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pinkrelish · 2 years ago

Text

𝐭𝐡𝐞 "𝐲𝐞𝐬" 𝐩𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐲.

singledad!mechanic!eddie x fem!reader

✶"Can I kiss you?"✶

NSFW — smut, blowjob, swallowing, ball worship, cock worship, grinding, dry humping, first kiss, slow burn, flirting, mutual pining, eddie is touch starved, mild angst, 18+

chapter: 10/20 [wc: 25.1k]

↳ part 01 / 02 / 03 / 04 / 05 / 06 / 07 / 08 / 09 / 10 / 11 / 12

AO3

Chapter 10: The Intentional Second Date

Smoke trembled past his lips in stuttered bursts.

It was Eddie’s second cigarette of the morning. Not completely out of the ordinary for him; sometimes he needed a second one when Adrie gave him trouble before preschool, or if he had a bad night’s sleep and relied on nicotine to help delay the impending headache, but that’s not why he was smoking again today. Adrie woke up, got dressed, brushed her teeth, and told him she loved him in the carpool lane. She was a dream. His nightmare, on the other hand, was coming to fruition. Because of course he couldn’t remember where he’d set his wallet if it weren’t chained to his pants on a sober day, but drinking enough to where he should’ve been plastered? He remembered it all. He remembered it all.

Oh, he remembered it all.

And when he heard the front employee door to the auto shop unlock, he held his breath, and counted down the routine seconds for you to pop your head out in the alleyway and greet him, and when it didn’t happen.. He knew you remembered too.

The morning smile did not come. No greeting. No laughter. Just nothing. Nothing happened except for the glass door to the lobby opening, and you going inside.

He fucked up. He fucked up. He fucking fucked up.

He made things weird, and now you were avoiding him, as you had every right to after he tried to initiate phone sex without warning— Consent? Consent. Both of you were inebriated to some degree, and he’d never felt more like a creep.

Oh, God.

His knees went weak.

Anxious bile sloshed in his seizing stomach. His face broke out in a cold sweat. Knots constricted tighter. Heart beating in his throat. Decisions—mistakes—put stars in his vision. His world was ending, and it pounded at his temples. This was it. This was it. He fucked up.

“Good morning, hand—Oh?”

Eddie froze.

You leaned more than your head out the door, and stepped onto the concrete slab. All your tender attention was on him, studying his pale face, and his hunched form. Your eyebrows swooped in worry at how he was crouched to the reedy weeds instead of standing tall with his back against the gray bricks. A frown slighted your smile, insulting your beauty when you saw him bent down, knees to his chest, holding his head while his other hand shook hard enough the cigarette pinched between his fingers fell amongst the rocks.

“Eddie? You don’t look good. Are you okay?”

His lips parted.

Was he dreaming? Was the lift of delight in your tone when you first went to greet him, and then the drop to concern ebbing your voice deeper when he appeared ill a figment of his imagination? Were you about to call him handsome? Was this the second chance he didn’t deserve?

“Eddie?”

“Yeah!” His exclamation helped him stand, and the twitch of your lips battled his nausea. “Yeah, I just had a long night,” he lied.

Lightheaded, he concentrated on keeping balanced in his woozy lurch towards the wall.

Sharp edges of rocks slid against one another under your winter boots. “Aw, I’m sorry.” Your apology was sincere, as was your silly quirk of swinging your arms to point finger guns towards the garage. “I brought donuts this morning, and went ahead and made coffee, so they’re both fresh if you’re the type to dunk.” You mimicked dunking a donut into a mug of coffee. “Maybe it’ll make you feel better?”

Endearing. Genuinely, honestly, so fucking adorably endearing.

“Yeah, that sounds great right now.” The pet names returned to their restricted status for now. He had to know for sure. “Did you, uh, like playing with us Saturday?” It was a coward’s way to dance around the real question burning his esophagus, but it was a valiant introduction.

“I did! It was a lot of fun. I’m glad you invited me. And, hey, uhm, I didn’t say anything weird to your friends, or anything like that, did I?”

“No, you didn’t,” he responded in an even tone, stomping his curiosity from fluctuating his cadence with hopefulness when you chose that of all things to ask him.

“Good! My memory went a little fuzzy after my fourth drink, you know, when Lloyd kept trying to get us to sing along to that adventuring song he made up. I didn’t know if I said anything weird, or rude, or something by accident.”

Salvation reigned upon him.

Eddie’s lungs allowed him to breathe at the kindness alcohol spared him, and finally, he could relax. Your fretting stemmed from making a good impression on his friends, and with his reassurance, you stopped fidgeting at your nails, and the color returned to his cheeks. “You don’t need to worry about that. Seriously, they loved you.” His grin struggled to blossom. “Do you not remember anything else?”

In contrast, your grin was a field of wildflowers swaying under the summer sun.

“Not really, it’s pretty spotty around the time they left, but I do remember a few things,” you said, taking another step towards him. “I remember you throwing a napkin at the back of my head. I remember falling asleep in Robin’s car. I also remember asking her to pull over on the side of the road. I remember waking up in the living room, on her dad’s recliner of all places. And boy! do I remember being hungover.”

Closing the few feet of distance remaining, your confidence was established in your ability to pinch the sleeve of his coveralls and tug at it in a playful, flirty way, coasting your frosted sigh over his embroidered name patch.

You claimed him, heart and soul, “But I remember us dancing, too. I’m so glad I remember us dancing.” Softer, “You’re the sweetest person I’ve ever met, you know that?”

“I’m the sweetest?” he repeated in a mumble, complying with the tug to open his arm in a curve, which you fit into.

“Of course you are. You sure you’re not sick? You still look like you’re about to puke.”

As if your grip on his tricep wasn’t enough of an anchor on reality, the backs of your fingers gliding down his cheek were, checking his temperature like he was worthy of being doted on. A fortunate thing, a blessing; having your hand guide him from the river Styx with a simple brush, thumb tracing the edge of his lip.

Yeah, his heart clenched. “I’m okay,” he rushed to whisper, wanting the words to sprint after your fingers falling from his chin. He kept the connection alive by copying the stroke along your spine, over your denim jacket.

The wintry redness returned to his face, he knew. His racing pulse brought it there, splotching warmth to his skin. There was not enough bravery in the world to ask how much of the dance you recalled; whether your memory ended at your head on his chest, or your wrist to his lips, or your foreheads together with your noses smashed to the other’s cheek, but he did gleam one thing for certain.

You beamed up at him with eager eyes, as if those intimacies flashed in the sun’s reflection, and you wanted more of them.

He said, “I think I’ll feel better after a donut. Or three.”

“Or a nap, or three,” you countered.

“Sweetheart,” he exhaled, a rasp present in his throat from smoking, “I’m not gonna waste my time napping when I could be eating donuts with you.”

A wry laugh played at your lips. “How romantic.”

“I’ve been known to be romantic from time to time.”

You hummed in interest, arching an eyebrow. It was a challenge. Oh, really? you asked. Show me, then, you said.

Stepping back, you dragged your hand down his arm and embraced the motion, seeing it through to his elbow, forearm, the heel of his palm. Feeling but a faint outline of his form beneath the thick sleeve of his canvas jacket and light blue coveralls, yet still clinging to him as if he were your heater. Your warmth. Another body laying next to you in a cold bed.

“C’mon, handsome.” You urged him inside by your feeble grip around the stretchy knit cuff covering the plastic bead bracelet around his wrist. “Let's see if getting some caffeine in you helps you look less like a corpse.”

He snorted, and obeyed. “Whatever you say, dear.”

By all means, it seemed you didn’t remember the phone call. No doubt you were stone cold sober for the bad jokes, dorky innuendos, and inappropriate behavior that would be frowned upon at work, but you didn’t bring those up, so he didn’t either. He was in the clear.

Fate forgave him. And now, he could move on with the ‘thank you’ he owed you in good faith.

————

It was days later when your stapler ran out of staples.

You clamped it shut a few more times until you realized, and opened the second drawer on the short filing cabinet beneath your desk. After a cool slide of metal on metal came a rattle. Instead of your extra sticky notes, folders, and office supplies being visible, a foreign object sat on top of them. Perplexed, you reached in and grasped the lime green box. An index card was taped to it, and removing it jolted the waxy candies inside, sliding them against the cardboard in a merry cascade.

Setting the Mike and Ikes aside, you read the thin, angular handwriting on the note, written in red.

DO YOU WANT TO GO ON A DATE WITH ME? (circle one)

YES or NO

ARE YOU ONLY SAYING YES BECAUSE ITS YOUR POLICY?

YES or NO

By outward appearances, your mouth was tugged downwards at the corners, but make no mistake, it was not a frown. No, no. What your expression was overcome with was so sentimental, so empathetic, you had to pout.

Besotted, you hugged the card to your chest, and reflected on the heaviness of his expectant gaze when he passed by your desk this week. The longer eye contact, the anticipatory lift of his eyebrows wrinkling his forehead when you waved at him. He must’ve put this in your drawer days ago, and you had kept him waiting by accident, poor guy.

You weren’t about to keep him in suspense any longer.

(Though, maybe he should’ve put it in the top drawer, which you opened daily for your highlighters, if he wanted a quicker response.)

Pen to paper, you selected your answers, jotted a line, and tucked the notecard inside a manila folder with two invoices he needed to fill out. You pushed your rolly chair away from the desk, and dug through your purse before going to the breakroom where Eddie sat hunched over the round table, shoveling a chicken Rice-a-Roni meal in his mouth (haphazardly) with his left hand while writing in his DND notebook with his right.

You stood at the vending machine with your hip jutted out, sinking to one side with utmost concentration on your pursed lips, perusing the rows of choices. There were just so, so many categories to choose from. Chips, candy, chocolates. How could you ever decide? You crossed your arms, and tapped your chin at the dilemma, taking your time. This was a wise use of your work hours, of course. Flirting with your coworker by passing notes, and watching the side profile of his smirk break through his curtain of curls in the glass reflection.

Finally, you settled on F4, and slotted in your quarters, punching those buttons.

The Kit Kat bar was deposited in a loud clunk.

“Hey, didn’t know if you saw,” you started casually, and held the manila folder out to him with an imposing grimace, “but you forgot to fill out a couple of lines at the bottom of these invoices. Can’t have you slipping up, and not finishing your paperwork before working on your little roleplaying game, now can we?”

Eddie shifted his gaze from the bulky folder failing to stay pinched closed, to your face. Fawning, he arched into an overly apologetic expression to match your performance, and placed a hand over his heart. “Oh, no, sweetheart. I’m so sorry. Did I forget to do that? Silly me.”

“Better not let it happen again, Mr. Munson,” you warned, placing it on the table and leaving.

“Never, never,” he promised.

Back at your desk, you sat in your chair, calm and poised. And approximately two seconds later, you kicked off the floor into a fierce spin, dizzying the lobby around you. The place was a blur, your stomach swirled, and still, your goofy grin refused to wane. But, you did stop eventually. The antics had to come to an end. You did have work to do, afterall.. Which you ignored when you heard him rip into the foil wrapper in the other room, and you couldn’t possibly concentrate on calling a warehouse to check on an order of headlights when your ears were tuned to the flimsy chair scraping across the tile, and his heavy work boots stomping down the hall.

“Filled out those forms for ya, sweetness,” Eddie said with a wink.

There was a weight to the manila folder when he dropped it on your desk, and tapped twice on his way out to the garage. Not a physical weight, but a gravity that wasn’t there before, now concentrated in his keen eye contact. An invisible significance.

The relationship had changed, just then, in the trade off of boring invoices.

Opening the folder, the index card was deemed more important than the paperwork. Your gaze stalled on the thick circles around YES, and NO. Yes, you’d go on a date with him, and no, it wasn’t because of your policy. Below them, your thick handwriting flowed together.

what did you have in mind?

I RETURNED THOSE KIDS MOVIES FOR YOU.

YOU CAN THANK ME FOR SAVING YOU

THE LATE FEE BY WATCHING SOME

HORROR WITH ME AT MY PLACE

PICK YOU UP SATURDAY AT 6?

Fighting back another sickeningly stupid willowy sigh at his charm, you wrote a lovesick reply.

In usual Eddie fashion, he left the very last box on the second form blank, so you had to go out to the service area, and address the mechanic bent over a car engine. Not that you were complaining. The back of his coveralls hugged the slight curve of his ass, and his hair was not only pulled into a low bun at his nape, but he wore a bandana tied to keep his bangs off his forehead.

“Hey there handsome, couldn’t help but notice you left the date box on this form blank again.”

“Oh, did I, pretty girl?” He spun, and rolled his eyes to mock himself. Wiping the grease from his hands on his coveralls, he took your pen. “It’s my old age, y’know. Things always slippin’ my mind.” Mumbling to himself, he pressed his palm to the back of the folder, and sketched out a sentence into the page longer than a few numbers warranted. During the arduous process, he looked at you with sorrow, and complained, “These dates are just so tedious to write out, it may just take me all night to complete.”

You refused to give him the satisfaction of a smirk at his (possible) insinuation.

All night? He wished.

Eddie surrendered the folder and pen, and smiled at you, stretching the streak of soot on his chin and cheek. “There you go. All filled out. Not a ‘T’ uncrossed, nor an ‘I’ left undotted.”

“Thank you,” you over-enunciated as a goodbye.

The very second the glass door came to a slow close behind you, you sat at your desk with the folder, and threw a subtle glance out the window to the garage to make sure Eddie wasn’t watching you lose your mind over two short words exchanged in quick succession.

sounds perfect :)

YOURE PERFECT =)

For the second time since you moved to Hawkins, you had a date. And judging by Eddie’s sway from foot to foot with his hands laced behind his neck and his head hung back, listening to the traffic outside echo off the cement walls, he was thrilled for his second date, too. He dropped into a steady bob at music that wasn’t playing. A too-large grin teased at his mouth as he paced to the motor he was repairing, and bent over it. His boyish excitement spilled like an overpoured mug of coffee into his unabashed giggle, and glance in your direction.

Eyes locked, he didn’t steal your breath. You gave it to him willingly.

————

Saturday’s setting sun was just another audience member to your date night routine. Robin and her mom leaned in the doorway of the bathroom the entire time you were shaving, and due to the opacity of the shower curtain, you were unable to convey your glare to the degree it deserved.

“Well, why doesn’t she wear this instead?”

There was a shock of laughter mixed with Robin’s scoff. “Mom, if she wore that Eddie would pass out on the spot. What if he hit his head, and they had to call an ambulance? You know she can’t drive him to the hospital. No, this bra still gives sex appeal without causing an injury. And besides, calling 9-1-1 would put a damper on them—”

“Rob,” you groaned.

“—spending a wonderful evening together,” she finished.

The thunk of a walking cane neared, and her dad’s hoarse voice sounded from down the hallway, “My! The rowdy Munson boy is getting lucky tonight, is he?” he proposed in a faux British accent after watching BBC nature documentaries all day. “Do you think he’d have dinner with us tomorrow? We haven’t seen him since Robin threw that New Year’s party years ago, and almost set the roof on fire.”

Oh dear God get me out of here.

Once you were finished with your shower, freshly scrubbed and smelling nice, you humored them by wearing the outfit they picked out. It was pretty much what you would’ve worn anyway. A short black skirt made modest by nylon tights to stave off the chill from Eddie’s trailer, and an oversized crocheted cream cardigan with tiny pink flowers, the hem of which hit you at your waist, showing a tempting preview of your stomach when you raised your arms to fix your hair. The pale lavender bra (the reason for their debate), was covered by the aforementioned sweater, and you weren’t sure if the sheerness of the lace mattered much when Eddie’s daughter may be present, or in the next room over. It didn’t occur to you to ask if he’d have Adrie with him, so, such is life. The bra may stay a secret despite their efforts to doll you up. But the sudden realization he may see you in it tonight clenched your stomach with excitement..

The clock struck 5:55, and an ominous roll of thunder put everyone on edge. It electrified nerves, and stood hair on end, setting forth premonitions of bad weather and foul fortune. Doom, it was; and it came, and came, neverending. Except.. It wasn’t thunder. It was Eddie Munson’s brutal music.

His little black car came flying down the road, and swung into the driveway, screeching to a halt heralded by flung rocks spat by his tires, and a flock of songbirds splitting the sky.

And yet?

Charm bowed before Eddie’s easy strut. Pebbles dodged his stride. Clouds of hellish dust evaded the shine on his laced up boots. His tight jeans flaunted the subtle flex of his thighs, and his belt sloped on his narrow hips with each uneven stride, daring the world to stare at the extra length of stiff leather flopping outside the confines of the belt loops, attracting all the attention he desired to the places he wanted.

You were still in the living room struggling with the buckle on your Mary Janes when the intense, raw screams of his heavy metal music stopped, and the muffled guitars faded away. He showed up, shockingly, on time, and you shot out the door before the heavy slants of sun breaching the leafless trees could beat down on his trademark jacket rattling with dainty chains.

“Hey there, sweetness.”

“Hey!” you blurted in a huff, racing down the steps. Flustered by his punctuality, you made the first move of the night by snatching his hand and dragging him away.

Slighted by your absence of drooling over how cool he looked, Eddie grunted in objection, but let himself be steered away. He glanced over his shoulder at the three faces peering at him from the window, and spared them a tentative wave. They were nosy, but not in the unkind way he was used to, and for that, he was thankful.

You apologized at a hurried pace, “Sorry, but if you step foot on the porch, they’re gonna ask you a bazillion questions, and never let us leave.”

“Ah,” he said, short of a laugh, “but let me get the door for you. Wanna impress them.”

“Impress them?” Dregs of sleepy sunlight highlighted the twist of your lips. “You come in here like a bat outta hell, blaring your music loud enough that I’m surprised you’re not hard of hearing, and you’re worried about impressing Bobbie’s parents?”

Refusing to let your fingers slip from his when he felt your grip go weak, he tightened his hold, and opened the car door with his other hand, sidestepping awkwardly to avoid the wide swing, towing you around him.

“Is that so strange?”

“It’s a little strange.”

“Good.” He established the bond of your palm cupped to his until you sank into the red plush passenger’s seat. At the groan of the hinges, and a hard slap on the metal, he finished, “I like being strange—” Punctuated by the door slamming shut. His cackle was far away. Shrieking silence filled your ears, interrupted by your elevated pulse pounding in your chest, and the tink of a pebble pinging the bumper when one was unfortunate enough to come into contact with his boot as he strode around the front of the car with his hands in his back pockets, stretching his shirt over the curve of his stomach.

What a lovely thing he was, truly. To lord the power of sheer captivation over you, and still ground you with a humble gaze and tender smile through a windshield flecked with dirt, as if stealing one of your five senses was a normal feat and returning it to you wasn’t an act of benevolence.

He folded himself into the seat beside you and staggered his legs until he could relax fully into the position, and turned the key in the ignition. His music took residence in the sense he stole. You tensed in anticipation, but it wasn’t offensive. The previous song was ending, and with you being boxed in with the speakers bullying your ears from every angle, you heard the animalistic screams as something more haunting, more beautiful. They were organic. Emotional. Conveying a longing which flowed into the next track; a restrained piece laced with sweltering lines, where each croaky utterance heated your cheeks fiercer and fiercer. Carnal of a different nature.

Intentionally avoiding eye contact with Eddie, you twisted enough to see the carseat behind you was empty. “No Adrie?” you asked to confirm a suspicion.

“She was invited to a sleepover for one of her friend’s birthday parties tonight,” he said.

You reeled at the information, but not for the reason you assumed. “Wait, what? There’re people out there willing to have a hoard of five-year-olds running around their house? Like, with the screaming and everything?”

“Crazy, right? Some people still have their sanity, I guess.” He stamped the gas and clutch, revving the engine with an amused answer poised on his plump lips. “Or enough downers to get them through the night.”

The guitars increased in ferocity, drowning out his wistful reminiscing on such substances helping him through the day, pre-Adrie.

It was then you noticed an interesting detail about his compact car you didn’t fully appreciate last time you were in it: there was no center console. You didn’t need to check. The lack of separation was confirmed by the heat radiating from his heavy palm draped over the gear shift, and the blunt edge of his nails skimming your tights when he clicked the stick into a lower slot, dragging it along your leg. The armrests were raised, and they too touched at the base. It was no surprise when his long hair swept your clothed shoulder as he twisted around to look out the back window and put the car in reverse, avoiding the Buckley’s dented mailbox, and lurching you against the seatbelt.

The lyrics peaked in sultry aggression.

So, no Adrie. “Am I meeting your uncle, then?” Oh, how your question was thin against the strong note the singer held. His wavering timbre penetrated you in waves, releasing a ripple of tingles from head to toe. Creating a change in the tension existing between you and Eddie when he answered in a deeper register.

“No, he’s uh, he’s gone for the weekend,” he said, drumming his rings on the steering wheel, squeezing his fingers over the gear stick to shift it into drive. “Out playing poker with his friends. So, uh, it’s just you and me. S’that cool?”

So, no Adrie, and no uncle.

“Yeah—Yeah, that’s cool,” you replied. Whereas his voice went lower, yours went higher at the acknowledgement. Fainter, wispier. Fluttery with the nerves in your stomach. Restless like butterfly wings beating on gusts at the explicit implication matching the subject matter pumping through the speakers.

Tonight was your first real date with Eddie, in his trailer, alone.

Soon, the dense thicket of rural Hawkins was replaced by houses and population; gone were the fields of deer, and approaching in a blur were stout brick buildings, and stop lights swinging in the slight breeze.

He slowed at the intersection where Family Video’s neon sign struck red over the black pavement, and stopped. Eddie, being an opportunist, saw the boring wait for the light to turn green as fortuitous. It granted him the ability to gaze upon you as he wished, ready to take you in after your rushed greeting. You had robbed him of the movie-esque scene where he’d walk up to your door, knock three times, greet you with a stunning grin and compliment you until you were giggling and swooning in his arms. It was only fair he drank you in now, in the low liquid blue of the early night.

Beyond bewitched, he didn't register how methodically he traced his eyes over your body; devouring details the generous neckline of your cardigan allowed him, reaching the narrow channel of shadow where your bra assisted your chest, and the small gaps the tiny pink flowers woven into the yarn created in the chain loops, gifting him a charitable preview of the delicate lavender beneath. Appreciating how below that, your skirt wrapped your legs snugger than his arms had ever been privileged, and your tights graced skin he’d never felt. Perhaps he even lingered on the strap of your Mary Janes draped around your ankle, wondering if he’d be lucky enough to circle his fingers there one day, too.

Flattery raced your heart. You’d never been the subject of someone’s study to this degree, as if you were artwork to be admired. Not from any of the dates you’d been on, anyway. Not in a meaningful way, consumed wholly by someone you considered a close friend. And not while a man sang about vulgar acts in a gorgeous way.

Eddie remembered to breathe when green flashed in his periphery, and his gaze evened the playing field when he caught you dedicating entire prayers to the indecent crease at his hip and inner thigh where he rested his large palm.

“Baby, you’re beautiful,” he exhaled.

Not you look beautiful. You are beautiful.

Meeting him head-on, you smiled. “I don’t have the lexicon to describe you.” His expression faltered to a confused pinch between his brows, and you reassured him, “Handsome isn’t good enough anymore. Never was. No words are. They need to invent new ones.”

Leaning in, he scrunched his nose, and teased, “You can just call me hot.” Which would’ve been a decent line; imposing himself so near his words caressed the gloss on your lips, and finishing the hard plosive—Hot—with the bite of his charismatic wolfish grin. But the aggravated honks killed the mood.

Two cars behind him laid on their horns, and he was startled into the reality of holding up traffic. You openly laughed at his change in demeanor, at how he scrambled to get the car going before they got angry again, all flustered and stomping too hard on the gas, sending you both slamming backwards in your seats.

“Yeah, real hot stuff you got goin’ on,” you teased in return.

