#yes i am talking about aunt may

[webslingingslasher]

could you do angst -> fluff?

you and peter are long distance. someone sends you a picture of "peter" cheating. but the picture isn't peter.

Long distance relationships sucked. 

You may be biased, but you knew that long term relationships were the worst of them all. You’d put that in the same category as finding out you’ve been catfished for years. 

It could be worse, like Sadie and Dylan. Dylan moved across the country for school and watching your roommate go through the process of trying to set up date facetime calls, and scheduling calls between the hours of the night, made you feel like you didn’t have any say about yours. 

At least you and Peter were in the same time zone, he was only an hour and a half train ride away but it felt like lifetimes when for years you shared a school and zip code. You always had Peter around, and it’s very noticeable when he’s not. 

Imagine not being able to kiss your lover everyday, hold their body, or look in their eyes. 

Sadie smiled empathetically when Peter called, she got up to leave the room empty. Many times you’ve gotten out of bed at three am for a long bathroom break, you know that there are some things you tell Peter you’d never want anyone else to hear. You could extend that to Sadie as well. 

Peter’s voice was warm through the phone. 

“Hiya, baby.” 

You bit your bottom lip, too excited to keep it in. 

“Hi, handsome.” 

“Tell me three things from your day.” 

You paused to think, you knew this question would come up, you made a mental note of what to tell Peter. 

“So, the fat squirrel by park hall attacked this guy for his sandwich, and I know what you’re thinking, but that squirrel is fucking vicious. And, hm…” 

Peter shuffles around on his end. 

“Oh! My English professor is letting us have open notes midterm, and finally… I really, really missed you.” 

Peter gives you a soft chuckle, you wish you could see his face too. 

“I missed you too, also that fat squirrel? Next time I come down I wanna see him in person, pictures don’t do it justice.” 

When he comes down, he hasn’t visited in a month. Not that you can’t go see him, you make sure to take trips but he also has his aunt here, and he tries to do Spidey in the city as much as he can to keep questions to a minimum. 

“Two more, petey.” 

He hums on the line, you miss feeling his chest vibrate when he does it against your back. 

“I ate a salad for lunch,” 

“Bullshit.” You cough on the line. 

“Okay, listen here, stinky.” 

“Shots fired! I’ll hang up right now.” 

Peter whines, “you can’t! I have to tell you my third thing.” 

“Go on, I have a call to finish.” 

He scoffs, “rude, I was going to say that I may have found an out for my robotics midterm so hypothetically-” 

You squeal so loudly on the phone Peter pulls his own away from his ear, it was slightly obnoxious but knowing you were just as excited to see him made his heart melt. 

“Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes!” 

Peter gives you that boyish laugh, the one that makes your heart beat three times fast. 

“Baby, I didn’t even finish.” 

“You don’t have to! I know what you’re saying and I need you here so I can kiss your face and other stuff.” 

Peter’s tone drops seductively,  “oh? Like what other stuff?” 

“You want to see the fat squirrel right?” 

“The one in my pants?” 

“Oh my god.” 

“Okay, okay, so I was thinking I could come up on-” 

His name was called in the background, it made you pause for a second, he stopped talking for a minute. His name was called again, it was tilted, like a song almost, it was a female for sure. 

“Oh, peteyyy?” 

Your stomach dropped, that was your name for him. The name that he only liked you calling him, it was something that was so sacred and this person you don’t know saying it so loosely, like it’s regular. 

“Pete?” You say his name like you’re asking ‘who’s that?’ ‘why is she calling you that?’ ‘where are you, are you in your dorm?’ ‘why is there a girl in your room calling you my name?’ 

He coughs, “sorry, baby. I uh, I need to go but I’ll call you in a few hours, okay?” 

“Oh. Oka-” 

The line went dead. 

Your mind swimmed with dangerous thoughts, each one simmered down with the overwhelming echo that peter would never do anything like what a part of you is insinuating. Not to mention you were sure that he’d explain everything when he called you in a few hours, except when you sat around and waited, and waited, and waited, he never called. 

You fell asleep waiting on his call, you woke up with your morning alarm and checked your phone, no missed calls or texts. It felt weird, he never missed goodnight calls. It wasn’t until ten he tried to call, you had to ignore it because of your class but made a note to call him on your way back to your room.

At lunch everything shifted. 

You and some friends met up in the dining hall and you were in the middle of scarffing down fries when you tried to look up your friends ex’s new girlfriend on instagram, you were confronted with a message request. The picture and text made your hand fall, french fries scattering, you felt like you were about to puke all over the table. 

“I’m pretty sure you’re peter's girlfriend, we shared a class last semester and he talked about you all the time. I was out with some friends last night and I’m pretty sure I saw him at a bar with a girl that doesn’t look like you. If this isn’t him or if you guys aren’t together anymore please ignore this, idk i’d want someone to tell me. I’m sorry :(“ 

Sure enough the picture was grainy, definitely zoomed in from across the bar but it sure did look like him. A plaid button down you’ve seen him a million times in before, curls poked out the sides of his head, it seemed curlier and longer than you remember but it’s been a while since you saw him in person. 

His left arm was looped around the waist of a girl totally opposite of you, it looked like his other hand held her face steady as he kissed her. It made your vision go blurry, you’ve never felt this way before. Curls blocked the side of his face but it looked like him, maybe he looked taller than normal but it was a pic taken from far away, you want to question everything about it but the longer you look at it the sicker you feel. 

You shut out of the app and go back to smiling with your friends, you wonder how you’ll call him out. If you were strong enough you’d just ghost him all together, never speak to him again and make him question his insanity. 

Instead the second he called when you were home you picked it up with shaky hands. 

“Hi ba-” 

“We’re done.” 

You hung up the phone. 

It rang less than three seconds later. 

“I’m sorry, what did you-” 

“I said we’re done. Goodbye.” 

You hung up again. 

It rang even quicker, immediate redial. 

“Is this a joke?” 

“I dunno, peter. Am I?” 

“I-” 

“Save it, it doesn’t matter. We’re broken up, you can stop calling.” 

You don’t know why you thought that would settle things, if anything that made everything worse. 

The fourth time he facetimed, he only did it when he was alone, you assume he either kicked his roommate out or is biting the bullet to get teased by his friend for the rest of his life while he begs to keep his girlfriend. 

You answer, “what.” 

“I need to see your face, what are you telling me?” 

“What did you do last night?” 

Peter’s eyebrows furrow, “I don’t know, what did I do?” 

You take a deep breath, “don’t play dumb. Who was she?” 

He makes a face of realization, “Ohhhh, you mean the girl on the phone?” 

You mock his tone, “yeah, the girl on the phone. You know, the one you were making out with?” 

You hear someone cough, it’s not peter, you can imagine the dead silence that just blanketed the room. 

Peter immediately takes the defense, “I didn’t make out with anyone last night, want to take the offense louder?” 

“Someone literally texted me a picture.” 

“Okay, so let me literally see it.” 

You narrow your eyes, “I don’t have to entertain this, peter. I broke up with you and you cheated, the end.” 

Peter sits up on his end, “no, not the end. You’re throwing damaging accusations out there and not giving me any fucking context.” 

“I. got. a. text.” You paused between each word to prove a point, also a little condescendingly. 

“Show. me.” He mocked your tone. 

You let a groan rip from your throat, “it doesn’t change that you did it.” 

Peter rubs his hand down his face, “okay, fuck this. I was here all night, in my dorm room. If you want you can ask my roommate, he was here, with his girlfriend,” he enunciated the last word, “who called me petey, you know, like you do, maybe, I don’t know, mockingly?”  

His words make you think, if he was truly guilty you don’t think he’d be defending himself so hard. You would think that once he was caught he’d fold his cards, instead he’s insulted you could even assume something like that. 

You take down the threat in your voice, “but… I got a picture. And it looks just like you.” 

Peter takes your side, he may defend his but he can’t make it better by pitting against you. 

“I’m sure it does, baby, but I promise I was here all night.” 

“Peter, it looks just like you.” 

He takes a deep breath to settle his frustration, “I know, but I promise it’s not me. Why would I cheat?” 

It’s a good question, you never would’ve thought he could but the picture was damning evidence. 

“I don’t know. I didn’t think you would, but I mean pete, it looks like you. He’s even wearing your green blue plaid button down.” 

Peter’s eyes bug open, his head spins, you know he’s staring his roommate in the eyes. 

“Evan!” They both exclaim at the same time. 

Your eyebrow scrunches, “who?” 

“Hair a little longer than mine? Maybe a little taller?” 

You pull your head back, “yeah… why?” 

Peter smiles wide, “making out with a blonde? At a bar?” 

“That would be it.” 

Peter shares a high five off screen. 

“That’s our friend Evan, he was on a date. He borrowed my shirt, wasn’t me, promise.” 

You stare at the screen, he seemed authentic and desperate for you to believe him. 

“Fine. We’re still dating for now, but I need to see you and him in the same room. Preferably from the back and in the same shirt.” 

“Done. I’ll print them out and bring them when I see you next week.” 

Peter winks at the screen and you squeal at the thought of seeing him so soon. 

[trippinsorrows]

ltye + 𝑓𝑎𝑚𝑖𝑙𝑦 oneshot

authors note: the wonderful @callmekayd asked about roman's conversation with fetu where he called solana his light, so i figured, why not write it?

only gonna tag a couple of people, cause i'll link this with the next update.

gif belongs to @romanreigns

words: 2.3k

warnings: some angst, discussion of solana's trauma

“You’re quiet, tonight.”

Roman looks over from the bottle of corona he was spinning in a circle on the wooden dining room table. “Am I?”

Fetu chuckles, snatching the bottle from him. “Smartass.” She pops off the cap and takes a swig, Roman sitting up in the chair.

“Should you be drinking that with your medications?”

“Probably not.” She answers so casually, so nonchalantly. It makes him sigh. This is what Ava was talking about. “But, I’m old, so I do what I want. Now stop trying to change the subject.” Placing the cap back on the drink she’s now commandeered as her own, she asks again in a more serious tone. “What’s going on, atalii o le uso?”

That’s such a loaded question, so much so that he’s not sure where to start. “Solana….”

“Your wife, right?” He nods, eyes glancing to the phone that’s screen up on the table. She hasn’t text him in a couple hours, which could either be a good or bad thing. He’s not sure. “How is that going? I know you weren’t very happy about it the last time I saw you.”

Roman is the one to chuckle. It’s almost unreal how much his tune has changed since his last visit with his aunt where he essentially expressed both disinterest and acceptance with the arrangement. 

“Yes, it’s about her, but….not in the way you think.”

When he doesn’t say anything, Fetu impatiently implores, “well, would you hurry up, boy? I may be old, but I still need my beauty sleep.”

Rolling his eyes, Roman shakes his head, growing quiet, muddled thoughts floating into something less disorganized and more cohesive. “She’’s—she’s not what I thought she would be.” 

At that, Fetu asks, “Oh?” She offers a warm smile. “Tell me.” 

Another loaded request he’s not sure how to handle. Roman swallows. “She’s…..kind.”

Fetu snorts, again grabbing the beer he really should try to take from her and would if not for the fact she’d probably bust it over his head in the process. “Well, they say opposites attract.” Roman rolls his eyes. Granted, she’s not entirely wrong, hence why he offers no disagreement. “What else?”

Leaning back in the chair, Roman tries to think of the best way to describe her. To describe the last person on earth he ever expected to care about but has done just that. “I’ve…..I’ve never met anyone like her. She has a big heart, and she’s so innocent. Despite being raised in this life, surviving hell, she still….she still has this softness about her.”

Fetu hums, reminding him, “not everyone in this world is cruel and unkind, Roman. There are very much good people, and it sounds like you’ve maybe been lucky enough to land one of them as a partner.”

He nods, quietly admitting. “I have.”  Roman traces his finger over the imperfections of the wooden table. “But, she’s had a lot of trauma. It’s been….not the easiest to get to where we are.” He takes a deep breath, disclosing, “we haven’t even consummated the marriage yet.”

Fetu’s eyes widen a bit as she asks, truly out of genuine curiosity, “wasn’t that the point of the marriage? To create an heir?”

“She was gang raped as a child,” Roman informs in a low voice, only feeling comfortable sharing such sensitive information because he knows it will never leave this room. “So touch is….it’s hard for her. She asked to work up to intimacy, so we’re trying that.”

“Oh, that poor child.” Fetu’s expression is visibly disturbed and saddened. “Sick fucks.” Roman doesn’t say anything, but the murderous urges boiling underneath are something he has to push back down. In due time. “Wait. Don’t take this as me agreeing with that bullshit requirement, but if she wasn’t a virgin, how did the Elders approve of the marriage? It obviously wasn’t her fault, but we both know how they are. Traditionalist pricks.”

If not for the nature of the conversation, Roman would laugh. “Her father had the doctor lie on her medical report. It stated she was still a virgin.” Roman feels the need almost to defend, “wouldn’t have made a difference to me either way. You know this.”

“It better not. I didn’t raise you to be a hypocrite.” Fair. “Wait, her father did that?”

That actually makes Roman chuckle, but there’s no humor whatsoever. “That’s why I’m here.” Hand naturally forming into a fist, he continues to share information he would never share with anyone else. “Her mother was stabbed to death when she was ten. Solana was there and stabbed too, but she survived.” His jaw clenches. “Her father and brother are both pieces of shit who used to abuse and torture her.”

Fetu is visibly perturbed by the heavy details. “My God, that girl has been through hell.”

“I know.” It doesn’t make sense to Roman how with everything she’s experienced, she still stands, still keeps going, keeps fighting. “But, she’s made tremendous progress since leaving her family. I made her start training, and I think it’s helped a lot. She’s made good friends with Naomi and her friend Bayley. Solana is half Mexican, and Bayley is Mexican, so they seem to bond a lot over that.” And he's happy she has that. Glad she has people she can talk to and connect with. “She’s……happy now.”

Better.

Much better.

Fetu tilts her head to the side. “Something tells me there’s a but.”

There is. A major one. Roman releasing a heavy sigh and running his hand over his face. “I found out her father was behind the hit that killed her mother and was intended to kill Solana too, but she survived. And when he couldn’t afford to pay off the balance, he sold Solana’s virginity and had it set up like a home invasion.”

Fetu says something in Samoan, her own expression slipping into something angry. “What a fucking piece of shit. His own wife? His child?” She asks, an almost demanding element to her question. “You’re going to kill him, right?” Like it’s less of a request and more of an order.

“Of course.” That’s a no brainer. Roman’s new number one mission in this life is to see Xavier, his bitch ass son, and Solana’s rapists meet gruesome, painful deaths. And he’ll be sure to see it through. “But, I don’t—I don’t know if I should tell her. “ He quickly adds, “but, I don’t want to lie to her either. I promised her I’d never do that.”

Fetu nods, her lips pressed together in a sort of frown. “I see…..”

“I don’t want to hurt her,” he admits in a low voice. “I don’t—I can’t see her hurt.”

“Roman….” Fetu’s voice takes on that gentle tone that’s always been comforting to Roman. That, for a long time, before Solana, was the only source of comfort he truly could find in this life. “It’s obvious you lo—care for this girl.” She catches herself. In his own timing. “But, the truth is, there is no way around her being hurt by this.” Roman looks away, jaw clenched, clearly not wanting or liking what he’s hearing. As expected. “She’s going to be devastated. As would anyone to find out their own flesh and blood, let alone a parent, could be so evil.”

“She’s tried to kill herself when she was younger.” Recalling this specific piece is by far the hardest part. Just thinking about the medical report he read detailing the emotional aftermath Solana’s attempt. How distraught she was. “I just—I just don’t want to be the cause that pushes her over the edge.”

Fetu reaches over the table, placing her hand on top of his. “It wouldn’t be because of you.”

He shakes his head. “Yes, it would. Either because of what I tell her or I don’t tell her, and she finds out some other sort of way.”

“Is there a way she could find out?”

Roman has to think about it. One of the first things he did was cut off contact between Solana and her family. For the mere fact he knows Xavier is up to something, wants something out of Roman’s marriage to Solana. Roman knew that he would try to use her, and just from what he saw at the outset of this whole thing, he knew the last thing she needed was to be dragged into some type of wicked plan.

Xavier has no way to contact her, and he’s not stupid enough to show up or send his dumbass son to her job. 

He knows it’d be walking into a deathtrap. So, no, it seems like there’s no chance for this information to ever get out and arrive at Solana’s doorstep. 

But……there’s still a chance.

“I don’t know,” is the answer Roman settles on. ‘But, I can’t—I won’t do anything I think could hurt her, and this…..this will do more than hurt her.”

It could destroy her. Destroy all the progress she’s made. Regress her so far back that he’s not sure she’d be able to recover. 

And he can’t have that. 

“I think she deserves to know the truth. It was her mother. Her assault. She has a right to know.” Roman doesn’t disagree with that. “But, I’m also thinking about everything you’ve told me regarding her mental health, and I guess my concern is what that truth could do to her. If she could handle it.”

And that’s exactly what his fear is.

Roman’s voice is full of vulnerability that he could never show outside of this safe space. “I don’t think I could handle seeing her the way she used to be. I—I care about her too much to do that to her.”

“I understand.” Because she does. Oh, she does. And if not for the heavy nature of this conversation, she’d be more expressive at the joy bubbling beneath the surface. Her elation at finally having years worth of prayers answered. At having comfort in knowing her sweet boy has finally found his person. His soulmate. “Your intentions are good, Roman, and I can’t tell you what to do, though something tells me that’s what you’d prefer.”

He scoffs, shaking his head and admitting, “I just needed to talk to someone.”

That much was obvious. She continues, advising, “what I can tell you is to just continue to support and be there for her, because when she does find out, whether from you or some other means, she’s going to need you, son.”

Roman doesn’t say anything, sitting on his aunt’s wisdom. She’s right. This truly is the depiction of being stuck between a rock and a hard place, but for the sake of Solana’s mental health, it’s not in her best interest to know the truth.

He’ll tell her.

But only when the time is right. 

Fetu, however, has a question of her own. “I want to ask you something, and I want you to be honest with me.”

Roman sits up and sighs, “I’m always honest with you, uso o le tinā.”

“Because you know, even with how big and strong you’ve gotten, I’ll still whoop your ass, little boy.” She’s pleased to see the small smile that accompanies his eye roll, a brief glimpse of that young child she once knew so long ago appearing for the first time in a long time. And she’s pretty sure she can bet just what’s brought that dormant side out of him.

Or who.

Her voice is gentle. “If you knew then what you know now about Solana, would you have still agreed to marry her?”

It’s a valid question. 

It’s also something he doesn’t have to think about. 

“Yes.” Fetu smiles. Knowing. Confirmation. “I wouldn’t change anything.” It’s the easiest thing his aunt could ever ask him. It requires no thought. No contemplation. Just an automatic response. “Solana is…..she’s my light.”

Her heart swells, and she finds herself with unshed tears. There’s this invisible weight that’s suddenly lifted off her soul. A worry that’s been destroyed by one woman. One strong woman who’s managed to capture the heart of her sweet boy.

