#yolk baby she carries around | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

ginnsbaker · 1 year ago

Text

In Silent Screams (3/3)

Chapter word count: 11.8k+ Pairing: Wanda Maximoff x Fem!Reader, Wanda Maximoff x Vision (past) Warnings in this part: Smut (F/F), Angst, Gaslighting, Blackmail, Mild attempted sexual assault

A/N: This is probably the most uncomfortable fic I've written after In Flames (for good reason lol), so I'm nothing short of amazed if you were able to go through every line in this three-parter. P.S. For some reason, third part was the hardest to write for me, I guess it's because a lot of the scenes now are the same ones from In Flames after R found out and switching perspectives was a lot harder than I anticipated :P

Series Masterlist | Main Masterlist

It all feels like a dream, starting from the moment she opens her eyes and a few rays of light have filtered through the slats of the blinds. For a few moments Wanda pretends she’s back to that day—to that first morning she woke up next to you as your wife. She can still vividly recall the setting: your old bedroom in Montauk. Less than a year out of college, both you and Wanda were being frugal about the whole marriage thing, opting out of checking into a hotel after the festivities the night before.

Wanda smiles to herself at the fond memory. She glances to the side, and the alarm clock reads 5:30. It's too early to be waking you up, or anyone in this sleepy town. Nevertheless, she has to talk herself into extricating herself from your arms if she wants to pull off a very special breakfast-in-bed. A hesitant decision, a quiet sigh, and Wanda's slowly pulling herself from the warmth of the bed. The wood floor feels cool against her bare feet, prompting her to reach for one of your used polo shirts hanging over the back of the desk chair.

She enters the kitchen, her hands immediately getting to work. The spinach and mushroom are her first go-to, swiftly layered with day-old bread, and custard mix, forming the base for her strata. Next come the eggs, which she sets to poach, anticipating the smooth burst of yolk that'll cascade over the muffin once all is said and done. And then finally, bacon—your favorite.

Sparky trots into the kitchen, inevitably drawn by the wafting aroma, his tail wagging in tandem with his eagerness. He settles by her feet, watching with those pleading puppy eyes, occasionally letting out a quiet whine that speaks of his impatience and hope. Wanda chuckles, bending down to ruffle his fur. “You think this will get you a piece, huh?” she teases. But, she already knows that she'll give in, sneaking him a piece or two. He's your and Wanda's baby after all.

After she’s finished plating the meal, she sets them on a tray and carefully carries it back to the bedroom. The morning sun presents itself more boldly, almost spotlighting you in bed. Your face is tucked beneath a pillow, the sheets haphazardly pooled around your waist, revealing the bare expanse of your back, without a care in the world. Warmth floods Wanda's chest. She places the tray on a nearby desk.

Breakfast can wait.

Slipping into bed behind you, she becomes a shadow to your form. Her fingers gently trace the curve of your shoulder, lightly skimming over your skin. A shiver runs through her, and she lowers her lips to your nape. The temptation is too great, and soon, her tongue joins the fray, drawing a wet path down your spine. And then, unable to stop herself, she begins to rub herself against you, a soft moan escaping her lips. The sheer fabric of the polo shirt she's wearing, infused with your scent, rubs tantalizingly against her sensitized skin, heightening her need.

She can't stop thinking about last night, and the times before. She can't stop thinking about you—having you, being had by you. However, as your muscles start to tense, indicating the micro movements of your awakening body, a soft “fuck” slips from Wanda's lips, distracting her rhythm. She waits, a small smile tugging at her lips, silently asking if you're ready to greet the day—together.

You lazily roll onto your back, causing Wanda to reposition herself, now straddling your abdomen. With a drowsy smirk, your eyes half-lidded, you murmur, “Good morning,” squinting at the enthusiastic goddess—my wife, you think possessively to yourself— hovering above you.

Her face lights up, her morning energy nearly palpable. “Morning,” she chirps back, leaning down to capture your lips in a short but sweet kiss. Breaking away only slightly, she gives you a playful eskimo kiss, her nose rubbing affectionately against yours. A giggle escapes you, and she continues until you feel her nose scrunch up from how hard she’s smiling, all the while relishing the sound of her laughter.

When she's done teasing you, she buries her face in your neck. Drawn to the soft, milky expanse of her thighs, your hands begin to wander. As your fingers brush the curve where her thigh meets her hip, the subtle absence of fabric gives you pause. She's without a stitch beneath your polo. Your thumb ventures further south, discovering the dampness tangled in her soft curls. Heat surges to your cheeks, and you bite your lip, stifling a moan.

Wanda notices the slight change in your expression and a devilish smirk forms on her lips. “Seems like you found a little surprise,” she teases.

“Did I?” you smirk, tracing the V-line leading to her hidden treasure, teasing her a little. Wanda's breath catches, her pupils blown. But just as she readies herself for whatever comes next, you suddenly shift upwards, unbalancing her slightly. Reflexively, her legs wrap around your waist, anchoring herself to you. Her hands fly to your shoulders, gripping them for support. With a swift move, you part the front of the polo she’s wearing, exposing the smooth curve of her breast to the cool morning air.

The sudden exposure makes her gasp, but before she can utter a word, you close the distance, taking a hardened nipple into your mouth. Her face contorts in unabashed pleasure, her world spinning as you draw her deeper and deeper into your mouth. It's messy and primal, yet at the same time, it's reverent and sacred—something she has only ever experienced with you. She can't help but squirm, fingers threading through your hair, pulling you closer, urging you on.

Keeping an arm firmly around her waist to ensure she stays secure, your free hand travels down her belly, fingers tracing a sultry path to her soaked center. You leisurely trace her slick folds, gathering her arousal, playing with it.

“Please, baby,” she arches and bucks, grinding her hips, “more...I need more.”

Your lips twist into a devious smirk, reveling in her desperation. Drawing back slightly, you gaze at the flushed, vulnerable state of her, taking a moment to commit the image to memory. “I love it when you’re this needy…” you rasp, the tease evident in your tone.

Oh, but she is. She needs you to claim her, time and time again. She never wants to be anything else other than yours once more.

You lean back in, trailing a path of searing kisses from her collarbone, down to the valley between her breasts. Without warning, you nip at her tender flesh, causing her to let out a surprised gasp. Marking her further, you suck and bite gently, leaving a trail of reddened spots, declaring your claim on her. With every purple bruise you leave, Wanda's moans grow more desperate, more wanton.

When you finally lift your head, her chest is littered with bites, then with a wicked grin, you dip your finger into her wetness once more, circling her entrance but never dipping inside.

“Tell me what you want.”

“I... I want you,” she admits breathlessly, biting her lower lip, eyes pleading. “Please, I need you inside.”

Not wanting to make her wait any longer, you slide two fingers into her, curling them expertly. Wanda's body arches off the bed, her inner walls instantly tightening around your digits, pulling them deeper. Every sound that spills from her lips, the way her body arches, trying to get closer, to feel more of you, tells you just how good you’re making her feel.

Your thumb finds her clit, rubbing it in tight circles, while your fingers continue to piston in and out of her. The room is filled with the sound of Wanda's ragged breaths and the wet, slick noises of your fingers moving within her. As you feel her body tense further, you take a chance and slide a third finger into her, stretching her, filling her completely. The sensation of being so full sends Wanda over the edge.

“Oh, God!” she gasps, her back arching, eyes squeezed shut. Her hands grip your shoulders tightly, knuckles white from the intensity of her climax. Her inner walls spasm around your fingers, coating them with her release, her entire body trembling in the throes of ecstasy.

You keep up the pace, not wanting to stop until she's wrung out from pleasure. Each stroke of your fingers sends aftershocks rippling through her. When it finally becomes too much, Wanda grabs your wrist.

“Enough,” she breathes out, a sated smile curling her lips.

You can't resist the allure of the taste she's left on your fingers. You raise them to your lips, deliberately and slowly, letting her watch as you savor her taste. The move earns a flustered gasp from her.

“You taste so good,” you murmur, your voice low and husky.

Wanda's cheeks redden, but her eyes darken once more, filled with a burning intensity. “Your turn,” she whispers, reaching for you.

Thirty minutes before she can call it a day, the sound of a knock on her office door sends a ripple of tension through Wanda.

She knows that knock all too well.

Taking a deep breath, she calls out, “Yes?” even as she mentally braces herself for who might be on the other side.

The person almost immediately steps in, and—unfortunately, she's correct about who she thinks it might be. Before she can utter a word, he says, “You know, I can't just come in without an appointment, right?”

“Exactly, Vision. You shouldn't be here without—” she starts to say, but he interrupts her by triumphantly holding up an appointment slip.

His cheeky grin widens. “Got one right here.”

Wanda eyes the slip, pursing her lips as she thinks of a retort, keeping her guard up. The game has changed, but Vision's audacity, it seems, remains the same.

“Alright, what do you want? And I wouldn’t entertain anything that doesn’t have to do with the course.”

“Just some clarification about our last lecture,” he says as he closes the door behind him, audibly locking it. Wanda maintains her composure, not letting it show that the small act alarms her in the slightest.

“Go on,” Wanda prompts, leaning back slightly against her desk, arms crossed defensively.

But Vision, without missing a beat, launches into something entirely different. “I miss you,” he starts, and Wanda's posture stiffens, her fingernails reactively digging into her arms rather painfully. “I realize I messed up, Wanda. I do. But I can change.”

“Vis—” she warns, trying to interrupt him, but he barrels on, his voice filled with desperation.

“And if, by any chance, you're pregnant, I'll step up. I promise. I'll be responsible,” he continues, his voice quivering slightly. “You have no idea how happy I’ll be if you are.”

“I'm not pregnant,” Wanda whispers, struggling to keep her emotions in check. It's one thing for him to disregard her boundaries and be reckless with his words, but to assume that she would continue a pregnancy, knowing he's the father? Even the thought of it is sickening.

“And I would still choose not to be even if you were successful in your plans,” she adds, just to spite him.

Vision looks as if he might be sick, his complexion turning pallid, and a faint sheen of sweat forming on his forehead. Wanda has never seen him struck by her words this hard, and she realizes she doesn't have any idea what he might do next.

“I just... I thought…” he stammers, eyes glistening, “I just wanted to matter to you, b-by—”

“By what, Vision?” She cuts him off, her tone icy. “Hoping you'd lock me down by trying to knock me up?”

Vision’s face crumples further, tears spilling over. For all his stature—tall, lanky yet broad-shouldered—in this moment, he's stripped of that facade. His body shake as he tries to hold back sobs. “I didn't... I didn't think it through,” he manages to say between choked breaths.

Wanda almost pities him, but she shakes her head. “If you’re not here for school, you need to leave.” Her voice is cold, but inside, she's fighting a storm of guilt for the hurt she sees in him.

Just then, the shrill ring of Wanda's phone startles them both simultaneously. Vision's eyes dart to the screen as her caller ID lights up, displaying your name. In a split second, desperation and panic take hold of him. He lunges for the phone, but Wanda is quicker. She swiftly grabs it from her desk, tucking it safely into her purse.

“What the fuck are you doing?” she hisses, her back pressing against the desk.

Vision's eyes burn with an intensity that chills her. Taking slow, deliberate steps, he looms over her, his presence imposing in the small confines of her office. “That’s her, isn’t it?” he demands with barely suppressed jealousy. “She's coming to get you now?”

Wanda backs away slightly, her breathing erratic. “Vision, you need to think—”

“I am thinking.” His voice drops to a low, menacing growl. He tilts his head, eyes never leaving hers. “And maybe I'm thinking of doing something you won't like.”

“No!” Wanda pleads. “Look, Vision—okay, okay, let’s talk. Just not here. We can go to your place.”

His gaze narrows, considering her offer. “When?”

“Soon.”

Vision shakes his head. Not good enough.

“Tomorrow,” he states without room for argument, his eyes drilling into hers. “Same time. Like we used to.” The allusion to their previous meetings isn't lost on her.

Wanda's throat constricts, “Fine,” she whispers, barely audible, a clear note of dread in her voice. She hates the familiarity of this situation. Most of all, she hates that she's put herself in this position to begin with.

Suddenly, Vision reaches out, his fingers nearly brushing the side of her face. Wanda instinctively shrinks back, but the space between the desk and Vision offers her little room to escape. Her back is to the wall, both literally and figuratively. She can feel the cold press of the desk behind her, contrasting with the heat emanating from Vision's body. It’s obvious what he's thinking, what he's restraining himself from doing.

Horrified and trapped, Wanda closes her eyes, waiting for the inevitable. But instead of the touch she anticipates, she hears Vision's harsh intake of breath. The realization that she's retreated from him seems to strike a nerve.

Without another word, Vision pulls away sharply, as if burnt. He turns on his heel, storming out of her office. As soon as he’s gone, her legs give out from under her and she slides down to the cold floor, clutching her chest as she struggles for air. The walls of her office seem to close in on her, trapping her in her own spiraling thoughts.

As the room begins to blur, the sharp buzz of her phone breaks through her spiraling thoughts. Instinctively, she reaches into her purse, pulling out the phone. Your name illuminates the screen, and with it comes a flood of emotions—relief, safety, love.

The mere thought of you—so close, just beyond these walls—stops a panic attack from consuming her.

“Would you like to go bowling?” Wanda asks you as soon as she fastens her seat belt.

The randomness of the suggestion takes you aback, and a hearty laugh escapes your lips. But as you glance over to see Wanda's reaction, expecting to see her sharing in the moment's levity, you're met with a pained expression.

Your smile fades immediately, replaced by concern. “Hey, are you okay?”

Wanda mentally curses herself, realizing just how easily you can read her, see past her defenses. Needing to come up with something plausible, she quickly blurts out, “I had something super spicy when you called earlier. Didn't handle it too well, it seems.”

The corners of her mouth quirk up in a weak attempt at a reassuring smile, hoping you'd buy the lie, or at least not press further.

You don’t. “Hmm… how about we take Sparky out for a stroll today?” you suggest.

“A walk sounds great,” Wanda replies, her voice softening.

“Good,” you say, starting the car. “Let's head to the park. A bit of nature might do us both some good.”

The engine rumbles softly as you shift the gears, transitioning smoothly from one to the next. And then, almost instinctively, you reach out to take Wanda's hand, your fingers lacing with hers in a gentle yet firm grip. You hold her hand throughout the entire ride home, giving her fingers a reassuring squeeze whenever you feel them tremble between yours.

That night, while you sleep soundly beside her, she finds herself unable to sleep. She spends the empty hours simply studying your peaceful face. There's a childlike innocence in the way your lips part slightly, a soft snore escaping occasionally. It's endearing, and it makes Wanda smile, even through her turmoil. She imagines traces of age on your face—the lines that will mark years of laughter, the silver that will streak through your hair. She tries to picture herself beside you, her own face carrying the weight of the years, both of you holding on to each other until the last breath. Her smile is teary as she hopes and hopes that this is where she's headed—to this future.

Because tomorrow, she will have to see Vision, and if everything goes well, she'll never have to see him again. Then she will finally express how she needs you to take her back to Manhattan or anywhere far from here, so she'll never have to relive this nightmare she’s created.

The next day comes like any regular day of the week. She kisses you goodbye as you head off to work, and she feeds Sparky to his heart's content before getting into a pinstripe blue blazer set. She fails to notice just how good she looks in this well-fitted ensemble, the fabric hugging her waist perfectly. Her focus is solely on feeling powerful, as she knows she'll need all the strength to finally put an end to things with Vision.

Wanda takes a deep breath, then another, and then two more, before she finally gathers enough courage to knock on the door. Vision answers almost immediately, as though he had been anticipating her knock down to the very second.

The man before her now looks wholly different from the one she had encountered just yesterday. His blue eyes are bright and clear, his face clean shaven. The scent of a cologne she doesn't recognize wafts to her. New, she thinks. It's heady and distinctly masculine, unsettling her slightly.

“Wanda,” he greets with a charming smile, one that reaches his eyes, but doesn’t quite touch the soul behind them. For a moment, she's transported to the countless afternoons she spent here, entangled with him with nothing—not even air—separating their sweating, writhing bodies. His lips quirk into a sly, familiar smile, as if he too remembers those days and expects this visit to be a similar occasion.

“Vision.” Gripping her shoulder bag tighter, almost using it as a shield, she quickly sidesteps him. “May I?” she asks, though it sounds more like a statement as she makes her way into his apartment.

He chuckles softly behind her, the sound dripping with memories she would rather forget. “Of course. After all, you've always felt at home here.”

Wanda's stride falters for a fraction of a second at his words, the implication threatening to pull her under. But she needed to keep her wits about her. If she wants this conversation to go her way.

“Let’s just get to the point, Vision,” she says curtly.

“I intend to,” he replies, closing the door behind them with an intentional finality. Wanda allows herself to glance around, seeking even a brief distraction from what's about to unfold. His apartment is in disarray, a stark contrast to his appearance. Her eyes are drawn to one particular piece amongst the chaos—the finished nude painting he had made of her. The realization catches in her throat. It appears he’s finished it.

Wanda shoots him an expectant look, urging him to speak first.

Vision clears his throat, attempting to sound casual but failing. “Wine? Or should we skip the formalities?”

Her eyes narrow, her patience waning. “We skip.”

“Alright.”

He sighs and drops onto the couch. “Look, I've said sorry over and over, but I’ll say it again. I'm sorry, Wanda. I'm sorry for being careless that night.” His voice lowers, “But I don't regret it.”

Wanda's eyes flash with disbelief. “You don't regret it?”

“No,” he murmurs. “What I regret is that it didn't result in... well, you know.”

The implication is clear, and Wanda feels bile rise in her throat. How could he say something so audacious?

She opens her mouth to retort but he continues, raising a hand as if to hold off her words, “I want to keep seeing you. I can’t stop. Because, believe it or not, I'm in love with you.”

Wanda feels as though the ground has been pulled from under her feet. Every instinct tells her to run, but she knows that this won’t have an ending if she does. Wanda swallows dryly and closes her eyes, trying to piece together a strategy, a way to get through him, a way to get out of this unscathed, a way to ensure he won’t tell anyone about this when she leaves.

“I-I believe you,” she starts. “I think I’ve always known, no—felt, that you l-love me.” Vision nods to her words, his lips curling into a hopeful smile.

“But I have to be honest with you, too,” she continues, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “I took advantage of those feelings, Vision. I knew, deep down, that you felt this way and I still... I still let it happen. And for that, I'm deeply sorry.”

He stiffens at her words, a frown forming on his brow. “Wanda—”

She raises her hand, signaling for him to let her finish. “I don’t love you. It's Y/N. It's always been her. From the very start. What happened between us, it was a mistake, one that I haven't forgiven myself for. Especially because of what it means for Y/N.”

She takes a shaky breath, looking into his eyes earnestly, “You deserve someone who can return your feelings, who can love you wholeheartedly. You're a handsome, intelligent, passionate young man. There are many out there who would consider themselves lucky to be with you—”

But Vision vehemently shakes his head, unwilling to accept it, refusing to acknowledge their end. “I want to keep seeing you.”

“You can't,” Wanda insists, a few tears slipping down her cheeks. “It's over.”

Vision's eyes flash dangerously, the calm veneer shattering in an instant. He takes a step forward, trapping Wanda with a threatening look.

“You think you can just fuck me and then discard me like nothing?!” he hisses.

Wanda backs up, startled. She feels her control starting to slip away. “Of course not. I… you were my friend. I cared—I care about you. But I shouldn't have let it get this far.”

He scoffs, not a word of hers reaching his ears. “So, it's all a game to you? You get to decide when to play and when to stop?”

“No, it's not a game,” she replies, desperate for him to understand. “But I can't keep lying to myself or to you. I can't keep hurting Y/N or you.”

His gaze snaps back to hers, and there's a glint of something dark and foreboding in his eyes. “Maybe you should've considered the consequences of your actions, Wanda.”

She swallows hard, sensing the danger in his voice. “What are you saying?”

“Maybe Y/N should know the truth,” he surmises, his voice dripping with malice. “Maybe she should know exactly who she's been sharing her bed with.”