He stuck his tongue out in concentration as he checked the rearview mirror, speeding to put distance between him and the other cars. Dangerously, he slid his gaze to you once more, prioritizing you over the road. “Are you really gonna deny I'm the hottest guy you’ve ever met? Even with all your city boys, actors, and freaks who’ve been on bigger stages than me? Guys who took you to fancy sit-down restaurants in a suit and tie? Men who drone on about finances because they chose a viable career not covered in grease? Are they really hotter than me?”

His tone was flat, and his face neutral, cracking a cavern of curiosity wide within you.

Your instinct was to treat the insecurity as genuine, but the moment you opened your mouth to restore his confidence, he smirked.

“Just kidding, baby,” he broke the act. “I know I’m the favorite.”

Glowing with confidence, he took his hand off the gear shift to jab at your ribs, but he underestimated how thick the crochet was. Instead of tickling you, it was more of a soothing stroke along your side. And he didn’t stop. He kept up the intimate gesture, brushing the fabric with his curled index finger three times. Giggling, himself, at nothing other than his own thoughts.

Gone was the swell of empathy clogging your throat. “My favorite idiot,” you corrected in an exasperated mumble, yet leaning into the shy affection.

The cassette played static, then began a new song. Angsty still, but not quite as on the nose as the last. This, along with another dig at each other, eased the pressure preventing you two from relaxing into the evening. The awareness revealing itself in nervous glances and dry swallows digressed into your normal dynamic as friends with the benefit of flirty innocence without the stress of expectations. Those motives could stay locked between your clenched thighs, and aching against his jean’s zipper. Tonight was the first foray into real time together, and if you watched movies and it ended there with no moves made, or romantic elements explored, then so be it. There wouldn't be any unnecessary impatience, or snap decisions made to cross those final platonic boundaries if one of you chickened out. This date would be perfect, regardless.

Right?

You could endure another day of him acting confident in front of others, only for him to buckle under the pressure and pussy out before kissing you, right?

..Right?

Whatever. The night was young, and oh, how Eddie’s giddiness for spending time with you emerged. The instant he arrived at the trailer, he jammed his thumb into the seat belt latch and commanded you to stay put. Naturally, this didn’t go without a snort from you, but it escalated to true laughter when he stumbled out of the car, and sprinted around the front in a flustered jangle of chains beating on jeans, only to play it off as cool once he reached your side and opened your door for you. “You’re silly,” you commented. His chest rose with a panting breath, and his lips jumped into a playful smirk at his own oddities. He stepped back, and swept his arm in a classic bow.

The friction burn from the seat belt slipping through your grip was balmed by the chilled leather beneath your fingers when he offered his elbow to you. You set your heeled shoes on the uneven ground, and wobbled on the deep tire tracks scoring the dried mud, and again, he was twisting this way and that, trying to figure out the best gentlemanly way to help you balance. Not that his brave palm on the small of your back wasn’t warranted in the treacherous battle of shadows in the underripe evening, but even you couldn’t stop your snicker when he, too, met you with a side-ways glance.

“Nervous?” you asked, bringing attention to the situation for what it was.

“Me? Nervous?” He arched his eyebrows up, then brought them into a swift furrow. “Nah, never. I’m just making sure my girl doesn’t twist her ankle before I get to cook for her on our second date,” he ended with a suggestive tone, canting his head to yours. Foreheads near.

Ah, the buzzing of springtime bees was trembling your fingers again, gripping him when the hive in your stomach fed honey to your hungry heart, pumping, pumping a sugar rush.

Acknowledgements. His girl. Cooking. Second date.

He was sweet. And you were trapped in the sticky nectar thrumming in your veins. It was a futile effort, after all, to convince yourself you two could act as normal friends do around each other. Truly, you lost that war when you inclined your head to his, and divulged in the same grin he wore.

“Cook for me?” you repeated in a voice of ambrosia, which he partook.

“Mhmm,” he hummed amongst the drone of television programs filtered through bug screened windows. “I wanna watch movies with you, cook you somethin’ nice, and remind you that I’m not the guy I was at the movie theater—” He flinched at the last part, accepting your weak slap to his chest. Pleased with himself for finally swooning you, he trained his gaze on your giggly sway, and squinched his eyes with mirth.

“Eddie, I’m well aware you’re not that guy.”

“Oh?” he lilted. “But aren’t I? Still got the outdated haircut, stick in the mud attitude, and leather jacket.”

You slipped a finger beneath the jacket, and poked at the macabre skull on his tee. “Got a different shirt, though. Last time you were wearing a rattlesnake, now it’s..?”

“Metallica,” he finished. A softer expression deepend his dimple. There may have been a particular meaning behind it you were missing, but he didn’t share. “Good memory, but may I also bring to your attention that it’s fucking freezing out here?”

Overcome by a shiver, you retracted your prodding, and he removed his hand from your lower back. The warmth was sorely missed. You agreed, it was fucking freezing and pantyhose were not a replacement for snow pants.

Eddie jostled the keys from his pocket and unlocked the front door for you to enter first, trailing behind you with a welcome to his humble abode, as if you hadn’t been there several times before. But you supposed the circumstances were different when he showed you in, and a certain coziness defrosted your cheeks. The trailer was lit by a singular lamp in the living room and the nightlight from the bathroom. An electric radiator generated heat near the armrest where his pillow stayed, and at the other end of the couch was a messy pile of blankets in varying textures and thickness. A stack of three VHSes sat on the coffee table near a collection of never-used cork coasters. In the kitchen, a spread of groceries occupied the counter, along with a page from a magazine, but Eddie stole your attention before you could puzzle together the ingredients he laid out.

“So, which one do you wanna start with first?” Eddie asked, drawing your gaze to the VHSes fanned in his palms, fingers stretched wide to contain the movies.

Subtly, he wiggled the one on the end. The green HORROR sticker on the cover appeared new; unblemished, without creases or dirt. You recognized the drippy blood stylized title as the same one printed in the local newspaper warning mothers of its gore and perversions. Less subtly, he darted his eyes to it, and made encouraging noises while presenting it closer to you. It's not like you cared what order you watched his surprise selection in, so you went with the new release he was most eager for, as opposed to the other schlocky B movies.

“Sweet!”

Adorably, he told you to make yourself at home, and you both found yourselves bumping into each other in the entryway. You bent to unbuckle your shoes, and he shrugged off his jacket. Maybe you swung your knee into his shin, and he flopped the leather sleeve atop your head in retaliation. And when you stood, he jabbed his elbow into your arm before kneeling to untie his boots, and you picked a long, curly auburn hair off your sweater, holding it out and away from you as if it were revolting. “Is this what it’s like living with you?” you asked with an excessive amount of mock disgust.

“‘Fraid so,” he consoled, looking up at you as he worked the knot out of his laces. “At least—until I go bald.”

You tilted your head as you tried to picture him without his wild haircut, and after some consideration (and curious fingers kept laced tight to discipline yourself from running them through his curls to test the tamability of such rowdy layers cut without rhyme or reason), you concluded, “I think you’d still be the most attractive person I’ve ever met.”

His expression widened at your honesty. Pushing himself upright, he rocked side to side as he toed off his boots, and stepped beyond them, narrowing the distance between his ego and your lifted eyebrow. “Most attractive? Yeah?”

Before his head swelled to hot air balloon status from a compliment he pried out of you, you stopped him.

“Bald or not, you’re still Eddie,” you expressed. “And that’s what I like about you the most; your Eddieness. Regardless of your hair, you’re still that guy that’s willing to trip over his own feet so he can open a door for me.. and cook for me, apparently.”

You drove your gaze to the ingredients on the counter, but he distracted you from venturing into that part of the date.

“Uh-uh-uh,” he tsked. “Movie first, then dinner. I’ve been wanting to see this one, so make yourself comfortable. Get some blankets too, I know the radiator sucks.” The warmth it gave off rarely brought circulation to his toes when he was sleeping, much less kept him from shivering on the windy nights. “Lemme get us something to drink, and I’ll put on the movie.” He chose to fill two bright red plastic glasses with water and bring them to the coffee table. They were the type of textured cup one would find at a pizzeria, and he set them directly on the wood, because why bother with coasters when most of the varnish had been worn away over the years.

Water itself shouldn’t be a surprise, but the fact he chose it over beer stood out.

Interesting. You made yourself snuggly as instructed, and sat in the middle of the couch where two cushions met. Amongst the pile, you picked the thick blue and white striped comforter, and draped it over your not-quite-numb legs. He crouched in front of the TV, and popped open the VHS case, brushing his calluses over the frosted plastic cover, and shut the case with a satisfying snap. Lining the movie up with the VCR slot, he pushed on the flap, and it was accepted into the mouth of the machine—kuh-chunk, slide, whirring reels, a fuzzy high-pitched noise—staticy snow played, then the first commercial started, flickering a woman’s face mid-scream across the screen.

Eddie turned off the lamp, and in the sudden darkness, he slid his socked feet in timid steps across the carpet to avoid a pinky toe colliding with the coffee table, and he fell into place next to you.

The cushions sank with your combined weight. The seams separating you clashed. Hip, thigh, shoulder. Layers of clothing blazed from the heat of his proximity, setting fire to your cheeks. You weren’t touching, not really, not yet, and you both stared at each other with lips slightly parted.

Your voice went unnaturally airy as you offered him the blanket, “Want some?”

And his voice was lost to the sensation of his bare arm making contact with your sweater.

He nodded.

Predictable for the genre, the next commercial advertised a pair of tits before the camera cut away, and the woman was assumed to be brutally stabbed by a masked serial killer.

He shifted. You shifted.

The comforter slid across your lap. He stole the warm pocket of air you were generating for yourself, and replaced it with the cold half of the blanket. It may have been an innocent movement, but him yanking it caused you to press against him more than you already were. His arm went rigid with tensed muscles the further you sloped into the crevice where the cushions met, stiffening against your soft body like a brick wall you had no choice but to lean on. You tried to help the situation by breaking the silence between the next commercial.

“Do you want to know another Eddieness I find endearing?”

During the first part of your sentence he didn’t react. He watched the TV; jaw tight but not clenched; it was only on the last word did he turn his head, and set those big eyes of his on you.

You went ahead and answered, “It’s how shy you are.”

The hint of a deeper emotion eased from his gaze when he closed his eyes in a slow blink, and raised his brows, processing what you said. “’M not shy.” His smile grew at that, stretching half his mouth in shadow, making his nose appear larger, rounder.

“And awkward.”

“I’m not awkward,” he complained, tone soft and playful.

Lit by the soft grain of the movie starting on a scene of a young boy running inside pitch-black house, Eddie’s eyelashes clung to the remnants of light, curling longer, and longer. His lips lifted at the corners, testing a sneakier grin at the idea of you finding him both shy, and awkward. Words he hadn’t heard in years. Descriptors he would’ve called himself when he was still in high school and dipping his toe in the dating pool, but not since then. Not since he dabbled in liquid courage at parties and gained some experience from the confidence alcohol afforded him.. and lost when he discovered the consequences of acting impulsively, and his casual assuredness was ripped from him when his daughter was born.

Or, yeah, maybe he was always shy and awkward as you presumed, he just didn’t care about people’s opinions when he wasn’t invested in starting a future with them. Which was fine by him, you could call him dorky if you wanted, because here he was in the midst of a boyish rush of adrenaline when the lack of stressful music coming from the TV became ominous, and the excitement of his plan working vibrated in his chest.

“Oh! And you’re—” Whatever adjective you were about to use was bitten short.

Paying more attention to him than the movie, you missed the build up of the masked killer’s reflection in a mirror, and were caught off guard by the boy’s sudden blood curdling scream trilling above the heart-racing violin screeches. It wasn’t even a good jumpscare—totally predictable—but you still jolted from it.

Eddie lurched into a devious smirk. “Movie getcha, pretty girl?”

It was your turn to be defensive. You pouted, “No. It just surprised me, is all.”

“Aw, come on,” he implored in a gravelly urge. Under the thinning comforter, between the mountains of compacted cotton from overwashing it, there was movement, and the unmistakable contact of the back of his hand on your nylon tights. He bumped you once. “Here, if it’s that scary, you can hold my hand, okay?”

As snarky as his teeth glinted, as teasing as his words were, both of your chests rose with a mutual suspended breath.

This was the line. The barrier. The emotional boundaries were dust, only the physical ones remained. He invited you over them as gingerly as a grown adult man could when on his first true date in years, and the fresh fear of making a move on his crush spiked his rejective-sensitive nerves.

“Yeah, you’re right,” you exhaled. Holding his gaze with the same fondness which existed in your heart, you found the edge of his hand after some sightless venturing. At the graze of skin on skin, you dropped your head to the side, and appealed to him, “It’s so scary.” Across the room, the TV played a calm, serene daytime scene with birds chirping in the background. “So terribly scary,” you repeated, facetiously pitiful. “There’s no way I’ll get through to the end all on my lonesome.”

But rather than hold hands perfectly between the both of you like the pious churchgoing teenagers you’d felt yourselves become, you went in for the kill.

Drawing back, you wedged your fingers between his arm and his ribs, and after a beat, he understood and lifted his elbow. You snaked your hand along his forearm, and down to his awaiting palm. His jeans were rough; his palm was too, torn asunder by his trade to ensure a roof over his and his family’s head, but the spaces between were softer. Love gentled the joints digging into your bones. Your fingers had to stretch to accommodate him, and the wintery dryness pulled at your unlotioned knuckles, but the twinge was forgotten when you focused on your hand in his hand. Your hand in his hand. Your hand in his hand.

You dragged your attention away from the entanglement of your selves finding a missing half under the blanket, and searched his face. His eyes flicked from the same knot stirring under the comforter, and the wrinkles in his expression flourished. He thinned his lips into a tight smile. His cheeks were never that full, but there was a roundness there you’d give anything to discover by touch. You’d been closer to him before, like in the kitchen when you counted his freckles after your painfully geeky dagger innuendo, but if you leaned in any further, your vision would blur.

An obvious awkwardness dwelled in the intimacy of your entwined arms, and tensed bodies.

“So, so scary,” you promised during the exposition dialogue taking place on a sunny morning between the characters eating cornflakes at a large dining table. “I’ll probably have to cling onto you the entire time with my eyes shut.”

His voice cracked high pitched, “Yeah?” Feathery soft, on the verge of disappearing altogether. “Guess I’ll have to be the brave one, then.”

“So very brave,” you said, sweet as sugar.

He snorted whereas you giggled, converging with heads together, and a laugh shared, hands held so very bravely. A breakthrough. One second at a time, you melded into his shadows, as you belonged. You angled yourself toward him and tucked your legs onto the couch, freely huddling your knees against his thigh. Your joined hands were nudged onto his leg more, and the clasp became sticky from perspiration. That was okay. There was a thrill in being the reason each other sweated. He curled in his fingers harder, nesting them between the peaks of your knuckles, and you returned the honor by hooking your fingers between his, lightly squeezing him back. One second at a time, he sought your sunshine, as he belonged. He made sure the pressure of his arm and elbow boxing yours in against his side wasn’t painful, slouching a bit so the top of his leather belt wasn’t digging into your forearm. He was thoughtful that way. Concerned for you and your comfort. Didn’t matter if his lower back would be killing him by the end of the first movie, you were wrapping your free hand around his bicep and rubbing your thumb under the short sleeve of his shirt, back and forth. Back and forth. Then, you were resting the side of your head on his shoulder.

He heard you—felt you—inhale deep. Why? Was it to fill your lungs with the scent of his deodorant, the cheap cologne he spritzed at his chest, the drip of Old Spice aftershave on his shirt collar? Was any of that better than oxygen?

Curious, he tilted his head as if something in the movie had him stumped, and he put his nose to the top of your hair, and took a small breath.

A different shampoo than usual hit him first, but below that, clinging to your clothes, was the smell of Robin’s home. He was struck with the thought of what his home smelled like. Was it good? Bad? Could, over time, over months, over difficult questions he couldn’t bring himself to ask, could maybe by the end of summer your two homes combine to make one unique scent?

That would be the dream. And a dream, it may remain. But what a lovely reality it would be; you staying, and your scents mixing to create a new one.

So lost in his thoughts, he didn’t predict the fake-out jumpscare of a murder of crows taking flight after an eerie bout of silence, and he was the one to flinch.

“Aw, movie too scary for ya, big guy?” you cooed.

Eddie sealed his lips in a frown, and tucked his chin to create the maximum amount of wrinkles when he looked down at you. “Maybe a little. Good thing I have you here with me, though. Right?”

You nodded most ardently, squishing your cheek over his scorpion tattoo—just another place on his body you made your home—and grinned up at him.

“Of course, babe.” You called him babe. He smiled so fucking hard. “I’m here if you ever need me to hold your hand.”

You squeezed.

He squeezed back.

Scenes went by on the tiny TV across the room beyond the condensation pebbling on the plastic cups threatening to fall on the coffee table where Adrie’s box of crayons spilt into her coloring book. A story unfolded in the flash of blade, a clatter of piano keys, and a quiet neighborhood who knew no better. The movie played, but neither of you paid attention.

Your gaze was keen to the way his lips stayed parted after he licked them. His gaze was invested in your expression, how you viewed him with such kindness he was seldom shown. A tenderness he was rarely given. He tried to show you the same sincerity, but your eyes were fixated on his mouth.

Self-conscious, he asked, “Is there something on my—?” He rubbed the back of his wrist over lips.

You answered him with a belittling pat on his chest. “No, big guy. You’re good.”

Your tone didn’t sound ‘good,’ but you pulled the blanket up to your chin, and laid your head on his shoulder again, wrapping your other hand around his bicep until your fingers were stuffed between his arm and side. He interpreted your change in mood as a signal the conversation was over, and put his eyes on the movie. Though, his brain was busy toiling over why you were staring at him, and wondering if the pats on his chest were still echoing beneath your ear, or if it was simply his heart threatening to strangle him from the angst of not understanding if he did something wrong already.

At least he was holding your hand like a real boyfriend would. That had to count for something.. Right?

~~~

The credits rolled, and neither of you moved until you pointed out a name scrolling by, and a laugh so akin to a man being punched in the gut wheezed out of him, it caused you to erupt into your own embarrassing goose honk laugh, causing you to both double over in a fit.

Somehow, his nose was nuzzled to your hair. His inhale was cool on your scalp, and his words were a humid huff. “Bart Horsedick,” he said, “Whatta name.”

“You should name a character after him in DND.”

“Mm! You know what? I will. He’ll be a local legend with all the ladies, and tries to charm his way into the party by constantly making passes at the girls. Erica will kill him for sure.”

With a groan and a wince, he sat up straighter, and you lifted your head off his shoulder, making similar complaints about your neck. It was tough work being brave during the scary parts for each other, regardless if neither of you were paying enough attention to care about the reveals.

He asked, “How’d you like the movie? Even that last scene kinda got me.”

“Yeah, it was good,” you answered in the same tone, searching for anything to say that wasn’t, If you don’t kiss I’m going to fucking scream. “I wasn’t expecting the second killer to be the news reporter. That was kinda cool. And that final death was super gory, with the guts ‘nd all, but uh, I’m starving, and ready for something campy.”

Heeding his lady’s request, Eddie dashed around the room, turning on a few of the eclectic lamps, and jabbed the backwards arrow button on the VCR until the movie was playing in reverse at a hilarious speed. “Be kind, rewind, y’know.” Once it clicked, he took the tape out, and put the next one in.

You followed him into the kitchen where the groceries were laid out on the counter. Some were things he already had, like the half-empty bottle of olive oil, and two government supplied cans of vegetable stock, but from the fridge he added an unopened tub of butter, a container of mushrooms, and a wedge of parmesan cheese. He put them beside the onion, fresh sprigs of parsley, and special bag of rice. Ingredients he bought specifically for a meal he didn’t know how to make, but knew it was impressive, and wanted to try cooking it for you.

You picked up the magazine clipping and raised your eyebrows at the recipe.

He fidgeted, spinning his rings. His voice was hesitant; falling back on self-deprecating humor as a crutch, “I know you’ve probably been to France, or, uhh, Italy or whatever,” he guessed, “and’ve learned from experts on how to make it perfectly, but I thought maybe I’d give it an attempt and hope it turns out edible. Just forgive my shit knife skills, and if I pour too much broth, or don’t stir it the exact number of rotations, or some pretentious bullshit like that,” he finished, gaze solidly on the floor, toeing at a scuff on the vinyl to occupy himself. “‘M not exactly a chef outside a can of Boyardee, so..”

Some of his mumbling was lost on you as you read the bottom of the page. Narrowing your eyes at the title printed beside a number in the corner, you put your fist on your hip. “Edward Munson.” He snapped out his worrying at the use of his full name. “Did you rip this out of one of my lobby magazines at work?”

He rolled his lips inward to curb his grin. “No, no, of course not, dear,” he promised, finding it the most opportune moment to turn away, and organize the ingredients in no practical order.

“I swear if I go to work Monday and find Better Homes and Gardens missing page 57—”

“Okay, okay—I’ll tape it back in, but give me some credit, will ya? I didn’t rip it out like some animal.. I cut it out neatly with scissors.” He eyed your harmless smirk, and plucked the mushroom risotto recipe from between your fingers. “Now, if you’d like to get out of my hair, you may,” he said, gesturing at the TV with a knife. “Skedaddle. Go watch the movie.”

“You don’t want me to help? Or at least to keep you company?”

It wasn’t often he was tripped up on what to say, so when his mouth hinged on a mute excuse to get you to leave, you registered what he was going on about earlier, and shook your head.

“Wait, Eddie, I worked in kitchens prepping vegetables when the cooks were too drunk to come in on time because they went home with some random woman from a bar, and were too hungover to know what day it was. That’s why I’m like, okay-ish with a knife. You don’t really think I’d judge you for how you chop an onion, do you?”

A few words were stammered. You shushed him from bothering.

If his confidence had trouble surfacing when everything was out in the open and not hidden under a blanket, then you’d give him another nudge; a single stroke of your knuckle along the monster tattooed on his tricep. The muscle reacted to you, flexing the wyvern’s clawed feet. You did it again. And again. Pinching his sleeve and tugging at it, doing all the cutesy, flirty things you’d learned over the years, including dropping your gaze to his pretty pink lips. Employing your best strategies, you laid it on thick; swaying your hips, and bringing in your arms to frame your chest. “You could heat me up a can of Chef Boyardee, and it’d be the best meal I’ve ever had, as long as I got to share it with you.”

Shy, shy, shy. He brought his shoulder up and ducked his face from your view, giggling at your heavy adulation. “You don’t have to flatter me like that,” he mumbled, sounding not unlike he was wrapped in a ball of lovesick yarn. Overly smitten, ooey gooey with the warm fuzzies in his chest. So very, very adorable, sneaking a glance at you with an unbelieve amount of precious crinkles at the corners of his eyes.

How sweet.

It’d be sweeter if he could take the hint and share those kinds of things with you, but you could be patient and wait until he was ready. Again..

Just.. keep making everything so obvious for him, and try to ignore the sting of rejection when the guy you’ve liked for months finally invites you over for a date, and still won’t kiss you.

At least you were saved from the worst of your downward spiral by the bad B movie and its body melting scene.

“Ooh!” Eddie pushed the cutting board away. “That effect was really cool!”

Since he was already making his way to the TV, you trailed at his heels, and crouched beside him, sinking to your knees while he pressed the rewind button, and clicked Stop/Play twice. The lead up to the moment played again. You sat in anticipation, wholly aware you’d just watched this interaction between the college girls putting their best effort into delivering their lines, only for them to fall flat when their acting was off the charts horrendous. Eddie regarded them with the same sort of awkwardness, rotating his hand in hurried circles until one of them got obliterated into a goopy pile of human remains, and you began to dissect the undulating puddle of sludge.

“How do you think they made that one?” he whispered, mesmerized. “The way it pulses like that?”

“I think it’s from a balloon inflating beneath it. Watch the way the flesh cracks, and the blood oozes out. I think it’s something like that pushing it up from under.”

He hummed, and rewound the tape a few seconds. “Yeah, yeah, I see what you mean,” he said, tapping his finger on the thick curved glass. “And look at that bone. It actually looks like a charred, brittle skeleton instead of those cheap femurs everyone gets at the party store for Halloween.” You also agreed with him in a hum. The extra touches of effort were impressive for a low budget film like this.

The movie continued inches from your eyes. You rested on your calves, flattening the plush carpet under your shins. The harsh fibers were dulled by your pantyhose, and if this was a spot Eddie had to scrub clean after Adrie spilled juice, you weren’t aware of the stain; you were only aware of the hair-raising sensation of being watched.

You directed your attention to Eddie’s pointed stare on the side of your face, about to ask if there was a reason behind his adamant inspection when—

He dropped his gaze to your lips.

Sparks ignited behind your ribcage. Hopefulness latched onto each long second wherein he resisted flicking his eyes back to the screen. Each passing breath a choice to follow the gentle curve of your mouth, and stay there to revel in the simple pleasure of studying the unspoken language evolving between you two, sinking into his own warm grin for you to decipher. He was still crouching on the balls of his feet, and you had to wonder if he leaned over to kiss you now, would he lose his balance and cause you both to fall to the floor? Would he catch the back of your head in his palm to soften the crash? Would his hips fit perfectly between your legs? Would his jeans drag along your inner thighs? Would he whimper when you held him? Would he grind down on you at the first sign of reciprocation? Would he already be hard?

Your thigh muscles ached at the racing thoughts, clenched so tight in response to the needy throb between them.

Was the unspoken language shouting now?

Eddie’s throat bobbed on a stuttered exhale; his chest shook at fractions of his inhale, as if he was experiencing the same tightness there from the rosy desire blooming so greatly, struggling to cope with the oxygen in his lungs when there were far sweeter things they’d rather be filled with. “I—” He stopped. “I read a review on the back of the box that said this movie was scary too,” he informed you in whisper, right when a godawful green alien appeared and shot the worst CGI laser you’d ever seen from your peripheral vision. “Better hang out with me in the kitchen, where we can keep each other safe.”

You urged your yearning away from his mouth to the neon colors of a spaceship glancing off his cheeks, to his large nose, to the tips of his bangs skimming his eyebrows, to the bags under his eyes, and finally, you caught the last moments of him roaming your features with utmost care before your gazes locked.

The floor beneath him creaked.

Briefly, you considered closing your eyes.

The carpet flattened in a muffled rustle.

Briefly, you considered uttering his name.

The dry air in the room vanished with his humid huff coasting over your forehead.

Briefly, you considered begging him when he pushed off his knees, stumbled slightly towards you, and stood, offering you a helping hand.

He said, “Gotta make this dinner for you before I starve, sweetness.”

Kissless, you fought against your inner bitterness, and accepted his fingers. To hide your wilting resilience, you put a swing of vigor in your voice, and happiness on your face. “Yeah, watching hot blondes perish into goo really makes one hunger for sloppy rice with mushrooms.”

Well, at least you could always make him laugh.