Even if he hasn’t realized it just yet.

“Well, she’s obviously a strong woman to survive all she has, and she must be to deal with you.” She flicks his hand, pulling back and asking, “let me see a picture of her.”

Roman grabs his phone, unlocking it and opening his photos album. Hitting the favorites folder, he selects one of the photos taken of Solana the night she went out with Bayley and Naomi for Cinco de Mayo.

Reaching the phone to his aunt, he watches her slide her glasses over her eyes, mouth ajar just a bit. “Oh my goodness, she’s beautiful! Too pretty for you.” Roman smiles. “You know if my tits still sat nice like that, I’d wear stuff like that too.”

And just like that, a scowl is on Roman’s face. That was the last visual he needed. Ever. 

Taking his phone, Fetu implores, “I want to meet her, Roman.” He stills, hitting the lock button after checking for any texts from Solana. “It’s bad enough I can’t have gentleman callers or anyone else come see me. The least I can do is meet your wife.” It’s a fair request, though something he’s unsure about. “I’m tired of seeing your big ears and Ava’s massive forehead all the time. Bring Solana here.”

This request, however, is not the easiest thing. He doesn’t have an answer for her right now. “I’ll think about it.”

“Well, don’t take too long,” she warns. “I’m not getting any younger.”

Roman tenses at that. He hates when she jokes like that. 

He stands up, walking over and kneeling in front of her. “Thank you.”

Fetu smiles warmly, reaching over to kiss his forehead. “Ou te alofa ia te oe”.

He doesn’t hesitate to reciprocate. “Oute alofa fo'i ia oe” 

-------

Translations: 

"atalii o le uso" = nephew

"uso o le tinā" = aunt

“Ou te alofa ia te oe”. = I love you.

“Oute alofa fo'i ia oe” = I love you too.

[juanarc-thethird]

If interested please DM him

Nora: How was your Valentine's Day?

Jaune: Um... Normal.

Nora: You didn't ask a girl out?

Jaune: No...

Nora: Why not?

Jaune: Because no one is interested in me?

Nora: What?! How is that possible?!

Jaune: Trust me, it is possible.

Nora: Not on my watch! *Leaves*

Jaune: Hey! Where are you going?! *Sighs* Whatever, it's not my problem.

The next day....

Jaune: *Reading a book*

*Ting!*

Jaune: Huh? *Checks his phone* An unknown message?

*Ting!* *Ting!* *Ting!*

Jaune: More?

*Ting!Ting!Ting!Ting!Ting!Ting!*

Jaune: What the?

*TING!TING!TING!TING!TING!TING!TING!TING!TING!TING!TING!TING!*

Jaune: WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?!!

Momentas later

JNPR's Room

Nora: *Playing games on her phone while lying in bed*

Jaune: *Shows up* *Angry* What did you do?!

Nora: Do what?

Jaune: You know very well what I mean. What did you do?!

Nora: I seriously don't know what you're talking about.

Jaune: I'm talking about this!

Jaune shows his phone, still being bombarded by messages from unknown numbers.

Jaune: Why do I have a bunch of strangers asking me on a date?!

Nora: *Excited* Really?! That means that my post worked!

Jaune: *Confuse* What post?

Nora: This one!

She selects something on her phone and shows it to Jaune.

"Do you want a Man that has abs? Do you want a man that can cook? Do you want a man that is literally the dream house husband?! Well look no further.

Jaune Arc, the only son of the Arc Family.

Let's talk about features: - Power: No - Money: No - A car: No - Great confidence: Nope... but he has a humongous dick that makes up for everything else.

Let me tell you a story. One day I entered the bathroom without checking to see if anyone was there using it. And when I did it, he poked my eye. "With what?" you might ask. I think we both already know answer to that.

You can present him to your parents, to your sibling who never stops bothering you that you are single and alone, to your weird creepy uncles, to your gossiping fat aunts, to your racist grandmother who no one dares to tell her to stop saying rude things, because for some reason everyone is afraid of her. And I can assure you that all of them will change their ways when they see what a good boy this man is. God damn it! Everyone will want to protect this golden retriever of a person!

Good boy Approved!!

Things this man is old enough to do: - Vote: Yes - Consent to Sex: Yes - Becoming Huntsmen: HE IS ALREADY A HUNTSMEN!

This man has history. He's seen some shit. He has done "things" for his friends. He has killed for his friends. He will not judge you like other people.

Interesting facts: - He is a good boy on the outside, but he is a beast on the inside~ *Wink* *Wink* - He is an Arc, so he is designed for breeding. - He holds the record for most boxes of cereal consumed in one day!

What more can you ask for?!

Look...

Let's face the facts. He may not be the most beautiful person in the world, but you aren't either (I mean that's why you're still single). So stop lying to yourself and stop lying to your mom about that "guy" you met at the supermarket. (We both know that's a lie). He may be too good for you, but he's really desperate. So send him a message and try your luck.

Jaune Arc 206-XXX-XXXX"

Nora: What do you think? Very cool, right?

Jaune:...

Jaune: Am I a joke to you?

[justwinginglife]

This Time, It's Different

Dedicated to the only person who will read this, my bestie @minasfwoopyponytail, yall I know I be doin Soshiro all the time, but I got on the Ranpo track cuz we were talking about Ranpo being in our top favs for BSD so I gotta show him some love today (I am so sorry that I bought Chuuya, Dazai, and Akutugawa merch and forgot about you Ranpo my love, this is my apology fic for you).

You were never good at lying. 

It was inconvenient in almost all aspects of your life, but you never thought your ineptitude would be the reason someone finally fell in love with you.

After many failed attempts at bending the truth, after attempting to tell your aunt you liked the socks she got for your birthday and instead unknowingly wrinkling your nose at them and breaking her heart, after attempting to tell your boss that you were busy and couldn’t come to work on a Saturday and when she asked follow up questions about your supposed plans you found yourself flushed and floundering, after attempting to tell your ex that you enjoyed meeting his family but then immediately declining any further interaction with them, after multiple awkward interactions and even more disastrous encounters, you decided to give up on lying. It wasn’t for you.

So you resigned yourself to the fact that you would have to tell nothing but the whole, honest truth for the rest of your life. Your lackluster lies may cause catastrophe otherwise. 

So when you joined up with the Armed Detective Agency, when you rejected Dazai’s advances by saying, “No offense Dazai, but I’m sure you say that to all the ladies, and while I’m flattered, I’m not into womanizers,” when you offered methods of stress relief to Kunikida because he “always looked like the world was ending,” when you asked when Furukawa would be retiring because you were concerned about him “overworking himself in his old age,” when half the detective agency was against you from your first day, Ranpo Edogawa found himself half in love with you already. 

He’d never met a person who didn’t -or just couldn’t- lie, even among his fellow coworkers, and he was at least intrigued by you if nothing else. He found himself eager to see just how far you were willing to go to continue telling the truth. 

Going forward, you often found him tagging along on missions with you, peeking over your shoulder while you worked, listening to everything intently, even despite your other coworkers telling you that Ranpo almost never went out of his way to be this personally invested in anything, just because he wanted to hear you talk, to see if you really told everyone everything you thought all the time. And to ask you questions. Lots of questions. 

Most of them were controversial because he wanted to see if you’d stick to your opinions even if you were in the minority, some of them were philosophical because he wanted to know the way your mind worked, and a few of them were just downright absurd because he was Ranpo. 

“Okay. So. You want to know if I would divert the trolley to save the lives of five by killing one?”

“Yes, and when you’re done with that, do you think that dress makes that girl’s butt look fat?”

“Mr. Edogawa, sir, I really don’t see how this is relevant to the case.”

“Oh it’s relevant, alright. Answer the question, I’m your superior and I wanna know.”

“Um. Alright. Well clearly it makes more logical sense to sacrifice the life of the one for the good of the many, just mathematically speaking, and yes, that dress is very unappealing on her, I don’t know why she went with white.” 

“Agreed, the white is hideous, you pass my tests. For now.”

And so this bizarre relationship of yours continued.

Ranpo would wait for you to finish up cases, would wait for you to finish in the bathroom, would wait for you to finish up dinner, just so he could pick your brain, just so he could amuse himself with your answers. But the more time he spent with you, the more his reason changed for spending the time. He was always attentive, had always had a keen eye, but when you were around, it seemed every last bit of his attention had devoted itself to you. He knew how long it took for you to finish going to the bathroom, so -much to your embarrassment- he always knew what you were doing in the bathroom depending on the length of time. He knew how long it took for you to eat and which foods took you longer amounts of time to eat them. He knew when it was your time of the month, he knew what you craved during said time, he knew the way you’d react when he brought you said craving. He knew almost everything about you and it still wasn’t enough. 

One day, he diverted from his usual barrage of insane questions and he started asking about you: what was your favorite food, where were you born, did you have any pets growing up, what did you like to do outside of work? By now, you had gathered from all his previous questions that he was just having fun interrogating you, but you enjoyed talking with him, so you answered all his questions regardless, personal or otherwise. You were unsure how telling him your favorite color was supposed to entertain him the way his usual ridiculous questions did, but you told him it was green anyway. He brought you a bundle of kiwis the next day because he couldn’t figure out what else was green to give you. You were unaware of the fruit’s connection to his question about your favorite color but to him, he’d pretty much just asked you out. 

When you didn’t reciprocate his feelings, because you were unaware he had feelings for you, and unaware he had just presented them to you through said kiwis, he pouted for the remainder of the day.

You couldn’t figure out why the man who had spent every waking second of your career with the ADA by your side had suddenly started avoiding you. You couldn’t figure it out, and it was killing you. Little did he know, you had also started memorizing details about him, and the way his laugh sounded, the way his lips curved into a smile, the way his fingers pushed up his glasses, the way he did anything and everything, the way he said anything and everything had you craving your next interaction before the previous one had even ended. And you couldn’t take the silence he had now forced you into. So you went on a hunt for him.

You found him sulking on the rooftop. 

You plopped down beside him without saying a word and when you could tell he might be preparing to run again, preparing to plunge your relationship into further silence, you handed him a Ramune. He froze. And then he snatched the drink out of your hand like it was just another Tuesday for the two of you.

“You remembered my favorite flavor, huh? Not too shabby for a second rate detective.” He chugged down the drink.

You laughed and nudged his shoulder with yours. “If I’m such a second rate detective, how did I know you’d be on the roof?”

He shrugged. “Got lucky, I guess.”

You bit your lip and for the first time in years, considered lying. But you couldn’t do it. “Actually, I didn’t just ‘get lucky.’ I knew you’d be on the roof. You always come to the roof when you’re upset. I notice more than you think. So tell me- why are you upset?”

He sighed. “You’re not into me. No one’s ever into me.”

You blinked. “I’m sorry, what?”

He sighed again, this time more exasperated. “I gave you a gift, but you didn’t accept my feelings.”

You blinked again. “The… kiwis?? Ranpo. You always give me gifts. You gave me strawberries during my last period even though Yosano told you to get me chocolate because you know I like fruits better than chocolate. You gave me limited edition tickets to a play that was already sold out because you’d preordered it when you heard me vaguely mention that I liked it. You are always giving me things, and they’re perfect, and I love it, and I appreciate it, but how was I supposed to know this time was something different?”

He tapped a finger on his chin. “Yeah okay fine. I see that now.”

You inched up closer to him. “So… this time is different though?”

He suddenly blushed. “Yeah… this time it’s different. This time I wanted… well I wanted…”

“Me?”

He’s suddenly quiet and it’s the first time you’ve ever seen him like this. You’ve rendered him speechless and it’s impossible not to find it adorable.

You kiss him.

If he was speechless before, now he’s speechless and breathless.

“I just… you just…so we’re?”

You nod, smiling at him. “Yeah. We are.”

“We’re… together?” He squeaks out.

“I’d like us to be.”

He nods vigorously. “I-I’d like us to be too!” He blurts out.

You kiss him again and this time he savors the feeling of your lips melding with his. This time he kisses you back with fervor, with passion he never knew he could feel. This time, he’s all yours.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Author's Note: I am too lazy to write a longer fic that delves into their relationship after this, but I did want to write a lil drabble about it, so I will be posting it here.

[raina-at]

Pride

Omg, you guys, it's the last one! Where did the month go!

A huge, huge thank you to @calaisreno for keeping is going the entire month, and a huge thank you to all of you for reading and writing and gushing and commenting and crying and making this more fun than it had any right to be. I'll miss this!

I did a Pride ficlet last year as a bonus ficlet because I missed two days. I had a lot of ideas for this year's, and maybe I'll post some of them as bonus ficlets through June, but for now, I say goodbye to May with John and Rosie.

--------

"Dad."

"Hmm?"

"Dad!"

John puts down the newspaper. Apparently this is a serious discussion. "Yes, love?"

Rosie throws herself into Sherlock's chair and contorts herself into a pretzel-like shape that can't be comfortable. "I'm...um..." It's apparent she doesn't quite know how to phrase her issue, because she's unnaturally hesitant. Sherlock's influence has made her shockingly blunt, while John's influence has made her shockingly foul-mouthed. Arguing with her is a joy. But now, very untypically, she looks confused and a bit lost.

"Ro, whatever it is, you can tell me," John says, leaning forward, a bit worried now.

"It's..." She sighs, looks down at her hands. "It's a bit personal?"

"Oh my god you're pregnant!" John blurts out, his momentary fear overriding his usually good brain-mouth-filter.

"Dad, what the actual fuck! I'm not fucking pregnant!" Rosie rolls her eyes so hard John wonders if she sprained something. "You know I'm on birth control. You went with me to get my first prescription, for fuck's sake."

"Accidents happen, my dear," John says, gesturing at his lovely daughter, who, light of his life, and joy of his world as she may be, was also very much an unplanned pregnancy.

"Fair enough," Rosie admits, deflating a bit. "Still."

"It wasn't a completely unreasonable assumption. You have a boyfriend, you're twenty, I'm assuming you're having sex."

"Please, dad!" Rosie exclaims, the tips of her ears turning red. "I really don't want to talk about my sex life."

"You think I do?"

Rosie makes a very Sherlock-like  'never mind all that nonsense now' gesture. "Anyway," she says, giving John a glare that tells him to shut up until she's finished. "It's actually kind of about Mark."

John nods, to let her know he's listening, but carefully and deliberately keeps his mouth shut, even as he's thinking, If he hurt you, I'll kill him so fucking dead so quickly he'll never know what hit him.

"It's... you know... he's... well, he's a boy," Rosie finally gets out.

John blinks a few times. Waits a bit. When it's clear Rosie won't be any more forthcoming about the issue, he dares to ask, "And?"

She looks down at her hands, studying them with unwarranted fascination. "I'm..." She sighs. "When did you know you were bisexual?"

John exhales audibly. Now he knows what this is about. In a family of mostly queer people, Rosie seems to have assumed she'd be some kind of queer as well. And if anyone knows how complicated identity can be, especially if it's weighed down by expectation, it's John. "Um. Quite honestly, I'm not sure I am."

Rosie looks up, surprised. "I mean. Mum. And Paps. Um. You know..." she makes a 'please fill in the gaps yourself' gesture.

"Look," John says, leaning forward and taking his daughter's hands. "I personally think labels are vastly overrated. If a word, or a label, or a phrase, helps you to better understand yourself, that's great. Use that label as long as it serves you, and if it doesn't anymore, use another one. As for me, I was raised in an environment where being different was bad. What kind of different you were exactly was completely beside the point. And I saw first-hand how the world treated your aunt, so I thought, best not think about it. I wasn't that attracted to men, it wasn't difficult to ignore. Until I met Paps, and you know how difficult he is to ignore."

Rosie grins. "Oh, yeah. So Paps made you bi?"

"No, you know it doesn't work like that. He made me... " John answers, smiling fondly at the memory. "Well, quite simply, he made me fall in love. He was—still is, of course—the most intriguing, gorgeous, infuriating, exasperating, fascinating person I've ever met, and I fell in love with him so hard, and so fast. But I wasn't ready, and he wasn't ready, and it took us years to get our acts together. And part of that was that we both couldn't accept a fundamental truth: The heart wants what the heart wants. Fighting against it only brings misery and destruction." He squeezes Rosie's hands. "So. Do you love Mark?"

She nods, her eyes shining with the truth of it.

"Is he good to you? Good for you?"

She nods again.

"Then who the fuck cares about anything else?"

Rosie's silent for a bit, apparently mulling over his words, still holding on to his hands. "So," she finally says, looking up from her joint hands with a smile. "You'll love me even if I'm straight?"

"Well, love, I suppose I can overlook this glaring character flaw. Also, you might meet a stunning lesbian when you're forty and she'll rock your entire world and turn everything you thought you knew about yourself upside down. And I want you to remember," he says, leaning in a bit more, looking deeply into her eyes, "I'm fine with everything, as long as you give me some grandkids first."

Rosie laughs and pushes him away. "Fuck off."

John gets up and makes his way to the kitchen. "So, sexual identity crisis over? You want to have some tea now?"

"Of course I want tea. But what you're saying, if I understand you correctly, is not to assume I'm straight just because I fell in love with a man?"

"I'm saying," John says, flicking the kettle on, "is that it doesn't matter, love. Gay, straight, pan, bi, ace, all these labels are useful if they help you understand yourself. But if you feel boxed in by a label, don't use it. Use another one. Use none at all. Let nothing ever keep you from knowing and understanding your own heart. That's the only thing that matters. I might be bi, who knows. The important thing is that I love Sherlock with all my heart, and that I made a commitment to him. Everything else is just noise."

Rosie is quiet for a bit, looking thoughtfully at the fire crackling cherrily in the hearth of 221B. "You're getting soft in your old age, Dad," she finally says, with a grateful smile.

John hands her a mug, drops a kiss on her head. "Love you too, dear," he says, smiling into her hair.

----

Don't forget that I'm collecting these ficlets here on AO3, and don't forget to check out the wonderful collection of May prompt ficlets as well. I know I'm already looking forward to reading all of them again.

Tags under the cut as usual.

@calaisreno @totallysilvergirl @jrow @peanitbear @jolieblack @meetinginsamarra @helloliriels @keirgreeneyes @lisbeth-kk @friday411 @givemesherbet-blog-blog @weeesi @thalialunacy @thegildedbee @dapetty @salmonsown

[sanctum-of-ramshackle]

🕷️🕸️The Chaotic Adventures of Spider-Mage✨🌟

[TWST AU]: The MC/Yuu may not be only one who encountered an unexpected turn of events.

[Synopsis]: In this timeline, an unknown stranger gets bitten by a spider that actually gave them spider-based magic to become Twisted Wonderland’s Spider-Hero.

[Gender Neutral!Spider!Reader]

[(A/N)]: Happy New Year! I’m sorry I haven’t been posting much on my TWST blog. Been busy IRL and stuff like that. I hope this makes up for missing out and enjoy reading.

So…about the Arachnohumanoid Polymultiverse- This is a stupid name. I don’t know why O’Hara chose this over the Spiderverse. That name makes more sense and easier for people who can’t decipher scientific names right away…

Anyway…

There are many variants and other dimensions who have their own spider like protectors.