Wanda feels like she might faint anytime. Panic rises, threatening to choke her. “Vision, please,” she pleads, “you can't do that.”

His eyes remain steely. “Why not? She deserves to know, doesn't she?”

Wanda takes a shaky breath, grappling for words, trying to appeal to his sense of reason. “Yes, she does. But not like this. Not from you. If anyone should tell her, it's me.”

“But you'll never tell her,” Vision says, his voice laced with accusation. “I see it in your eyes, Wanda. You don't have the balls to be honest with her. Because you're afraid. You're afraid she'll walk away.”

Both are poised in this high-stakes game, each waiting, anticipating, guessing what card the other will play next. For a heartbeat, Wanda feels disarmed, Vision's threat too sharp and too real. But as the seconds tick by, something shifts in her. She straightens up, pulling herself to her full height, and when she speaks, there’s no fear or hesitation in her voice.

“You’re not going to tell her,” she declares.

“And what makes you so sure?”

“Because you know I'll hate you,” she says. “And if there's even the slightest chance that I'll change my mind, then doing that wouldn't be it.”

Vision lets out a humorless laugh, but the look in his eyes betrays his indifference. “You think there's a chance you'll change your mind?”

“No,” Wanda says firmly. “It's over.”

The defiant look that had been painted across Vision's face begins to crack. He looks smaller somehow, like he's shrinking back into himself. His shoulders slump, and the facade of control and confidence he'd donned earlier dissolves. The boy from yesterday, the one who seemed so heartbroken, returns in full force.

“Wanda,” his voice trembles, almost as if he's on the verge of tears. “Please, I’m all alone. I told you my life, I told you about my parents, nobody in this world cares about me! And I know I said I’m fine and I can survive without them, but why should I when I have you, Wanda—”

She can't help but pity him, his brokenness tugging at her heartstrings. But she knows that relenting now would mean drowning in the same cycle all over again.

“Vis, you will find someone. Someone who isn't me, someone better for you. Trust that.”

“How can I want someone else when I had you,” he insists with unwavering stubbornness, his eyes growing more frenzied, and Wanda shivers at the unsettling sight before her.

“Maybe you had me,” she says tearfully as she decides to finally drive a stake into his heart. “But not in every way like Y/N has me.”

Before she can register what's happening, Vision's hands are suddenly around her waist, pulling her forcefully against him. The initial shock and his assertiveness make her freeze for a split second. As he starts rubbing himself against her, she feels the unmistakable hardness growing between them.

“Vision, stop!” she protests, trying to wriggle free.

“Can you feel that?” he whispers hoarsely, clearly misinterpreting her struggle, mistaking it for their first time together and all the other times she eventually gave in to his advances. “That's how much I want you. Need you.”

Tears of frustration and fear spill from her eyes. “This isn't right, Vision. Let go,” she pleads, placing her hands against his chest and pushing with all her might.

“Wanda, just—maybe if we—you’ll see. You’ll see that you love me, just let me—”

Her fist connects with his cheek, causing him to stumble a few steps away. For a while, they both freeze in horror, the gravity of the situation sinking in. In his moment of delirium, Vision comprehends what he was about to do to the woman he claims to love, and guilt claws at his guts, wrenching his insides.

On the other end, Wanda's chest heaves with shock and distress. She stands there momentarily paralyzed, the aftershocks of the ordeal still rippling through her. Tears blur her vision, but she refuses to let them fall, not now, not when she needs all her strength. Her gaze meets Vision's only briefly before she pulls herself together. She wraps her arms around herself, and then rushes to the front door.

He yells, “No, Wanda! I…please let’s just—”

But his pleas fall on deaf ears.

Wanda goes straight home after the whole fiasco with Vision. She locks herself in the bedroom, crying for hours, paying no attention to Sparky's worried barks from outside the door. She tells herself that it could be worse, trying to talk herself out of going to the police. If she goes to the authorities, she'll have to give a statement. This would inevitably lead to an investigation into their past, revealing things she doesn't want you to know.

Drained from crying, Wanda's eyelids grow heavy. As sleep overtakes her, vivid dreams flood her mind, each presenting an alternate reality. In one dream she’s back in Vision’s apartment, his arms wrapped around her like a chain, and every time she tries to pull away, the chains grow tighter, pulling her back into his prison. A cold dread settles in her heart, as she struggles and fights, desperate to wrench herself free from his grasp.

The next scenario places her in a world without Vision. It's a life untouched by his influence, where she walks unfamiliar streets and meets faces that do not recognize her. Then, in a sudden shift, she's back at her office on that fateful evening, but the events unfurl differently. The temptation of Vision never materializes. She leaves, unburdened by the weight of a choice she didn't make.

But the relief is short-lived. These dreams meld into a harrowing nightmare, saturated in hues of red and black, where you discover her secret. She tries to call out, to explain, to mend, but her voice is swallowed by the deafening silence of the dreamscape.

In her seemingly endless silent screams, Wanda wakes up. The remnants of her haunting dreams still clutching at her, making her jolt upright. The fabric of the sheets sticks to her body, drenched in a cold sweat. Each breath comes in ragged gasps, as if she's been submerged underwater and has just broken the surface.

The bedside clock reads half past six and panic sets anew. You could be home in an hour, given that you haven't been extending your hours at the office lately. The realization pushes her into a frenzied urgency. Throwing off the sheets, Wanda rushes to the ensuite bathroom. The cold stream from the shower brings a semblance of clarity, washing away the residues of her nightmares.

Wrapped in a towel, with droplets still cascading down her skin, she dashes to the kitchen. She pulls out ingredients, her hands working methodically, albeit with a haste that speaks of her need to keep busy, to keep the demons of her subconscious at bay. She manages to prepare a simple but appetizing meal, but the mere thought of taking a bite threatens to turn her stomach inside out.

The dining table is set, and she seats herself, her gaze distant once again. And she stays there, lost in her own head.

It’s how you find her when you get home at 9:15 in the evening.

You’re quiet tonight. Alarmingly so.

She asks you how your day was, and you respond tersely with a simple, “Good.” She attempts to get you to elaborate, maybe share an anecdote like you usually do, but you dismiss her efforts, attributing your lack of interest in conversation to fatigue.

But Wanda can’t stand the silence. When it’s quiet, the voices in her head are even louder.

So she decides to tell you about her day instead. She swears to herself this is the last day she’ll ever lie to you with a straight face. She talks about the final projects her students have begun submitting. As she describes her favorites, your interest particularly sharpens when she mentions the portrait projects. You pepper her with questions, mostly about who made which, and Wanda offers names that probably wouldn't mean much to you.

After you finish eating, you thank her with a small smile. It's only then that Wanda feels she can breathe again. She leans in, pressing her lips to yours, her longing evident. However, just as she tries to deepen the kiss, you pull away, placing a hand on her shoulder. “Showered without me?” you tease, but it lacks the usual lilt in your voice. She simply nods in response. You playfully tap her nose, whispering, “Naughty girl.” Then, without another word, you're on your feet and heading up the stairs to the bedroom.

She proceeds to clear the table and wash the dishes, all while the sound of the shower fills her ears. She allows herself a small smile, chiding herself for being overly affected by her dream.

By the time she makes her way up to join you, she discovers you've already drifted off, turned away from the vacant space beside you that's meant for her.

She’s positively shaking as she takes the short walk from the parking lot to the classroom, the dread building up inside her like a swelling storm. The thought of facing her class, and especially Vision, sends shivers down her spine. The recent events—the horrifically inappropriate advances and Vision's glaring sense of entitlement—play over and over in her mind.

Her feet eventually take her to her destination, but she remains outside for a full minute. The thought of facing Vision again is almost enough to turn her around. But another, stronger, voice reminds her of her duty, her commitment to her other students, and her own integrity. Moreover, she doesn't want to be alone today, here the haunting events with Vision could replay in her mind without any distractions.

She pushes open the door. It appears to be a typical day, with her students clustered in small groups, engrossed in conversation and seemingly oblivious to her arrival. She swiftly surveys the room and, to her relief, doesn't spot the familiar blue eyes that usually fixate on her by this time.

When she starts her lecture on the final topic of the semester, it flows seamlessly. Still, the end of the course can't come soon enough; continuing here is untenable. She can’t keep teaching here, when these hallways keep reminding her of the mistake that almost cost her everything.

You've been leaving the side of your bed cold for almost two weeks now. Sometimes, your careful movements stir her awake, and she watches you, bleary-eyed, as you go through the motions of prepping for a run, a habit you've picked up quite recently. At first, Wanda would always ask where you’re headed and if she can accompany you. But you'd consistently dismiss her offer, always seeming in a rush to hit the pavement.

She thinks it’s good for you—the exercise. The only aspect of your new hobby that she dislikes is that you typically go before sunrise, where everywhere is still too dark and eerily quiet, and her imagination runs wild of all the worst things that could happen to you while you’re out on your run.

And Wanda wouldn’t admit it, but she can't help but internalize the consistent rejection of her offers to join you. She wonders if there's a deeper reason behind it. When you're out and she's left alone with her thoughts, Wanda can't help but let the guilt seep in. Has she become too transparent? Has something given her secret away? Did you find out about her affair? How would she even begin to explain?

But then you return after your run, with a sense of tranquility, as though the exercise had been a cathartic release of some pent-up tension. However, something still feels amiss. Perhaps it's because she hasn't slept with you since the night she discovered she wasn't pregnant with Vision's child, and all that has passed between you are brief, perfunctory kisses here and there. She wants to discuss it with you, but she doesn't want to appear too eager or guilty. Instead, she remains committed to being a good wife. And even though being a good wife was never about housework, Wanda ensures that every corner of the house sparkles and shines.

Meanwhile, you go about fulfilling your own household responsibilities seamlessly. From tending to minor repairs to ensuring that bills are paid on time, you continue with the routines that have always defined the dynamic of your relationship. There's no sign of resentment or dissatisfaction in your actions. It's almost as if everything is back to normal. This confounds Wanda even more. She starts to question her own memory, wondering if perhaps this distance, this new version of you, has always been present and she just never realized it. It's possible that you've become this way while she was preoccupied with her affair, and she didn't notice how you slowly adjusted to her unavailability.

Of course, she only has herself to blame. She's determined, however, to rectify it and make it up to you.

Which is when the idea strikes her. The dream vacation to Hawaii that both of you often fantasized about but never took due to financial constraints and a tight schedule. With the money from her teaching job, she now has the means to turn that dream into a reality. A surprise trip might be the perfect remedy to rekindle the connection that has worn out due to your busy lives and... her unfaithfulness.

She knows it doesn't atone for her sins, but it's a step in the right direction.

It should have been the perfect day for her surprises. She has two of them—the surprise trip and the news of her resignation from the university. She had just handed you the box with all the Hawaii trip details, and you were about to dive in, when there was a knock at the door.

Two men in dark suits have arrived at the house, looking for her. Detectives—Rogers and Barnes. Wanda uncovers the real reason behind Vision's absence from school, and it wasn't due to personal family matters or a decision to pursue education elsewhere.

He's been in an accident, and they suspect foul play.

Their questions start off simple, touching on the basics. But soon, they feel like piercing arrows as they delve into the phone calls between them, how close they were, and if she ever set foot in his apartment. Throughout the interrogation, Wanda manages to keep a straight face, though deep down she knows she probably can't fool detectives of their caliber. Yet, she silently prays that you don't see past her mask.

“That’s enough,” you interject firmly. “My wife has answered your questions. Unless there’s anything else directly related to your investigation, I believe we’ve covered everything.”

Your intervention when their questions grow more intrusive suggests she's managed to keep you in the dark. The realization that you're still on her side floods her with immense relief.

“Very well. Thank you both for your time,” Rogers says.

But Wanda isn’t done. She has her own questions. She needs to know if Vision's involvement with her is the reason they're here, probing. She wonders if he might have informed the authorities about their inappropriate relationship, and if that somehow relates to his current situation.

“Wait!” Wanda exclaims, her chest rising and falling rapidly. She contemplates asking her burning questions, but with you observing from the side, she suppresses her urge to do so. Instead, she conveys her worry—she is, after all, his teacher.

“Is he… is he okay?”

Wanda's complexion turns ashen upon catching the look on Barnes' face, instantly realizing he's fully aware of her and Vision's relationship. She can barely hear Roger's response, her blood rushing in her ears.

“…that he’s stable. However, he remains in a coma. It’s uncertain when or if he’ll wake up, but let's hold onto hope.”

Oh.

Her secret's safe—for now. But she... she has to be certain. She needs to tie up any loose ends, if there are any.

It's reckless to visit Vision's apartment in daylight, especially right after a visit from the police.

Exiting her car, Wanda's sandals softly scrape against the ground. She pauses to scan her surroundings, her gaze flitting from one building to another. The neighboring houses and apartment complexes stand silent, their stillness almost eerie, as if they've been forsaken. She knows that not many reside in this part of the town, a fact that had made Vision's apartment an ideal hideaway for their secret meetings.

She cautiously approaches Vision's unit, her hand shaking slightly as it reaches for the door knob: locked. A memory surges—Vision handing her a spare key during one of their early encounters. Retrieving it from her bag, she hesitantly fits it into the lock, preparing herself for what she might find beyond the door.

It opens with a muted creak, and a blanket of darkness envelops her. Hesitating at the threshold, she fumbles for a light switch, her fingers brushing against the cool wall before finding it. She'd half-expected Vision's belongings to be packed up, perhaps by a landlord who wanted to move on from the situation. But everything appears untouched, as if frozen in time; dust hasn't settled, and the items scattered about give no indication that the place has been vacant for weeks. It occurs to her that the ongoing investigation might be the reason the apartment remains untouched.

Wanda moves quickly, knowing she shouldn’t linger. Heading straight to the bathroom, she swiftly gathers her toothbrush and a few other personal items she had left behind. As she emerges, her gaze is drawn to the corner where Vision's easel stands. It used to hold a portrait of her, a work he'd wanted to submit for his final project, capturing her in a light she had never seen herself. But now, it’s empty.

A cold rush of panic seizes her. She clutches the edge of a table, her breaths coming in short, ragged gasps. Had Vision decided to move the painting for some reason? Or worse, had the detectives seen it and taken it as evidence? The painting wasn’t just art; it was tangible evidence of their affair.

But then, in the midst of her mounting fear, a memory jolts her—there was another painting, the one Vision had purchased from the gallery where she used to work. With a newfound urgency, she hurries to his bedroom. The scene is disarrayed, with sheets and pillows strewn about. Ignoring the mess, Wanda goes directly to the cabinet where she remembered he last stored it. She yanks open the doors, and her eyes dart around, searching, but the painting is nowhere to be found.

Desperation grips her. If the detectives come across either painting, they'd have more reasons to scrutinize her further than she's comfortable with. Such involvement would be near-impossible to hide from you. Wanda proceeds with caution, scanning the apartment for any lingering items that could connect her to Vision. Unexpectedly, she finds a piece of her lingerie nestled within his sock drawer. Swiftly, she snatches it up. Before departing, she meticulously wipes away any fingerprints from the surfaces she's touched, then dashes to her car.

Once inside, she pauses to draw several deep, steadying breaths. It's overwhelming to think that this is now her reality, teetering on the brink of exposure.

She eventually finds herself falling off the edge when she discovers Natasha’s email on your laptop, mere moments after the crushing realization that you hadn’t bothered to open her gift.

Her instinct is to craft a lie. She searches her mind rapidly, trying to come up with a plausible excuse for the intimate handhold. Maybe she could say it was an old friend from the past, or perhaps a distressed student she was comforting. But one glance at the photo and she knows, deep down, that any excuse would fall flat. The way Vision looks at her, with such unmistakable affection and wonder, betrays any innocence she might claim. Trying to explain this to you or anyone else would be an exercise in futility.

Wanda had played out various scenarios in her mind about how you might discover the truth, but she never imagined it would be through seeking the expertise of your best friend. It was perhaps naive, but she had hoped you wouldn’t notice anything or, if you did, that you'd confront her about it.

But why would you come to her? She's been pushing you away for months, and the only time she truly showed you how much you mean to her was when she was so relieved that she wouldn't be carrying the consequences of her indiscretions in her womb.

In case you need them, the subject of the email says. Need them for what? Wanda wonders. From the way Natasha worded the message accompanying the photos, it doesn't appear you're just discovering the truth now.

No, it seems that you’ve known for a while. Which means—

The pieces fall into place, a chilling realization creeping over her. Wanda's breath catches as she pushes the laptop away, her hand coming up to cover her mouth. The way you had carried yourself, especially around the police—it was far too serene, too measured. When they mentioned Vision's name, you didn't so much as flinch or even show a flicker of surprise.

Her heart beats painfully against her ribs. The calm demeanor, the calculated way you’d been moving about—it wasn't out of ignorance. You knew. And for how long? The thought terrifies her. How many days or weeks has she been living this lie while you watched, silently knowing everything?

Your silence, amplifying her betrayal, eats away at her conscience. The quiet before the storm, she thinks. And she's right in the middle of it.

“Wanda?”

She’s hiding in the bathroom, staring at her reflection in the mirror, practicing a smile and a thousand more expressions even though she's barely holding it together.

“Wanda.”

She couldn't shake the thought of you knowing. Did you have any involvement in Vision's accident? You've never intentionally hurt even the smallest creature, let alone another human being, right?

“Wanda!”

She nearly leaps out of her skin as the bathroom door slams open, and you stare back at her, looking just as startled and taken aback.

“Hey,” she says, forcing a smile.

You narrow your eyes at her, and she shivers under your intense scrutiny.

“Are you okay? You’ve been in here for almost an hour.”

Wanda nods quickly. “I'm fine.”

You continue to watch her for a moment, before saying, “Alright.”

Just as you're about to step away, Wanda remembers the plans for later. “About the dinner tonight,” she starts hesitantly, “with your colleagues from the bank... should we cancel?”

She's desperately hoping you'd say yes. She can't bear not knowing what's going on in your mind. The way you act as if everything's normal is suffocating her. Does she even still know the real you? Every moment you're not cursing her out or confronting her betrayal feels like an eternity.

But you shake your head. “No, let's do it. We already promised them.”

Wanda's heart sinks a little, but she nods in understanding.

“I'll go grab some wine real quick,” you say before leaving the bathroom, leaving Wanda alone once again with her thoughts.

Later, as the last of the guests leave, she's certain you've picked up on her distress, noticing how you kept glancing at your watch and drifting out of conversations. She senses your gaze on her as she escorts Scott and his wife to the car, acutely aware you're observing her every move from the bedroom window.

Though they're older than both you and Wanda, they've only been hitched for two years. Wanda can't help but wonder if maybe things are smoother for them because they waited to get married. But then a familiar warmth washes over her. The memory of how deeply in love she was with you surfaces. Even if you had waited six years to propose, she’s sure that had you suggested it within the first few months of dating, she would've said yes in a heartbeat.

Truth be told, she doesn't regret it now, the timing of it, and everything in between.

All she's uncertain of is how tonight will unfold.

The house lies shrouded in an inky stillness, almost like it’s holding its breath. She carefully climbs the stairs to the bedroom you both share, one uncertain step at a time. The door is slightly open, and you're standing by the window, your silhouette thin and brittle.

“What happened, Y/N?” she asks as she stops a few feet from you. Your eyes are closed, and your body trembles. Though she should be consumed by fear, her only desire is for you to open your eyes, hoping to find the person she fell in love with over a decade ago still there.

“What did you do? Did you cause his ‘accident’?” she continues. But you remain silent, unmoving. “Y/N?”

Still, nothing. Wanda is slowly but surely losing her sanity.

“Did you hurt him? You did, didn’t you? Jesus, Y/N. Talk to me,” Wanda pleads, and then out of desperation she screams, “Tell me what you did!”

“No!” You roar with a primal intensity, reminiscent of a wounded animal in the wild, and the sheer force of it makes Wanda recoil. But she doesn't move away from you. Not at this crucial moment, when she senses how close she is to losing you. “You tell me what you did!”

