamn sad is that."

"max caster is gonna get murdered, but i love him."

"i wish bowens and his extremely attractive boyfriend the best in life."

"colt cabana and tay conti are tied for best smile in wrestling, but tay wins because i dont want colt to kick me in the face."

"penta is the only joker i formally recognize."

"today i found out that some people don't like stu and uno, and to them i say get entirely fucked."

after rush came out and i lost my entire shit: "i don't fully understand yet, but i support you." *one minute later* "oooooooooooohh. okay, yeah."

gf: "i enjoy that cody is pushing ogogo by being a dumb bitch with this america schtick." me: "you gonna say that when cody wins?" gf: "...fuck."

"ogogo got that guy ritchie movie ass music you love to see it."

"you were right about cody and i fuckin' hate it."

"aw yeah, its big boi season."

about miro: "i'm very gay, but the thing is, men with extremely jacked traps just do something to me."

"lance changed changed the color of his extensions and i appreciate that." *thirty seconds later* "are those... three crosses? tattooed on his back? jesus doesnt like murder, i don't think he likes murderhawks, either."

"britt baker is the only dentist i want in my mouth. no, wait, don't type that one!"

"oh, fuck, shidas getting teary i'm gonna fuckin cry, oh fuck, i get it now, i'm so sorry i made fun of you, i love her."

"oh fuck, shida knee me directly in the face."

"britt scares me. like the blood drip details on her gear are really cool, but i would legit believe its real blood from her."

"are you really crying about britt and the nice announcer man hugging?"

"hey, quick question, just real quick while ive got you here... why is the emo twink... like this?"

"darby's dad looks like my dad, and i'll never be okay with that."

"i like that darby just yeets himself around like that. he came in like a wrecking ball. a tiny, tiny wrecking ball."

"sting just tossing his son around the ring like that is very good, but, sir, that's bad parenting."

"the thing about sky and page is that these are the suburb guys i beat up at the beach on summer vacation. they have big "i robbed these guys at the pier" energy."

"damn, darby just feels his emotion with his entire face, doesnt he."

"okay explain the gambling thing and WHY it's a thing."

"orange rolling into the ring is so fucking good, that man is national treasure."

after me showing her the video of younger orange cassidy shitfaced and holding a fish for no reason: "i am shocked and appalled that you're only showing me this now."

after explaining the history of the jansport: "the range of this dumbass."

"i get that kenny is good and all, but his hair really fucks me up. it's upsettingly bad and i hope he knows that."

"pac is just. so much muscle. flippy beef man. a meateor." she did specify how to spell it for the joke because it was important.

"that man is a weeb, isnt he."

"something about a man breaking a hold by putting his hands in his pockets really gets me hype."

"fuck just murder omega and be done i hate this, put it on the beef man or the juicey boy already."

"babe, ill be right back i gotta murder this callis bitch."

screaming, "THAT'S MY FAVORITE REF, YOU UGLY FUCK!"

after kenny won: "i fucking hate wrestling, this is bullshit."

"holy fuck, babe, i forgot mark henry was a wrestle boy! i know him from the olympics!"

"hey, is mark henry bigger than large paul?"

"mjf is a dumb bitch and i love him."

"hey, quick question, who thought repelling down the stadium would look cool, they're so far away."

"there's wardlow, my sweet boy. this is cool now."

she laughed for a solid two minutes at tony schiavone saying, "here comes the little guy."

"i fuckin hate hager. kill him wardlow, kill that crispy maga ass bitch."

"okay what's with the chairs." *after a brief explanation of the chairshot heard round the world* "and, like, he can't just pick a new gimmick? it's been two years, bro. move on, shes not coming back."

"okay, i admit that this is great and i love it, kill that old man on the dancefloor."

upon learning this is technically the main event: "you mean it's over after this? theyre ending the show on THIS? not the triple threat match, this?"

"i just noticed mjf's bedazzled jeans, i'm not angry anymore, this is perfect."

"no, more wardlow. gimme the beef."

"christ, sammy guevara is kinda incredible and i'm fuckin angry about it. why cant inner circle be just sammy and santana and ortiz, fuck the other two."

"no, shut up! i refuse to sing along to this! whats wrong with you?! this is a bad song!"

[twothumbsandnostakeincanon]

I posted 375 times in 2021

42 posts created (11%)

333 posts reblogged (89%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 7.9 posts.

I added 99 tags in 2021

#this blog needs a tag for my bullshit - 48 posts

#ask - 12 posts

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#steter - 5 posts

#i love this - 3 posts

#asks - 3 posts

#stiles - 3 posts

Longest Tag: 136 characters

#and in the beginning he keeps dating villains because he only recognizes that he’s having a strong reaction to this person and he’s like

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

I love the idea of Stiles going thru it like, “Ok werewolves are real. Ok magic is real. Ok demons are real.” And then at the end of it all going, “you know what isn’t fucking real?? THIS GENDER.” And then just fuckin ditching that shit.