There’s one particular Spider who has an interesting upbringing with their situation.

Maybe it’s better to let them introduce themselves to the people reading this…

[Y/N]: “My name is [Y/N] [L/N]. I’m a Second Year of Night Raven College and part of the Ignihyde Dorm. One day during last year, I get bit by an experimental and magical arachnid which granted me spider-based magic. I became to the public as “Spider-Mage”.

“I climb up on flat surfaces, having a Spider sense to alarm me for potential danger, the usual things.”

“I created an algorithm to alert me for crimes occurring and use my newfound powers by casting web-like portals to reach to that specific location.”

“Following my backstory: I was raised by my aunt and uncle, Aunt Mei and Uncle Benji. However, Uncle Benji passed away due to saving someone from an Overblot attack. He asked me if I were to become somebody having great magic, listen to his advice. With great power, comes with great responsibility.”

♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️

[Chapter 1]

OB!Riddle: *On a rampage* YOU ALL WILL BE OFF WITH YOUR HEADS!!!! *Throws a rose bush towards MC/Yuu and Grim*

MC/Yuu & Grim: *Gasps and embrace for impact*

[Then a mysterious figure jumps into action. They cast a magical web barrier to protect MC/Yuu and Grim from the thrown plant.]

Spider-Mage: *Looks back at the two Ramshackle students* It’s okay. I got you two.

OB!Riddle: WHAT IN THE QUEEN’S NAME? WHO ARE YOU?!

Spider-Mage: Hi! I’m Spider-Mage. The friendly arachnid type magic user you hear people talk about. Y’know, you have some serious issues and hopefully seek anger management after this.

OB!Riddle: *Throws another bush at them*

Spider-Mage: *Shoots web at the bush and triggers a fire spell to burn the plant to ashes* Bad idea, buddy.

♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️

MC/Yuu & Grim: *Running late for class*

MC/Yuu: *Carrying Grim in their arms* You just have to try sleeping in.

Grim: It’s not my fault I was studying late!

MC/Yuu: You were cramming for an exam today!

Spider-Mage: *Just saved some people from a robbery* Huh? The Prefect and their familiar?

MC/Yuu: Spider-Mage? Hey! We’re late for our morning class and it’s at the other side of the building.

Spider-Mage: Need a lift?

MC/Yuu: Of course! Thank you.

[Cut to a scene where MC/Yuu and Grim were dropped off to their class and have messed up hairdos from all the swinging around.]

♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️

[Ignihyde Dormitory]

[Y/N]: *Crawling back into their dorm without disturbing anyone* *Lands on their feet from the ceiling and stalks over through the hallways*

Idia: Ortho, did you get my- *Stops mid-track and eyes widened at them* …

[Y/N]: …It’s not what it looks like. *Deactivates their suit*

[Y/N]: *Looks down at their body* Shit.

Idia: Y-Y-You’re Spider-Ma-

[Y/N]: *Shushing him* Don’t say another word. I’ll explain everything somewhere private.

[Back in Idia’s room]

Idia: You’re Spider-Mage.

[Y/N]: Yes, I am. I got these abilities last year and then bam! I’m a magic superhero.

Idia: You kept all of this from me?

[Y/N]: Well, I tried to explain everything to you since you’re my Dorm Leader but duty calls and assignments.

Idia: …I still can’t believe one of my dorm members is Spider-Mage.

[Y/N]: It’s alright. It’s a lot to take in.

♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️

[Rose Queendom]

Spider-Mage: *Shooting webs and swinging around the city* *Lands onto of an apartment complex’s rooftop*

Fan 1: Oh my Seven, It’s Spider-Mage! *Pulls out their phone* Hey Spider-Mage, can you do a flip?

Spider-Mage: *Does a flip*

Fan 1: *Recorded the whole* Thank you, Spider-Mage! I’m showing this to my friends.

Spider-Mage: No problem! Tell your friends I said hello!

♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️

[In the hallways]

Kalim: Hi [Y/N]!

[Y/N]: Oh, hey, Kalim! Uh…What’s up? How was your break?

Kalim: You wouldn’t believe who came by. Spider-Mage came to rescue Jamil and everyone. They were amazing! They shot their magical webs and swung around kicking off the ‘Blot!

[Y/N]: Really? That’s crazy. “Great Seven. I’m jealous of myself…(T . T) Fuck me…”

♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️

[Monstro Lounge]

[Y/N]: *Working there to fill in a deal*

Floyd: [Y/N]-chan/kun~ *About to squeeze them*

[Y/N]: *Spider sense triggered and kicks back at Floyd in the stomach*

Floyd: OOF- *Crashes into Jade*

[Y/N]: Crap! I’m sorry, you two. I’m just on edge today.

Azul: What is going on here? *Sees Floyd and Jade on the ground*

[Y/N]: I’m so sorry, Azul. I’m just super anxious today and Floyd was about to squeeze the shit out of me.

Azul: …Why don’t you take a half day off? You claimed you’re anxious enough to beat the two most valuable people in my dorm.

[Y/N]: Yes! That’s true and I’m going now. *Sprints out of the restaurant* “Fuck me and my Spider sense! I need to lie better.”

♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️

[Afterglow Savannah]

Spider-Mage: *Battling against a weird-looking guy with lightning bolt accessories*

The Shocker: Well well well, love the new look Spider-Man.

Spider-Mage: Uh…Who? I’m not Spider-Man.

The Shocker: Oh, I see. Playing dumb to distract me.

Spider-Mage: Great Seven. Dude, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Let’s just get this over with. I have clubs to attend.

[The Shocker charges at Spider-Mage throwing rays of electricity at the magic user.]

Spider-Mage: *Shoots their web casting a Water spell to absorb the attack* Think fast! *Shoots the water spell at The Shocker*

[The water spell webbing was effective to short circuit the electrified villain.]

Spider-Mage: Now I can leave.

[Then a portal opens in front of Spider-Mage.]

Spider-Mage: What the…

[Three people appear out of the portal and they’re picking the unconscious Shocker anomaly.]

Spider-Mage: Uh… *Spider sense triggered*

???: Wow. Another Spider variant in this dimension.

???: Yeah, and explain what we’re doing here.

???: While also grabbing the anomaly who’s waking up. *Knocks The Shocker out*

♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️

[After [Y/N] was taken to the Spider Society on Earth-928, everything was explained to them and how their Canon Events will happen.]

[Y/N]: Y-You can’t be serious. I couldn’t let it happen. There has to be another way.

Miguel O’Hara: There are no other ways-

[Y/N]: You’re wrong! The multiverse is wrong! I’m doing everything I can to prevent any more disasters back in my already chaotic world. I can’t lose him…

Peter B. Parker: Kid, everything’s gonna be alright.

[Y/N]: Tell that to “Leader of the Spider Society”. I’m going and won’t stop until everyone’s safe.

[[Y/N] casts a spell to disappear from everyone’s sight.]

♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️ ♢🕷️

Arachnis: No no no Miguel. *Blocks his path* Do not chase the teen like last time with Miles.

Miguel: They can’t interfere with the Canon Events. Their world would already start falling apart.

Arachnis: Miguel, you don’t know that. Remember when I saved you from your supposed event? My Canon Event overlapped with yours which should interfere but didn’t, preventing your untimely death. What if [Y/N] can save their friends and loved ones like us? We almost lost everyone when we were against The Spot.

Miguel: *Glare softens and sighs* I don’t want this kid to make the same mistakes.

Arachnis: I know. It’s tough to accept the possibility, but we been through this before. Doing everything we can to help others. Hey, look at me.

[As the Spider-Man of 2099 and Arachnis share an intimate moment, [Y/N] ran back because they dropped their Magic Pen.]

[Y/N]: Uhh…Is this a bad time?

Arachnis: Kid, I’m gonna shoot your ass if you don’t rush back to save your world.

[Y/N]: Right! Sorry! *Sprints out of their sight*

✨[Reblogs helps creators and creates for more content]💫

[Tagged]: @windblume-wishes @hhurric4ne @theladyheroine

[lixzey]

Letters

warnings: mentions of therapy, grief, child abuse, keeping a child in a basement, starvation and malnutrition of a child, mentions of bruises, mentions of child protective services, bullying, and hospitalization

a/n: PLEASE READ WITH CAUTION ‼️‼️‼️This has very detailed scenes which may not be suitable for everyone. The last five letters will be the same, so heads up!

The Thirteenth Letter

Timothée stared out into the window, taking a deep breath as the plane soared through the clouds. He knew he had to continue reading the rest of Y/N's letters, as painful as it might be. He was terrified; there was no denying that. The mere thought of a young Y/N going through more suffering made his stomach churn, but he needed to know more. He would find her, protect her, and be there for her in any way he could. He couldn't change the past, but he could certainly make a difference in her future. He had to be there for her, to listen to her, to support her, and to show her that she wasn't alone anymore. Timothée swore to himself that he would do everything in his power to make sure that she felt safe and loved. 

Timothée took another deep breath before opening the thirteenth letter, dated August 11, 2023.

Dear Timothée, 

Sorry, this letter took a long time to write. I got caught up in therapy. I have a new therapist; her name's Gina. 

She asked me about the letters since I had mentioned them to Julie before and they were written in my file. Gina asked me if the letters were helping me, and of course I said yes. She asked if I could show her one, and I did. She took it and ripped the letter into pieces, right in front of my eyes. I honestly didn’t know how to feel; I just stared at the pieces of paper on top of the table.

Gina said a lot of things about coming to terms with my past in a natural and slow process and that maybe these letters weren't helping as much as I thought they would. Writing to you was riling up those painful and bad memories, only making me feel worse. She also mentioned that false hope wasn’t good for me, which is bullshit because I don't really hope for anything anymore.

I know you won't reply. I know you won't even read any of my letters. Hell, I know you won’t ever receive any of the letters I wrote. I just like to pretend that you do, that's all. 

After the 'session', Gina gave me a pamphlet. It was 'How to Deal with Grief and Coming to Terms with Loss'. It was shit, really. Because one of the bullet points says to talk about your loss with another loved one. Funny, because all of my loved ones are dead. So here I am, talking to you, because you are the next best thing. 

So anyway, here's the continuation of the story of my fucking life. 

I still spent the rest of my days down in the basement—locked up alone, scared, and nearly dead. I was sickeningly thin from malnutrition and dehydration. Bruises littered my body in all shapes and sizes; I had scratches all over—out of frustration and skin irritation from allergies, since I didn't get the chance to fucking clean myself. Every day, I prayed for some kind of miracle to set me free from that living nightmare. I didn't know how much longer I could survive in that hellhole. I could hear my aunt's voice upstairs every night, laughing and carrying on as if I wasn’t three feet under her house. It made me sick to my stomach to think about how she could go about her life while I suffered down below.

It didn't get any better, until my eleventh birthday came around. Honestly, I didn't know how long I was down in the basement. I had lost track of time, but it felt like I had been down here for years. Then one day, my aunt just dragged me out of the basement and shoved me into a bedroom upstairs. It turns out a social worker was looking for me. I was eleven, and the school year had just begun, but I wasn't at the local school, so child protective services got worried. My aunt got to work fast; she made me look as if I wasn't abused—that I was a normal and happy kid living with her. She did a fucking great job, I'm not gonna lie—she covered each and every blemish on my body with foundation and concealer—fucking impressive. She bought clothes, toys, and everything a child would need just so she could avoid getting arrested for child neglect. 

When the child protective services came again, I was forced to act like everything was alright and that I was in a happy home. I desperately wanted to tell the social worker the truth. I wanted to scream so badly and just run into the social worker's arms and beg her to take me away, but I couldn't. 

My life got a little bit better after that day, though. My aunt was forced to let me stay in the room upstairs rather than the cold basement downstairs since child protective services visited me every week. It was easier for her to let me stay in the bedroom than to make me look decent every time. I was never to leave the room unless necessary, not that I wanted to leave the room with my aunt around the house. I still got the bare minimum from her—I still got her scraps of food, but it was better than nothing. 

Then middle school happened. 

At first, I was excited to make friends with kids my age; I never had any growing up since I usually stayed at home with my parents and there weren’t really any kids in the neighborhood I grew up in. So, naturally, I thought that making friends would be easy.

I was too fucking stupid to believe that it would be easy. I mean who was I kidding? Middle schoolers were fucking mean—well,  not high school mean, but you get the point. I was bullied relentlessly, and I always dreaded going to school; it was torture. The kids in my class always made fun of me, calling me names and treating me like shit. I was the freakishly thin girl who always wore baggy clothes that no one wanted to be friends with. There was this one time when this girl—her name was Claire—tripped me in the hallway, and I crashed into the janitor’s cart. Bleach and other cleaning chemicals spilled everywhere—on my skin, on my clothes, and in my hair. It burned my skin so badly that I had to be taken to the hospital to get treated properly. Until now, I still have burn scars on my arms and neck area. I had to wear long-sleeved shirts to cover up my arms, though in the long run, the burns weren’t the only reason why I covered my arms up.

I just wanted a normal fucking life, but life decided to push me into a living hell. Was that too much to fucking ask? I’m so damn tired, Tim. I don’t think I can live like this anymore. I’ve been through so much, and what’s written in this letter isn't even half of what I’ve gone through.

I think it’s about time to stop writing, don’t you think? As if you’d answer me, God, I never fucking learn.

Maybe Gina does have a point. Maybe these letters really are making everything worse.

All my love, 

Y/n.

Timothée sighed, folding the letter and tucking it back in its envelope. He wanted to let her know that he was—in fact, listening—granted that it was a year late, he was listening. The pain and suffering she went through were unimaginable, and the guilt he felt for not being there for her when she needed him most was killing him. If the letters had just arrived earlier, he would have done anything to make it all easier for her. 

“I hope you're still here, Y/n. I hope you didn't give up.”

@helens3amstuff @gatoenlaciudad @thebetawolfgirl @lovemelikecrazyiloveyoucrazy @tchalamss @ashlynnmalfoy @imnotoverlyobsessive @crazycat-ladys-blog @michakune @mxltifxnd0m @spencerr3idd @dangelnleif @sthkate @ferrjulie @mel-vaz @elsagreeer @lovely-maryj @meowmeowmau @bobthe-turmpetman29 @saintcosette @ashisabitgay @ladyladybuggg @nyrasunderwrld @lizzxoxo @remussbitch @jadahxx @starrystormwritings @ell0ra-br3kk3r @dreary-salem @drewsandsebastianswife @greenapplegrass @lilianelena39 @danni-phant0m @haybellewrites @cloudlst @si4a @ev3ningrain @ttulipwritezz @bambikitten @bullets-from-another-dimension @siriuslycaptainofthedawntreader @reg-arcturus-black @abruuinlove @marina468 @3stelar @timhalamet @st4rf00k3r @idli-dosa @jimins15thhair @blacksgarden

[achillean-knight]

Woe, doodles be upon ye

HC's below the cut if you're absolutely interested in my Spiderverse Noir HC's + his world 👉👈

First the ones I agree with that I've seen a shit ton of people mention >:33

- He is a fatherly figure to Peni. I can imagine when they see each other again, she'd run to him and give him the biggest fucking hug ever. She experienced her Canon Event between ITSV and ATSV too, right? So I can see her needing comfort so badly, and the only ones she ever truly grew close to were Noir and Ham.

- He'd 10000/10 get along so well with Hobie. Along with Hobie legit mentioning his hatred for the AM, PM and fuckin NAZIS IN THE COMIC ,

he'd be rambling so much with Noir about common interests and get along so well with him. Imagine he badazzles him in punk attire and based on this image:

(I'll link where I found the image tomorrow when I'm on my laptop lol if I remember) but based on this image, he teaches Noir how to play the guitar and shit and OUYGG I WANNA SEE THEM INTERACT (they're my fave Spiderverse characters so 👉👈)

- OHOHOHO He loves the colour purple. So much. He can't see it, ofc but he has such a love for the colour that he sees any beautiful colour- or well, of what he can see of colours, and thinks every pretty colour is Purple.

- MJ see's Noir/Peter as a brother and he see's MJ as a sister in turn. There is no romantic attraction at all. Yeah, this means MJ see's Aunt May as a nice Aunt Figure she can go to and talk to about things.

Now onto some of my own headcanons- or some that I don't see mentioned a ton. These have probably been said before but oh well, these are just what I like and my brain go BRRR

- Felicia is taller then Noir. (For those unfamiliar, Felicia is a character from the comic.) Yes that'd probably make her freakishly tall based on how tall Noir is in the movie, but that comic panel of when he first meets her rots in my brain.

- Felicia still has her mask from her ordeals. However, unlike how she pushes away Peter, they actually become friends again. Comfort each other. They swore they'd never be in a relationship again.

- Noir is a combo of both his OG comics personality and 2020's comics personality. I see movie noir as anywhere between 19 - 21. He's learning and developing as a human still. He's calmer and kinder and resembles how his personality is in the newer comics, however, based on this deleted scene LOL, makes me think he looses his shit easily and goes actually feral.

(here's the link to where I found the video BC I actually saved the link lol yeah it's reblogged by yours truly, but the full post is there.)

- Oh yeah, Noir most definitely adopted Ding Ding btw. He probably is nearly at the newer comics stage of his life, being a private eye and such, drinking his fucking egg creams like newer comics noir SBSBBS So he found and adopted Ding Ding.

- Despite being young (19 - 21) he has serious eyebags man, dudes sleep deprived 😔 I'm also heavy on the Spiderverse portrait of him unmasked that I don't really draw/see him with facial scars but he could totally have them after the shit he went through 💀

- Noir is a part-time singer. I will not elaborate.

There's so many other things I wrote down that I want to share, but they're on my computer 😭 so you get these for now hhhh

Sorry if they're half-assed, it's 10:30 pm, I am tired

[catofadifferentcolor]

Terrible Fic Idea #87: Percy Jackson, but make it MCU

Look, I didn't want to come up with yet another crazy PJO crossover, but here I am. Because instead of just coming up with the lightest, fluffiest, gayest PJO romance possible - which is what I wanted - I had to turn it into an MCU identity reveal fic too.

Or: What if post-ToA Percy Jackson was Peter Parker's caseworker following Aunt May's untimely death?

Just imagine it:

Tony Stark first meets Percy Jackson in the ICU of Metropolitan General the day after Peter and his aunt are caught in a terrible subway accident. May dies on scene. Even with his advanced healing, Peter is badly injured and taken to the nearest hospital - where it quickly becomes apparent he's Enhanced. It takes about 24 hours for the news to make its way to Tony, who immediately storms the hospital with the intention of taking Peter back to his Tower to heal-

-only to be told Peter's not going anywhere by the social worker assigned to the case.

This is remarkable for many reasons, not the least because the social worker is an unassuming, overworked 27-year-old wearing Finding Nemo socks and a faded Save the Oceans t-shirt. That the case worker - Percy Jackson - stands his ground in the face of Iron Man's wrath is even more remarkable, but Tony is forced to admit the kid has a point: he can't just let someone without any obvious connection to a minor walk off with said minor, particularly when that minor is Enhanced.

