#you can wait until the end of your third season to start opening up to yaz!!! you cant!!!! this can only end badly for both of you!!!!

[dilemmaontwolegs]

It Started With A... || CarLandOscar

Summary: Whoever thought love was limited to one person was an idiot. Love had no limits and you knew that better than most when a rookie found himself carving out a third of your heart. Warnings: established relationships, fluff, angst, pining. WC: 7.5k

It started with a smile. It was stiff and polite and made you pity the rookie who was being introduced to everyone so fast he would surely forget their names. 

“It took me a few months, but you’ll figure out who is who,” you encouraged him as the welcome committee went back to work in the factory and Oscar looked for guidance on where he was meant to go next. 

“I hope so. I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name,” he admitted sheepishly. “Are you in the PR team?”

You looked down at your black skirt and white blouse and thought you probably did look like someone from PR or legal. “Contrary to belief, I am actually what people would call a PR nightmare,” you said as you held your hand out. “Y/N Y/L/N, Lando’s girlfriend.”

“It's nice to meet you. I suppose I’ll see you around here a lot then.”

You smiled ruefully and shook your head. “I’m studying at Royal Holloway but we wanted to be here for your first day so we stopped by.”

You looked around for Lando and found him returning from the cafeteria with a takeaway coffee cup in his hand. “I wondered where you went,” you teased as you happily accepted the hot drink and the kiss he placed on your cheek. 

“Figured you needed this, love. I kept you up pretty late for a school night.” Lando nudged Oscar and winked. 

The Australian’s ears turned pink and you rolled your eyes at your boyfriend's humour. “He was steaming until some ridiculous hour this morning. You’ll probably find him crashed out on a couch somewhere this afternoon while I will be struggling through lab tech.”

“You’re the smartest person I know, I don’t think you even need to go to class.” Lando tipped your chin back, giving you a deep kiss without care that his new teammate was watching the interaction. “We should go, love, don’t want to make you late again. You want to come for a ride too?”

“Shouldn’t I go inside?” Oscar asked as he looked to the double doors that led into the employee only section.

“They want us to do a few icebreaker promo vids to get to know each other so you’ll just be waiting around for me to get back anyway.”

“You should probably get used to that, he likes to keep people waiting,” you joked. 

“When have I ever kept you waiting?”

“I’m still waiting for a win.”

Lando chuckled and playfully swatted your ass. “I’m working on that. Hard.”

You cupped his cheek and ran the pad of your thumb over his pouting bottom lip. “I know you are, baby, and it’s gonna come.”

Oscar cleared his throat and jutted a thumb over his shoulder. “I can just go wait inside.”

“Nah, come on,” Lando said as he grabbed his keys from his pockets. “You should see where her classes are in case there's an emergency.”

You frowned in confusion. “An emergency?”

“Yeah, like if I’m running late.” Lando draped an arm over your shoulder and led the way to the handful of reserved parking spots near the front door. “It’s only 15 minutes down the road.”

Lando opened the passenger door to his Range Rover and you glanced at Oscar who just smiled and opened the back door. “I’m okay back here,” he said as he climbed in. You settled into your usual seat but adjusted it to give Oscar’s longer legs some extra room. 

The drive took a little longer with the tail end of rush hour traffic but it seemed to pass quickly with Lando and Oscar making small talk. You could almost feel Lando’s excitement vibrating off him when he spoke about the upcoming season while Oscar was far more reserved. You quickly understood that he was merely the quiet type, not that he wasn’t excited. 

“You should come over for dinner,” Lando said, one hand resting on your thigh while the other steered. “I’m heading back to Monaco this afternoon but I’ll be back for the weekend.”

He squeezed your leg when he caught your eyes dropping down at the reminder. “It’s only a few days, love.”

“I know, doesn’t stop me from missing you.”

Oscar tried to turn his attention to the scenery out the window, feeling intrusive in the intimate moment, but Lando caught his eyes as they glanced over you. “Oscar could keep you company. Maybe you could show him around Surrey?”

Oscar’s eyes widened as if he had been caught red handed and his cheeks flamed again. “I, uh, sure, I mean, you’re probably busy studying though.”

“I can make time. I actually get through it a lot quicker without this distraction in the house. Who would have thought?”

Lando gasped, “Me, a distraction?”

“Mhmm, you always need attention, baby. But that’s okay, I still love you.”

“Good to know.” Lando dropped a lopsided grin and winked before pulling up to the front of the Science Block. “I love you too, and don’t forget Carlos is picking you up this afternoon.” 

You leaned across the gearbox and kissed Lando farewell before turning to Oscar. “It was really lovely to meet you.”

“You too. Should I get your phone number?”

“Asking for my girlfriend’s number in front of me,” Lando scoffed. “Mate, that’s fucking rude.”

You slapped Lando’s arm and he burst out laughing. “You should have seen your face. Classic.”

You smiled apologetically to the Aussie. “I’ll put it in your phone,” you offered as you held out your hand for the device. You quickly entered the number and hit the green icon until your phone rang in your pocket before taking a selfie and adding it to the contact. “There, now you’ll remember who the name belongs to.”

“Thanks,” he chuckled, taking the phone back. “I would’ve just put ‘Lando’s Missus’.”

“I like that, you can still update it,” Lando chuckled. “It’s a good title.”

“One I’m still waiting for,” you said as you waved your empty ring finger. The movement drew your attention to the watch on your wrist and you swore as you saw class was about to begin. “Bye, baby, have a safe flight.”

You bundled up your bag but when you reached for the door it was already opening and you gave Oscar a quick hug as you stepped out. “Bye, Osc.”

Half the students had disappeared into the halls and you speed walked up to the heritage building where you would spend the first half of your day.

Lando watched you walk away while Oscar took the front seat. “You’ve done something right,” he commented as he put the SUV in reverse, “it took me two weeks to get a nickname.”

A dark blue Ferrari was surrounded by dozens of students when you left your last class and you cradled your textbooks tighter, prepared to bustle your way in. Carlos had been keeping an eye out and was quick to spot you leaving the building. He moved assertively through the crowd and met you at the edge of the circle so he could use his body to shield you. 

“Nice and inconspicuous,” you teased him when you were safely deposited into the passenger seat.

“Sorry, hermosa, the flight was delayed. I didn’t have time to go home and switch cars.” He drove slowly as the last of the fans moved aside and tried to peer through the tinted glass. “How was school?”

“I didn’t fall asleep, so there’s that,” you said with a yawn and felt Carlos’ hand close around yours as you closed your eyes. “I missed you.”

“I missed you too.” Carlos lifted your hand to his lips and kissed your knuckles before resting them on his lap. “Lando said you made a new friend.”

You smiled and opened your eyes to see Carlos glancing across the car as he sped along the highway home. “You two are the worst gossips. Oscar’s nice. I think they will get along well as teammates.”

“Better than me?”

“No one could beat you and Lando as teammates, baby, that was pure magic.” You rubbed soothingly along his thigh to reassure him. “I don’t know if he will get more vocal as he gets comfortable but I get the feeling Oscar is just a quiet person. He’s very different from Lando, and you and Daniel, which could be a good thing.”

Carlos chuckled to himself. “It sounds like you have spent a lot of time thinking about him.”

“There may have been moments,” you admitted. “But there was someone I thought about a lot more.”

A wicked grin grew and Carlos’s hand drew yours higher up his leg as he turned onto the narrow lane that led to the private property Lando had bought. Set halfway between the McLaren factory and your university, it was the idyllic spot to live and Carlos could fly in from the Ferrari HQ in Maranello whenever he had free time, or, when Lando didn’t want to leave you on your own. 

“And who exactly did you think about?” Carlos asked as the front gates opened. “Was he handsome?”

“Very, very handsome, with dark hair and a sexy accent. And he’s so fucking fit, I could break my teeth on his abs,” you hummed happily as the car pulled into one of the few spaces left in the large garage. “I could go on and on about him. Charles is just-”

“Cha-“ Carlos’ foot fell heavy on the brake and the car jutted to a sharp stop. “Charles!”

Your giggle filled the empty car as Carlos ran around the front and opened your door. The world tipped over as he grabbed you out of the seat and tossed you over his shoulder, swatting your ass as he marched you into the house. 

“I’m sorry, I was joking,” you spluttered between laughing and gasping as he spanked you again. “I was thinking about you, doing something surprisingly similar to this actually, just less clothes.”

The world spun again as he tossed you on the bed and caged you beneath his body, his bottom lip pushed out in a pout. “You hurt my feelings, mi amor.”

You wrapped your legs around his waist and combed a hand through his thick dark hair that had grown in the week he had been gone. “Then let me make it better.”  

It started with a text, asking if you had any recommendations for the local takeaways. It was Oscar’s cheat day and you were feeling like you could use a little pick me up of greasy food so you offered to show him your favourite spot. Carlos had been called away a day earlier than planned so you had the whole house to yourself and its grand size always seemed scary on your own. 

The buzzer from the gates sounded and you hit the remote button to open it after, swearing as you realised you lost track of time. Open textbooks covered the kitchen table and highlighters were strewn amongst them as you tried to colour code the notes you had made on post-its. It was a mess, but it was too late to clean up as Oscar knocked on the front door.

“I promise I didn’t forget you were coming, I just thought I had time to finish my homework first,” you said as you opened the door and waved him in. You looked down at the grey sweatpants that came from Carlos’ drawer and the hoodie that came from Lando’s, not quite what you had planned to wear into town. “Obviously, I thought wrong. Make yourself comfortable, I’ll just get changed real quick.”

“You don’t have to get dressed up,” he said as he took his shoes off and closed the door behind him. “I’d rather you be comfortable.”

You smiled at the sincerity and gave him a quick hug, inhaling the musky cologne that clung to his shirt. “You’re sweet, Osc, but you’re a rookie and it shows.”

He frowned as you pulled away and started to head to the stairs for the second floor where the bedrooms were. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

You paused at the bottom step and looked over your shoulder. “You’ll see in an hour.”

The chicken shop had been almost empty when you entered before the dinner rush but there was a crowd growing outside. You were used to having cameras pointed your way after publicly dating Lando for over two years, but Oscar had only shot to fame in the last month when his infamous tweet aired on Drive to Survive. He hadn’t been known outside of the smaller F2 circle but now he was a household name. 

“I see what you mean,” he said as he did his best to ignore the people knocking on the glass. 

“You get used to it, eventually.” You popped a hot chip in your mouth and chewed it while you watched him, a small frown tugging his brows together. “The trick is deciding early on what your position is.”

“What position?”

“With the fans, the paparazzi, all of it.” You glanced at the window and waved. “When we started dating, Lando tried to protect me from them and hide our relationship but they were like sharks after blood. We found we had more privacy if we acknowledged them, then they just moved on.”

You didn’t try hiding with Carlos so no one ever dug too deep into it. Everyone just assumed you were close friends given how close Lando and him were too. It was easier for everyone to believe you were just friends.

Oscar turned to the glass window and forced a smile before waving to the children. Cameras flashed as the fans got the face shots they wanted and then they dispersed back about their day, with the exception of a few stragglers. “Huh. Are you sure you’re not in PR?”

“I’m sure,” you said with a smirk. You weren’t joking when you said you were a PR nightmare - if the world found out about the unorthodox relationship between you, Lando and Carlos it would be. “I have just been through it all before so I can be your personal guide.”

“Thank you.”

You pushed the leftover plate of fries his way knowing he was probably like every other driver who had the ability to consume three times their weight in carbs on a cheat day. “You can thank me with another dinner date, it beats going cross-eyed studying.”

“I’m not sure your boyfriend would appreciate that,” he said as he dragged the plate of fries closer and finished the last of them.

“Lando appreciated what makes me happy, and he’s secure enough to trust what we have isn’t going anywhere.” 

The idea was foreign to him and you could see the doubt he had about it, but he settled instead for a polite, “That must be nice.”

“Your PR team is going to love you,” you chuckled as you grabbed your wallet to pay. “A driver who actually keeps his thoughts to himself, that’s a rarity.”

Oscar’s long legs quickly overtook you and he had some cash out ready. “I invited you,” he said with a stern look that caught you by surprise. “I’m paying.”

Raising your hands in defeat, you smirked and slipped your wallet back into your handbag. “Yes, sir.”

You watched his eyes linger on your lips before he shook his head of the wayward thought and led the way out of the store. “So what do you usually do when Lando is in Monaco?”

“Carlos usually comes and keeps me company, or I just study. Not exactly the epitome of excitement but it’s my last year and then I’ll go to Monaco too.”

Oscar quietly accepted the knowledge without questioning it, though you could see them swirling in his eyes. He wanted to know about Carlos but he was too polite to ask, or maybe he knew it wasn’t something you could answer. “Well, you have my number so if you get sick of studying you can always call me.”

"You can call me too, Osc.”

Term break arrived with as much turbulence as the plane you took to Austria. On one hand you were excited to be able to travel to a few races but on the other you nervously awaited two assessment results and continuously checked your phone for updates until Carlos locked it in the hotel safe. “You can get it back when you promise to relax.” 

“I won’t relax until I know what I got,” you argued but between him and Lando they distracted you well enough, for a while at least.

“We need to get going,” Lando reluctantly said as he climbed out of bed and tried to restore some control over his mussed hair. “You can have your phone back, but just so we can contact you, not so that you can worry about your damn exams.”

Carlos laughed as he unlocked the safe that also had your passports and valuables stored. “I’m sure she will listen to you,” he said as he handed the phone over and saw the unread text messages from Oscar light up the screen. “Though maybe she won’t have time to check her emails now.”

The two managed to shower in a matter of seconds before they reappeared and sorted through the pile of clothes on the floor, tossing red one way and papaya the other. 

“Is Oscar on his way?” Lando asked when he was dressed and ready to go to the track. 

“He’s already there,” you replied, barely looking up from the messages that were coming in rapidfire succession except to kiss Lando goodbye. “And he said you’re going to be late again if you don’t hurry up.”

“I was on time yesterday,” Lando grumbled, pulling his shoes on as he hopped to the door. “I just looked late because I was the last to arrive.”

“Better than coming too soon,” Carlos joked as he leant down to give you a kiss too. “See you later, mi amor.”

You arrived at the track just before the driver’s parade began, when everyone was too busy making their way to the grandstands so the paddock was much easier to navigate. The results had been posted and a smile had been plastered on your face since seeing the grade, but you wanted to tell Lando and Carlos in person. 

“Hey, you’re actually here.” The aussie twang greeted your ears before you turned and found Oscar opening his door opposite Lando’s. “I was starting to believe you were a figment of my imagination.”

Oscar opened his arms and you stepped into the hug you were pretty sure you had trained him into expecting every time you met. He was already in his fireproof skins and they hugged every inch of his torso so you could feel the muscle that lay beneath. 

“I got in last night,” you said as you brushed a hand through his soft hair and giggled when it flopped back over his forehead. “How has your week been?”

“I’m pretty sure you know almost everything that’s happened.” Referring to the hundreds of texts that were religiously exchanged. 

“It’s not the same without seeing your face, I can’t tell if you’re lying or not.”

He tucked your head back into his collar and held you a little tighter. “I wouldn’t lie to you.”

“You would if you thought it was protecting me.”

He didn’t have a response for that, at least not before Lando’s door opened and he leaned against the panel with an amused look on his face. 

“Are we celebrating or commiserating, love?”

You had completely forgotten why you had come to the building and a bright smile lit up your face as you bounced on the balls of your feet. “A+, baby.”

“Knew you could do it!” Lando wrapped his arms around you and, incidentally, Oscar too. “Fuck the diet, we are going out tonight.”

You looked up at Oscar. “You’ll come too right?”

“Of course he’s coming,” Lando answered with a wink. “Gotta thank the guy that looks after my girl when I’m away. She would never get her nose out of a book if you didn’t take her out.”

You had quickly learned that it didn’t take much to make Oscar blush and Lando loved to make it happen. 

“It’s no problem,” Oscar murmured as he scratched his heated neck. 

Oscar understood more than anyone why there were always rumours about Carlos. Every time pictures were snapped of you and the Spaniard, or all three of you, the gossip began anew. After spending quite a bit of time with you over the last six months he had his own fair share of rumours but he knew nothing had happened with you. It was hard not to gravitate closer to you or to hug you at any given chance - there was a magnetism he couldn’t explain and he didn’t want to fight it. 

“You saved me from total starvation on numerous occasions,” you praised, rising on your toes to kiss his pink cheek. “My hero.”

Oscar’s face grew another shade deeper and he tried to change his racing thoughts to something other than the feel of your lips. It was impossible, he was too far gone and was helpless to his own feelings that wanted more than you could offer. He couldn’t even look at Lando after the betrayal he had just imagined doing. That was his teammate and you were his boyfriend.

“I’m going to head to the garage,” he choked as he took a step back and grabbed his balaclava from his room. He could feel your eyes in him as he left and when he reached the end of the corridor he turned with a frown as he realised he had missed something. “Congratulations on the grade, you deserve it after the effort you put in.”

Those eyes he had come to love in the last six months softened and you smiled. “Thank you, Osc. Good luck out there.”

It started with a kiss. While Lando and Carlos were celebrating the points they had earned, you were keeping Oscar’s glass full as he stewed in his mind over what he could have done better. You could almost see the calculations running through his head as he swirled the amber liquid in his glass and it was like he couldn’t even hear the music in the nightclub. 

“If you don’t drink that I will, and you don’t want to see what happens to me when I have whisky,” you warned him. 

He looked at the glass and sighed, putting it down. “I think I should just call it a night. You should go have fun with them.” You followed his sight to Carlos and Lando jumping with the crowd, Lando’s mouth moving with the words and Carlos’ arm draped over his shoulder.

“They can keep each other company, I want to be here with you.” You took his glass and lifted it to your lips. “Last warning…” The liquor burned down your throat and you rushed to take a gulp of your fruity cocktail to wash away the taste before a shiver rolled down your spine. “Oh god, how can you drink that?”

You poured another glass from the bottle on the table and held it out until he took it with a small laugh. “It’s meant to be sipped, not shot,” he clarified before drinking a small amount.

The whisky hit your stomach and you felt warmth spread across your skin. The bar menu suddenly became a necessity and you fanned your face with the cardboard as the flush reached your hairline. “We should dance.”

“I, I’m not a good dancer,” he said, looking concerned at the idea.

“No one is good at dancing,” you pointed out, the crowd basically just jumping to the beat or moving side to side. “Just follow my lead.”

He accepted your hand and you grinned triumphantly as you towed him to the dancefloor before turning and stepping closer to his body. Your hands came to rest on his chest and you swayed your hips to the beat before realising he really did need to be led because his hands were still limp at his sides. 

“You can touch me,” you teased as you grabbed his hands and put them on your hips. “Just relax and feel the rhythm.”

Oscar’s fingers flexed when he felt you start moving again, your body brushing against his, and he released a shuddering breath when you turned in his arms and tipped your head back on his shoulder to look up at him. 

“You okay?” you asked as you watched his blue eyes darken in the laser lights.

“You’re beautiful.”

You turned to face him with one of those smiles of pure joy that always made his day better and he forgot about his poor race result. He could hardly breathe when your hands roamed his body, climbing the thick column of his neck to rest on his racing pulse. He was pretty sure he was going to pass out when you rose on your tiptoes, eyes closed and lips pursed to give him one of those sweet kisses on his cheek.

Someone knocked into him and he turned to growl a warning but then your lips were there, pressed to his lips and he lost the words. Time slowed to the space between one heartbeat and the next as he savoured the sweet taste of your drink, unable to stop himself from taking a little more. 

You had kissed his cheek enough times to memorise the feel of them and knew it was not what you were kissing. A soft gasp slipped past when his tongue parted your lips and your fingers found themselves tangled in his hair, tugging him closer as your body yearned for more.

“Uh-oh, someone’s had a bit of frisky whisky,” Lando purred in your ear.

Oscar startled back and wiped his lips that were the same shade as your lipstick. “Fuck, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to, it was an accident. Someone pushed me,” he stammered as he looked around but had no idea who had barged into him when there were hundreds of people in the club.

“Relax, mate,” Lando said with a laugh, clapping him on the shoulder. You cozied into Lando’s arm and tried to process what had happened while your lips tingled from the kiss and your heart fluttered. “It’s the whisky.”

You wanted to tell him the whisky hadn’t kicked in yet but kept quiet as Oscar exhaled in relief. Hiding your face in the crook of Lando’s neck, you screwed your eyes shut and pushed away the image that told you he had regretted the kiss. The knowledge settled in your gut that twisted and turned and you gripped Lando’s shirt harder at the rejection. 

“Can we go?” you begged quietly. “Please?” 

Lando kissed your forehead and nodded. “Okay, love, let me just tell Carlos.”

Your hands were left empty as Lando darted back into the melee to find Carlos who would probably stay until the club shut down. For the first time since meeting him you felt awkward in Oscar’s presence knowing you had made him uncomfortable. You didn’t know what to say and it was clear he didn’t either as he buried his hands in the pockets of his jeans. 