You stalk towards her menacingly, until you're mere breaths away, and Wanda wants to reach out and touch you, but she knows she'll be burned.

“How you fucked him over and over and over! How you lied to me… over and over and over,” you tell her brokenly.

“Y/N, please–”

“Don’t. You don’t get to talk to me now,” you say, tears gathering at the corners of your eyes. “You didn’t think I’d know? I wouldn’t feel it? I knew from the very first night. Because I know you, Wanda. Every thought. Every look. Every fiber of your being. I know you and I fucking hate you! I didn’t want to hurt him, I wanted to hurt you!”

The confirmation she's been dreading, along with the murderous glint in your eyes, saps the color from Wanda’s face. “Oh my god,” she chokes out, hand clamping over her mouth in horror. “Y/N…”

You try to walk away, but your legs give out, and you crumple to the ground, knees first, like a puppet with its strings cut. The tears flow freely now, unburdened by pride or anger. A raw, guttural sob escapes your lips, echoing the pain in your chest. Wanda, too, collapses, a mirror reflection of your despair, her body shaking as sobs rack her frame.

How could she have ever been afraid of you, especially knowing what you've been through? Beneath it all, she sees the woman she deeply loves, now appearing so fragile and torn apart, all because of her own mistakes. “I'm so sorry...” she whispers, her apology a mere drop in the ocean of hurt between you.

“Was there anyone else aside from him?” you ask suddenly, looking at the carpeted floor before you.

“No,” Wanda answers earnestly.

You offer a wry smile. “He must be really special then.”

She frantically shakes her head. He's not. No one is. It's always been—

“Do you love him?”

“No,” Wanda responds hastily, almost too hastily for your taste. And by the look on your face, she's crushed by the realization that no matter what she says next, your trust in her words may be irrevocably broken. “I thought I did, but no,” she admits. She can't bear the thought of deceiving you further and aims to leave no question unanswered.

“Did you…” you start, staring intently at the ceiling, and Wanda knows exactly what you’re asking even before it comes out of your mouth. The fact that you have to ask leaves her utterly heartbroken.

“...ever love me?”

This was her doing. The very second she acted on impulse and succumbed to temptation was when she truly lost you.

“I love you,” Wanda murmurs, her tear-filled eyes meeting yours, stubborn for her words to reach you. “I know how fucked up that sounds to you right now. But I do, I love you, Y/N.”

“You love me?” your voice falters, making you wince. “You have a truly unique way of showing it.”

How does she prove it? How can she make you believe? Wanda scrambles for tactics, for miracles, for a do-over.

“After all this,” you continue, “you might as well have killed me. Being dead might be painless compared to this.”

“Baby, please don't say that,” Wanda's voice breaks, choked by tears she can't hold back. She feels the urge to reach out, her fingers itching to touch you.

“You don’t get to call me that anymore. Even hearing you say my name makes me sick.” Your voice is steady, each word dripping with cold resentment.

“You can stay,” you say after a while. Wanda senses a fragile hint of hope blossoming within her. But it's quickly crushed when you add, “Stay in this house, for as long as you need. But I'm leaving.”

And it’s here where the panic sets in. The realization that she's on the brink of losing you entirely, not just emotionally but physically as well, hits Wanda like a freight train. The walls of the room seem to close in on her, and the weight of her decisions and mistakes press heavily on her shoulders, making her feel as if she's sinking.

“No,” she whispers. “Please, don't go.”

You start to slide your wedding ring off, and that’s when Wanda loses it. She launches herself at you, capturing your lips into a heated kiss. In the split-second it takes for the golden loop to slip off your finger, a flood of memories rushes over Wanda—the scent of rain as it patters on the roof of the reception, the song playing in the background as you and Wanda sway to your first dance as a married couple, the warmth of your hand intertwined with hers. Those fragments play in a demented, rapid slideshow, and time stretches and contracts, maddeningly so.

For Wanda, it feels like someone's drilled a hole in the base of her skull, letting all the sorrow rush in like a merciless flood. Everything else is white noise. For that brief instant when her lips slot against yours, you don’t push her away. Wanda pours everything she has into this kiss, hoping you'll feel her truth in it. But then, before she even has the chance to deepen it, you’re pulling away and it’s—

It’s over.

Stubborn as always, Wanda tries to hide in your neck, and you feel her tears sliding down your throat. She clings to you with all her might, holding on for as long as she can. But when she feels you gently place your wedding ring into her palm, her face crumples with a pain so profound, she knows she may never recover from it. And then you begin to rise, lifting yourself from the floor. As she instinctively clings to your leg, you take another step, causing Wanda to stumble forward from the sudden loss of support.

“This can't be the end. It just can't,” Wanda murmurs to herself like a mantra, as if repeating it will change the course of reality. She's almost certain you hear her, but it doesn't change your stride; you just keep walking away.

The ring burns in her palm, a searing reminder that her promise of loving and cherishing you always means nothing to you now.

Wanda can't quite figure out how, but you've chosen to remain in the guest bedroom for the evening. She'd heard the engine of your car roar to life, but then it fell silent after just a few moments. Peering out, she’d seen you stepping out of the car, phone pressed to your ear.

Who had you been talking to? An intense curiosity had consumed Wanda, making her wonder who had been on the other end of that call. In the short window they'd been estranged—no, just temporarily separated, because Wanda refused to believe that you'd entirely lost your affection for her—could there have been someone else? Someone waiting in line for their turn?

Now, she stands hesitantly in front of the guest bedroom door, hands clenched in her sides, torn between giving you space and continuing to fight for her marriage. She's torn, but not clueless. It's not just about barging in or holding back; it's about the aftermath. She stands there, frozen, trying to figure out which move won't blow everything to smithereens. Because the time she has with you is running out and there might not be a tomorrow.

Or a you and her. Ever again.

Wanda finally sinks to the floor, her back flush against the cold, indifferent wood of the door. Sparky, pads over, his little claws making almost no sound against the floor. He nestles himself on her lap, making his bed there for the night. She wraps her fingers around his soft fur, his warmth seeping into her, but his presence is a double-edged sword. As much as she adores him, he's going to be the only thing of you she gets to keep, and it's going to be a painful reminder from here on out.

In an act of despair, she presses an ear flat against the door, searching for the tiniest murmur, the faintest shuffle. Anything to tell her what's happening on the other side of this barrier. A barrier that was never there before. She's on the outside, and the thought that you're moving on, building a life sans her, is terrifying.

It's a cruel irony, she realizes. Here she is, just a few inches from you, yet completely and utterly in the dark. And so, she sits, hoping against hope, that at some point during the night, she'd hear the door creak open, and you’d scoop her in your arms and take her back.

She waits, because that's what love does—it waits, even in the darkest of times.

The next morning, Wanda wakes up, surprised to find herself in a bed instead of on the hard, cold floor. She doesn't recall making the trip, but the idea that you cared enough to ensure she slept on something warm and comfortable almost makes her heart leap out of her chest.

However, her happiness is short-lived as she opens the closet and discovers that some of your things are missing. To a stranger, the differences wouldn't be obvious, but she knows which shirt and trousers you chose, and she understands the implication. It means you won't be returning tonight, and perhaps not tomorrow either. When she goes to the bathroom, she finds only one toothbrush, and that's enough to make tears well up in her swollen eyes once more.

“Thanks for picking up,” Wanda says, her fingers gripping the phone tight, holding onto it like she’s drowning and it’s her only lifeline.

“Well, you've called enough times. Figured I'd give you a break,” Natasha's voice, though distant, is biting, as frigid as the coldness that Wanda has been feeling in her bones these past days.

“I need to know where she is. Please.”

A sigh on the other end, followed by a chilling silence. “You think after everything, you still have the right to know her whereabouts?”

“She's still my wife,” Wanda counters, but it’s weak.

“She was your wife,” Natasha fires back, unrelenting. “The last I checked, people who love their partners don't sleep with college kids.”

The words hit Wanda harder than any physical blow could. She's taken aback, gasping for air as if she's been sucker-punched.

“I—”

“She loved you,” Natasha continues ruthlessly, “more than you ever deserved. And you threw it away, for what? Some fleeting thrill?”

Loved? Past tense? Had Natasha just assumed—

Or was that word coming directly from you?

Pushing down the slightest twinge of sympathy that threatens to surface, Natasha picks up on Wanda's faint, broken breaths on the other end. She can tell Wanda's on the verge, and it's familiar, too familiar. It's almost exactly the sound she caught when she was on the phone with you the other night.

“I never meant for this to happen,” Wanda barely manages to say.

“Well, it did,” Natasha snaps, her voice cold. “Intentions don’t change actions. And actions have consequences.”

Wanda’s voice comes off a little strong this time, thick with conviction. “Maybe I deserve this, Natasha. Maybe it’s my time to pay for all the wrongs I’ve done.”

“You think?” Natasha scoffs.

“But you... you’ll never get it. You’ll never understand why I can’t just let go, why I can’t give up on her,” Wanda says.

“And why’s that?”

Wanda's voice trembles with the knowledge that what she's about to say is a cheap blow. “Because you've never been married. You've never committed yourself to someone in the way I have with her.”

That stings, and Natasha can feel her own anger rising.

“Don’t think for a second that just because I’m not married, I don’t understand commitment, pain, or betrayal,” she says, voice low and measured.

Wanda swallows hard. “I didn't mean to—”

“Of course you didn't. But here we are, yet again,” Natasha cuts her off. She sighs, leaning back in her chair, “I’m not telling you where she is. She needs time, Wanda. Time away from you. If she wants to talk, she’ll find you.”

That's the last thing Wanda wants. She worries that distance will solidify your resolve, turning her from an immediate regret to a distant afterthought.

“I need to see her, Natasha,” Wanda pleads, “Just tell me where she is.”

“Why? So you can make things even worse?”

After a tense pause, Wanda plays her last card, “Remember that night after we all went out? The night you and Bruce...” she trails off, not needing to complete the sentence.

Natasha stiffens, instantly knowing where this is headed. “Don’t you dare, Wanda.”

Wanda forges on, “I never told anyone, never used it against you. I kept your secret. You owe me, Natasha.”

The feeling of Bruce's hand against her cheek, the humiliation, the denial—all of it comes rushing back. She never thought Wanda would throw that night back in her face.

“You're really going there?” Natasha laughs hollowly.

“I’m desperate, Natasha. I love her. I can’t lose her,” Wanda’s voice breaks.

The line goes quiet, stretching seconds into what seems like hours. Finally, Natasha exhales heavily, the weight of the decision clear in her tone. “I'll give you an address. Show up, try to talk to her, but if she asks you to leave, you respect her wishes. Understand?”

Wanda swallows dryly. She knows Natasha can enforce her terms if she wants, which means she has no other choice but to comply. “Understood.”

Natasha's parting words would later linger in her mind for hours.

“This doesn't mean I've forgiven you or that she ever will. But you get your shot. Make it count.”

Wanda’s been standing outside the diner for what feels like a long time. She hopes her outfit—a parka over a crisp white v-neck and high-waisted jeans—makes a good impression. A glance in the reflection of the diner’s window confirms her red hair looks glossy and radiant, cascading in waves down her back.

Time and time again, Wanda had turned over every conceivable strategy to win you back. But in the end, they all hinged on the one thing she feared most: agreeing to a divorce. The very thought threatened to break her from the inside, but her desperation to make things right, to show you that she's changed, made this painful decision a necessary one. Wanda had taken so much from you, taken everything you had to offer and discarded it carelessly. Now, it was her turn to give something back, even if it meant letting you go, legally.

She tells herself, repeatedly, that their love story isn't defined by a marriage certificate. They won't end just because their marriage does. She had to believe this; it was the only way she could find the strength to move forward.

Steeling herself, Wanda takes one step forward. Another. Until finally, she’s there.

“Hey,” Wanda greets, doing her best to sound casual as she slides into the booth opposite you.

You give a nonchalant nod, mouth full of your Reuben sandwich. “Hi, Wanda.”

The scent of your cologne is the first thing that hits her, and it’s... different. This one's sharper, crisper, with a hint of citrus, perhaps. It's as if you're purposely shedding parts of yourself that she's grown accustomed to, distancing yourself in the most elemental ways. There's a new watch on your wrist, sleeker than the one she gifted you on your last anniversary. Even the way you hold yourself seems altered, shoulders squared and posture more rigid. Every detail screams of a transformation, a conscious effort to morph into someone she wouldn't recognize.

But why? To hurt her? To move on? To forget? All of the above? It's been just a week, yet the differences are already evident. Wanda dreads to think how much more will change if she goes months without seeing you.

This isn’t going to be easy, and that’s putting it mildly. “Sorry for cornering you like this. You rarely return my calls and it’s been almost impossible to match our schedules,” Wanda admits.

You concentrate on chewing your food, trying to appear perfectly disinterested in what she’s saying. As you take another bite of your sandwich, Wanda studies her intently, looking for any fleeting sign of emotion, but there’s nothing there but a chilling detachment.

“Natasha told me you’re already talking to divorce lawyers,” she continues. She's woken up next to you for more than a decade; she’s not easily deterred by the display of indifference. “If you’re decided that it’s what you really want, then I’ll give it to you. I’ll cooperate.”

“Okay.”

Wanda notices the fleeting moment your eyes dart to her left ring finger before you quickly look away.

“I, uh, got something for you,” she says.

“No, thanks.”

Wanda’s heart sinks as you dismiss her before even knowing what it is. Determined, she pulls out the small ring box and places it on the table, feeling a pang in her chest. “But it belongs to you,” she murmurs.

“What’s this?”

“It��s your wedding ring,” she says, pointing out what you already know. Your expression darkens, frustrated that she misses the underlying meaning of your question—not about the ring itself, but rather its significance right now.

For a split second, Wanda harbored a fragile hope that seeing the ring might stir something within you.

But then you're shaking your head, beginning to say, “I don’t want—”

“I understand,” she says, her shoulders sagging as she leans back into the booth. “But I'm returning it to you, and I’m keeping mine. What you decide to do with it is up to you. However, holding onto it on your behalf isn't something I can do.”

The ring she slipped onto your finger five years ago held all her promises, all her devotion to you. So it hurt that you no longer accepted that, no longer recognized it as yours. And she didn't want to be the guardian of that pain anymore.

“Fine,” you say, reaching for the tiny box and Wanda releases a heavy sigh of relief.

“So, you've got your ring back, and I'll sign the divorce papers once they're drawn up,” she says, mustering all her courage for what she's going to say next. “And then, I'll come for you.”

She watches in surprise as you nearly spit out your coffee, a few droplets escaping past your lips. As you hurriedly reach for a napkin, Wanda can't help but offer a gentle smile, always finding your occasional clumsiness endearing even in the middle of breaking her heart.

Your wide-eyed stare meets hers, speechless.

Her smile fades slightly, replaced by a melancholic self-awareness. “I didn’t want to believe you when you told me that night that you hated me. But I guess that’s better than indifference.”

“I don't hate you, Wanda,” you say. She can tell you're telling the truth, and she smiles a little at that.

“You have no idea how much that means to me,” she laments. “Thank you.”

She takes a deep breath, knowing she needs to be clear, to lay everything on the table. “I’m not going to give up on you, Y/N. On us. What we have, and I’ve thought a lot about it, is something I’ll never find in another.”

“I’m not telling you this to get a reaction out of you,” she continues, “I know you’re not exactly thrilled at the idea of me pursuing you, but,” she falters, the first sign of her vulnerability. “This time, I want you to know everything. I don’t want you to be blindsided by my intentions, so I’m giving you a heads-up.”

“Wands,” you say, the nickname slipping effortlessly from your lips, and she has to fight the instinctual urge to reach for your hand across the table. “You can’t torture yourself like this.”

“I’m not,” she assures you. “I just refuse to give up on my dream.” She senses the skepticism in your eyes, and she can't blame you, not after everything that happened in the recent weeks. You’re my dream, Wanda had confidently and lovingly written in her vows. The memory of that day, with the weight of those words, is as vivid in your mind as it is in hers.

She's always been the type to hold onto what she loves, never letting go without a fight. But seeing the dark circles under your eyes, the sunken weight of your cheeks, she knows the very sight of her is taking a toll on you. And so, she’s leaving, for your sake.

“I'll see you soon,” Wanda says, getting up to leave. She hesitates for a moment, considering whether to go for your cheek, if you'll allow her. However, the lack of response from you pushes her to take small, shaky steps toward the door and out of the restaurant.

It isn’t over. Wanda’s made up her mind: she won't give up on you. Maybe she's the villain in this story; and hell, there's probably someone out there, all primed and polished, perfectly poised to love you without the scars and rough edges. Except, she doesn’t care, even if she knows she’ll be diving headfirst into the storm.

She swears that someday she'll be on her knees, asking you to marry her again.

#wanda maximoff x reader #wanda maximoff x vision #wanda maximoff imagine #wanda x you #wanda maximoff #my writing #category: angst #iss #my fic #wanda x reader #wanda x y/n #natasha romanoff #vision

575 notes · View notes

atangeledskein · 6 days ago

Text

Ever since I watched Tennelle Flower's video analyzing Chikai and Don't Think Twice a few months ago, my mind felt like an egg that had been cracked open, leaking yolk all over my writing and my daily life. I'd heard these two songs through my Utada rotation on Spotify over the years, thought they were pretty, never thought to look up the Japanese lyrics, etc. I think even if I had, without the context of being songs written specifically for Kingdom Hearts, I would have remained blissfully ignorant, never knowing just how much they could inflame the torch I carried for SoRiku in my heart.

Link to the video, for reference -

youtube

All my thoughts after watching this video were stuck between two, major and immoveable truths -- one, that I 100% agreed that Chikai was from Riku's point of view (on top of the perfect lyrics, it played first the first time during his reveal trailer, after all), and two, that as much as I wanted to agree with Tennelle, I couldn't think of Don't Think Twice being from Sora's pov with the same conviction. I thought it could make a neat inspiration for fanfic, being so full of longing and portraying an unfulfilled connection between two people. It clearly expresses a desire for closeness, a gratitude for being a part of this other person's life. But underlying all of it is a bittersweet frustration that their feelings aren't being returned, that even after making promises to change they are practically begging for any hint of affection from the other person. It made no sense to have two people, mutually declaring their love and a desire to stay together, being framed in one of the songs as having unrequited feelings.

So I sat on it, listened to it, sang it, watched more videos, and finally came to a different realization. Don't Think Twice is from Kairi's point of view.

And all the puzzle pieces fell nicely into place.

How did I live in a kingdom of thieves And people who say things they don't really mean - Kairi's early life in Radiant Garden

You're only everything I ever dreamed Ever dreamed of - Kairi's desire for Sora in her life, his steadfast companionship, is a balm to her lonely soul

I want you for a lifetime So if you're gonna think twice, baby I don't wanna know - Sora's initial rejection and hesitance over sharing a paopu fruit with her; she doesn't want to know the real reason, or how he feels, she just needs him to take it and give her peace of mind

If you want to take it to an even higher level All you gotta do is say the word, you know I'll follow - She's still waiting, hopeful for some word of affection, some sign that Sora is willing to give her a chance and take the next step in their friendship If you want to make it happen, nothing's impossible All you gotta do is say the word, the walls will crumble If you want to make it happen, nothing's impossible - Kairi's unrequited longing is so clear here, how desperate she is for a chance to be what Sora wants, even though he is still giving her no sign that it's going to happen.

This block of lyrics is really where I started to doubt that this song was from Sora's point of view. The line "nothing's impossible" and all the sentiment around it feels really naive, like a schoolgirl with her first unrequited crush. A relationship of mutual affection isn't built on breaking the laws of reality, on forcing something that's impossible to become real. This struck me too heavily with a feeling of, "I'll change, I'll be anything you want, just say the word and I'll be everything you need, I promise." But why should there be a need to change in the first place, unless they know deep down that their feelings aren't returned?