It takes Tony a couple days to get his ducks in a row, proving that he is not only able and willing to take in Peter, but is the one his aunt wanted to take care of him in the event something happened to her. During that time he has JARVIS research everything he can on Percy (lives in a Central Park penthouse owned by his long-time boyfriend, a successful music producer; volunteers for a NPO started by his best friend dedicated to restoring the wild; brief stint as the youngest ever on the FBI's most wanted, etc), but finds nothing to suggest he's anything other than a social worker trying to do what's best for his charges.

Percy becomes a semi-regular fixture at the Tower. At first it's just business, checking in on how Peter is doing and facilitating the foster care/adoption paperwork. Later it becomes something akin to friendship, with Percy being utterly unimpressed by Tony's fame but remarkably charmed by his inventions and philanthropic efforts. (He also comes to have strong feelings about the Rogues and their actions during the Civil War once he learns of them, helping Tony to see their betrayal for what it is. This alone makes him one of Rhodey and Pepper's favorite people.)

This goes on for quite some time - though I see this as happening post-CACW, we don't jump straight into the Infinity War, with there being several years wherein the Accords are ratified, the Rogues found and tried for their actions in the Civil War, and for the most part allowed to return to the Avengers on a probationary basis - until Thor finally arrives with news of Thanos' impending arrival.

Only Percy happens to be visiting when Thor arrives and the Avengers naturally have questions after Thor addresses him as Prince Perseus.

The truth of Percy's identity comes out in fits and starts (demigod son of Poseidon, saved the world a couple times, ascended to become God of Heroes, Natural Disasters, and Poison as well as Patron God of New York City; has been dating Apollo since he was fourteen; yes, is actually a social worker, albeit one who takes cases across the country to protect demigods and Enhanced), which is not helped by Thor (who can't help but comment on what he knows of Percy's heroics) or Apollo (who shows up after Percy texts an SOS but can't help but talk up his boyfriend either.)

The Infinity War still happens, albeit rather differently than in canon - perhaps Thanos turns out to be a disgruntled child or sibling of Gaia out for revenge, justifying Greek/Roman interference? But the details don't really matter as much as the identity reveal.

And... that's really all I have with regards to plot. But there should be a lot of character moments leading up to the reveal that hint at who Percy really is but which don't form a coherent narrative until the truth is revealed.

Bonuses include:

The softest, fluffiest romance possible for Apollo and Percy, with the pair more or less falling head over heels at first sight at the start of TTC, having their first kiss at the party at the end of the book, and dating throughout the rest of the Titan War. Apollo goes absolutely batshit insane when Percy goes missing at the start of HOO and breaks out of Olympus to crash the Senate meeting at the end of SoN and check on his boyfriend, and eventually gets made mortal for helping too much during the Giant War. The broad strokes of ToA occur with Percy fighting at his now-mortal boyfriend's side, and Percy ascends to godhood when Apollo regains his. There's some tension (Zeus is not happy about his firstborn son's choice of lover, fearing overthrow; Poseidon fears Apollo will end up breaking Percy's heart, but softens after Percy ascends and his chance of becoming a flower diminishes; many CHB campers think Percy's mad for dating a god, etc) but for the most part it should be as fluffy as circumstances allow.

Percy having been really obvious about his background, but in ways that seem reasonable ("How did you meet your boyfriend?" "I was at a really bad party when a friend ended up calling her brother to pick us up early. I fell in love with his car and then with him.") or like jokes ("Those sea turtles really seem to like you." "I like them too." "I guess they're kind of cute." "Excellent conversationalists too.") until the full truth comes out; and

Thor attempting to make up for blowing Percy's cover in dramatic (and hilarious) ways. This should include the gift of at least one native Asgardian water plant ("Dude, have you never heard of invasive species?") and end in a bakery's worth of Asgardian baked goods.

And that's all I have, though given the way this has been living rent-free in my head all week there may be more. As always feel free to adopt this bun, just link back if you do anything with it.

More PJO Ideas | More Terrible Fic Ideas

[tempo-tales]

"Tell me it's you, young lady."

"Yes, it's me, Ali...no, the possible Alicia in your timeline.

Dominic, despite Alicia's new look, could recognize her perfectly, specifically, Alicia's sweet, soft gaze, being now, Tempo.

"Tell me it's you, young lady."

"Yes, it's me, Ali...no, the possible Alicia in your timeline.

"So... I traveled to the future?"

"No dear. This place exists neither past, present nor future of anyone. But it's also not impossible for you to compare it as something like that."

Yejun, who was so confused, that the rabbit-faced woman was so attractive and moreover, she would be the sensitive young girl he met a while ago.

"I don't understand. Is she Alicia? I don't think so, that irritating personality of that big woman? Is this a joke?"

"Refrain from your words, young man. The theft you performed much trouble you have caused."

As the two watchmakers argued with Tempo, Lance just stared, wistfully, especially at Tempo and Dominic.

"You know them, Lance?" asks Balan as he sees Lance's face.

"Back in my day when Balan(ce) was, Mr. Clockmaker was in my charge. He was the closest person Alicia ever had in WonderWorld. That watch that Tempo has, that was the gift the mister gave her."

"Wow, you know a lot."

"Just Alicia told me about it. And I won't forget that smile she had...and I could never give."

King Negati ducks his head, not taking his mind off his failure to sway Alicia's heart.

As the two humans argue with the lady, Dominic notices two tall, thin men.

"And you are maestros too?"-Dominic asks, stepping closer as he sees the two.

"I see you don't recognize me, my estimable Mr. Dominic Leggero."

Balan, Tempo and Yejun are impressed by the surname of the man already revealed.

Yejun approaches the watchmaker with astonishment. His admiration grew even more.

"It's you! You really are the genius of mechanics! Your contribution has served a lot to....mrfh!

"You talk a lot" Lance covers Yejun's mouth, he wants to avoid revealing more than unnecessary to the watchmaker, coming from a more delayed era.

"Lance...I guess Mr. Dominic... "Balan mutters in surprise.

Lance nods his head as he directs his gaze to the rabbit lady.

"Yes, he is the direct ancestor of Christopher Leggero, your best friend."

"Chris..." Upon hearing the name of her best friend and beloved man, a small smile tugs at the lady's lips.

"If he's my descendant, then he must have this funny index finger inward, or not?"

Tempo looks at Dominic's right hand, and remembers that both Chris and Guido, have that disfigured shape on the finger indicated by the watchmaker.

"Wow, they're definitely related."-Tempo smiles slyly.

"And he's not missing Yejun."

"ª?"

The watchmaker stares at the man.

"This boy also has that malformation. I suspected it when I first met him."

"Sir, but how are you so sure of that?"-Yenjun asks with a distrustful expression, as he felt that because of his origin, he finds it impossible his connection.

"Young man, I am sure, my intuition has never failed me." Dominic expresses very proudly.

"Emmm..." Tempo, upon hearing that word, approaches Dominic with doubts she wishes to clarify. And a slight smile leaves her lips.

"And... your intuition is also... inheritable?"

Dominic is surprised and thinks for a few seconds.

"Ummm, if my great-grandfather and aunt have it...it may be so. But she tells me that relatives who don't inherit that gift can pass it on to their descendants."

"Hehe, I understand."

"?"

"Chris has that gift too. If it wasn't for his intuition, I would have been in trouble when I was a child" A small smile appears as she remembers those moments she spent with her beloved. Her expression changes to one of sorrow and melancholy.

"Do you miss your friend, young lady?"

"Very much."

"I would love to do something for you, tell me what you need."

The maestro didn't hesitate to use that favor, so she looks at the two maestros with a determined expression.

"Balan, Lance, I ask you to please leave this place."

[itskindofidontknow]

What dreams know about love?

Chapter 12

Dream of The Endless/Morpheus x Love!OFC

Summary: The Queen of Love has grown used to the absence of her husband, the Dream King. After banning her from the Dreaming, they only saw each other when Morpheus summoned her for social or marital duties. He would go decades without calling for her, enamorated by a variety of mistresses. It broke Love's heart. Not that her husband cared. However, after being imprisioned for a century, The Dream King wants to regain his Queen's love. She doesn't believe him, not after centuries of neglect. The question is: Can dreams repair a broken heart?

Tag: Established relationship, arranged marriage, regency romance, eventual happy ending, angst, morpheus is a dick prepare to hate, love is eoster from west germanic mythology, typos are to be expected

TW: Sexual content (+18)

“Tell me he at least gave you a good fuck” Love almost chokes on her tea when Lady Honesty spoke. “Honesty!” They barely sat with afternoon delights and tea, at the table under the white marbled gazebo covered in lilac wisterias just outside the palace, a sceneary worthy of protraits. Love hadn’t seen her sister in a while and forgot that Honesty was never kin on pleasantries, she preferred going straight to the subject. Some, like their Aunt Prim, did not approve this kind of behavior, saying that Honesty may have the look of an ethereal nymph with her long black as night locks gently curled and an intense purple stare with full lashes, but she had the tongue of a demon.

Love always thought that it matched perfectly with her sister, she didn’t shy away from controversy, often getting the truth behind any second intention or misleading speech. Honesty constantly repeated that if someone wasn't going to say what they really meant, then there was no point in having a conversation.

Eoster found it truly entertaining to see her in action. It was never boring to have her sister at the table. And she truly needs some of her high spirits to distract her from Morpheus, the Dreaming and all that mess.

Love just didn’t expect that Honesty would want to talk about exactly what Love wanted to avoid.

“What? I am only asking what everyone has been wondering”. The sister shrugged it off, while taking a sip of the lover's tea. And Love raised her eyebrow “And who, might I ask, are those ‘everyone’?” She perfectly knew who, but wanted to see if Honesty was going to out them. “Your dear sisters who have been crazy worried for you.” Love bited her lip at the judgmental look her sister was giving her. It was a bit of her fault.

She did not answer their letters, nor went to the gathering they often held, or went to visit their offspring when they recently were born. All her sisters have children by now. She knew she should’ve gone, after all she was named godmother of most of the newborn children. And of course she was beyond happy for them. But, at the same time, however, she didn’t have the strength to see them. None of her sister's marriages were perfect.

Well not perfect as Love defines a ‘perfect marriage’ but perfect in a deviant way.

Their husbands were avid cheaters, but so were her sisters. Although they would constantly complain about their husbands being stupid mules with barely a sense of direction, and their kids being clingy brats, anytime Eoster saw her sisters with their spouses and offspring, she could feel a genuine love. They were not unhappy. Messy, yes, but not unhappy.

And she knew it was selfish, but Love couldn’t stand being with them. Her sisters were blessed with love and she, the Queen of Four Loves, stuck in a loveless union. What did she ever do to deserve such cruel fate?

“I don’t think my intimate life has anything to-“ Honesty didn’t let her finish slapping the hand on the table, almost spilling the tea “ He didn’t! Fuck, I just lost fifty years in servitude to Pride. I hope you are happy, Love Dove” How could she be angry with Love when Love herself had nothing to do with it?! Besides the fact that her sisters were betting about her intimate life made her furiously blush and brutally exposed. How was she, the most discreet of her sisters, with the most antisocial of husbands, the one with a marriage that was a hot topic among everyone she knows?

Of course none of them had an Endless husband.

And of course, if they were betting on it, they were discussing it, and Love remembers quite well when they were all maidens how graphic and detailed they would talk about the tender intimacies of other entities. Just thinking that they might be discussing her like they did with those poor entities made her want to hide her in the most isolated room in all the Garden and never come back.

“I didn’t tell you to do a foul bet with Pride. And you should know better not to bet with her.” Her older sister Pride was addicted to gambling and the only reason why it wasn’t a problem that required intervention, was because Pride would always win. That was how she got married. Winning her husband on a bet.

‘And they are still in a happier marriage than me’ Love often thought. Honesty pretended not to hear the scolding tone in the brunette’s voice, taking a bite of a delicious sugar coated cake while explaining her betting plans “The odds seemed in my favor. You, lonely, faithful, in a cold large bed on the Dreaming, wet dreaming about those long pale fingers sliding under your silk nightgown, caressing your tights, pushing your undergarments out of the way, that deep soft voice saying how he missed your cu-”

“ Honesty!” Love interrupted before she would describe the most coarse of actions. Looking to the nearest weapon of choice, a napkin, and angrily throwing at her sister. Eoster would never admit to her sister, but that description was vivid in Love’s imagination while alone, in baths, after Elijah finally left her to soak under the water. Very similar thoughts would creep in her mind. Morpheus surprising her at night with an intense drive of passion that he couldn’t contain and only Love could take care of, how desperately he needed her, how she was made for him.

She knew it was cliché, hell, she invented those clichés, but was it wrong to want to live them, to deeply desire them? They are not supposed to happen to mortals, but to inspire them to get a love as close as possible to those. But Love? She was supposed to have a cliché romance and the most passionate of all marriages. She was supposed to inspire mortals and entities with her marriage. That was the reason she waited to get married, to find that exact someone who would write new clichés with her or inspire her!

Love shook her head, trying to physically get away from those thoughts. Her sister was largely laughing, almost threatening to fall off the chair, even after a napkin attack “ I’m teasing, I am teasing! I guess we can’t ever count on our Lord of Dreams to do anything right. Not even his most sacred duty.” Marital Duty. Love smiled before taking a sip of her tea, not realizing her sister stopped laughing and was looking over her with a very analytical attitude “ Unless-“

Love tilted her head “Yes?”

Her sister snapped her fingers and slammed her hand against the table, making the entire tea set threatening to fall. Love would’ve killed her if any piece broke, since it was a gift from Lady Death. One of the few Endless siblings she actually liked. It was supposed to be at the Dreaming, but Dream never cared about those gifts, so Love kept them in the Garden, where she could actually use them. After all, why have a tea set in a place where there was no one to have tea with?

“Oh, Love, you cold heart bitch! You didn’t let him fuck you senseless back to happiness!” Love eyes widened at her sister, a thought went across her mind if it would be appropriate to stuff one of those sweet cakes into Honesty mouth until she choked with her words. Probably way more appropriate than continuing with this conversation.

“ My stars, you are spending too much time in Aesir!” The nordic pantheon was known to be nothing but an unmannerly pit. “As Lady of the Four Loves it’s my obligation to tell you that the Lord of Dreams could not do anything to bring me happiness.” Love stated but as the words left her mouth she was not sure that was entirely true.

She fixed her posture and put an annoying curl behind her ear, shifting in her seat. The Love Queen told herself the reason she was bothered was because this wasn’t an appropriate talk to tea time, and any of her cupids could hear and gossip around.

But the truth was more selfish than she wanted to admit. Desire always joked that she looked uptight, tense, frigid. Love never took the offense to heart, it was annoying but she always took that as a way the sibling had to embarrass Dream and his abilities as a husband, especially since Desire considered Love an easy little thing to please. And that wasn’t a guess from the Queen, Desire told her more than one time to her face.

Now she wondered if someone could actually tell just by looking at her that she was never fulfilled or satisfied with any of her private encounters with Dream. Like she had a tag in her forehead with a written trope of ‘unhappy stepford smiler’. Love carefully made herself to always look bright and full of energy and happiness in every single social she had to attend, so entities would not even think about her being miserable. Of course, they knew about the cheating, but not about the unhappiness. Or did they know? And pretend not to out of pity?

Honesty shrugged it off. “Of course he can’t. No husband can, really. Do you think Wodan makes me happy? No, but my stars, he makes me feel good while trying.” The brunette Queen furrowed her brows, her sister smirked knowingly. Eoster didn’t believe Wodan didn’t make Honesty happy. Between threats of death, poison and tries of sacrifice, what her older sister called ‘love games’, Love knew if her sister wasn’t happy she wouldn’t put up with Wodan.

Of course, what he does to keep her happy was not a mystery to anyone, their love making were famous and spoke to it in its frequency, volume and duration. There was a reason they were no longer invited by anyone in their right mind to spend the night in another’s realm for a longer festivity.

And Love could be Lady of Eros, supportive of passionate nights and devoted spouses, but thinking of her sister and spouse made her nauseous. She didn’t spare an unladylike groan throwing her back against her chair “Spare me the details of your marriage, I can feel the tea in the back of my throat.”

Eoster never liked Wodan from the first time they were introduced, she knew exactly what he was: a rake, a brute, a classic god of war, thirsty for bloodshed, unfaithful, who saw naive maids as conquests, luring them with false promises of love until he had them exactly where he needed them, and then, discarted them, and moved to another.

A terrible match to Honesty, who Love always saw as witty, independant, enlightened, smarter than her sisters. She always thought Honesty was too smart to fall for the cheap rough charm of Wodan and would prefer someone that was an intellectually worthy adversary.

Besides, Wodan previously tried to court Love. “Court” would not be the proper word, since in the first five sentences they exchange, the norse god began a very pleasant discord on how some other gods (and he highly suggested other Love’s suitors) considered a lady’s place to be at the childbed, but he truly believedthat a lady’s place was in a man’s face, and he continued his lovely discourse describing how mortals were calling the act of cunnilingus the ‘devil’s lunch’ and how it may be but ‘yet is a fabulous meal any time of the day’, giving Love, who was vigorously blushing and praying for a way out, very suggestive looks. He only gave up when Eoster threatened to destroy all the harvest from mortals who worshiped him, if he ever spoke to her again.

An uncouth rake that Lady Honesty happened to fall in love for.

Love constantly questioned her sister's good senses and sanity, and Honesty dismissed Love, using her older sister tone: ⅔ condescending ⅓ full of mockery by saying ‘You are the one that likes them all broody, intellectual and sensible’ or ‘ I didn’t marry to have deep philosophical discussions’.

Love would defend herself by saying it wasn’t a preference for 'broody, intellectual and sensible'. She only wished for someone she could have a conversation with beyond the bedroom. And Honesty argued that that is what sisters are for.

And when arguments got heated, Honesty would throw in Love’s face that her husband might be all what Love disaproves of, but at least he married her out of his own desire and heart, she was invited into his life and he treated her like his queen. Unlike Dream, that on paper seemed all that Eoster wanted it, but was forced to welcome an univinted wife into his life and treated her like an unpleasant clingy mistress he got tired of. ‘If you wanted an Endless so desperately, you should have invested in Desire or the Prodigal one. You could’ve convinced him not to leave’. Even that, Honesty made it seem like Love’s fault. When fights like this would occur, they would spent decades without talking to each other.

The dark haired lady shifted in her seat, acquiring an older sister posture ready to lecture her reluctant younger sister. “Well you should listen. As your older sister with a senior marriage, it is my duty to teach you the ways of husbands.” Love rolled her eyes at ‘the ways of husbands’ as they held mysteries beyond the surface to be analyzed and discussed. Love could feel the torture that was yet to come “Oh, please!”. They had very different marriages, with very different husbands, whatever advice Honesty had, it wouldn’t work on Morpheus.

Wodan was a god of war; he yearns for a conquest, for the thrill of it, Honesty only needed to play hard to get for a moment before he is challenged, moving worlds to have her back.