“I’m sorry,” you mouthed as you took a step away, hoping the crowd would swallow you whole.

When you woke the next morning for a moment you could pretend it was some strange dream, or nightmare, until Lando blinked his sleep eyes open and pulled you into his arms. “Good morning, beautiful.” The timbre of his voice when he was just waking could always bring a smile to your face but your lips merely wobbled and he sat up concerned. “What’s wrong?”

“I fucked up, with Oscar.”

“Baby, it was just a kiss and you were both drunk, I’m sure he’s probably already forgotten about it.”

The thought that he could forget something that to you was so profound only compounded the ache in your chest. You didn’t want him to forget, you didn’t want him to regret, and you voiced as much to Lando as you cried in his arms.

“Sweetheart,” Lando murmured softly as he wiped away your tears. “I think this is a conversation we should have with Carlos.”

“It doesn’t matter,” you grumbled, tearing yourself from his embrace. “It wouldn’t work out anyway.”

Lando got up and followed you to the bathroom as you turned the shower onto the hottest setting. “Why wouldn’t it work?”

“You and Carlos are best friends, and while you are always close to your teammates I know he doesn’t have the same interest in Oscar.” You stepped under the cascade and welcomed the burning heat that rained down. “I don’t want to lose what we have by wanting more.”

You didn’t hear Lando leave as the steam fogged up the glass and you let your head fall against the cold tile wall. He left you to your thoughts and gave you the space needed to reconcile your feelings to the past.

It started with a phone call. The urge had woken you from a deep sleep and you couldn’t shake the need to reach for your phone and dial the number you knew by heart. It had been a good weekend for the McLaren team with double podiums both in the Sprint and Grand Prix. The two third place caps were hung on the post of the bed as testament to the productive weekend but Lando had gone to bed deflated. 

Oscar had won his maiden race before him. A rookie had done what he had waited years for, what he still waited for. 

“Hello?”

You had assumed the call would go to voicemail after ringing for so long so you weren’t prepared to hear Oscar’s sleepy voice in your ear.

“Hey, sorry to wake you.”

“It’s okay, is everything alright?”

You swallowed and shook your head before remembering he couldn’t see. “I just wanted to say congratulations, I thought you would still be out celebrating.”

“There’s no one to go celebrating with,” he said so quietly you wondered if it was even meant to be said out loud. 

“I’m sorry.” You weren’t sure what for exactly but you felt the need to say it anyway. It was about the only thing you had said to him in weeks. “I should let you get back to sleep.”

“It’s, uh, it’s good to hear your voice,” he admitted and you a little bit of the weight on your shoulders eased as you realised whatever you had wasn’t completely ruined.

“You too, Osc. Good night.”

“Night.”

It was naive to think that one phone call could repair the divide that had chasmed between you because when you returned home for your last semester you still felt his absence everywhere. There were no daily text messages, or invitations to dinner, no sudden appearances as you left class. He was a memory that haunted you and it was always worse when both Lando and Carlos were away.

Four Months Later

It started with a bouquet. The small card was almost lost in the overflowing explosion of blossoms that left a sweet scent in the air but when you flipped it over your heart skipped a beat. Congratulations, OP x 

You were still smiling just as brightly an hour later when you arrived at the graduation ceremony to receive your Honours degree. You had kept the bouquet with you and inhaled the fresh scent as you waited for your name to be called. A loud cheer erupted from the rows where Lando, Carlos, your friends and family sat but it was the lonely cheer at the back of the hall that caught your attention. 

Unfortunately it may have been a hopeful hallucination as you didn’t see him again after that or at the celebration Lando threw for you at home.

“Pack your bags, baby, it’s time for Monaco!” Lando engulfed you in a hug and spun you around so your ceremonial robes billowed out and you clutched your cap to keep it from flying off. “I’m so selfish, I can’t wait to wake up to you every fucking day.”

Another set of arms tugged you away and you fell into Carlos’ embrace. “I’m so proud of you, hermosa.”

You were practically a marionette the way you were passed from one person to the next until finally the bottles of champagne ran dry and the party came to an end. You collapsed onto your bed with a giddy laugh that the long journey was finally over and you toed your heels off, letting them fall to the floor. 

“You can’t sleep in your dress, amor,” Carlos chuckled as he walked into the room with Lando after locking the house up. 

“Then you will have to undress me,” you teased with a beckoning finger that faltered when you saw Lando had the bouquet in a vase that he had found downstairs and he placed it on the bedside drawers beside your phone. “I saw him.”

“I know,” Lando said as he straightened the card among the roses. “I invited him.”

“Thank you.”

The next bouquet was one that you sent to him on his birthday. He barely kept the flowers alive for a week but he did keep the card that was attached. The two little xx’s you signed off with were almost faded from how often he traced his thumb over them before slipping it back into his wallet. He was no longer a rookie but he found this season harder to bear without your companionship and he wished he could somehow fix what he broke.

The problem was that he couldn’t settle for just your friendship anymore so he had to keep his distance instead. He had tasted your lips and nothing less could sate the addiction that had festered in the absence of another hit.

Miami was torturous for Oscar. The car was running great and his qualifying was great, but after five rounds of racing he was still stunned every time he watched you enter the paddock. At least in China the weather was horrible so you were bundled up in Lando’s hoodie but Miami, Miami was hot. Monaco had been influential in your fashion and the dress you wore was worthy of the runways in Paris. 

Stacks of passes hung around your neck and fell into your cleavage as you entered the grid and joined Lando where he was talking to Carlos. Oscar watched with envy as you hugged them both and kissed their cheek with well wishes for the race while he failed to hear what his race engineer was explaining. He was distracted by the fact you had seen him, and smiled. It was small and shy, but it was a smile nonetheless and one of his own growing as you waved your fingers and disappeared back into the garage.

One hundred and ten races he kept you waiting, but finally Lando won his maiden race and there was nothing that could bring him down. He had not stopped smiling, or dancing, or talking since winning and he wasn’t even sure if any of it made sense. The hours were a whirlwind of alcohol and noise until it all turned black and Carlos had to help you get him into bed.

Lando was fast asleep with his mouth open and snoring, which heavily down to the copious amounts of alcohol he had consumed at the after party. He didn’t even stir as you slipped out of the bed and left the room to answer the call that lit up your phone. 

“Hey.” You kept your voice low even though you knew nothing short of a fire alarm would wake your boyfriend.

“Hey.” You could hear the smile in that word and your own lips curled up in response. “I’m sorry if I woke you, I just needed to hear your voice.”

You navigated your way through the dark hotel suite to the balcony and opened the door just wide enough to fit through before closing it. The humidity was instant and the satin nightgown clung to your warm skin as you hung up the phone. “You didn’t wake me.”

Oscar was so close you could almost touch him, but the balcony one room over was just too far away. He even looked down the gap to see the fifteen storey high plunge and you could see his brows burrow together like he was calculating his chances of making the leap across. 

“Don’t you dare,” you warned him. “I didn’t come out here to see you fall to your death.”

His knuckles turned white as he gripped the railing and he sighed in defeat. A smirk soon tugged at his lips and he brushed his hair back over his ear as he eyed the sheer slip you wore. “But you did come out here to see me.”

You crossed your arms over your chest, aware of how thin the material was and all it bared. “I wanted to check how you were.”

Oscar’s lips pursed at the reminder of his poor race result. 

“Could have done without your boyfriend’s boyfriend crashing into me.”

He didn’t know how close to the truth he was with that statement and you wondered if he knew about the relationship that Lando and Carlos had or if he was just playing on an old fan rumour. You wondered how shocked he would be if he knew that Carlos was passed out on the other side of Lando right now. 

“It is a part of racing,” you reminded him. “There’s always a risk battling it out.”

Oscar dropped his head with a little laugh. “It’s a good thing I didn’t call you for sympathy or I would be disappointed.”

“Why did you call me?” 

You knew why.

“I told you, I wanted to hear your voice.”

“Osc,” you sighed, your hands falling to your side, and he lifted his head to look at you, his blue eyes so similar to his teammates.

“I’m not an idiot,” he said as he let go of the rail he leaned on and rose to his full height. “I know you love him.”

“I do,” you confirmed with a small nod, unable to look in his direction as you turned your focus to the view of the ocean instead. 

You didn’t hear him move until his feet landed quietly on the concrete behind you and you spun around to face him. A small shocked gasp escaped your lips when his palm glided over the satin at your waist and pulled you closer to his body. Your hands found their own space on his chest and he froze as he waited for you to push him away, but your fingers curled into the white shirt he wore.

“I know you love him,” he whispered, his lips brushing the shell of your ear. “But I think you might love me too.”

“You have ignored me for months.” It wasn’t a denial and he caught the admission of those missing words.

“I can never ignore you, and now I know I can’t even keep my distance from you.” He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against yours as his large hands cradled your face. “I need you, Y/N.”

“You don’t know what you are asking for,” you whispered as you fought the urge to tell him just how much you needed him too. 

“I’m asking for a chance to show you how perfect we are for each other.” He pulled back to see tears shimmering in your eyes and he sighed. “I shouldn’t have called. I didn’t think. I’m sorry.”

“Wait-”

“No, you don‘t have to say anything. I shouldn’t have put you in that position. I don't want you to cheat on Lando.” He kept backing away but you followed with each step until his back was pressed to the railing. 

“Lando isn’t the problem,” you promised as you reached for his face and cradled his sharp jawline. “Remember when I said I was a PR nightmare?”

Oscar nodded as his brows furrowed together. 

“I’m trusting you with a secret no one else knows.” His confusion grew as you took his hand and led him inside the suite. You pressed a finger to your lips as you reached the bedroom door and nudged it wider so he could see what was inside. In the dim light it was hard to make out what he was looking at but then everything came into focus like the Ferrari shirt on the floor and the CS55 cap on the nightstand. 

Oscar’s jaw slackened as he recognised the two bodies spread across the sheets and he eyed the empty space that you had filled. A thousand questions muddled in his head and he swallowed them down until you had closed the door again. His hand slipped out of yours as you walked back to the balcony and you wondered if that was the last time you would ever hold it.

“No one can know, please,” you whispered as you hugged yourself and stared at the moonlight on the waves. 

“Help me to understand what I just saw. Are the rumours true then?”

You laughed and turned to face him, crossing your legs and you leant against the rail. “They're not wrong,” you admitted with an evasive shrug. “They love each other and have a relationship, but it’s not the same relationship that I have with them.”

“You’re not exactly helping me to understand this,” he muttered, dragging a hand down his face as he sat heavily on the outdoor settee. 

You had never needed to explain it before, the addition of Carlos to yours and Lando’s relationship had naturally fallen into place and been accepted without having to understand why you all felt the way you did or how it was going to work. But now you were going to try.

“I met Lando first and what we had was instant, he was funny and sweet and kind. Then he introduced me to Carlos who was so charismatic it was impossible not to love him too. It didn’t mean I loved Lando any less so he supported me having a relationship with Carlos too.” 

“Okay.” He nodded like it made some sense and it gave you a slither of hope. “But what about them?”

You watched Oscar’s eyes linger on the skin bared by the satin and they darkened when you uncrossed your legs to step closer. He sat up straighter as you approached and his legs opened for you to step between and he did nothing to stop you when you took a seat on his lap. 

“You want to know if it's a package deal?” you teased, toying with the strands of his dirty blonde hair. “You want to know if you can have me, but at what price?”

His throat bounced with a deep swallow and his tongue wet his dry lips before he could speak again. “Is it?”

You thought about teasing him more but you settled for the truth. “No, like I said, they don’t have that sort of relationship. Yes, we may sleep in the same bed more often than not and on occasion they share me, but that is as far as they go. That is where the rumours are wrong.”

“Share you as in…”

“Threesome, Oscar,” you confirmed with a laugh as his cheeks turned pink. Seeing that colour again reminded you of the kiss and you shifted on his lap to straddle his hips. “I can’t stop thinking about you. It feels like a part of me has been missing for months.”

His hands slid up your back and pulled you closer. “I know what you mean.” 

His lips were so close you could feel their warmth and they begged you to close the distance, but you couldn’t just yet. “I want you, Osc, and you’re right, I do love you.”

You could see the sadness in his eyes as he asked, “But?”

“But I don’t know how this works when you and Carlos are battling each other every week.”

“I know things sound heated on the radio but that is just on the track,” he promised, his thumbs drawing soothing circles over your spine. “I have no problem with Carlos, I swear.”

Carlos had said the same thing but you weren’t sure if they were just trying to placate you. Only time would tell.

“It’s not just my heart that will break if this doesn’t work,” you whispered as your eyes fluttered shut and you surrendered yourself to him.

“Then we will just have to make this work.”

[thelostconsultant]

Team building

pairing: Max Verstappen x reader

summary: You're Max's new teammate, but things don't go well, so Christian and Helmut send you on a private team building event before the next race of the season. At the end of the first day, things between you change drastically.

You and Max acted like two feral cats that kept hissing at each other every time they met. 

It was childish, you knew that, but he started it with an interview last year, in which he made a comment that could be translated to you not deserving your Red Bull seat. Not like you made it any easier for him, because after that you hinted at believing he had a fragile ego. Sure, you didn’t really mean it, you were just so mad at him that it slipped out. 

After the first race of the season it became obvious that the two of you didn’t want to be near the other. You smiled for the cameras and acted like everything was all right, but behind the scenes you didn’t talk to each other. It didn’t help on the track either, because you both refused to share information about settings or tires, which would have been crucial. 

Your bosses soon had enough of this nonsense, and after the third race of the season they announced you would go on a little team building trip together after the next race. You both protested, but you were both told to shut up. And so the two of you were taken to the middle of nowhere in China, accompanied by a filming crew and a very serious looking Christian who began to scold you both like you were stupid children when you went a little farther away from the others.

“You get a car, two tents, a compass, food and water for two days, a phone, and a paper map. We circled your current location and your destination. The filming crew will be there with you, but they can’t help you and can’t even talk to you unless it’s absolutely necessary. Good luck finding your way back to civilization,” he said as he handed Max the car keys. 

Both of you stood there rendered speechless, watching him walk away with a mocking smile on his face. Out of the corner of your eye, you glanced over at your teammate who let out a groan and looked down at the keys. He muttered something under his breath before turning on his heels to go back to where the others were waiting for you. With a sigh, you followed him and eventually stopped next to him, watching the old school Jeep and feeling several pairs of eyes being fixed on you. The car that brought you here already left with Christian, so it was now your little group in the wild.

“Are you good with maps and a compass?” Max asked you, briefly glancing down at you. 

You shrugged. “How hard can it be?”

A desperate laugh left his lips as he opened the Jeep. “We’re gonna die here,” he said quietly, more to himself than you or the cameras. “I’ll drive.”

Rolling your eyes, you went to the passenger seat where some of the stuff you got was stored until now. You put the map out of the way and that’s when you noticed the phone which was an old school type with no apps on it. Great, so you couldn’t even use its GPS to find your way out if reading the map didn’t work. You sorted out the items and only kept the most important ones there with you so you could open the big map and figure out where you were supposed to go. 

You checked the compass, then pointed in a direction. “That’s the way,” you said, but Max gave you an annoyed look in response. “What?”

“We need to go in the opposite direction, you–” He suddenly fell silent and you followed his blue eyes that were glued to one of the cameras put inside the car. “Okay, you need to learn how to use the compass, so for once try to focus,” he said, then went on to explain to you how it worked. 

Max talked to you as if you were an idiot, making everything as simple as he could so he could be sure you would understand. If there were no cameras around you, you would have slapped him and told him to shut the fuck up, but you had to behave. In the end he even explained a few things about reading maps, which–and it was painful to admit–came in handy as you didn’t know about them. Maybe if you hadn’t turned down your father’s offers to take you camping when you were a kid, you wouldn’t be in this situation now. 

But you were sure your teammate wasn’t a big camper either, he just knew a lot of things that sometimes came in handy. Apart from occasional short sentences, the two of you drove in complete silence, trying to avoid getting into a fight when your whole trip was being recorded. You could see the way he was gripping the steering wheel, trying hard to keep up his calm facade, so you decided to play nice and focus on navigating. The silence was only broken by the phone that beeped in your lap, so you took a quick look at it. 

“You guys are too quiet, as if you were on your way to a funeral,” was all the message said. 

He glanced over at you with a raised eyebrow, and you showed him the phone so he would know what their problem was. The look in his eyes gave away that he was the exact same thing as you. What the hell would you talk about? You had nothing in common, and if there was no one to tell you what to discuss on a video, you would’ve spent all of them awkwardly standing next to each other in complete silence. Or yelling at each other, that was the other possibility. 

Minutes passed in silence, but then Max began to talk about the first races of the season, starting a conversation about the grid and how other teams seemed to perform this year. He chose a safe topic, clever, so you could easily keep up with him. From the outside, it must have seemed like a pleasant chat, but the air in the car was heavy with tension. You said something that you expected to be funny, but he only looked over at you with narrowed eyes, making you question if you crossed a line with that comment. You really didn’t mean to, not this time. 

Before the sun went down, you chose a nice place for camping for the night, and used the equipment in the trunk to make dinner. It tasted terrible and that was the only thing you could talk about, although this time it was at least an honest conversation. When you put up the tents, the mood felt lighter once again, mostly because you were suffering and felt like you would sleep out in the open that night. If it wasn’t for Max’s offer to help, that’s exactly what would have happened. 

After the crew said goodnight and retreated to their own camping site farther from where you chose to stay, the two of you looked at each other in silence for a while, trying to figure out what to say. Something changed in the last two hours, you could tell. You didn’t feel like strangling him, in fact you realized the way he could get lost in explaining something was quite entertaining. 

Neither of you seemed sleepy, but maybe trying to sleep was the best you could do now, so you waved goodbye and went inside your own tents. But just when you were about to fall asleep, you heard the zip of the tent being pulled to open it, which was followed by someone climbing in next to you before zipping up the tent again. When they lied down on your side, it became clear it was Max, and you watched him with a confused look on your face as you tried to figure out what was happening. 

“Why can’t we always be like we’ve been once we stopped here?” he asked you quietly, sounding genuinely interested. 

You thought about it for a second as you rolled on your side to face him. “We like to make our lives complicated.”

Letting out a short laugh, he shook his head. “I don’t. Well, not intentionally. So maybe we should do something about it,” he told you with a smirk. 

Before you could ask him what he meant by that, Max put his hand on the back of your neck and pulled you closer to kiss you, surprising you by how gentle he was. For a moment you assumed he was just testing the waters, waiting to see how you reacted, but then he seemed to get lost in it and made you assume it was his plan to swallow you whole. It was nice, you didn’t want him to stop, and as if he could read your mind, he pushed you on your back so he could cage you between the ground and himself.

“If you tell anyone,” he said as he placed kisses all over your neck, giving you a warning as if there was a need for one. 

Because you weren’t about to tell anyone that you got rid of some of the tension between you this way. “Trust me, I don’t want people to know either. You’re not even my type, what would that look like?” you added jokingly.

Well, apparently this stupid joke didn’t land. Max stopped what he was doing and looked at you with a hurt look in his eyes. “Thanks, good to know,” he said with a sigh. “Why I don’t want anyone to know is because I know what people are like, there would be some who say that’s how you want to manipulate me.”

You raised your head to give him a quick kiss as your hands sneaked around his waist. “That’s nice, thank you, but I’m a big girl, I can pick my own battles. If I have to fight some morons who think about me this way, so be it. And just FYI, based on my previous boyfriends, anyone can tell you’re exactly my type,” you explained with a bright smile. Okay, maybe they didn’t like to talk as much as you do, but–”

“Mhmm, which of us is the one who talks a lot again?” Max asked with a smirk, causing you to giggle that he drowned with another kiss. 

The next morning you were woken up by a soft kiss being placed on the crown of your head, his large hand rubbing your back to bring you out of your sleep. With a groan, you rested your chin on his chest to look up at him. “Morning,” you muttered groggily. 

He swept a stray lock of hair out of your face as he watched you with a smile. “Morning. The crew is already here based on the noises coming from outside.” You gave him a confused look, not understanding what the problem seemed to be with it. He sneaks out and goes back to his own tent before they notice. Not a big deal. “They are right here and I’m not invisible,” he informed you with a laugh. 

“Oh,” you said, finally understanding the issue. 

Shaking his head, he gave you a soft kiss, then moved aside to put his clothes back on. You did the same, but only after admiring the view long enough to earn a cocky smile from him. “Wish me luck,” he said, then he kissed your forehead and pulled the zipper away to climb out of the tent. You saw him stop halfway and heard a nervous laugh leaving him. “Hey, guys, good morning.”

After he walked away, a cameraman leaned down to look into your tent, so you waved with and awkward smile at him. “Hi.”

“We will edit that out,” you heard someone say in the background. 