~~~

Onion skin crunched under Eddie’s heavy chop. The papery layer was discarded. Laying the halves on the textured cutting board, he dragged the knife in long slices out from the root, then rotated to dice it into cubes. He blinked away fresh tears, and beside him, you scraped the sweated mushrooms into a bowl, and placed the pan back on the burner for him to sweep his prepped vegetables into. They sizzled on impact. You stirred the mixture with a wooden spoon, and made sure nothing seared to the bottom.

Steam rose from the bowl of cooked mushrooms. Slippery oil slicked their surface, adding to the smells of onion and garlic. Condensation fogged the tiny window above the sink. The rice began to toast. A burnt popcorny, yet pleasantly floral fragrance mixed with the sour note of cheap white wine bubbling down to nothing, and salty splashes of broth.

Mostly, the continuous stirring was done passively because you were both watching the movie from across the room. When it was your turn at the stove, you grasped the skillet handle and moved the spoon around in some sort of pattern, but your upper body was twisted towards the TV. When it was his turn, you took his place at the wrap around counter, bending over to rest your forearms on it, savoring his body heat baked into the surface under your palms before it faded and was replaced by your own.

The last VHS was inserted. No commercials on this older tape.

You grated the last of the cheese into the rice, and tipped in the mushrooms. Behind you, there were two metallic latch sounds followed by two loud bangs. Eddie sucked in a hiss, and apologized. You were too busy portioning out the risotto to see what in the world he was doing, but the sharp clicks of his lighter were distinct, as was the notch turns of the unnecessary lamps being turned off, casting you in dimmed ambiance.

Garnishing the meal with parsley, you scooped up the bowls and turned.

“Ta-da,” he said meekly, opening up his arms with weak pizazz.

You were stunned at the effort.

The collapsable ends of the green table hung by their hinges, making the surface area impossibly intimate. On top, there were three lit candlesticks to set the mood, and underneath, the seats of the chairs almost touched. The whole thing was incredibly sweet. Thoughtful. Endearing. He had trouble meeting your eye.

Eddie glanced at the unscented candles burning bright for practicality’s sake. The first wet drip of wax joined the others melted down the side since the last time he used them when the power went out. Not exactly romantic. “Has, uhm, anyone made you risotto before?” he asked, and tacked on, “At home?” when the fear of not being the first smacked the words out of him.

“No,” you stated. “No one's ever done something so sweet for me.”

His lower lip twitched, and he ran his tongue over his teeth to quell the giddiness from exploding. And to stop himself from celebrating too soon.

As you carried the bowls towards his attempt to recreate a fine dining experience, he tried to push aside the thoughts of inadequacy—the candles, the fact he couldn’t take you to a real restaurant, the flowers he decided against because he no longer had a vase, the nagging voices in his head that told him this whole idea was stupid—and instead, he focused on anything else. Anything, anything else.

“Here, lemme help you, sweet—Ow, ow, ow, ow—Jesus, do you have hands of steel or somethin’?” The candles wobbled when he dropped the bowl on the table, and you both froze as they teetered back and forth, praying your second date didn’t go up in literal flames.

When they came to a rest, you both sighed.

“Hands of steel, huh?” you mused. “I think they feel kinda soft compared to yours.”

Quickfire, he picked up on the age-old flirt you used on him months ago (back when he was dumb, and genuinely thought he was the one flirting with you by suggesting you come back to him when you found a spider as big as his palm), and he concurred, “Maybe we need to compare them again. Y’know, really get in there and make sure I have the toughest hands in the Midwest.” Adopting a southern drawl, he stuffed his thumbs into the waistband of his jeans, and puffed out his chest. “Can’t let a lil’ lady who answers phones with ‘Yellow?’ have stronger hands than me, now can we?”

You pinged him with a wry expression twinged with cringe, and sat down, scooting your chair in, and looking up at him still standing. “You are so pitifully dorky.”

“I sure am, sweetheart,” he said proudly, falling into the chair across from you.

Your knees collided under the table; bone on bone due to his inability to wear jeans without holes in them. They knocked painfully, and while he did remember to apologize when you winced, he was distracted by the silly notion that his bare knees were the second body part to make contact with your tights. The back of his hand during the movie didn’t lend much to his senses, now he had a better feel of the texture, and how it rubbed against his skin. A strangely marvelous thing. And he was getting ahead of himself, sure, but he wondered how your tights must feel under the same rugged palm he was offering to you upturned on the table while below, his thoughts were erring away from respectful visions of circling his thumb over your knee cap while you were stretched across the couch with your legs in his lap, to something he felt unworthy to ask for.

Oh, but how he ached to be the one who was trusted to keep you warm when you were undressed..

Your chair squeaked. You changed the position to where your legs were bracketed by his wide spread. Perfect, because he brought in his stance and crossed his ankles behind yours, locking your thighs and calves between his, as if you were his possession, unable to escape. Indulging him, you giggled, and squirmed to the edge of your seat, taking his hand. His right, your left. A polite union of criss-crossed fingers. Mountainous calluses mapped against rolling hills of satin. Flickering candlelight dancing off the silver band of his ring. Kind, and sweet.

He gripped his spoon in an unnatural way, dragging it through the risotto, and bumping the ceramic.

“I can hold your other hand,” you offered, motioning at where you could link his non-dominant hand in the space between your bowls.

His voice was made of mushy tenderness, but his clipped tone left no room for argument, “Nah, I like it this way.” If you didn’t understand why yet, you did when you traced his gaze to his wrist. The beads had shifted from where they dug into his flesh. Squares from the blocky letters left indents in his skin, as did the corners of star beads interspersed throughout the round ones. Opposite D-A-D-D-Y, your sleeve was bunched up from cooking, baring the precious nickname M-O-U-S-E.

Your eyelids fell half-closed. The fondness on your lips wasn’t a result of the risotto—as delicious as the first bite was—no, the sentiment was much too darling. Almost as if you could hear the dormant vocabulary you awoke running hot in his veins. My girl, my girl, my girl is wearing the matching bracelet my daughter made for us, and I’ve never wanted anything more than another excuse to call you my girl out loud; I want it so bad I could cry.

“You did such a good job on this,” you complimented the risotto after taking another bite.

Fate. “It only tastes good because I had my girl’s help.” Under no circumstance was he about to make eye contact after saying that. In fact, he avoided sound altogether when he angled his spoon so he wouldn’t scrape it along his teeth a second time, and blew on the porridge-like rice before sliding the richness over his tongue, alighting his mouth with mellowed complexities for such unassuming ingredients. As he ate, he listened to you eat too. As he glanced, you glanced too. As he embellished his grin with a secret, you snuck in one of your own through the mysterious sharpness in your eyes boring into his too. He didn’t question it, didn’t breathe, didn’t make a sound above the panicked yelling happening in the movie in the other room; for now, he was content with holding your hand and calling you his girl.

The pressure to continue conversation waned.

He squeezed.