I won't go deeply into Chikai's lyrics, since I think it's a given that it's from Riku's perspective. But I do want to point out the contrast between the two songs and how difficult it is to think that they're being offered as the sentiment of two people that have the same feelings for each other. Chikai is all about the awe and wonder of discovering that their secret feelings are actually mutual, that their self-perception of unworthiness hasn't chased away the other person or gotten them rejected. And from that point onwards it's nothing but pure conviction, an outpouring of their deepest feelings, and a declaration to keep their most precious person close for the rest of their lives. It's a vow of everlasting love.

And who has always been at the center of the love triangle between the Destiny Islands trio? Sora, of course.

So it makes sense to me that both of these songs are being sung TO Sora. One, wishing for more but knowing deep down that their romantic feelings are not returned. The other, expressing their disbelief that they were chosen, and then charging full-speed ahead without hesitation (I love you too, I want you in my arms forever, let's get married).

And there's my analysis. SoRiku is endgame.

[As an aside, I have to thank the existence of MDZS for even more firmly cementing Chikai being from Riku's pov. I think I would have fallen into that uncertainty that our fandom is often plagued with otherwise, because SoRiku is built on context clues rather than explicit narrative, and we deal with a fan-majority that is indifferent to (or outright hates) any mention of homosexuality in the game. But if I had been presented Chikai without knowing it was from KH, and been asked to think of a character it could have been written for, I would immediately pin it on Lan Wangji and his feelings for Wei Wuxian. The instant change from, "Wait... you feel the same as me?" to: "I love you too, I will promise you forever, let's go get hitched," is too on-the-nose to ignore. I wonder if Utada is a secret MXTX fan...]

#soriku #soriku is endgame #Youtube #rikuisgay

46 notes · View notes

ellevandersneed · 3 months ago

Text

the scared, wrinkle skinned infant, that yolk barely gestated but kicking and screaming on this earth for 25 years deep inside me next to my heart and lungs: "we gotta find away to turn our late night melancholy into abstract humor! likes equals profits! attention is money, time is meaningless! we can't die, someone please tell me we can't die!"

the watchful owl, with its claws flecked with mouseblood and dripplings of red staining the white feathers under its beak. the wise owl who was never wise, was only an animal pretending, because she was told she had to be the wise owl because all owls are wise and because you seem wise you must be an owl and because you seem like an owl you must therefore be wise. the owl replies to the infant, her eyes flashing: "what is to be gained by talking? what do we gain through attention? what does it mean to gain anything? Shouldn't you know better by now? Don't look at me, I'm you! I can only know as much as you do. But, what I know and what I think are different things. I think you will not be happy if all you do is tell jokes. I think you will remain a weak little scrap of flesh if you forget that time is passing, if you forget that death is around the corner. I think its time you remember your mistakes. Slow down, slow down."

The owls eyes widen and close as the infant looks up at her, beads of sweat sliding in and out of folded skin. The baby is so old, suddenly. The hairs on its head appear thin, limp. The pudge of his cheeks have begun to droop, gravity has taken its toll. The crows feet peck at the corners of his eyes and the bags beneath his eyes carry decades.

"Do you remember," said the Owl, " when I tried to eat you? I wanted you to shut up. I was sick of your snivelling and your short sighted dreams. I thought that the salt from your constant tears would keep you flavorful and your hot running blood would have boiled your insides perfectly. When you passed through the stones in my gizzard, I thought everything was finally over and that I could live freely and stretch my wings. I was happy to wander and to hunt and kill as I pleased. But one day I opened my mouth and your voice came out. And I started noticing it again and again. In an old barn I found a mirror and saw that my body had become translucent, and you were right there, in one piece, next to my heart and lungs, stretching and kicking and howling as you always had. Do you remember how I forced you back out and vomited your wet, sorry flesh back onto the floor of our house? I am stuck with you, and you with me. We are happy prisoners in here. Can we not compromise?"

She spoke as if she had both rehearsed this moment and was speaking of it for the first time. There was a measure to her voice, a sort of croon. Yet, some of the words were pronounced wrong. The measure broke and reformed and broke like the bones of an arm doomed to a life of chronic pain. The infant closed his eyes and, of course, cried. The infant only knew three states of being: he wanted to be a child forever and this he achieved: second, he wanted the current moment, whatever that may be, to last forever; thirdly, he wanted to close his eyes and wake in the future, expecting to be a different thing that he is now. States one and two are quite similar, but with the key difference being the understanding that only the second state is obtainable, if only temporarily. He doesn't really want to be a child, just to stop drifting further away from childhood. He is happy being immature but never childish. The three states of being are all happening simultaneously. They are called "The Was, The Moment, and The Time After." When they are held together tightly, and bound by the string that binds all things in the metaphysical, or better yet the space between the mind and the body and the world, the fourth place they call it, they may be called "The Want." The Owl gave them these names.

The Owl knew all of this, and was narrating. Or she thought she was. This is the failed wisdom of the Owls of the world. The moment of coming up short. Who is else speaking now but the whole, the entire being. This is not the same as when the Owl swallowed the infant, as one had tried to stifle the other and thus suffered. This is when the Owl and the infant, and the other voices who have not named themselves tonight, dissolve into water and combine into a great ocean that stops moving except for the shimmer where the moonlight hits its surface. I think, and now I have become I - I think that the ocean is empty, but this is merely a parlour trick or more aptly put a faulty defense mechanism. A hex, maybe. I cannot see under the shimmering moonlit surface. It is not impenetrable, others can see into it and often see something different from one another. This is an aspect of life. I know that the ocean is made up of the Owl and the infant and the many others; the things that visitors and strangers cannot know so intimately, but I cannot see anything beyond this. However, when I gaze in now, I could swear I saw a shadow moving. The outline of whales. I am not savvy on whales. Sperm, humpback? I can see shades of silver streaking. Beluga? I saw one of the only baby Belugas in captivity many years back. It was such a little thing, and followed its mother eagerly. It was beautiful. Just a baby. I close my eyes. The sea is breaking up. I close my mouth. The infant is crying. The valves tighten shut. The Owl contemplates killing the infant. It knows the blood on its claws can never wash off. It think it knows everything.

#writing #vent

9 notes · View notes

chenanigans-draws · 8 months ago

Text

A new Cherry ref sheet again! She has to stop changing so much! This is her as of level 14!

I'll talk about some stuff under the cut!

Cherome "Cherry" Sedum

Cherry is the dnd PC I've been playing as for the past 2 years. She is shy, compassionate, blunt, but overall a sweetie pie. She wants to save the world from IMMINENT DOOM so she can go home to her parents and sister. Also to have her first birthday party when her next birthday rolls around.

She loves her 2 families (the Flockless and Chamily), her dolls, eating, fruits, bugs, and drawing. She dislikes fires, explosions, loud/repetitive noises, being in a locked/small room, and bath time.

Fun Facts

INT is her highest stat because she drank the yolk of a magic Giant Golden Egg that raised a random stat by a random number (I rolled a 7)

She has not been knocked unconscious YET whereas the rest of the party has, some multiple times

She can cast the highest level spells out of the party

She has carried a Potion of Poison resistance for over 80 sessions and still has yet to use it.

----

Stats

STR - 12 (+1)

DEX - 14 (+2)

CON - 16 (+3)

INT - 20 (+5)

WIS - 14 (+2)

CHA - 18 (+4)

HP - 103

AC - 13 (some silk armor gets her to this)

Resistances - Fire, Necrotic, Radiant

Languages - Celestial, Common, Sylvan, Telepathy

Best Skills - Religion (+10), Persuasion (+9), Insight (+7), Medicine (+7)

----

Spells

Cure Wounds is from Gift of the Metallic Dragon

Identify and Misty Step are from Fey Touched

Sending is from her Rocky Talkies (Sending Stones)

Legend Lore and Fizban's Platinum Shield are from her cloak aka Dragon-Touched Focus (Wakened)

----

Her Outfits

Each outfit is separated by geared up, without gear, and geared up with her cloak.

Undies

Cherry dress; belated birthday gift from her parents

Shirt and skirt; from her parents

Cherry overalls and shirt; from her parents

Pyjamas; fixed her old pyjamas into a dress for her due to her growth spurt

----

Her Fave Items

Lucky Mary was a gift she got when she turned 1. It was one of the things her parents put in her pack when they were coerced into giving her to the church

Cressabell "Bell" was given to her by Cresel to help with her nightmares. It was the first gift she ever received since she was a baby.

The Confetti Wand was given to her by Porccy when she expressed liking confetti and throwing it. Porccy was the former BBEG at the time

Seashell was a gift from Shelley. She bought it for her because she had been so brave and working so hard to fix things in Selva.

The Rocky Talkies (Sending Stones) were given to her by Ciskas. After we revived him and things settled down a little, Cherry asked if he knew a way she could talk to her parents even when they were far away since she didn't wanna rely on Cres who needed their Sending spell for their cousin. He made her the Sending Stones which she called "Rocky Talkies". She has one and charents have one.

#dnd #dnd oc #aasimar #sorcerer #original art #cherome cherry sedum

7 notes · View notes

anxiouspregnantlady · 1 year ago

Text

bye bye baby

i think i've been afraid to write here, to make it feel real, but last thursday we had our u/s and discovered a 6+4 sac with a yolk sac (maybe an amniotic sac??? i think?) and - no baby. of course i feel grief & anger & numbness but also - the relief is unreal. it feels good to know.

so many thoughts.

i'll start with technical things... finally got an hcg done on sat and it was 15499 so more consistent with 6w. waiting on monday's value. had another ultrasound this morning and the sac shrank perhaps ever so slightly but otherwise same. they were (in my opinion) unreasonably concerned about ectopic b/c of a cyst on my right ovary but i always have a cyst on my right ovary and i'm not medical but .uh. isn't that the corpus luteum (also i happen to know that i ovulated from the right).

care-wise. i continue to be so grateful for LWC midwives, they have been absolutely lovely. both u/s techs have been ok. there is apparently a NP midwife at LWC who expressly does early pregnancy loss stuff (!) so i have felt medically taken care of.

i had an itch to want to see if i could do tissue testing on the miscarriage but am probably leaning away from it - too much trouble, worried about scarring, worried about billing (esp without good health insurance). i'll just never know.

i have a strong suspicion that an embryo did form this time, we just caught it too late and it had already stopped developing & had been reabsorbed. i was quite nauseous (still a bit nauseous) & we didn't get a yolk sac last time. and there looked to me like there was an amniotic sac, though it was empty. and it's just a hunch.

i've been so tired, both jetlagged but also just grief. at 5-6 pm i lose the ability to stay awake entirely. you couldn't pay me enough money to stay awake. i just lose consciousness wherever i am. and again after p "puts me to bed" at 8pm i cannot get myself out of bed and sleep for 15, 30, 45 minutes. And then when midnight rolls around i absolutely cannot sleep, i take melatonin, baths, etc. and p has been up at weird hours anyway, crying mama, mama, mama.

showing up to work has been ... well, it's been a miracle that i have been. i did cancel a thursday night appointment after the u/s but other than that i've been fudging my way through, trying not to let show how raw and bruised and completely depleted i am.

k has been wonderful. he is keeping me going. p somewhat understands what is happening. yesterday during bath she announced she had a baby in her belly, and then plucked it out and said she was putting it in mama's belly. she knows mama is going to the doctor a lot and always asks if i am still hurting. i told her the baby is gone. i don't know how to walk this line between being honest with her and protecting her. i kind of think that she must understanding the workings of embryonic life/nonlife better than me, being that much more proximate developmentally/spiritually. only a few years ago she was also in the womb! but she is generally still her happy, curious, thriving little self, and we keep thinking how depressed we would be without her.

sigh.

it was too good to be true.

i only asked the universe for one more baby.

i think, maybe even more than wanting to have this baby, i wanted to never ever ever have to fucking go through this again.

(but i did really want to have this baby)

i am back in the world of Not Knowing. i don't know how many more pregnancies i will have or how many tries it will take to have those pregnancies, or how many weeks each of the pregnancies will last. i still don't know! why! my! body! can't! carry most pregnancies to term!

k thinks maybe we were just too sick and stressed from all kinds of bugs (including covid) and from the 40 hours of travel and 13hr timezone changes and his loss of employment and loss of insurance. and that's why we miscarried. i don't think the line is so clear, but i think one big takeaway from this whole thing is: i need mothering. in my desire to mother another child (and in my struggle to mother the one i already have), i sorely need mothering. i need a warm, generous, wise, and proximate figure to be keeping tabs on me - i need to be on their radar - i need their hugs, hot drinks, meals, nurture, comfort, advice, solace, confidence, life experience.

so my body is still clinging to this pregnancy (coming up on 9 weeks), and i suspect it will be awhile before I start bleeding. maybe christmas.

and then?

and then we are definitely going to take a break. there is (just a bit) less hurry this time - we have our hands full - and i do want to develop some better habits re: nourishing myself, caring for myself. i've barely eaten in the past 5 weeks. and anyway we are going to wait for k to get a job and new health insurance, and we are focusing on some other dreams too.

and then i want to do a bit of testing, maybe a hysteroscopy/endometrial biopsy, a few clotting tests that we missed, re-check my thyroid, etc. have a WTF appointment w dr. kelly/make a plan.

and then we'll see. immediately after i got the news i felt strongly that i could never go through this again, or risk going through again. i felt that we would just have to walk the path of accepting that we were done growing our family. it felt good to be like, HELL yah we won't contribute to overpopulation or subject our unborn child to this mess. but that doesn't really resonate... i still really want to try. to have a child and to raise them so that it is worth it.

so many things hurt about this. hella everyone is pregnant or giving birth. i hate the dejavu with our first pregnancy, feels stuck/stagnant & like we are destined to be in and out of sad ultrasound appointments. feel like we wasted our trip.

0 notes

sunkissedpages · 3 years ago

Text

instead of you [part fourteen]

pairing: [best friend’s brother] tom holland x college!reader

summary: you didn’t expect to spend your summer pretending to be your best friend’s girlfriend- then again, you didn’t expect to fall for your best friend’s brother, either.

warnings: swearing, alcohol consumption

word count: 2.6k

series masterlist

“Just that you’re not technically a chef yet,” Tom explained defensively. “You’re not certified.”

“A chef doesn’t need a piece of paper to call themselves a chef,” Leo countered. “Anyone can be a chef. But don’t tell the WAC I said that.”

“Yeah, Tom haven’t you ever seen Ratatouille?” you teased.

“Great movie,” Leo added. “Sam, great job on your dough,” he reiterated.

Sam stuck his tongue out at his brother across the table who rolled his eyes in response as Leo picked up his ball of dough and rolled it in his hands.

“Tom, yours is still a little tough. Keep working on it.”

He nodded and took his dough back to continue kneading it. You noticed his jaw clenched subtly in frustration, but he didn’t say anything else. You watched as he rolled the pasta dough with a little more force, maybe a little too much.

Leo checked yours next and gave you similar feedback to Tom’s, even though Sam had helped you with yours. You didn’t want to think about what kind of feedback you would have gotten on your own.

Your dough was still flaking apart when you went back to working on it, and you tried desperately to hold it together with little success. Sam had left your side to help his mom so you were on your own.

At least Tom was also struggling. You felt a little better knowing he was miserable too.

You were starting to sweat with effort, you were so out of shape that even cooking had you catching your breath. You had thought this was going to be fun, but instead you were having flashbacks to high school P.E. class.

Leo made his way down the rest of the table and checked everyone else’s dough before circling back to you and Tom. He took over for Tom and instructed Sam to finish kneading yours so that he could move on with the lesson. It was embarrassing to be singled out, but Sam assured you it wasn’t your fault. He wasn’t making much progress with yours either.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with yours,” Sam whispered to you.

“I probably did it wrong,” you hissed back.

“I watched you do it, you did it the same way as everyone else.”

“Then why is it being like this?”

“Sometimes food has a mind of its own,” Leo interjected, making you realize the entire class had been listening to you and Sam’s back and forth. “This is good enough, though. We can set it aside with the other balls of dough to let them rest while we make the fillings.”

You and Tom set your sad pasta balls on the counter with the others before moving to the sink to rinse your hands.

“I think they’ll still taste good,” Tom said thoughtfully as he offered the bottle of soap to you and pumped some into your hands.

“I hope so.”

“It’s pasta, it’s almost impossible to fuck it up.”

“Yet somehow we still managed to.”

“Some would say it’s talent,” he said and shrugged.

You bumped his shoulder with your own as you fought over the water stream. You managed to stick your hands in first and Tom put his above yours only for you to shove them away.

“Hey!”

“You’re completely ruining the purpose of washing my hands!”

“I have soap on my hands, you have soap on your hands, what's the issue?”

“And you’re washing off your germs and they’re going on my hands now!”

“Fine, fine, I’ll wait my turn,” he seceded and let you finish washing your hands before he rinsed off his own.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Making the fillings for the pasta was a much simpler process than making the dough. All you had to do was mix certain ingredients together. It didn’t matter what order you added them, if you whisked fast or slow, the only important thing was that everything made it into the bowl one way or another.

You worked in pairs for this step. Sam mixed together the pesto filling while you did the parmesan-truffle one.

“This is different than the pesto I make,” he said, looking at the mixture in his bowl.

You frowned. “But I like your pesto.”

“It’ll still be good, baby,” he assured you with a kiss to the forehead. “Don’t worry.”

When the fillings were done it was time to revisit the balls of dough and roll them into pasta. Sam explained it to you like rolling Play-Doh, but it was far more difficult in your opinion. Play-Doh was nowhere near as stubborn as this. The pasta dough somehow retained tension, and would bounce back every time you tried to stretch it.

Sam ended up having to help you and Tom because both of you were starting at a disadvantage with your fucked up dough.

“I never want to hear you say I have it easier than you ever again,” Sam warned as he folded your strands of dough into raviolis.

The class had moved on to the final step, shaping and filling the noodles, but you had already tapped out. Sam was done with his portion before you had even finished one so he had taken over for you.

“I’m sorry for saying that,” you said, remembering all the times you had teased him for stressing out over his ‘soufflé final’ or ‘crepe labs’. “I would much rather be writing a paper right now.”

He shrugged. “Everyone has their strengths.”

“I’m starting to think that Ratatouille movie was bullshit,” you groaned.

“How ironic,” Tom snorted across from you.

He was really starting to get on your nerves. But you let his comment go, not allowing your temper to get the better of you. He was still Sam’s family, even if they had a... complicated relationship.

When the class finally settled in the dining room of the restaurant to eat you were sweaty, sore, and exhausted. You could feel your skin sticking to the leather seat, and you felt severely underdressed. Back in the kitchen you hadn’t been so self-conscious. But now you couldn’t stop thinking about your appearance.

The atmosphere was much more sophisticated. The lights were dim, and soft music played in the background. All of the other guests were following an unspoken black-tie dress code while the fifteen of you were still wearing your disposable aprons, only now they were covered in flour and egg yolk.

And to make it worse-

“Smile!”

Nikki held up her phone and motioned for you and Sam to scoot your chairs closer together. You took a deep breath and complied, leaning your head against your fake boyfriend’s and managing a grin. You really didn’t want this moment to be immortalized, but you didn’t want to be difficult either.

The camera flashed once, then again. Sam wrapped a hand around your waist and pulled your body against his, pressing a kiss to your cheek for another picture. You scrunched up your face as the flash went off, the tickle of his breath against your skin and the feather-light touch of his lips making you squeeze your eyes shut.

“That’s a good one!” Nikki complimented, even though you were sure it wasn’t as flattering as she was making it out to be.

The pasta was served with a glass of red wine for everyone. Sam was right, the pesto was different from his, but it was still good. It was no match for his recipe, but the handmade pasta did give it a few bonus points. You were sure you hadn’t gotten any of the noodles you made because all of the ones on your plate were perfect. It didn’t feel fair that you got to enjoy somebody else’s hard work while they got your shitty excuse of a ravioli.

But as the wine dwindled from your glass the negative thoughts began to ebb away too. Your muscles, though still sore, relaxed slightly and you rested your head on Sam’s shoulder as everyone else finished their meals around you. The conversation carried on without your contribution. Your social battery had died hours ago, but you were content to listen to the Hollands chat with other students at the table.