[yunhoszn]

steamed milk

pairing choi san x f!reader word count 2.5k genres fluff﹒smut warnings 18+ MINORS DO NOT INTERACT, mature language, not proofread, all lowercase bc i wrote this at 2 am… a week ago <3, barista!reader, barista!san, clumsy reader, mentions of burn scars?, mutual pining, little bit of power imbalance but it doesn’t play into the plot, escalates pretty fast, public sex, unprotected sex, cute fluffy moment at the end, may we get f’s in the chat for kim hongjoong’s desk chair

summary a closing shift with san is… interesting… to say the least.

more alright alright alright, i know i have a billion wips and a billion reqs to work on,,, but @bro-atz needed something to read on a flight and i needed an excuse to write with no plot in mind, solely based on vibes and this is what came out of it… i ALSO KNOW i’ve been withholding for a week but that’s bc i wasn’t sure if i wanted to keep this locked in the dungeon for a rainy day or not, until i remembered i should post something in honor of chellateez 🥳

@atzhouse @san-network

“did you burn yourself on the steam wand again, y/n?”

you bite your lip and turn away from hongjoong bashfully. so what if you’re a little clumsy, it’s not like you completely sucked at your job. maybe there were a few milk spills here and there. at least you knew what you were doing most of the time. 

“um, what would you do if i said no?” you scratch the back of your neck with the hand that wasn’t burned. hongjoong sighs, leaning back in his rolling chair. as the manager of a coffee shop, he did not get paid enough to babysit and coddle his employees like he usually did. 

between you almost always making a mess and then yunho and mingi goofing around whenever they were on shift together, he felt like he was starting to grow grey hairs. he shakes his head with a tsk, pulling out the first aid kit from one of the drawers in his desk. “let’s put some burn cream and a bandaid on it so you can hop back out. the dessert rush is about to begin.”

you nod and rock on the balls of your feet as you wait patiently. your manager dresses your burn and sends you on your way. the dessert rush, aside from the morning rush, was arguably the worst part of the day. shifts at the coffee shop were divided into thirds— open to mid, mid to evening, evening to close. while opens were the most busy, you at least got out early and could enjoy the rest of your day. mids were the slowest, but they took place midday so you couldn’t do much after you clocked off. 

closes were the worst, because they were so unpredictable. you weren’t ever sure if it was going to be busy, apart from the usual dessert rush, and that uncertainty bothered you. the beginning of your closing shift was staffed pretty well. there was yeosang, who was probably the best barista out of the lot of you, and seonghwa, a seasoned veteran in this game. he was your assistant manager. 

however, yeosang and seonghwa were off at 6 PM and the shop closed at 9 PM, leaving you and your lead for the night to close all by yourselves. and your lead? choi san. 

closing with san wouldn’t be such a problem if it weren’t for your massive crush on him. out of the other leads, san was the kindest. he didn’t lose his cool if your clumsy nature got the best of you during a hectic shift. in fact, he took his time to ensure everything was okay. he didn’t care if there were angry customers demanding that their drinks be made. his baristas were his number one priority. 

and well, with his appearance today, it would be more difficult than usual. donned in a white button up and some black slacks, his brown apron over, you think you’re going to faint. on a regular basis, san wore simple things like the occasional sweater or t-shirts and jeans, but this new look was making you all sorts of dizzy. you felt inferior beside him. (though technically, you were.)

with hongjoong, seonghwa, and yeosang leaving all at the same time, you were in a crisis. how were you supposed to survive this shift? it’s like the universe meticulously crafted this moment so it could laugh at you. and it all started with you burning yourself on that goddamn steam wand, while you were on bar with san of all people. 

“are you sure you don’t want me to send you home?” san asks lowly, making sure only you heard him. the two of you were finishing an order when he asked the question. 

“i couldn’t let you close by yourself.” you pout. as hard as it’s going to be working with him alone for three hours, you’d feel awful leaving him to fend for himself. 

“i can ask yeo or hwa to stay,” he shrugs, putting a lid on the iced vanilla latte in front of you. “i don’t want you to hurt yourself again.”

“i’ll be fine, san,” you reassure. “besides, seonghwa would probably kill me if i was the reason he had to stay later than he had to.”

san laughs a little, eyes scrunching up in the cute way they do when he smiles. your heart rate spikes and you have to take a deep breath to compose yourself. he nods as he turns to hand out the order. 

“if you insist.”

maybe you should’ve taken him up on that offer to go home. 

you’re too distracted by the way his rolled up sleeves strain against his muscular arms, staring a little too much. hongjoong just so happens to walk out of the back at that exact moment. he thinks your (very obvious) crush on san is funny, but not when the line is wrapped and you’re about to be down two men. 

“y/n, there’s five drinks waiting to be made,” he calls out, tapping on seonghwa and yeosang’s shoulders to let them know they can go. “what’s more important that has you standing there doing nothing?”

“sorry…” you apologize sheepishly, avoiding his gaze as you start on the next order; a dry cappuccino with cinnamon. great. another drink that required you using that godforsaken steam wand. a truly evil contraption. 

“i can be milk if you’d like?” san suggests suddenly, noticing your hesitation to steam the 2%. 

“if it’s not too much of an ask,” you frown. “i just don’t want to hold us back in the middle of a rush.”

“you don’t need to explain yourself to me, y/n,” he quickly swaps places with you. “i think you’re pretty damn good with a portafilter anyway.”

it’s a stupid compliment. only another barista would even know what that meant, but you take it to heart. your body flushes with warmth as you tamp the espresso grounds and pull a shot viable enough to use for the cappuccino. you’re a little shaky as you pour it into the paper cup and wait for san to pour the milk. 

this was the closest you’d get to flirting with san, and it was him telling you that you were actually good at your job. what a sad life you lived. 

thankfully, you manage to bulldoze through the line with just the two of you. in times like these, your solution is to go nonverbal and lock in. if you talk while you’re making drinks, you get distracted too easily and you find it’s harder to multitask. after the rush, things are slow for the most part and then it’s just you, san, and the sound of cafe music playing quietly over the speakers at 9 PM. 

“y/n, can i ask you a question?” san inquires, counting the till as you wipe down the espresso machine and the bar around it. 

“what’s up?” you hum, refolding your rag. he shuts the register and walks over to you, leaning on the bar adjacent to the one you were at. 

“i’m curious, and you don’t have to answer if you’re uncomfortable, but i’ve heard that you like me. is that true?” it comes out so politely, you’re not even sure you heard him correctly. you blink as the words process in your brain. this was the end. now you really wished you went home early. 

“well— um— i don’t know how to answer that…” you fiddle with your fingers, looking everywhere but at san. 

“all i want is a yes or no, because truth is,” he walks closer and closer until he’s directly in front of you. “i have a little crush on you myself.”

“you what?!” you don’t mean to sound so shocked, so appalled even, because he takes a step back, eyes widened by your outburst. you’re just so confused. choi san liked you? like, liked you?

“i’ll take that as a—“

“no!” you stand upright, grabbing his wrist. when you realize what you’ve done, you immediately let go. “i mean, no, as in yes. i do like you, san. i was just… embarrassed… that you found out from elsewhere instead of me. and i’m a little in disbelief that you feel the same.”

“why’s that?” his head tilts to the side a bit. “what’s not to like about you?”

“for starters, i’m the biggest klutz on the planet.” you huff, but that makes his smile grow wider. 

“i think that’s your charming point,” he admits, hands stuffed into the pockets of his slacks. “while i don’t enjoy seeing you hurt, like when you burned yourself earlier, i do think it’s kinda cute when you accidentally knock over a drink.”

“are you okay in the head? were you dropped on it as a baby?” you ask with a raised eyebrow. he laughs, this time a full on laugh that has him bringing a fist up to his mouth. you think you just shed a tear. and not from your eyes. 

“i don’t believe so. i guess i’m just attracted to people who aren’t afraid of being themselves,” he shrugs, reaching out to take your hand into his. “and you check all the boxes.”

remember the whole fainting thing? that’s about to come true. you manifested it. 

san brings your knuckles up to his lips, first kissing over the bandaid where your burn was and then all over the back of your hand. you stand there like a fish out of water, mouth opening and closing but no words escaping you. was the universe… rewarding you somehow?

“how often does joong check the cameras?” you gasp when his kisses have moved from your hand to your neck. he doesn’t break contact, speaking into your skin as he unties your apron. 

“almost never, but you have a point.”

this is how you end up on san’s lap in hongjoong’s office chair, fingers tangled in each other’s hair, lips locked like no tomorrow. he was a fantastic kisser, which just further proved your theory that he was the perfect human being. along with the subtle flirting, and the obvious knack for respecting boundaries, it’s almost like the universe had hand crafted choi san to be the ideal man. and they say chivalry is dead. pft, san’s existence dispels that notion undoubtedly. 

“he won’t know, right?” you pant, arching into him when he sucks at a particular part on the base of your throat. he hums. 

“you’re worrying too much,” san’s fingers slip under your top, digging into your waist. “i promise, he won’t find out. but we’ve gotta be quick since he’ll know what time we left.”

“m’kay,” you sigh, grinding down on his lap to help speed things along. the undressing process is a blur. you wish you could spend more time admiring his bare chest and arms, especially because you’d been fantasizing about this moment for almost an entire year now. 

“god, you’re so gorgeous, y/n,” he murmurs, reconnecting your lips sweetly. his hands massage the sides of your thighs as you hover over him, preparing to sink down on his cock. “i finally have you all to myself.”

you whine when you do, his words encouraging your arousal. the intrusion has you moaning softly, eyes squeezing shut from the sheer pleasure streaming through your veins. your nails scrape his shoulders and back, toes curling. the tip of his dick grazes that sensitive spot deep in your cunt with ease, as if he was made to be inside of you. 

“feels— fuck— feels so good, san,” you whimper, head falling to the crook of his neck. san chuckles, albeit a little strained. his hands remain in your hips, aiding your movement so you don’t get too tired. 

“is that right, sweetheart?” he says into your ear, nipping the lobe gently. “you’re taking me so well.” 

his praise shoots straight to your core, punching another moan out of you. you really shouldn’t be surprised that he’s inching you towards the edge of that familiar tide so fast. it’s san, and like you’ve stated before, he’s damn near perfect. but holy shit, the way he’s fucking you has you thinking that there is such a thing as heaven. 

you have to bite down on his collarbone to stop yourself from screaming like a fucking pornstar, leaving a myriad of marks on his skin to restrain the ferality threatening to jump out of you. every drag of his cock on your velvety walls drives you just a little more insane each time. 

he’s moving so slow, but so deep all at once, and it’s just the right combination to decorate the backs of your eyelids in stars and colored spots. his ring and middle fingers meet your swollen clit, circling with practiced pressure. the office chair squeaks awfully with each of your bounces on his lap, but you’re too close to pay it any mind. instead, you drown it out with your own noises— warnings of your impending orgasm. 

“gonna cum— my god, san, i’m—!” you don’t even finish your sentence, the tide finally reaching the shore. your orgasm washes over you hard and unlike any other you’ve ever experienced before. you aren’t sure if he’s just that good, or if it’s because it’s san. (most likely a combination of both.) 

san coos, guiding you through the peak of your climax. once you’ve calmed considerably, you slide him out of you and stroke his cock until he’s painting the inside of your thighs with milky white and a groan. his face screws up in pleasure, eyes fluttered shut and brows knit together. his lashes kiss the tops of his cheeks and you think you’ve just fallen in love, for real. 

his chest rises and falls as he attempts to catch his breath. you can’t help placing a hand over the left side to feel the rapidity of his heartbeat, smiling to yourself. he mirrors your expression after a moment, leaning up to press a sensual kiss to your lips. 

“as fun as this was, and as much as i like the view right now, it’d be better if i could actually take you out after this… and if i could fuck you somewhere nicer than on our manager’s desk chair.” san bites at the inside of his lip, glancing down at the rolling chair beneath you. 

“i agree,” you giggle, brushing his hair from his face. “hongjoong’s office isn’t the ideal location for a first date or first time sleeping together. but at least we’ll have a fun story to tell our kids.”

san bursts into laughter at that. “our kids, huh? you’ve thought that far ahead?”

“i’ve had a crush on you since i got hired, choi san, what do you think?” you raise an eyebrow, booping his nose with your index finger. he scrunches it up with a grin. 

“i think that i’ve had a crush on you just as long. and if we’re having kids, it’s best to omit some details when we retell this story.” 

© yunhoszn. do not steal, claim, or repost.

[lovelettersforthedamned]

the idea of college!hockey!peter gets me everytime like he’s prolly a little of an asshole and so cockeyyyyy ahhhhh i want him to bully me into having sex with him

73

✰ college!hockey!peter parker x f!reader

✰ word count: 0.8k

✰ summary: why keep peter when he keeps giving you the asshole treatment? you know why, but you wouldn't dare say it out loud.

✰ warnings: language, peter is depicted as taller than the reader, a tease of smut but no actual.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

main m.list ⋆ peter parker m.list

gif by @ddlovatosrps

You swore off coming to another one of Peter’s games, but here you were, sitting in the worn-down stands of your school’s hockey rink. The arena was packed as you tried to navigate your way to the seat that Peter saved for you, his practice jersey slung over the back of the plastic. 

peter🏒: 

i saved you a seat. my jersey is on it

you should wear it

When you received that text from him, you rolled your eyes, but you couldn’t help the stupid smile that grew on your face. Peter’s always been a pain in your ass, so why couldn’t you push him away?

Peter’s team was entering the rink, causing an uproar from the home side. Making a few laps around the perimeter of the ice, your eyes caught the bold ‘73’ on the back of his jersey, matching yours. 

Little kids and other college girls flood the glass, holding signs and waving them around, hoping to catch their favorite player’s attention. You couldn’t help but notice quite a few of the posters having ‘HEY PARKER! CAN I HAVE A PUCK?’ drawn on in thick letters. Peter has been team captain for two years now, and his skill with a puck and a stick has been widely received. 

A few minutes pass before the game officially starts. You weren’t the biggest fan of hockey until you met Peter. He brought you to practice, and his games and made you watch every game of the professional league’s playoffs last season. And with every goal, he would always turn around to you and say, “I could totally do that by the way.” And every single time you would push his face away and laugh. At first, you thought he was joking just to be funny, but then you realized he was dead serious. 

This season really did prove that he could score at least two points each game, and he never failed to make you realize that. Tonight was no exception. 

5-1 was the final score when the third period ended, making everyone jump up in their seats. You slowly stood, clapping your hands while keeping your eye on Peter, a soft smile appearing on your lips at the sight of him celebrating with his teammates. After a few minutes, the team starts to head back into the locker room with Peter being the last in the line. Walking down to the glass, you meet him there. He smirks before flipping you off. “I told you so,” he yells through the glass. 

“I hate you,” you tell back, ignoring the growing crowd around you. The world around you seems to not exist when you are with Peter, it’s annoying. 

He begins to skate away before mouthing, “No, you don’t.” 

At the end of every game, you meet Peter outside where the door to the locker room leads. You’re usually surrounded by the team’s girlfriends waiting to celebrate their boyfriend’s win. And though you aren’t Peter’s girl, you still smile at the hugs and kisses the girls around you receive. 

As soon as Peter’s moppy brown hair and broad frame come through the door, your smile drops. He knew you’d be waiting here for him, but you don’t want to give him the satisfaction of you potentially being happy to see him. 

“Where’s my hug and kiss, (L/N)?” Peter’s deep and now scratchy voice floods your ears. 

Your arms cross in front of you as you tilt your head up to meet his eyes, his height drastically different from yours, “Yeah, you’re real funny, Parker.” 

His arm slings over your shoulder as he leads you to his car, his body still warm. He pops open his trunk, dropping his equipment inside before holding your face in both his hands, giving your cheeks a small squeeze before kissing your lips. “Don’t act so grumpy, buggy. We both know you want me to fuck you dumb on my cock,” he whispers against your lips. 

Your cheeks flush, and your body runs hot immediately. Releasing your eye contact with him, you look away, nervous, “Is that what you tell yourself to make you feel better?” 

His lips are so close to touching yours again, and you’re almost aching for his touch, but you won’t give yourself away. You can feel a huff of a laugh against your lips before he pulls away, “I don’t need to make myself feel better, I just want to make you feel good.” You’re frozen in place for a few seconds, not even noticing that Peter is already at the passenger door, holding it open for you, “You coming, or are you gonna stand there and look stupid?” 

You quickly make your way to the door, shoving his chest before entering his car. He slams the door once you get settled in.

 Peter fucking sucks, but why do I need him so bad?

✰ author's note: I LOVE HOCKEY PETER!!! sorry anon, i couldn't make him super mean because i love when he has a soft spot for the reader. thank you for sending in this ask!! if you want to aswell, my ask box is open! don't forget to like, comment, and reblog if you enjoyed. ok, ily bye!!

[totallyhextra]

People? In MY computer?? It's more likely than you think!

The following is a fanvertisment and is not connected to the show. ****Yet.*** *Also yes, this is the fourth time I'm posting this because TUMBLR WONT LET ME EDIT SPELLING MISTAKES!

ANYWAY,

Once upon a time, back in 1987, Dire Straits put out this music video for “Money for Nothing”, which, as you know, was a song about wanting my MTV. 

The video was made by two guys (Gavin Blair and Ian Pearson) on a very moody computer. After the video went out, these two guys went to a pub:

Ian: “Hey, we should make a whole show like this!”

Gavin: “Dude, making three minutes almost killed us.”

And so it was decided!🎉

The two guys were joined by two other guys (Phil Mitchell and John Grace) and created the Hub, which then became Mainframe Entertainment. They got even more people, and then they all holed up in this hotel.

They were mad lads with a dream: a whole cgi animated show, and they made it happen a whole year before Toy Story!

Behold! ReBoot!

(Yes that fever dream was real)

Now before I get any of this:

Let me lay this down. If you can’t with the animation of the first season because it was CUTTING EDGE IN 1994, you can close your eyes and listen to it. ReBoot wasn’t just a CGI gimmick. The characters are fully developed, the voice actors are peerless, the plot is sharp, and there’s so many easter eggs that you’ll never find them all.

Never

(And yes the episode "Bad Bob" was the actual catalyst for Fury Road. Look it up)

ReBoot is about what life is like in a computer (in the 90s, because it was the 90s) called Mainframe (because of course it is). People are sprites, the guys that look like 1s and 0s are binomes (which represent 1s and 0s). Bad guys are viruses, and the good guy is a Guardian named Bob, who is a certified cinnamon roll.

In the first season the eps are light and self-contained, mainly because there was constant friction between the Mainframe studios and the Board of Standards and Practices.

They still got away with some pretty dark stuff, like Megabyte (virus) making Enzo (the kid) watch his dog get sliced open (dog got away, obviously) , Dot (sprite) have a hallucinatory breakdown, and the fridge horror of realizing the thousands of worm things (nulls) that plunged off a bridge to their death were actually people.

And Hex's (virus

best girl) scary face single-handedly traumatized an entire generation. 🙂

But busting through a window was a no go, because WhAt If tHe cHiLdReN dID iT tOo?

Anyway, halfway through the second season, ABC cut them loose, so they were like, fuck it, we’re going to start going hard. The story shifted from episodic to arcs and things start to get serious.

Third season the show moved to YTV in Canada, which gave no fucks about shielding the innocent children.

So it got DARK

How dark?

The UK refused to show the entire season, so the audience there had to wait until pirated copies made it across the pond to see how it ended.

Also by 1997, the animation was gorgeous. (Best example of third season animation I could think of that didn't have spoilers)

The show was green-lit for a fourth season on Cartoon Network, but halfway through production Warner Bros took over and the same fucking thing happened.

Because Mainframe was halfway done, they decided not to scrap all of it, but knowing they wouldn't be able to finish it correctly, Mainframe stripped anything that would hint at Season Four's true ending, then left what remained on a cliff-hanger of angst.

FOR 22 YEARS

(It's also why the last four eps of season four seem to make no sense)

And so it was.

Other crap happened, the soul left Mainframe, and its animated corpse spat out “The Guardian Code” in 2018. 

But never say die! The year is (almost) 2024, 30 years later. ReBoot shall rise from the dead, because here come the documentary!!

Do you dare see what you’ve been missing?

What the (UK) government doesn’t want you to know?? 

Then come on down to ReBoot!

We got:

Magnificent bastards with sexy voices!

(Tony Jay at his best)

Kickass women who could probably crush your head with their thighs and you’d enjoy it!

Innuendos in a kid's show!

💗 This adorable cinnamon roll!! 💗

Insane third season glow-ups!

YOUR NEW GOD

These guys!

(Gay roller-skating binome is my boi. I named him Jerry)

Nonstop cultural refs (You'll never find them all. Never.)

(There are literally videos dedicated to trying)

So many computer puns!

Body Horror!

Existential Crisis!

HAVE I MENTIONED YOUR NEW GOD?

This is it, folks! The real thing, the gem hidden in the moose-filled forests of Canadia!🌲🌲🌲

Take a trip inside a mid-90’s computer!