You squeezed back.

~~~

Dinner was finished in cherished bites. The movie was in the process of concluding, as most of the cast had been killed off by the time Eddie uncrossed his ankles and released you. He blew out the candles and stood, already regretting the act when the imprint of your body faded from his between his legs.

While he filled the sink with soapy water, you put away the forgotten ingredients, and wiped up the counter with a wet rag in absentminded circles, thoroughly invested in the slasher’s “forest chase scene” probably filmed in someone’s mom’s backyard.

Once the frothy bubbles sloshed to the rim with each dish put in, and the clammy air was brightened by the scent of blue Dawn liquid soap, Eddie rolled the stretchy bracelet up his forearm and began dunking the glass cup used for measuring the broth. He ran his hand around the inside to rid it of the gritty residue left behind. Dipping the thin washcloth, he submerged his hands up to his wrists in skin prickling hot water, and brought the cup out, exposing his chafed knuckles to the sting of cold air. He washed it, rinsed it under even colder water, and handed it off to you. You toweled it dry, and put it in the cupboard next to the fridge.

Over and over, he washed, you dried. He washed, you dried.

Routine, monotonous, robotic and quiet.

Outer input died away. No more movie, no more hot water, no more spoken conversation, no more meaningful glances, nor more intimate nicknames, no more inappropriate touches stolen under the guise of a drunken night. Just his thoughts, insecurities, anxieties, and hopes and the instant foreboding stress wrenching his stomach with fear of those hopes never coming true.

The air was thick with awareness.

You were in his home. The date was coming to an end, and so was his bravery. This was his chance, and he was letting it slip by him. Again.

He’d run out of excuses. Or rather, he reasoned with the excuses, and now he was facing the real problem. All the stuff from months ago about him not knowing if you liked him, your flighty lifestyle, the dynamic of being coworkers and worrying if it’d make things weird, the conversation he never had with Adrie; forgoing divulging his hobbies, his music, or his past with you because he didn’t see the point; those things he conquered. Those things no longer bothered him. Those things had answers putting them to rest.

Now, there was nothing keeping him from pursuing you except his own inhibitions..

Sad, how even when he had the courage to get this far with you, the differences in your lives served as a reminder he was just a poor boy from Indiana whose greatest aspiration was owning a trailer of his own so his uncle could have his room back. You had a drama degree—hell, you went to college in the first place. You had real dreams, and achieved semblances of those dreams before coming to Hawkins. A star as bright as you shouldn’t have to peter out in a town in the middle of nowhere. You needed the city to thrive, to perform on stage again. It was your calling, wasn’t it? Munson wasn’t calling you like your previous life, was it? You spoke of your accomplishments so highly. Would you ever learn to speak of him that way? Would he, one day, become one of your stories? A memory you moved on from?

Or did he deserve to ask you to give up everything you loved and earned to settle down in a dead-end shithole that hated him, and help him raise a child that wasn’t yours, tying yourself to his reputation forever?

What if he asked those things of you? Would you say ‘yes’?

Shit.

While the sea of doubt churned in his head, he rinsed off the ceramic bowl you used to eat from, and blinked the sting from his eyes after staring off into space for too long. He waited to hand it to you until you had put a pan away in the lower cabinet under the wrap-around counter, and accepted the bowl, drying it off and ping-ponging to the other side of the kitchen to the upper cabinet above the toaster. You didn’t have to guess. You knew exactly where it went. You were familiar with the precise drawer the spatula went in, next to the cutlery one where you tossed in the spoons. There was a beautiful domesticity to it all; washing dishes with you as if it were a nightly occurrence. Like you lived here. Together. You, him, Adrie, and his uncle—preferably not in that arrangement, and not in this trailer, but the vision.. the vision was there. You and him rejecting the bullshit small town mentality, and creating a life in Hawkins you could both be proud of, free from strife. A do-over, in a way, with you at his side, and his daughter on your hip.

The pit of self-loathing in his stomach yawned.

Those idyllic fantasies were too much to ask for. Too much to even risk speaking out loud. He could feel the rejection welling up behind his eyes as it were, wobbling at his bottom lip. The crushing reality of being a lonely single dad with nothing to offer—

You slammed the cabinet door shut, and tossed the towel aside. “So, are we gonna pick up where that phone call left off, or not?”

Eddie stilled under your loaded stare.

You remembered you remembered you remembered—

“If you adore me so much..” you added.

Jolted into action, the last dish slipped from his fingers, splashing and bouncing sluggishly off the bottom of the sink. Adrenaline hit him in droves. Frantic stings of want pushed him forward. Chores were forgotten. Mind blank. The soft thuds of his stride thundered off the thin walls. Pace quickened. Pulse beating in his throat. Vice grip on his heart. Months, weeks, days, hours of keeping his starvation alive through longing looks and inside jokes and hands brushing hands in fragile innocence, denying the vital comfort he craved to experience with the one person who made him feel special; the yearning reached its peak.

Predatory hunger rushed color to his cheeks at the remarkable sight of his dearest dream going slack with surprise.

He secured his fate with his arm wrapped around your waist, sweeping his hand upwards and dragging your cardigan with it. Water dripped to his elbows, cooling the wicked fever igniting his skin. He poured his strength into bringing you into him at the same time he stepped into you, forcing you back, back, back until the distance keeping you apart was eliminated, caging you where you gave him his final nudge beyond the brink of composure. His hips coaxed you side to side. His legs boxed you in where he commanded. Each motion pressed his strong, needy body to yours, driving the edge of the countertop into your lower back. Sway by sway, a dance of insurmountable patience built over months met its breaking point. You went pliant for him. No fight, only a small noise when he engulfed you in his aggressive embrace.

You gathered the hem of his shirt in your weak fists. His sudden leap over the platonic line broke goosebumps across your exposed midriff, tightening your nipples against the delicate lavender lace. The tremble in your knees was juxtaposed by his steady hand tilting your face up to his.

Sudsy bubbles burst on the peach fuzz beneath your ear from where he cupped your jaw. Droplets trickled to the base of your neck, curving over your breasts, and beading on the surface of your cardigan. He swept his fingers in an untamed stroke over your cheek. He tested a deeper angle, fitting his broad grasp to your chin and compelling you to lean in with the heel of his palm guiding you, drawing you forward, supporting the pout of your bottom lip with the base of his thumb.

His nose whistled when he took a shallow breath. The wet, soapy trails left in his hand’s wake went cold against his sigh coasting over your skin. Again, he tried another breath. Deeper; initiating the unadulterated intimacy of his stomach filling out and pushing against yours. More. The great expanse of his shoulders squared with confidence, and his muscles braced under your tender exploration. Your weak grip left his waist to climb up the confines of his arms, passing over his ribs and the flat plane of his pecs to place the lightest touch at the base of his neck. Closer. The serious glint in his eyes blurred as he neared.

The tip of his nose butted the apple of your cheek.

“Can I kiss you?” he spoke aloud for the first time, words breaking on the whisper.

You answered him in a faint, insatiable, “Yes.”

He imposed himself more. Frame on frame. Unyielding body leaned and curved around your softness, channeling every repressed feeling he’d had since you met into pinning you against the counter. Gradually, he dropped his head into a better angle; grinding forehead on forehead, tracing his perfect nose along yours, tilting so his mouth hovered fractions above a decision.

He teased, “Are you only saying that because it’s your policy?”

You smiled against the edge of his thumb after spying his sly grin through your heavy lashes. “No,” you stressed the single word, speaking through the mild irk of impatience building like an itch that could not be scratched in the marrow of your bones.

Anticipation clung to the prolonged gossamer blinks before they lulled into closed eyes, and slow swallows of air until lungs were poised on a held breath.

Every syllable of his next question dragged his lower lip across yours. “Are you my girl?”

“Eddie—”

The whine. The beg. The genuine plea of his name.

Organically imperfect, he smashed his mouth to yours. It was a harsh collision of teeth to lips, and a startled grunt at the abrupt impact, but neither of you cared. Reservations were off. You clung desperately to his shirt, stretching the cotton around his neck and biting the ball chain necklace into his throat, striving for a needier kiss; sparking a heady rush of awareness to the oversensitive areas reacting to the animalistic push and pull of him gaining control, advocating for his own fight in the flex of his thighs driving you into the creaky doors of the cabinetry. The fervency spurred him on. You combed your fingers through the downy curls at his nape, and he did not hesitate slipping a hand under your sweater to smooth his palm to your bare waist. And fuck, how you arched your back on instinct.

Nasally grunts of pain descended to pleasant hums from the throat.

Unable to divide his attention, the kisses went sloppier. Rushed. Awkward, and clumsy. He slotted his mouth to yours with too much force, to the point of bruising your spit slicked lips, and the wet smack pulled a submissive whimper from the places he’d yet to take. The flush blotching his throat ran hot like flames, heating the Old Spice aftershave on his skin. The scent aided the dizzy lurch in your head, lost to the dull lamplight beyond your eyelids, rocking you onto your toes and falling back on your heels in the swirling give-and-take of his unstated needs reaching levels of crisis only you could solve. A pain you could cure as you crammed your nose to his cheek, spread your fingers firmly against his skull, and kissed your friend harder than he kissed you.

Hums lowered into a depraved moan.

The intensity of your reciprocation fueled his ego. Seeking, he moved his chivalrous hand from cupping your face, downwards. Grabbing, seizing, squeezing. After refraining from so much for so long, he was mesmerized by the curve of your shoulder, the sway of your lower back, the waistband of your scratchy polyester skirt. He roved until he found your ribs, and he molded his fingerprints there, branding you with the sensation of his thumb beneath your underwire bra. It was a messy exploration. His excitement had him bearing his weight down on you, and when your strained feet failed to steady him, your ankle gave. Knees bumped; he stepped on your toes. He fell into you and matched the pain of the counter prodding your tender flesh with the bulk of his leather belt scraping your stomach. No apology. Not with words. It was the safety and protection of his arm crooked between you and the laminate countertop which rescued you, and as a reward, he dropped his forearm from the cusp of your hips and feasted his thick fingers on a handful of your ass, rocking you into him.

There was no other way to react to the blunt suggestion.

Heavy, uneven breaths were panted across the other’s sore lips as you both withdrew to gauge the next step. He scoped your features with urgency, darting from your relaxed brows, to your keen gaze. There was an etching of insecurity marring the honey in his gentle brown eyes when you were too dazed to remember to smile, jumping to conclusions in his worrisome ways.

He really did worry too much.

Bringing your hand out of his curls, you grazed the strained tendon on the side of his neck, and worked your way up. You trailed your knuckles along his cheek, swept them under his wispy bangs, and put your fingertips to his temple, triggering a shivered sigh and fluttering lashes at the new touch.

You answered him as you combed his hair away from his face, “I’m your girl.”

The instant sincerity of his red, swollen lips kicking up into an uneven grin invoked a raw tenderness to his pink nose scrunching in playfulness, and the corner of his eyes going tight with happiness.

“Yeah?” he asked, voice hoarse from the exertion of kissing you senseless.

“Yeah,” you promised in another caress.

For a moment, he held your gaze with the importance of someone understanding what it meant to be by his side and to be seen with him out in Hawkins public; as if he were on the verge of crying from the sheer gratitude of your policy landing you here, in his arms, on this night, wanting to be his.

Eddie peered into your eyes again. His wide pupils and dusky cheeks spoke of the nature of his body, but behind that, lurking beneath his fibrous sinew was the same innate marrow telling him this was okay. This was right. Just let go.

Just let go.

He listened.

As wild as he took you minutes before, he was ready to luxuriate in the nuances of affection. He pressed his mouth closed in a dry swallow, and raised his hand from your ribs, beckoning your cheek into the stifling heat of his palm. The throbbing pulse in his neck beat a rhythm to his chest, rising and falling in a quick cadence until he was able to discipline his attention away from the obvious snag of his zipper on your skirt.

He relaxed into another kiss. It may have been the hundredth of the night, but it was pivotal. Something changed. The frantic clashing lessened, and the cravings heightened.

Consistent as he was in taking things slow, he knew how to make you feel cherished. He took your bottom lip between his and dragged it as he broke the chain from one kiss to the other, as if the extra second he claimed a part of you was crucial to his survival. Truly indulging in the full potential of someone witnessing the many bad days of his life and still wanting to cook dinner with him. Someone enjoying the harmonized hum of your lips converging while you scratched small circles on his scalp above his ears. Someone willing to hear his shameful complaints about fatherhood, and not judge him when he took his lunch break in his car, cranking the seat back to rest his blood-shot sleepless eyes, instead of sharing a coke with them in the breakroom. Someone he’d come to rely on; a constant in his life.

He poured his coffee pot’s worth of trust into you, and you answered him with the blissful endeavor of your fingers scaling his forearm, brushing through the thin hair growing like wheat and pushing the beaded bracelet up to his wrist, cupping your hand over his on your cheek. D-A-D-D-Y. M-O-U-S-E. In turn, you drank his insecurities and added your own, overflowing with the mutual truth that neither of you had been in a stable relationship lasting longer than a month, and this whole thing should’ve been very scary.

But it wasn’t scary.

It was slow and steady.

The heaviness of his body returned. Hands wandered aimlessly. Arms entwined, untangled, confused themselves on who was where. Attentive fingertips glided over woven yarn and cotton, following the dips and curves and slopes; basking in the reverence of married threads and validation. Legs shuffled, spreading and accommodating. Jaws went slack. Languid tongues merged, lazy and hot. He palmed your ass in a lax grip, easing your hips flush against his. You answered with a purposeful roll intending to earn some friction, but you couldn’t reap the benefits on account of one problem..

Your skirt was stretched to the fabric’s maximum allowance, creating a taut buffer keeping him at bay. Any motion was nullified by the hindrance. Noticing this, he shifted to be better cradled by your thighs, and a delicious gift was granted with the tandem action of your bodies joining.

He flattened his hands on the countertop behind you and blessed you with a proper long drawl of his hips; pausing in an open mouthed kiss because the noise you made—the noise you made—the noise the noise the noise you made—

Your quick inhale faltered, flattering the hard press of his cock with a shameless gasp.

Eddie halted at the top of the motion from your involuntary praise, and locked eyes with you. Just like when he made you laugh, he wanted to witness your pleasure, soak in your reverent stare and pride himself on the way you asked for more—by sinking back and away and rutting upwards, instigating a filthy tension on the layers separating you; panties, nylon, polyester skirt, seams on seams on seams of harsh denim, and his choice of boxers; and God, you thrived on the bulk behind his zipper caressing you for the first time where climaxes were born. Your moan hinged on his satisfaction, and in a dare, you pivoted the descent of your roll towards the right, capturing between you his stiff length tenting towards his pocket. And when you arched into a slow grind on the base—sliding him along the curve of your clothed heat—he released his own pretty noise.

“Mm—fuck,” he groaned into your mouth.

Gravitating elsewhere, he left messy kisses on your jaw and brushed his nose over the peach fuzz on your cheek to put his love-bitten lips to your ear. Gravelly with want, he asked, “When did you remember what happened that night?”

A dirty throb pulsed where he buried himself between your legs, striving for the angle which had you grasping at his narrow hips as a silent plea for him to drive into you harder.

“Oh,” you panted into his hair sticking to your mouth. Answering casually as you could despite your face running hot, and your voice straining light with a joke, you answered, “I never forgot. I lied when you asked me.”

“You—?” The word was a quick huff of air against your neck. He pulled away enough to look at you, but not divorce your stomachs from touching. Two deep creases formed between his brows, shadowing his squint with incredulity. “You lied to me?”

A pang of doubt weeded its way into your insecure hands around his waist, forcing you to question if he was really mad at you for pretending you didn’t remember the exact details of last weekend in order to bolster his confidence into asking you on a date instead of wallowing in silent guilt for thinking he did something wrong and end up pushing you away, sabotaging himself from ever acting on this.

You were about to speak your mind—that is, until his lips crooked up, and he invaded your space with his big eyes, big nose, and even bigger grin.

“You lied to me,” he said with a snap of wolfishness, tonguing his sharp canine after the bite of his words; hosting an overabundance of admiration in his half-lidded gaze raking over you, alighting every sinful nerve in your body.

Time to pick up where that phone call left off—

“Yeah, I did.. But you didn’t.” You sank your hand between your bodies, and flattened your palm to the front of his jeans.

His breath hitched.

Skimming, teasing, playing with him, you strung his lust taut, tracking your fingertips over the hardness and sweeping them to the very end, circling an outline around his head like a Siren’s call to his fiery blood. His biceps flexed against your arms. The laminate counter squeaked from his sweaty grip on the edge. Vinyl flooring creaked at his antsy rut into your hand, and you gave in to your own curiosity.

Wrapping your fingers as best you could through the thick denim, a spike of cold excitement washed over you at the sheer girth you struggled to handle—much less the long, long drag of your palm from base to tip—sending an ache to your cunt begging to be stretched by him.

Slightly over seven inches, indeed.

Lacking poise, you blurted an unintelligible word, and his smirk underscored his heavy kiss.

“Told you I didn’t need to overcompensate,” he taunted.

His newfound smugness was allowed. Encouraged, even, by your firm strokes, again and again, creating a damp patch on his pants at every pass of your thumb. You were fascinated by his ability to engulf you in another tender union of lips when your senses were overwhelmed by the impressive size filling your palm. Intoxicated by the gentle glide of his considerable tongue along your bottom teeth. Dazed by his pitiful groan when you increased your pace, building and building the wicked friction burn from his jeans on your soft skin, tending to the flames of your arousal, sensitive nipples peaked and receptive to the warmth of his lean chest pressing down on you.

Needing him, you closed off the kiss and played into your appeal with a saccharine pinch to your expression, and a cloying sweetness to your tone. “You do so much for your family,” you murmured. “You work so hard to provide for them, always staying late at the garage, covered in grease and dirt, fixing cars until your hands are torn and your back aches. Making sacrifices without a second thought. Always putting their needs first.”

Stroking his hard cock, you asked, “When was the last time someone put your needs first?”

Eddie screwed his eyes shut and fit the bridge of his nose to your forehead. When he spoke, his embarrassment influenced his mumble, “S’been a long, long time.”

“Sounds like you need me to take care of you, handsome.”

He tensed to suppress his shiver from your sultry tone, and withheld his whimper at the prospect, meeting your gaze in a nervous flick. “I don’t, uhm.. have..” His assured demeanor ebbed to stuttering shyness. “I didn’t, uh, buy any condoms, and all the stores are closed by now..”

Your face fell flat.

You threw your exasperated stare to the ceiling, and searched the series of events which would lead to him asking you on a date, at his home, at night, without anyone else present, and somehow not think to buy condoms. “Why didn’t you buy any?”

He shrugged, frustration evident in his tone. “I was afraid of being a dumbass and leaving them out in the open where you could see them—like with the groceries or some shit—and give you the wrong impression, like my goal was only to invite you over for that reason, and, I don’t know, think I’m coming on too strong, or something, and make you uncomfortable.”

You gripped your beloved dumbass by the chin with your unoccupied hand, and put an end to his fretting. “Or, I would get the right impression, and we’d have that box opened within ten minutes of me walking through the door.”

He blinked dumbly.

Before he could ask if you were serious, you steered the conversation to its original topic with a gentle squeeze where the dark spot on his jeans bloomed, and said, “We’ll worry about condoms next time.” He throbbed in your palm. Next time. “After all the romantic stuff you’ve done for me, I want to show you my appreciation.” You slid your fingers through his belt loops, and leaned up, nosing your way through his frizzy waves to whisper a fantasy in his ear. “I want you in my mouth.”

You put the power of suggestion in your aggressive tug, snapping your hips together.

Ripples of electric pleasure stood his arm hair on end. The alertness in his expression glazed over. He lazed in the feeling, hardly able to open his eyes to follow the bounce of your eyebrows and the deep cut of your smirk; matching with his own goofy smile going lopsided with enthusiasm.

Since his birth, there were few instances where he felt wanted, or loved, and for his dream girl to waltz into his life and be so brazen about her attraction to him with no hidden motives, empty sweet-talk, or ill intentions—

For possibly the first time in Eddie’s ostracized existence, he felt desired.

Each low tug on his jeans was another boost to his self esteem, guiding him step by step further beyond the platonic line. Deeper, and deeper into new territory. Crossing the threshold from cracked vinyl to plush carpet, and with it, entering the fear of the unknown he wasted countless hours resisting. There’s no going back after this. Acquaintances was a laughable notion, coworkers was a tricky dynamic left to be dealt with on Monday, and friendship was the foundation of him opening up to you.

Every decision persuading you to the edge of his bed was made in careful consideration. Choices were presented and chosen without impulse. Nothing about him was casual. Not anymore. The slow crawl towards this relationship was impeded by his past, and instead of giving up, you stayed true to him. Because you saw him as worthwhile.

Eddie sank to the couch, and before his back made contact with the cushions, he had his fingers cupped to the backside of your thighs, proposing a bend to your knees. In a fluid motion, he dragged his rough palms up your tights and coaxed your legs on either side of him, running his heavy hands over your skirt and up to your waist. He relaxed into the sitting position with an arm crooked around your ass while he treated himself to a handful, gathering you as close as possible until he was satisfied with the places he could reach. Not once did his eyes leave your face. He tipped his head back to watch you go from standing at the end of his knees, to straddling his lap. Wholly enamored.

Blue cast from the TV’s standby mode contrasted the dim glow from the old lamp on the kitchen counter, highlighting his blushy cheeks in eventide colors, and cleaving a defined shadow down his bobbing throat.

Earned muscle and bulky denim and seven inches of bliss prodded the delicate meat of your inner thighs. You sat high on his lap, releasing the tension in your body in increments, settling yourself on top of him. He kissed you. Short and sweet; a brief encounter compared to before, but with your senses amplified by the deeper connection you two fostered for one another, it was the best kiss of your life. And it served as a chaste prelude to his next devotion.

Taking the lead, Eddie moved on from your lips, working downward in a dreamy, drunken daze, reveling in skin-on-skin. Want—more—please. When he couldn’t access the vulnerable underside of your chin, he urged your head up with a determined bump of his nose to your jaw, and continued to praise you in stray kisses and greedy palms. He showed you what he wanted by dragging you forward in his lap, and you didn’t need to be told twice by his white-knuckled grip.

You grinded down on him, and your mouth went slack with a fragmented moan.

“You’re so pretty when you do that,” he slurred, voice husky and low.

The bulge behind his fly parted your aching cunt. With your legs spread wide, you found your perfect middle and worked the stiff seams against your need. Each rut glided him along you, slipping over the nylon and stretching your pantyhose taut. You beared down harder, obeying the faint throbs of desperation, and turned them into inadequate stirs of pleasure, fleeting at each pass.

The first stitch of nylon broke. Then, another.

His generous kisses went wayward, favoring your jawbone as a means to end, tucking his teeth into the pocket beneath your ear and nipping at your vulnerable pulse. You swallowed under the threat, and dropped your head back, revealing the neglected expanse for him to cherish.

Cascades of euphoria flowed down your neck. Teeth grazed, his tongue tasted, the cold tip of his nose drew sentiments on your throat. For every dull sting of his untamed bite, he apologized with a softer, and softer affection. Lessening in aggression. Soothing your sweltering skin with cooling breaths on the streak of spit he left behind. You shivered despite the sudden break of sweat in the humid entanglement and embraced your urges, squirming against his jeans and circling your hips in measured thrusts, tilting into the motion for your own sake and blanketing your thigh over his achingly hard cock by chance. “Christ, sweetheart.” His muffled moan set your blood on fire. Your fingers went tight on his shoulders, digging into the muscle shifting beneath your nails, wrinkling the fabric of his favorite shirt.

More nylon stitches popped.

Too lost in your own efforts, you hadn’t noticed the loss of his possessive hold on your waist until your hard nipples brushed two solid objects.

Yarn fibers tickled overtop the sheer mesh cups of your bra.

Eddie nuzzled at the base of your neck and rested the slope of his broad nose there, moving his lips on your skin when he remembered, but otherwise his attention deviated elsewhere. At his leisure, he thumbed the top button of your sweater through the loop, and drifted to the next. Another, and another, exposing the sheen of perspiration on your chest to the stagnant air in his living room. His deft fingers undressed you with undue ease. Each loosened button raced your heart, and you repaid him by widening your knees and sinking fully onto his lap, laying your plush inner thigh on top of his length in a satisfying squish, and staying there.

A weak whine tinted his pretty, “Feels—good.”

Feels good played off the thin walls stacked with ceramic mugs. Feels good joined the sporadic pitter patter of raindrops on the tin roof streaming to the grassless earth outside. Feels good warmed you like the oil filled radiator at the end of the couch, popping and crackling when the heat droned higher. Feels good manifested in your cardigan slipping from your shoulders and falling to the floor in a mute drop; rooted itself in his ringed fingers dipping into your waistband; was proven by his other palm molding to the curve of your hip as if it were shaped by the same artist; and confirmed by the unambiguous focus to your right side.

Feels so fucking good burst forth in his hand’s unyielding snatch on your waistband and decisive jerk forward, ripping through the last of the strained seam trapped against your satin underwear.

The pantyhose split at the gusset, and your plump pussy spilled out, perfectly framed by the gaping nylon hole presenting your wet cunt to the thick denim. You draped him sweetly. Curved over the immense rise behind the creased zipper, creating a stiff peak before sloping to the soft give of his stomach. It didn’t take more than a single experimental thrust for your thin panties to slide into your sticky need, working them snug to your heat and inciting the first true tug at your core. Whispers of relief roused at your center, but it wasn’t until your second try, when you tilted your hips and Eddie guided you down onto him, genuine satisfaction was achieved.

The low rumble from the bottom of his chest filled you with oozy pride.

You concentrated the friction on your clit, and Eddie concentrated on anything else.

He stopped sealing his kisses, letting the envelope of his lips fall open, slack, and inarticulate, never beginning nor ending the ode to your neck. His mouth hovered wherever his head hung, and in his stupor, he could do little more than use his tongue to cut a fat line through the luster beneath the hollow of your throat, letting the salt sit in his mouth before swallowing, grateful. With each movement, the scratchy grain on his jaw from that morning’s shave buffed your sensitive skin, and he lapped at the rawness he caused in apology. The higher you rose over the swell of his cock, the lower he prized you in sloppy drags of his ample lips. He cupped his ringed fingers to the underside of the lavender lace and used his heavenly tongue to lick the top of your breast, accentuating the curve for his teeth to savor you in a lovebite. Your nipples begged for him, and your back arched for him. Your mouth fell open with a gasp—”Eddie”—drawing out the last set of vowels before they devolved into a whimper. Soon, his head was a heavy burden between your tits, and you wrapped him in your naked arms, cradling him there with your fingers in his hair. Spit from his sloppy kisses smeared on your cleavage, wetting the stubble on his cheeks, and he remained smitten, moaning into them with each bounce on his lap.

He was so wrecked on intimacy.

Loading your lungs with another sigh of his name, you rocked your hips in whichever way felt best, not paying attention to the way your inner thigh rolled over Eddie’s fat cock, again, and again. Satin on denim; faster, and faster, tensing your leg muscles and releasing them like a quick stroke down his length. You embraced him with your chin to his hair, panting over the frizz sticking to your lips. Tender, always. Committed to lauding gentle kisses to his scalp even as you chased the one thing on your mind. Grinding in quicker thrusts. Listening to his muffled praise, but not hearing him go quiet, or noticing his body go still when his thighs edged into a hard flex under your ass. You were oblivious to his hand falling from your bra, and his fingers anchoring onto your waist. You were too engrossed in the act, rutting like animals do. Lurching towards the inevitable one desperate grind at a time, quicker.. quicker.. Heeding what your body wanted. Racing, faster.. faster..

Abrupt pain bloomed where he shoved his palm into your thigh to stop you.

“You’re gonna make me cum,” he panted in a ragged breath.

A new heat rushed to your cheeks. The dirty word spoken from his mouth engulfed you. It tingled and danced over your skin, firing signals of excitement in pulses. With clarity, you realized the few direct strokes during what was supposed to be foreplay had him tensing and trembling, trying to keep his release from arriving too early and making a mess of himself before getting to the real deal. Your nipples tightened at the knowledge, and your legs clenched on instinct. You almost made him cum his jeans. What a compliment.

Your puffy clit was sore from the brief friction, and you felt every centimeter of space he put between you and your reward, but it was like a switch flipped in your brain.

The sharp throbs of his fingers clamped onto the meat of your thigh and his thumb jammed into the soft muscle were forgotten when you looked down at the man who shied under your observation; his face aflame with the awareness he ruined your release as well and his, and his bashful eyes worried with remorse. He was the reason you craved the early dawn, and weekday nights. He was the reason your heart crowded your throat when you woke up and your first thought was to reach for the bracelet on your bedside dresser. He was the reason you took a liking to heavy metal and board games. He was the reason your body reacted to wafts of earthy tobacco in the air, only to be disappointed when the person behind you at the grocery store was just another smoker who hand rolled their cigarettes, as if they had the right to smell like Eddie Munson.

You looked down at the man who lived an isolated and thankless life, who found joy in the small things and loved with his whole heart, who had few outlets to express himself and receive love back, and nothing mattered to you more than giving him a reason to look at you differently come Monday morning.

You thumbed the edge of his jaw with a promise. “I’ll go slow, pretty boy.”

He made a choked off noise in response.

Eddie’s eyes followed the nuances of your movement as you rose from his lap and planted your feet on the carpet. His stance widened to make room for you, chest falling with a silent exhale; peering at you with a question between his brows, as if he were contemplating his luck. When you bent over and placed your palms on his thighs, you stole his gaze from the intimate way your cleavage shifted under gravity, and honored his lips a last time for the foreseeable future, about to show him how fortunate he really was.

You sank to your knees, dropping dry kisses onto his shirt in a path to his belly as you went, and lifted the hem. The bottom of the inked sword and dragon greeted you. Sparse hair fanned as you raised the shirt above his tattooed navel, and pushed it to the crease where his sternum and belly met. His stomach wasn’t as flat as when he stood, giving him a slight curve where it pushed past the edge of his belt—a roundness when he sat relaxed. You laid your elbows on his thighs, and avoided touching the large subject in your peripheral, instead shaping your hands to his hips, and bowing your head.

His muscles jumped under your lips.

Finally, you knew his ticklish spot.

He sucked in a breath, and squirmed at the scattered kisses to his sides. You applied more pressure, mashing your mouth to him with a giggly hum, and teased your wet lips through the thick curls leading downwards. The hairs grazed the sides of your mouth and nose. The warm metal from his belt buckle brushed your chin. You’d never guessed you’d come to know these sensations when you first met him and he made it clear your enthusiasm for life was not appreciated, but here you were, stroking your thumbs up his leather belt, bordering your grin with his happy trail.

Eddie skimmed his fingers over your wrists. “I’m not gonna last long,” he warned.

“That’s fine,” you assured him in a quick peck to the significant outline you’d become obsessed with, feeling him twitch beneath your lips. “We have all night to work on that.”

“What—? Jesus Christ, uh—okay.”

Sitting back on your calves, you held his gaze while you pulled the extra length of his belt through the loops in a smooth rush, and worked it through the handcuff buckle. You tightened the slack and loosened the pin with a nimble finger, undressing him with the ease of an expert.

Asking from a place of your own curiosity, you wondered, “How often do you jerk off?”

His eyebrows disappeared behind his tousled bangs.

Not yet used to you being so forward with him, he stammered on his tongue, but held his composure, much to the surprise of both of you. “Not that often, I guess.. Uh, a few times a month.”

You snorted. “You don’t have to lie to me, you know that, right? You can tell me if it’s everyday, I don’t care. It’s not like I’m gonna judge you.”

The two halves of his belt flopped to either side of his waist. With it out of the way, you pinched at the stamped button at the top of his stupidly tight jeans, but you had trouble getting a good grip on it. Here, let me—he mumbled in a small voice, lifting his hips off the couch to undo it himself, popping it through and revealing the waistband of his forest green boxers.

It was with great determination you aimed your gaze above his obvious grandeur when he started talking.

“I’m not lying,” he said during the sturdy grind of the zipper being tugged down. “Not exactly like I have a door to lock when I need some alone time around here, sweetness. Plus” —he grunted at the freedom his unzipped jeans granted him, pushing them lower on his hips— “I’m usually too worn out after work, and just wanna crash on the couch. Not to mention taking care of everything around here is exhausting. Just don’t have the energy most days.”

Reading the precious draw of sympathy between your brows, he sat on the edge of his bed, and reached into the fly at the front of his boxers. “But, uh, there has been a recent change in my life that’s motivated me to.. take better care of myself. More often.” A certain motivator who sat between his legs with her hands in her lap, piqued and obedient. “Lot more often than a couple months ago, before she started working with me.”

He wrapped his fingers around himself and stroked upward, moving his knuckles against the fabric. He’d been rambling to ease the anxiety from his nerves until only the adrenaline remained, and with his pretty girl biting her bottom lip at his impure thoughts, his stalling came to an end.

Out came his hand—broad palm and thick fingers stretched full—and you stared in silent awe.

The back of his pale wrist and rosy knuckles were the first to show. Prominent blue veins led to his crooked hand, thumb and foremost fingers grasping his base while the last two struggled to collect the rest. His wet tip grazed the top of his boxers, peaking the fabric and dragging it along in a mouthwatering sweep towards the opening, and out it bobbed in flushed hues of pink and needy red. Below, he used his other hand to lower the fly, and cupped his palm to his heavy hanging fruits. They slipped out one plump roundness at a time to display their greatness against his dark jeans in a weighty sway.

Eddie’s cock leaked a bead of anticipation for you.

Starting with a lazy tug, he stroked himself. The arousing sheen smeared around his tip glistened, shining anew with the pass of his fist. As predicted, he curved to the right, and the fact he could hardly overlap his thumb to get a good hold on himself spoke of his size. All of him was beautiful, and you felt beautiful when another drip of precum swelled from his pretty head, threatening to fall before your very eyes.

He was thrilled by your shock. “Want it?”

“Need it,” you responded in a faint exhale.

With a smirk deepening his smoky tone, he kept moving his hand up and down, and granted you permission, “It’s all yours.”

You snapped your attention to his face, and inched forward until you were snug against the couch, eager and motivated by the lustful stretch in your thighs exposing your soaked cunt to the air. Good and pleasing, you clasped your hands politely in the folds of your bunched up skirt, and framed your arms around your chest.

Dipping your head, you lolled out your tongue for his approval.

His expression was the highest compliment; revering you with crinkles at the corners of his heavy-lidded gaze, lips stretched into a genuine smile which emphasized the elusive dimple on his cheek, and defined the bags under his eyes. Strands of his finger-swept messy curls stuck out at odd angles after you had your way with his hair, grazing his high cheekbones, and thick neck.

His heart pounded louder in his chest the longer he stared at your offering.

Weight pressed down on the plush middle of your tongue. It left, then happened again, again. Again, he tapped the fat head of his cock to the sticky wetness, mixing his salty taste with your spit. Bestowing you the gift, and taking it away. Teasing you. He slapped his heaviness down in a dull throb of owning you, and lifted it off to run his fingers over his own length, jerking himself off at an easy pace he wouldn’t cum from before putting his weeping tip to your tongue once more for you to admire, but not indulge. It was the cruelest, and hottest, thing he’d ever done to you.

When he next rubbed his head along the supple muscle and took it away, you tempted him into giving you mercy.

His lungs stuttered at your first demure kiss to the underside of his cock. You listened to his shallow breath on the second, released in a short ahh on the third. On the fourth, you vied for privilege to spoil him. He relented. How could he not?

To give himself a better angle to watch, he propped one of his hands behind him, and dropped his cheek to his shoulder, where his hair poured in a mass of tangles. The broad grin he wore waned to a subtler emotion as you hummed for the silky skin thrumming against your lips, feeling him shift when he lifted his thumb from taming his hard-on down.

Eddie marveled at how you balanced his cock on your pout. Amusement—and an unending amount of tenderness—gentled his features. He was sweet on you. You were sweet on him.

Treating him how he deserved, you rolled your tongue around your mouth to gather spit, and pushed it past your lips to wet his slick head, making your kisses slip against him in a smooth glide. You showered him in small pecks at first. Short kisses with the cutesy sounds pressed to the sensitive ridges which earned Eddie’s involuntary moan; low and thick, drawing from the months of pining for this moment. Venturing into more, you darted your tongue out to test his reaction when you licked the valley between the halves of his plump tip, and you winced. His cock kicked up, and fell in a smack. It was painful, probably bruising the delicate inner flesh of your lips when it smashed them against your teeth. You thanked him in an acquiescent whine.

It was addictive—a daze. With nothing but gravity to keep him in place, you cherished your favorite mechanic’s cock openly and honestly. You flattened your tongue to him in a loving lap, and chased it with a long drag of your lips up the underside to the round head, struggling to keep your eyes open from the bliss of tasting his reward, and suckling noisily for more.

Eddie accepted defeat in a sudden, disappointed grunt, “Yeah.. I’m not gonna last long.”

He fell backwards in a dramatic flourish.

Sprawled almost flat, his shoulders hit the cushions, and his body melted into the position with his fingers laced over his eyes as a shield. A groan of despair reverberated in his throat. Poor Eddie, can’t last long with his favorite receptionist’s mouth around his cock. A giggle bubbled from your chest, and you were about to repeat your promise to go slow, but the words wouldn’t form.

Your mouth had other plans than wasting their time on reassurances.

In his melodramatic moping, his dick left your lips and flopped onto his belly—which was a loss you felt in your soul—but with how he slouched into the cushions, a fruitful endeavor presented itself. Swung, and bounced, actually.

You leaned in, and became acquainted with your hand around his girth; familiarizing yourself with the naked warmth in your palm, and his airy whimper when you did.

The top of his boxers brushed your knuckles as you drifted your hand up in a single stroke. One fluid glide on the cock which belonged to you. He did say it was yours, after all. And though the thought alone had you wishing it was stretching your tight cunt in a blend of pain and pleasure, you had a yearning for what else moved up and down when you pumped your fist.

“Eddie?” you called. He peered at you from the shadow of his fingers. Innocently, you traced the bottom of his sack, and oh so carefully settled them into the nest of your unblemished palm. “Are these mine too?”

A croak broke his speechlessness. “Y-Yeah, those are yours, too. If you want them.”

Please was written in your grateful lurch towards his cock. Thank you was expressed in your lush moan when he entered your mouth.

“Baby,” he whined in a docile sigh.

You sank his cock into the wet heat he needed, but only for the purpose of curving your tongue to his begging tip and bathing him in your spit, using your hand to work it down his shaft. Except, you got carried away. A few strokes in, and you put your lips tight around his head, and already there was a warning forming between his brows.

You backed off. His face went lax in relief.

“Feels too good, sweetheart,” he praised from the depths of his gravelly voice. “Gonna make me cum like that.”

Your pussy ached to be spoken to that way.

Moving your attention away from how pitifully empty you felt, you loosened your grip and twisted your wrist to massage the base of his slick cock; not exploring upwards, just giving him enough friction to keep him on edge without spilling over. A perfect amount of pleasure, you guessed, from his red face emerging from behind his hands, raising them to comb his bangs off the fine layer of sweat beading on his forehead, and blinking himself out of his haze just in time to see you lower your face between his thighs.

You tended to him first with a kiss. An opening, or introduction, to your lips finding the spot beneath your working thumb where the hardness ended and the velvety skin began. He tensed. His legs flexed around your shoulders, bringing his knees in all shy like, like he was self conscious to have you down there. And maybe it was one thing to have his balls cupped in your palm, but it was another to have you nosing around the opening of his boxers when he hadn’t gone through with his plan of trimming back the hedges.

All he could do was stare when you inhaled his scent after he spent the day cleaning his home, running errands, driving across town to pick you up, and sitting next to you during scene after scene of horrors playing on a screen directly across from the terrifying event of holding your hand while trying not to out-sweat his t-shirt.

His bewilderment was apparent, but so was your enjoyment.

You burrowed your nose at the narrow opening of his fly, and tilted his cock to the side, finding the thick thatch of curls growing around his base, and admiring his heavy musk breaking through the perfumed Dove soap. A heavy purr of pleasure rumbled in your throat, coming out as a nasally moan against the wrinkled skin you kissed. So enraptured by his body, you couldn’t hold back anymore. You had to part your lips, and run your tongue along the seam of his sack. It was with a dire urge you stopped at the bottom, and flaunted how big he was by snuggling your nose to the heft and lifting.

You draped his balls over your mouth.

It was silly to him, and you didn’t mind the tss of laughter, but to you, earning his baffled smile while your giggle was buried under his sack was vital to your design. Their ripe heat enveloped you. The stripe you licked was wet on the tip of your nose. His natural scent swaddled you. Both corners of your lips were encumbered by the wonderful weight hanging on either side, brushing your cheeks as you swallowed the taste of his tangy sweat. You kissed up into the excess skin stretched over your face, and they rolled to your chin when you changed the angle you were teasing his cock, disciplining him towards his stomach so you had more room to worship the pome.

Warming him to the idea, you flattened your tongue to one side and ran it along the fullness, curving up, and dragging down in a long caress. In a breath, he placed his hand on his stomach where his shirt gathered, and skimmed the other over his body until it laid on top of his jeans, in the crease between his hip and thigh. You could see his fingers work themselves into the loose denim out of the corner of your eye, and heard them relax when you traced the other side of his sack, ending with a murmur to the textured skin.

“Too much?” you asked—he shook his head before you could finish the question, still hanging onto a suggestion of his fascinated squint at what you were doing to him.

With his approval, you indulged.

The gentle licks evolved to sloppy circles, eager to prize and polish, ensuring there was no part of his balls gone neglected. Lapping at, kissing at, making out with another spot on his body out of a necessity to fawn over every inch of him. Willing to nuzzle your way between the plumpness and have your drool drag wetly across your cheeks in his name. Fully content with messier and messier affections, cozying your nose to the base of his curls until he understood how little it bothered you to be smothered by his nature.

Unable to resist satisfying him how he deserved, you dropped an open kiss to the squish of his sack, and suckled on a small section, checking his reaction.

Not an ounce of protest glimmered behind his lashes, eyes falling almost closed at the intimate gesture between two people who were never supposed to be more than coworkers.

You parted your lips, and accepted a mouthful.

Eddie whimpered.

His toes curled into the carpet at the novel sensation. There was an incredible amount of trust required to fight the instinct to pull away. Even his fingers strained the denim when you drew your lips around one of his balls, and slackened your jaw. It was with great respect you brought him into your mouth, and cradled the weight on your tongue, cheeks stretched full and soft. You held him there for a long second. The rain was a steady noise of the roof, but your exhale was loud in the space between his thighs. Quiet suspense followed your hand climbing his shaft.

You wrapped your fingers around his hopeful tip, and fitted your thumb to the valley on the underside. In perfect sync, and with your eyes steady on his face, you hollowed your cheeks and squeezed each of your fingers at the same gentle pace.

“Fuck, baby—”

At once, Eddie’s unabashed groan inspired you, and his balls jerked in response to the direct touch in the places he needed it. From pinky to index, you massaged his fat head in a smooth pulse—matching the strokes of your thumb—and though your grip was light, he was already kneading his hand along his inner thigh and clamping it down close to your face. You soothed him on your tongue as best you could, and eased him into having more pressure from your lips, sucking harder on the most sensitive part of him.

Concentration stressed a shadow between his brows; chest braced on a held breath.

The telltale sign of his skin tightening in your mouth, along with his clenched stomach and abnormal silence, had you testing his limits. But it was too fun feeling his legs squirm at the effortless flow your fingers performed, coaxing him closer to coming undone and still daring to smear the swells of precum over the pleading edge of his tip, again and again, but slower. Slower. Memorizing the metallic slink of his guitar pick running along the ball chain necklace when you released him, and his chest sank with a sigh.

His voice cracked a notch higher, “Jesus, you’re really into this, huh, sweetheart?” he asked, but you couldn’t answer.

Before committing to his other ball, you spat into your cupped fingers, and put them to his cock, adjusting how you held him until you could look past and see the handsome glint of respect in his eyes, and he could gaze into wealth of adoration in yours.

“Love being on my knees for you,” you mumbled sweetly, kissing your way to the other side of his sack. “Love your cock, Eddie.”

His name, spoken where it was on his body, brought out a smugger twist to his already prideful grin. “Yeah? You like it?”

Rushing at the chance to compliment your man, you straightened your spine, and punctuated your words along the thick vein leading up to the drips of seed. “Love it,” you promised in a syrupy yearn, swallowing the bitter salt. “Love your cock; love it so much. It’s my favorite.”

“Is it the best?”

The question was tonally rich with confidence, but just in case there was any doubt woven into the wording itself, you regarded the man who went to work early on a day he had off for the purpose of leaving flowers on your desk, and smiled.

“Yeah,” you confessed, recalling a memory from the earlier months, after your first failed date, when he shared his can of Coke with you at lunch because the vending machine was out, and two sets of chapsticked lip prints were left around the metal rim. “It’s the best.”

You hugged his cock to your cheek, and nuzzled the warmth as you would any other part of him, humming a sunshiny hum, and parted ways to return to your true calling further down.

This time, Eddie groaned in relief when you settled his other ball in your mouth—”That’s it.”

With your newly slick hand, you slipped your palm over his desperately purple tip with ease. His thighs jumped into a flex, and his stomach fluttered with tension—almost like he was going to lose himself right there—but he exhaled hard through his nose, and became better at existing in the mutual pleasure. This was as much for you as it was for him.

There was a scrunch of determination above his nose, and a strong edge to his jaw, but otherwise, his fingers were gentle on your temple.

“You always know how to make me feel good,” he said, tracing his knuckles downward, lacing multitudes of meanings behind the sentence. Physical, and emotional.

He prodded his thumb into the hollow of your cheek, feeling how full you were of him; how his calloused fingerpad rocked in the same rhythm of your lips sealing around him and sucking; and you leaned into the tender gesture of his open palm, to which he cupped your jaw with a sentiment tantamount to what you were baring.

A sweet man through and through, even as he trembled in your fist.

You curved your tongue around the tight skin in your mouth, and moaned prettily for him. Frequent moans, ardent moans, moans appealing to his ego, moans you’d hear on a tape rented from the backroom of a competing video store with a black curtain separating it from the wholesome movies up front. Performing for him, finding what he liked. Which lick, which whine, which speed had his cock leaking over your fingers. Which trick made the creases between his brows mature, and his mouth fall open: the answer was two fast pumps over his throbbing head, and back down to his base for a respite, prolonging his release with a thank you on his heavy eyelids.

Prolonging, at least, until two fast pumps became a naughty blur of more—Oh, fuck, baby—and his brushes along your cheek went rare, and he licked his dry lips in the fog of his ramping high, and he hung his head back to the dense cushions, and his question escaped his throat in a hoarse huff, “You wanna—?” and it wasn’t a question at all.

You pushed your lips in soft goodbye to his sack, and his fingers under your jaw communicated his wish, aiding your chin up with a light pressure until your mouth was tasting the result of his aching lust. Slow and steady, you lavished his head in tame licks, building into a long sweep over the top. Warming yourself up to the painful stretch your lips were about to endure while his kind fingertips coasted over your hair, and found themselves at the back of your neck. Drawing out the seconds he tucked his thumb behind your ear, and rubbed circles. Sitting in the moment of something delicate, before things changed, and the platonic line became a horizon.

You drove his tip past your lips, and channeled all your appreciation into sucking Eddie’s cock.

He whimpered in surprise. A different whimper than before; not a drowsy noise he may make when rolling over in bed, but a sputtered note expelled in bursts of heavy breaths, singing a hymn to your blood.

The pace was not shy.

You descended to meet your fingers wrapped around his shaft, and reached your temporary depth where his hardness caressed the back of your mouth, and your throat clenched. Pulling back, you focused on his head, wetting his length with the sudden drool, and busying your other hand with his balls, cupping and stroking them in gentle passes.

“Ri–Right there, yeah, God, right there, sweet girl.” The syllables were mashed and dropped and disconnected on his whine.

Flicking your gaze up, you thrived on his fixated stare, bobbing your head on his tip only. Sliding your lips back and forth over the luscious ridge which had his tongue pressed against his bottom teeth. Massaging your wet heat around the center of his pleasure; encouraging a pinch in his expression as if he were in pain when he was in anything but.

Being higher on your knees meant your tits could be seen, and what a delicious sight it was for him to covet. Braced by your bra, your cleavage bounced as you pumped your fist along his cock, grazing your nipples above the opaque floral applique, cresting them beyond the sheer lace. It was enough to make his stomach squeeze, and his fingers tremble in the baby hairs at your nape.

His cock twitched twice in your mouth, conveying a message.

You welcomed him to the back of your throat, gladly this time, accepting the overfulness making it hard to breathe and the soreness surely to come, using your hand for the rest you could not take. No amount of uncomfortableness would make you shy from showing him the recognition he earned. For years he didn’t see the value in himself, and knowing the person who saved a Laffy Taffy wrapper to tell you the joke on the back didn’t prioritize his own happiness compelled you to take him deeper, faster. You shaped your tongue to the outline of his cock, and chased your lips with your fist, hollowing your cheeks at the top, teetering him on the cusp, rousing him until your skin buzzed from the friction and his hips pitched. Bringing him so close to the edge that when you broke away to catch your breath, his muscles shivered, and the shadows between his brows lessened as they arched higher from the mounting pleasure, where every touch on his body felt better and better and better than the last.

In the brief seconds you wrapped both your hands around his length, he made a pleading noise with the added weight of his warm palm at the back of your head—an urgency in his disheveled state, but not without the option of choice.

At once, he was at home in your throat.

In a union, your fingers wrenched his waistband into your damp palm, and he laid his hand across your knuckles. The control was yours, but the pace was his. He fucked himself into your pliant mouth in short, quick thrusts; ever attentive to keep his thumb strokes on your cheek unquestionably loving.

“Gonna make me—” He found the angle to cant his hips so you could watch him unravel; eyes falling closed and face tipped to the ceiling. “—Make me cum, baby,” he finished, voice light as air.

Throat flushed bright pink, cheeks dark red. Eddie panted into a shaky moan of true relief, and your core craved to be the one to take care of his needs, but there was something special about proving your attraction to him in every way you could.

The ridges of his greedy tip found where they were best brushed, and his hips lost their tempo. His stomach sank and stuttered in pulses. A dear emotion clutched your chest, letting loose when he crashed into his climax.

His knees closed you in, crowding you to his lap. “I’m gonna—” he gasped, rough and breathless; presented as a warning for the shot of bitter taste at the back of your throat, filling your mouth and spilling over your tongue with each throb of the thick vein pumping over your swollen bottom lip.

Something undeniable feathered the vulnerability of the position.

You swallowed.

And when more remained after it slid down your throat, you steadied his twitching cock over the offering of your tongue and jerked him off, stealing more drips to satiate you, swallowing with your lips pressed in a kiss to his overstimulated tip. “Baby,” he begged with his head thrown back, legs shifting restlessly around you. He sucked in breaths. Squirmed. Bit his tongue. Tugs of laughter played at his screwed up mouth, so desperate to resist giving in to a true grin when you rode out his high until he was beginning to soften, and the euphoria wore off to a dozy tingles, and the tingles dissipated into you giving him mercy, and mercy gave way to the aftermath.

In all the awkwardness of reality, you unceremoniously wiped your hands on his jeans, and right as he properly tucked himself back into his boxers, he beckoned you with open arms, gripping at your hips and bringing you onto the couch in a clumsy tumble; straddling his lap with his eager kisses seeking your jaw, your neck, your mouth which worked so hard for him. “Fucking amazing, baby,” he mumbled at the corner of your lips. You didn’t need the words—you’d heard them all before—but the reassurance of his arms locked tight around your middle, and the golden rays of honey shining so bright in his eyes allayed the tiny ball of worry at the pit of your stomach telling you he’d next follow it up with an excuse to send you home, as did every man before him.

“‘Mazing, ‘mazing, ‘mazing,” he mushed together on his way to your slack lips, bringing you out of your thoughts and into a kiss. “And dare I say, ‘amazing?’”

His ability to make you giggle when your bare stomachs were pressed together was the sort of tenderness you sought, and he provided.

You rubbed the tip of your nose along his, so very aware of his broad grin, and sweet nature. “You’re silly.”

“That I am!” he stated proudly.

Dipping to complete your gentle smile with his, you sank into the acceptance of him wanting to take your bottom lip between his, and flatter himself with the knowledge of where it’s been, what parts of him it became intimate with, instead of avoiding what was only human. He noticed your cold skin beneath his hands, and ran them along your back and upper arms. There was a motive behind his fingers slipping under the hem of your skirt, and palming you forward—where your heartbeats hammered together, and heat stirred in the lack of layers separating you—but still, there was one more affection you thought he deserved before the night moved on to your own.

Shivers chased his thumb braving the roundness of your breast, edging closer to the sensation of due pleasure yearning to be released. He spoke straight to your needs by putting the suggestion in your hips, “It’s your turn now.”

You stopped yourself from toppling to the cushions, and upheld your decent balance through your grip on his shoulders. “Wait,” you complained without malice, forgiving him for not reading your mind, “I’m not through with you yet.”

The word choice sparked intrigue across his face, then it cautioned to curiosity at the ominous roll of thunder rumbling through the trailer, clanking the mugs on the wall behind him.

He turned his head to the side, eyeing you. “What does that mean?”

