#you piece of fucking garbage. Not opening up to you or your husband is a conscious choice i make every day.

[0nevergrowoldnevergrowold0]

"I just wish you would talk to me"

You caught me self harming three separate times over the course of five years and you didn't get me a therapist until I threatened to hurt someone else - on top of that you actually flicked my self harm scars when i wore shorts to point them out and ask me what they were when you knew full well, talked about how sad it was that i was "mutilating" myself in the summer when I would wear swimsuits because you could see my HEALED SCARS (was a great pick me up for a pre transitions trans person with an eating disorder), why the fuck would I EVER talk to you about anything personal again?

[flowerandblood]

Robbed and gifted (1/6)

[ arranged marriage • modern!Aemond x female ]

[ warnings: sex content, angst, smut, violence ]

[description: (Anon Request) She and Aemond are faced with a situation, where they must form a fictitious marriage. They are complete strangers to each other, who cannot find themselves in a new reality. When his wife stands up for him at a family dinner, something changes between them. Smut, angst and a lot of sexual tension.]

* English is not my first language. Please, do not repost. Enjoy! *

Previous and next chapters: Masterlist

_____

She had only signed a few sheets of paper, but she felt as if she had sold herself to a slave market.

She despised herself and her uncle.

His proposal.

She despised her husband and his father.

That they made a deal with each other over their heads, making their fictional marriage a route to easy cash flow and money laundering.

She was surprised when her uncle, Arthur, her mother's brother, called her with the proposal. When he offered to pay for her college and financially support her parents, who were in debt because of her father's gambling addiction, she thought he must be crazy.

Then he began to mention a family with whom he had close ties, about the young man who was their son, about how she could help him a lot, and with this favor ensure her future and safety.

"We would need this marriage for about a year, maximum two, so that our money would be filtered through your bank accounts in several tranches. Your community of property will make things easier for us – and then you can divorce." He said as they sat in a small restaurant where he had invited her.

She was about to take a piece of spaghetti in her mouth but she put the cutlery on the plate, staring at him with her mouth open.

She didn't believe what she just heard.

"You want to sell me?" She asked, feeling her whole body tense, cold sweat running down her neck. Her uncle laughed, taking a sip of wine from his glass.

"Of course not. You are only to make appearances. Of course, we wouldn't want the rest of the family to know about this deal, so you'd have to live in the same apartment in case someone came to visit you, and show up at family events once in a while. What you do privately is up to you. It is as if you have been given an assignment and a mission for a certain period of time for which you will both be handsomely paid." He said with a calmness and serenity that terrified her – she wondered how he could talk about such things so lightly.

"Are you proposing me a sham marriage to a stranger for money?" She asked, pale, her eyes wide, her hands trembling slightly. Her uncle smiled warmly at her.

"I offer to take care of your future, for your small favor and sacrifice. Think about this." He said, putting some bills on the table, definitely more than their dinner was worth and left, leaving her with disbelief written on her face.

She came home angry and distraught – she thought that her uncle treated her like garbage, like a bargaining chip, an object that he could put up for auction.

She felt an unpleasant lump in her pit as she saw that her father was gone again.

She walked over to her mom who was just lying on the couch watching TV – she stood for a moment in the doorway of the room, pursed her lips.

"Where is dad?" She asked quietly.

Her mother shrugged.

"Probably where he always is." She murmured, taking a sip of tea from a large mug.

She felt a tightness in her pit at her words and went to her room without asking for anything else.

In the night, she heard the sound of a door opening, followed by a loud thud and a scream – she saw the hallway light was on and peeked through the door, opening it a little.

Her mother was standing over her father who lay slumped against the wall, drunk, his vision completely blurred.

"God, how do you look? How much have you lost on those fucking slot machines again today?" She asked low, angry.

She saw her mother kick her father in the stomach – she cringed, as if she felt the pain too.

Her father was only moaning, it sounded like something she might call gibberish.

Her mother began to sob and continued to yell at him, asking why he was doing this to her.

She slipped into her room, closing the door, feeling her whole hands tremble, her heart pounding like a mad in her chest.

The next day she called her uncle, saying that she agreed to his proposal.

She just wanted him to take her away.

Then everything went fast – she had to appear at the Registry Office to sign the documents, together with her fictitious husband.

She saw him there for the first time and this was not how she had imagined him.

The fact that he was dressed all in black made him look very pale – his eye patch made her think that he was some kind of character from a movie, not a real person.

As if it was all some kind of theater in which she played one of the main roles.

She thought, looking down at her black dress that they were both dressed as if they were going to a funeral.

When everything was settled, Aemond, as it turned out was her current husband's name, simply left the room without saying even a polite farewell – she looked down at her feet, pursed her lips, and decided that he owed her nothing.

Neither she to him.

She wasn't going to take her frustrations out on him.

Her parents were terrified, but when her uncle gave them the exact numbers that they would get for it and the payment of their father's debts, they both calmed down and decided that two years wasn't that long after all.

She stared blankly at them, wondering who these people were at all – they seemed alien and distant to her as never before.

In accordance with her uncle's demands, she had to move into her husband's apartment.