See the World Wide Web! (omg):

Witness the original purple Gamecubes that randomly fall from the sky when the owner of the computer (OUR GOOD LORD THE USER) wants to play a game. If it lands on people and they lose, they dissolve into mindless energy leeches, fated to tormented by their former bretheren for all of eternity.

Just like in real life! 🙃

So watch the eps! They on YouTube!

I think they're on Pluto, Hulu, Sling, and Tubi too! Also DVDs for people who have the patience to wait for them!

WATCH! BELIEVE! SUFFER THE SOUL-CRUSHING RAGE OF THE SEASON 4 CLIFF-HANGER!* (come on, its fun!)*

HYPE THE DOC!

The more people hype, the better the chances of actually getting it finished.

NOW SHARE THIS WITH EVERYONE!

And now I will leave you with this screenshot from the ep "Painted Windows", where dicks can clearly be seen drawn upon the wall behind the fleeing anthropomorphized television.

(PS: If you heard the clown pic at the top of the page in your head, you're welcome)

IMPORTANT UPDATE

This message is now approved by Gavin Blair! He's an awesome guy. Show him some love on TWITTER (fuck you musk) at @TheRealMrSweary Also, if you want to share this with non-tumblr friends, here is my attempt at a webpage version:

theseventhstarprojects.com/REBOOT.html

[seiwas]

cw: happy tears and tickle fights, birthday celebrations and other things. unedited sawry. ‼️ FIC SPOILERS PAST THIS PORTION OF THE CONTENT WARNING ‼️ pregnancy.

.

hajime’s birthday this year is different.

you don’t celebrate on the day of, contrary to your tradition of keeping it free no matter what. instead, you decide on the weekend, taking time to prepare his gift while he’s out of town.

the sunday morning starts out slow, a late wake to his usual 5:00 a.m. runs. you shift beside him, turning to snuggle deeper into his hold.

you weren’t able to wait for him last night, any hour past midnight simply impossible for you to keep up with these days.

your breath puffs out in a long exhale, tickling his collarbone.

he pulls you closer when you move, tucking his nose into the crown of your head. it’s something you both do, you’ve noticed—breathing each other in the moment you return to one another.

the celebration today is not lost on you, but you take in these few silent moments with him for just a bit longer.

when he stirs, squeezing you tighter as he mumbles a low ‘morning’, you peer up to kiss his chin. he’s ticklish there, you know, especially when your lips catch on the bits of stubble grown a few days after he shaves.

it takes longer for you both to get out of bed because of that, a tickle fight ensuing as hajime sneakily crawls his fingers up your armpits, blowing raspberries at the spot right below your ears.

you slip into the bathroom that way—a little clumsy and a lot giggly. then you crouch low, opening the cabinet under the sink; hidden in it is your gift for him, a flat rectangle wrapped in kraft paper and a green bow.

it’s the first thing in your agenda today, you’ve decided, unable to wait until he receives it at the end of the day, like you’d originally planned.

hajime’s propped up against the headboard when you step back into your bedroom, blanket scrunched at his hip. you’re no fan of the season’s heat, but you thank god it’s summer, because at least, you’re met with the view of his exposed chest every morning.

he holds an arm out to welcome you back in, letting you rest your legs across his lap as he cradles your back.

“your gift,” you whisper, holding out the wrapped rectangle, “open it first. that’s the first thing on our agenda today.”

he chuckles, taking the soft rectangle from your hands while kissing your temple, “thanks, babe. you didn’t have to.”

you watch eagerly, tucking yourself into his side as you wrap an arm around his waist. he tears through the wrapper but sets aside the bow, knowing you like to recycle them when you have the chance.

hajime is a simple man, and at the sight of his favorite brand of socks, he lights up at the addition of one more to his already-full drawer of them.

he turns to you, about to pepper your face with a bunch of kisses but—

“check the hem, i got something done to it.” you giggle.

he looks confused for a moment before he turns them over, plain white save for the dark green letters running around its ankle garters.

there’s another reason you decided to celebrate his birthday this weekend, on the third sunday of june.

he deciphers the word, reading each letter: p-a-p-a, and you can see the cogs turning in his brain before he immediately whips his head to face you.

“you’re—?”

you nod.

there’s something indescribable in his eyes, emotion welling up as they gloss over dark olive green—it makes you want to cry, too.

damn all these hormones.

“happy birthday, papa.” you sniffle, smiling wide, “and happy father’s day.”

(after a whole lot of tears, and even more kissing, you show hajime the tests you took while he was away. he tells you you should have told him, that he would have come home, but you shake your head.

it’s well worth it, seeing his reaction to two things he can celebrate today.)

[hippopotamusdreamer]

They Were Roommates

genre. [C][F][A][AU]

warnings. None! Maybe a "damn" thrown in there

additional notes. Female! Reader | You/Your pronouns, not proofread lol

pairing. Yang Jeongin x Reader

w.c. 962

a/n. This is for Fall Cryptid season!

Kpop Masterlist

Fandom Masterlist

Fall Cryptid List

You had a poltergeist problem.

Well, not really a poltergeist, it was a ghost. But you couldn’t very well say a spooky silly ghost problem because then you’d just look and sound ridiculous.

It started when you moved into a new apartment a at the beginning of the year. Rent was cheap and the housing market was the bane of your existence. It didn’t matter that someone was murdered there 10+ years ago in the heat of passion. Or that the previous owners felt like they were being watched. Which was weird because the unit was on the third floor.

And so what if you heard footsteps outside of your bedroom at like three in the morning? Who cares that all your cabinet doors were left open after you’d left for work more than once. And that chill in the air in the middle of the night? Let’s just say that the money you saved during the summer was enough to make you turn a blind eye to everything. Especially now that it was October and the autumn air was settling in.

But the one thing you’d never thought about? It never even came to mind as a possibility of happening.

A ghost getting fed up with your bullshit, so much so that he decided to APPEAR in front of you while you were crying on your couch because of your ex. And just to be clear, you were not crying because he dumped you (you dumped him). You were just so relieved that he was out of your life that the tears just wouldn’t stop coming after that.

“Are you seriously crying over that piece of shit?” An exasperated voice chastised you.

“W-what?” You hiccupped while looking up. Before you stood a transparent being. Sharp eyes that just screamed that they were judging you, and reasonably fashionable for a ghost.

“I’ve watched you day in and day out suffering at being tied down to that absolute shitshow of a guy. And now that you’ve finally gotten rid of him, I find you crying over him! Make it make sense.”

“I’m not crying over him!”

He gave you what could only be the ghost equivalent of a “Sure Jan” look.

“I’m not!”

“What are you crying for?”

The silence in the room was deafening until it wasn’t.

“OH MY-!”

“PLEASE! I SWEAR!!”

What was your life right now? Arguing with your resident ghost over you ex? A ghost that doesn’t even help you pay reeeeent to make matters worse!

“Why am I being attacked right now!?” you cried out pitifully.

“Y/N, you don’t need him in your life. Get a grip…”

“I know that! I don’t know how many times I keep telling you that I’m not crying over him.”

“Then…why are you crying?”

“I don’t…cause I’m relieved? I don’t know, I just know that it feels like a weight is off my shoulders now that he’s gone. I don’t have to walk on eggshells whenever he’s near anymore. I can finally breathe again.”

You could feel yourself relaxing into your couch now, now that this pressure was gone. You blinked and the ghost was gone from in front of you. Though from the noises coming from the kitchen behind you, you knew he didn’t go far.

From your peripheral, you could see him coming to you slowly.

‘What are you doing?” you asked with no intentions of turning to look.

“Shush, this takes a lot of concentration…”

Narrowing your eyes at his words, that did make you want to see what he was doing. “Wha…?”

“Shh…!”

“Now, hold on—”

“Wait!”

The comedic series of events was astounding. You finally decided to turn to you ghost man. Only for him to, you guess, loose concentration. And the ending result? The mug of water he was apparently bringing to you just fell out of his grip and landed all over you and the floor below you. Cue your ghost standing there like he was about to call his mom and tell her he just frew up.

Neither of you said anything as you stared down at the wet mess. At least it was water and not something hot you supposed.

“Damn Y/N, you’re so clumsy.”

You couldn’t say anything coherent, just squawked, flabbergasted at his audacity to try to put the blame on you. Then the laughing started. Laughing at the entire ordeal. Not just the water but actually meeting the ghost that haunted your apartment and not running for the hills immediately.

From the small smile on your ghost’s face, you guessed he was just trying to get you to do something other than cry your eyes out that night. Even if your clothes where caught in the crossfire.

“So, you know my name. What’s yours?” You sighed while standing to go grab something to clean up the mess.

“…Why should I tell you?”

“You literally just threw water at me. You owe me that much.”

His lips puckered knowing you had him there. After a few beats he said, “It’s Jeongin.”

“Jeongin?”

“…Yeah.”

You were too busy cleaning the floor to notice how misty eyed a ghost could get; but you were able to catch the change in his demeanor.

“What’s wrong?” You briefly glanced up at him from your crouched position as you mopped up the water with a used towel. He chewed on his bottom lip before answering.

“…It’s just been a long time since someone’s said my name out loud.”

You felt a pang in your heart at his words. Nodding, you went back to cleaning.

“Then I’ll be sure to call for you every day, Jeongin.”

“…Ok.”

And if it sounded like he was gonna cry, well you weren’t going to bring any attention to it.

This in no way reflects the actual persons involved/based in this fic, nor their actual character. This is purely fiction.

© hippopotamusdreamer, est 2024. all rights reserved.

[onthepyre]

He's overplayed, but sometimes, Glenn Miller just hits the fucking spot. You hear the song for the first time and maybe you aren't quite sure where it's going, but Mickey's danced to "In The Mood" every weekend for the last year. He's got it down to a science.

The girls come and go. He has favorite partners, that's for sure - ones that let him fling them in the air or send them flying out in light-speed spins, or even the ones who can just really groove. But sometimes they're there and sometimes they aren't, and ultimately, it doesn't make much difference to him. It's not about the girl at the other end of his arm. It's about Mickey and the music. He can feel it - the trombone in his feet, trumpet in his arms and sax in his shoulders, bass and drums thumping in his chest.

His ballroom isn't a popular one. It's a few regular faces and a handful of out-of-towners, passers-through who dance with an accent; on an average Saturday night, though, most of the attendees are the sort that rotate in and out of five or six different floors. It's hard to get them all in one place. But the band is decent, the admission cheap, and the bartenders heavy-handed. So it's Mickey's.

He's making his way off the floor after the night's fourth Miller track, panting, chatting lazily with the brunette who'd stepped on him a minute ago. She's got two left feet, but they exchange niceties - great dance, love that song, all the things Mickey says when he doesn't have anything to talk about. She wanders off when he makes it to the bar and doesn't offer to buy her a drink.

He sits silently, sipping whiskey, listening to the band's approximation of Count Basie. They're doing a shitty job with this one and people are falling off the dance floor left and right, doing whirlygig turns into their seats. There are only six dancers left on the floor by the middle of the song. Two of them are an ancient married couple, barely able to keep up with the inconsistent tempo. There's a pair of teens who keep losing the beat, but the third set are the ones that catch Mickey's eye. The girl is cute in a kiddish sort of way, round rosy cheeks and a big smile. She dances young, too, inexperienced but with flair. The man seems far more seasoned - he hits every accent and anticipates every pause like he's a member of the band. He leads the girl, green as she is, through some pretty complicated shit with ease. They're both ginger. Siblings, probably, Mickey thinks.

Mercifully, the song ends, and the redheads laugh their way out of a dip. The band kicks off another tune, one Mickey doesn't know the name of, and other dancers begin to trickle back onto the floor. He loses sight of the siblings until the man appears next to him and asks the bartender for some frilly cocktail Mickey's never heard of.

"Those were some neat tricks," he says to the man. "That your sister?"

"Yeah," the man answers, "Debbie. I'm Ian."

"Mickey."

"This is one of Deb's first nights out. Our other sister's been teaching her the ropes, but you can only get so far in a kitchen. She's getting way better with real music and real people."

"Band's havin' an off night tonight. I think the usual drummer is out."

"We'll have to come back when they're better equipped," Ian says with a grin. The bartender sets down his drink - he finishes half of it in one swallow.

"You ever tried to follow? Dance the girl's part for a night?" He looks over at Mickey out of the corner of his eyes.

"Hell would I do that for?"

"Makes you a better dancer." Ian shrugs, starts sliding off his stool. Mickey scoffs. "Here, c'mon. Give it a shot."

There's ice in Mickey’s veins. To ask that - and in a public place, no less - risks a lot more than his lindy-hopping skills. But Ian’s hand, open and waiting in front of him, is enticing. So Mickey can't rebuke him completely.

"Lotta moxie, you got."

"Wouldn't be here without it."

He's not sure what Ian means - here on this earth, here in this room, or here asking another man to dance. Mickey can't read his expression; he wears a good-natured, joking grin, but there's something else in his green eyes. Something pleading.

"Promise it won't be weird," Ian says. "I get ya, I swear."

Fuck.

Mickey can't say no, so he doesn't say anything, just drops his hand heavy into Ian's. He lets himself be led out onto the floor, willing them invisible to prying eyes at the bar. Ian drops the handhold and slides his arm around Mickey's back to start marking the beat, exaggerated, almost silly. They're late to the floor, left behind as the other dancers set off and running with the music. Still, within seconds, it's some of best chemistry Mickey's ever felt. Ian's giddiness is contagious and so is his rhythm. When he folds Mickey in so they're face to face, it's like greeting an old friend.

Ian's dancing is an open book, and Mickey can tell he's holding back at the start. He keeps them up to tempo, but only leads the boring shit - the kind of stuff the newcomers pick up first. The way he does it, though, high kicks and full-body pulse, is enough for Mickey to be suppressing a smile. When there's a heavy hit in the music, the kind that would have Mickey tossing a girl over his head, Ian pauses for a split second. It's clearly intentional, like he's waiting for Mickey to do something, but he's got no clue what girls do in moments like these.

He takes control instead - uses the tension in their arms to send Ian sliding across the floor under his legs, and Ian lets him do it. He pops back up as Mickey spins around, and just as the song hits its climax, the roles flip.

Back where he's comfortable, Mickey lets loose. He brings Ian in and sends him back out four times in a row, lightning-fast with the trumpet player's run. It gets Ian laughing, so Mickey's laughing, too, and it feels like his feet are floating an inch above the floor. They move in tight, near-violent circles, narrowly avoiding the other dancers close by.

The end of the song is building up - Mickey can tell in Ian's careful attention to his feet that he's anticipating it, too. The whole band crescendoes, the trombone digs into a slide, and Mickey dips Ian so low his head almost brushes the ground. Ian trusts him with it, kicks his foot up and lets his weight fall, his back arch. They hold there, eyes meeting for the longest few seconds of Mickey's life.

When they pull out of the dip as the band pauses, it feels wrong. To be around Ian, still linked at their hands, and not be dancing with him - Mickey feels uncoordinated, off-balance. But when Ian cracks a smile, Mickey's head is back on his shoulders, his feet back underneath him.

"Not so bad, right?" Ian asks.

"Guess not."

[lafrexniere]

Luca Fantilli - Free Time

The goal horn thundered throughout Amalie Arena after this entire season of memories being made Michigan had lost to Quinnipiac and it was over. You saw the heartbreak of your hockey family, as the boys filed through the handshake line before heading back to their respective ends. You tried to keep your emotions pushed down to put on a smile for your boyfriend Luca, you knew how upset he would be after going this far his freshman year, especially with it being an overtime loss to end his season.

You waited with the other families to get to the locker room after the game ended, and people began to file out of the arena. You stood with the Fantillis and waited until you saw Adam walk out of the locker room. He showed a half smile with red eyes, then looked back down at the ground dropping his things and slowly walking to his parents. You watched the family hug, feeling a little awkward and bad for Adam, if he was like this you couldn’t imagine how Luca would be. The family hug broke apart, and Adam turned to face you. You opened your arms, for him to fall into,

“Thanks, Y/N,” he sniffled.

“Of course Adam, I’m sorry about the game,” you said as you let go. He wiped his eyes as you waited for Luca to come out of the locker room. You watched a few more players walk out then there he was, your sweet boy a mess. He like Adam walked over to the Fantillis hugging them with Adam joining in, then the two brothers hugged, making you start to get emotional. Luca looked up from Adam’s shoulder seeing you standing behind him. He let go of Adam and wiped his eyes as if he was embarrassed to be seen crying in front of you. He slowly approached you, clearing his throat.

“Come here, Lu,” you held out your arms. He fell into your arms sniffling, as the tears all started again. No embarrassment, no judgment, just being there for him through this tough time. You played with his hair as his head rested on your shoulder, and you rubbed his back with your other hand. Your hug broke apart after a moment, you kept your arm on his back, as he kept his arm around you. You walked down the hallway all the way to the exit of the arena where the Quinnipiac fans were waiting to taunt the team. You screamed back at those taunting and yelling at you as you got Luca to the bus. The boys threw their things underneath and got on,

“I’ll see you later babe,” Luca said. The door closed behind him, you waved goodbye as the bus pulled away. 

You got to the hotel and saw a few of the boys sitting in the lobby, Adam was one of them. He smiled and waved when he saw you,

“Room 307 Y/N,” he said, “we couldn’t get him to come down, so hopefully you can cheer him up.” You nodded and headed towards the elevator. On your trip up to the third floor, you thought about how to approach Luca. The doors slid open giving you less time to think. You walked down the hall to the room waiting outside the door for a minute, you were about to knock when the door opened.

“Oh hey Y/N,” he said.

“Going somewhere?” you asked.

“Not anymore, I was gonna look for Adam he wasn’t answering me but, now you’re here.” He smirked and grabbed your hand pulling you into the room, and shutting the door behind you. He let go of you and flopped on his bed. He let out a dramatic sigh, staring at the ceiling.

“Lu?” He turned his head to look at you. He gave you an annoyed look, then went back to staring at the ceiling.

“What babe?”

“I know you’re upset.” With that statement, he snapped up. He sat up and turned to face you,

“I’m just disappointed, you know for the older guys, it’s hard.” He patted the bed next to him, you sat down. 

“I know that’s not it, what’s on your mind?” Luca went silent. You put your hand on his hand that was resting on his thigh. He looked at you and locked his fingers with yours.

“I don’t know, it just went so fast Y/N, I wanted that winning feeling to last a little longer,” he gave a half smile and shrugged.

“Are you reading my mind? I was literally thinking that earlier,” you laughed.

“I guess we are feeling the same thing,”

“Yeah,” he rubbed his thumb on your hand. You kicked off your shoes and lied down back on the bed, sighing. He lied next to you, gazing into your eyes. You pulled his head onto your chest, playing with his hair. He closed his eyes and smiled,

“You know Lu, it’s not so bad,” he rolled over on his stomach to be lying on top of you. You continued playing with his hair as he looked at you.

“I guess, don’t know what’ll do with all my free time, hmm maybe video games with the boys all the time, as well as school work obviously,” he smirked.

“Woah bud, you forgetting anything”

“No I don’t think so,” he teased.

“Don’t play dumb Fantilli,” you rolled your eyes. He grinned, raising his eyebrows, then scooted closer to your face. He placed his hand on your cheek, locking his lips with yours. You wrapped your arms around his neck, trying to pull him closer which was impossible. You both gasped for air, as you ran out of breath, locking your lips once more, your hands moved from his neck to his back. You held him tightly as you broke apart once more. He opened his eyes smiling,

“Maybe I’ll make some time for that too,” he said, moving off your chest to the space on the bed next to you.

“Oh, you think?”

“Shut up,” he laughed, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear.

“Okay okay, did I cheer you up though?” you asked grinning.

“I don’t know, I’m still a little upset,” he gave you puppy dog eyes.

“What am I gonna do with you babe?” you sighed. 

“This.” He pulled your face to him once again pressing his lips to yours, putting his other arm around you, and pulled you into his chest. You ruffled his hair, as the kiss deepened. 

“More time with my girl,” he said.

“I wouldn’t want it any other way,” you smiled.

________________________________________________

The past few posts have been my pictures and I'm almost out of pics to use which is making me sad

[ladykailitha]

Ser Stephan of Harring’s Town Part 2

Just remember that 20 slots for tagging is the max.

Part 1

*

The next day Steve had barely been up for a twenty minutes when there was a knock on the door.

He opened it to reveal a very nervous Will on the other side.

“Oh good, you’re awake,” Will said with a sigh of relief. “I was worried I came over too early.”

Steve laughed. “Can’t get rid of the early wake up call from sports. Come on in. You have breakfast yet?”

Will shook his head.

“I was about to make some scrambled eggs. You want any?”

“Sure,” Will said with a furrowed brow. “You don’t have to.”

Steve smiled. “I know.”

He made them some scrambled eggs and poured them both a glass of milk.

“Where did you learn to cook like that?” Will asked.

“PBS,” Steve said.

Will raised an eyebrow.

“Seriously?”

Steve shrugged. “I didn’t have anyone to teach me and my parents weren’t around.”