~~~

“God, that feels so good.”

“Yeah, right there.. A little to the left—Oh fuck, right there.”

“So fucking good, sweetheart, keep going.”

Perturbed, you asked him, “Do you ever shut up?” and kneaded your knuckles harder into the knot of muscle between his shoulder blades, earning a louder groan than when you had his dick in your mouth.

One of the horror movies played on the TV, volume turned high for the alien’s gargled dialogue to be heard over the storm. Eddie’s lanky body was limp with sleepiness, melting under the smooth strokes of your palms starting at the base of his neck and gliding downward over his shirt, dragging another grunt out of him when his voice was hoarse from shameless use, not tempering it for a late night where he’d employ his range outside of singing for Corroded Coffin. He mumbled another praise, but his face was smashed to his pillow, rendering what he said unintelligible. His strong back rose with a shallow breath, and you moved with it. The couch was crowded, but you insisted he get comfortable, even if you had to straddle the curve of his ass with one knee fallen to the alarm of crayons and crumbs stuck between the cushions, and your other leg hung off the edge. This worked for him, though. It gave his hand a place to hold you, fingers clasped to your calf and thumb tending to you in little sweeps of truth. I need to touch you. The room was smothered in darkness, save for the brighter scenes highlighting the glossy line of his eye fighting a losing battle one massage of your thumbs into the pockets of soreness at a time.

You worked at the tense muscles with his comforter draped around your shoulders. It slipped down to greet the chafing air, rushing goosebumps over your skin. After the fourth time adjusting it, you left it gathered at your waist. Making sure Eddie was taken care of was more important. And the college girl turning into goo occupied what was left of your attention.

Though, soon, your tendons ached from effort, and staying-up-late stole the water you yawned from your eyes, and the comfort of being with someone who appreciated you wore heavy on your bones.

You grabbed the blanket, and leaned forward.

Brushing back the mess of curls covering the side of his face, you combed through the strands of hair stuck to his stubble, and found his chubby cheek smushed to his shoulder. You kissed him. “I adore you.”

He put a weak squeeze in his palm behind your knee, and spoke through the grog, “I adore you too, baby.”

Adore. Using the endearment in place of another word, and still, the weight was understood by the both of you.

Housed in the cozy heat of his body, sheltered from the rain lashing the windows in sheets, and the howling wind whistling past the corrugated metal roof in gusts, you sighed. Thunder vibrated from the floor, to the couch, to him, to you.

“You’re too sweet to me,” he said, sounding more awake.

“I’m exactly as sweet as you deserve.”

Instead of using his words to express he wanted to turn over, he just started rolling beneath you, forcing you to rip yourself from his divine warmth, and settle upright on his lap.

You were reminded of the reason you were cold when his eyes trailed over your naked skin, not afraid to show their appetite for your chest. The hunger in his hands returned, scaling the plush expanse of your thighs, and feasting his thumbs higher on the sensitive inner haven he’d yet to pay tribute to.

A smirk cut across his mouth. With a slow breath, he rocked his hips, grinding his half-hard cock against your neglected need, now attuned with the perfect tilt to achieve that pretty noise from your mouth which riled him like nothing else.

Oh, he was very awake.

Eddie exhaled with a pitying sound with attentive eyebrows, almost like he was mocking your moan. “You look so good up there, sweetheart,” he admired through his teasing. “Could get used to it..”

“Yeah?” you questioned. Reaching between your joined bodies, you held no qualms about circling your fingers over his cock, and honoring just under his head, ending your stroke just before he could reap the benefit.

He tipped his head back to gain his wits, finding his answer in the darkness behind his eyelids. “But you keep forgetting this night was about you, and thanking you for everything you’ve done for me. And then you go and add that on top of it.” Private fantasies took hold of him, influencing his heavy moan and thumbs climbing higher, higher. “Gotta thank you for so many things, sweetheart. So many.. However many you want,” he said, alluding to his way of showing gratitude. Fresh lust rushed to your soaked heat hugging his length. “Gotta get you out of these, though.” He scratched a nail over your pantyhose.

You snorted, accidentally ushering humor into what was a sexy exchange. “Why bother? You already ripped them.”

“I what?” Plain confusion marked his face.

Treating it like an ordinary thing, you bunched your skirt up to your waist, and drew his gaze to your mismatched black panties. You gandered at them as well, second guessing if you should’ve taken the extra time to find the lavender pair somewhere at the bottom of your drawer.

“Yeah,” he groaned; as his chest fell, his cock swelled. “I’m gonna show you just how thankful I am, again, and again, and again,” he trailed off, each word fluttering the heartbeat at your core—

Lightning struck, and the phone rang.

Jolting, Eddie stared at it from a long moment, breath held as if that alone would will it into submission from ringing a second time. Spikes of prickly anxiety stabbed at your chest, frightened out of the moment worse than any jumpscare.

It rang a second time.

He took the initiative and sat up, consoling you with his hand on your back and a kiss on your cheek. “I’m sure it’s nothing, just stay put and make yourself comfortable, sweet girl. I’ll be right back.”

Use your pet names all he wanted, his voice didn’t instill confidence when it went flat and wavered.

He got up from the couch and you were left feeling exposed, nestling into the blanket as the rain picked up, and the buzzy feeling he left imprinted on your skin faded.

“Hello?” he answered, rubbing his stomach above the open fly of his jeans.

As he listened to the man’s voice on the other end, he dropped his hand, and his shoulders sagged at the information.

Turning away, he huddled the receiver to his ear, and asked, “Is she okay?”

His question didn’t have the direness a parent should have if someone were hurt, so you stood up and padded softly to the kitchen, straining your ears, listening intently and discerning a few sniffles. But one little girl’s cry rang above them all. A shrill call for her Daddy to save her from her greatest fear.

Thunder rocked the trailer.

“Yeah.. Yeah, I’ll come get her.”

The phone clicked into its holder on the wall, and like that, the illusion was shattered. It was no longer just you and him spending a night together, carefree. Responsibility took precedence, and when Eddie faced you, his mood was tainted by all the things he explained about being exhausted from just existing his thankless life, judged by all.

He stared into your optimistic gaze knowing this is when you’d get a dose of his reality as a single father.

Fatigue and dread haunted his expression: this date is over.

#eddie munson x reader #eddie munson #stranger things #eddie x reader #eddie munson smut #mechanic!eddie #eddie munson fanfic #stranger things fanfic #the yes policy

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kwanisms · 1 year ago

Text

Under Your Skin 02 — s.changbin

taglist | playlist

summary: Everything seemed to fall into place for Y/N. She had a loving boyfriend, her dream job, and the bestest friend in the universe. She never thought her life was missing something until she was introduced to Changbin, the town's newest tattoo artist who happens to be harboring an unimaginable secret.

pairing: tattoo artist!Changbin × fem!Reader

genres/themes/au: angst, fluff, smut, slow burn; “forbidden” love, strangers to lovers, supernatural themes; tattoo artist!au, werewolf!au; tattoo artist!Changbin, werewolf!Changbin, established boyfriend!Joshua

warnings: adult dialogue, tobacco use, female reader, mild religious themes as part of the story takes place in a church, sexual content (18+ mdni), smut warnings under the cut!

taglist: @yoonguurt @wonderfulshinee @x-woozi @candidupped @snow-pegasus @brownieracha @hobi-is-golden @avyskai @i-say-choco-you-say-ice-cream @biribarabiribbaem @mchslut @spicxbnny @hgema @likeaboss-duh @oiminho @slut-for-dabi @ughyeka @honey-lemon-goose @skidsflowers @fixation-dump @meadowyin @sleeplessdawn @bristidutta @changbinnss @racha-enthusiast @phobia0922 @sanjoongie @chillllllli @nattisbored @kimseungminsprincess @chrollosforehead @typicalcuriosities @tai-loves-skz @labyrinthonmymind @spookyauthorspopmusictrash @mariesakamari @mamieishere @buttergumz @nxiim9 @emithecharmer @binnies-donuts @v3n0mszn @kazzilla @alexvessey @jihanlovic @thezombiepandaleague @moonl1ghtmuse @blue3ss5

Red strikethrough means I cannot tag you. Check your visibility settings.

And if you change your url, YOU are responsible for telling me.

a/n: finally, here's part 2 of Under Your Skin! We are still going strong with the long chapters lol I know the pairing for this series overall is Changbin and he is end game I promise but Y/N is in a serious and committed relationship with Joshua so there will be some action there lol

A huge thank you to my wife, Sky ☁️, for this entire story idea. Without her late night thoughts, as well as her constant hype and support this series wouldn’t even exist.