She wanted to vomit just thinking about it for most of the morning.

She felt like a puppet controlled by someone else, as if she sold her life for a few bills.

She thought that maybe she wasn't so different from her parents after all, and the thought hit her hard.

She came with a moving team – Aemond showed them a room to set up her bookshelf, desk, and any other furniture she wanted to have.

It was obvious to her that they would sleep separately, almost as if they were roommates.

Her husband didn't say a word to her as the men brought in everything and she paced the apartment, looking around.

The flat was large and had huge windows, the walls were white, so it seemed very bright and pleasant inside, a lot of old oak furniture and plants around her.

She thought she liked it here.

That whoever her husband was, he had good taste.

She heard the door close suddenly and then there was silence.

She turned towards him – he stood in the corridor and looked at her dispassionately, as if she were an intruder, a whore greedy for money, someone empty and worthless.

She felt it in every cell of her body, but she couldn't be mad at him.

Part of her wanted him to treat her that way.

"I have someone." He spoke coolly, his voice empty. "So I don't want you asking me who and where I'm going out with. I hope that's clear."

He said it in such a way that she felt as if he had slapped her in the face.

She swallowed hard, looking away.

For some reason she wanted to cry.

After a moment she forced herself to choke something out.

"I wouldn't dare to expect that. I'm sorry." She said, although she did not know for what.

She saw something change in his eyesight, his pupil narrowed, his mouth tightened – she thought his expression looked almost sympathetic for a moment.

He nodded.

"Make yourself comfortable." He said a little softer and turned away, opening one of the rooms and locked himself in.

Only then did she allow tears to run down her face.

For the next few days he wasn't in the apartment. It didn't bother her – she felt more at ease then, because she wasn't afraid to go to the kitchen or the living room. She didn't walk into his office or bedroom, thinking it was impolite.

She spent her days filling out college papers and buying books – the thought that she would actually go to medical school cheered her up.

One night, lying in bed, she heard a soft turn of the lock, and then saw that someone had turned on the light in the corridor – her heart pounded at the thought that he was back.

She thought that he must have forgotten something or had come for some clean clothes and was about to leave again, but he hadn't. She heard him turn off the light in the hall and lock himself in his office.

She spent the rest of the night writhing on the bed, unable to sleep a wink. She got up at dawn, unable to bear it any longer, and went to the kitchen – there was almost nothing in the fridge.

She thought then that they might live apart, but that didn't mean that they had to dislike each other – she decided to go shopping and make them breakfast.

Lighten up the atmosphere somehow.

She quickly went to the store for fresh rolls and vegetables, eggs, cheese and ham. When she returned, she decided to make sandwiches with fresh lettuce, radish, tomato and chives with a delicious sauce, and casseroles, which she put in the oven in the meantime.

She flinched as she heard the sound of the door opening – she knew he went to the bathroom.

After a while he left the room and walked into the kitchen – he looked at the large plate on the table where she had placed her sandwiches without saying a word.

"I made us breakfast." She said.

“It will be hard for two years to pretend we don't see each other. Can't we just be roommates like in college? Who sometimes meet in between and talk?" She mumbled out.

He just stared at her, frustrated for some reason.

"You mean college like the one that you're going to, that was paid for with my money?" He asked suddenly, and she looked at him, shocked.

She opened her mouth, feeling her entire stomach clench, shaking her head.

"– I – my uncle told me –" She stammered, but he didn't let her finish.

"Your uncle is just a venal pig. Just like your whole family, apparently." He said it so calmly and dispassionately, that she felt tears welling up in her eyes. She stared at the bun that she had just sliced and put the knife aside, her lips pressed together.

"I didn't know." She whispered. He chuckled at her words, but it was ironic, aloof, incredulous laugh.

"Right. You women never know. Everything around you happens by itself." He hissed as he took his mug and left the kitchen, locking himself in his office.

She took several sandwitches in her hand, breathing heavily, wiping her tears and nose, as she wrapped them in cling film for him – she knew that he'd be leaving for work soon, so she wanted to at least give them to him for lunch.

When she got home after going to the college she saw that what she had left at his door, wrapped in a cardboard box, he had thrown into the bin.

He tried to pretend that she didn't exist.

She gave up trying to make contact with him. It made her cry often, because she felt like an intruder knowing what he thought of her.

She started classes but she wasn't proud of it at all – she was convinced that she was like a parasite that clung to him.

She wasn't surprised that he couldn't look at her.

One day, he surprised her by knocking on her bedroom door – since their exchange she ate alone, not in the dining room. She opened the door – he didn't even look at her when he was talking to her.

"Get ready. We're going to my parents' house in an hour. My family wants to meet you." He said indifferently and turned away, disappearing back into the living room.

She felt like she was about to die.

She put on a pretty, blue, girlish dress with tiny flowers and let her hair down, decideding that she couldn't embarrass him and had to present herself as best as she could.

She left the room and told him that she was ready – she saw him look her up and down as if to see, if she looked acceptable, then nodded and they both left the apartment.

They rode in complete silence, listening to the radio. She flinched when she heard his voice.

"Yes."