Morpheus was lord of dreams, nightmares and stories. He didn’t yearn for any conquest. If she played hard to get, he would just move to someone more interesting. That was why even in discomfort Love never denied him in the bedroom, because at least she would have him there, not with someone else. He could think about others while inside her, but, at least for a few moments, he was with her. He was hers.

At least, before. Now, she could not understand what her husband was planning, let alone, wanting.

Honesty pretended to not listen to her sister's complaint “A repentant husband like yours will try anything to make his wife happy.” Love stubbornly refused to give in to Honesty. Even if Morpheus did go the extra mile to try to have Love live in the Dreaming again. “And you, my darling, should take advantage of that.” Love was about to ask Honesty if these so-called “advantages” included losing two realms to Morningstar.

Her lecture was interrupted by Matthew, the raven, flying over, dropping a letter with Dream’s seal, landing on top of Love’s porcelain’s plate.

Excitement, happiness, eagerness, all those feelings that were conditioned by the arrival of a letter, rose in Love’s chest at the same speed they were crushed, leaving her speechless. Color dropped from her face, and she looked at the envelope as if it was a ghost from the past, making no mention of opening it.

She knew it was ridiculous, to want to escape a paper. But she couldn’t stop wanting to disappear, run as far away as she could from that single stupid piece of paper.

Love received thousands of these same letters but written by Desire. Maybe the raven cackled something about the letter being from the Dream King, since the queen was behaving strangely towards it. Matthew could swear she threatened to jump away from her seat, when she saw the letter, like he was dropping a literal bomb on her lap.

She couldn’t answer him. She couldn’t take her eyes off the letter. A single letter made her feel small, a young Queen again, pushing her lips in a smile every time a dove was seen in the horizon. Love remembered running desperately down the stairs, wanting to beat down every cupid that wanted to deliver her a letter that would made a marvelous day in the Garden thanks to the Queen’s humour. Sometimes running so carresslesly, that she would rip her flowy dresses on pointy corners. Love didn’t care. She wanted to be the first and only one to read his words.

Looking at the seal, she couldn’t believe how she was deceived. Of course her husband’s seal would be deep purple, almost black. It suited him. Very different of the scarlet one Desire used. She should have known. How didn’t she notice it before? Was she that naive? Did she close her eyes for the truth? The clues must be all obvious as this one. Did she suspect through all their court but wanted to go on with it anyway? Was it loneliness? Was it desperation of not finding someone like she dreamed of, so she clenched her fists into fantasy, hoping for it to become true?

Did she conspire with Desire and told herself she was an innocent maiden in all of this?

Love’s head hurt.

Honesty dismissed the bird. Since Love seemed to be too stunted to move, and her sister was not the most patient woman, she took matters into her own hands, hovering over the table and grabbing the letter trying to break the seal with a desert knife.

That was enough to make Love wake, and jump over the table, dropping a few cinnamon cakes on the floor, and sugar syrup on her dress, trying to get the letter off her sister's hands. Whatever was in the letter, if her sister read, all of her siblings and their spouses would know, and in a snap of fingers, the whole universe would soon know too.

“Give this back!” Love screamed while attempting to get the letter from Honesty hands, that jumped away from her sit, trying to push Love away with one hand and open the letter and read the cursive with another. “Your husband's cursive is awful, I can’t read this! Damn, Love! Stop! Stop smothering me! You’ve gone fat! Out! Out! Let me read it!” The dark headed woman struggled, was grabbed by the arm by her sister to keep Honesty unable to escape. Love was now with her knees smashing down a tower of strawberry cupcakes, throwing her left arm and torso over Honesty trying to reach the letter on the free hands of her sister.

And for goodness sake Love hated those long arms of Honesty!

“It is not yours! Give it back! It must be something serious”. Honesty in a poor attempt to get free from Love, use the letter as a weapon, hitting Love with it. Probably thinking that a paper cut would made her take a few steps back. She clearly did not saw the stupidity in doind this “Than. It. Is. Better. That. I. Read. It.” Honesty said every other punctuated with a paper hit “You are too sensib- Damn it!”

With a now-or-never decision love took an impulse and throw herself in her sister’s hand, successfully grabbing the letter, as her sister took a step back to get away from her, due tot the now free hand, Love had no one to hold her free fall, and she hugged the air, falling with her face to the grass. She quickly ignored the pain and scanned the letters.

His cursive was really terrible. Different from the rounded vows, heavy pressure that Desire used. His writing was fast, pointed consonants, narrow “L” loops, slanting to the left. Even the writing was obviously different.

It was a short letter, direct but she couldn’t make sense of what he wrote. Actually, she could. But those words in a sentence coming from an invitation from her husband made no sense.

Honesty thinking it was taking an eternity for her to read the message, couldn’t contain a needy and demanding “Well?”

She was almost asking again or going to her sister to a second round in trying to get the paper from her. Love was paralyzed, before dropping the paper on the floor, looking at her sister and saying “ He wants us to go for a parade. In the Dreaming.”

Honesty frowned. Love was delirious that was it. “Parade? For what? Does he think it is great doing escape from a mortal after a millennia in imprisonment?” It was a century. Love didn’t know why she felt the impulse to correct her. It didn’t make a difference. Well it did. A few thousand years of difference. But she shouldn’t care. She didn’t care.

“And I heard if it wasn’t from a small mistake, he would still be there. Great achievement.” Her sister was sarcastic but right. His return was not from great victory, it was an escape. It didn’t make sense celebrating. But Dream didn’t want to celebrate his return.

“No. He says that he wishes us to parade through Dreaming, since we didn’t have a parade for the marriage.” A parade meant Love would be shown off to the dreamfolk, an introduction to their queen, so the people would get to know who the Dream King was marrying. It would have made sense, a few centuries ago.

“But you are not newly wed.” Honesty pointed out the obvious. “ I know”. Love could only answer. What did he want? To make her feel guilty of not helping the dreamfolk through all the years of his imprisonment. Well if he did, she would make sure to tell them that he was the one who forbade her to come.

“And you know the Dreaming, obviously” Honesty said, trying to make sense of the letter. Maybe he created new territory and wanted to show Love. The Dreaming was always changing, didn’t someone tell her that? It wasn’t stable like some realms due to the nature of dreams and nightmares. “Of course.” Love hesitated answering a bit too long. Enough to make Honesty suspicious.

“You don’t, do you?” Honesty knew the expression of a liar when she saw one.

“ I know the palace.” Love annoyingly answered. It was a blessing and a curse having a sister that was honesty herself, able to tell a small, minuscule half-lie from the truth. And Love couldn’t understand why Honesty was pushing her lips in a smug victorious smile “ And he wants you two to go on a romantic parade through his realm. Sounds like-“

Love raised herself from the floor, feeling a sting on the left leg, the one that hited the ground first, she ignored the pain, not realizing she was raising her voice to convince her sister that this wasn’t a romantic tale of some sorts “I don’t want a parade!”

The queen’s eye widen with realization, the permission to Elijah leave earlier, hitting her strong like a quick in the stomach. Suddenly the meeting made sense. A piece of a puzzle finally found! “Do you think that is why he asked to see Elijah?”

Her sister frowned, unable to understand that connection. Was Dream conspiring with a cupid and for what? Take over the Garden? Isn’t it already his? By marriage? Did he went insane after imprisonment? ‘Does he know how natural gossipers Cupids are?” Honesty just hoped she eventually would hear what this audience was about “Did he have an audience with Elijah, your Cupid? Why? Were you unavailable?”

Love grabbed a napkin from the floor, walking back to the gazebo, whipping out the sugar syrup from her champagne dress “No, I was here.” She answered while passing by Honesty, “ Of course it’s the parade. Since when does Dream know how to plan anything?” Besides, of course, their doom. Love spoke to herself making sense on that meeting, and the invitation. She just didn’t know why Elijah didn’t tell her.

Honesty bited her tongue not to tell Love that he obviously wanted to surprise her, feeling that her sister might kill her if she speculated anything good of Dream’s intention. Love might be Love but she felt her dear younger sister could stab a man (preferably her husband) if anyone suggested that he could do anything slightly amorous. Better to stay in safe territory. “And when is it?”

Love sighed. “ Tomorrow”. Don’t they get better and more important things to do than parading? Besides that amount of time together, after everything. It would be a disaster for both of them.

“ My stars! And do you have a dress?” Honesty took her hand to her chest, as having a dress was the most urgent life-depending matter at the moment.

She also thought that her brother in law 's desperation for her sister's good favors was quite smothering. If Wodan prepared a parade in such a short notice he would be parading alone, a woman needs time to decide her wardrobe.

Love rolled her eyes, not knowing how a dress was more important than the fact the Dream wants to parade around the Dreaming! “Is that what you are worried about?” Since when her sister was this frivolous? Or since when is Love not that frivolous?

“Well, forgive me for wanting the dreamfolk to see you in your best.” Honesty looked down on her sister wearing a loose fit champagne dress in a thick fabric that looked more like cotton, pushing her lips down, in the opposite of a smile. Love looked like a maid from southern France, not a Queen “Not whatever peasant phase you are going through now. You need to look like a Queen. I never would thought thatit would come from me of all people to tell you that”

Love’s eyes sparkled with a glimpse that worried Honesty because it meant she had an idea. And by her state, that wasn’t a good one. “I do have a dress. I do” Love smiled childish before running through the lavender garden, straight to the palace. Her sister followed her trying to keep her pace, but her small heeled shoes did not allowed to go a lot faster. Both passed through some of the palace staff who wriggled out of the way to not be knocked out, or surprise to see the Queen running around like a child, something she didnt do for centuries.

As soon as Honesty got to the door at Love’s bedroom, she saw her sister taking the dust off one of the most atrocious crimes any seamstress has ever sew. “Oh no you don’t.” Honesty took large steps grabbing the outfit from Love, holding it in front of her sister, so she could proper see what she was choosing. “Have you gone mad? You are not going to wear this awful looking thing that Aunt Temperance gave you. No, I forbid you.” Eoster quickly took back the piece before her sister would throw it on the flames. Rationally speaking “It is very traditional and a wedding gift. It is more than appropriate. And I think it is rather… Happy. Isn’t that what he is planning on making me? Happy? According to your great knowledge of husbands?”

She look confident and pleased with her witty response. Love had one of the most extensive wardrobes. She was the one that always impressed with her choice of dresses. Always on theme, always dazzling. From all her sister's gowns that never saw the light, why use this one?

Honesty scoff trying to appeal to REAL reason “It is medieval and makes you look like a fairy godmother missing only the wand with a star on the point. And that hennin. Please don’t tell me you are wearing that hennin.” She shouldn’t have said it because Love threw the dress in her pink bed and disappeared into her hat closet, appearing back wearing the pointy silk garment with a long veil falling in her back. “A fairy. Good. Might remember him of Titania and bring back some memories.” .

Honesty eyes open wide to the mention of one of her husband's former mistresses. Honesty didn’t know she knew about others. Love always seemed to be most resentful of the muse. Honesty couldn’t blame her. Calliope was the one that bore her husband’s cub, and Love never got pregnant. It caused quite a talk at the time.

Whispers and jests began to rise questioning if Lady Love was as warm as lovely, or if she was as frigid as beautiful.

Honesty would not waste her time arguing with those who were making awful hypotheses about her sister, but she sure did put Wodan to shut them up. And the dark haired lady was pretty convinced that their Aunts helped in shutting the rumors down. All the help was needed since her husband either was completely oblivious to gossip or he did not care what it was being said about his Queen.

Dream could impregnate Love anything he wanted to, have a proper heir, something his wife could love and that would love her back. It would even make it easier for him, if the problem was her being too clingy and noisy (not that Honesty believed it was the case). Hell, husbands did that all the time to get rid of their wives without breaking the marriage. But he chose to impregnate the other woman.

A boy that would later die for love.

A cruel fate but a well-deserved punishment for Morpheus. Not only Love’s sisters would agree on this, but most of the lovefolk.

“Titania would not be caught dead in that pink mess' ' Honesty snapped out of her thoughts turning to her sister that ignored the comment and sat down at the bed stretching the fabric of the dress. “Well if he is so willing like you said, he won’t mind. He will appreciate my company.” Honesty rolled her eyes, sitting at the bed. “And will you be a company to be appreciated?” Honesty was too smart for Love’s tactic of vague words. She knew her sister would not make the slughtest effort to be a good company.

“I will abide to my duty.” She shrrugled her shoulders, looking down at the dress corset a mix of dusk colors, majority pink but tones lilac and blue sprinkled across it.

Honesty throw her back against the soft mattress giving up any tries to convince her of other clothes and other attitudes. Speaking freely, giving her opining even if it risk to be choked down with the atrocious dress petticoat “My stars, Love. He is trying. Don’t try to make your marriage more difficult than it is.”

Love dropped her childish face, looking her sister dead in the eye, she sounded hurt. She was feeling stab by her own sister. Honesty seemed to be taking Dream’s side on this. Like she forgot everything he did. “I tried, do you not remember? Years of trying. And now you expect me to drop at his feat because he suddenly remembered his wife is not part of decoration but actually his queen, and he might start treating her like one?”

It gutted Honesty to tell her that. It hate her to not be able to give her words of comfort, to take her away and find her another husband, since her sister avidly deny any lover. She wished Love didn’t fall into a trap setted by that awful Desire. Honesty wished a lot of things to her younger sister that she could not do it. Love was stuck in a True Marriage. The only way to be free from it was a walk in Lady Death’s realm, which Love had no interest in doing.

She knew Love was feeling corned into a place she did not like it. It was not about sides. It was about reality. Their roles, their duties, their differences. “Love, you know it is different for them. And you suffered so much through your marriage why tire yourself more? Could you not just enjoy his tries? You do not need to forgive him, just let him adore you.”

The brunette eyes were wet with tears she refused to let them drip through her cheeks, but she looked to Honesty with disbelief like she could not believe how her sister, her closest sister, did not understand her feelings, or the situation.

“He hurt me, Honesty.” She clearly said. “More than you would like to imagine.” Honesty might be older, but Love often thought that she was oblivious to miserable marriage real struggles since hers seemed like a game with no losers.

This time Honesty raised her upper body angrily answering her sister that patronized her. As she was a naive nymph oblivious to the problems of the universe. “What? Cheating? Dragging other goddesses, stars and nymphs to your bed? While you pretend not to hear their screams while taking polite tea with your ladies-in-waiting in the other room? Taking you when he couldn’t find anything better to warm his cock? Pain in your lower stomach that you get drunk to forget? Crying yourself quietly to sleep because he doesn't like the sound of your whimps and you know that he will leave your bed if he hears your cry and you prefer his cruel company than a cold bed, because at least you can pretend that if you shared a bed, you are happily married? Please sister, don’t patronize me.”

Love thought in reply that Dream never complained about her crying because they didn’t share a bed, as a statement that her situation was even worse, But was it any winners in this scenario? Was it really worse?

She didn’t reply, winking a few times, taken aback by what her sister was describing. “I didn’t know Woda-“ If he did do such things, Love was right in hating him from the start, which did not bring any rush of pride that she thought she would get from being right. After all it meant her sister was in pain, and not only that, she was a better stepford smiler than her.

Honesty dismissed this with a gesture “Wodan wouldn’t dare. He is a good husband.”

Love rolled her eyes when she saw Honesty smile. “He is an uncouth rake. Weren’t you trying to curse him last time we spoke?”

Honesty shrugged it off. Cursing husbands was a passtime to her sisters. “Probably. He is a good husband, not a perfect one. Besides the point is: You are not the only miserable wife in the cosmos, and I am very good listener.”

Love threw herself in the mattress along her sister “You are a very good gossiper”

“Potato, Potatoh” Both of them smiled at each other, and Honesty lied back turning to her sister, looking compassionately at her face, raising her hands to let her thumb caress her sister cheek. Love delve in her touch. Beautiful green eyes and thick lashes, a smile curved in full pink lips. Her sister was beautiful, she was the most beautiful of the siblings, although Honesty would never admit that to her.

It pinched Honesty’s heart that she could also see the eyebags underneath her eyes, the purple from terrible slept nights, and the lack of glow she had when they were maidens. She wished she could offer some way, some path of a crazy adventure to restore some secret gem or magic dust, a visit to a sea witch, an offering to the Fates, anything that a brave warrior or a pure heart heroine could pursue in order to gain her happiness or at least freedom.

But the truth was they weren’t any of these things, and these weren’t choices available to them. They had duties, obligations to realms, to subjects and mortals. They were bound to them. They could turn their unberable suffering into bearable, misery into contempt. Honesty couldn’t give her sister a magic sand to make her pain disappear, but she could advise her in not hurting herself more.

“ Dove, don’t go on a crusade to punish him and hurt even more of yourself. An Endless like your husband does not have a heart to be wounded.” If he did have a heart at all, which most of the times Honesty doubted. Love sighted sarcastically, rolling her eyes at her sister, repeating her words empathically “An Endless like my husband wasn’t supposed to be locked away for a century by a mortal who barely understood what he was doing.” Which wasn’t a lie, after all wasn’t he trying to trap Lady Death?

Honesty couldn’t help to laugh with her sister “Touché.” She took a minute, both starring at each other eyes in a silent understanding of caring. Love and Honesty could have entire conversations just by deeply looking at each other.

As a spell broke, Honesty took a deep breath before taking an impulse out of the bed, returning to her usual bored and sophisticated tone of voice “I must go now Love Dove, thanks to your hate for orgasmic bliss, Pride waits with who knows what plans for poor me.”

Love frowned confused, raising herself from bed “ I thought she invited you for cricket.”

Honesty fixed her hair with a dramatic wave.

“The torture already began. If I don’t make it, remember me, dear Love”

——————

The parade was everything Eoster loved. She did not expected so many dreams and nightmares that wanted to see her, and give her flowers. They knew that Eoster was goddess of spring, and flowers apparently were the only suitable gift they thought of. She was not expecting to be received with such a warm embrace from them. Even the most awful nightmares seemed to be in their best behavior just to have a chance to exchange a few polite words with Eoster. Morpheus was clearly tense when Love was exchanging pleasantries with the nightmares, after all he was their creator he knew what they were capable of. He had no idea if Love had any knowledge superficial or deep about what they would inflict in a mortal's head, how they would even turn anything they hold dear into an awful horror during their sleep. But she acted with such kindness and gentleness that Dream questioned if she knew, she wasn’t parading only for dreams.

“Those were nightmares.” He said in a matter-of-fact tone, while she was delivering her bouquets to Elijah. The cupid and Lucienne were a few steps behind them, giving them some privacy. She looked at him as if he was oblivious to reality “I know, husband. Even nightmares deserve kindness. “ She said between smiles and cheerful ‘thank yous’ “Do you have any objection to kindness to nightmares? Maybe I should send them straight to the darkness, like my lord husband. ” Love ironically spat with a smile plastered on her face before turning her back to him, the veil of the henning slapping his face, as she continued her walk.

The parade was not what the Dream King imagined. He did not count that so many of the dreamfolk would appear, and that they were eager to see Love up close and talk to her. She seemed in her most natural environment. He was dressed in his usual black attire, and Love was dressed as a fluffy sunrise. A gown with voluminous skirts mainly pink but the fabric reflected lilac and blue depending on the angle, puffy sleeves, a tight corset that made her breasts more apparent than she wished, and her high hennin with a long veil, that she was using as a weapon to slap Dream any opportunity she had.