Also a massive thank you to @icybluehosh for her professional input on all things tattoos. You are a saint, my love and I thank you so much!

To everyone else, thank you so much for reading this story and I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it! As always, this is a work of fiction and all characters are not reflective of their respective irl counterparts. for entertainment purposes only. Header and line breaks made by me. Content and support banners made by me with a template made by @cafekitsune. I do not allow reposts, translations, or continuations of my works. All my writings are ©️ kwanisms.

smut warnings: dom!Joshua, brat!Reader, rough sex, use of pet names (baby, sweetheart, and brat. Don’t question it. He calls her brat as a term of endearment when she’s being a brat), slight dirty talk, counter top sex , suggestive and implied sexual encounter in a church!!! and I think that's all. Of course, pls let me know if I missed anything!

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𝗰𝗵 𝟬𝟮 - 𝗸𝗶𝗻𝘁𝘀𝘂𝗴𝗶

wc: 15k

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It had been a few days since the incident at the club and you hadn’t heard from Joshua since that night. He’d texted you once to make sure you had indeed made it home safely. After that it was radio silence.

You weren’t as upset about it as you thought you’d be. You chalked it up to needing some space from one another after that fight.

Instead, you focused your time on work.

A new shipment of antiques had been brought in from your boss’ most recent trip abroad to collect items to resell. The shop was your home away from home. You spent most of your time here as it was your job.

You remembered seeing the shop when you were younger and coming in with your mother. You spent the short time you were in the shop wandering the shelves and looking at all the neat tea sets and other antiques that had been cleaned and restored with care.

When you turned 19, you expressed a desire to work and your parents supported it, saying it would help build character. Your father offered to give you a secretarial position at his company but you had something else in mind.

Your parents were confused about your desire to work at Serizawa’s but when they visited the shop again on the day you went in to apply, they couldn’t imagine you working anywhere else.

Your boss, a man named Isei Serizawa, was a kind elderly man in his late 60’s. His wife, Shinju, was a small woman, also in her 60’s, and spent her life as a stay at home mom, taking care of their two children.

The couple started the shop back when they first got married.

Back then it was in a small storefront in Shingu, near Fukuoka, Japan. They spent their life running the shop and living in the small town near the ocean. They had two children who went off to become extremely successful in both Tokyo and Osaka.

After their children started their own families, the couple moved to Korea and settled in Sejong, bringing their shop with them.

When you first started working at the shop, you mainly worked setting up the items to be sold and sweeping, manning the front of the shop. Eventually, you started to learn about the work Shinju did and asked her to teach you.

She found it nice to have someone interested in her work, restoring old tea sets and mending broken ones. She taught you everything she knew and as her arthritis started to get worse, she left the restoration work to you.

Mr. Serizawa restored furniture and old electronics, leaving the ceramics to you now that Shinju stayed at home, keeping her arthritis at bay with cross stitch and knitting.

Some time after you started working at the shop, the Serizawas’ grandson, Daniel, came to live with them, moving into their spare bedroom.

You didn’t know the particulars of why he left Tokyo but your boss did tell you he wasn’t doing well. He was acting out and mixed in with the wrong crowd.

When you first met Daniel, he seemed troubled and at first he was cold and initially it seemed like he didn’t like you being at the shop or the way the Serizawas treated you like family. Eventually he warmed up to you and came to see you almost like an older cousin.

He also began opening up to you once he started working in the shop when he wasn’t in school.

His grades, which had apparently been dismal at his school in Tokyo, were thriving out here in Sejong. He loved the small town atmosphere and the feeling of community that came with it.

He started doing so well, in both school and his personal life that the Serizawas let him move into the apartment above the shop so long as he kept his grades up and stayed out of trouble.

Since it was summer time and he’d kept his promises to keep his grades up and stay out of trouble, the Serizawas let him go on a school summer trip to Busan to visit the ocean and the island of Jeju. Daniel kept his grandparents in the loop, sending them pictures and letters as well as postcards of his trip.

The Serizawas and even you were happy to see him thriving and having the time of his life with his friends and classmates. He was due to return soon as summer was ending and school would be starting back up.

The ring of the bell brought you out of your hyperfocus and you quickly set the cup you were holding down, wiping your hands on your apron as you called out. “Be right there!

“This is a lot of stuff,” Jeongguk murmured as he followed Changbin into the shop.

They’d driven past what felt like a dozen furniture shops in town until Changbin mentioned seeing this place and Jeongguk begrudgingly drove along the main street until they found the correct side street.

The shop wasn’t huge nor was it loud or ostentatious. It was a small brick building, nestled between a café and an ice cream parlor with a small alleyway leading between the coffee shop and the antique shop.

The sign was made from black wood, coated in a lacquer that made it shine with gold lettering that read the name ‘Serizawa’s.’ The windows on the front of the shop were large and rectangular, stopping about waist level with a row of planters full of neatly trimmed hedges and pruned flowering bushes.

The front door was the same black lacquered wood with a golden knob.

Inside the shop was what Changbin could only describe as organized chaos.

Jeongguk was right, there were a lot of items but they were organized neatly. There were five shelving units, each labeled clearly with all manner of antique items ranging from old typewriters and phones to toys of all kinds.

A series of floating shelves near the door were loaded with various tea sets from different backgrounds and each with distinct patterns.

Jeongguk was immediately drawn to the porcelain, inspecting them as Changbin looked further around. On the back wall were various pieces of furniture, some on special wall mounted hangers to allow more space to peruse the shop.

A small tile section of flooring was between the entry way and the shelves where some pieces of furniture were displayed, almost like one would stage in a home or apartment.

Next to the door was a long counter, behind which had lots of small porcelain trinkets and other knick knacks.

Across from the main door was a doorway with a thick and no doubt heavy green curtain.

Changbin heard a voice call out to them when they first entered and a moment later, footsteps started shuffling from behind the curtain before the material was pulled back and Changbin’s eyes widened as a woman stepped out.

He’d only managed to get a good look at her a few times the other night but he was certain it was indeed Lilah’s friend, the same he’d intervened for when her boyfriend tried to forcibly remove her from the club.

Changbin watched as she stepped forward and recognition passed over her, well your, face.

“Hey,” you said with a smile as you walked forward to meet them. “Hey,” Changbin said with a small smile. He wasn’t sure if you’d remember him.

“Nice to see you again,” you added as Jeongguk returned to Changbin’s side. ‘Well, she definitely remembers,’ he thought, a little bemused.

“Yeah, I had no idea you worked here,” Changbin added as Jeongguk looked between the two of you.

A silence fell over the three of you before you finally spoke.

“So, how can I help you guys?” You asked, looking between them. Changbin was so focused on your face as you spoke that he’d completely missed your question.

Jeongguk discreetly elbowed him, making him sputter before answering.

“Oh, right. I’m, uh, actually looking for some furniture,” he said softly. Jeongguk rolled his eyes and turned away to inspect the shelves some more. ‘Him and those damn tea sets.’

“What kind of furniture?” You asked, tilting your head to the side, reminding Changbin of one of Jeongguk’s puppies. It was cute. You were cute. 'This is neither the time nor the place,' Changbin mentally scolded himself to stop letting his mind wander.

‘Focus, you idiot!’

“Oh, just some accent pieces. Something vintage. Preferably black or red,” he answered, trying to sound casual.

You nodded a couple times, taking in his words before turning to the rest of the shop. “Actually, I think I've got a few pieces like that,” you replied.

“I could show you if you’d like?”

Changbin nodded and you smiled, beckoning him to follow as you moved towards the back of the shop.

He followed while Jeongguk stayed behind to continue to look at the tea sets.

“How many pieces are you wanting?” You asked as you led him to the back wall. “Just a couple. Maybe three at most. I’m really trying to find some chairs for the lobby of my shop,” Changbin answered as you both walked towards the back.

“What kind of shop?” You asked, sounding interested.

“It’s a tattoo shop,” Changbin answered, expecting you to lose interest immediately.

“Oh, the one that just popped up on Market Street?”

Changbin was taken aback that not only were you interested in the shop but that you knew where it even was. He nodded wordlessly, wondering what other kinds of surprises you had.

“Lilah has been talking nonstop about it ever since the last shop closed. I’d never been to that one,” you added as the two of you neared the back of the shop. “The last shop seemed to be a favorite among the locals, what was it called?”

Changbin watched as you stopped, amused as you wracked your brain.

“Ink Moon Studios!” You said suddenly, as if having an ‘aha’ moment. Changbin’s smile widened as you turned to him. “I really liked the name of that shop. What’s yours called? I didn’t see any signs when I last went by.”

Changbin suddenly felt very self conscious. “Uh, White Lotus Studio,” he answered softly. “I like that,” you said, smiling warmly.

“Maybe I’ll have to come by with Lilah some time.”

Changbin bit back the urge to smile. If you wanted to come by his shop, he wasn’t going to complain. Not one bit.

“So,” you said, stopping to point out a couple different pieces.

“We have these,” you continued, showing him a couple of red velvet chairs. The wood was a dark reddish brown. “But I also have these,” you added, pointing out a chair and ottoman set.

Both pieces were black upholstery with white painted wood. “This is probably a long shot,” Changbin started. “But do you have anything with black and gold?”

A smile spread across your face and you waved at him to follow you, leading him back towards the front of the shop.

Back at the staged area, you showed him two of the chairs.

They were high wingback arm chairs with black velvet upholstery and gold painted wood with carved details. They were exactly what he was looking for and he mentally kicked himself for not noticing them as soon as he came in.

You were excited, showing them off as you explained the work that went into restoring them.

“My boss just finished these last week. I was really excited when he showed me his plans for them.”

You pointed out the wood trim. “These details are all hand carved. They’re Rococo inspired pieces but obviously they aren’t that old,” you explained. “The gold paint is coated in a layer of epoxy which gives it the shine. The epoxy won’t wear down so obviously the paint won’t chip. The velvet is real and will have to be cleaned by hand with some velvet cleaner and a microfiber cloth.”

Changbin nodded as you spoke, kneeling down to look at the pieces and looking over them, inspecting the wood and looking at the supports under the cushion. “No offense to your boss, but how often do customers complain or return items?”

You smiled warmly again. “No offense taken. I think the only time we’ve had something returned it was a mirror. The frame got damaged when they were carrying it out to their car and Mr. Serizawa offered to fix it right away,” you explained.

“He’s been doing this his entire life and for him, it’s not about the money. It’s about bringing new life into these old pieces and making sure people love them as much as he does.”

Changbin glanced up at you from where he was kneeling in front of the chair. “Impressive customer service,” Changbin noted with a smile.

You smiled again.

“My boss strips all pieces down to the base before reinforcing any cracks or weaknesses in wood. He uses high quality foam and upholstery when refurbishing each piece,” you added.

Changbin stood up and walked around one of the chairs, continuing to inspect it.

“And he does all of this in the shop?” Changbin asked as he stopped to look up at you. Nodding in response you continued to speak. “He has a workshop in the back where he does all his restoration work,” you answered.

“Like I said, he’s been doing this his whole life. He’s had this shop in Sejong since I was a little girl. Before that he lived near Fukuoka and had a shop there.”

Changbin looked up at you again as you spoke. His eyes trailed over your face, taking in your features before looking back down at the chair. He didn’t want to get caught essentially checking you out, though he really wanted to.

He needed to be professional. The last thing he wanted was to make you uncomfortable in any way.

Changbin nodded a couple times before clicking his tongue and looking back up at you with a smirk.

“I’ll take them.”

Changbin was immediately entranced by the smile that spread across your face. It was different from the warm and polite smiles you’d given him before. This was a genuine smile. The first he’d seen from you since meeting you the other night.

He’d thought you were pretty before, seeing you at the club under all the neon lights and then again today in the natural lighting that filtered into the shop but the moment this smile graced your face, it nearly took his breath away.

He was convinced he’d never seen someone so stunning.

“Perfect, I’ll go grab the paperwork,” you replied, drawing him out of his thoughts before excusing yourself to disappear behind the curtain.

Changbin watched as you disappeared behind the green material before Jeongguk hissed at him from across the shop. He turned to look at his friend who had been looking at the tea sets the whole time.

“These are so fucking expensive,” he hissed. “Who the fuck would buy something so outrageously priced!?” Changbin’s smile fell and he glared at his friend from across the store. “Knock it off!” Changbin hissed.

Jeongguk looked back at the tea set. “Who would spend almost a million won on this?” Changbin sighed, glaring at his friend. “Stop it! She might hear you!”

Jeongguk shrugged his shoulders. “It’s not my fault they’re priced so high.”

Changbin was staring daggers at Jeongguk when the curtain opened and you returned, carrying some papers, a polite smile on your face. Changbin wondered if you’d heard them bickering. If you had, your face didn’t let it show.

“These are a formality,” you explained as you handed over the small stack of papers. “Basically just going over what was done to refurbish the items and how we recommend you take care of them.”

You smiled at him as Changbin flipped through the pages quickly. He glanced up as you were looking at the price tag of the chairs and writing on a small pad of paper, filling in the boxes and adding the sales tax.

You finished and gestured for Changbin to follow you to the counter near the door so you could properly ring him up.

Jeongguk was still looking at the tea sets as Changbin pulled out his wallet and waited for you to do your thing, tapping away at the register screen.

“Okay, the total comes to five-hundred and fifty thousand won,” you said with a smile. “How much?” Jeongguk asked, whipping his head around. “That’s for both chairs and I gave you a discount since you’re buying both of them,” you explained.

Ignoring Jeongguk’s glare, Changbin opened his wallet, pulled out his card and waited for you to input his total before turning the screen around for him to pay.

The transaction only took a few moments but it was long enough for Jeongguk to interrupt the silence, yet again.

“Can I ask you something?”

‘Oh god, here we go.’

You glanced up as Changbin signed his name. “Yes?”

Jeongguk gestured at the shelf. “How do you choose the prices for these things?”

Your cheeks burned at his inquiry and there was no doubt in Changbin’s mind that you had heard them bickering earlier. He desperately wanted to apologize for Jeongguk’s rudeness but was unable to do so as you started speaking.

“Well, it’s really hard to put an exact price on art,” you started as you printed Changbin’s receipt and stapled it to his paperwork. Changbin thanked you as you handed him his papers.

“Some of those sets are almost a hundred years old,” you continued, leaning on the counter as Changbin put his wallet away, both he and Jeongguk engrossed in your words.

“That specific set, the one that’s almost a million won, is a rare bone China tea set from England and is about 150 years old.”

Jeongguk’s eyes widened and he looked back at the set.

“The prices are determined by the age, condition, and rarity of each item. We also factor in how much work went into restoring each piece. That set came to us in multiple pieces.”

Jeongguk turned back to face you. “So it was restored in the store?”

You nodded as Changbin watched you.

“Yes. Everything is restored and cleaned in the shop before we sell it.”

Jeongguk chuckled, looking back at the sets. “I'm picturing a cute little elderly lady in the back, cleaning the tea sets,” he murmured but loud enough for both you and Changbin to hear.

Changbin chuckled as well, shaking his head at the image Jeongguk put in his head. A small giggle came from you, causing both to look in your direction.

“Actually, there’s no little old lady,” you said, giggles subsiding.

“I do all the tea sets.”

Changbin’s eyes widened as did Jeongguk’s.

“Wait, you restore the tea sets?” Jeongguk asked. You nodded with a slight redness to your cheeks. “I do,” you answered.

“That’s so… impressive,” Changbin said, making you blush deeper. “What made you get into this line of work?” Jeongguk asked.

“Well, I spent a good portion of my youth and teens attending fancy parties and soirees and I’ve been to more tea parties than I care to count,” you explained as both men continued to listen.

“I’ve never really liked tea that much if I’m being honest, but I’ve always loved the sets.” A small smile spread across your face as you reminisced.

“And the sets were always so pretty. All the intricate patterns and details have this way of drawing you in.” You were so engrossed in your explanation you didn’t notice the way Changbin was looking at you.

“Both the art and even the soft clink of porcelain brings me a great sense of nostalgia,” you continued softly as both men watched you, especially Changbin, with a deep fascination.

"The Japanese have a word for it. Natsukashii."

Changbin had never heard someone speak so passionately about tea sets. Normally he wouldn’t be interested but the fact that you were in it for the art was something he appreciated greatly.

“I’m sorry,” you said suddenly, waving your hand. “I went off on a tangent there.”

You cleared your throat and turned to look at Changbin.

“We’ll be open until 8 today, so you’re welcome to swing by any time to pick up your chairs. I’ll go ahead and put the sold signs and grab the plastic from the back to wrap them up.”

Changbin smiled and nodded. “I’ll be back before then with a truck,” he replied, standing up straight before tapping the counter softly with his knuckles. “See you then,” you replied with a warm smile.

Jeongguk finally turned away from the tea sets but not before looking at the set below the one he’d called out for being expensive. “What about this one?”

Changbin could have strangled his friend.

He knew you were probably up to your elbows in work and he really didn’t want to keep you any longer than was necessary.

You must have been some sort of saint, smiling kindly and moving around the counter to get a better look at the set Jeongguk was pointing at.

Changbin allowed himself to look at it and understood why Jeongguk was so intrigued.

It was a black traditional tea set. The black was broken up but lines of gold. It was extremely striking. The inside of the cups was white with speckled blue.

“That’s a traditional Japanese tea set,” you answered. “It’s about fifty years old. It’s made from ceramic as most Japanese sets are,” you answered. “It’s from Kyoto and comes from a very popular geisha house. The story is that it fell while being transported and it cracked, several of the chawan broke into multiple pieces.”

Changbin glanced back at the set. “What’s the gold?” He asked suddenly.

“It’s powdered gold,” you replied, looking at him, meeting his gaze when he turned to look at you. “Have you ever heard of kintsugi?”

Both Changbin and Jeongguk shook their heads. “It’s something I learned from my boss’ wife. She used to restore tea sets before her arthritis set in,” you explained, squeezing between the two to grab the tea pot.

You turned it and showed them the various lines of gold. “This teapot was originally broken into 6 separate pieces when it came to the store. Using resin and gold powder I attached the pieces together. This is called hibi which means crack,” you said as you set the teapot back on the shelf.

“There are other methods but usually I only do this one,” you continued.

“If a piece is missing, sometimes we’ll substitute with a piece from another set but I have yet to have to do that.”

“So why the gold?” Jeongguk asked, asking the question on the tip of Changbin’s tongue.

“Kintsugi is about displaying the imperfections rather than covering them up. It’s the belief that the imperfections are what make it beautiful. As a philosophy, kintsugi treats breakage and repair as part of the history of an object. The imperfections become part of the item,” you explained.

Changbin glanced up at his friend who was deep in thought as he looked at the black and gold set. Before Jeongguk could ask anymore questions, Changbin grabbed his friend by the elbow. “I think we’ve taken up enough of Y/N’s time,” he said gently tugging his friend towards the door.

Changbin turned to you as he guided Jeongguk out the door. “Thank you so much,” he said, smiling at you. You returned the gesture, giving him a small bow. “Thank you for coming in,” you replied, giving him a small wave as he exited.

Once the door shut behind them Changbin rounded on Jeongguk. “First you insult the items and then you won’t shut up and stop asking questions?” He asked as they walked down the sidewalk where Jeongguk’s car was parked.

Jeongguk rolled his eyes, lowering his mask. “Okay, I admit, the whole price thing, that was out of line. But I was genuinely curious about the sets! It was actually kind of fascinating. I’ve never seen or heard someone talk about tea sets like that,” he replied as he unlocked the car.

Both men opened their doors and slid into their seats. “She’s passionate about it,” Jeongguk continued as he buckled his seatbelt and started the car, the engine roaring to life. “She’s in it for the art,” Changbin added.

“I think that's something we both can appreciate.”

You watched as Changbin and Jeongguk walked down the sidewalk and out of sight. Once they’d disappeared beyond your scope of vision, you turned and headed back into the backroom to file the store’s copy of the paperwork away and return to your workspace.

The backroom was where you spent a good majority of your time, taking Shinju’s old station. It was a sturdy desk made of white oak wood in the shape of an L. One of the sides was pushed up against the back wall of the workshop and had an attached cabinet.

Inside the cabinet were various tools you used to restore sets including a vast array of paints and paintbrushes. Not only did you clean and seal cracks in the ceramics but you also touched up any painting that needed it.

It was a lot of fine details and tended to be very tedious but you’d always had a particularly steady hand and a deep love for art to begin with. Normally you painted on canvas in your youth. Now the ceramic was your canvas.

You took a seat on your cushioned chair, grabbing the heavy knitted blanket Shinju had gifted you last year to keep your legs warm. For some reason, the back of the shop always got extremely cold, even in the heat of the summer.

Picking up the cup you were currently working on, you started back up, dipping your brush into the small mug of water before dipping it into the gold paint.

The swirls came naturally as the brush tip glided across the ceramic. It was easy work and it took up a decent amount of time. You listened to the music over the shop speakers, simple classical tunes that were pleasant to the ear.

As you continued painting along the rim of the cup, time ticked by on the clock to your right. You hardly paid the face any attention as you worked. Only glancing at it when you felt necessary to gauge how much time before you needed to start cleaning up.

What felt like only minutes but was probably closer to an hour went by before the familiar tinkling of the bell caught your attention. You set the cup down on the cloth that stretched over the workspace before cleaning the brush and quickly patting it dry.

“Hello?” A familiar voice called from the showroom.

You got up, brushing off your apron before heading to the curtain only for it to be pulled back and the face of your boyfriend appeared.

Upon seeing you, Joshua gave you a smile, one you almost returned before remembering that he hadn’t spoken to you since the night at the club.

Joshua noticed the change in your demeanor, the chill in your stare.

“I come with a peace offering,” he said, holding up a brown paper sack without a logo. You narrowed your eyes suspiciously before beckoning him to join you in the back room.

Once he’d passed the doorway, you moved out to the showroom, crossed to the door and turned the lock before flipping the small sign that read ‘be back soon.’

You returned to the backroom, letting the curtain fall behind you before crossing your arms over your chest and fixing your boyfriend with a blank expression. You were waiting for an apology.

Joshua understood your body language immediately and set the bag on the small table just inside the back room where you usually sat to eat lunch. “I know,” you heard him say softly.

“I messed up,” he continued, moving to place his hands gently on your shoulders.

“I messed up big time and I am so sorry for the way I acted at the club the other night.”

Looking into his face, you could see the sincerity etched upon his features. He really did mean it. But you weren’t satisfied. That wasn’t all he had to answer for in your opinion.

“And?” You asked, raising an eyebrow.

“And I'm sorry for not talking to you since that night,” Joshua added immediately.

You pursed your lips. "And?"

Joshua gave you a confused look until you sighed and shrugged off your cardigan, showing him the now bruised spot on your arm. The same spot he'd grabbed roughly the night at the club.

His eyes fell on the mark and the confusion melted away as he immediately took your arm gently. "Oh my god, baby," he murmured as he inspected the bruise. "I'm so sorry."

"You're lucky Lilah hasn't seen this. Or my parents," you replied pulling your cardigan back on, fixing Joshua with a blank stare. He immediately reached up, cupping your cheek. "I am so, so sorry, Y/N. I really did not mean to grab you like that."

You nodded wordlessly. "I know," you replied. "But it doesn't change the fact that you did. You need to be more mindful of your actions, Joshua." He nodded in agreement.

"Of course," he answered. "Hold me accountable. What I did was wrong and inexcusable." He took your hands in his, looking into your eyes. "I promise I'll be more mindful and to pay more attention." He gave your hands a gentle squeeze.

Once you nodded, showing that you both understood and forgave him, Joshua pulled you into a hug, swaying you both lightly until you broke the silence. "So, what's in the bag?"