183 notes • Posted 2021-06-30 05:10:42 GMT

#4

I just had a migraine dream that Peter and Stiles were both secretly trying to microchip each other to make it easier to keep track of them, but they both found out about the other trying to do it and instead of talking about it, it became a silent competition to secretly microchip the other person first, and also an opportunity to bitch about it to other pack members like “oh my god I can’t believe he thinks he needs to microchip me, I’m not the one who got arrested in Vegas twice last year” and “of course I don’t want to be microchipped, if he can find my location at all times then I can’t do fun sexy surprises for him, like stealing his car.”

260 notes • Posted 2021-09-14 19:47:51 GMT

#3

See the full post

287 notes • Posted 2021-06-23 04:30:24 GMT

#2

mmmmmmm you know what’s some good good shit? some tasty words?? some delicious delicious fiction??? 

Peter taking care of Stiles after the Gerard Beatdown. 

Here’s a list of fics that have that, but not a comprehensive list because I KNOW I’ve read more than these. Feel free to add if you think of more!

The Fort Fic by @cywscross  

Do you remember - back when you were a little kid - the forts you used to make at home out of blankets and pillows and overturned furniture? Like all those kids, Stiles does. Unlike all those kids, Stiles never quite outgrew it.

The Alpha Thief by @hotpinklizard

Something changes around the time Peter turns thirty. His wolf becomes malcontent and angry. His control, impeccable since he was a child, starts to slip, that inner rage leaking out. Talia's iron clad control over the pack chafes him. He can't explain why, but it feels like his world shifts. Pack members he's grown up with suddenly leave with barely an explanation, without a goodbye. His parents' deaths, something that occurred over five years ago, suddenly feel raw, everything after their passing he remembers feeling stilted and wrong.

Or

What if Malia's existence wasn't the memory Talia took from Peter? And what if memories weren't the only thing she stole?

Razor Edge of Danger, also by @hotpinklizard

It starts with Gerard. After the clusterfuck of Stiles crashing into the kanima with his jeep, Jackson's 'death' and werewolf resurrection, Lydia and Jackson go off together, Scott goes after Allison, and Derek, broken and hurt from yet another betrayal and use of his body against his will, takes Isaac and leaves, unable to look at any of them. That leaves Stiles standing next to his battered jeep, arms wrapped around his aching ribs. No one so much as looks his way. Except for Peter.

A Meeting in the Dark by LeeBlack

He’d no sooner stepped in the kitchen when the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end and he froze in place, having gotten the crash course on being able to tell when an apex predator was watching him.

“If you’re going to kill me, just get it over with,” he said, with a bravado he most certainly did not feel.

The back door opened enough for someone to slip inside and close it, flipping the deadbolt shut.

“You should keep this locked. Beacon Hills isn’t as safe as it used to be,” came the response.

(baby) maybe that matters more by @lavender-lotion

“Well, well, well,” drawls a familiar voice that Stiles hadn’t even considered he might ever hear again. “The token pack human, left all alone?”

A Little Tender Love and Care by @ambersagen

Peter's back from the dead. Stiles is fresh from a beatdown. It's the perfect opportunity for a certain half mad wolf to get what he wants this time around. Luckily for Stiles what Peter wants is what the boy needs.

Would You Forgive Me if I Called You Hope, Peter Hale? @whispering-sumire755 (I could have sworn this one was post-Gerard beatdown, but it’s actually post- A Different beatdown. I’m including it anyway because it fucks.) (not literally it’s rated T)

Stiles has scars. He owns that, he accepts it, he's cataloged and memorized every single one, he's hyper fucking aware of them all.

//

"What do you want, Peter?" Having the more untrustworthy of the Pack getting protective weirds him the fuck out, leaves an odd fluttering in his chest, like moths, waiting perilously and suicidally to be burned.

He doesn't like it.

"You're injured," the man says, "and whatever it is, it's put you in enough pain that I nearly fainted when I-"

"- Used your werewolf mojo on me without my permission?" Stiles smirks, and Peter gives him a black look, crossing a leg over his knee and smoothing out some invisible wrinkle on his pants.

"Tell me the truth Stiles, how bad is it?"

[Or: The one where Stiles has scars, is more than a little fucked up, and Peter notices. He helps.]

391 notes • Posted 2021-04-03 21:03:13 GMT

#1

Stiles, age 8, on Ask Jeeves after finding a skeleton in the woods:

What do bones eat

Pet Bones

Can I have a Pet Skull

Skull terrarium

Enrichment for bones

Do teeth eat the same things as regular bones

405 notes • Posted 2021-04-15 19:13:13 GMT

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