She looked like a child’s idea of a tooth fairy.

Their day started with a light fight, of course, since Dream had planned to go in an open carriage through the Dreaming, but Love insisted on going by foot. It ended when he argued in favor of her feet and she replied that he was never concerned about her well-being and he did not need to start now. The carriage would give them more privacy, which was what the king intended, just like Elijah suggested. But the queen, suspecting of what her sister said, was avoiding any situation where they would have the slightest of privacy. She even avoided holding his arm while parading. Only doing it when it was extremely necessary or it would look like she was publicly avoiding him. She did not need the dreamfolk to start enquiring about her marriage.

A part of Love was constantly thinking of her own words. ‘He hurt me’ countless times of being cold, stoic, uncaring, making her feel guilty, undeserving of love, having his way with her because it was easy, not caring if it was unpleasant to his wife or not, and she drank to forget it and drank to let it happen. ‘He cheated on me’, dragging every lady that showed the slightest interest in him to their bed, to their realm. ‘He humiliated me’ Having a muse pregnant, never wanting to share a life together, making her cry in empty hallways wrapped in sheets, condemned to live in eternal misery.

Strong arguments and memories, undeniable truths that kept them separated and her heart close.

Another part of her, one that kept opening a small creek in her heart and was fed by the way he kept starring at her during the parade, anytime he thought she wasn’t looking, how his face brightened when he saw her in the ‘atrocious pink dress’, the warmth of his hands when he guide her down the stairs before the parade. She could have denied it and walked by herself, but being alone with him, no Elijah, no Lucienne, it clouded her mind, and before she knew it, she was thinking how soft and warm his hand felt against her and awakened recent memories of his hands holding her face. How she suddenly wished he would do it again, have him close, inches away, feeling the familiar warmth of his breath and his touch. How she hated to feel cold when dropping his hand, to walk in front of him, to give away fantasies. The sweet words of his promises. The yearning. A new beginning. A start over. Hope.

“We will see three more dreams.” Love winked, lost in her thoughts realizing that the dreams and nightmares were scarce now. And Elijah and Lucienne seemed to be discussing an important matter that had both of them checking their notes in their respective notebooks and pointing to the horizon. Dream offered his arm to her and Love crossed her fingers resting them against her corset “ I thought all dreams and nightmares were invited to our parade. I do not believe any of them would risk your wrath of not coming to it.” She might fantasize about a husband she could love but it would not mean she would would be easily swayed by her real one “ Besides I am exhausted”

“ I did offer you a carriage, might you remember” Morpheus didn’t see when the answer slipped from his lips. Arguing with her came so easily. Love was not drunk, she was difficult and stubborn when drunk but he could tell the difference even after centuries apart, this was his sober wife that although didn’t disobey or cause any scene during the parade had been exhaustively petty, offering disguised insults through passive aggressiveness comments.

Love widened her gaze to Morpheus, groaning loudly, reaching for her skirts, turning her back and walking away. She would depart to the Garden immediately. And when he opened his mouth to appeal to reason, Love turned back fluster in angry “ Might I remind you, lord husband, that you wanted a marriage parade that I immediately agree, doing once again your bidding, performing my decorative role as your wife, and now I wish to return to my Garden.”

“Love, please” Morpheus walked a few steps close to her, not enough that she would feel threatened but enough that she could hear him. Love didn’t know what shocked her more, the fact that her name was dropping from the lips of her husband for the first time, without any title before it, or the fact that he was pleading. And Morpheus remembers quite well the words of the Cupid ‘don’t summon, invite her’. He cleared his throat and assumed the posture of a gentleman, one hand in his back and the other extended to her “Will you be kind enough to accompany me? Those dreams aided during my return. Besides, I would be delighted with the pleasure of your company. “ She took a second looking from his eyes to his hands before accepting it. “Any subject that aided my lord husband in his return, deserves my deepest gratitude.” Love stoically replied, a hint of tiredness in her voice. Morpheus looked at her trying to read any emotion, but Love did not look back.

Lucienne and Elijah were nowhere to be seen. And Love tried not to think about them being alone, she specially tried to avoid the thoughts that kept creeping in her mind about their last encounter in her quarters. How close they were, she could have kissed him. Despite the hate and the hurt. She could blame them for fear of losing their realms. Take his coat and shirt off, feel his arms, slide the point of her fingers all along his defined marbled torso, hear he groan in pleasure, feel him under his pants, his desire for her, the warmth of his breath in her neck, his mouth against every inch of her body, his tongue across her painfully hard nipples, while his hand took the other giving both his indivisible attention. Love would loudly moan in pleasure, keeping her fingers in his hair and eyes locked with him putting her hand on top of his, showing how she liked to be touch, desperate to teach and feel him everywhere, but he would want to savor every piece of her body, trailing kisses from her chest to her belly, skipping where she most needed him only to open her tights wide, Dream would flustered, his eyes darkening in lust, contrasting the delicate moving of his fingers finally reaching where Love most ache for him. She would let him beg for forgiveness every night between her legs.

“Your nails.”

Dream made her mind snap away from her deviation. She was starting to feel warm for nothing. She immediately relaxed her nails, realizing she was digging into his arm. “Forgive me. My feet are starting to tire me.” She lied, Dream noticed the red in her cheeks, but couldn’t possibly think why pain in her feet were a reason to be embarrassed. Maybe because she didn’t want to give in that he was right in using a carriage.

The raven haired king kept quiet during their walk, mostly because it was a difficult walk. Love nails started to dig into his arm a long time ago, he didn’t think she was having any difficulties in walking, but they were digging deep. He promised to himself that the path to her heart if there was any was through courting her properly, the very traditional way of courting, being invited to picnics, dinners, tea, dances in ballrooms, letters, slowly trying to gain her favors. But he could not help to wonder those same nails digging into his back or in both of his arms, having Love under him, feeling a hot wave of white pleasure across her whole body, digging her nails to keep him unbelievably closed, like being inside her wasn’t enough. His pants were starting to feel tight, and he tried his best to focus on the way. Cain and Abel, and Goldie. It didn’t help that the side of her breasts kept constantly nudging against his arm and through the side of his eyes he had the perfect view of her low neckline, which was more evident thanks to the tight corset he wanted to free her from.

He knew he had long lost his right in imagining her like this, to crave her like air, but he did both.

The couple walked in complete silence, before reaching two decaying Victorian style houses. The ground was covered in dry leaves, and the air smelled like autumn, which for Love didn’t make sense. She was about to question if she was able to be grateful to the houses. When two short men appeared. One looked quite cheerful, as the other had a cranky face. They were similar but at the same time, very different. No one needed to tell her they were brothers.

“Cain, Abel, this is Queen Eoster, Lady of the Four Loves, Princess of Springs, and Ruler of the Garden of Lovers and The Dreaming. She is my wife and your queen.” Love could not remember if she was ever introduced by Dream. Everyone already knew who they were, and she did not know how to feel hearing him actually telling others that she was his.

The brunette queen opened a polite smile, “Blessing from the Garden, Cain and Abel. I offer you my deepest gratitude for helping my husband, in such dire times.” She could see they were lost, looking at each other for a moment, before desperately looking over to Dream, who probably indicated something that they should do a courtesy. And they did, a clumsy one. Eoster could tell the cheerful one was a bit startled, while the cranky one seemed to be looking from Love to Dream, unsure. She realized they looked like a very atypical couple.

Love opened her mouth to break the awkward silence between them, when the cheerful one interrupted her. “My lady, do you like gargoyles?” At the same time, the cranky one punched his brother in the arm. “Do not interrupt her, Abel! The lady was about to speak!” Love flinched at the sudden violence, trying to avoid any conflict. Dream seemed unfazed by the interaction. Was this normal? “No, please. I can not say that I do, Abel. We do not have gargoyles in the Garden.” The eyes of the man seemed to sparkle with that realization. “Than you must meet Goldie. Lord Dream gave her to us. She will always be Irving to me, but please do not tell Cain.” He grabbed her hand, passing through the fallen leaves, Love’s hennin got stuck in a tree, and she turned back to grab, she immediately felt a breath in her back. She quickly turned to see a golden gargoyle.

Gargoyles were supposed to be terrifying, at least according to stories, however this was anything but. “Oh- Hello, hi” Love stumbled into a tree branch, almost falling back, but she supported the queen with her head, stabilizing her before Abel made the introductions mistaken a few of her titles as ‘Lady of the Four Springs’ and ‘Queen of the Springs’ but, the main title he got right, which was Lord Morpheus’ Queen. Goldie did the better bow between the trio. “Goldie likes you… ou-my lady” Cain stepped into Abel’s feet after he took a time not addressing Love by the proper title. Love did not care exactly. Especially because she was starting to grow fond of Abel. Love kept petting the Gargoyle and decided to ask some curiosities of her “ Do you both prefer a more autumnal scenario?”

Cain and Abel look at each other, unknowingly how to give the right answer, so Love explains, circling her finger indicating the environment “The dry leaves, dry trees, everything in orange-brown tones. Autumn.” They still kept quiet. It was not that Love did not liked autumn, she found it quite tolerable, going to the mortal’s world during this season always was pleasant, but it was also quite depressing.

“Your houses have a lovely front, and the soil is good. I can make it spring for you. Don’t you wish for blooming flowers, a light warm sun, trees full of green leaves, soft grass, maybe some carrots for Goldie?” Abel eyes were sparkling, he looked to Cain in excitement, but Cain seemed unsure. Not a fan of changes, Love could sense. “It would be my way of expressing gratitude.” She made a small bow, and that she knew would convince Cain. He was proud, but he would not say no to Love, especially with Dream right there.

Dream! “Of course, if my lord allows it, to shape his Dreaming.” She turned to him, completely forgetting that he was there! Biting down her lower lip almost as asking for forgiveness before the fight. She only wished he saved the lecture when they returned, not here. “You are Queen of the Dreaming, if it is your wish then I have nothing to allow.” He said in the most peaceful manner. Love frowned, taking a second to digest it, trying to sense any hostility, sarcastic, passive-aggressiveness, but he seemed to genuinely mean it. She was Queen of the Dreaming. Love couldn’t believe it.

The brothers sensed how unsure Love was. Constantly looking over to the Dream King as if he would change his mind at any second. Abel was about to tell her that it was no trouble at all. Dry leaves and dead trees were fine. She would not want her to get into trouble, especially after being kind to him.

But as he was about to speak, a cold air came across them, Lady Love had her feet on the ground, her eyes closed, as the next breeze came it smelled like freshly cut grass, and spikes of green herbs started to grow as the tree foliage, damaged tree trunks healed, the vines that climbed against the outside wall of the houses, went from brown to a deep green, as the smell of jasmyne, roses, lilies and lavenders started to rose, the field blossomed. Dream kept watching his wife awakening spring, her hair got fuller, and her skin slightly glowed as she was bathing in sun, she looked more alive than he ever saw her, while the nature besides him blossomed, he could only look at her.

The smell of rain came next. “Forgive me if it is not up to your liking, it’s been ages since I last performed a small spring, especially in front of an audience. We better get inside.” Love put her shoes back, before going to Morpheus’s side, her eyes were a vivid deep green that he never quite seen before. “ It is coming quite a storm to completely awake your spring my dreams, I believe I got too excited. We better go inside, unless you want to soak under the rain.” She expected any of them to lead the way, but Cain and Abel were still fascinated by the awakening happening all around them, Abel was especially charmed by the trail of tiny flowers, growning where Lady Love walked. And Dream kept cursing himself for his lack of control, thinking about his wife soaked under the rain, her dress sticky to her figure, her curls untangled, falling to her waist, the fabric semi transparent, showing her curves covered only by her underwear, that if he remembered were always flimsy lace, “Which house, shall we go?” Love innocently asked, not knowing where Dream’s thoughts were nor the argument this would cause.

Cain argued they should go to The House of Mystery, and Abel wanted them to go to The House of Secrets. Love did not know if she should intervene, for her the houses looked the same, even their names. Weren’t secrets just mysteries waiting for someone to discover them? And isn’t a mystery just an obscure secret? And most importantly wouldn’t they offer the same protection of the spring rain that was about to come? Love intervened when she thought Cain had a murderer look towards poor Abel. “We shall have tea in The House of Mystery! And of course we will have dinner at the House of Secrets. Does that please both of you? Then off we go, gentlemen, please. ” This seemed to settle the argument.

Dinner? She did not want to have dinner and tea with Cain and Abel. Actually she didn’t mind the dreams or the gargoyle, but she did mind pretending to be a happy harmonious couple more than she had planned. But how could she stop the two brothers? Love let the two walk upfront, making the preparations, like a mother that let the kids close the door before fighting with a low voice with her husband. “Would you let the two of them kill each other? Do your dreams mean nothing to you?” She spat, passing her hands through her hair.

“Abel is the First Victim and Cain the First Murderer”. He answered as this was enough to settle her down, when he saw her face continued the same, he further the explanation. “Cain is constantly killing Abel, and Abel does not remain dead. Cain always buries him, but Abel is alive again by sunrise. Cain is trying to avoid killing Abel in front of you. Out of respect”

He did not mention that he was the one telling them to avoid bloodshed, since Love was not fond of manslaughter, nor was herself used to it. Love looked at Dream with disbelief in her eyes. Did he learn nothing with Morningstar? Did he not listen to her? “And you did not thought that was crucial to share with your wife?” Dream crossed his arms in his back “Lady wife, you did not ask any habit of my other creations, I did not think this was any different.”

Love blinked looking at her unfazed husband. Tall, dark hair, pale, and not a hint of annoyance. He was not lying, she could tell. Morpheus did not lie. But he was not being sincere either. Something in Love kept nudging her that he wanted this to happen. It could be insanity, she must be going insane after those days. Better ladies would already give up. But it could be true. Maybe he wants to spend time with her, convincing her that he has changed for the better.

Well, she would give him reasons to regret it.

—------------

Tea time was tense. Abel kept shaking his tea. Cain kept giving murderer looks to his brother that flinched and shaked even more. During a conversation, Dream tried to hold Love’s hand over the table and she abruptly took it away, not breaking eye contact with the brothers that were telling a story. The brothers pretended not to notice the queen’s anxiety, every plastered smile Queen Love offered, every rehearsed compliment, and those half-a-second-blink-and-missed coldly glancing at Dream as a warning. Near the end of the tea time, Love asked a question that changed the course of her later evening “ How did the name Goldie come to you? Was it both of your choices? My sisters and I could never agree on naming clouds, imagine gargoyles!”

Five minutes later, Abel’s blood spills in Love’s face, Dream’s coat, and the table cookies, their chamomile tea acquiring a pink color after a dash of blood mixed to it.

Four hours later, there was no dinner, Cain was outside burying Abel. And Dream and Love were settled in a bedroom that Cain fixed for them to share a night at the House of Secrets. This time it wasn’t Dream who convinced Love, but Cain. He said that they need to fulfill their promise and to wait for Abel to say goodbye.

“If that was the case, then you should have learned how to control your nerves better, Cain of the House of Mysteries.” She scolded the dream. Cain was taken aback by her response. He heard Lady Love was kind, beautiful, generous and very polite, no one said anything about her scolding, how it felt like it was disappointing and betraying a mother. Cain merely nodded with his head down. He was ashamed of something he had done his whole existence. How was that possible?

Love did not caring if her husband would later scolded her for it.

To her surprise he didn’t. At the moment, he looked a bit… impressed. Like he didn’t know that Love could scold or lecture her subjects. Her cheeks turned pink when she realized he was looking at her in awe.

Now, they were stuck in one bedroom. Neither she or Morpheus had the courage to ask for separate rooms. It would be one night. At a dream’s house. What could possibly go wrong?

Love tried to tell herself, as she walked to the couple’s bed, covered in old flowery covers matching the walls, it looked like an old room in a farm cottage. She stopped between the bed and the vanity, untying her dress. Love could not sleep in her gown, it was too big and occupied too much of a space.

She stripped down the gown, and marched away from the two petticoats Elijah put her on. The corset was the last piece missing and she was struggling with the tight knots Elijah gave. It seemed silly, but it has been centuries since she was the one undressing herself, she usually had a dream maid or Elijah to help her, even Lucienne helped her once. She was getting tired of trying to push the knot since it seemed to tightens it more. Maybe she could sleep in a corset. It would crush her ribs. Nothing much.

“May I?” She wasn’t surprised with Dream behind her, she heard his footsteps. Love just didn't expect him to come help her. At first she denied, saying it was fine. He did not move, of course he didn't believe her, a single person could not untie the amount of knots in that dress. He could not understand why Love still picked those laced ribbons type of dresses, but he had a feeling that if he mentioned anything, Love would kill him in bed. “Fine.” She gave up.

Love didn’t want Dream this near to her. She could feel his breath in her neck, and it sent shivers down her spine. She held her breath and become stiff under his fingers when they slightly grazed her skin over the cotton gown. Love could see his expertly hands working through the mirror in the vanity. Even with the corset getting loose it was getting harder to breathe.

Dream pretended to be well composed, but his breath was uneven, and he was sure Love would notice. His mouth was dried and he tried to ignore it, while trying to focus on the ribbon knots, and avoid gazing at the naked skin of her shoulders, the connection point between her neck, and how it moved with every small turn. How he wanted to close the space between them, and kissed and take her scent in, discard that corset and put his hand over her waist, embrace her, let her skin melt against his, as he would slide his hands under her gown, feel her silk skin against his fingers, mark her neck as his.

He turned his eyes to the mirror, trying to get away from those thoughts, especially since he was going to share a bed with Love. He might daydream about his wife wanting to give him her tender affections, but he knew that in reality if Love even suspected he was slightly aroused, she would put her dress back and sleep on the floor. And he didn’t want her to be uncomfortable because he couldn’t control himself. Sharing a bedroom was not in his plans. Spend time with her, yes, but this was pushing the limits.

His eyes crossed with hers, as she was staring at him working on her corset through the mirror. He continuously untied her corset, but he didn’t break eye contact, neither did her. Both of them played a dangerous game, until her garment fell into the ground.

“Thank you” Love shyly said, turning herself to the bed, getting quickly under the covers, even if her nightgown covered every piece of her body besides her shoulders and her ankles. She tried to focusing herself, remembering why Dream was an expert in untying dresses. ‘ Yours he wasn't untying.’ She sat on the bed, braiding her long hair. She didn't had to, but at least it would keep her mind away from her husband stripping in front of her. “If it pleases you, I can sleep on the floor”.

Morpheus suggested standing at the side of the bed. Love looked at him in a normal black cotton shirt and boxers that matched it. Thinking it was a good idea. But also seeing the ridicule of it. They were married. He had seen her naked before, she laid with him, he spilled his seed into her. But even if it sounded ridiculous, sharing a bed in nightclothes was far more intimate then everything they shared “We are married” She shrugged off, it was the answer to their questions, she opened the covers on his side. “Maybe you should have one and I the other”. She pulled one of the covers to her side of the bed, pushing one to leave on Morpheus' side. He looked hurt believing she thought that he would do anything to her during the night. Another sin to carry. That was the type of husband she thought he was. That was the treatment he gave her.