“I would have that thought that with all the money, you would be ordering take out and fast food all the time,” Will said with a half shrug. “I would have.”

Steve smiled tightly. “I probably would have, too. But that much junk food and shit makes for a shit poor athlete and I was in three sports.”

“Three?” Will asked. “I knew about the basketball and swimming, but what’s the third?”

“Baseball,” Steve said. “All of the seasons lined up so I could be in one right after the other until almost the end of the school year. Kept me busy until I was old enough to take care of myself.”

“Wow,” Will said. “Your parents really didn’t like you, did they?”

“Nope!” Steve scoffed. “I’ll be right back with my art stuff.”

When he came back downstairs Will was waiting for him in the front room. He had two sketch pads both have finished.

“I only took a couple of art classes in high school to fill out my electives. So like I said they aren’t anything special.”

He handed them to Will.

Will took them from him and began flipping through. “A lot of static poses, but not bad. You’ve got the basics down and you can tell they’re all different characters.”

Steve blushed. “You’re just saying that.”

“No, really,” Will said, coming up to sit next to him. “Here let me show you what I mean.”

And he did, after he was done, Steve was feeling better about his art.

Will picked up the other drawing pad and a slip of folded paper fluttered to the ground. He frowned as he opened it. Inside was a very good likeness of Eddie.

“Wow,” Will whispered. “That’s really good.”

Steve frowned and then looked over Will’s shoulder. He resisted the urge to snatch the drawing from his hands.

“You weren’t supposed to see that,” Steve muttered.

“Why?” Will asked, confused. “It’s the best thing I’ve seen so far.”

Steve brought his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. “It’s only good, because if you draw the same thing over and over again, you can’t help but improve.”

Will looked down at the drawing of Eddie again. “How many times have you drawn him?”

“I have seven drawing notebooks, and those are the only two that aren’t filled with drawings of Eddie Munson.” Steve buried his head into his knees.

“Do you like boys, Steve?” Will asked gently.

Steve lifted his head slowly. “I think I like both.”

“Wow,” Will muttered. “It is true what they say.”

“What do they say?” Steve asked, furrowing his brow.

“That like attracts like,” Will said. “That in a small town all the weirdos and queers flock together even subconsciously because they can sense it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Isn’t a little strange, that you’re bisexual, me, Eddie, and Robin are gay, and that likely others in the group are some variation on that theme?”

Steve looked at Will for a moment. “Oh.”

He felt this weight lifted off his chest. And then it really hit him.

“Eddie’s gay?!”

Will laughed. “I was wondering when you were going to pick up on that.”

“Oh that makes perfect sense,” Steve said with a laugh. “I thought he was teasing me. Turns out he was flirting with me.” He just started laughing and couldn’t stop.

Will started laughing too. “You really have to stop using your head as a shield man if it made you this slow.”

Steve shook his head. “Tell that to the rest of the world, man. Because I don’t like doing it anymore than you like see it.”

“I was never going to be the normal one,” Will said, “even before the Upside Down and the bullying. But it’s nice to meet other people like me and not feel alone. Because yeah, my mom and Jonathan are always going to have my back they’ll never understand. Not fully. So it’s nice that I know that there are people I can go to, people who are like me.”

Steve wrapped his arms around him. “I’m glad I got to be one of those people, Will.”

“Me, too,” Mike said with a watery chuckle. “Because it’s gonna piss Mike off so much.”

Steve looked at him, wide eyed. “Am I hearing that right? Will Byers isn’t defending Mike Wheeler? I think I might need that hearing aid after all.”

Will chuckled. “Eddie pointed out that I can disagree him from time to time. I don’t have to stick up for him when he’s being a little shit, because it just encourages him to continue his bad behavior.”

“Sounds about right,” Steve said, sitting back. “You fight with friends and lovers. That’s just what happens. It only becomes a problem when you fight about the little stuff as well as the big stuff. And if you’re fighting over every big thing than man, find someone who likes you. Because they really don’t.”

“Is that what happened to you and Nancy?” Will asked.

Steve pursed his lips. “I don’t know what happened between me and Nancy. Was it the Upside Down? Was it not being right for each other? Was both? Neither? I just...just don’t know.”

“I heard that she couldn’t even say she loved you,” Will murmured.

“Where did you hear that?” Steve asked, rounding on him.

“I eavesdropped on Nancy and Jonathan after the fight,” Will admitted.

Steve’s eyebrows went up. “Really? What else did she say?”

Will looked at him. “I don’t think you want to know man.”

Steve looked at him for a second. “No, no. You’re right.”

Suddenly there was a knock on the door and they turned to each other.

“You expecting anyone else today?” Will asked.

Steve shook his head and got up to answer the door.

He opened the door and was surprised to see Eddie standing there looking a bit sheepish.

“I’m sorry if I woke you,” Eddie said.

Steve laughed. “Early riser me. Come on in, I was just showing Will some of my drawings.”

Eddie perked up. “You draw? Lemme see!”

Steve prayed that Will was fast enough to hide the drawing of Eddie before the man himself came bounding through the hallway.

“Eddie!” Will greeted cheerfully, standing up to hug the older man.

“How come you got to see a Steve Harrington original before me?” Eddie teased. “Kidding, kidding. I know you draw too.”

Steve come up from behind them. “We all draw, right? Eddie’s little cartoons, Will’s epic masterpieces and my little hobby.”

“Oooh!” Eddie said bouncing. “We should form an art group.”

Steve laughed. “For some so anti-establishment, you sure like clubs.”

Eddie frowned. “You don’t have to.”

Steve ruffled his hair. “I didn’t say I didn’t want to. I just think you’re weird. In the best way possible.”

Eddie’s expression went from confusion, to mollified, to embarrassed. “You keep talking like that and I’m going to think you’ve got a crush, Harrington.”

Will and Steve looked at each other and then burst out laughing.

“What?” Eddie asked.

Steve ran his hand down Eddie’s arm. “I’ll you about it later. But come see my art work.”

Eddie flopped on the floor and began rifling through the notebooks.

He stopped at one and cocked his head to the side. “I didn’t know you liked ‘Labyrinth’, Steve.”

Steve and Will leaned over to see which picture he was talking about. It was one of the ones that Steve had actually colored. And it was of the ballroom scene clothes.

“Doesn’t look much like David Bowie, though,” Will admitted.

Steve bit down on his lip.

“And I thought his hair was blond in the movie,” Eddie said. “This is brown.”

Steve began actively chewing on his lip.

They both looked up at him for an explanation.

Steve scratched his cheek and pushed his hair back. He sighed and closed his eyes.

Will and Eddie shared a look.

“Why don’t you want to tell us?” Will asked.

Steve tilted his head back, rolling his eyes. “Oh god. Fine. Turn the page. Maybe that will clue you in.”

Eddie and Will frowned but did as he asked. There in a male version of Sarah’s ballgown was Steve.

Eddie looked up at him wide-eyed and then back to the other page.

Will caught an faster than Eddie did. “Oh shit.” He glanced at Eddie and then back at Steve.

Eddie caught the panicked look on Steve’s face and then back down at the drawing pad.

“It’s me.”

“This was back before...” Steve waved his hand, “before.” Will and Eddie nodded. Before Eddie fell into Steve’s life. Back when he was just the kid’s DM. “Robin wanted to watch it. And it struck a cord with me you know. I felt like you’d stolen the kids from me. I had to go through so much to get them  to like me and you just waltzed right in and were instantly adored. So you became my goblin king.”

“And the fact that it’s a love story...” Eddie asked.

“It’s not though,” Steve said with a frown. “He’s obsessed with her sure. But if he loved her he wouldn’t have hurt her. Would have...I don’t know.” Steve threw his arms in the air. “I think the message is that you aren’t beholden to someone because they say they love you. You are your own person. If you want to love them back, if you can love them back, that’s okay. But it’s not on you to cater to those feelings. It’s in his speech at the end. About her doing everything he tells her and he’ll be her slave? Love doesn’t work like that. Or at least it shouldn’t.”

Eddie blinked. “Wow. You’ve really thought about this, haven’t you?”

Will was staring up at Steve with new appreciation.

“You caught me, I’m a romantic at heart,” Steve said with a heavy sigh. “I guess I always will be.”

“Do you have other pictures like this?” Eddie asked holding up the notebook. “Where you draw your friends as movie characters?”

Steve shook his head. “Not really. It was just something I felt in the moment.”  He pointed at Will. “That’s more Will’s thing than mine.”

Eddie turned to Will. “You’ve drawn the party members as characters before?”

Will blushed. “Sometimes. Mainly it’s Mike.”

“Ah.” He moved to stand back up when he saw something sticking out of the cushions of the sofa.

Steve watched in slow motion as Eddie pulled out the paper and unfold it. He watched as Eddie gasped, covering his mouth with his hand as the other hand began to shake.

“Eddie?” Steve asked, his voice higher with worry.

“I’ve never seen myself drawn like that before,” he whispered.

“Like what?” Will asked, putting his hand on his friend’s shoulder.

Eddie ran his fingers over the smooth surface of the drawing. “Like I matter to someone.”

He looked up at Steve. “When did you draw this?”

Steve’s heart was racing in his chest as he fought to get the words out. “Remember that night when I came early to pick up the kids. The night you guys finally convinced me to play?”

Eddie nodded. “Can I keep it?”

Steve could feel the weight being lifted from his chest. “Yeah, sure.”

“Hey, Eddie,” Will said, trying to break the tension, “why are you here? I mean it’s been fun, but you can’t have come over for Steve’s art, because you didn’t know he drew until today.”

Eddie looked between Steve and Will in confusion a moment as they waited for his answer. “Oh! Right, I had an idea for your character and wanted to talk to you about it. But I got so excited that I just drove over here without thinking.”

Steve laughed and even Will smiled and shook his head.

“So let’s hear it, then,” Steve said.

And soon the air was filled with discussions of the campaign.

Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7

Tag List: @itsfreakingbats @marvelousforlife

[luwritesomething]

Dean Winchester x Reader: tolerate it.

Warnings: Swearing (probably), angsty?? and with fluff but it remains angsty until the end. also, dean doesn't (know how to) acknowledge reader's obvious feelings for him, lowercase intended, unrequited love coded.

Tags: angsty, hunter!reader, reader has known sam and dean since kids, no season states, can be read as black reader, can be read as plus size reader.

Reader pronouns: they/them (used once)

Word count: 785

Summary: When Reader bursts into tears because of seeing Dean hurt, he doesn't know how to react.

Author’s note: another dean thingie because angst is my specialty and i was feeling THAT kinda way... I rarely ever write for Dean! Not because I don’t like him (I LOVE HIM), but because since I haven’t finished the show (i've just finished season 8) the requests have to be either pre-show or within those seasons. Anyways, Dean and Sam Winchester requests are open, but with those conditions !! love my boys <3 also gif is not mine.

you cried when you saw dean really hurt after a hunt for the first time in long months.

it made you feel childish and stupid, as you had been into the hunter life for as long as he had, as you two and sammy had been through hell and back; but when you saw the exhaustion in his face, the hopeless look in his eyes as he tried not to move his arm too much because the pain was piercing and burning him, you couldn't help it. tears had ran down your cheeks in silence, blurring the sight of the gold rush of a man you called dean, but before you could turn your face away from him and sam, they saw you.

"hey..." dean started, and that was enough for you. you couldn't take it.

your steps were quick towards the door of that old, stinky motel dorm the three of you had found hours ago, making sure to grab dean's impala keys before you stepped outside. sam called out your name and even opened the door, fearful that you might just take the car and drive away from them and the reality, the pain, the misery. but you only needed the keys to open the door to the car and lock yourself in, spacing out of everything around you to try and rationalize the cascade of emotions you were feeling.

sam sighed softly, almost in relief, when he saw you weren't going anywhere, and he closed the door with care before turning to his brother. dean's eyes were filled with worry, an anxious expression that sam hadn't seen many times outside of the battlefield, but he understood.

"should i..." dean had to clear his throat to recover his voice from the surprise, the hoarse shock your reaction had thrown him onto. "should i go talk to them?"

"later?" sam asked like that was dean's original idea. he heard dean rushing to him in agreement, like he had never intended to go right now. "yeah, i think you should. later."

dean nodded stiffly. "later."

later was an eternity, but dean waited. he cleaned his wound, patched it up with sam's help, got a beer and then he got a second one, and a third one. he waited, sitting in his bed with his gaze lost in the floor boards beneath his boots, and sam didn't try to pull him back to reality.

later came when sam decided to get into bed, shutting the little lamp by his side. dean brushed his face with his hand, rather harshly to wake himself up from the trance he had put himself into, and then he moved the curtains to the side to make sure you hadn't drive away from them. you hadn't, and he already knew that because he would have heard you, but his heart slowed down at the sight of you still in the car.

dean closed the door to the room softly and made his way to the door slowly. you had your eyes closed, as you sat on the drivers seat, not asleep but completely disconnected from your surroundings. he had to knock on the glass window to get you to open your eyes, and your eyes softened when they locked with his, so soft, so caring.

surrounding the car, dean got into the passenger seat as soon as you allowed him too, closing the door to allow the intimate conversation to stay inside the vehicle.

"hey."

"hey." you muttered. you let your eyes close for longer than usual, then turned to look at him. "i'm sorry, i overreacted."

dean pursed his lips slightly. "we've gotten through so much worse. you know that."

"i know." your voice was barely a whisper. "i know. i just worry, you know? i... can't really help it."

"i know." he nodded along to his words, giving them value, making you feel like he was finally listening to what you had to say. still, your heart ached. "but i'm alright. i promise."

"we always are."

he only looked at you from the corner of his eyes. "it's what the job asks of us."

"i know." you had never sound so bitter in your entire life, you knew. but he avoided to look at you, and you did the same. "you're alright."

some beats of silence. then, a slow grin started forming in his face, "you should've seen the other guy."

"too soon."

"ah, c'mere." his arm extended and wrapped you around your shoulders, pushing you closer to him. you let him handle you, accommodating your head against his good shoulder, closing your eyes. your heart ached more and more and more--- "we've survived. that's enough."

but it wasn't.

[farfromstrange]

Total Eclipse Of The Heart | Matt Murdock

Matt Murdock x Vampire!reader (f!reader)

Part 1 // Part 2 (currently here) // Part 3 (coming soon)

PART TWO - Humans are dying at the hands of her species and she has to do something about it, but how can she when the object of her attraction just so happens to stumble into her path over and over again, as if he's just as addicted to her as she is to him?

Warnings: 18+ MINORS DNI! Very explicit sexual language, dubious consent (inappropriate touching, dirty talk), blood, vampires, death, bad humor, plot, religious imagery (?), submissive Matt Murdock, Dom!Reader, DARK FANTASY (dead dove do not eat), really, this is absolutely filthy dark, AND not proof-read

A/n: This is so dark, holy shit… Here’s the second part! I hope you’re not mad at me that I left you waiting. 2023 already feels so weird I don’t know why, but I’ve finally finished this chapter and I’m getting to work on the third one as we speak. The smut is coming soon, I promise. Until then, I’m just going to get you all worked up :)

DARK CONTENT UNDER HERE, 18+ ONLY!

Ever since the beginning of time, humans have felt threatened by their fellow species. The goal is self-preservation rather than preserving the world around them. At the same time though, there has never been another species so hell-bent on destroying their habitat than the human race. 

She watched the seasons come and go. Where one life ended, another started. Humans were fast to reproduce, she realized, but they were also just as fast to die. Sickness and injury are the biggest threats to the human body.  You could be okay one second, then on your deathbed the next. While the female body could withstand the terrible strain of childbirth, it stands no chance against cancer. You could bleed out in seconds if the right vein is nicked, and if you fall the wrong way, a broken neck will either kill you instantly or leave you dependent on machines for the rest of your life. 

While humans are considered the most sophisticated species since the beginning of time, they are all collectively fragile. 

The last time she was actively human, she didn’t even have a quarter of the knowledge at hand that she gained later in life. Times have changed since then. The world grew into something new, something modern, and the human race evolved with it. 

They’ve never had many nice words to say about her kind, so it came naturally to be terrified of a species that was more than willing to eradicate her own.

Sure, killing and blood-sucking isn’t something that goes over well with a crowd, but she often emphasized that they weren’t all cold-blooded murderers. Not all vampires were the same, and the lore often got it wrong.

Cold, they were, but only temperature-wise. Her half of the litter, anyway. And they were murderers too, else they wouldn’t have survived this long. Drinking blood to survive was a curse she wished upon no one. It naturally made her species reborn killers; they had to take a life to sustain their own, and since death and starvation weren’t in the cards without a stake through the heart, they had to follow their most primal instincts.

She tried to refrain from murder like a good citizen, and it worked, most of the time. There are other ways to get blood that doesn’t involve murdering an innocent. In Hell’s Kitchen, she could easily roll open a map and point to a random place, and she surely would have found criminals deserving of punishment.

But there were also humans who didn’t fear her species, those who were willing to give to the cause voluntarily. They liked to call themselves blood-submissive as if it were a sexual practice on its own – the sex was a nice byproduct, and some of those people were born to be whores, but making it a new trend was something she wished would never happen.

Though she was well aware of the subculture around humans fetishizing vampires, who were all more than ready to give their blood. Humans are so susceptible to overstimulation, especially through strange forces, even the smallest taste of a vampire’s blood could get them high enough up the precipice to push them into an orgasm.

That was the one thing that enticed her the most; the human anatomy, and how responsive they were to stimuli. She knew all about it, and yet she found herself surprised again and again whenever she lay with someone new. 

That evening though, she woke up with a heavy feeling in her stomach. One that wouldn’t go away. 

She entered the kitchen of her shared home to find a stranger sitting on one of the stools at the kitchen counter. Two very obvious holes adorned the young man’s neck. He didn’t look terrified when he saw her, only overly tired and perhaps a little drained. 

She sighed heavily, moving to get herself a drink from the fridge. Not that she had one already sitting there, but he wasn’t hers to take. He had already been labeled with two very sharp fangs that could only belong to one person.

“Eli, you left your dinner in the kitchen!” her voice bounced off the high walls, doing black flips until it finally made the human twitch. “No offense,” she said. “I’m just not a fan of waking up to blood banks sitting at my kitchen counter.”

He opened his mouth, but no words would come out.

She grinned. With her mug in hand, she returned to ask the boy, “Coffee?”

He declined.

“Well, you can’t say I haven’t tried to be hospitable with you.”

Just in time, Eli came around the corner wearing nothing but a pair of boxer briefs. She rolled her eyes. It was one of those guests. 

She met Eli somewhere around 1800 when she spent some time in the deserts of Egypt. He was only a couple of days old then, bitten by a passing vampire with no regard for human life. Eli was lucky to have survived, but with no one to teach him, he went rogue and slaughtered his entire village in a hungry haze. When he came to, the life he once knew had been destroyed beyond repair.

She saved him. Initially, she planned to just pass through, but the word about a vampire on the loose traveled fast, even back then, and so she found herself in Eli’s village soon after, convincing him to join her. She saved his life and therefore, he felt as if he owed her. They never left each other's side again.

Though sometimes, Eli was particularly hard to live with. He was almost like an unruly child, and he left his food lying out most of the time – he tended to forget that wasn’t the only hungry one in the household. 

“Would you stop calling every human I bring home a blood bank?” he said. 

“If you stop letting them stay for breakfast,” she retorted.  

He met her bitter smile with a sour one of his own. “Not everyone feels the need to submit to you as Talon does.”

“Maybe I should make that a rule then. I mean, I am the head of this coven, after all. The least you can do is give me some respect.” She eyed the young man still sitting at the counter, completely hypnotized by the shirtless man prancing around the kitchen. “And your blood whores, too, before you start giving them a sexually transmitted human disease. Or turn them into one of us.”

He scoffed. She patted his shoulder as she passed by him, taking the chance to whisper into his ear, “Would be a shame if I had to drive a stake through one of them when all they signed up for was just a little fun.”

She couldn’t help herself. On her way out, she passed by the helpless human, pulling his head back by the hair to reveal his deliciously long neck, and she dipped her nose to take him in. The blood running through his veins smelled beyond divine. Sweet temptation. She wanted to bury her teeth in his soft skin and suck until he was empty. “Ah, delicious,” she said. “Youngblood, untainted, pure. Excellent pick. I wonder if he tastes as good as he smells.” 

The tips of her sharp fangs scratched at his neck, and she had to force herself to pull away before she could make the mistake of taking Eli’s food off his plate. 

“Get him out of here,” she told him. “Before I make you bathe in holy water for the rest of the week.” 

He rolled his eyes. “Yes, ma’am.”

The respect issue was a problem she had to deal with. She wasn’t someone to play around, with except for the bedroom. She was nothing if not playful there, with someone writhing underneath her and begging for the mercy of pleasure, and they would always get what they wanted and deserved. She was considerate like that. But her lovers also never struggled to pay her respect. That seemed to be a family problem only. 