Joshua had stopped by one of your favorite delis, getting you a lunch special with a sandwich and a cup of soup. The two of you sat at the small break table, eating lunch and chatting.

Joshua explained what he had been up to the last few days and answered your questions about work while you finished your food.

He had just finished explaining something one of the project leads had done when the shrill ringing of the phone cut him off. "Oh shoot," you murmured, getting up and crossing the backroom to answer the landline at Mr. Serizawa's work desk.

"Serizawa’s, this is Y/N speaking," you answered politely.

"Hello, Y/N. It's Isei," a voice on the other side said.

"Oh, hello Mr. Serizawa!"

Joshua had gotten up from the table and crossed the room as you listened to your boss speak. You felt Joshua's presence looming behind you and just as suddenly, you could feel his hands on your hips as he reached you.

"I'm not going to be able to come in later to close the shop," Mr. Serizawa started. "Shinju isn't feeling too great so I'm going to have to take her to the clinic." You furrowed your brow.

"Is she going to be okay?" you asked quickly, ignoring Joshua whispering the word "what" into your ear.

"I'm not sure. Hopefully it's nothing too serious but I'd like you to close up early. And please take the deposit to the bank for me. I don't think I'll be able to get it done by noon tomorrow."

You nodded even though he couldn't see you.

"Of course, Mr. Serizawa. I made a sale today so I'll call them and let them know to come sooner to pick up their items," you replied. "I hope Mrs. Serizawa is okay and tell her I'm thinking of her."

"Thank you Y/N. I will keep you updated. Goodbye"

The line clicked, indicating he had hung up.

You immediately set the phone back down.

"Everything okay?" Joshua asked as you sighed, his chin resting on your shoulder. "Shinju isn't feeling great so Mr. Serizawa is going to take her to the clinic," you said as you turned in his arms.

"He wants me to close the shop early," you added. "Which reminds me." You gently pushed Joshua back and moved over to the filing cabinet to pull out the file with Changbin's receipt.

"I need to call him back so he can come get his items," you murmured as you moved back to the work desk and picked up the phone. Joshua leaned against the counter top, watching you dial the number on the receipt.

The line rang a couple times before it picked up. "Hello?"

"Hi, may I speak with Changbin?"

"Speaking, who is this?"

"It's Y/N. I just got a call from the owner and he's asked me to close the shop early. If you want to still pick up your chairs today, you might want to head over here as soon as possible. I'll be closing the shop within the hour," you explained, playfully swatting Joshua's hand as it started to wander.

"Oh, hang on a sec," Changbin said before speaking indistinctly to someone else. You waited a couple moments before he returned. "I'll be by in ten minutes. Twenty at most," Changbin finally said.

You smiled in relief. "Okay, I'll see you soon," you replied. "Bye bye." You hung up and turned to Joshua who grabbed your waist and pulled you toward him. "Who was that?"

"Just a customer. He came in earlier to buy some chairs," you answered, looking at Joshua. "How long did he say he'd be?" Your boyfriend gave you a mischievous grin. You shook your head.

"He'll be here soon," you answered, trying to pull away but Joshua held you firmly in place. "So like twenty minutes?" he asked with a smirk, leaning in to kiss you. You pulled back much too quickly for his liking. "My lunch break is almost over, Mr. Hong," you said sternly. Joshua snorted but leaned in for another kiss.

His lips parted yours, tongue slipping past and just as quickly, he turned both of you, pressing against you and pinning you against the work desk. "Joshua," you warned as his lips started to wander, leaving a trail of kisses down your neck.

"Come on," he murmured. "There's a lot I can do in twenty minutes," he continued, one hand sliding down your hip to the hem of your dress. Why you chose to wear such a short one today, you'd never understand.

Your hand quickly grabbed his wrist as his hand dipped between your thighs. "Joshua Hong!" you chastised, eyes widening at the devilish smirk on his face. "Come on, baby," he urged. "I promise I'll be quick." You shook your head, pulling his hand away.

"No way, mister," you answered. "I'd like to keep my job."

Joshua sighed, leaning his forehead against yours. "You're no fun," he grumbled. You smiled cheerfully, giving him a quick peck on the lips before moving to clean up the break table and wash your hands.

Joshua sulked, watching you clean up and start putting away your painting supplies before setting the tea set you were working on in one of the empty cabinets and shutting the door.

Just as you were finishing up, there was a knock at the front door. You wiped your hands on your apron and ignored your boyfriend's pout to go answer the door.

Once past the curtain, you saw Changbin with Chris standing at the door, chatting amongst themselves. You approached the door, unlocked it and opened it to greet them.

"Hey," you said cheerfully as you let them into the shop as Joshua appeared from behind the curtain. You caught a glimpse of his expression and you could tell he was now upset.

You narrowed your eyes, silently telling him to knock it off.

"They shouldn't be too heavy, Changbin noted as he and Chris moved over to the two chairs. You waited by the door for them to pick up the chairs which they each did with relative ease.

Holding the door open, you let them pass by you as they carried the chairs out to the waiting truck. Chris set the chair he carried down before opening the tailgate of his truck. Each one of them carefully loaded the covered chairs into the bed.

You watched as Chris climbed in, starting to carefully secure the chairs with rope. Once tied down, Chris hopped down while Changbin walked over to where you stood on the stoop.

"Thanks again for giving me the heads up," he said with a smile, one you returned. "Of course," you answered. "I don't know when your shop is opening and I'm sure you'd want to have these chairs now rather than later." Changbin nodded before glancing past you into the shop where Joshua stood, arms crossed and looking unimpressed. Changbin quickly looked back at you.

"Are you alright?" he asked softly. Your heart pounded in your chest at his soft expression. He barely knew you and yet here he was, being so sweet and making sure you were okay. You nodded.

"Yeah. We're fine," you answered. Changbin nodded and turned to look back at Chris. "All set?" he asked. The other man nodded, giving him double thumbs up. "All set!"

Changbin turned back to face you. "Thank you again," he said with that same soft smile. "I'll see you around, Y/N!"

With a wave, he jogged around to the passenger side of the truck as Chris got into the driver's seat. Once they were settled, Chris started the truck which roared to life, and the two took off, pulling out carefully onto the main street and heading out of view.

You stepped back into the shop, letting the door shut before you turned the lock and turned, just now remembering Joshua was in the shop, arms still crossed, and an unmistakable scowl on his face.

"What was that?" he demanded as you walked towards him. " What was what?" you asked as you reached the curtain and pushed it aside, letting it catch in the curtain hook. Joshua followed you into the backroom as you moved towards the supply closet for the broom and dustpan. "You know what," he argued.

"He was a customer, Joshua," you said, no longer amused by his behavior. "All the smiles and waves? What the hell was that?" he asked again as you grabbed the broom and started sweeping.

"He was a customer," you reiterated. "I'm nice to all my customers," you continued as you swept the backroom. It took less than five minutes to sweep as it wasn't a busy day and Mr. Serizawa hadn't been in the shop to work on furniture. You dumped the dustbin and moved to the front of the store, Joshua hot on your heels. "I don't like him," he said as he watched you.

"You don't even know him," you retorted.

"Neither do you."

"Chris does."

"You don't know Chris so you couldn't possibly trust his judgment."

"Lilah knows them."

You savored your victory when Joshua fell silent. He couldn't argue with that. "In any case, I think you should stay away from him," Joshua finally said. You paused your sweeping to turn and look at him. "Are we really having the whole control conversation again?"

Confusion was replaced by realization as Joshua's posture relaxed. "I'm only thinking about your safety," he answered. You sighed, turning away and rolling your eyes. "I'll be just fine," you replied.

Joshua said nothing, instead checked his watch and huffed.

"I'd better get back to the office," he announced, disappearing into the backroom to grab his jacket before returning. "Are you going to be okay walking home by yourself?" he asked. You nodded as he approached, leaning in to give you a quick kiss.

"Text me when you get home," he added before heading to the door and unlocking it. "And lock this door as soon as I leave," he added with a faux stern expression. You rolled your eyes playfully and walked over as he exited, closing the door behind him and waited for you to turn the deadbolt.

After checking the door, he waved and headed to his waiting car. You watched as he got in and drove off before flipping the closed sign and pulling the shade on the door window down.

You resumed sweeping until you were certain every nook and cranny was swept. Returning the broom and dustpan to the supply closet, you bagged up all trash and took the bag out to the dumpster in the alley behind the shop.

Once back inside, you locked the backdoor and headed up front to pull the shades down on all the windows and then went behind the counter to count the register for all the cash transactions.

After counting and adding it to the ledger, you headed into Mr. Serizawa's office to access the safe and collect the deposit for the bank. Putting the money in the locking cash bag, you put the bag inside your purse and tripled checked all doors were locked.

You grabbed your jacket, purse, and keys and headed out the door, making sure to lock both locks before heading down the sidewalk towards the bank. This wasn't the first time you'd deposited money for Mr. Serizawa and you were glad he trusted you with such a task.

The walk to the bank took only about ten minutes and once you deposited the money and got the receipt, you were about half way to your apartment when you realized you forgot your phone and your apartment key.

Cursing yourself, you begrudgingly turned back and headed to the shop. It added an additional 20 minutes but soon you had your phone and house key in hand and you were back outside the shop, locking the knob and deadbolt.

You were fiddling with the deadbolt when you heard someone call your name.

Looking over your shoulder, you were met by the smiling face of--

"Jeonghan!" you said as you finally got the deadbolt to slide into place and turned to properly greet the man. He gave you a warm smile. “How have you been?” He asked as you returned the shop keys to your purse.

“I’ve been good!”

An awkward silence filled the air before Jeonghan spoke.

“You closing up the shop?”

You shook your head before nodding. “Well, sort of,” you answered.

“I closed earlier but forgot my phone and house keys like an idiot.”

Jeonghan’s expression shifted from warm to confused. “You aren’t an idiot,” he replied. “We all forget things from time to time.” You nodded wordlessly.

“Well, I’d better get home.”

“Would you mind if I walked you home?”

You both stared at one another before laughing. “Go ahead,” Jeonghan continued. “What were you going to say?”

“Just that I should probably head home,” you replied. Jeonghan nodded. “I was going to offer to walk you, but I’m sure you’ll manage on your own,” he stated.

“Yes,” you answered. “But thank you anyway.”

The two of you parted ways after an awkward goodbye and you made the short walk back to your apartment, stopping just inside the door to grab your mail and head up to your floor.

As you reached the top of the stairs, the front door of the apartment next door opened, your neighbor poking his head out.

“Hey, Y/N,” he said, catching your attention. You looked over to see his normally tidy black hair was tousled, glasses slightly askew. “Are you okay?” You asked, mildly concerned. “You don’t look so good, Wonwoo.”

Your neighbor shook his head. “I’m alright. I just realized, halfway into my shower, that I don’t have any body wash. Could I borrow some? I’ve got a date tonight and you’d really be doing me a favor.”

You tried to hold back your laughter. “I would except I think my body wash might not go over too well with your date. She might think you have a girlfriend,” you answered. Wonwoo stared blankly at you until your words sank in.

“Oh shit, you’re right,” he finally said, eyes widening. “What do I do?”

You finally let out a laugh before shrugging. “If you’re really in a pinch, dish soap would probably work,” you answered. Wonwoo’s face lit up. “Brilliant! Why didn’t I think of that?” You shook your head. “No idea.”

“Thanks Y/N,” Wonwoo said before disappearing into his apartment and shutting the door, leaving you to unlock your own door and enter your apartment, letting the door shut behind you before locking it and looking over your mail as you entered your apartment.

After sorting your mail and going through the important papers, you started your usual nighttime ritual of dinner, a movie, and your evening bedtime routine. Once in bed, you made sure your phone was plugged in and your alarm was set for the next morning.

The next morning was Sunday which meant it was time for church. It wasn’t your favorite activity but you didn’t have much of a choice when it came to attendance. Your mother and father always made you attend in your youth and while you didn’t necessarily believe, your attendance was expected.

The vibration of your phone caught your attention as you sat at your vanity having just finished your makeup.

You sighed, turning to grab your phone as you checked the screen. It was your mother. You swiped the screen, bringing the device up to your ear as you looked over your outfit choices. “Hello?”

Your mother’s dulcet voice greeted you.

“Good morning, dear,” she said soothingly. “Did I wake you?”

You rolled your eyes. “No mother,” you answered as you picked up a hanger, inspecting the outfit. It was a white tweed jacket and skirt set with a gold pattern and a short sleeve white turtleneck.

“I’ve been up for about an hour now.”

“Are you getting ready?” You nodded, resisting the urge to sigh annoyed at her tone. “I am,” you answered. “Picking out an outfit now.”

“I’m sure you’ll select something appropriate,” your mother responded. “Mhm,” you replied, not really paying attention to what she was saying. “How are you planning to get to the church?” Your mother suddenly asked.

You hesitated. “Uh… I had planned to walk,” you answered. You heard your mother tut. “We’ll just send a car to come get you.” You sighed heavily.

Your parents lived in a gated community on the west side of Sejong, a much nicer area of the city, though most of the city was nice. Your family came from money, as did most of your friends. Your friend group attended the best private schools in Sejong, continuing onto university and never having to worry about how to pay for tuition or books. You knew how fortunate you were and how privileged your upbringing was.

“I’m perfectly fine walking,” you retorted as you set the suit down and picked up another outfit, a short sleeve ribbed white turtleneck with a black skirt and a split cropped short sleeve blazer. One side was entirely black while the other side and the collar was a black with white plaid pattern.

“Don’t be silly, dear. It would take such a long time for you to walk there. Our driver will come get you. We’ll send Martin.” You knew there was no point in arguing and relented. “Fine,” you answered. “I’ll see you at the church, mother.”

Before she had the opportunity to redirect the conversation, you said goodbye and hung up. “This one,” you said, turning to your closet and grabbing a belt and a pair of shoes to match.

Once dressed and looking up to your own standards of “church ready” you grabbed a small clutch purse and put a few items inside; lip gloss, phone, compact, and wallet. You weren’t sure if you were going to go out to eat after services or if you were going to come straight home but you wanted to be prepared either way.

As you headed out of your apartment, your phone vibrated in your purse. Locking your door before you forgot, you puled the device from your bag and checked the notifications. A slew of texts from Lilah filled the screen.

Lilah🌕: are you going today? Lilah🌕: i don’t know why you pretend to believe Lilah🌕: we could be doing more productive things Rolling your eyes with a slight smirk, you typed a response. You: you know how my parents would freak if I stopped coming You: besides, it’s not that bad

Lilah’s response was instantaneous and you pictured here lounging on her bed, waiting for you to text her back.

Lilah🌕: speak for yourself. You don’t get weird stares when you’re just sitting there existing. All those people follow teaching that tell them not to judge yet that’s all those hypocrites do Lilah🌕: skip services and come see me instead Lilah🌕: I miss you ):

You sighed as you took a break from her messages to head down the stairs. After the last time you tried to text while traversing the stairs ended up with a trip to the hospital and a twisted ankle followed by bed rest and a bulky brace, you learned your lesson.

Once you were on flat ground again, you stopped by your building’s front door and peered out the glass, looking for the car your mother insisted on sending. You saw nothing and instead went back to your messages.

Lilah🌕: where you go? ):< You: i was walking down the stairs lol calm down Lilah🌕: oh yeah. We don’t want a repeat of last time You: i remember thanks lol anyway i can’t skip You: my mother is sending a car to pick me up Lilah🌕: BOOOO. BOO KAREN You: my mother’s name isn’t Karen Lilah🌕: no but your mother IS a Karen You: 🧍🏻‍♀️ Lilah🌕: just tell Jeeves that you don’t feel well and come see me instead :> Lilah🌕: we can order pizza and watch Gilmore Girls! You: ugh i wish but i can’t back out now Lilah🌕: why not? ):< You: because the car just got here

You sighed and locked your screen as a familiar silver car pulled up.

It was definitely one of your father’s, a silver Lexus. Your father loved his Lexuses.

The driver’s door opened and a tall man, who you presumed to be Martin, in a black suit with black sunglasses stepped out, moving to open the back passenger door like some sort of secret service.

Holding in a chuckle, you descended the steps, smiling as he greeted you with a formal “morning miss.” You thanked him as you climbed into the back, settling in the seat as Martin shut the door and walked back to the driver’s side.

The interior was an off-white leather and rather spacious. Leave it to your parents to send such a nice car to pick you up for church.

Once Martin put the car in gear and pulled onto the street, you returned to your texts with your best friend.

Lilah🌕: boo. Throw up on him You: lilah! 💀 Lilah🌕: what?? He’ll leave you there to go home and change and then tell Karen that he refuses to pick you up ever again. It’s a win-win! You: absolutely not lol Lilah🌕: sometimes you’re no fun Lilah🌕: you already on your way there? You: yeah. It’s so quiet in the car. No music, no conversation, nothing Lilah🌕: not even Nocturne in E-flat major, Op. 9, No. 2? Lilah🌕: what has happened to society? How could they not play Nocturne in E-flat major, Op. 9, No. 2 You: oh stop it lol 😂 You: i just meant it’s really awkward right now.

The car jostled as it hit a small bump and Martin apologized quietly, glancing at you in the rearview. “It’s not a problem, Martin,” you replied kindly. “Just another sign that Sejong needs to focus on repairing some of these roads instead of the other ventures they seem to be spend on,” you added as you looked back down.

Lilah🌕: you mean Jeeves isn’t the most fabulous conversationalist you’ve ever met? Lilah🌕: absolutely unacceptable. How did he even land that job? You: your sarcasm is leaking through my screen, Li Lilah🌕: good 🥰 Lilah🌕: i’m gonna watch a movie. Text me when the cult meeting is over You: Lilah! Lilah🌕: love you!! ❤️😘

You chuckled as you put your phone away, looking up as Martin pulled up outside the cathedral. You took a deep breath as Martin got out to open the door and you stepped out as members of the congregation started filing into the open doors, some stopping to greet others.

You thanked Martin as you brushed your skirt and looked back up. You didn’t see your parents anywhere outside and figured they must be inside already. Taking another deep breath, you followed the throngs of people entering the building and climbed the stone steps up to the doors.

Inside the foyer were small crowds of people, all speaking to one another. The doors that led into the main room were still closed as no doubt the staff were preparing for the services. You finally caught sight of your parents who were standing off to one side talking with Joshua’s parents, your boyfriend standing nearby and looking like he was part of the conversation.

You squeezed through the crowded foyer, saying excuse me until you reached them. Joshua was the first to spot you as you approached. He greeted you with a smile, breaking from the group to pull you into a light hug, pressing a kiss to your temple before your parents and his noticed your presence.

“Oh good,” you heard your mother say as Joshua guided you over to both sets of parents. You noticed another couple of your parents’ friends were standing in the circle and you could feel their eyes scrutinizing not only you but Joshua as well.

You saw the way the woman, whose name you forgot, looked over you, scanning your outfit and how you had presented yourself. It made you feel like a child all over again and you were showing your parent what you had picked to wear on the first day of school.

“You’ve made it,” your mother said, drawing your attention from the woman silently judging your choice of attire. You weren’t sure why she was judging you so hard, especially when she was wearing what you assumed was a dress. It looked like something she’d probably been wearing since the 1980’s and probably should have stayed there.

“What are you wearing?” Your mother asked softly, eyes looking at your jacket.

You glanced down and then back up. “What?” You asked. “What’s wrong with it?”

You saw the way your mother glanced to the side, probably to see if anyone was looking at you. Glancing back, you saw that no one was. “It just doesn’t seem appropriate for church,” your mother responded before turning as her name was called and she greeted another member of the congregation with your father in tow. You tried not to let her words get to you.

After all, you were used to this. You’d expected the scrutiny but for some reason, it still hurt. You were an adult now and she still treated you like a child.

You felt an arm around your shoulders before Joshua whispered in your ear. “You look nice,” he said softly. The sour feeling that had started to prickle at the back of your throat started to subside, as did the heat of embarrassment.

He always managed to calm you down when it came to your mother.

“Thanks,” you replied just as softly. “I think you look amazing in everything you wear,” Joshua added, kissing your cheek. Your cheeks burned and you mumbled at him to stop though that was the last thing you wanted.

You giggled as Joshua nuzzled your cheek until you heard his mother’s sharp voice calling his name. Joshua looked over his shoulder at her. “We are in public,” she said sternly, fixing you with a steely glare. Like it was your fault for Joshua’s behavior. “You’re right,” Joshua said turning back to look at you, taking your chin in his hand and tilting your head to place a kiss on your lips right as the doors opened.

“Joshua!” You heard his mother hiss. Joshua rolled his eyes with a smile on his lips. “I’ll see you later,” he murmured, giving you one last peck before you were dragged away by your mother who reprimanded you for public displays of affection as she led you and your stoic father to a row of benches about half way into the room.

You were thankful to be sitting at the furthest end of the row closest to the outside wall as more people filed into the church, filling the rows. Your mother was sat on the other side of your father who merely checked his watch before looking around the room, almost as if he was bored and you were left wondering if he even wanted to be here.

As the rows behind and in front of you filled up, your parents greeted the other members of the congregation, speaking about everything ranging from business to their plans for the week. Your mother talked about upcoming charity events and soirees while your father spoke strictly business and golf.

You checked your phone quickly, seeing Lilah had sent you a couple texts about the movie she was watching and reminding you to text her when you got out of church. You were about to put your phone away when you got another text. One from your boyfriend.

Joshy: put your phone away ma’am

A smile spread across your face as you typed a response.

You: you first Joshy: i can see you 👁 You: well, it’s not like i’m trying to hide from you Joshy: turn around

You looked behind you and saw him a couple rows behind with his parents, staring directly at you with a smirk.

You turned back to look at your phone.

Joshy: hi You: you’re such a dork Joshy: you still love me You: do i? 🤔 Joshy: i’m wounded ): 💔 You: poor baby Joshy: hey. I’m not a baby 😠 You: awww is the widdle baby mad? Joshy: i’m NOT a baby Joshy: you’re the baby Joshy: you’re my baby You: i know 😌🥰 You: okay princess 🙄 Joshy: you really should put your phone away though You: i’m a rebel Joshy: is that so? You: yes 😈 Joshy: I'm not sure you should be using that emoji in a house of worship 🤨 You: just goes to show I'm a rebel 😎💅🏻 Joshy: okay Rebel Girl, meet me in the basement ten minutes after the services start You: we can’t leave! 😶 Joshy: i thought you were a rebel 🤨 You: i am ):< Joshy: prove it to me You: i dont know Josh… Joshy: either you’re your parents’ good girl or your mine Joshy: you decide You: but Josh ): Joshy: ten minutes. I’ll see you downstairs ♥️

You glanced up as the sermon started, slipping your phone into your purse and placing your hands over it. The pastor’s words seemed to just go into one ear and out the other as you tried to think of a way to sneak away.

Checking your watch you saw you only had a couple minutes left. ‘How the hell am I going to get away?’ You glanced around, eyes scanning the congregation. Most eyes were on the pastor as he spoke, his droning voice no doubt boring into their brains much like it did to yours.

You noticed several kids were either dozing off, playing on their phones, or just flat out asleep. Even some adults were dozing off. You heard whispered voices behind you and glanced back in time to see Joshua whispering to his mother and getting up.

Turning back forward, you stared at the back of the bench before you, wracking your brain until Lilah’s words to you earlier hit you.

‘Throw up on him.’

‘That’s it!’ You leaned forward slightly, dropping your head. Your father merely glanced at you but your mother leaned across him to ask you what the matter was. You lifted your head briefly. “I think I’m going to be sick,” you whispered. Your mother studied your body and so you threw in a fake retch for good measure.

“Go to the bathroom. Do not throw up here.”

You nodded and got up slowly, making sure to move as quickly as possible but not too quickly. Once you were out in the foyer, you turned to the right and headed for the steps that lead into the basement of the church where a few rooms for classes and a secondary set of bathrooms were.