You weren’t a huge fan of wine, but the one served with dinner was palatable, and to be honest you weren’t one to turn down complimentary alcohol anyway. It tasted more expensive than anything you had ever drank, like the equivalent of velvet on your tongue. You finished your glass and the rest of Harry’s.

The next few days in Florence passed in a similar fashion. You ate a lot of carbs, drank a lot of alcohol and let the business of the itinerary overwhelm you. It was getting tiring, living in an act. Trailing along behind the Hollands like a dog, worn on Sam’s arm like an accessory.

You had known what you were getting into, and you were trying your best to enjoy the experiences- because who the fuck knows when you’ll ever get to go on such a nice vacation again, but pretending to be in love with your best friend was a harder feat than you had thought.

It felt like being in a school play. Every move and phrase had to be intentional. You tread the lines of your relationship with rehearsed expertise. And you had to watch what you said, because everyone’s eyes were on you. At least that’s what it felt like.

Sam’s parents were easy. They fully bought into your lie, seeing what they wanted to. They usually left you to your own devices, too. His brothers were the ones who needed convincing. Not even Harry, though. Tom was the problem. Tom was always the problem.

You were in Rome now, walking back to the hotel from the Colosseum. Sam had his arm slung around your shoulders and was talking his twin brother’s ear off about the Gladiators and inaccuracies in films about Ancient Rome.

You didn’t think you’d seen him this excited the entire trip. It was cute, the way he talked with his hands and looked off into the distance whenever he was really engaged in something. Harry was also cute. He was trying his best to keep up with Sam, nodding his head at all the right points, asking questions when there was a pause in conversation.

“Yeah, gladiators fucking unionized,” Sam explained. “They put their lives on the line all the time, ya know? Might as well get benefits.”

“If I was a gladiator I’d join their union,” you said, adding to the conversation for the first time in a while.

“There were women gladiators too, babe! You totally could’ve been one.”

You laughed. “You remember my season on the intramural dodgeball team? I wouldn’t last a day. But I appreciate the thought, Sammy.”

You had dinner in the restaurant attached to the hotel lobby. Nikki passed around her Canon for everyone to look through the pictures from the day while a bottle of limoncello was passed around the table.

You’d scarfed down your pasta and passed on dessert in favor of another shot of limoncello. Rookie mistake.

In the past the sugary drink had always tasted like cough syrup to you, but this batch tasted like straight-up lemonade. You were tipsy, bordering on drunk, but nowhere near blacked. Nikki and Dom turned in around shot three, leaving the tab open for the four of you. Sam went upstairs next, having gone too hard too fast on the limoncello (he was on shot five when his parents went back to their room).

Then it was just You, Harry, and Tom. You told Sam you’d join him in a bit after the pianist played a couple more songs. In all honesty, the music reminded you of Sam. Back at school you could always find Sam in the music hall if he wasn’t in the culinary building. You’d always hear him playing as soon as you walked through the double doors. You could always tell it was him at the keys by the way the playing sounded. He was self-taught, but still a genius in your mind. He didn’t need any formal training to make beautiful music, and that’s what you loved about it.

When he moved out of the dorms and into an apartment he bought a keyboard, and you’d spend nights together in his room illegally pirating sheet music for him to learn new songs. He’d play whatever you requested, and if he didn’t know how to play it he’d teach himself.

The pianist in the restaurant played with a little more expertise. The notes sounded refined, perfected. Sam always told you that perfect music was restrained music, that real music had flaws, that a song should sound a little different every time it was played.

After an encore of Beethoven the man at the piano stood from his bench and took a bow, passing his hat around the room to collect tips. Tom dropped a bill into the hat and you did as well, handing it back to the man afterwards. He dumped the contents of the hat into a briefcase and closed the lid of the piano, thanking everyone in the audience for their donations.

“Well, I think I’m going to head up now,” Harry said, yawning for emphasis. “We still have to get up at the ass crack of dawn even though we’ll all probably be hungover.”

“Speak for yourself,” Tom said cockily, then turned to you. “One more shot?”

The bottle of limoncello was almost empty anyway. Might as well finish it off, it’d be a shame to let it go to waste, right?

“Hit me.”

“God, you’re both going to be so fucked tomorrow,” Harry groaned.

“We’ll be fine,” Tom insisted, rolling his eyes at his younger brother.

“Good night, Harry,” you sang, waving at him as he walked off.

“Yeah whatever.”

Tom wasted no time pouring you both a shot of what was left of the limoncello. The restaurant was beginning to clear out so he worked fast, filling the glasses up to the marked line. You both took one and clinked them together before throwing them back.

You winced at the burning sensation in the back of your throat and put the glass back on the table, searching for something to chase the shot with. Your eyes fell to Tom, lingering on his cheeks, his lips, both pink from the alcohol or something else. You flicked your gaze down to his neck, his collarbone that was peeking out from the neckline of his shirt. You thought about how it would feel to kiss him there, to run your tongue over a love bite you’d given him.

You forced your gaze back to his eyes, hoping he hadn’t caught you staring. You had to act uninterested, you couldn’t let on to- but he was staring back. His eyes were intense, and almost impossible to read in the darkness of the room. You knew you should look away, knew you had to keep up appearances, but you couldn’t.

Later you’d blame it on the alcohol, but in that moment you knew the limoncello wasn’t what was making your head spin, or your what was making your vision cloudy.

You were about to leave the table, about to rush to the elevator and back to Sam but then suddenly Tom was kissing you. He cradled your head in his hand and tilted your chin up to meet his lips. It wasn’t desperate or messy like most drunk kisses were. Instead, it was delicate. You swore you could feel every line of his lips against yours, feel his heartbeat through his hands on your cheek.

It was only for a second, not enough time for you to react or reciprocate and then he was pulling away, eyes wide with panic.

“Please don’t tell Sam.”

logging off before i get yelled at but lmk what you think i always appreciate feedback!!

forever tags: @mischiefmanaged49 @bookingbee @cloverrover @captainbuckyy @perhaps-he-schnapped-blog @awkwardfangirl2014 @the-queen-procrastinator @tastingthestarz @sleepybesson @everythingbooknerd @sunshine96love @bitchymathematician @livingincompletesilence @melsbooktrash @swim-deep-or-die @fizzy828 @spider-slutt @theamuz @nedthegay @astroasethic @stuckonspidey @darlingtholland @sgtbookybarnes @tinyplanet-explorers @mildcockandballtorture @uglypastels @gennyld @devin-marie @r-wooooosh @hell-yeah-peter-parker @itssnowingandimstuckinside @relise-thefury @osteporosis @legendsofwholock @peterunderoos @fuckyeahhomerun @nobelwarriorheroes @delicately-important-trash @thwip-it-real-good @claryfray101 @softholand @tomhollandseverything @cool-ultra-nerd @jillanaholland @dinasaur36 @farfromhaz @hanlons-wp @moon-390 @parkerstylesperalta @httpchrisevans @screeching-student-unknown @almondholland @noisyzineeggsbandit @5sos-microwave @quackson-love @smilealways19 @quackeroos @my-patronus-is-mabel-pines @wolvesofwinter @mukesnugget @mytonycinematicuniverse @itsjusttor @percysmcu @peterquillzsblog @lovewolfspirit @biebsmylife95 @a-disappointing-teen-author @justanotherusername80 @b-buckys @sunkisseddreamer @hufflepuffprincess24 @princessxcryxbaby @tinyyoungblood @holyfrickfracks @amii-nyc @clara-licht @veryholland @captainamirica @ultrunning @cocoamoonmalfoy @nellbellzz-blog @bookfrog242 @honeymoonlover @nellabellaa @its-the-solar-system @spiitfiires @tomhollandfangirl1 @parkeromanoff @randomstufflol29 @pogueslandia @hollandswife @bunnyweasley23 @determined-overthinker @madz-holland

send me an ask to be added/ removed from a taglist

#instead of you #iou #tom holland x reader #tom holland x bi!reader #tom holland x fem reader #tom holland x you #tom holland x y/n #tom holland series

419 notes · View notes

sporadicthingcollection · 3 years ago

Note

More baby Duros headcanons pls 🥺

Caaaaaaan do!

*puts on world building hat*

Baby Duros Headcanons!

"Featuring Mama -- yours truly -- and Dad Bane.""'Cause if she don't know her own biology, how can ya expect 'er t' know mine-- back up. What'd ya call me?""Nothing, dear."

Mothers are ovoviviparous, meaning they incubate the eggs internally and birth live young.

"Not Cad. He crawled out of a hole in the ground fully-formed." "Wasn't a hole, it was a trash compactor." "My mistake."

Back when they lived in caves, mothers would leave immediately after birth to hunt, leaving the babies in the care of the father. Fussy babies attract predators, so males developed a response to soothe their infants in the form of purring--

"It ain't purrin'! It's rumblin'! We ain't cats!"

--rumbling deep in the chest. It's a hardwired instinct and fathers often don't realize it's happening until it's pointed out.

"I still can't get him to admit he does it."

Newborns feed on an egg yolk reserve and don't need to eat for about a week after birth, which is when their teeth start coming in. Tiny widdle needle teefs that are incredibly sharp -- scratch fever is a fairly common occurrence among new parents, and disinfectant is an essential part of the nursery.

"Dem teeth ain't a joke. Had t' get a stitch on my trigger finger, de li'l jerk."

When they do start eating, it's on semisolid meats. They're purely carnivorous at this stage and later graduate to include plants. Unfortunately, that means that baby food bears an unfortunate resemblance to wet cat food.

"Smells like it, too." "Don't smell dat bad. Yer jus' delicate." "You don't have a nose. Stay out of this."

Unlike mammals, babies don't have a sucking instinct. Instead, they chew, and a Duros pacifier is just a teether. Tooth cutting is painful for them, but it lasts a very short amount of time.

"The treatment is the same on Duros and Zeltros, believe it or not." "Li'l dab o' whiskey swiped on de gums."

Relatedly, instead of thumb sucking, they chew the web between their thumb and forefinger.

"The way to get 'em to stop dat is de same too." "Pepper oil!"

They make a lot of noises, including trilling for attention, chittering when they see something that arouses their predation instinct, and a purr-like sound they'll make in response to their parents.

"I just about melted the first time she mrrrr-ed when I was holding her." "Ya did melt. Crumpled right t' de floor an' I had t' pry 'er outta yer hands." "And you went on to stare at her for a good hour."

Like ducklings, they tend to follow around anything vaguely Mom-shaped. Carrying infants until they know not to run off is common.

"De li'l lady almost followed another Duros home once. And another Zeltron. And a Twi'lek. And an astromech... Startin' t' think she might need glasses..."

Co-sleeping is recommended to keep them warm, but if that's not possible, special heating pads are available for cradles that give off heat and imitate purring--

"RUMBLIN'!"

--rumbling. Cute li'l beanies to keep their noggins warm are recommended as well.

"Are you guys done yet? I'm gettin' tired." "Just finished up, pumpkin. Go get ready for bed and we'll come tuck you in." "...Can I have a story first?" "Go hop in bed, li'l lady. Daddy'll tell ya 'bout de time he fought an Acklay." "A what?!" "Acklay. Big ugly thing wit' nine legs 'n' big ol' claws. Nasty teeth, too.""...hang on, Acklay only have four legs--" "Nine. Legs. An' a stinger. An' fire breath." "Did you die?!" "Better go brush yer teeth or else you'll never find out."

---

"Catch Us If You Can Masterpost" | To the Mastahpost | Tip Jar

#thanks for the ask!#headcanons #duros #cad bane #dad bane #star wars #irno favara #cad bane x oc #smol bbys #emberly writes

55 notes · View notes

heyyyharry · 4 years ago

Text

Deja Vu (part 2 of 'Drivers License')

(inspired by deja vu by Olivia Rodrigo)

Word count: 2.5k

Read part 1 here

“What the fuck is this?”

Harry flinched as his girlfriend shoved the phone at him. He’d just got out of the shower, hair still dripping wet, but it wasn’t so out of the ordinary that she would start a fight first thing in the morning.

He sighed and gently pushed her phone away from his face. “Baby, if it’s another rumour about me cheating on you...I was with you this whole week!”

“No.” She lifted the phone up to his face again. “That girl just released another song about you.”

Even though Harry didn’t let it show, whenever he heard about Y/N, his heart would always skip a beat. He couldn’t remember exactly when the last time they’d spoken was, but he knew in his last message to her, he’d congratulated her on that new song about him. She’d never replied, and he’d taken it as the answer — they could never go back to the way it was.

It had broken his heart to listen to ‘drivers license’. Y/N had never been the kind of person to be vocal about her feelings. Or maybe she’d expressed it through actions instead of words, and he had been too nonchalant to see? He hadn’t meant to break her heart and leave her in the dust. After all, she used to be his best friend.

“Y/N’s a songwriter. She writes about her own experience the same way I do. Maybe that song is not even about me, babe,” he calmly told his girlfriend, who was standing in front of him with fresh tears in her eyes. He hated to see her cry, and he hated that this wasn’t the first time she’d done it because of him. He tried to reach for her but she stepped back, shaking her head.

“Listen to the song.”

“Baby.”

“Listen to the song,” his girlfriend repeated without looking at him. “Why are you so afraid?”

“I’m not.”

“Then listen to it and tell me it’s not about you, and that she’s not throwing shades at me. I’m so tired of this girl telling the world about how horrible we are as if you had even dated her in the first place—”

“Fine,” Harry exhaled sharply, his eyes pinched shut. He hated that when his girlfriend got mad, she would get so mean for no reason, and the last thing he wanted to hear right now was her insulting Y/N. He knew Y/N. She had always been respectful to his new relationship. However, he wasn’t in the position to tell his girlfriend how to feel about this situation. He knew it was all his fault, so he stayed quiet, took the phone from his girlfriend and sat down on the edge of the bed. His girlfriend stood with her back against the wall facing him, waiting for him to play the song so she could see his reaction to it.

“Go on,” she told him, her voice emotionless.

Harry looked at the song on Spotify. It was titled deja vu. He took a deep breath and one last look at his girlfriend before finding enough courage to press play.

Y/N’s previous song about him had been blasted in every shop he’d visited, all the time when he was filming, every time he was in the car, and now, the moment he heard her voice again, it really did feel like deja vu.

Car rides down Malibu

Strawberry ice cream

One spoon for two…

“Are we there yet?”

“No, stop being so impatient! Just keep on driving!” Y/N said and looked out of the window on the passenger side. The sun was going down, and the horizon was gradually turning the colour of an egg yolk. It was their last day in Miami. They had been filming for every day that week, and this was the only day they could spend just for themselves.

Harry stole a glance at Y/N and saw that she’d finished half the strawberry ice cream while bobbing her head to the song Uptown Girl on the radio. He frowned, making her laugh when she noticed.

“Open your mouth,” she said and fed him a spoon of ice cream.

“Ahh, brain freeze!”

“But it’s good, isn’t it?”

“So good.” Harry licked his lips. The face he made got Y/N laughing harder.

Fifteen minutes later they arrived at a secluded beach. Y/N had found this place when she traveled to this city alone two summers ago and almost got lost.

Together, she and Harry carried their picnic things through a palm forest, and by the time they saw the ocean, the moon had made a fading presence on the pink Miami sky.

Y/N picked up her shoes and ran towards the waves, letting it chase her back into Harry’s arms and nearly knocking him over. Their laughter echoed in the wind as their shadows stretched out long and lanky on the empty beach. In that very moment, it felt to Harry as if they were the only people in this world, and he had a sense of peace that he might never be able to experience again.

“You don’t get to see this in the city,” Y/N said dreamily as she pulled Harry’s jacket tighter around herself. It was dark now, and the sky above them was full of stars. They sat shoulder to shoulder on a picnic blanket, listening to the whispers of the ocean and the wind. Harry used Y/N’s jacket as a blanket because it was too small for him to put on. They’d laughed for five minutes straight when she told him he looked like that monkey from Aladdin and took plenty of photos just to prove the point.

“I don’t want to leave tomorrow,” he said, still looking at the sky.

“Me neither,” Y/N sighed, her shoulder brushing his. There was a pause, and he could feel her eyes on him, so he turned and saw her looking. “When I get home,” she said with a small smile that made her eyes sparkle, “I’ll learn to drive, and when we come to Miami next time, I can drive you to this beach.”

“I’d love that,” Harry said, then made her pink-promise him.

“They went to Miami last week.”

Y/N blinked. The beach and starry sky disappeared in a second, and she found herself once again standing in the fitting room with her stylist and best friend.

“What?” her best friend marched over to where she stood in front of the full-length mirror.

Her stylist was holding the phone up to show her the article. “Here. Harry took that actress to Miami last week.”

“Don’t show her these!” Y/N’s best friend grabbed the phone and put it on the vanity desk as she gestured to the stylist. “You do your work. Enough chit-chatting.”

“I took him there,” Y/N said. She didn’t even recognise her own voice at first because she was too in shock. She didn’t think Harry would do something like that. But let’s be honest -- how much did she really know about him?

It had been a few months since his last text to her, which she had ignored, and now her song had been overplayed, and nobody cared about the drama anymore. The whole world had moved on, and she had, too. Or so she’d thought. Now, seeing these pictures of him and his girlfriend on that Miami beach made Y/N feel betrayed.

“Asshole,” her best friend said and grabbed her shoulders. “Don’t worry baby. You’re prettier.”

Y/N worked up a smile and opened her mouth to say that she was fine, but then she heard someone call her name and turn around. They weren’t calling for her. Just a name similar to hers that had become an inside joke between her and her friends.

The moment she locked eyes with Harry’s girlfriend, her heart seemed to stop as she held her breath, her lips thinned as if to hold back a scream. She didn’t know the girl personally and had never run into her before today. How unfortunate that they had to be in the same room after Y/N had seen those Miami pics.

“What is she doing here?” Y/N’s best friend asked the stylist the question Y/N was too afraid to ask.

“Fitting for an event, I guess,” the stylist said.

Y/N told them to just ignore the others and mind their own business. The sooner they got the measurements, the faster she could leave. Or she could leave right now and come back another day, but that would make it look like the other girl’s presence was bothering her. They were both actresses, and so they would have to run into each other at some point. She must be professional about it. This was normal. Just act normal.

“He’s so unique,” Harry’s girlfriend said while laughing with her team. Y/N didn’t mean to overhear the conversation, but apparently, the girl was making sure that Y/N heard her loud and clear. “We were watching reruns of Glee last night, and he even sang to me and told me he loved me inbetween the chorus and the verse. Don’t touch the jacket! It’s Harry’s and it’s Gucci. We exchange jackets sometimes. Isn’t that adorable?”

“Show off,” Y/N’s best friend scoffed while shaking her head.

Y/N didn’t say anything. In her mind, she agreed with her best friend for a second and immediately felt that she was being petty so she forced herself to just be nonchalant about it.

She could not. She could not ignore the fact that she’d been replaced as if she didn’t matter. Harry was doing all the things he used to do with her with his new girl. Even taken her to that Miami beach. Their place.

Y/N bit her lip and tried to hold back the half-formed tears in her eyes as the stylist went on talking about the fabric. She chose a random one just to get this over with.

“I hope that fucker gets deja vu.”

“What?” Y/N blinked at her best friend, who gave a mean shrug as she glared at the girl.

“He’s probably thinking of you while doing all that shit with her.”

Y/N pondered over it. Over and over. Even after the girlfriend’s laughter had faded down the hallway, and Y/N was also packing up to leave the studio. Her best friend’s words stayed with her as she got into the car and watched the street of London pass by her window.

That night, when she was alone in her living room with her piano. She sat down and started playing a few experimental chords. Then, she cried. Her tears blurred the handwritten lyrics on her notebook as she tried again.

“I have this idea,” she told her manager on the phone before sending the recording. It was three in the morning.

“Oh my god,” her manager exclaimed, sounding much more enthusiastic than he had when picking up her call. “This song...is so gonna win a Grammy!”

Y/N’s song had won a Grammy.