Perhaps she had to assert more dominance over them too, even if it was just for kicks. They would learn soon enough. It wasn’t exactly easy to be a leader, after all. That was common knowledge even amongst the undead.

The vibrations of the phone in her pocket caused her to look up. She checked the text – a piece of technology she was quite fond of, the cell phone – and if she hadn’t been pale enough already, she surely would have turned white as a sheet right about now. 

“What happened?” she asked as she entered the main room. 

Talon nodded his head. “I just got word from my source at the police station,” he told her.

“And?”

“There’s been several suspicious murders in Hell’s Kitchen in the past week.”

“If I wanted a broken record player, I would have gone into the attic. Spit your words out now, Talon, or I will cut out your tongue.”

He flinched, remaining in his position with his head bowed downward. He couldn’t look into her almost blacked-out eyes and be met with disappointment. 

“The victims have been drained of most of their blood, but the injection sites are sloppy, so a lot of the blood got wasted and spilled around the corpses,” he said.

“That’s… graphic.” She rolled her eyes. Chaos only compelled distraction. “But not at all the details I need,” she said.

“Yes, I was just getting to the important part. There’s security footage that shows a foreign party escaping from the site of the murder, and the same person is shown a couple of days later attacking the third victim in a blood-thirsty rage.”

The scenery sounded all too familiar. She tilted her head, intrigued by his report, and moved forward. “What exactly are they saying?”

“The police are blaming it on a new drug epidemic that has the users acting out to the point they would cause a blood bath. The drug supposedly triggers hallucinations that make them unaware of their surroundings and crave violence.”

“You mean blood. The drug is making them crave blood.”

“That’s what they’re thinking, but it’s not in the official report.”

“Yeah because that drug is called vampirism and that’s not exactly an epidemic that should be happening,” she said.

Talon nodded. “Police are issuing a warning,” he told her, “without knowing what they’re warning from. It’s just a couple of kids overdosing and bleeding out in the most ghastly of ways. They’re saying it’s drugs because they don’t understand.”

She grew more and more agitated with every word that slipped past his lips. The pedestal that kept her above the man made her seem much taller than she actually was. She paced the floor. It gave her a sense of superiority that she fought very hard to receive. Her status surpassed those of the people around her. She was older and wiser and perhaps slightly more sophisticated. Her moves were calculated yet often brutal because she learned that you get nothing in life if you’re not willing to spill a little blood, literally and figuratively. To have something or someone threaten her precious freedom like that was an obvious call for action

She halted her movements when he went quiet. “Do they have proof?” she questioned as if she expected him to tell her himself. 

“No,” Talon said. 

“Good. Call a meeting. I need to know who did this. And make sure no one knows beforehand. The last thing I need right now is a fucking vampire uproar.”

“What, you suspect it was one of us?” He had a doubting frown resting on his pale face. 

“While I have faith that you can keep your fangs in your jaw, I need to make sure I’m not misplacing that faith,” she stated. “If I’m wrong in my suspicions, that is good for you. If I’m right and one of you idiots is behind this, I will drive you to hell myself.”

“If you want to have my opinion…”

She smirked, “I really don’t.”

“But if I may?”

“You may not.” Stepping down from the pedestal, she eyed him. “Call the meeting,” she ordered. “In the meantime, I’m going to get myself a bottle of Scotch to drown my sorrows, and then I’m going to steal from the police.” 

Talon yelled after her, “Do you need any help, boss?”

“Yes. You can help yourself to stop crawling up my ass! That would help me a lot, actually. Don’t get me wrong,” she said, “I like my men submissive, but your behavior is just getting pathetic now. I’m your boss, not your mother. She’s dead. Deal with it.”

It wasn’t the first time she broke into the police station in Hell’s Kitchen. Crime rates exploded at night, which meant a higher police presence in the building, but at the same time, the cells overflowed with the many criminals they caught. They were always drowning in paperwork, and the crime never seemed to take an end. 

She waited until the commotion in the bullpen caused the officer at the front desk to jump from his seat and escalate the situation. She sped toward the file cabinet, retrieved what she needed, and disappeared just as fast as she had come. 

The officer looked up to find nothing but a strong breeze knocking the documents off his desk. He frowned, choosing to ignore it as the man underneath him writhed against the handcuffs.

Talon said a lot yet nothing at all. She eyed the pictures in the moonlight, the dead eyes staring straight into the security cameras, the man’s body covered in blood as he left a trail of bodies along the Hudson’s riverbed. He downplayed it. This was bad, a monster out of control, someone who shouldn’t even have existed in the first place and yet somehow came to life. There were clear rules. Those rules had been broken in more than one place, shattered on the ground, and then walked over with utmost disrespect. 

And he wasn’t the only one. Every murder was accompanied by one of the herds escaping, later appearing on the scene of another crime. To the untrained eye, it appeared as if these kids were high and just playing around. The blood around the bodies was significant, so the ordinary human might sort it as an overdose after all. An accident. Though none of the things she saw were accidental. 

They killed without a care, without remorse, and at the rate they were going, she was sure they wouldn’t stop anytime soon. 

It wasn’t the first time she had to run against the clock, but it had been a while since she was tossed into such a situation where she had to choose between peace and her most primal nature. She had to appeal to her common sense. She knew better than to let them continue this.

Humans aren’t stupid but often underestimated. At this rate, if they kept going, war seemed inevitable. 

These strangers were hunting on her turf and they turned everything upside down. She wasn’t having it. She had to do something. 

The wind came from the far east and blew through the streets. Many different smells lay in the air that night, but the most prominent hit her nose at the front step of the precinct. 

She tilted her head. She could sense him clearly now. He still smelled the same, his blood a bittersweet taste on her tongue, and she craved more. His heartbeat filled her ears, an elevated sound. She searched for him in the night until the sound of his scruffy, careful voice caught in her ears. 

He stood on the fire escape of the precinct’s second floor. The metal creaked. A door fell shut. He wasn’t alone. 

“Look, man, I’d be happy to help you, especially because we are way in over our heads with this case, but I told you,” the second voice said, “The file is gone.” 

She stared down at the brown folder in her hands. 

“What do you mean gone?” he asked, finally, and her eyes rolled back at the mere sound of him. 

He was everywhere, so goddamn overwhelming, all she wanted was to pull him off that fire escape, into the alley, and turn him into a helpless mess until he was begging her for mercy with tears in his eyes – she could only imagine the soft color behind the red glasses. Were they brown, green, or perhaps even blue? They surely would turn black with lust and then gloss over with exhaustion from the sheer overstimulation when she was done with him. Though she would only stop when the color of his eyes would disappear behind his eyelids as he slipped into a state of unconsciousness, the pleasure causing his mortal body to shut down and submit even more to the power she wielded. 

“Apparently, someone took it.”

“Since when do people steal files from a police station, Sergeant?” 

The man shrugged. “It’s not the first time,” he said. “Happens more often than you might think.”

“What now?” her nameless stranger asked. 

She could only imagine his mouth moving in sync with his gravelly voice, the movement of his Adam’s Apple in his throat as he swallowed, and the way his hands balled to fists at his sides, the beautiful veins protruding and his knuckles turning white. She wondered how those hands would feel somewhere other than a cane or a metal rod. How they would look tracing not the brim of glass but rather a different opening. Playing with wetness until his hands were coated in it the same way he played with the condensation on the glass of his drink. 

“Sergeant, if you want me to help you, I need more than a whim to go on. Do you have anything you could give me?”

“Look, I can’t help you,” the Sergeant said, “but if I did know something, I would suggest scouting out the docks. Ground zero seems to be close to the docks, but I’ve also got word that the rest of Manhattan might be involved too, so I’d be careful if I were you.” 

“Thank you.”

“Yeah, whatever. We have heightened police presence there since the first suspected overdose, consider that before you make any wrong moves.”

That stopped him. “Suspected?” he questioned.

He was a smart one. Her lip curled into a distant smirk.

“I’m not saying it’s not an overdose, I’m just saying they’re too suspicious to be instantly ruled as such. It’s my opinion, not the official statement, and everyone else here at the station and even the DA’s office agree with the drug epidemic explanation. But I’m not sure it’s right to assume that, not yet, not without evidence,” he said. “We judge people way too quickly these days.”

The stranger chuckled again, his voice darker than when she met him, but the darkness he displayed was something she thoroughly enjoyed. It was enticing, eliciting an excitement she hadn’t felt in quite a while.

“Are you talking about me?” he asked sheepishly, and she imagined him smirking. He seemed more confident in that alley, fully in his element, not at all as submissive as he had been around her. 

She wondered if there were two sides to that man whose name she still hadn’t figured out. 

The Sargeant scoffed, opening the door back into the precinct. Hot air met the cold one outside, causing the air to condensate. She could feel it even from a distance, the changes in temperature, the warmth that felt more wrong than it felt right. 

“Just be careful,” he told him. 

The fire escape squeaked and the sound of his boots disappearing into the distance had her frowning. Blind men don’t jump rooftops and they don’t do parkour. There was more to him than she first suspected. He wasn’t the innocent man he made himself out to be. He had dark secrets that went way below the surface. Her curiosity was spiked. She needed to see him again and she needed to have him now. 

She held the file in the air, watching as the edges started to crinkle and the fire spread from her fingertips, infecting the paper. The folder lit up, filling the night with yellow flames and the ashes of the several documents gone with the wind. 

When the paper fully dissolved, she closed her fist and the last remaining flame vanished. 

As the mysterious stranger made his way over the rooftops of the city, she turned in the opposite direction. Her first instinct was to follow, but there was no fun in chasing him just yet. She wanted to play some before she did that and wanted him to know more about her before she completely destroyed and corrupted him. His beautiful soul would only remain a faint memory. 

The doors into the old, abandoned church swung open. The benches were occupied with exactly five people, two of them Eli and Talon, and the rest of what she liked to call her family, but historians would have called them a coven. An assembled group of vampires qualified as such, as did more than one witch sharing the same ideologies and sharing the same living space. That’s what the two species have in common - they are both widely hated by all kinds of religions except for Satanity. 

Six vampires living in a church sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, but the place had been abandoned years ago and there was no official owner, so it was run-down and, most importantly, they didn’t require an invitation to enter. So they made their home there, choosing Hell’s Kitchen as their turf and claiming it as their territory. That had been years ago and the small chapel grew significantly to feel like home since then.

“Cold-blooded murder,” she recited as she walked down the aisle, “Blood baths, two injection sites on the neck, suspicious behavior making humans thirsty for blood, and the police declared it a fucking drug epidemic!” she said. “What century are we living in, people? Is this the seventeenth or the eighteenth? Have we traveled back in time so that these words can be used in the same sentence again, right here in New York? What bad dream am I having right now, because it surely can’t be real?”

She reached the pedestal, stepping up in front of the altar. 

“Seriously, what is happening?” she asked. 

They all stared at her with wide, confused eyes. Those weren’t the faces of people who were about to cause a supernatural war of the undead. They were pretty much caught off guard by her accusations and that gave her hope, considering she knew them pretty well by now to know their tells when they were lying. 

“Please tell me that it’s not one of you currently going on a rampage in Hell’s Kitchen, turning innocent teenagers into ruthless, blood-thirsty vampires, and breaking every rule that was set for us when it comes to hunting humans. Tell me none of you is going on a fucking murder spree!”

Her voice boomed off the high stone walls, almost cracking the colorful windows that adorned the church, pictures displaying passages of the bible and glowing bright red under the moonlight while others shone in blue and green. Though that night, red was truly prominent, and it fell right on her pale face, making everything appear dangerously dark about her. 

One of the younger men raised his hand. 

“William,” she called. 

He stood up, clearing his throat, his hands tangled together in front of his body. He was the shy one, the one she had to pick up because he was starving himself due to his fear of what he had become after he was brutally turned by a woman he thought he could trust. It had been a very dark time back then, early twentieth century, and vampires in the States were still on the loose without a care in the world. There were no rules, only bloodshed, and the covens had body counts higher than the entire population. 

“None of us is going on a murder spree,” he said. 

“Are you saying that just because I want to hear you say it or do you actually mean what you just said?” 

“I, um… you know what, I’m just gonna sit back down.” 

“Wise choice.” She nodded. “So, William’s not a killer. What about the rest of you? Anyone trying to start a rebellion?”

Eli shrugged. His answer was obvious, “It’s not me.”

“I figured. You let your dinner stay for breakfast, and you know, you prefer blood whores. Gives you a sense of superiority, which of course, is not how this works. But anyway…”

The group burst out in laughter and Eli glared at her from across the room. “Very mature,” he said. 

“I’m just giving you a taste of your own medicine,” she said. “Now, anyone else wanna share?”

Another hand rose in the air. “I’m honestly just knitting,” the woman said. As a demonstration, she lifted the half-finished scarf - they didn’t even wear scarves - and threw the ball of wool in the air. “I tried my hand at a very complicated cardigan, but that project failed, so I’m just going back to my roots.”

“Thank you, Helen, but I never doubted you, not even for a second. You’re a total sweetheart.”

“It also wasn’t me,” Talon spoke up. “But you already knew that.”

“Yes, because you are too stupid to cause such mayhem,” she stated plainly. “That leaves only one…” she let her eyes roam over the pews until she found who she was looking for. 

His head hung low. Was he… sleeping?

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, for fuck’s sake! Can someone please punch Adam in the face?”

Eli stabbed him with his finger. The man shot up, causing the bench to creak. “I’m awake!” he declared. 

“Thank you for gracing us with your presence,” she answered sourly. “Did you hear anything I just said?”

Adam looked around. All eyes were on him. He rubbed his very heavy eyes. “I zoned out after you said bloodbath.” At least his confession was honest. 

She sighed. She was living with a bunch of idiots. She shouldn’t have suspected them. They weren’t capable of the monstrosities that she saw in the police file. 

“Never mind,” she said in exasperation. “You’re all dismissed. Now please, fuck off. I need to be alone so I can fucking shoot myself.” 

She wondered how they even managed to make it this far without getting caught. 

“Talon.”

“Yes?” he replied.

“I need to get back out there. You’re in charge while I’m gone. Make sure that these idiots don’t kill themselves or each other.” 

“Are you sure that is such a good idea? Going out there, I mean? We don’t know what we’re dealing with,” he said. 

“No,” she stated after a slight moment of hesitation, “but I’m the only competent one in this house, so I have to step up.” 

Her version of stepping up was simple. Scout the docks, stake out if necessary, and confront anything she deemed suspicious enough to risk getting caught. She hoped to run into one of the young vampires, at least, so she could make them answer her – the young ones were never bright, always controlled by hunger and the new intensity of their emotions. The anger was the most brutal one. 

It’s like that even for humans – anger blinds, anger poisons, and anger can tear worlds apart and start new generations built on the same ideals. She witnessed anger and greed topple empires that had once been strong and flourished. There is no limit to what anger can make a person do. And vampires, like any other enhanced species, experience most emotions ten times deeper and worse than the ordinary human being. 

She felt that effect even after years of being trapped in the same body, in the same state she was left in back then, and especially as she stood on the roof of the warehouse by the docks, overseeing the Hudson and the city that laid on the other side of the shore. She learned how to control and live with her anger. She learned how to survive. Though there were moments when even the highest form of self-control failed and she was stranded with the blade of a hot knife stuck in her sternum, digging further to tear apart her cold, dead heart. 

The hunger was the worst part. It had the ability to cloud her mind completely and dictate her every behavior with the purpose to stave that hunger, which was a near-impossibility. There was no satisfying a hunger that had been there for centuries, that not even pints of blood could satisfy. In the years she lived, she learned how to live with it, but always going hungry was also no real way to live. It was awful, constant torture, and with every passing century, she grew more tired of the life she was forced to live. 

In the distance, the wood creaked. One of the boats on the harbor displayed movements in its belly. The light only faintly fell on the source of the noise. A figure emerged behind the barrels stocked on the pier, heading straight for the oblivious fisherman who seemed to have stayed around to have a celebratory beer after bringing home quite a large catch of fish. She could smell them across the docks, already tied in bags to take home, but the victor was still inhabiting his boat. Humans have always been particularly obsessed with the art of fishing; it had once been their largest source of food income and fish is still pretty high up on the list of shippable goods. Though there was nothing worse to her nose than the smell of several fish perched together in one place. The stench was astronomical. 

A young vampire was far more sensitive, though once hungry, there was nothing but blood on their minds and so none of them would run at the smallest hint of fish in the air, let alone the fear of getting caught. They didn’t have that kind of perception, not yet at least, because this particular behavior was taught. Primal nature dictated them to be monsters and without the proper training, the hunger would control them instead of them gaining control over the real monster – the insatiable thirst. Self-control is one of the hardest traits to gain, but it goes a long way, especially for creatures of the night who were born to be the opposite of compliant and self-aware. 

If you want to live amongst an emancipated species, you have to learn how to conform to their rules and compromise, if necessary. You have to be willing to change your true nature to fit in and become something more than what history made of you. All of it comes back down to self-control. Without self-control, there can be no rules and without rules, society is doomed to collapse. Rules are what make a society habitable. 

If there was one thing all young vampires had in common it was their lack of stealth. The young boy she had heard lurking behind the barrels across from the fisherman’s boat only checked the corner to his right, his eyes bright red as the moonlight fell on his blacked-out irises. 

She cocked her head to the side. Someone trying to preserve themselves would have gone about this much differently. He stopped tip-toeing when he caught her scent in the air, slowly turning in her direction, and the way he looked straight at her reminded her of a frightened deer or a child caught in the act of stealing something. He was stealing, it just wasn’t something so easily explained. What he was stealing and risking went beyond what the human mind was capable of comprehending, let alone the brain of a young vampire that had absolutely no rational thoughts left behind. 

He froze dead in his tracks and she sighed, almost like a condescending mother trying to teach her disobedient son a valuable lesson.

“I see what you’re doing,” she stated.

The boy licked his lips, revealing parts of his very sharp fangs. Another thing about the young ones – they didn’t know how to mask. One look at them and your first thought would be a vampire. Red eyes, protruding veins around the sockets, pale, clammy skin, and strength and speed they couldn’t control yet. Stealth was little to non existent, as was their sense of self-preservation and control. They were like unruly babies turning into toddlers overnight, the Devil on their shoulders whispering sweet sins into their ears and causing them to make the worst decisions. Right or wrong didn’t exist in their world. They knew what they wanted and they would try everything to get it, rules be damned. 

Even though they all started out like this, not many chose to stay that way anymore. Once you learn how to live by the rules, it’s not that hard, and she grew to love the routine. 

Without someone to teach them, young vampires could turn into everyone’s worst nightmare, and then everything she had worked so hard toward for centuries would have been for nothing. 

“Fair warning,” she said, “Don’t.” 

He bared his teeth. 

“Oh, I’m shaking in my boots. Not. What’s your name, kid?”

He looked no day over seventeen, at best. His mother was probably worried sick. Little did she know that her worst fear, her son dying, had come true but in a far worse sense than she could ever imagine. Who he was now had nothing to do with the boy he used to be. The young vampire staring back into her eyes dark and empty had nothing left inside of him but insatiable hunger. His soul was clouded by the demon inside of him and chances were that it would never fully recover from the monstrosities he committed and would still commit. 

She couldn’t stop him, she knew that. If she took him with her, whoever was responsible for the sudden spike in bloodless corpses would only create more of him, and take more teenagers from their parents until they got what they wanted. She needed to know what that was so she could stop the war that was looming on the horizon. She couldn’t have an apocalypse, not when her life was going semi-normal for a change. She quite liked New York, she wasn’t done yet. 

“Who did this to you?” she asked again. 

“Leave,” he growled. 

“You see, I can’t do that. I want to, believe me, but I can’t. You’re too young, too inexperienced, so I’m trying to tell you this as easy as possible. What you’re doing right now is breaking all sorts of rules. You’re hunting on our turf,” she said. “My turf. My coven and I live here now. If you continue causing mayhem and destruction and turning innocent people into vampires, you’re breaking a truce that is far older than you, your parents, and great-great grandparents together. There is a set of rules for a reason…”

“You need to leave,” the boy repeated.

She ignored him. “This truce,” she continued, “was put in place over a century ago to assure that vampires and humans can live together in peace. Covens are not supposed to turn innocent people into vampires, let alone leave them without someone to teach them the ropes. A vampire out of control poses a danger to all species and if you continue what you’re doing, your actions will lead to war.” Her eyes narrowed. “Or perhaps that’s what you want. Is that it? Do you want us to be at war again?” 

He smirked. 

“You weren’t there the last time. It was ugly. That’s why there are rules, right?” She motioned as if explaining the way the world worked to a toddler. “To prevent such unnecessary bloodshed from happening again. To prevent us from killing each other,” she explained. “That’s what those rules are for, okay? Prevention, not causation. You’re supposed to stick to the rules to prevent a war that would destroy more than it would fix, and world domination doesn’t happen just because you say ‘fuck it!’ And shine a dangerous light on all vampires in the process. We’re not all alike. Every coven knows that,” she said. “Whoever made you is only using you to get ahead. In other words, you’re fucked and doomed to get slaughtered in the end. Either by your own kind, a war, or maybe even one of the very ancient vampire hunters that are only waiting for a chance to get back at us.”