You walked down the hallway, keeping your head on a swivel to keep an eye out for not only your boyfriend but staff as well. You were passing an empty room when you felt a hand grab your arm and tug you into the room, another hand clamping over your mouth to prevent you from screaming.

Your heart hammered as Joshua pushed you against a wall, shutting the door behind him.

You let out a deep exhale as he removed his hand. “Sorry,” he said with a sheepish grin. “I didn’t want you to scream.” You hit him lightly with your purse. “You scared the crap out of me!” You hissed as he cackled softly. “I’m sorry, baby,” he said as he leaned in, pressing his lips to your cheek.

“Let me make it up to you?”

You felt one of his hands slid up between your legs. “We are in a church,” you hissed as his hand continued under your skirt. “That hasn’t stopped us before,” he murmured, lips ghosting over yours. “I thought we agreed to never talk about that again,” you whispered as his lips moved to your neck, leaving light, feathery kisses that verged on tickling.

“I guess I forgot that memo.”

You rolled your eyes, let out a soft gasp as his fingers made contact with your cloth covered sex. “Joshua!” You warned, though it couldn’t have been much of a warning when your voice was so shaky. Joshua clearly heard the tremble in your voice.

“You sure you want me to stop?” He asked, his hand stopping. You shook your head quickly. “No,” you gasped. Joshua smiled against your skin. “Good girl.”

"Have you seen my charger?"

Changbin glanced up, making eye contact with Minho who was peering into the room, holding up his wall plug but the cord was missing. Changbin shook his head and returned to his tablet.

Minho narrowed his eyes as his boss. "Did you take it?" he asked the younger man. Changbin glanced back up before fishing his phone out of his pocket and holding it up for Minho to see.

"Why would I take an Apple charger for an Apple device when I use exclusively Samsung products?" he asked, lips threatening to twitch into a smirk as he returned the same scrutinizing stare.

Minho only held his gaze for a few moments more before conceding. "What about Jeongguk?" he asked as Changbin pocket his phone and went back to ordering supplies on his tablet.

"Also Samsung," a voice said, causing Minho to turn and look up at the man in question as Jeongguk held up his phone. "Ask your roommate," Jeongguk added as he returned his phone to his pocket. Minho glared in the direction of Chris' station before slinking out of the room like a cat.

Jeongguk snorted as Minho could be heard in the background.

"Give me back my charger you thieving, two-faced Australian bitch!"

Changbin shook his head, holding in his laughter as he finished adding items to his cart. He glanced up as Jeongguk sat on the custom red bench Changbin specially ordered for his last shop.

"Do you need any new needles or bands?" Changbin asked, not looking up as he continued to tap away on his tablet. Jeongguk shook his head. I still have bands from that last order," he admitted and my station is overstocked on needles."

Changbin nodded silently as he proceeded to check out.

Minho and Chris could be heard bickering in the background as Changbin finished filling out the forms and placed his order, saving his confirmation number before setting the tablet on the desk behind him. He turned back to face his friend.

"Did you need something?" Changbin asked, just now noticing Jeongguk held a stack of colored papers in his hands. Jeongguk nodded at the stack, tilting it to show Changbin the front.

"They flyers came in," he answered. Four colors like you ordered," he added. Changbin crossed the distance and held out his hand to take the stack and look over the paper.

It was exactly as he ordered. "Perfect," he murmured. "You still wanna post them around town?" Jeongguk asked as Changbin flipped to the other colored pages. He nodded. "Yeah, where are the other two?" he asked, absent-mindedly scanning the paper.

Jeongguk leaned back and whistled, drawing the attention of the two bickering in the other room. Moments later, Chris and Minho appeared at the doorway, looking equal parts shocked and curious. "You got plans tonight?" Jeongguk asked, glancing over his shoulder at them.

"I was going to see Ari," Minho admitted while Chris shook his head. "We just got the flyers in," Changbin said, holding up the stack to show them. "We wanted to put them up around town," Jeongguk added. "You guys in?"

"Or you gonna make us do all the work?" Changbin asked teasingly. Chris smiled widely. "I'm in," he replied cheerfully before turning to look at Minho who rolled his eyes before a smirk formed on his face. "I guess I can see Ari afterwards," he said, pulling his phone out to no doubt shoot her a text.

"Great," Changbin said, splitting up the flyers and handing one color to each person. "Well split into pairs. Minho and Jeongguk, you take east of main, Chris and I will cover the west side. Check in with the small shops. Ask if they have a business bulletin board. If they refuse, just move on," Changbin explained. "I don't wanna make enemies or cause a scene."

Minho, Chris and Jeongguk nodded. "Wait, how are we attaching these?" Minho asked as Jeongguk glanced at Changbin. "Oh, right," the eldest said as he got up, handing his stack of papers to Changbin and sauntered out of the room.

He returned a couple moments later with a plain white paperboard box and opened the lid, setting it on the bench. He pulled out four staple guns, handing one to each guy before passing out smaller little boxes of staples. "My brother sent these with the flyers," he explained as he opened his own staple gun and loaded the staples into it.

"Your brother?" Chris asked, tilting his head curiously. Jeongguk nodded as he pulled the trigger, making sure his staple gun was loaded properly. "Yeah, he made the flyers." Minho glanced down at the papers. "He's a talented artist," he noted.

"He's a comic book artist," Jeongguk explained. "So we commissioned him to design the flyers and then print them for us," Changbin continued. "Come on," he added. "The sun's going down and I'd like to get this up with the light."

The four headed out of the shop, Changbin locking up after Minho finally exited. "If you run out of flyers, awesome," Changbin said looking at Jeongguk. "If not, no big deal. Just go around until the sun sets."

The brunet nodded and motioned for Minho to follow him. Changbin and Chris turned and headed in the opposite direction. It was a mundane and repetitive task, stapling the flyers on the wooden telephone poles, stopping by small businesses and asking them to display the flyers on any bulletin boards they might have.

A few businesses turned them away, albeit very rudely upon hearing the word tattoo. Some business owners were only too happy to help support other local businesses.

Half their stacks were gone as they continued down one of the many side streets off main street, stapling sheets as they went.

While taking a short break, Changbin noticed Chris smiling at his phone as he typed away. Changbin didn't want to pry but he wanted to make an effort to get to know his employees as he would most likely end up being close friends with these guys.

"Lilah?" Changbin asked, drawing Chris' attention. The older man smiled as he locked his screen. "Yeah," he answered. "She's really funny," he added. Changbin nodded. "She's pretty tol," he added, causing Chris to smile wider.

A comfortable silence fell over them before Chris spoke up.

"Her friend, Y/N, is really pretty, too."

Changbin’s heart thumped in his chest at the mention of Y/N's name. He nodded silently. "Yeah," he answered nonchalantly. "She has a boyfriend though, right?" Changbin added, looking at Chris who nodded. "Yeah," he said, sounding slightly bitter.

"Joshua Hong."

Changbin’s mind wandered back to that night at the club. The night he met you and was willing to put himself between you and your boyfriend. It was clear to him then that Joshua wasn't the nicest guy and he got that same impression again when he went to pick up his furniture from Serizawa's antique store.

"You don't like him?" Changbin asked, watching Chris as he contemplated telling him something. Whatever it was Chris was keeping from him, Changbin could tell he was hiding something bigger and he would be lying if he said his curiosity wasn't piqued.

"No," Chris answered, voice devoid of emotion. "From what Lilah tells me, Y/N could do so much better than Joshua," he continued. "Chris stopped in his tracks before turning to look at Changbin who had also stopped. "Why are you so interested all of a sudden?"

Changbin tried to play it off by shrugging. I met her through you and Lilah, she works at that furniture and antique shop. I keep running into her and I've been wondering if she's always so nice."

Chris nodded with a smile. "She's always been such a sweetheart. Ever since I first met her hardly anything gets her down." Changbin and Chris started walking again.

"You seem to know her pretty well," Changbin noted, to which Chris snorted. "I know what Lilah tells me," he corrected. He turned to fox Changbin with a curious look. "You seem awfully interested in a girl who has a boyfriend," he said, watching as Changbin shook his head once more. "Nah," Changbin answered.

"Just curious as to what her story is. That's all."

Across town, Minho and Jeongguk were just as busy stapling posters to every wooden post they came across.

"Ah my arms are so tired!" Minho whined, shaking his arm. Jeongguk snorted at him. "Are you always this whiny?" Jeongguk asked as he checked his phone. Minho gave him a cheeky smile. "No," he answered. "It's just for you."

Jeongguk playfully swiped at the younger man who dodged him easily. "Just hang up your damn flyers," Jeongguk said as he slipped his phone into his pocket again. "Stop bothering me."

Minho rolled his eyes as he moved to staple another flier to the phone pole. "Yes, dear."

It was Jeongguk's turn to roll his eyes as he pulled out his pack of cigarettes. Minho turned and shot a staple at him. Jeongguk glanced at the tiny metal projectile hanging onto his sweatshirt and looked up at Minho. "Aren't you supposed to be quitting?" Minho asked, narrowing his eyes as Jeongguk pulled out his lighter.

"'Supposed to' being the operative word," Jeongguk answered as he lit the end of the cigarette, taking a deep inhale. "To my credit," he continued as he put the pack and his lighter away. "I haven't bought any more. This is my last pack."

Minho rolled his eyes and continued down the street, stapling another flier to a wooden board covering a vacant building window.

"If you were a good friend, you'd help me finish the pack," Jeongguk jokingly accused as he took another drag. Minho laughed and turned to look at Jeongguk. "I'm not your friend," he retorted. "You're my employer," he added.

Jeongguk chuckled. "Seriously, do you want one?"

Minho shook his head. "I quit," he replied. "I noticed it only made me more anxious instead of taking the edge off."

Jeongguk shrugged his shoulders and took another puff. "Suit yourself."

The two of them continued down the street as the sun started to set behind the hills and trees that surrounded the town.

"Can I ask you something?" Minho asked suddenly. Jeongguk took another drag of his cigarette before exhaling. "Sure," he answered, looking at the younger man as they stopped on the sidewalk.

"How did you and Changbin meet? How do you know each other?"

Jeongguk hesitated, reaching up to scratch his head. "The long story is complicated but the short version is we met at a tattoo convention when Changbin was first looking to open his own shop. I was working a booth as a traveling artist, renting spaces at shops all over. I guess I was trying to find something more stable, " he explained before taking another long inhale of smoke.

"Changbin stopped by my booth and was impressed with my work and we started talking and when he asked which shop I worked at, I told him the truth," Jeongguk explained while Minho listened.

"He told me he was about to open his own shop and asked if I would come work at his place. Initially, I said no but the more I thought about it, I decided to give it a try," he continued.

Minho nodded, watching Jeongguk take another drag. "And that's it?" He asked. Jeongguk studied him for a moment before nodding.

"Yeah, pretty much. Four years later, and we're business partners," Jeongguk concluded. "He's my best friend," he added.

"As cheesy as it sounds, I couldn't imagine where I'd be in life without him," Jeongguk said as he took one last draw from his cigarette before putting it out. Minho nodded in understanding.

"I get it," he replied. "It's kind of like that for me with Chris." Jeongguk nodded in return before glancing up at the darkening sky. "Come on," he said suddenly. "We should head back, put more of these up on the way," he added, waving the lighter stack of flyers in his hand before leading the way down the sidewalk, Minho in tow.

Back at the shop, Changbin was scrolling on his phone while Chris played a music game when the door opened, the bell ringing and drawing their attention. Minho and Jeongguk entered with smug smiles on their faces. Minho held up his staple gun and aimed at Chris before launching a single tiny projectile at his friend.

"We put up all our flyers," Jeongguk said as Chris and Minho got into a staple war. Changbin looked impressed as Jeongguk strolled over and set his staple gun on the reception counter. "You smell like smoke," Changbin accused. Jeongguk shrugged his shoulders.

"My last pack is almost empty," he answered. "Then I'm done."

Changbin narrowed his eyes. "You better be," he said, playfully shoving his friend as Chris put Minho in a headlock which he quickly tapped out of.

Chris laughed loudly before looking over at Changbin and Jeongguk.

"Hey, we're gonna order some pizza and play video games tonight," he announced, drawing the attention of both men. "Maybe watch a movie. You guys wanna come?" Chris looked hopeful as Minho glanced to Jeongguk and Changbin who exchanged looks.

"Sure," Jeongguk answered, turning to look back at the two men.

Minho and Chris' eyes shifted to Changbin who glanced at Jeongguk before answering.

"Yeah, count me in.

You joined the crowd as the congregation exited the church, easily finding your mother and father as Joshua snuck off to find his parents. The sky had started to darken, gray clouds looming overhead.

Your mother turned to look at you and upon seeing you, she looked exasperated.

“You missed the whole service!” She reprimanded. You grimaced at her. “Sorry,” you replied. “I think I emptied the entire contents of my stomach in the bathroom.”

Your mother looked you over. “I was going to see if you wanted to join us for lunch with the Hong’s but perhaps you should go home,” she said as Joshua and his parents joined your little group. “I think we should postpone the lunch,” your mother said, sounding apologetic. “Y/N isn’t feeling well.

“Is that so?” Joshua’s mother asked, eyeing you suspiciously. You nodded silently as your mother felt your forehead. “Yes, she’s sweating and warm. She mentioned getting sick in the bathroom. I think we should wait until she feels better.”

Joshua’s mother nodded, lips pursed as she continued to look at you with that same scrutinizing stare. “Will you call Martin, dear,” your mother asked your father who reluctantly reached into his pocket for his phone.

Joshua interjected. “Y/N’s place is on the way to my apartment. I could drop her off,” he offered. “Maybe make her some soup and make sure she feels better before I head home?” The contrasting looks your mother and his gave you could have been comical.

Your mother was looking at your boyfriend like he was a saint, an angel even, to suggest doing something so sweet. The perfect boyfriend who would one day make the perfect husband. ‘In sickness and in health.’

His mother on the other hand was looking at you as if you were some harlot, trying to entice her son to sin. Like you would lead him directly into the gates of hell or something. She never did like you for some reason.

“If she’s sick, I don’t think it’s a good idea,” she said softly. You didn’t miss the intonation in her voice as she said the word sick. It held an underlying layer of contempt she held for you. Joshua waved her concern off. “I’m sure it’s fine, mother. Y/N probably ate something that didn’t agree with her,” he said.

“She’s always had issues with her stomach. I’m sure you remember that.”

Joshua’s mother pursed her lips again, glaring at you from behind her son.

“Thank you so much, Joshua,” your mother said sweetly as your boyfriend moved to wrap an arm securely around your shoulders. “It’s no trouble, Mrs. Y/L/N. After all, Y/N is my girlfriend and I would be a terrible boyfriend if I didn’t take care of her.” You could have sworn you saw your mother swoon as Joshua said goodbye to both sets of parents and gently steered you towards the door.

“You really don’t have to drive me home,” you said as you descended the steps outside and followed the sidewalk towards the parking lot. Joshua chuckled as he led the way. “Actually, I do now,” he answered. “If either of our parents saw you walking home, they would ask a lot more questions than they are now.”

You cursed mentally, knowing he was right.

“I guess you’ve got a point,” you said with a shrug. Joshua tsked and rolled his eyes. “Just can’t admit it when I’m right, can you?” You shook your head with a wide grin. “Never.”

Joshua scoffed as he led you to the passenger side of his car. “Brat,” he murmured as he unlocked and opened your door for you. “Thank you,” you said, laying heavy on the word so he wouldn’t know what you were thanking him for.

The ride back to your place took a shorter amount of time than the ride to the church. Joshua parked on the street, as he usually did. He had every intention of coming inside to “take care of you” as he put it. As soon as the apartment door shut, he was on you in seconds, one hand on your cheek and the other on the small of your back as he carefully backed you against your kitchen counter.

“Up,” he simply said, moving both hands to your thighs to help you up onto the counter before his lips were back on yours. “I need to go to the store,” you interrupted, pulling away but he shook his head. “I’ll order you groceries,” he answered, lips moving down your neck and stopping to remove your blazer and untuck your shirt.

“Joshua!” You whined as he pulled your top off over your head and threw it aside. “Keep saying my name like that,” he said breathlessly. Your head tilted to the side as his lips continued to kiss down your neck. “Seeing you come undone earlier really drove me crazy,” he groaned, fingers digging into the skin of your exposed thighs.

Before you had a chance to reply, he pulled you down from the counter, turning you to face away before he pressed against you, grinding into your ass. “I had to deal with this the whole ride over here,” he growled. You pushed back against him.

“Must have been so hard for you,” you said, enjoying the way he grew more and more frustrated. “If you don’t stop it, I’ll take you right here.” You hummed in response. “Oh, i’m so scared,” you replied, pushing against him again, letting out a moan at the feeling of his erection grinding against you.

“Fine,” Joshua said, one hand moving to the back of your neck. “Have it your way, brat.” Without another word, he pushed your chest down against the counter, keeping you pinned while the other hand reached to undo his belt and pants.

“You gonna keep me waiting?” You asked teasingly as Joshua pushed his pants and boxers down enough to pull his cock free. “What have I told you about that attitude, sweetheart?” He asked as his hand pushed your skirt up, grabbing the back of your panties and roughly pulling them down your thighs.

“That you’ll fuck it out of me?” You asked coyly.

Joshua wasted no time, ramming his cock into your pussy, making you cry out. He quickly placed his hand over your mouth to muffle your moans. “Precisely,” he answered before his hips started to thrust sharply, hitting your ass with each movement.

Each thrust had you practically screaming into his hand, your own hands trying to find something to grab onto to ground yourself from the force of your boyfriend’s hips. Another loud scream, muffled by his hand, escaped your lips.

“You alright, baby?” You heard him in your ear, his hips slowing to shallow thrusts. You nodded, breathing heavily against his hand. "Good," he replied, resuming the same merciless pace as before, pounding into you from behind, hand still muffling your cries as he took his pent up sexual tension on your body.

It never failed to astonish you just how rough Joshua got in bed. Of course, he wasn't like that the first couple times. It wasn't until you asked him to go a little harder that it came out. When you were both frustrated and needed release, he usually bent you over the closest surface and fucked you so hard you couldn't walk.

That wasn't to say he was always rough with you. For every rough session, he made up for the abuse to your core by showering you in affection. For every scream he'd pulled from you, there were twice as many whispered I love you's as he reverently made love to you.

"Fuck, I'm not gonna last," you heard him grunt in your shoulder. "I'm gonna cum." You whimpered against his hand as he chased his high, taking you over the edge with him as you both came together, you with a squeal as he thrust deeply into your abused hole, spilling his seed inside you, coating your walls.

With one final thrust, Joshua’s grip on you loosened and he had to brace himself against the counter to keep from collapsing on top of you. You panted heavily, cheek pressed against the cool granite of your kitchen counter. You felt his fingers comb through your hair, brushing some of the strands away from your face.

"You okay, baby?" he asked breathlessly. You nodded slowly and wordlessly as you tried to catch your own breath. Joshua leaned down, pressing a tender kiss to your temple. "I didn't hurt you, did I?" he asked, lips brushing against your cheek.

You shook your head, exhaling against the granite. "No," you finally whispered. "Do you want me to help you up?"

Joshua always made sure to ask if you wanted or needed assistance and you appreciated that about him. You nodded and whined as he pulled back, his cock slipping from your pussy.

He quickly redressed himself and then carefully helped you stand before guiding you to your bathroom. He helped you sit on the toilet before moving to start the shower. "I could stay and join you," he offered as he tested the temperature of the water.

You smiled and shook your head. "I'll be okay, Joshua," you answered. He closed the curtain and turned to cross the short distance between you, kneeling down and taking your chin gently in his hand. "You sure you don't want me to stay, angel?" he asked, eyes meeting yours in a loving gaze.

You nodded in response. "Yeah," you said with a sigh. "I'll be okay."

Joshua stood up, leaning over to press a kiss to your forehead.

"Okay, sweetheart," he replied softly. "I'll check on you later."

You thanked him as he stood upright, looking up at him from your seated position. His hand moved to cup your cheek, thumb stroking your skin tenderly. "I love you, Y/N," he said as you reached up to place your hand over his and leaned into his touch.

"I love you too, Joshua."

After stealing a few more kisses, Joshua finally left your apartment and allowed you to undress and step into the scalding shower stream. You sighed loudly as the steaming hot water hit your skin. It helped to work out your sore muscles from being bent over the kitchen counter for a while.

After cleaning yourself off, you stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around yourself and headed into your kitchen, grabbing your purse and sifting through it until you found your phone. Turning the device on, you saw you had a couple missed texts from Lilah and Joshua.

You answered both before heading into your bedroom area to get changed into some clean clothes. Once dressed you headed back into the living room, about to sit down when there was a knock at your door. You sighed heavily and walked over to check the peephole.

Your neighbor stood on the other side.

You unlocked and opened the door, smirking up at Wonwoo. "Yes, neighbor?" you asked. Wonwoo peered past you into your apartment before looking back at you nervously.

"You alright?" he asked sheepishly. You stared at him blankly, blinking a few times. "Uh, yeah?" you answered. Wonwoo nodded slowly. "I heard you scream earlier and wanted to make sure you were okay," he replied.

Your cheeks burned. "Oh, um," you answered. "Joshua was here earlier," you added softly. Wonwoo's eyes widened and his cheeks turned pink as he realized what he'd overheard.

"Understandable. Okay. Have a good day," he sputtered. "Glad you're okay."

He quickly shuffled back to his apartment, clearly just as embarrassed as you as he shut his door, leaving you to shut your own door and retreat back into your apartment, completely mortified that your neighbor and friend had overheard you and Joshua.

You grabbed your phone and shot a quick text, informing your boyfriend that he wasn't allowed to make you scream at your place anymore. Joshua's reply came minutes later, finding it highly amusing.

Joshy: guess next time I won't cover your mouth 😌 You: 🥲 I'm glad you find this amusing Joshy: I'm just teasing you baby Joshy: but you're feeling okay? You: yes. I'm making some ramen now You: gonna watch a movie Joshy: do you still want me to send you some groceries? You: it's okay. I'll order them later 🥰 thank you though Joshy: of course. Anything for you, my love 💕 You: 💕🥰

You set your phone aside to focus on making your food before settling down on your couch and starting the movie Lilah had recommended to you last week.

It was a decent movie, not the best, but you could see the appeal as you finished your noodles and started working on making a grocery list. You were scribbling a few items down when your phone started buzzing on the coffee table.

You reached forward and grabbed it, recognizing your boss' number and answered it immediately.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Y/N?" Mr. Serizawa's voice came over the speaker. "This is Isei." You sat upright. "Hello, Mr. Serizawa, how are you?"

"Oh, I'm alright. And more importantly, Shinju is doing well," he answered. You sighed in relief. "I'm so glad to hear that," you replied, tucking the device between your ear and shoulder.

"It's been a huge relief," Mr. Seirzawa stated. "But that's not exactly why I called," he continued. "Our grandson is coming back into town next week and we won't be able to pick him up."

You smiled, knowing there this was going. "Any chance you could head to pick him up from the ferry station in the next town over?"

You nodded, mostly to yourself. "Of course," you answered. "I'll pick him up," you answered to his immense relief. "If you want to borrow our car, I can leave the keys at the shop for you."

"That's okay, Mr. Serizawa," you replied. "I'll just borrow one of my parents' cars." You heard him sigh on the other side of the line. "Thank you so much Y/N, you're really helping us out here. I'll call Daniel and let him know you'll be picking him up."

You wrote down the details, making sure to double check the time. "Okay, Mr. Serizawa. I'll call my dad right after this and get one of his cars to use," you said before finally saying goodbye and hanging up the line. You quickly put the details in your phone before pulling up your father’s contact info and took a deep breath.

"Here we go."

#stray kids scenarios #stray kids imagines #stray kids angst #stray kids x reader #seventeen scenarios #seventeen imagines #seventeen smut #seventeen x reader #joshua hong smut #joshua hong x reader #series: under your skin #series: uys

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