Love on the other hand kept thinking that she just didn’t want to wake up curled into his arms.

She would never have thought that Morpheus would do anything nonconsensual to her during the night, he had plenty of opportunity to do it in the palace, and never did. Why would he start now? With dreams just outside their windows that could hear everything. It would not give him a good look.

Morpheus did not argue with her, merely agreeing.

As soon as he fixed himself, Love blew out the candle in their bedroom. Laying against her pillow. It wasn't fluffy as the pillow from the Gardens nor stained with tears or wine like the pillows from the Dreaming.

It had an unknown smell that was not helping her sleep nor the sound of Cain’s shovel. She closed her eyes trying to shut her internal voices, thinking about the pink milky lakes in the Garden, the sweet melodies her protégés would play, the sound of waves hitting the shore.

It did not work. She turned to her sides, feeling Morpheus was too close or the bed was too small. She decided to lay looking at the ceiling. How many hours did she spent turning on bed? Was it already morning? She needed to sleep.

The more she looked at the ceiling the more she realized she wasn’t going to sleep even if she was tired. “Husband, are you asleep?”

It was an odd question to ask, she realized. She did not know if Morpheus actually slept. He was the Sandman after all, but did he get the chance to experiment his own creations? Or he merely crafts his realm and its people for others enjoyment and misery? Always looking outside but never living it himself.

Both had more in common than Love realized.

He took his time to answer her, and she believed he could be sleeping. “No, my lady. I am not.” Love nodded, even if he couldn’t see. She moved, sitting on the bed resting her back against the headboard “May I ask you a question?”

Morpheus mirrored her, sitting in the bed “Yes.”

Love frowned, already regretting the question. She could have just stayed quiet. “You have to promise not to be crossed.” She didn’t mean to sound childish as she sounded.

“I will not. You may ask.” She could not see in the darkness but could feel Dream smile when answering her.

Love cleaned her throat “How was it?”

“Pardon me?” He could not have listened to her, after all she whispered like a student afraid of answering the wrong question from the professor.

“How was it to be imprisoned all those years?” She took a deep breath, reuniting all the courage to keep this conversation.

“ Why the sudden interest?” Love definitely regretted asking it. She did not know why she asked. It just popped in her head. Maybe because he kept saying his imprisonment changed him, changed how he sees her. She wanted a better understanding. Or it was her stupid heart trying to find any excuses to forgive him.

“ I can’t sleep” She lied shrugging her shoulders

“And details of my imprisonment might aid you?” Love could not contain a roll of eyes.

She stayed silent, both of them. He was crossed, he lied, although he didn’t sound like it. Morpheus sounded more amused than crossed, but Love couldn't trust what she felt he sounded like. It was dark, her senses were frail. She couldn’t trust anything. She turned herself to the opposite side, preparing to lay back and try to sleep or impatiently count the seconds so the night could be over.

“ Lonely.” He took a deep breath. “At first I kept thinking about the Dreaming, how it would be without me, neglected, unprotected, the effects on the wakening.” The Sleeping Sickness. Of course. Love remembers bits of it. She thought it was just an unrelated name to a common sickness, but it rendered dramatic love stories, couples forever apart by a forever sleep. “Then I remembered that you were here and my thoughts turned to your work, if you were getting a hold of it, dealing with dreams and nightmares, my siblings.” He didn’t say but part of him was expecting to come back to war ground, the Dreaming infested with Desire. How foolish it sounded now. “ I thought I was only thinking about duties, about the continuation of things, but as time went by, I realized that among all of it, I truly kept thinking about you. I worried about the dream folk and the realm but I kept always coming back on you. If anyone was helping you understand the Dreaming since I retrieve myself from that duty, if you were tired of bearing my load, if you were staying at the Dreaming or at the Garden, if you slept in my quarters as you were the sole ruler or continued in your bed, if anyone dared to defy your authority. When I realized, I stopped thinking about the work, and kept losing myself in these few memories of you, that were so scarce but fed my hopes of return, your soft delicate hands over mine, your floral scent. I curse myself for not remembering your smile, but clearly remembering your tears, the sound of your cries. I vowed that when I get back, I would make my daily iteration to make my Queen smile, so I could never forget. And if damnation came upon me, at least I have your radiance to remember when walking through my sister’s realm, knowing that I am not responsible for only your tears, but some of your happiness.”

Love could not keep her eyes away from Dream. His hair was a mess, he had prominent eye bags. His queen could not remember if she ever saw him more human, and under the soft moonlight coming from the thin curtains, he looked more handsome than she ever saw him. And the vulnerability! She was a fool, she knew her sisters would scold her for having a soft heart but she didn’t think properly when she suddenly kissed her husband.

Her lips crashing against his, she meant to pull away in a second, hide under the covers, and pretend nothing happened, afraid he might reject her. But contrary to her anxieties, he quickly responded to her kiss, and moved carefully against her mouth afraid she might break away. Love shyly opened her mouth as he gladly slipped his tongue inside which elicited a needy moan from his Queen that she had not realize it came from her, nor the effect it had on her husband who desperately needed to hear the sounds he could get from Eoster and felt a dire need to have her body close against him, he curled his hands into her hair, as they deepen the kiss.

Love showed no resistance to dwelling in his touch, letting the burning sensation on her body take over. Morpheus pulled her to him, letting Love straddle his lap, her gown pooled above her mid thigh, partially exposing her legs. Her hands resting flattened against his chest, feeling his heartbeat underneath her touch. She can imagine how he would look without a shirt underneath the weak light. They break their kiss for a second as her hands cradle his face, and she rested her forehead against his, even with the low light both staring at each other, their silence being only accompanied by their dorment passion, their chest heaving in synchrony.

Their moment was a brief eternity, Dream kept looking from her eyes to her parted lips, and when Love gave him a gentle kiss as consent to continue, Dream wasted no time, tracing a path of wet kisses from her mouth to her collarbone, following to her pulse point as she tilted her head giving him more access. His lips were warm from their kiss but they sent shivers across her back as he nipped the skin of her neck. Love weakly moaned, her tights tensed pressing harder against Dream.

Her hands went to his soft raven haired hair, grabbing his locks into her fingers, to which he groan in pleasure and Love felt a electric wave through her body. She wanted more. His hand was on her stomach, she could feel how cold they were as his fingertips raised the hem of the nightgown, delicately as he wanted to indulge every second of it.

She didn’t stop her sleeves to fall from her shoulder letting the sight of the top of her breast exposed, a silent invitation to be touched. Dream’s hand went up to her body, feeling every inch of skin, the warmth of his wife, he couldn’t take his hands away from her, it would be a sin, a crime to do it. To have neglected her all those years, he was the one that deserved an eternity in Hell for his foolishness.

Love was unsure if the feelings from her body were clouding her eyes, but she could swear Morpheus was smiling at her, and she was smiling at him. His hand laid over her breast, his palm a warm pressure over her nipple. Love arched her back, moving her hips, pushing her breast more into his hand “Dream…” the neediness in her voice, his name dropping from it like prayer, and if he never wanted or needed worshipers before, he would be content to only listen to her prays. ”Yes?” The rasp of his voice mixed with eagerness, wanting to hear every single need his Queen had. He started circling her breasts, pinching her hard nipple, as she moaned with each touch as he was discovering what would make Love say his name again. She took one of her hands to the other breast, feeling it burning in desire for her husband’s hand. Her palms were not the same as his, she squeezed it a bit stronger than her husband, to mimic the pressure.

The Dream King was mesmerized by his wife pleasing herself, he stopped for a moment his movements just to see her, throwing her head back, and looking deep into his eyes, full of desire, as a whimp escaped her lips “Touch me”.

Both of them shared a look, as she put her hand over his, showing how she wanted to be touched. Love never saw Morpheus take so well instructions from her. He didn’t need to be afraid she was going to break, so she pressed his hands more intensively against her, Love needed his touch as one needed air, she needed to feel his fingers dig in her skin, and as he learn, and Dream was a quick learner, she let go of his hands, holding him by his shoulder and then his back digging her nails in his skin as she pressed again her hips into him, his breath hicks, letting his head fall in her shoulder, his hair tickling her cheek as he kissed her skin, letting love marks all across her collarbone. One of his hands went to her waist to keep her close, she could feel Dream harder under her and his length grazing in her entrance, when he bucked his hips to meet her, sending a wave of pleasure that she wanted to keep chasing.

”Do you like it?” He whispered against her ear, and she stopped for a moment, Dream looked at her, flustered and painting, afraid he might have ruined it. As he opened his mouth to apologize, she kissed him, whispering back “You never asked before.” It was not a spiteful reply, like the ones before, everytime he asked her something about her well-being. It was a lovable answer, full of hope and happiness, like Dream finally asked the one thing that mattered in all those centuries. As a response to his question, she rolled her hips against his, feeling his hard on, and he immediately met her in the same motion, Dream holded her waist down to keep her exactly where she was, and both couldn’t help but moan louder than expected.

After years of their date nights being a painful annoyance only making her feel dirty, having to clean herself and drink tea for pain the next day, she never thought she would get any pleasure from her husband's erection, and she might be wrong or the heat got to her head but she couldn’t remember feeling him so stiff before. And for Garden’s sake, knowing she was the one making him painfully hard, was one sweat reward she never expected to feel.

“The crimes that I blame you for, they mean nothing more to me, my love” His words were sweet whispers as they shared sloppy kisses, while caressing her nude thighs. She was already soaking for him, it was not in her plans to get so easily aroused by him. But how can she not want to make true of every single fantazie she imagined all those years? Especially when Morpheus' was being gentle and attentive, his touch was addictive, her body responded to it as it did not need her mind to decide for it. As it wanted to give all for him. To be drunk on his touch, on his mouth, on his voice.

It wanted to ignore his words, but they kept resonating in her ears. Her body keep screaming to forget, forget and forget, that it didn’t matter, that she would ruin this, what she deserves, being worshiped in bed by her husband. She could smile and let him kiss her pain away, ignore his meaning. In a few moments he would be inside her, Love could tell by the way they kept quickly escalating their innocent kisses, and it would be pleasant, fulfilling, passionate, everything she always wanted. And Honesty would be right, Dream would try to compensate for all the years of negligence. And they would be the couple nobody invited to stay for longer festivities. But her mind kept turning the gears, repeating that he did not say that she was innocent of their forced marriage, he only dismissed it as he was forgiving her. He could not possible mean it, right?

“Crimes that I did not commit.” She lustfully whispered in the middle of a high pitched moan closing her eyes and pressing her forehead against his as Morpheus left her breasts to give attention to her neglected core, circling and pressing a finger over her thin underwear. He knew he was the only one to touch her wet cunt, she never had a lover and although he knew she not only could but should have by the way he treated her, he couldn’t help to feel more turned on by knowing he would be the only one giving her the denied pleasure he punished her with. And how much pleasure he plans to give Love.

His touch was vastly different from her own. It was intense and extremely hot, his fingers where slender and longer than hers, and could reach new spots she would not dream in touching, her insides clenched for him. “My lady, you are dripping for me.” He said as soon as he pushed away her underwear, and pushed a finger over her slit, circling her bud as well as pressing against her entrance. She hated how his words made it more difficult to think, how she grinded herself on his finger to raise the friction. “Yes, only for you, my king”. She felt dizzy and warm and drunk on his touch, Morpheus was painfully hard seeing her getting off on his fingers complemented with her filthy words, he gifted her pushing a finger inside her dripping entrance. It easily slided like it was meant to be inside her, he curled it in his direction, feeling her walls clenched around his fingers, as she cried at the intrusion. For a moment she thought that maybe she could make him say what she wanted if her body and mouth worked to let him be completely drunk on her as she was on him.

But it wouldn’t be true. He would say it merely to seek relise, to have her. Which was exactly what love has been avoided for all of these years.

She resisted the urge to ask him for another finger, although her body craved for it.

Trying to sober herself up from his touch and his warmth. She needed to hear him say. She needed more than any carnal desire. She needed to be believed by him. ”Morpheus?” She said his name for the first time, and squeezed his arm. He looked at her puzzely, she knew by his face that he was about to ask if he did anything to displease her, since her pleasure seems to be his focus. She cupped his face and looked him in the eyes, repeating herself “Crimes that I did not commit” so he would have the chance agree and make her entirely his.

He look at her, the lack of his immediate response set her aback and his next words were the wrong ones “We can move past this” a tired whisper, a string Dream was throwing at Love expecting she would catch. He went to kiss her again, but Love turned her face. The heat among them was lowering, and a wave of cold air ran through them, the rift between them opening again.

Love couldn’t believe that those words spoken in a sweet whisper, while both were entangled in each others arms, could be more cruel than any of their screams amids drunk fights before. How he managed to break her heart more than it was already broken.

Her eyes scanned through his face in disappointment and realization. “You still believe on that, don't you? You are convinced that I conspired with Desire.” Dream saw that he was losing her again, he saw in her green iris something broke inside her. Something drift away and slipped through his hands.

He could have lied, said exactly what she wanted to hear, but he couldn’t lie to himself and he couldn’t disrespect his wife by lying to her. They would be one of those couples that pretended to be happy, shoving everything else in the basement, until one day it came exploding in their faces. Or worse, it could be used against them, which could led to catastrophic consequences.

Love didn’t move, she dropped her hands fatigued, but still staring at her husband. Like holding her stare maybe would make him change his answer. What a romantic and stupid want. Her eyes started to feel dry, and the more she blinked the more she felt tears starting to pool. She felt ashamed of her exposed vulnerability. Not only of her body and how it crave for him, how it was responsive and wanted to ignore his words only to seek a sweet white relief, but her soul, how she let it again be hurt by him.

She was no better than any naive maid who fell for Wodan’s cheap charm. “ I am such a fool”

“ We can move past this” he repeated himself because that was the only think he could say. It was the past. They needed to move on. He holded her face in his hands caressing her cheek, looking at her teary eyes, he broke her heart once more, he knew and she was slipping away again, he wanted to hold her, so he could hold this moment, hold themselves.

Love knew if she nudged against his touch for a single moment, if she let him comfort her, she would not be able to leave. So she snap his hands of her.

She raised herself from him, returning to her side of the.bed, raising her sleeve and pushing down her gown feeling glad it was dark so he could not see the tears falling from her eyes. She wished she could run from this bedroom, whatever promises she made, threw it all to hell and never come back, never see his face again. “Love, please…” he reached his hands to touch hers, but she snapped them away before he could even touch her

She abruptly cut him, a knot in her throat making it almost impossible to speak, her voice was shaky, unstable, she felt herself trembling. “We can’t move past this, we can’t have a future without trust. We can’t hope for it, can’t you see, husband? You don’t forgive. And don’t tell me your imprisonment changed you, because you can say all you want but the proof of your inability to forgive lives in Hell at this moment because she declined you. And even after our marriage, the girl still is tormented in hell, just because you hold your grudges.”

“And do you forgive?! Do you dare say you don’t hold any grudges?!” Her husband snaps at her.

“My grudges are justified and you know it.” Love said in a serious tone

“And mine are not?” Love saw his point, but she would not argued it with him, besides she did not want to give in

“ You can’t forgive her, and you can’t forgive me” Love said it in one breath afraid if she stopped, she would begin to cry. And Love did not want to cry in front of him.

“Love, it is not at all the same, you…I…” Morpheus tried to justify, but what could he say? That Love was his wife, and he would never submit her to such treatment? He already did. He did not sent her to Hell, of course, but he did put her to live in misery.

“Eventually, we will fight again or I will displease you in some manner, and you will turn back to this ludicrous idea of conspiracy, and use it as fuel to punish me in bed and in public, and I will use wine to ease the pain you carelessly inflict on me. And you will say that I carved my own fate when I decided to conspire with Desire. As you said over and over.” Morpheus stayed silent, he couldn’t argue with her, Love knew his behavior too well.

Tears rolled freely from her cheeks, and Love did not make any attempt to clean them up “I am glad you are trying to fix the pain you cause me, I can see you truly repent of it and I am awfully sorry that you had to go through a century of imprisonment to realize your mistakes, but don’t lie to yourself, Morpheus, you don’t forget, you don’t move on and you still believe I mislead you, that I plot with Desire.” She glanced over at him, probably her own tears on the way, but if she didn’t know better, she would say that a tear ran through her husband cheek.

His voice however, was the same “It does not matter to me, it is nothing”

Love screamed in response losing her posture and control “It is everything! And it does matter to me! How can you be so blind?! You still think that some part of me is a vile creature that trapped you and hold you into a loveless marriage and that I conspired with Desire to aid in your demise.“

And pulling the memories, a week after their first night together, when she thought she could not live anymore, Love went to him, in all her innocence and naïveté “I begged you to believe me, I wept, I got on my knees, desperately pleading to you believe in my word, to see reason, to read the false letters, to believe in your wife. And do you know what you did, do you remember it?” At the ocassion she threw at his feet the hundred of letters written by Desire. And Dream, sat on his throne frowning reading a book, glanced at his wife, after the pleads and all was left was his sobbing Queen, on the lower step of the stairs, head in her hands, covering her eyes, as she kept crying.

Love never knew how he could see her crying and do nothing at all. Because that is what he did.

He left. Morpheus remembered it. He thought that Desire had chosen a good actress to partner with and how she patronize him, by thinking he, Lord of Dreams, would fall for a trick as a beautiful damsel in distress, in need of only his assistance.

“You left.” Love said it coldly. How could he not see the pain, she was before?

And Lord Morpheus, who would have dream prefer the silence but when spoke, speak always so eloquent, kept repeating the only thing he could “We still can find way to be together”

Amidst a sob that Love did not mean to escape but it found its way to her mouth before her words, she decided to open her heart, because what else would he do? He couldn’t break her heart anymore, he couldn’t lose her anymore that she was already lost “I love you, Morpheus. I do. I have to say it now because I won’t be able to muster up the courage to say it again. Against every fiber of my being, every pure logic, even knowing you were not the one the wrote those letters, I still see those same traits that made me fell in love, you are dutiful to your work, to the mortal world and the dream folk, you deeply feel and care for those you love even if I never was the one receiving it, I could see. And it hurts, because you never believed in the sincerity of my feelings and I cannot believe yours are anything but starvation of touch and sympathy, I am a fool for even a second thinking otherwise, and I can not bear to risk being misled again. I simply cannot hold anymore pain”

He didn’t know why he tried to speak but he had to “Love, listen-“ he had to at least try to make her stop, to make him rethink. But the doors were closed.

Elijah said Lady Love’s heart was never closed to love, that was her essence, but he was not sure if her Cupid ever saw her like this.

The way Love spoke next, it was devoided of any emotion, any pain, it was a tired speech, but she spoke as it was not up for discussion. And how could Morpheus tried to argue with her?