Talking to him was futile. He didn’t follow a word she said and even if he had, he wouldn’t have understood. Young vampires were so stupid, naïve, useless and a nuisance. To think they all started out this way grossed her out, even though she made saving the lost causes of the world her life’s work. 

Her logic was twisted and more often than not illogical, but she was wise and considered herself above average in intelligence, simply because she had been around for quite a while. She saw empires rise and fall. She stared into the darkest pits of existence and still managed to come back from the abyss. Her life had been a series of doors in her face, which led to several life lessons being taught over the course of centuries. She was no angel, but she wasn’t stupid and she had one job: make sure the truce would remain intact. And she would do just that, even if she had to eliminate that young boy in order to do so.

He didn’t say anything for quite a while. “Get out of my way,” he growled. Of course, he would settle on something as dramatically pathetic as this catchphrase. “I’m starving and I won’t hesitate to hurt you if you keep me from my meal.” 

“Ouch,” she cocked an eyebrow, “You really bruise my ego, thinking you can get through me without getting hurt yourself. I’d suggest you think about your actions,” she said, “but I know that I’m practically talking to a wall right now, so thinking isn’t an option. You’re incapable of rational thought.”

Fear was the last thing that came to her mind when he showed off his teeth again.

“Listen, I just want to know who’s behind this. Who’s leading your coven, kid?”

“Fuck you!” he spat.

“Hey now, no need to get vulgar. I asked you a normal question. Who’s behind this and is there a chance I might get to have a conversation with the one in charge? Tell me and I will gladly point you in the direction of a different hunting ground,” she said. 

The boy nodded toward the boat. “I want that one. He’s mine. Don’t even try to stop me.”

“Yeah, but you can’t have him.”

“I’m going to have him.”

“No, you won’t.”

“Stop disagreeing with everything I’m saying!”

She shrugged. “Can’t help that you’re wrong all the time. I’ve never learned how to shut up. It’s genetic; centuries of untreated trauma are at fault here, and of course, your general wrongness plays a big part in my need to disagree with your embarrassing hypotheticals.”

“Go to hell!”

“Already did. You know, of course, pride always goes before the fall. Such a human trait to have; multiply it by a thousand, where does that leave you? Certainly not more sophisticated than me, someone with hundreds of years of experience. You need to be careful, young vampires like you are at an even higher risk to be discovered and murdered before you even get the chance to learn what you were given with this transition.” 

Finally, he launched at her. She sped away, gone in a matter of a second, and appeared a few feet behind him, heaving a heavy sigh. “You kids are all the same,” she declared, looking into his very distraught eyes. He couldn’t believe she had switched that fast. “Fast but reckless and extremely easy to trick.”

A moment later, he stood in her spot and she was gone again, crossing her arms behind her back.

“You done?” she asked. His attempts to attack her only made her laugh, “Oh, so terrifying.”

She had him right where she wanted him, so agitated that he spiraled out of control, no longer aware of where he was going or what he was doing. She watched him dance for a bit. By now, he surely must have realized he wasn’t going to win. But the pride was stronger and he kept going, trying to get to her in all kinds of ways, though never succeeding. 

“I feel bad for you. What would your mother say if she saw you like this?”

He stopped. His left eye twitched. She saw the wheels on his head turning and she thought, finally, I got him. 

What did she say? Pride goes before the fall.

She caught the billy club that soared through the air in their direction only a few inches from the boy’s face. Her lips pursed and she stared at the red object, feeling the heavy metal between her fingers and the small ripples in the material. 

When she turned her attention back to the target, the boy was gone. He had sped away, using the moment of distraction to run. She couldn’t sense him anywhere; he must have escaped the docks completely, not even staying close to the Hudson. He was on his way home. The fisherman was safe and she had diverted quite the disaster, but she still deemed the interruption rude, including the attempt to impale that poor boy with the billy club. She had thought about it, but she would have never gone through with it. Whoever the weapon belonged to had to have been close by. 

Her night just kept getting better and better. That was her assessment, at least, until she heard his heartbeat again. The scent of him brushed the hairs in her nose and she took a whiff, feeling his presence so close in the air, she stopped to let the sensation wash over her. The fire inside of her belly ignited once again, the excitement tickling her cold skin and leaving nothing but lust and hunger to rummage through her veins. 

Footsteps thudded against the asphalt, stones crunching under his weight. They were slightly wet from the previous rain, causing a slight slip. 

She lowered her hand with the billy club, turning to look over her shoulder at the supposed blind man in a suit. She had seen that get-up before in the papers when he first showed his masked face in Hell’s Kitchen. She never thought much of it since he had never posed a problem before. 

The tables had officially turned.

Her lips parted to chuckle. “This is awkward,” she said. In the distance, the waves of the Hudson crashed into the riverbanks. It was colder than usual with a breeze in her hair that caused the water to go wild. 

She fiddled with the red billy club, smirking, “Does this belong to you?” 

“Who are you?” his voice sounded significantly lower than the night she first met him at that godforsaken gala. 

To think she didn’t want to go in the first place; she would have never met him if she hadn’t let Talon convince her that she was supposed to show her face. A political move, he called it, to assert her dominance, which she did, but not in the areas that mattered. 

“What are you doing in my city?”

She pouted. “So many questions.”

“Who was that boy you were just talking to? Where did he go?”

“What happened to hello, how are you? What’s your name?” She retorted. “Take a girl out for a drink first, would you? Back then men used to still be gentlemen.”

His chuckle was rather dark, a sound that made her shiver and imagine what it would sound like to reduce him to whimpers instead. The man was a brat, no doubt, not easy to force into submission, but she had cracked worse nuts. Surrendering wasn’t her forte, but she could make it everyone else’s.

“I’m not here to play games,” he told her.

“But I am,” she said. 

“What do you want?”

“As far as I can recall, I made that pretty clear when we first met.”

“When we- I don’t know you,” he lied and she realized how bad he was at it for a lawyer. 

She licked her lips, the fangs threatening to come out. She was starving. “I quite like an oblivious man. Makes things so much more exciting.”

“Listen, I don’t have time for small talk. There have been several suspicious murders around this part of New York and you’re currently my only connection, so you better talk before I make you.” 

“Just out of curiosity,” she said, “what does making me entail?” 

“Oh, for fuck’s sake!”

He headed straight ahead, determined to grab her, and she watched with an amused crinkle in her eyes. The downward tilt of his lips was truly something to laugh over. 

She allowed him to push her against the wall behind them. His force was surprising – those arms didn’t just look scrumptious, they actually carried a lot of strength for a human. 

The stranger bared his teeth and she smirked, eyeing his focused expression. He tried to look intimidating but failed miserably. One of his hands braced against the cement beside her head and the other landed around her neck, a threatening motion to assert dominance. They were all so predictable and foolish enough to think that a woman like her couldn’t fight back.

Everywhere she went, she was underestimated. If only everyone knew her true nature, they wouldn’t be so reckless as to push her into corners over and over again. Or in this case, against cement walls on the docks in the middle of the night, right in the middle of her hunting ground with not another human soul close enough to hear him scream. And water is knowingly a great way to dispose of a dead body.

He squeezed tighter and she unclenched her jaw, wriggling out of his grasp in the process. “You’re a kinky bastard, aren’t you?” she asked. 

“Answer my question,” he bit back.

“If you answer mine first.”

“This isn’t a game. Lives are at stake here! Listen, I don’t know who you are or what you are,” he said, “but if I find out that you had anything to do with these innocent kids getting slaughtered or know something about this new drug everyone is talking about, I will find you and I will destroy you.”

“You know, if it weren’t for the way you smell, I wouldn’t have recognized you, all confident in your little devil’s costume,” she purred.

Her finger slid up the leather of his suit, brushing over his tensing abs hiding behind the protective gear and she sucked in a sharp breath at the illusion she received.

“All of this tension and I still don’t know your name.”

He caught her hand and pinned it over her head. She squealed. He was full of surprises, and it only turned her on more. She wanted to bite him, really bite him, and suck on his pulse until he was crying her name and praying for God to save him, but the pleasure would only drive him further to hell and God wouldn’t be coming. She wanted him to writhe under her touch, taste him and make him come undone over and over again and once he believed she was done with him, she would start her torture anew, right from the beginning, pushing him from the precipice just far enough so she could catch him, bring him back to the top and then do the same thing in repetition all over again.

He roamed her face aimlessly, as it seemed, but barely visible behind the mask. “How?” he growled.

“Wouldn’t you want to know?” She chuckled. “It’s unfortunate that we had to meet again like this, but…” In an instant, she had them flipped around, her arms pinning him to the wall instead of herself and her strength remained unmatched. He could struggle, it was of no use. She had the upper hand.

Her breath tickled his ear as she spoke, far too close for comfort, “You smell absolutely divine. It’d be a shame to waste all that sweet, sweet blood for a second time,” she said.

He couldn’t move. Sharp nails raked through his hair and over his scalp, tugging his head to the side until his throat was completely bare to her, naked, exposed. His aorta pulsated wildly under his skin. She could see it bulge with every beat of his heart. That strong, masculine heart, stronger than anything she had heard or felt before.

She tasted the sweat on his skin and the salt of threatening tears in the air. If he was turned on or scared, she wasn’t sure. The lines between fear, pain, and pleasure blurred. It was all the same to her, anyway. Getting close to her would most certainly draw everyone under her spell at some point, no matter the sex or gender, and all the heads would continue turning to her whenever her presence entered a room full of lively human beings. Only then her pheromones could work their wonders.

The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen struggled against her grasp but to no avail. He was powerless, just how she liked him, how she wanted and craved him.

She licked a long stripe over his pulse point. “I want to taste you so badly,” she whispered. “I want nothing more than to dig my teeth into your pretty little throat and suck you dry, and then I want to get on my knees and eat your cum so I can feel it mix with the essence of what your heart has to give, and then you’d be mine. I’d own you. You’d be completely at my mercy, you’d be bound to me and it would feel so fucking good. It would feel so fucking good for the both of us.”

Her fangs began to scratch the surface, enough to make him feel it but not nearly enough to break the skin. She tasted the salt of his sweat even clearer now, wondering how much deeper she had to go to finally reach the source of the sweetness that surrounded him.

“Don’t you want that?” Her hand joined the words slipping from her silver tongue and wrapping around him like a poisonous snake. “Don’t you want to let me corrupt you, to bite you, to eat you until all you can feel is the pure pleasure of having me all over you? My lips, my tongue, my teeth, my body on yours everywhere, all the fucking time… oh, that would be such an orgasmic sight, and the pleasure you’d be feeling, I can’t even describe it. You won’t know until you at least try and believe me, you should. Isn’t that something you want, darling? Doesn’t your body crave to be caressed and receive undivided attention from someone who knows how to make you feel good?”

He sounded small, fragile, and utterly broken when he next spoke, and she hadn’t even started yet. “What are you doing to me?” he asked. The heat of his breath mixed with the cold night air. “What are you?”

She chuckled. “The better question is, what am I not?” The tip of her tongue moved from his neck to his cheek until she reached the corner of his luscious lips. Her nose dug into his cheekbone. “Fuck,” she said. “The things I want to do to you are far from innocent.”

But so fucking good. 

Even with fear holding the reins to his body, he melted into her touch. He turned into a puddle of melted chocolate right at her feet. She could have asked anything of him, he would have done so just for the sake of pleasing her. But she wanted him to do it voluntarily not because the smell of her pheromones managed to drive any man into a state of co-dependency. 

She wanted him to want her for the sake of wanting her. Like this, she would only compel him to do things he would never choose to do out of his own free will, and while the thought of having him right there on the docks was exciting and had her cunt squeezing around thin air, already wet and wanting, the only treacherous thing about her that was entirely defenseless and could be forced into submission with just a simple flick of the tongue over plump, rosy lips. He had her on the cloud of dangerous euphoria in seconds, already stumbling on the edge and about ready to slip, lose herself, and lose control only to have him, finally, in all the ways she pleased and all the ways that would make him feel good. 

She could give him anything he had ever wanted, give him a time that not a single human could give him, and make him come undone inside and outside so many times, he would pass out from the pure pleasure. But he wouldn’t regret it. He would go out this as the winner, fucked out and blissful and perhaps a little addicted to the taste of her as well – she was sure she would be addicted to him as well. She almost already was, just from the scent of his blood and the way his body shivered at the slightest touch. He was so responsive, so human, yet stronger and more unique than anyone else could ever be. He was the one thing she wanted and she was ready to take it as soon as he wanted it, too. 

She was used to taking what she wanted however she wanted and screwing the consequences, quite literally, but not with him. With him, the need bubbling up deep inside of her belly was different. It wasn’t just a hunger for blood or a hunger for sex and pleasurable violence, he caused much more than that within her already conflicted soul, and as enticing as that was, the connection confused her. There was a reason she didn’t let anyone close, using sex as a mere pastime activity to get the edge off – she couldn’t toy with him because chances were she would reduce his survival chances to zero. 

Allowing a human like him close would only cause pain in the long run, and she’d been through enough of that for several lifetimes. And that wasn’t even an overstatement. 

Her lips brushed over his momentarily before she forced herself to pull away, widening the distance between them. 

The poor man slumped against the wall, his world rotating. He took it much better than most people, but the sweet taste of his fear in the air reminded her that he was just human, after all. A curious, enticing, and mysterious human, but a human being nonetheless.

Humans serve only one purpose for vampires like animals serve a purpose to humans – predators hunt their victims to feast, sustain themselves and survive. Humans are essentially animals and vampires used to be humans turned into hunters, predators, and dangerous perverts who craved blood to survive while at the same time using it for twisted, sexual purposes that had God locking the gates of heaven to anyone who even dared to fantasize about it. There is no ancestor ready to turn around in their grave because vampires were born from lust and hunger, and the first vampires had been carnal creatures as well, ready to go at it like animals without a single brain cell at their disposal.

Vampires weren’t like that anymore. Sex still played a huge role in their existence, but their main purpose was to fit in. They wanted a peaceful life. Taking everything they wanted was no longer possible, their chances were limited, but at least they didn’t have to fear imminent death anymore. Not ever since the truce was first established, anyway. 

If those young vampires continued killing and turning innocent children without mercy, and their coven even supported their decisions, the peace would have been short-lived. She could already see it swindling with every passing second, though fear was not something she wanted to concern herself with, not yet. Her life had more important things to offer before she rang the warning bells on all the vampires she knew, therefore causing a certain commotion that would send the gravestones rolling. Not yet, she decided, but if they kept going at this rate, certainly very soon. 

“Go,” she growled into the night. “Do yourself a favor and stay away from the Hudson until further notice. You can never know what blood-thirsty and murderous monsters might lurk in the dark around here,” she said. 

He didn’t move. 

“Did you hear what I said?”

“You don’t get to tell me what to do,” he said, his voice remaining steady. 

She frowned. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah, you don’t scare me. Manipulate me all you want, this isn’t the first time an otherwise scary woman fails to put me under her spell. But,” he smirked, “don’t take it personally. I’m sure you look pretty scary.”

“Oh, sweetheart,” she cooed, her eyes switching from their natural color to a glossy black. “You have no idea who you’re talking to, do you?”

The red nails adorning her fingers grew sharper and in size. If only he could have regained his eyesight, he surely would have changed his mind. Her skin turned even whiter, the bags under her eyes sinking deep into her skull, replaced instead by thick, purple veins that transported the venom from the core of her existence into them. She was chaos, an abomination, humanity’s biggest threat – not scary was a description she wouldn’t accept.

No matter how blind he was, he had to follow the natural order of things like everyone else. He was supposed to be afraid of her. If he couldn’t find it in himself to show her, all of her games would inevitably lose their fun factor. And her ego would suffer the most. 

Open an ancient book about demons and a picture like that might stare back at you. 

“It takes a lot more than dark magic to scare the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen,” he told her.

It was cute. Remarkable, really. She laughed at his attempt to make himself feel better, and partly because she was starting to grow upset with him.

“Somehow, being infuriated with you only makes you so much more attractive to me,” she said. 

“You still don’t scare me.”

“Enjoy it while it lasts.”

Five seconds. The heartbeat of the fisherman rang loudly in her ear. She was starving, her last meal far too long in the past. He wriggled in her grasp, crying, begging for her to let him go, to have mercy on him and, “Oh, God, your face- what happened to your face? Are those- are those fangs? Please, I have a family!” 

Her laugh reverberated in her chest. The man stiffened when she tore at his hair to position his head sideways, his neck in perfect reach for her mouth. She looked at the man in the suit before her, his jaw clenched, and he had his billy clubs at the ready. They weren't going to hurt her, he knew that. She would catch them with ease. He could only stand by and pretend he wasn’t scared even though he had never been more in sync with the feeling. They were a package deal when it came to her. 

“Don’t worry,” she told the poor fisherman, “You’ll see your family again, and you won’t even have to remember a thing.” 

Her mouth opened.

“Don’t,” Daredevil threatened – yes, it was a threat, not even a warning – from the other side of her, and she saw the conflict dance clearly over the revealed lower part of his face. “You don’t have to hurt him,” he said. “The man’s innocent.”

She shrugged. “I know.”

“He has a family.”

“I know. My ears are quite impeccable, can you believe that?”

“How about you think this through before you act? There’s a lot of ways you can go about spiting me, but pulling an innocent bystander into this is not fair. Come on, you said you wanted me, so take me.” 

As lucrative as that sounded, she had a different plan. 

She hummed, “No.”

“Why? Are you scared? Perhaps you’re not such a bad person after all. Is that it? You want me to be afraid of you, so you’re trying to hurt that man until I cave? Well, I won’t, but I’m offering myself to you instead of him, so don’t try so hard. Just take me. Take your shot.”

Oh, he sounded so amused – time to wipe that smirk off his beautiful face. 

“Ancient advice,” she ignored everything else he had said, “Don’t be a martyr,” she said and her lips rained down on the fisherman’s throat in a fiery passion. “History hates martyrs.”

“No, history only consists of martyrs.”

“The official version. The truth lies much deeper than your little human brain could ever explore.”

Daredevil was right about one thing; the man was innocent. No matter how she turned it, there was nothing wrong with him, so death would have been unnecessary punishment.

She wasn’t going to kill him just to spite the man she craved to actually have a taste of. She was just going to take a sip, still a quarter of her hunger and then move on, heal the man’s wounds and make him forget this ever happened. He would be disoriented, but he would be fine. 

Humans are the most susceptible to manipulation.

“Don’t be afraid,” she told the fisherman, “I’m just going to have a little taste of the forbidden fruit.”

Her teeth dug into his aorta and she sucked, tasting the blood that squirted into her mouth and all over her face in thick stripes. He tasted nothing like the feast standing right across from her, but it didn’t matter. Her mind shut off. The hunger moved to the forefront and at that moment, everything else stopped existing. It was just her and the life of this particular human in her hands, the taste of his blood exploding on her tongue and her stomach churning with the endless hunger that only got fueled with the small taste. She wanted more, needed it, but she knew better than to let the desperation overpower her. 

Passed out and short of a few pints of blood, the fisherman fell to the ground. She licked her lips. He was everywhere, even stuck on her clothes and traces of him had gotten tangled in her hair. He was a bleeder, that much was sure, and if she hadn’t licked over his neck to seal the wound, he surely would have bled out. 

Poor thing, but sentiment was useless in a case like this. He would make it. No use crying over a blood bag, she was taught. Humans lived to feed them. It was their purpose and she had no reason to feel bad for wanting to be full for a change, not go to bed hungry because she wouldn’t dare touch someone that wasn’t already in a plastic bag. She deserved this. 

And Daredevil cowered in fear at the sounds he was met with. Her night had turned from a total shit show into the sight of victory. 

She stepped forward and he flinched away, finally. “You wanted to know what I am. This is it!” she declared. “I’m the monster parents warn their children about and I’m the one thing every church fears because I happen to stand against everything religion stands for.”

“Dear God,” he breathed out.

“God can’t help me now,” she said. Her eyes moved to the sky, watching the stars disappear behind a thick cloud of smog and thousands of lights from the city center. “He stopped doing that the second I died. He’s dead to me now. He cannot be found. There is no God, there is only hunger and I’m probably the most merciful of them all, so I’d run if I were you. I’d run before another one of those demons God gave up on saving, jumps out of the dark and decides to suck the life from your pretty little body. I’d run,” she said, “because there is not a millisecond that goes by in which I do not want to tear your neck open and drink your blood while I also desperately want to suck your dick between my lips and do the same to those veins too, and the longer you stay the more my self-control starts to fade into the thin smoke that comes out of your mouth whenever you speak.”

He shivered and the color faded from his skin, blood pooling in his veins at twice the amount and the smell almost knocked her off her already hazy feet from the first course. 