They had talked about it for so long. Harry had encouraged her to pursue a singing career, because she’d started out as an actress but was blessed with the most beautiful voice he had ever heard.

Ironic, wasn’t it? Now he was sitting at the front row and looking up at her as she received the award from an artist she looked up to, for the song written about him. She smiled at the crowd as the light shone on her and everyone was cheering because she deserved this. She said her thanks and expressed her gratitude to her family, her teams and her fans. She didn’t say his name. He hadn’t hoped that she would, because he knew there was no way his name would come with a positive message. So he was kind of glad she hadn’t mentioned him.

His girlfriend squeezed his arm as if she knew what he was thinking of. He smiled at his girlfriend. A smile of reassurance. They had put it behind them and promised to try again after all the fights about the song they were playing right now. Nothing would change after tonight. Because there was nothing Harry could change.

He caught Y/N’s eyes for one brief moment as she ascended the stage. Although he was sure he loved his girlfriend, there was something about that look that made him sad. Would he be happier to come here with Y/N tonight instead of his girlfriend? He wouldn’t know, because that would never happen. He didn’t even know if she still resented him, or if she was still the same person he remembered. A lot could change in a day let alone many months. And it was scary to think someone you used to know so much had become a complete stranger. The opposite of love wasn’t hate. It was indifference. And Harry felt it deeply as Y/N never paid him a second glance.

At the after-party, he worked up the courage to approach her when he found her standing alone texting on her phone.

“Hi. How are you?” he said.

Y/N looked at him as if she couldn’t understand English. If she ignored him and walked away, this would be the most humiliating moment of his life.

But no. She pressed her lips into a gentle smile and said, “I’m good. How are you?”

“Good.” He nodded, wanting to shake her hand, but his fingers stayed glued together behind his back. “Congratulations on your win.”

“Thank you.” She picked up the glass of wine on the table beside them, and Harry knew he’d lost his chance of shaking her hand tonight. “Did you like the song?”

“Yeah. It was good,” he said, finding it difficult to hold eye contact with her. There was something new about her that unsettled him, and he couldn’t pinpoint what it was. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For speaking out about it.”

“Oh.” Y/N showed no emotion as she shrugged. “It’s alright. I only said the truth. The song was fictional, and I don’t want anyone to get hate for it.”

They both knew it wasn’t true, and he couldn’t tell her that his girlfriend had almost broken up with him for it. Even if he had told her that, he didn’t think Y/N would care. She didn’t look like the Y/N he knew anymore. Suddenly, he recalled that night on the beach, when she was still looking at him with feelings.

“Look, Y/N, I—”

Before he got a chance to form a proper thought for what he was going to say, his girlfriend, who was obviously drunk, shouted from somewhere behind him. “Babe, Jeff’s wearing a tiny jacket! He looks more like the monkey than you!”

Harry looked at Y/N. She held his gaze. The corners of her red lips quirked as she raised her glass. “Deja vu?”

Just like that, she left him standing there all by himself.

#harry styles #harry styles fanfic #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles imagine #harry styles fluff #harry styles imagines #harry styles angst #harry styles writing #harry styles x reader #harry styles one shot #harry styles one shots #harry styles x you #harry styles x y/n #deja vu #drivers license #olivia rodrigo

634 notes · View notes

writefightandflightclub · 3 years ago

Text

The Brightest Suns: (Will Miller x fem!reader)

Genre: very pain and very angst. whump, maybe? character study sorta.

Summary: Will asked you to marry him, but you can’t fulfil that promise. He’s not the man you said yes to any longer. (Reader is Will’s canon fiancé, but I’m exploring pre-TF heartache.)

Rating: 18+

Word count: idk, shorter than most of my stuff

Author’s note: I watched TF again (I know) and this is what happened in my immediate brain dump which followed. It’s extrapolated from a couple of points in the canon that enticed me to explore further (one; the way that Will talks about looking after Benny, and two; the incident where he choked someone out and his fiancé had to hold him back). I have a couple of other Will fics but I’ve never had a great handle on his character, tbh, so this started out as me trying to delve slightly deeper into who he is, and ended in a world of pain, I’m so sorry. This was very much train of thought, written in one go, so I’m sorry if the structure / flow isn’t very pleasing! 🧡

Warnings: fiancé!reader; talk of Will being violent (canon typical) - not directly towards reader; preparing to leave one’s partner secretly; leaving one’s partner; choking mentions (non-consensual to non-reader character, consensual to reader); brief consensual smut (rough); break-up; angst; mention of black-outs; violent outburst against furniture; brief blood mention; no happy ending. Reader’s POV so take some of the things she says about Will / herself with a pinch of salt.

GIF: @uuuhshiny

Will’s shoulders are broad, but he has carried a heavy weight on them even before he was strong enough to bear it.

He was always destined to be a leader, wasn’t he?

A warrior.

Cool, calm, dependable, in control. That’s exactly what he was; until he wasn’t.

His power was always restrained in safe hands; until it wasn’t.

Until he looked down and didn’t recognise his hands at all. The hands he had wrapped around the civilian’s throat in aisle four for nothing but a minor infraction with a shopping cart.

Now, you lie with Will in bed, cocooned in warmth but still as a corpse. All of you is still aside from your eyes, trailing over his fair, weathered features, bathed in the egg yolk yellow glow of morning glancing through the blind slats.

A lump balls in your throat. A tightness blooms in your chest.

You promised yourself. When the sun came up, you would leave. You wouldn’t see even one more sundown out by his side.

But, the sun has been risen for a while now, and you can’t bring yourself to go.

Will can sleep anywhere, on anything, but he’s a light sleeper. Has had to be, and you lay still enough that you do not disturb him, barely even breathing. You stay still enough that you can watch him sleep angelically for a moment more before you go, his snuffled breaths against the pillow a soporific backdrop, at odds with the racing of your heart.

He is this; this contrast.

This light and shadow, broken, just like the fractured morning throwing its promise over him.

He is your golden boy -your sunshine- but he is hiding a darkness.

Pools of it; buried. In the crooks of his elbows and the curl of his trigger finger and the dip of his chin, as though his body has gathered shifting shadow mostly in the parts which have cracked necks and shot through bone.

You frown with regret, tears balling persistently in your eyes despite the fact you try to fight them back. You want desperately to kiss his full, parted lips; feel the scrape of his beard against your cheek one more time. But you know you can’t. So, instead, holding your breath, you shift your weight gently on the mattress until you are able to swing your legs and clamber out, leaving a cold spot on the crisp white sheets beside him.

You can’t bear to wake Will.

You can’t, because if you see his eyes peel open - if you see the dawning of his singular sunshine in those love-singed baby blues one more time, you will forget. You will forget those dark places he harbours. The dark places encroaching on you which you feel the need to run from before they swallow you too.

You will forget for another day, just like yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that.

And then, if you forget; you will stay, but you can’t stay a moment more.

That is why, when Will inevitably stirs, his words are spoken to your back as you shrug on a cardigan and pass through the door frame. “Morning, baby,” he purrs from behind you, voice achingly heavy with sleep and love and a smile.

His words are so bright they singe all the way through your chest; and yet, without turning, without letting him see the tears in your eyes you hush him, feeling the betrayal of it knot itself around your bones. “Sleep, my love,” you soothe, voice smooth like morning colours being poured over the horizon. “It’s still too early.”

The words twist like a knife in your chest, even as you hold it at his back, because it’s not too early at all, is it?

It’s too late.

It’s far too late.

Too late to save this.

From behind you, you hear him hum contentedly in that familiar, deep drawl of his, his voice thick and sweet like syrup in the first coffee of the day. “Day 825 together, baby.”

Will counts everything.

Will counts everything, even when he doesn’t know it will be the last, and his words arrest your body for a moment. You almost turn around; but you can’t.

So, as soon as you hit the hallway you clamp a hand firmly over your mouth, swallowing your silent sobs, hurrying down the stairs before you can change your mind and crawl into his arms and kiss him and tell him you are sorry. Before his light finds you, creeping over your home and your heart like dawn.

You do not see him lying there oblivious, white sheets curled chaotically around his bare, bulked form. You do not see his eyes watch you step out from view, shining with nothing but adoration.

Will doesn’t know yet.

Does not know that for months he will replay this specific moment in an inescapable loop in his head. This moment where you take one small step out of the room and a huge step out of his life. He will wish later that he had followed. That he had protested. That he had turned you around to look at your beautiful face one more time.

What he doesn’t know can hurt him; and it will hurt him later.

For now though, he doesn’t know and so he can’t even fight it. He doesn’t see your face that one last time, or realise that in future, he will struggle to conjure it in his memories, only ever able to dredge you up walking away. That he will only ever be able to replay this moment quite so vividly - the one which kills a love dead in one single shot, no matter how many moments it was alive for. Why is it always the memories soaked in blood which linger?

But for now, he doesn’t know, and nor do you.

You never will know how deeply it hurts him, because you are about to walk out of his life and you can’t even face him as you deliver the blow.

He pushed you though - that’s what you will tell yourself. He pushed you, by clinging to you so tightly; until you felt like you couldn’t breathe.

You walk through the quiet, dim house in a haze, collecting the bag you had stashed a day earlier in the shoe closet. You had meant to leave swiftly, but your feet feel like lead and for a moment you wonder if you can go through with it. For a moment, you linger in the hallway to pore over the photos on the wall of happier times, Will’s puppy-dog smile practically beaming at you out of the frame.

You feel sick.

He’s a good man. He is.

He’s just not your good man any longer.

The tears do not stop from this moment. They keep flowing over your cheeks as your face contorts in grief and you choke back sobs.

They do not stop when you scoop your car keys out of the bowl. They do not stop when you drop an envelope on to the hall table where you know he’ll find it, because everything in this house is order; everything except him and you.

Your whole body is thrumming with nerves, memories, pain. Everything about your time with him flooding back all at once, most of it good.

Not all of it good.

Will is a good man. You believe that.

Always was, even if he’s done bad things.

It’s just that, like most people, some of Will’s best qualities are also his downfall.

He pushes; sometimes too far.

He’s loyal to a fault; sometimes he loves too much.

He’s protective; sometimes he thinks he always knows best - you don’t blame him, when that mindset has kept him and so many of the boys alive.

He strives for perfection, and for order; in a world that is too fucked-up to provide him with either. He expects it of himself, and maybe that’s why he never cut loose. Maybe that’s why some dark things got pushed too far down. Far too compressed - ready to spring up again without warning.

He’s a hero; but he’s killed to become one.

He pushes. He pushes.

He needs everyone around him to be their best.

He pushes.

He pushes his brother.

Has always pushed his brother to achieve his potential. Gave him direction and ultimatums before he could fall all the way off the rails as a teenager.

In many ways, Ben was Will’s first follower, and perhaps that’s why Will had become accustomed to leading early on. Before the older Miller ever had a squad of his own to command and protect; his sibling taught him what it was to be responsible. Taught him the consequences of failure in a way that made sure Will was clear that it would never be an option for him.

Will pushes Benny hard even now. Even to the point he risks creating this rift between the two of them; insisting that Ben is above and better than whatever he’s got going on now. Too talented for a job as a stock boy at Walmart. Too talented to be clowning in the ring for an audience of “hillbillies”. It is borne out of a place of love, this push, and you know it is started as a tender thing. After all, he is there every fight, cheering his brother on and holding an ice pack to his wounds.

However, as Will has moved through this world he has become stronger, and his pushing has garnered more force.

Will pushed his squad to be all they could, and they needed that. In a way they still do; always will.

Will has pushed himself to his limits and beyond. Further beyond them than he ever should have, further than is healthy, simply because he was called to do so and he’s the type of man who steps up. Loyal to a fault, even where the fault is now his. He went further than any man should ever have to, to places he can’t come back from, and now he suffers the consequences of that.

There’s a dark side to this. This drive in him.

Everyone in place. Everything in place. Everything under Will’s control. His judgement always the be all and end all. The buck always stopping with him. Failure never an option.

It had never seemed to corrupt him, or to change him. He never lashed out. Never snapped; until he did. You wish you had seen it earlier, this dark coiling up and building ever so insidiously beneath the famed midwestern manners and easy smile.

He lived in dual worlds because he had to, accessing something deep and dark within him at the flip of a switch, whenever it was needed.

He used to be in control of it but when he got out, sometimes that switch would flip all on its own, and he couldn’t turn it off. It had become a habit of the cruelest kind, this darkness, and sometimes now he was in the dark without warning, ever so suddenly.

So lost. So far gone. Blacked-out.

Choking-out a man in aisle four.

That is, until you had leapt on his back and hung your weight around his neck, sobbing and pleading and begging with him to stop. Pleading for that enraged look in his eye to be replaced by that familiar but waning sunshine you had fallen in love with.

He pushes.

He pushed himself too far and there’s no coming back from that.

Maybe for him, but not for you. You understand that now.

With a glance up the stairs to check Will’s not yet approaching, you lift one of the photo frames from the wall and let your eyes sweep over it, barely able to see through the veil of tears now spilling liberally from your swollen eyes.

It’s a photo of the night he’d asked you to marry him. Even if you can’t see it clearly, it makes sense that you would want to cling to this moment, you think, out of all of them. You know you look impossibly happy in it - you know that you felt that way too, impossibly happy - but you also know it’s matterless now. It’s matterless since it’s a promise you cannot keep; to be with Will no matter what.

At one time, maybe, before you’d understood all that no matter what might mean.

It’s not like you hadn’t tried to work through it. To support him. Of course you had. You love the man. Loved him.

You had loved him with the light of a thousand suns. Poured all your heat into him until your own light went out. Until not even you could light his way out of the darkness.

In fact, you swore that all you were doing for him now was making it worse. Making him hurt because he felt he wasn’t the man you deserved. He was enough, but the fact he stopped believing you was a problem.

With an ache in your chest so intense it burns, you slip your beloved engagement ring from your finger and place it carefully on top of your letter to Will, already knowing that the words you had painstakingly pored over are vanishingly inadequate.

It hurts. It aches so deeply to know you will never hold him again, but a clean break is best for both of you. It’s what you need, because otherwise you’ll never stop. You’ll both simply keep tumbling.

You swallow, so many doubts flooding in.

This is the best thing, right?

You don’t want to end up hating each other. You want to leave with something beautiful still left in your chest, and so you know it has to be now.

You know it.

But then why does it still feel like it’s tearing you apart anyways?

You look back-up towards the stairs and your lower lip trembles, another sob crushed against your palm.

You want so badly to walk back up there and crawl into bed and cry against his warm, broad chest, but you have tried. You have tried holding him close to you for so long and it hasn’t helped.

You’ve tried everything. Letting go is the only option you have left.

You feel a deep rush of love and affection for the man. An aching sadness.

For his part too, he has tried, you know that. Could never doubt that.

But it’s different now. It’s not working. You can’t seem to fit the pieces back together. Not even to make anything new, and you can’t live amidst these fractured shards any longer.

Will doesn’t even trust himself with you.

He only ever looks at you, holds you, speaks to you, and fucks you gently, like he’s afraid of himself. It doesn’t feel authentic. It’s a shell of what you used to share with the man.

You know he’s afraid of himself, but it feels like he’s afraid of you.

He misunderstands. He tries to be perfect for you; tries so hard. But it’s not like you want him or need him to be all light. It’s more that you can’t stand how many of his shadows he buries, so that he can pretend he’s still your golden boy.

He’s not. As much as you wish he was, he’s a different man now.

One you can’t fully reach out to because he won’t let you. Because he has to protect you. Because he fears you won’t like what you might find.

He pushes. He’s protective. He thinks he knows best. You think you barely know him at all any more.

It’s not as though you didn’t push him too.

You tried; gently.

Then harder.

You tried incrementally.

Then all at once.

You felt all the anger that he wouldn’t allow himself, and in truth, it was making you ugly. You tried to push him too, to prove to him he wouldn’t hurt you; that he would never. You tried, because you needed to prove it to yourself as well.

There was one time you might have gone too far.

One time he was buried in you up to the hilt, all salt slick skin and his breath billowing against the hollow of your throat from between his teeth. In one way it was blissful. In another, the moment was painful even as he held you and moved inside you ever so gently, because even with him so close to you, you had never so desperately wanted him back.

Your Will.

You wanted him, free and unrestrained and fucking you like he used to. You needed him. Needed to feel him that way again.

You wondered, after, if maybe that was selfish. If maybe, you hadn’t understood the extent of what it was he kept at bay for you and the strength it took to do it.

Did you ever truly understand the magnitude of the darkness he so painstakingly kept from your door; until he didn’t?

You had begged Will as he rocked inside you, grabbing at his ass and guiding him into you: deeper, harder, faster. Taunting and pleading and bargaining with him until you dulled that sunshine in his eyes. Until his lust-blown baby blues were cut with violence, knife sharp and grey in the shadows. Until he was rutting into you so hard and so furiously that your eyes rolled back into your head in ecstasy.

“Put your hands on my throat, Will,” you had pleaded. “I trust you. I trust you. I trust you. Come back to me. Please. Please. Please. Come back to me.”

He had grunted, his mouth a snarl against yours, his moans sounding in the cave of your mouth, his hand twisting at your throat, and for a moment you thought it could be fixed; until you didn’t. Until his tears fell over you as he came balls deep with his finger marks bruising your tender skin.

After that, he couldn’t look at you for days.

Right afterward, he looked at you ashamed and broken, and that’s how you had returned his gaze. You had tried to take too much. More than he could give. That’s when you realised he was never coming back to you, not really, and that maybe you couldn’t be what he needed any longer either.

That’s when you had realised that the Will you used to know had stopped coming home a long time ago.

That you had been too blinded by his light to notice his shadows.

That he was not the man you said yes to.

He is no better or worse now, not in totality, and still a good man. Just different. Just going through something which you honestly don’t believe would be better if you stayed. Not for either of you. Not anymore.

You’ve given it time. Fuck knows, you tried to save this.

Of course, it was worst when he got out. When Will was effectively a weapon with nowhere left to point himself. When all his coiled up rage could find no release.

Will had still pushed though.

Tried to push through for you. For himself. Tried to tow the line.

Tried to push you both to be the best team you could be. You were going to be married, after all. Partners. His squad for life.

He was trying his best to look ahead and build something. He really was.

But you weren’t a team, not really.

You were another of his followers, and Will was leading you. You had always followed his lead.

You had always thought, though, that he was leading you into the sunshine. And… Maybe that was true once, but too much had happened. Too much had happened to him, and there was too much he had done. Too much you couldn’t hope to understand.

Sometimes, you wonder; maybe you simply aren’t strong enough to bear his burdens, even second hand. But you had never claimed to be a soldier, like him, and you simply can’t follow him any further into the dark. If you do you fear you’ll never find your way out either.

You have tried to pull him out, tried for so long but his weight is so heavy, so much already on his shoulders.

Sometimes, you think you have been a part of that heaviness, that burden, sinking him further anyway. That you are just another weight. Something else for him to protect; and now something to protect from himself. How exhausting that must feel.

You see it there almost every time he looks at you now. Nothing but this guilt. This apology, even though you never told him he had a thing to be sorry for.

You wish it was another way, but you can see that looking at you is sinking him. All you are to him now is a mirror for everything he believes you are disappointed in him for. And, if you want Will to make it out? If you are to give him that push to be the best he can be again, you know you have to leave.

Even if you loved him. Love him still.

You take a deep, steadying breath, the walls almost closing in on you, the edges of your vision blurring as you prepare to leave a whole life and a whole future behind.

And, in this moment, you do not remember the bad times. You cling only to the sunshine.

There is only one moment of late, in which Will seems to forget the shadows. That is first thing on a morning, when he opens his eyes and sees you lying next to him. In those moments, brief as they are, nothing but sunshine spills from his eyes. He is your golden boy all over again.

In those moments, which you so love to bask in, his love is so pure and luminous that it is almost enough to make you forget all of the pain and all of the shadows.

But you understand now. You understand that you’ve always been fighting that horizon threatening to swallow him.

You know now, that the brightest suns cast the longest shadows when they sink.