“After the Festival, I wish to go back to the Garden, with my court. We will call it a holiday. I will not be coming to the Dreaming, unless under your calling, and I deeply expect my lord husband to be less inclined in calling me, and highly advise you to find a mistress that will take care of your needs, for I won’t willingly lay with you anymore.”

She slided under the covers turning to the other side, looking at the window, they both stayed silent. The sound of Cain’s shovel being the only noise filling the space. She heard his sigh in defeat, more wonded than ever before.

“ Very well, lady wife”

@secretdreamlandmentality @littlemoistcarrot @lokigirlszendaya @roxytheimmortal

[moeblob]

You know, I'm sorry for another story time but my life has been very stressed lately and today I got a huge boost. SO.

As some of you may know, I moved states at the end of July and have been here since August 1st basically. Social anxiety is a struggle but I'm making it. And there's this easy to reach by walking convenience store and almost every time I walk there I walk past a gem store. And I think to myself almost every single time "I love the store has a bouncer". I didn't say anything to him at first! But one day I got brave and proceeded to make an absolute FOOL of myself as I am on my way back from buying some sodas and ask him "are you like the store bouncer?"

The man looks at me and smiles and gives a little chuckle and says pretty much yeah? And then I say more awkward things and then promptly leave feeling very embarrassed. I purposefully AVOID that lil corner for a couple days and then finally feel brave enough to walk by cause it's ... like. Literally right by my destination. Man isn't even outside that day and I think phew! I can't be creepy if I can't talk to him!

BUT THEN I SEE THAT HE IS DIRECTLY INSIDE CHATTING TO A WORKER. And he sees me. And smiles and stops whatever conversation he's having and exits the store to say hi. (I am definitely beaming, like a normal person, because I apparently am NOT creepy enough to this man more than a foot taller than me who could easily kick my ass if he wanted) So we just chat. For maybe ten minutes? It's very nice! We have a Very Normal Conversation! I feel better about the first interaction because I had a second interaction.

So now............ today. I am once again wandering around and on my way to lunch when I pass the gem store and I'm like "hello again!" to the gem store bouncer. We begin to chat again and he mentions a pendant they recently appraised that he likes and I, thinking this entire time that the store was ONLY appointment only and I would never be allowed inside, am casually mentioning "yeah, I was born in June and we have three birthstones and like.... none of them are dark enough for me. I mean there's pearl which I'm not a fan of and then moonstone and another." And so he's saying they have a sheet inside to show birthstones so we walk in together to find out the mysterious third stone.

And the sheet only shows pearls. And I'm like "this is a crime against June babies" and then I somehow start talking to one of the female workers and I'm saying "yeah I just kinda like walking by here and seeing the bouncer" and she looks at him and is like "oh I like that." and I admit I have no other idea what to refer to him as (I don't know his name at this point anyway) and she's like "most often security guard."

Ah. Yes. Like a normal person would think. Security. Yes. Not "gem store bouncer". She then leaves to grab a coffee from across the street and I leave with the bouncer and somehow we get into talking about wearing mostly black and how he's pretty goth and then I mentioned a sweatshirt my aunt sent me once saying "I'm only wearing black until they come out with something darker" and he grins and says it's a life motto. Then the woman returns with her coffee and he tells me to tell her what I said, so I repeat it and she looks me dead in the eye and says "that was made for me. Also I love that you called him a bouncer it's hilarious".

I now observe that he (all black suit black shirt black tie) and her (black sweater with black/white striped pants n black shoes) are indeed somehow the gem store goth club. And then she heads back in and he says he's sorry they don't have any cookies to offer me, they normally have cookies in the back for employees, and I'm like "ah no it's fine thank you".

And then I left feeling like I was somehow allowed to join the Cool Goth Club at the gem store.

Anyway, sup, my new favorite person is the goth bouncer at the gem store and he makes me smile so much when I see him.

[mcflymemes]

PRIDE & PREJUDICE PROMPTS *  assorted dialogue from the 2005 film

you must know... surely, you must know it was all for you.

are you out of your senses?

we've been nonsensical!

i have struggled in vain and i can bear it no longer.

are you rejecting me?

did i just agree to dance?

makes it all so much more enjoyable, don't you think?

you really do love him, don't you?

i appreciate the struggle you have been through, and i am very sorry to have caused you pain.

you're wasting your time with me.

count your blessings.

don't look at me like that!

only the deepest love will persuade me into matrimony.

i'm very fond of walking.

no, i prefer to be unsociable and taciturn.

may i have the next dance?

these past few months have been a torment.

i wonder who first discovered the power of poetry in driving away love?

my brother gave it to me.

i have never been thus treated in my entire life.

do you talk, as a rule, while dancing?

so this is your opinion of me.

i had to see you.

it's been many years since i had such an exemplary vegetable.

oh, believe me, no one would suspect your manners to be rehearsed.

i've been so blind.

i've come to tell you the news.

oh, very well then.

i must ask you to leave immediately.

you have insulted me in every possible way.

not all of us can afford to be romantic.

i could not have parted with you to anyone less worthy.

i will never see you again if you do.

he looks miserable, poor soul.

yes. a thousand times yes.

i will not and certainly never shall.

i thought that poetry was the food of love.

you are too generous to trifle with me.

all of these things i am willing to put aside and ask you to end my agony.

there's a lot to be thankful for.

don't you dare judge me.

i don't understand.

thank you for explaining so fully.

now tell me once and for all: are you engaged to him?

if your feelings are still what they were last april, tell me so at once.

have you no objection other than your belief in my indifference?

believe me, it was unconsciously done.

what a shame, for i dearly love to laugh.

and those are the words of a gentleman.

my affections and wishes have not changed, but one word from you will silence me forever.

you have bewitched me, body and soul, and i love... i love... i love you.

i love you.

i cannot tease you about that.

forgive me for taking up so much of your time.

how are you this evening, dear?

is this your reply?

they are far too easy to judge.

i do not have the talent of conversing easily with people i have never met before.

i thought you hated the man.

will that make you happy?

we're doing our best to find a fault in you.

i never wish to be parted from you from this day on.

i wish you would not call me "my dear."

perhaps you should take your aunt's advice and practice?

what endearments am i allowed?

please, do be seated.

one of these days, someone will catch your eye and then you'll have to watch your tongue.

people do not die of colds.

i was wrong. i was entirely wrong.

are you too proud? and would you consider pride a fault or a virtue?

this is a charming house.

i am well acquainted with you.

please do me the honor of accepting my hand.

what do you recommend to encourage affection?

what should i call you when i am cross?

are you... are you laughing at me?

i can admire you much better from here.

shall i call for some tea?

i cannot believe that anyone can deserve you.

i love you. most ardently.

good day. it's been a pleasure.

i have no idea.

did you walk here?

let us take a turn about the room.

it is a small kind of accomplishment, i suppose.

will you not join us?

i've never seen so many pretty girls in my life.

she is the most beautiful creature i have ever beheld.

why do you ask such a question?

what have you discovered?

we are all fools in love.

i have other reasons. you know i have.

i do not deny it.

[therossgarden]

since you talked about Izumi in some of your posts (like Dad!Zuko and Mom!Mai and their “conquering Ba Sing Se adventure”) and the Hou-Tong/Izumi beef, I was wondering if you were open to make Gaang kids headcanons.

and if you were, can I request Kya and Izumi headcanons on their friendship etc?

Ok so, anon refers to this post and this other post in the ask, FYI.

But yes, I absolutely am down to make adult gaang/Gaang kids’ headcanons of any kind. So if y’all want any headcanon of that kind feel free to send an anon!

Anyway, back to the ask. I absolutely love the potential of Kya and Izumi’s dynamic. But since I love angst, here’s some little HCs with p a i n.

Izumi and Kya are roughly the same age, maybe Izumi is a year older than Kya.

Ever since they could sit straight, they’ve been inseparable. And as kids, with the republic city construction, they used to be constantly together

I headcanon that Izumi was more responsible and protective of Kya, while Kya saw Izumi as her idol, because you know, pretty firebending princess who punches everyone who looks at Kya the wrong way

I also like to think that Izumi was Kya’s gay awakening in her teens, but never acted on it because Izumi was straight and uninterested. Also, I HC that Izumi had a thing with Bumi, but that’s another story

Anyways. Since Izumi most likely had Iroh at like, 20, Kya would always hang out with Iroh as his fun aunt, doing mischief around etc.

But, and let’s go to the angsty part, I also HC that Kya and Izumi kind of began losing contact once 30s approached. Because you know, Kya was always traveling, and Izumi had crown princess duties to partake in.

Also, given that Zuko was Fire Lord and kind of not as involved in republic city as he used to be, the FN royal family did not hang out with the rest of the gaang as often, and Izumi ended up being often excluded from the drama etc. nothing unfixable, but stuff that definitely hurt Izumi.

I also feel like Izumi (and parents) was always invited to all of the gaang’s and their kids’ milestones, like weddings, ceremonies etc.

And when in 158AG Sokka died protecting Korra, Zuko and Izumi were at the funeral despite their problems in the fire nation.

But, and here we reach the most angsty part, a year later it was Mai who died, of an illness that had taken her like, five years prior. Of course Zuko and Izumi were distraught, and asked Katara, Toph and the others to attend.

But the day of the funeral, only Katara showed up. Because Bumi was in the United forces, Kya couldn’t interrupt her spiritual travels, Tenzin had a heavily pregnant Pema at home, Lin was working, Suyin was just up in her business in Zaofu and Toph was nowhere to be found.

This made Zuko very sad, but Izumi? She was furious. Absolutely furious. Because, how could they miss the one time they needed to be there for her after all the times she had gone out of her way to support them?

And especially, Izumi felt betrayed by Kya, for not even passing by or answering back to the news. So Izumi kind of ghosted and stopped talking with everyone.

The first time she saw any of the Gaang kids was during Kuvira’s storyline. And even then, as cold as ice

So I kind of headcanon that Korra had some business to do in the fire nation and the gang kids tagged along, and kind of had a some of fight with Izumi about her ghosting them and them never visiting

Izumi would be the most angry and hurt with Kya, and they would kind of be angry with each other for the entirety of the storyline

But then by the end, they would have an actual talk and begin speaking to each other again

So yeah, happy ending but TONS of angst. I know right? Amazing❤️

[themultifandomgal]

Hey I got a request for peaky blinders

So basically you are the other Shelby sister age 15 and you got your first period and and aunty polly and Ada wasn’t there so it was only the boys and you woke up in bed with blood everywhere and yelled so Tommy Arthur and John run it to your room and all they seen was blood so they foget some one has hurt you and you told them you didn’t know what is was and then they realised it was your period so they comfort you and help you and explain what it was hope that make sense

Shelby Sister- First Period

Aunt Polly has been away at Ada's house helping with baby Karl so I've been stuck at home with my brothers looking after me. Last night I didn't feel to good, it was a feeling I couldn't quite pin point so I decided to just go to bed and go to sleep. This morning however, I wake up to the sunlight lighting up the room. Still not feeling right I grown getting out of bed, but something catches my eye. Am I unwell and shit myself? No it's a dark red... blood. I scream louder than I ever have before, I'm dying. That's it. The sound of feet rushing up the stairs is heard, then they burst through the door, my 3 brothers all with worried faces

"What's wrong?" Tommy asks panicking

"Tommy...." Arthur looks at my bed nervously

"Ok are you hurt?"

"I don't think so"

"Has someone done something to you, like have they touched you?" John asks

"No. I... Tommy what's wrong with me?" I ask panicking even more

"Are you sure your not hurt?" Tommy asks one more time

"No. Am I dying?" I stutter out nervously

"Ok" Tommy breathes out

"What I'm dying?"

"What? No. YN it's your monthly" John says

"My monthly?" I ask confused

"Yes. You know, Pol told you about it right?" Tommy asks

"Errrm... maybe" I try to think about a conversation that we may have had

"Ok well why don't you have a bath, clean yourself up, I'll see if I can find you some clothe rags or something" John says leaving my room

"We can talk more about this once your cleaned up" Arthur gently says.

After cleaning myself up I notice my bed has been stripped for me. I head to the living room where everyone is sat

"Here" John gives me some rags and explains to me to put them on my underwear so do just that. When I return I sit back down with my brothers, John is the first to explain things

"So once a month you will have a bleed, it's normal and at first they can be irregular. So you might not have one next month or in 3 months who knows"

"I think most girls have their first one at 14 years of age" Tommy says

"I'm 15 though, why am I having it late?"

"I'm not sure YN but some girls do" John explains

"Your monthly basically means you can have a baby, which your not because you are going to be married and be much much older" Arthur points at me

"When you are older and married and you want a baby, having your monthly will tell you that you aren't pregnant, but like Arthur said that won't be for a while. Got it"

"Yeah" I nod replying to Tommy

"Good. Now how are you feeling?"

"My tummy feels weird. Not sick but just.... Weird I don't know how to explain it"

"I remember Ada saying that heat helps her" John looks at our older brothers

"I'll get a hot bottle for you. You just lie down and relax" Arthur tells me

"I'll grab you a book to read from your room and Tommy will make you some soup"

"He will?" I ask excitedly. Yes my brother isn't one to eat much, but what a lot of people don't know is he is a pretty good cook! I may not have my aunt Polly here or Ada, but my brothers will look after me. I know they will.

[hrts4hanniehae]

clutch || eight

there are written parts :)

note that the timeline or educations may not add up but just ignore it because i don't have the brain power to sync up THIRTEEN + 1 's education schedules

sorry for the late chpt. I was really sick so i tried my best on this chpt. next chpt will be longer, i promise.

warnings: some level of chae-young attempting infidelity, swearing

wonwoo came home to find yn passed out on the couch.

"you okay?" - wonwoo

"i need sleep. i've been stuck at school finishing my final project and i just finished. now i have to worry about the stupid reunion in two days. i have no dress and i look like a zombie. life is great." - yn

"go take a shower. i'll get the guys to help you. jeonghan has connections." - wonwoo

the word shock wasn't enough to describe the look on everyone's faces when yn and wonwoo walked in through the door.

some background information: in the one week before this gathering, yn had completed her pieces for the museum, her final project for university and all her outstanding commissions. her exhibit had been very successful and she had earned quite a significant amount of money.

"yn. is that your boyfriend?" - aunt

"yes. this is jeon wonwoo, my boyfriend." - yn

"nice to meet you, my name is jeon wonwoo." - wonwoo

"yn-noona... isn't that the streamer gameboi? you're dating Korea's number 1 [game name] player?" - younger cousin

"no way..."

the whispers in the event room got louder and louder until the people she hated finally came towards her. it was evident that chae-young was gawking at wonwoo. she didn't even bother to hide her lovestruck expression from her husband.

"so this is the new guy you have, huh yn." - mother

"good morning, i'm jeon wonwoo." - wonwoo

it seemed like he had to repeat himself often today.

"what's your net worth?" a disrespectful question right off the bat was expected and both yn and wonwoo had prepared for it.

without missing a beat, wonwoo simply smiled and said, "14 million. I am sure that I have enough to take care of yn for the rest of our lives."

the jealousy that clouded chae-young's face was the best thing that yn had ever seen.

sitting at the table was very awkward because they were surrounded by whispers and glances.

“so wonwoo. what do you work as?” chae-young’s husband was actually a very nice man. he was always kind to yn and her brother and was the complete opposite of his distasteful wife.

“i’m a gamer. i’m currently in talks of joining [fictional korea no.1 pro gamer team]. that deal closes before june,” - wonwoo

“ah i see. what about you, yn? what are you working as now?” this question was on everyone’s mind. some with ulterior motives.

“up until thursday, i was a museum part-timer and finishing university. but i recently managed to sell many of my art pieces and have made quite a name for myself in the past three days. in case you all didn’t know, almost every artwork in this building was made by me over the last 4 years.” - yn

the room was silent. you could hear a pin drop and wonwoo couldn’t help but smile to himself.

let’s walk through the real train of events.

after the “fake-dating” agreement, wonwoo, minghao, mingyu and dokyeom had helped yn move every piece of her artworks over the years to minghao’s studio to sort through them. it took them almost 30 hours to categorise. by monday, they had organised the auction within the museum, an exhibition for her other works and an online bidding website for exclusive works. from tuesday to thursday, the auctions and exhibitions opened.

every one of yn’s artworks sold for incredibly high prices. this particular hotel that the family reunion was, had purchased a significant amount of said artworks.

“you mean you painted that painting of a phoenix?” - uncle

“i did that 2 years ago.” - yn

“and that ceramic heart? that was you?” - aunt

“yes.” - yn

wonwoo could not help but smile at yn’s nonchalent bragging. just then, a hand reached across to tap his.

“so~ wonwoo-oppa~ how did you and yn meet?" chae-young began to blatantly flirt with wonwoo while her HUSBAND sat helplessly beside her.

“i commissioned an art piece from her and fell in love at first sight.” wonwoo forcefully took back his hand before leaning closer to yn, earning a scowl from chae-young.

yn was’t exaggerating when she described all of chae-young’s antics.

here’s a list of the things she tried but failed to do. seduce wonwoo, yn’s “boyfriend”, spill water on yn, pretend that yn stepped on her foot on purpose, claim yn slapped her.

how embarrassing.

ฅ^•ﻌ•^ฅ

synopsis: wonwoo is a popular streamer known for his incredible gaming skills and good looks. He turned heads. but he hates the attention. he just wants to play games and earn money. one day he receives a letter. his apartment’s rent has almost doubled. no warnings at all. his current paycheck from streaming can’t shoulder those bills. he has no choice but to rent out his spare room. to who? a fresh art university graduate who has… 1. a stable job ✅ 2. talent for art and sculpting ✅ 3. many friends ❌ 4. social anxiety ✅ 5. no filter ✅ when his iconic cat logo gets copystriked, she comes to the rescue with a new logo for him. when his apartment’s walls start peeling, she fixes it. whatever he used to struggle with… the empty space... was now filled by her. so what does he *last player standing* do when her ex *enemy spotted* tries to take her back? heh. *clutch* he clutches.

inspired by wonwoo's gam3bo1 streams, falling into your smile & gogo squid (has hints of valorant)

pairing: streamer!jeon wonwoo x fem!artist!reader (ft. jeongcheol, soonhoon, junhao, seoksoo, verkwan)

genre: fluff, comfort, slowburn, comfort, pining, bestfriend!minghao

warnings: stalker ex, toxic ex, mentions of abuse, guns (game), cursing, hate comments, panic attacks

started: 28.12.23

ended: ?

taglist: join from my masterlist

main masterlist

smau socials

previous I next

tags! @fairyofhour @megseungmin @sun-daddy-yoriichi @woozixo @euphoric-univers @christinewithluv @haowonbins @ocyeanicc @asyre @cynthiaaax13 @superhoshisvt @bangantokchy @chimmy-bts @angelarin @daisawa @writingbarnes @jeonghansshitester

@belladaises @wonwootakemyheart @wonwooz1 @luchiet @kookssecret @caratsland @peachescreamandcrumble @thepoopdokyeomtouched @isabellah29 @leah-rose03 @yandere-stories @coupshour @heesbees @hamji-hae @hyuckxtagram