More, her body screamed, but she held back. She learned how to hold back. No one had to die tonight.

“Run now or I’m cutting this short, and then Hell’s Kitchen will no longer have a Daredevil to protect them from the likes of me. They won’t even get the chance to mourn because it’d be impossible for me to drop your body in the Hudson after getting a taste of your blood.” 

He turned around, finally getting the hint to run. He jumped the wall up to the rooftop too gracefully for a blind man. She watched, her bloody lips moving into a smile. 

“Fear is healthy,” he heard her loud and clear. “Don’t let your pride cloud that healthy feeling from manifesting. And find me,” she said, “when you’re ready to talk without underestimating me.”

By the time she looked back up, Daredevil was gone with the wind, but his scent still lingered long after he had left and she would take it to bed with her where the most unholy of things would happen to the sound of a name she didn’t even know. 

She should have fucked him when she had the chance.

[thesharkspajamas]

Jealous James

Requested by @im-kikimon - hope this is kind of what you were looking for :)

If anyone has requests or wants more of this AU please lmk I'm begging for feedback

Harriet - James' Pallas cat daemon

Gunnar - Ruby's badger daemon

Setting: the Beaufort twins are staying with the Bells after the mansion drama at the end of season one. (No real spoilers tho dw)

James listened to Kieran Rutherford’s pitch for an Ascot-themed Easter garden party. As outfitters to the King, the Beaufort family attended Ascot every year, and his mother always made every best dressed list.

“And what? We usher in Lexington in a carriage? So many people at Maxton attend Ascot that people would see it for the rip-off it is. You want to ask actual nobility to picnic like the Queen Anne enclosure?” James scoffed.

Rutherford flushed and his shoulders crept up to his ears. “Do… Do you have a better idea?”

The whole room turned to James, who did not, in fact, have a better idea. “I’m saying we can’t imitate something like that. We could keep the dress code and do a standard party - maybe themed with a flower type, hyacinths or something seasonal.” He shrugged, spinning the words out as they came to him.

Silence fell and the tension was thick as James had crushed Rutherford’s hard work a second time. Lin nudged Ruby until she stood up, “Um…” She hugged her notebook to her chest, and suddenly James felt embarrassed; she was clearly uncomfortable because he’d put her in an awkward position, again, without meaning to. He’d just tried to be helpful. “I think you’ve both got good points,” she nodded to herself as an idea formed, “maybe you could work together on this and come back next week with some solid ideas?”

Both boys scowled at her, but she thought it would be good for them to sort out their issues. She smiled and nodded as if they’d just agreed, “Great. Lexington said he’s trying to arrange the keynote speaker so we don’t have the final schedule yet, but they shouldn’t be more than an hour, and if the lunch starts at twelve then we should expect to serve food around one’oh’five.,” she started writing a vague outline on the paper pad, “canapes around six, as it’s a low alcohol event, carriages at nine, latest.”

…

James emailed Rutherford in the car after lacrosse practice:

Hi,

If you send me what you’ve got for the garden party I’ll read it through and email you back with some notes.

James Beaufort

Sent from my iPhone

That should do it. He didn’t particularly want to meet in person.

…

Rutherford sent a link to a Pinterest board later that evening. No message, only the link. James opened it and he realised he hadn’t just been an asshole to Ruby but to Rutherford as well. He could see the guy had put some serious effort into this, and that the Ascot theme was only a template rather than a theme.

He opened his email and started typing out an apology - cc’ing Ruby.

“Coward,” Harriet accused him.

James remembered how Ruby had apologised to him on the lacrosse pitch and deleted the draft.

...

"Hey,” he walked up to Rutherford, “can we talk about the garden party?”

Rutherford looked at the ground, “Yeah.”

‘Go on’ Harriet urged James with a glare.

“I apologise for being rude to you at the meeting. You clearly put a lot of work into the project and it was wrong of me to stomp on it like that.”

“Yannow, it always annoys me in those stories when the nice girl picks the hot guy who treats her like shit over the boring guy who really likes her.”

‘Yikes,’ James thought. He hadn’t been expecting that. “You think I treat her like shit?”

“You have.”

James exhaled, ‘yep, deserved that one. Wait, what does he know?’

“But…” Rutherford spoke up again, “I admit I’m blindsided by your apology. I think we can at least try to work together.” He pushed his glasses further up his nose.

James was stunned. He nodded, “Library? Breaktime?” 

“Yeah, I prefer the desk third from the door by the east window. There’s a squirrel drey in the tree right next to it.”

“Third desk from the door by the east window. Got it.”

James glanced at the empty desks near the windows; Rutherford wasn’t here yet. He pulled out his phone and checked the compass app before walking to the eastern side. He sat down at the third from the door and opened up his tablet. He’d made a folder in his sketchbook app last night of different things to go with the theme; invitations, drinks stands, signage, all sorts.

“Did you see the squirrel? It’s a Eurasian red squirrel, pretty rare for around here.”

James looked up as Rutherford sat down and hoped that his disinterest in all things squirrel wasn’t all over his face. “Couldn’t spot it.”

“That branch fork right there,” Rutherford leaned over the table and pointed to a nondescript cluster of twigs.

James nodded, “ahh” and angled his tablet so Rutherford could see it. “I liked the muted colours idea. That was clever. Lydia told me lupins are in season and they come in all sorts of colours, so I thought we could use those as a theme. I sketched an invitation.” He flicked through the app to his ‘sketch’ which had actually taken him ages.

Rutherford took it all in, “That looks really good. Can you mass-produce the invitation?”

“Not by hand, but we could have them printed or send it as an e-invite.”

Rutherford scrunched his nose and shook his head as if James was an amateur, “Paper. Always paper. We send an email to remind them to RSVP anyway, no use clogging their inbox.”

“If you’re okay with it I’ll send a photo to Ruby for her approval?”

“Uh, better on the group chat, the food people might want to put extra details on there and I was thinking about asking Lexington if we could use the conservatory in case it rains. That way we can have a garden or indoor party easily.”

“Good idea.” James added a new plain slide titled, ‘conservatory party rain’.

“And I wondered about an easter egg hunt. If you find an egg, you put your name on it and then you enter it into a raffle. Winner wins champagne or something.”

“Yeah. I can see that working. Where would we get the prize?”

“If you could design a fancy label, maybe we could re-label some champagne or something. Make it one of a kind.”

James nodded. He’d been forced to endure many events with some of these parents; they love the challenge of something they can’t buy. Rumour had it one of them bought a jar of honey for fifteen thousand pounds at a Tory charity gala. “That’ll do it. I’ll get on that. We have some easter eggs at my house from past Easter parties. I’ll ask the housekeeper if we can borrow those.”

Rutherford glanced at his watch, “I’ve gotta go, but it was good chatting with you, Beaufort.”

James stuck out his hand, “James. Thank you for being so decent about all this...” He made a vague gesture with his other hand.

Rutherford shook his hand, “Kieran.”

A few days later:

(Callum is an OC, and Percy (and an SUV) are assigned to chauffeur the Bells and Beauforts around while the twins stay with them. Mortimer sees it as a way of keeping them supervised, but not underfoot.)

James bit back a cringe as he watched Kieran present his and James’ party ideas to Ruby, (the whole committee was present, but he talked to Ruby as if they weren’t) desperate for a ‘good boy’ and a pat on the head or something. Pathetic.

When Ruby stood up, she thanked him ’so much’ for working with James on this, and how wonderful it was to have such ‘a cohesive committee working forward’ - or something like that. James was focussed on the way Rutherford was looking at her, like she was the only thing that mattered in the whole world.

James knew on some level that Kieran Rutherford was somewhat of a decent bloke. Just one with an insane crush on his girlfriend. And it was starting to irritate him.

He felt Harriet pawing at his ankle, “she verbally eviscerated you at Oxford,” she hissed, “keep it to yourself.”

‘Amazing how much you sound like him, like your father’, James realised Ruby was right; that was probably how his father would have dealt with it.

…

When Percy dropped Ruby and the twins back at the Bells, James got out of the back seat and slid into the front passenger seat. Percy regarded him calmly; he always spoke second.

“Percy. Could you give me some advice?”

Percy undid his seatbelt and shifted to fully face James, “Certainly, Sir.”

”There’s a boy on the events committee who clearly fancies Ruby. And, I’m… struggling to watch them interact.”

“You feel jealous when he talks to Ruby?” Percy clarified.

Jealousy sounded childish to James. Straight out of one of those awful romance books Lydia used to read. But, he realised that was exactly it. Jealousy. He nodded.

“What do you need my advice on?” Percy wasn’t sure if James needed any more advice;  sometimes as a kid he just needed help identifying what he was feeling and then he’d work it out himself.

“Last time, with someone else, I lashed out, and…” He didn’t want to admit it, but if he could admit it to anyone, it was Percy, “Ruby said I sounded like dad.” He looked at the textured dials as he held his head in shame.

“Communication is the foundation of any relationship. You each need to communicate your feelings and be vulnerable with each-other. Tell her how you’re feeling, but be mindful that the committee is an obligation to her, and he might be too.”

James reflected on the interactions he’d seen between Ruby and Rutherford. “I’ve never seen her reciprocate. She’s pretty closed off around him.” The more James thought, he realised Percy was probably right. The logical conclusion was that James didn’t have anything to be jealous about, but… ugh, it’s still there. Just a bit.

“Sir, have you officially asked her to be your girlfriend yet?”

James frowned and looked at Percy as if it was a forgone conclusion that she was.

Percy smiled softly. “Ask her.”

James nodded to himself. He could do that. He’d get her flowers too; he’d seen how happy that one rose made her. Angus had too. “Should I ask her father before?”

“Before you marry her, Sir.” Percy was really doing his best not to laugh, but the way James flushed really tested him.

…

James bought some flowers on his way back from his next run with Callum. Angus gave him a knowing look as he crept into the kitchen with the bouquet. 

“These are for Ruby. Where can I hide them while I shower?”

“There’s a vase in that cabinet,” Angus pointed to a cabinet. When James put it down on the counter Angus had a pair of scissors. “Giving a woman flowers like this,” he tugged at the wrapping paper, “is giving her a task. Giving them flowers in a vase means she just has to enjoy them.”

He proceeded to teach James how to cut and arrange flowers in a vase, making sure to add the plant food sachet to the water. “As for hiding them, you can put them in our bedroom for a while with the door closed.”

“Thank you.” He hadn’t even thought about the ‘giving her a task’ bit. Now he knew Ruby would ‘only have to enjoy them’ he was looking forward to asking her even more.

He ran upstairs and placed the vase just inside the doorframe of Helen and Angus’ bedroom before heading to the bathroom.

…

“Ruby”

Ruby and Gunnar both looked up from her manga to see James in her bedroom doorway, hiding something behind his back, it was cute.

All the practice James had definitely not done in the shower left him. He came to stand right next to the bed, stalling for time.

“I haven’t done this before, so I wanted to make sure we’re on the same page.” He saw Ruby’s brows furrow and quickly held the flowers out for her before she got the wrong idea, “Will you be my girlfriend?”

Ruby’s face was frozen in a delightfully surprised, open-mouthed smile, “Yes!” She set the flowers on the bedside table and hugged him tightly. James hooked his chin over her head and breathed in deeply, glad it had gone well. Would have been a bit awkward if it hadn’t. He saw Harriet and Gunnar curling up together on the bed and sighed as the extra feeling of intimacy washed over him.

…

“Ruby, can I ask you something?”

She gave him a look which screamed ‘you just did.’

“Is there, or has there ever been anything between you and Kieran? I’ve seen the way he talks to you, and while I’ve never seen you reciprocate… I just wondered…”

Ruby shook her head easily, “No. Nothing between us, I know he’s got a crush on me but hasn’t made any moves and I’m not interested in him. He’ll get the message, especially with you around.”

James was surprised that that was good enough for him. ‘Guess Percy was spot on on both accounts.’ He thought to himself. Harriet only moved her head in a way that said ‘told you so’.

[xxsycamore]

'𝗧𝗶𝘀 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝗙𝗼𝗿 𝗟𝗼𝘃𝗲 Content Creation Challenge ❄🎅🏻

After 'Tis the season for smut & 'Tis the season for smut 2.0, I joined @voltage-vixen and we present you with a revamped third installment of our favorite winter holiday themed challenge!

The challenge starts today, November 23rd, and ends on January 14th. Check the rules below for additional information!

Targeted fandoms: Ikemen Series, Voltage Games, Tears of Themis, MLQC, Obey me!, Mystic Messenger, Genshin Impact. All mobile & console otomes as well as other anime and game fandoms are also encouraged and welcomed to join!

███  RULES:

One prompt list is consisting of fluff prompts, and the other of smut prompts! Minors DNI with the second list, please!

Starting from the day this post goes live, November 23rd, you can begin creating and posting your fandom works (fanfiction, fanart, headcanons, etc) following the prompts in the two lists.

You can combine prompts for the same list or from both lists. You don't have to follow the order of the prompts. You can create as few or as many works you want to! There are no fixed dates for this event, but for those of you who like to post daily, you can do it like a countdown until Christmas day! AUs are allowed. Suitor x Suitor, Suitor x MC, Suitor x OC, Suitor x NPC are all allowed. You can use the gif banner at the top of the post if you'd like to!

Tags for the event will include #’tis the season for love & #’tis the season for love content creation challenge . Additionally, please tag both of us hosts ( @xxsycamore & @voltage-vixen ) in your creations so that we can see and reblog them.

Kristen (voltage-vixen) will be making a masterlist featuring all contributors and their works shortly after the day that marks the end of the challenge, January 14th. A reblog from her means that your work is successfully added to the masterlist. If you suspect that your work went unnoticed or is not on the masterlist when it's posted, don't hesitate to contact either of us!

Both our DMs are open for your questions, and you can also send an ask here on my blog, where other people who might have the same question will be able to get their answers too. We'd love to help!

Happy Holidays to these who are celebrating and to everyone else I hope you have some good time during this time of the year ❤ We can't wait to see your works inspired by the challenge! Happy creating, everyone!

Under the cut you'll find both lists typed out for your convenience 🔽

FLUFF LIST:

Starting with preparations way too early

Sipping hot chocolate and then stealing a kiss

"Okay, maybe I DO need help putting the star on top of the tree."

"This gingerbread house just WON'T stay up!"

Sharing a scarf

"I said that I'd teach you how to ice skate, I didn't say that I know how to ice skate."

Forced to wear an ugly Christmas sweater

Being the MC/LI's fake date for a Christmas party/ball

Surprising their partner in the morning with a new pet underneath the Christmas tree

"Those clichéd traditions are exciting for me, now that I have you."

SMUT LIST:

Warming up together after a snowball fight

Wearing nothing but a ribbon around the neck

Fun under the blanket

Bodies roasting by the open fire

"A kiss under the mistletoe doesn't have to be where we stop."

"What are we going to do until the storm passes?"

"I've decided I don't want to be on the nice list this Christmas."

Sleigh ride your partner into a holiday bliss

Christmas treats sugar rush

"Actually, there is one more thing on my wish list."

[jennay]

Episode 7

The request:

ok hear me out, i got inspired by all these tiktok comments under edits of jamie in stranger things 💅🏻 so, y/n and jamie are watching st episode 7 and when 001 says "join me" to little eleven, y/n is like "i would without hesitation" and jamie starts laughing at her 😭

master list

Hope you enjoy!

Jamie hated watching himself on tv but enjoyed seeing you this excited to finish a series. One thing about you was a nonexistent attention span. He couldn’t remember the last time it was this quiet while watching anything. Usually, a million questions would be asked by now, and curiosity would boggle your mind, forcing you to skip to the end and rewatch it. Something about the suspense gave you anxiety. You didn’t mind spoilers, but when it came to Stranger Things, Jamie wasn’t allowed to spoil anything, even when you threw a fit and begged to know if they would kill Eddie. He knew better than to tell you what happened to your favorite character. He didn’t want to break your heart, but he knew this would be like when Dean died in Supernatural. You never fully recovered from that one; to this day, you still get upset when anyone mentions Castiel’s death. In your heart, they still live. Unfortunately, Jamie knew that soon you’d be scooting the two over to make room for a third, and he’d be waiting with open arms to hold you, but Knowing you; you might reject his care when you discover his character kills your beloved.

“Tricked you? No, I saved you.” 01 Softly says to 11.

Jamie watches as your eyes widen and your face scrunches together. “Don’t do it. God, why is he so manipulating? Why can’t he use his powers for good!?” You fling your arms up.

This was how Jamie knew you were no longer thinking of Peter as Jamie. You were fully engulfed in his character; maybe you’d forgive him for his treachery later in the season.

“Join me.” He says to poor little 11.

Your lips part just enough to say, “In a fucking heartbeat.”

Jamie’s laughter pulls you out of your fantasyland. You almost forgot he was sitting next to you. “You’re not supposed to go with the bad guy, darling.” He chuckles as you look at him with wide eyes and your jaw slacks like you can’t believe he would say such a thing to you.

“Jamie, I love him. I just want him to be happy. Peter deserves some contentment in his life. He’s just misunderstood and his parents should have gotten him the help he needed instead of pawning him off to a monster!” You say this with such conviction that Jamie is becoming slightly worried about your outlook on his character.

.“Love, he killed his family and a bunch of children.” He chuckles. “Don’t worry you’ll feel massive amounts of hate for him later on in the season.”

You sigh and lean your head on Jamie’s shoulder as the episode continues. “He’s going to kill Eddie. He’s a new character they kill all the new characters.”

Jamie shrugs he wraps his arm around you and your head falls to his chest. “Just watch.” He kisses the top of your head. “Just promise you’ll remember the difference between 01 and me.”

Your phone buzzes and it’s a text from one of your friends. ‘Jamie killed Eddie!?’

You push away from Jamie’s grip and look him dead in the eyes. “You killed him. You know what?” You stand up and grab your cellphone.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m going to bed. You can sleep on the couch. This is the worst betrayal, Jamie!” You pout as you start down the hall.

“Love!” He yells from the couch. “It’s just a tv show!”

“Oh, is it!? Tell that to Eddie!”

He hears the bedroom door close. He decides you’re right. The safest place for him is on the couch until you can let go of the loss you’ve experienced. He lightly laughs as he puts his hands in his lap. He stares up at the ceiling. “Why do you keep doing this to me?.”

[anxxiousleo]

Today is Samhain. It is one of the most important of the 8 Sabbats as it is the Pagan New Year. The wheel of the year has turned full circle and a new year begins. The word Samhain means 'Suns end'. It is pronounced Sawin.

Leaves fall and the trees become silent and skeletal against the darkening skies. The sap which rose in the Spring and made the land fertile and green, now returns to the roots of the earth where it will wait silently until the warmth of Spring draws it back to the surface. This is the eternal cycle of life, death and rebirth, not a rigid straight line, but rather a continual cycle, season by season, year by year.

Samhain is the third of the harvest festivals, only this isn't a harvest of crops or grain, it is the harvest of flesh. It was the time of year when farmers and families would slaughter cattle and preserve the meat to last through the cold winter months.

Samhain is a festival of death as it is the death of the year and of the waxing Sun. It is also the death of the earth when plants, seeds and acorns are now slowly descending underground to ready themselves to be reborn in Spring. Animals will start to hibernate and the earth will appear barren as it sleeps through the winter months.

Earth energies are being pull inwards at this time, this is the time we should also be looking inwards at ourselves. Contemplate the year we have had and what lessons we have learned, whether they were good or bad, what can we take from them and use in the future.

The God of the waxing Sun descends into the underworld opening up the veil between the two worlds of the living and the dead. At Samhain spirits can commune with the living and visit us. We remember our ancestors and the people and pets who have died. We honour them by placing pictures of them on our altars and invite them to join us. We should also adorn our altars with seasonal fare such as fallen leaves, twigs, acorns, nuts, turnips and pumpkins and offer these as gifts to the the God and Goddess and thank them for their sacrifices.

On Samhain the triple Goddess who is maiden, mother and crone enters her final phase of the year, The Goddess enters her crone phase, she is the wise dark mother of knowledge and days past.

Although a time of death Samhain is also a time of fresh starts and new beginnings. It is a time of 'out with the old and in with the new' To start looking forward to our future.

On Samhain we should light a fire as this is primarily a Celtic fire festival where the villagers and towns folk would light giant bonfires to say goodbye to the God of the waxing Sun and to thank the Goddess for her harvest of gifts bestowed upon the earth. There would also be big feasts with stews, corn and breads and we would give thanks for people in our lives and show gratitude for all that we have and we give thanks to the people who are no longer with us and invite them to join us at the feast.

Light a candle tonight and put it at a window west facing to light the way for our lost loved ones and invite their spirits to visit us. If you don't have a west facing window, put the candle on the western most part of your home.

Today is a great time for divination, for doing Tarot reading and looking to the future and asking ourselves how we can improve our lives and move forward for the coming year.

Have a Blessed Samhain may the God and Goddess watch over you.

ctto: Wicca Teachings