You know too, that Will will cast a shadow over your heart for a long time to come. Maybe for always; but still, you know it is right to go.

You think.

This is not your battle.

You’ve fought for him for so long, with all your strength and might, and still you cannot save him from himself. Only he is strong enough to do that. His broad shoulders have so much weight to bear already, but you dearly hope that he can carry it alone.

You hope that he can be happy again, one day.

And so, after one last, wistful look up the stairs you turn away from his blinding light. You bow your head and you pass the happy photos and his shoes and coats strewn in the hall. You kick the holiday cards addressed to you both from the mat as you walk through the door and pad to your car, your legs quaking under you.

You leave him behind, your wracked sobs now loud and violent as you leave the quiet of the house. As you leave his calm and his circumference of light.

He always was so cool and calm and controlled; until he wasn’t. But maybe it hadn’t been so sudden after all. Maybe it was a more gradual shift. Maybe you’d just seen what you wanted to see. Ignored the encroaching shadows.

And, as you turn the wheel to leave your home behind, you don’t know it yet. You don’t know it, but for months, for years to come, you will wish you had woken him before you left. You will wish you had given him that last kiss. You will wish most of all that you had turned your head to see the dawning of your love in his eyes just one more time.

For one more day.

He made every day count. He even counted every day.

But if you had; if you had turned back to him, you knew you would forget. You would forget the shadows, and you would never leave him.

And you had to leave.

Some time later, Will wakes, when the morning sun has become luminous enough to fill the whole room with spun gold.

He reaches for you, but his hand finds only a cold spot on the sheets.

He stirs and pads through the house, eager to find your warm soft body and wrap his strong arms around your middle. Eager to kiss your neck and whisper that he loves you in your ear as you pour out some coffee.

However, Will tracks downstairs to find his home empty. Finds his house quiet. Finds the ring you have so carefully placed on top of the crisp, white letter.

He finds his sunshine gone.

And, a switch inside him flips.

The next thing Will knows, he is panting heavily on the floor, crouched on his knees and his fist shoved into his mouth to stifle a raw, curdled scream. The hall around him is a mess of smashed furniture. Shards of fractured mirror and glass, cuts on his hands and knees beginning to sting and seep through with red.

He doesn’t know how long he stays there, but he knows it is a long time. Long enough for him to feel entirely numb. Long enough to run through all of his mistakes. Long enough for him to cycle through every single painful thought, before landing on the most painful one of all.

That is, he wonders if it’s for the best that you are gone, as when he sees his eyes glancing back at him from this sharded glassy lake across his floor, he sees nothing but darkness behind them.

He wonders if it’s for the best that you are gone, as the thought of hurting you -in any and every sense- is no longer another weight he has to bear.

Maybe it’s for the best.

At least he pushed. He tried.

At least he pushed you away, where he finally knows you are safe.

And it is painful to admit, that in a small way, it is a relief.

Even so, there is a large chasm of grief to bear. Indeed, Will wonders what he will do now that his sunshine is gone. He wonders how dark his shadows will get without your light.

Still, somehow, eventually, he pushes himself to move. To get up.

Maybe it’s his training kicking in.

When you’re bruised and bloodied, you move.

You live.

He drinks water. He eats something. He watches something on tv though he couldn’t tell you what, and he stops counting.

Stops counting the minutes or seconds or… anything.

For once, time simply passes without any meaning.

Eventually, he retreats up the stairs and collapses on your shared bed, grabbing his phone from where it’s charging on the nightstand. “Ben,” he croaks, when his brother picks-up, tears finally spilling across the bridge of his nose as his fingers form a claw over his face. “She’s gone.”

It is only when he says the words out loud that Will finally falls apart, his pain sharp and barbed and cutting like the glass still littering the hall has found its way into his chest.

Will doesn’t even hear what Benny says to him in response. He simply drops the phone from his ear as his brother talks. Instead, he reaches out to your cold, empty side of the bed and lays there in the dark, curling in on himself.

Shadows pool in the crooks and contours of him, but this time, for once, Will does not look lethal.

For now, he looks entirely defeated.

If you could see his eyes now, you would see that the light has truly gone out.

And that, even more so than leaving, would break your heart.

#will miller x reader #will miller #triple frontier #charlie hunman

123 notes · View notes

ancientwastedlores · 4 years ago

Text

Undone by “Darling”

REQUEST (from @november-solarstorms): Celebrating another year of this earth being braced by Tom Hiddleston's presence! Lol. Might I make a prompt request? I feel as though it would be interesting to read from Loki's POV to explore the dynamics between him and a human female who is just as intelligent as he. She has a sharp wit and even sharper tongue. Her sarcastic and clever nature enable her to out-banter Tony Stark, the king of snark himself (may he rest in peace). But she is also just as flirtatious and salacious. She never blushes, never falters, and is incredibly clever. You can decide the nature of their encounter. Really im just in it for a good game of cat and mouse.

A/N: Okay, I had SO MUCH FUN writing this!! And yeah, this will run a bit longer than my usual fics lol. Also, there IS a Loki POV, just keep reading thaaanks <3

WARNINGS: none.

WORD COUNT: 1,932

____________________________________________________________________

Undone by “Darling”

17 hours and 6 white chocolate mochas later, it was finally ready - an upgraded version of Corvus Glaive’s glaive, this one spec-ed out to your fancies and requirements. It was a beast, and definitely not something Nick Fury would ever let you play around with, even if you made it.

Satisfied with your work, you remove your safety goggles and grin at Stark, who is working on his own weapon he scavenged from the Black Order.

‘I’m done!’ you say triumphantly, causing him to look up and groan. ‘How did you finish before me!?’ he lowers his glasses and looks at your weapon. ‘I’m smarter’ you say. ‘I went to MIT’ ‘And I didn’t, yet here we are, both in the same lab’.

He shakes his head, not unlike a petulant child, causing you to laugh.

‘How far along are you?’ you ask. ‘Still running diagnostics’. ‘Still!?’ ‘Have you seen the size of his hammer?’ he gestures to Cull Obsidian’s chain hammer on his work table, but the innuendo doesn’t escape you and you grin at him. He facepalms. ‘Y/n, for god’s sake...’ ‘You’re just tired, or you’d appreciate the joke too’.

You stretch your weary body and let out a deep breath. You’d test the weapon out tomorrow, but for now, you need a nap.

‘Take a load off, Stark. Hammer’ll be there tomorrow’. ‘Oh, you’d like that wouldn’t you...’ he puts his goggles back on and get to work.

Loki’s POV:

Humans are surprising, but I always knew that. I never thought them boring, even if my brother says I do. Humans are of so little power but such incredible resilience that it’s frankly astonishing. I am inclined to believe that sometimes resilience is just stupidity... in most cases, I am right. But that’s not to say I haven’t come across some truly brave people.

Take the Avengers Tower, for example.

Just in here, you have Y/n, a brave soldier with the mind of an intergalactic scavenger, and I do mean that as a compliment. She’s awfully clever, she can build better than Stark, and has a track record of finishing every mission to perfection and before time. And then you have the Super Soldier Steve Rogers, a big muscled, big hearted idiot who often mistakes challenging our enemies for bravery and morality.

The two couldn’t be more different, but they get along like siblings. Not siblings like Thor and I... better adjusted, perhaps.

They sit in front of me, talking about some mission while they play Chess. Her moves are quick but calculated, his take more time because he’s more interested in telling his story than playing the game.

‘...so there I am, no weapons, no shield, bang in the middle of the Serpent Citadel...’

He’s a good storyteller, I’ll give him that. But not as good as Y/n. She paints quite a picture, full of delicious gory details and horribly dark jokes.

‘Steve, you have to pay attention, you’re losing’ she says. ‘Yeah, I don’t actually know how to play chess, I just wanted you to listen to my story’.

She looks up at him, almost offended. ‘STEVE...’ ‘Cool, I’m gonna go wrap Stark into a game of Battleships and tell him about my fight with Copperhead’.

She laughs as he leaves the room, and she puts the chess pieces away.

‘We could play?’ I ask her. ‘Is the God in a mood to lose?’ ‘Over confidence isn’t attractive in anybody’. ‘Oh darling, neither is telling someone what is and isn’t attractive’.

She’s never called me that before, and in the context it should seem cutting, but it isn’t. ‘Darling?’ ‘Problem?’ ‘It’s quite a term of endearment to set someone straight’.

She says nothing.

‘Cat got your tongue?’ I tease her. She only smiles and continues putting the pieces away neatly. Stark’s chess set is gold and black, all individually carved pieces. The pawns are all Iron Man suits, but that’s to be expected. She handles them with the care Stark would.

‘I mean...’ I continue, ‘honestly, if someone heard, they’d never let you live it down’.

And she carries on, unbothered.

‘Y/n!’ ‘Oh dear, look at you come completely undone with just one term of endearment’ she comments, shutting the chess set. ‘Whatever would happen if I held your hand?’

The very thought of it seemed to drain my brain of blood. I unwillingly glanced at her hands, working the lock mechanism of the box, her blue veins prominent.

‘Cat got your tongue?’ she asked.

I stood up, the human emotion of embarrassment becoming too familiar for me. ‘I’ll have to see you at lunch’. ‘Sure, darling’.

Oh, I hate how she’s enjoying this.

----------

The next day, Y/n booked a training room to test out the Glaive, and Stark had a rusty but working chain hammer. Steve insists on trying it out anyway, and now our breakfast is being spent on discouraging him from doing that.

‘Guys... if nothing else, I’ll still have my shield. Let me test it out!’ ‘Y/n’s glaive cuts through Vibranium, you know that, right?’ Stark says. ‘Y/n wouldn’t do that’. ‘Oh yes she would’ Y/n says nonchalantly as she sinks her teeth into a bacon and egg sandwich.

As she does, the yolk runs down her fingers. She makes a sound at the inconvenience and sets the sandwich down, then grabs a napkin. I’m hardly ever crude, but the energy it took not to take her hand and lick off the yolk myself could burn every star in the galaxy.

Captain America scrunches his nose at her remark, severely offended.

‘In any case, that shield barely covers your giant body. It will force Stark to make you a new one’. ‘What do you care about his giant body’ Stark says. ‘It’s America’s ass, Tony’ she takes a sip of her iced coffee. Steve blushes, and Tony rolls his eyes.

----------

The training facility is magic, of course, somewhere between a mirror dimension and Wanda’s reality powers creating a safe cocoon inside the building so no one can be harmed. Y/n hardly trusted anybody to fight with her except Thor, but given the nature of Corvus’ Glaive, she knew magic would be required.

And so she called me.

After getting into my battle armour, I stepped into the facility, equipped with my sceptre and the teachings of the witches of Asgard.

She whistles as I walk in. ‘Trying to distract me from killing you?’ ‘Are you?’ I ask. She’s dressed in a black bodysuit, details of purple in her belt and weapon harnesses. ‘Why yes, I am. Glad you noticed’.

The glaive is on the floor, and she stomps her foot on one part of it so it swivels up and neatly places itself in her hand. She smiles.

‘Try to keep up. I’m not just looking for eye candy in a training partner, darling’ she says, getting into battle stance.

With nothing left to say for the second time this week, I aim the sceptre at her and the stone at the end glows.

She charges and I shoot at her, but she spins the glaive and creates a shield which absorbs the energy.

She continues to charge at me. I shoot again, and again the glaive takes the hit. Not a scratch on her.

Once she comes closer, she simply places the flat end of the weapon against my chest, sending me hurtling back into a wall.

She spins the glaive and laughs.

‘Compliments of Wakanda. It absorbs any hits and charges up with kinetic energy’.

I get up on my feet. This is far from over. I create multiple illusions to surround her, all of them brandishing knives, Chitauri tech, and sceptres.

‘Damn, suddenly my whole evening has opened up’ she says, looking around.

Even my clones look around at each other puzzled.

‘Come on then, who’s up?’ she spins the glaive around. ‘One at a time or all at once, baby’.

They charge at her, and I expected her to fight them off at once... instead she plants the staff on the ground and ducks, and a semi-circle shell grows from the top of the staff, down to the floor... like a mini fortress, completely impenetrable. It could, no doubt, continue to take hits and build up kinetic energy, so I call off the clones.

She gets up and retracts the shell. ‘Nanotech’ she grins at me. ‘The whole shell sits in a disk. It can withstand bombs and even a moon’. ‘Is there any tech you haven’t adopted?’ ‘I’m an intergalactic scavenger, aren’t I?’

I stare at her, horrified. Can she read minds?

‘Maybe I can. Or maybe I heard you tell Stark when he was complaining about me finishing my weapon first’.

Silence.

‘Also, darling, you’re awfully predictable in your fighting’.

She picks up every trick and tech she sees, so beating her is less about weapons and more about cunning.

No problem. Cunning is my specialty.

‘Ready now?’ she asks. ‘Mhm’.

She takes a deep breath to ready herself, her eyes shutting slightly. Once they open back up, she stares in shock.

In my Jotun form, I give her my most menacing smile.

She cocks her head to the side, studying my icy blue skin.

The illusion I cast of myself approaches behind her, dagger in hand. Once it’s close enough and I can almost taste my victory, she raises the glaive and in one swift motion, sticks it into its abdomen.

The illusion disappears into green light.

‘Cute’ she remarks. She points the glaive at me. ‘What else you got for me?’ I shift back to my Asgardian form and sigh. ‘You win’.

Y/n laughs and lowers her weapon. ‘Oh darling, I won the second you walked in wearing all that leather’. She winks at me, then walks out of the facility. I feel a blush creep to my face, much against my will.

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

‘Maybe you should stick to your guns, Tony’ Y/n says, ‘Fancy suits is it for you, chain hammers may be overshooting it’. ‘Is that what they taught you in the back alley you learnt ironmongery from?’ ‘Yes! Do you want their number, I’m sure they’ll have a spot on the waiting list for you’.

Ah. Y/n’s relationship with Stark seemed more like mine with Thor. While they banter, Steve and Natasha tear up from laughing. I wouldn’t go so far as to call this domestic, but it certainly is comfortable.

‘Come on, the glaive can’t be that good, right Loki?’ Stark asks.

The company looks at me expectantly. ‘To say her weapon isn’t good enough means to insult your own tech, Stark. Everything about it is founded on your theories’.

‘So technically, it’s my brain that made the glaive so cool’ he tells Y/n. ‘Yeah, you could say that. The glaive comes from the same mind that manufactured Captain America’s dinner plate’.

Steve doesn’t find that one funny, but Natasha does, sending her into peals of laughter.

‘Oh whatever’ Tony huffs. ‘I’m going back to the lab’.

He stands up and Y/n grabs his arm. ‘Aww Tony, I’m just kidding!’ she pats his hand, ‘Look, you’re a brilliant inventor, we all have our slow days’.

He sighs and nods, and holds her hand. ‘Thanks... I guess I’m just not in my element, you know?’ ‘Yeah...’ she keeps patting his hand.

And the feeling of domesticity creeps in. We really are all a family. Y/n smiles encouragingly at Tony, and Tony seems more relaxed.

‘So, you want me to get you the number of that ironmongery, or...?’ ‘OH FOR...’ he snatches his arm away and storms out of the room, with Steve and Nat losing it all over again.

___________________________________________________________

Ah this was so fun!!!!!!!! I hope you guys liked it <3

MASTERLIST HERE

ASK BOX OPEN FOR FIC REQUESTS. Find GUIDELINES HERE.

#loki x you #loki pov #loki x reader #loki marvel #Marvel Avengers #avengers tower #avengers fluff #tony stark #loki fanfic #loki fluff #tom hiddleston fluff #tom hiddleston birthday #fic prompts

91 notes · View notes

ttylfedora · 4 years ago

Text

The Rookiest Rookie that ever Rookied- Part Two

Oh god I feel so bad for Cole!!

Characters belong to the completely wonderful @lumosinlove

Cw, food

Enjoy!! 💚

“Right, mon fils, you remember the plan?” Pascal had sat Louis and Marc down at the dining room table and had his serious dad face on. The boys knew this face meant business and sat up straighter, as though they were in a proper business meeting.

“Oui, papa.” Louis answered. Marc nodded in agreement, both of them determined not to let their father down. After all, this was the difference between whether or not they could go out for ice cream at the weekend. All of the shots were riding on this!

“Repeat it back to me.” Dumo instructed.

“Which part?” Marc questioned, still getting his little brain around all of the instructions his father had given him.

“All of it, this is serious business. The two of you are embarking on a journey that can only be ruled as the greatest journey known to man. You two have a legacy to fill, mon fils, a legacy!” Dumo exclaimed dramatically, his arms out as though he was introducing a show on the West End.

“Ce n'est pas si dramatique, papa.” Louis rolled his eyes, and his father gasped.

“Say that again and you are grounded.” Pascal locked his eyes on Louis’. The famous Dumais pranks were a serious business and should be treated as such.

“There is a lot riding on this,” Dumo reasoned, “do you want ice cream or not?”

“I guess.” Louis huffed. “Alright, so we only answer to each other’s names.”

“Make sure all the clocks show a different time.” Marc continued “Can you help us get the higher clocks?” he asked his dad. Dumo nodded.

“Make sure the robot spider is under the couch.” Louis chimed in.

“Ask him where babies come from.” Marc giggled. “Where do they come from papa?” he asked curiously.

“Non, non, ask Cole. He’ll tell you.” Dumo wiggled his finger in front of his younger son's face.

“Okay, okay.”

“Parfait, right, he’ll be back in,” he checked his watch,”half an hour from hanging out with Leo. Let’s get this started, shall we mes fils?” Dumo rubbed his hands together and giggled, leading his children into the kitchen to get started on the clocks.

“Right, we shouldn’t be gone for long but if anything goes wrong, just call us straight away. We’ll be back by dinner time.” Celeste fussed. Her husband was already out in the car with Adele and Katie, ready to take them both to basketball practice.

“I will, promise.” Cole smiled. It was the first time they trusted him to look after any of their kids so he can understand why they were airing on the side of caution. “We’ll have lots of fun.” He smiled over to the two boys who were currently sat watching something on the television. Celeste thanked him again and left, shutting the door softly behind her.

Babysitting was a piece of cake. He could do this.

“Right boys, what’s the plan for today.” He clapped his hands and rubbed them together, sitting down on the couch that was adjacent to the two brothers. Marc’s eyes lit up.

“Can we make a cake?” he asked, practically jumping up from his spot on the couch.

“We certainly can, what flavour?”

Marc thought for a moment. “Chocolate.” he smiled.

“Sounds good to me, buddy, lead the way.” He reached over and grabbed the remote off of the coffee table in the centre of the room and switched the television off, following them into the kitchen.

“Right, let me see what we have here,” Cole started, going through all of the cupboards to round up the ingredients for the cake.

“Louis, can you grab me the eggs please.” He said over his shoulder as he went to retrieve the milk and butter from the fridge.

“No, no, no, Marc wait-“ Cole was cut off by the eggs Marc was attempting to hold in one hand dropping to the floor and smashing everywhere. He froze with his arms out mid step, and just sighed, laughing slightly. “Oh dear.” Marc looked up at him.

“Sorry Cole.”

“It’s okay buddy, how about you go and change your trousers and socks so that you’re not walking around all day with egg on them and we’ll throw them in the wash. It’s no big deal.” he smiled, grabbing a wet paper towel to start to clean the egg yolk off of the floor. Marc nodded and ran to his room. As he cleaned up, Louis gathered all of the ingredients onto the side, and grabbed more eggs from the basket.

By the time the floor was clean, Marc had come back down in a fresh pair of jeans and socks and popped his dirty ones into the washing machine for his mother to deal with later.

“Perfect, right, Marc, you’re in charge of weighing things, okay?” He looked at Marc but Louis nodded, sitting up on the bar stool in front of the weighing scales.

“Okay.” Louis smiled. Cole widened his eyes slightly but shook it off. Maybe he misspoke?

“Marc, you’re going to help me mix everything up, okay?”

“But I thought I was weighing the ingredients?” Louis asked, confused.

“Yeah, I was talking to your brother?” Cole said, though it came out more of a question. He placed his hand on his hip and scratched his head.

The boys just shrug and carry on anyway, allowing Cole to guide them through the recipe, one his mother swears by back at home. He was hoping it lived up to Celeste’s baking but he doubted his skills were that good. It was the least he could offer her for all the amazing meals she had cooked for him so far. She insisted that it was nothing but when one is so far away from home, having another mother cook a full homemade meal brought immense amounts of comfort to him.

They carried on working around each other, occasionally turning up the radio when a good song comes on, laughing and throwing flour and sugar over each other. Cole was an only child, but if he wasn’t, this is how he would want to spend his weekends with them. He supposed he wasn’t any more; his chosen family adding to the numbers ten-fold and he was beyond grateful for it.

Once all of the ingredients had been mixed, he asked Louis, well who he was sure was Louis, to help him pour the cake mix into the cake moulds. He started doubting himself as Marc, well who he was sure was Marc, came to help him. Once he had placed the moulds into the oven, which he noted had the wrong time displayed, he sent the kids through to the sitting room as he set the timer on his phone. His thumb hovered over the message app icon, wondering whether or not admitting defeat was wise. He quickly changed his mind as he thought up a better idea, opened the app and clocked on Leo’s name instead.

‘Hey man, I have a really embarrassing question but you CANNOT tell Dumo, okay?’

‘Oh god, this is gonna be good.’

‘Leo, PROMISE ME.’

‘Jeez man, okay, i promise!!’

‘Which of Dumo’s boys are older? Louis or Marc? Because i think ive been calling them by the wrong names.’

‘OH MY GOD HAHAHAHAHAHA COLE!!!!!!!!! PLEASE TELL ME YOURE JOKING’

‘Leo…’

‘Oh my god you arent joking.’

‘Please?’

‘Marc is the older one. Oh my god that is actually hilarious. Logan’s wetting himself.’

‘I’m never hearing the end of this.’

Cole put his phone away in his pocket, feeling incredibly embarrassed. Had he been calling these kids by the wrong name for the past month? It would seem so. He filled himself a glass of water and walked into the sitting room, sitting down on the couch next to Marc, no, Louis, the younger one.

“How long until the cake’s ready?” the older one asked.

“About twenty minutes now buddy. What are we watching?” he asked, gesturing to the television.

“Minecraft videos,” the youngest answered, smiling. Cole shook his head, clearly realising he had lost his touch with kids. Wasn’t Minecraft big, what, four years ago now? He pulled his phone out of his pocket and started aimlessly scrolling through Instagram, liking and commenting on a few of the posts until the youngest sibling piped up again.

“Cole?” he asked, an inquisitive look on his face.

“Mhm?” Cole replied, taking a sip of his water.

“Where do babies come from?”

Cole promptly spat his water back out looking at the youngest with wide eyes, stuttering slightly in shock. How was he meant to answer that?!

“I- well- have you not asked your dad this?” he stuttered, this was not what he expected to be answering today, to a nine year old nonetheless.

“Non, I just thought of it” the younger one shook his head.

“Oh, well, I mean, when two adults want to have a baby, they do a special hug, I guess?” Cole replied cautiously.

“So maman, and papa did a special hug for me, Louis, Katie and Adele?”

Cole just stared at him, mouth trying and failing to come up with a response to that. The last thing he even wanted to think about was Dumo’s sex life, no matter how many times the Lions’ sex lives were brought up in the locker room.

Thankfully, the timer for the cake went off, giving him the perfect excuse to exit the conversation. He set the cake on the side to cool, making a start on the icing. The boys decided to stay in the sitting room, engrossed in the video they were watching. He glanced up at the clock on the wall. Surely it wasn’t still early afternoon? He checked the time on the oven and it matched, as did the one on the radio, and the fridge, and everything else in the kitchen apart from his phone.

“Boys, what time is it?” he shouted through to them.

“The tv says it’s 3pm!” Marc, Louis, the older one shouted back. He ran his hands over his face and checked his phone, noting that the time read ‘17:30’. He just rested his head in his hands with his elbows against the counter; he evidently did not get enough sleep last night. He quickly decorated the cake to return his thought process to something concrete and set it aside, joining the boys in front of the television quickly after.

He couldn’t have been sat down for more than five minutes when the biggest fuck off spider he had ever seen crawled out from under the couch, right next to his foot. Like any normal, self-respecting 19 year old man, he screamed and jumped up onto the couch.

Both boys were in hysterics.

“Cole, we got you so good!” The younger of the two was currently beside himself on the other couch, tears streaming from his eyes as he held up a little remote; evidently the remote for the spider.

“You two are taking after your father it seems.” Cole laughed nervously. He was well aware of the notorious Pascal Dumais prank streak and it seemed. They pressed play on the tv until Celeste, Dumo, Adele and Katie came home. He was grateful only in the sense that he was completely and utterly exhausted from today.

“Aaahhhh, you boys made a cake!” Celeste mused, walking into the kitchen to have a look at it, “it will be perfect for after dinner.”

“Did you have a good day, mes garçons?” he asked. Both boys nodded, understanding that their father was asking if they did everything he asked of them.

“It seems your boys take after you, Dumo. Got me pretty good with a spider under the couch there.” Cole laughed from his position on the couch.

Dumo let out one of the biggest dad laughs known to man. “Incroyable! I’m proud of you both!” Both of his sons looked at him and began laughing with him, but followed their mother and sisters into the kitchen.

“I hope they weren’t too much trouble?” Dumo asked, hanging his coat up and turning to Cole.

“No, not at all. It was a fun day, a long day but a fun one. Really set me through my paces there. For a hot second i thought it was one of your tasks.” he laughed as he stood up.

Dumo froze.

“My children are a task to you?” he looked Cole straight in the eyes and cocked an eyebrow. Cole stared at him wide eyed and started stuttering, attempting to form and answer. Pascal laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. “I’m only joking, kid. You should have seen your face!”

“Haha, yeah, I’m just going to run to the toilet real quick and I’ll join you for dinner. Won’t be long!” He left, looking quite flustered as PAscal made his way into the kitchen. His wife was leant against the counter with her arms crossed and a slightly amused expression on her face.

“You are a cruel man, mon roi. A cruel cruel man.” she shook her head and turned back around as she continued to prepare dinner.

He stalked over and placed a kiss on her head.

“It’s called character building, ma reine.” he smiled. “And I am nowhere near done just yet.”

#coast to coast lumosinlove #sweater weather lumosinlove #lumosinlove #pascal dumais #Pascal Dumais Prank Series #Cole Reyes

53 notes · View notes

dcbbw · 4 years ago

Note

Would you ever 📝 AU Romance. Riley having a pregnancy scare or how would Liam would react?

@gkittylove99!!! THIS ASK! THIS.ASK. I have to thank my pre-readers and idea bouncers @sirbeepsalot, @burnsoslow, and @ao719. And to all the folks I sent random snippets to, thank you for not thinking I was crazy!

Warnings for this full-blown fic: Slightly NSFW, Frank discussion of pregnancy termination

I awaken to feel Liam’s weight pressed against my back. His palms cover the backs of my hands as his cock sits in my center, throbbing and twitching.

“Are you awake yet?” His breath, warm and stale, tickles the back of my neck.

I respond by arching my hips upwards; I feel his groin grind against me as he alternates his thrusts between teasingly slow and hard and rough. His teeth scrape my skin between groans of: “Throw that pussy at me,” and “You like how this dick feels?”

The head of his cock is pressed against my spot and I cry out as I release over his shaft; the pillow muffles it. Shortly thereafter, I feel his orgasm splashing against my still clenching walls. He pulls out and rolls over onto his back.

We start every morning with some form of sex. Sometimes it’s oral for me, a blowjob in front of the bedroom mirror for him, or intercourse. It’s always vanilla; we save the kinky for the nighttime.

I stay laying on my stomach; I have been tired lately. And unfocused. I think I need vitamins, maybe an iron supplement. Liam’s voice rouses me, and I turn my head to look at him.

“You need to get up, Riley. It’s time for your shower.”

“I don’t feel good,” I say.

He raises an eyebrow. “Do you have a cold?”

I shake my head. “I just don’t feel good.”

He gives me an odd look before speaking. “I’ll make you some tea and arrange to telework today.”

And then he rises naked from the bed, leaving me alone in the room.

One Week Later

It’s Wednesday, and I am in the office. Chase and Penelope have gone to make the Starbucks run before staff meeting. I didn’t order anything; I am still queasy and it’s strongest in the morning. I feel even more rundown, and there is some heartburn. I am booting up my laptop when my desk phone rings. It’s Lynn, my boss.

“Hey! Come back here and talk to me,” she requests in her signature cheery tone.

I tell her to give me two minutes and hang up. The phone rings again. “Need me to bring you anything?” I answer, sure it’s her again. But it’s Liam.

“Don’t order a car this evening. My car will pick you up at 4:30.”

I stare stupidly at my screen. “Why?”

“You’ll find out.” And the call is disconnected.

I feel uncertainty twist my already roiling stomach as I head into Lynn’s cubicle. She looks up at me, a bright smile on her face. Her hair is in loose waves and falls just past her shoulders; her skin is clear with a rosy glow.

“You look great!” I compliment her. “How do you feel?”

Lynn is entering her fifth month of pregnancy. It’s her fourth; she’s carrying twins.

“Thanks! I feel like I’m hauling around a pod of whales. Sperm whales,” she giggles at her pun.

I offer her a weak smile as I sit in the only empty chair in her cubicle. She frowns slightly. “Was that HR offensive?” She waves her hand dismissively. “I don’t know and too fat to care.”

I shake my head slightly. “You’re fine.”

She begins to dig into a styrofoam container that holds her breakfast: corned beef hash, sausage links, grits, potatoes, toast, and sunny-side up eggs. The sights and smells turn my stomach even more. As she eats, Lynn prattles about her weekend, possibly hiring a new person to help Coco in IT, and maybe putting together an employee handbook.

I say nothing because if I open my mouth, the water and yogurt I had earlier may come up. Noticing my silence, Lynn looks up me; her eyes are critical as she studies me.

“Riley, are you okay? You look … listless.”

“I’m fine!” I force myself to respond cheerfully. “Just a little tired.”

One of her hands rests lightly against her burgeoning belly; the other firmly grips her fork as she drags it through hash, grits, and egg yolk. “Go home. Get some rest for the remainder of the week.”

“I’m fine,” I protest.

“Then go home and get even better. Answer a couple of emails, take a call and you won’t have to use your leave.” She speaks around mouthfuls of food.

My eyes fall to her belly. “Do you have names for the babies yet?”

“Peanut butter and Jelly.” She sees my surprised expression. “There’s a story there, but it’s definitely NSFW. I’m not dealing with HR today.”

She waves her hand at me in a “shoo” motion. “Go home! See you Monday.”

I rise from the chair and make my way slowly back to my desk. I shut down the laptop. I pick up my desk phone and call Liam.

“What?” His tone is curt. I wonder if he’s busy or doesn’t want to hear from me.

“I’m leaving work now. I’m off until Monday.”

A pause before he speaks. I hear papers being shuffled and him typing on his keyboard. “Call the car, go to the penthouse. Shower. Don’t answer the door for anyone, don’t be a Nosy Parker, and I’ll be there shortly.”

And he hangs up.

Once inside the penthouse, I wander around before I shower. It’s rare Liam leaves me alone here; I find it feels strange without his presence. The quiet sounds different, the sun slants through the windows at an altered angle. The stovetop and counters gleam in the bright kitchen; usually both are filled with pots and pans and food in various stages of preparation. I open the refrigerator; there is a platter of homemade meatballs, perfectly rolled and shaped and filled with onions and peppers, ready to be cooked for our dinner tonight. I wonder what else we’ll have.

As I cross back through the living room, I look up at the staircase; only when Liam requests me in his study do I venture into the upper level of the penthouse. There’s a study, home gym, full bathroom, guest room, and the only ingress/egress to the outdoor space upstairs.

I keep walking until I reach the bedroom. I pass Liam’s chest of drawers and frown; one of the drawers isn’t fully closed. I set my phone on top of the furniture and place my palm against the gleaming wood to push it close, but I hesitate. I wonder what’s inside. I look around, even though I know I am the only person in the house.

I’m going to be a Nosy Parker.

I pull the drawer open cautiously and peer inside: neatly folded stacks of boxer shorts in white and black greet me. Next to them are wife beaters, also in white and black, and short-sleeved undershirts in white. There is a wooden tray on the right-hand side of the drawer; it’s mostly cufflinks and tie clips, but I see two photographs, face down. I look at them curiously; just as my fingers reach out to touch them, my phone rings.

I jump and let out a small yell before pushing the drawer shut and looking at my caller ID. I don’t recognize the number; I toss the phone onto the bed before stripping and entering the shower. By the time Liam arrives home, I am wearing his robe and wrapped in a blanket on the living room sofa. There is a talk show on the television. He stands in the doorway looking at me, carrying a brown paper bag. It smells delicious.

And I am now starving.

His eyes look me over as he passes me the food; it’s a grilled cheese sandwich and cup of tomato soup with basil. I look at him gratefully before I bite ravenously into the gooey, melted cheese and hot buttered bread. The cheese melts against my tongue; a droplet of butter rolls from my lower lip down my chin.

Liam sits next to me; he turns the television off.

“You’re feeling better?”

I am drinking savory soup directly from the container. “I’m still tired, but my nausea has passed.”

He nods thoughtfully. “You haven’t used your supplies this month, Riley.”

The sandwich is at my lips, but my mouth does not open. I’m trying to calculate the last time I had my period. Liam watches me for a few seconds before speaking.

“You’re 10 days late, Riley.”

I stare at him, struggling to come to terms with what this meant. Or could mean. Even the most regular women were sometimes late due to hormones or something.

But I was sick in the mornings. I was fatigued constantly.

The image of Lynn’s hand on her pregnant belly flashes through my mind.

I set my food down; my mouth is suddenly dry. “What … what if I am?”

“Pregnant?” Liam asks as he stands, then makes his way to the television set. He stands there, arms folded across his chest. His burgundy tie is blood against the crisp, white shirt he wears.

I nod slowly.

“You’ll get rid of it.” His tone is calm, matter-of-fact.

A coldness spreads from my belly to chill my entire body. I feel goosebumps rise on my skin. “No,” I whisper. “IF I am, it’s my body!”

“But my child. I don’t want children, Riley.”

“Then you should’ve taken better precautions!” I yell as I stand and get in his face. The robe falls open. I am naked beneath it, but Liam isn’t looking at my body.

“YOU said you were on birth control!” His voices thunders throughout the apartment. He takes a deep breath as he composes himself.

“However, I should have ensured that no … accidents could occur. I’ll be rectifying that situation.”

My eyes search his. He returns my gaze, his eyes steady. How could he be so callous, so cold towards a possible life he helped create?

“I’m not getting rid of our baby. This isn’t something you can throw money at to make it go away, Liam!”

He looks at me incredulously. “It’s a BABY! I will ALWAYS BE THROWING MONEY AT IT!” He shakes his head. “Best to make a one-time payment and be done with it.” He looks at me with hard, dark eyes. “And you either get rid of it or give it up. Those are your only options, Riley. You can’t have us both.”

He steps around me, headed for the stairway that leads upstairs. “Finish your food before it gets cold.”

The heels of his shoes tap against hardwood as he jogs up the stairs. And I am alone.

All alone.

I look around and my glance falls on my lunch. I gather it and take it into the kitchen; I watch red liquid splash against the stainless steel of the sink as I pour the soup out. I wrap the sandwich in its paper, put it back inside its bag, and ball the whole thing up before tossing it in the trash.

Back in the living room, I straighten the sofa cushions and fold my blanket; I carry the blanket with me to the bedroom. I place it back inside the closet; I look at my clothing. Clothing that Liam bought. My fingertips run across the various fabrics: silk, wool, cotton; it causes the hangers to tinkle against each other.

I am standing at the window, the robe belted tightly around my waist, when I hear Liam’s voice behind me. He says I have a doctor’s appointment Friday morning to determine if I am indeed pregnant. I say nothing as my eyes stay fixed on sunlight glinting off the East River, barely visible behind buildings of stone and steel.

I feel him behind me; I smell his cologne and hear his breathing. I feel tears prick my eyes.

“Why do you hate me so much?” I whisper.

“I don’t,” he answers softly.

His arms come around my waist and I feel his face drop into my hair. Then he steps away. “Dinner in an hour.”

“I’m not hungry.”

His footsteps pause. “You should eat.” And then he is gone.

That night, we do not have sex, but we do the next morning. We then spend the remainder of the day avoiding each other and not speaking.

I sit on his ridiculously oversized bed, chin resting on my knees, wondering what I will do if I am pregnant. I have my job; I have the alimony from Maxwell. I would need to find a bigger apartment, a two-bedroom at least.

I would not ask Liam for any child support, nor would I accept it if offered.

Friday morning, we are sitting in a doctor’s office. I fill out paperwork and give the receptionist my insurance information. Liam sits in a chair, an ankle resting on a thigh while he reads a magazine. When my name is called, he walks with me into the examination room.

The nurse is cheerful; she asks me questions that I answer in a dull tone.

No, I have never been pregnant before.

My period is now two weeks late.

The nausea is worse in the morning. I also have heartburn.

No pain.

Liam’s eyes stay fixed on me.

The nurse draws blood; I go to the bathroom to pee in a cup. And we wait.

The doctor comes in 20 minutes later. I am not pregnant. But she wants to do an ultrasound. I feel relief, sadness, and fear. I look at Liam, but his expression is stoic, giving nothing away. I agree to the ultrasound.

There is cool gel. Pictures of my insides show up on a screen. There are white spots on my right side.

I have gallstones; that is why I am nauseous and have heartburn and fatigue.

My surgery is scheduled for a month from Monday.

Liam asks if there is anything that can help relieve my discomfort for the next month. He inquires about foods and drinks to avoid. But he doesn’t look at the doctor when he asks his questions.

He is squatting in front of me, his thumb brushing my cheek while his eyes hold mine captive.

The doctor answers as she scribbles on paper: Ibuprofen to help with pain, and I need to limit my dairy, fats, grease, and fried foods.

At the reception desk, Liam pays the co-pay costs. The receptionist smiles at him. “Dr. Marion will see you Wednesday. Did you receive your paperwork?”

Liam nods, and tells her he will return it no later than Monday before he takes my hand as we walk to the elevator. I want to pull away because I don’t think he would be holding my hand if I were pregnant.

He won.

But I let my hand stay wrapped with his.

“Who’s Dr. Marion?” I ask.

“My urologist.”

“Is it a routine visit?”

I feel my stomach sour even though I haven’t eaten anything.

The elevator car arrives, and we board. He pushes the button to take us to the lobby. His eyes stay fixed on the metal doors as we begin our descent downstairs.

“I’m getting a vasectomy.”

And he says nothing else.

Tagging: @sirbeepsalot @jared2612 @katedrakeohd @jovialyouthmusic @hopefulmoonobject @amomentofsinclairity @ao719 @burnsoslow @bbrandy2002 @janezillow @marietrinmimi @annekebbphotography @merridithsmiscellany-blog @queenjilian @texaskitten30 @glaimtruelovealways @indiacater @forthebrokenheartedthings @kingliam2019 @bebepac @zaffrenotes @liyanin @liamxs-world @choiceslife @ac27dj @the-soot-sprite @gnatbrain @sanchita012 @anotherbeingsworld @atha68 @hopelessromanticmonie @amandablink @cmestrella @iaminlovewithtrr @cinnamonspongecake @lifeaskim @starrystarrytrouble @liamandneca @liamrhysstalker2020 @alyssalauren @queenrileyrose @ladyangel70 @yourmajesty09 @gkittylove99 @neotericthemis @twinkleallnight @umccall71 @ritachacha @marshmallowsaremyfavorite @cordonianroyalty @superharriet

#tw discussion of pregnancy termination #tw slightly ns*w #dcbbw answers #UnRomance AU ask #liam x riley #this isn’t Cordonia

79 notes · View notes