"We met by chance at one of the business events. You were there with your uncle. We fell in love right away. We kept our relationship a secret for a year. Do you understand?" He asked with emphasis on the last words, his voice as cold as ice.

She swallowed loudly.

As they stepped into his house, she smiled – she decided to play her role as best as she could. His mother, Alicent, hugged her tightly – it seemed to her that she knew nothing about what was really going on between them.

Their house was huge, modern, terrifyingly opulent – she felt uncomfortable there, as if something was missing. She sat down at the table in the indicated place and she was immediately bombarded with questions.

Her husband sat next to her, crossing his legs and placed his hand on her thigh. She looked at him in surprise, and he didn't even glance at her – she thought that he was trying to pretend, just like she was.

At the table were his father, mother, and siblings, but also his sister from his father's second marriage, Rhaenyra, with her children and now-husband, Daemon. From what she understood, they were all in the big family banking business.

They asked her about things that she didn't understand at all, but she nodded and talked to them about nothing – if there was one thing she was good at it was simple, light chatting.

Wine was poured with dinner – so many dishes were placed before them that she did not know where to look. She saw a lot of cutlery in front of her and thought that she felt like in that movie, where they sit some worker at the table with the nobility and make him guess which fork is for what.

She shuddered, snapped out of her thoughts when she heard her husband's voice next to her ear.

"I don't advise you to take soup or roast, because everyone will be looking at you." He said indifferently, serving himself the soup.

Apparently, what he meant was that his family for some reason cared a lot about how someone ate.

She asked what he could offer her.

"Everything but roasts and soups." He said dryly and she rolled her eyes, impatient with his behavior.

She saw him purse his lips at the sight, displeased, his fingertips digging into the soft skin of her thigh.

"Don't make faces like that." He hissed through clenched teeth. She looked at him expectantly.

"Decide for me, husband. Let your will be done." She whispered, leaning over him, her moist lips slightly parted.

She saw his gaze flit from her eyes to her lips, then back to her eyes – he tapped his finger against her knee, as if he was thinking hard about something.

"Careful." He said lowly and she shivered.

After a moment he looked away, leaning over the table, reaching for a salad – pretending that nothing had happened, she poured some of it on her plate and began to eat.

She hasn't had anything in her mouth since morning.

Suddenly, Viserys and Daemon went from light subjects and stories to business topics – although Alicent tried to add a funny anecdote, Daemon interrupted her, continuing his thought.

"If you don't have anyone to give it all to, what's the point of all this?" He asked, annoyed, spreading his hands.

"I think Jace would be a better fit." He added, several people moved uneasily on their seats.

She saw her husband reach for his glass of wine and take a deep sip from it, in his eye a fury and madness that she had never seen in another human being.

After a while his father spoke up.

"Well, that's a bit of an unfair assessment on your part. However, I agree that Aemond is not as dedicated to the company as I would like.” He said.

Her husband put his glass down on the table with an aggressive motion, everyone eyes turned to him.

"Are you fucking serious? I am not sacrificing enough for the company?” He hissed – she could feel him boiling, his hand on her thigh clenched into a fist.

She swallowed hard, looking from him to his father – Viserys shifted uneasily in his seat, knowing what he was implying.

"Math is absolute, son. Your results could be better." He said, speaking lightly as if it didn't really matter. "But of course everyone can have a bad time, it's natural."

Her husband leaned back against the back of the chair, his mouth slightly parted in disbelief.

She had seen, going to the bathroom at night, that the light was on in his office late into the night.

If he wasn't with his woman, he was still working.

For some reason her heart clenched tight.

"My husband works from morning to night. Even when I'm asleep he's still doing reports. Are the results he is supposed to strive for even achievable?" She blurted out suddenly, frowning, causing silence at the table.

Feeling a cold sweat on her back, she glanced quickly at Aemond, fearing that he would kill her for the outburst – he, however, just stared at her, his gaze expressing disbelief, his mouth slightly parted.

He cleared his throat, taking a glass in his hand and took another sip of wine, several people at the table looked at each other. His father smiled at her in a way she didn't like.

"It's nice to see such a loving and devoted married couple." He hummed and she felt a lump in her throat.

She knew that he was the only one among them who understood what their marriage really was, and he was mocking her. She flinched as her husband got up from the table abruptly, throwing his napkin on it.

"We're leaving." He said dryly to her as he headed for the hallway. She stood up quickly, following him, terrified – his mother tried to stop them, but he didn't even look at her.

"He humiliated me and you didn't fucking say anything, as usual." He hissed to her, slamming the car door behind him.

She humbly sat in the passenger side, fastening her seatbelts and closed the door behind her – he took off with a squeal of tires, causing her to be pinned to the seat for a moment.

He didn't even turn on the radio, lost in his thoughts, running his free hand over his jaw.

She thought, looking at him closely, that he was a really handsome man.

She smiled lightly at the thought and he looked at her suddenly – she swallowed hard and looked away.

They walked into his apartment without a word. She thought that he was going to lock himself in his office as usual, but he didn't – he went to the living room and started rummaging in the bar. She stood in the corridor, not knowing what to do – she wanted to go to her bedroom, but his voice stopped her.

That maybe they will get closer to each other.

"Would you like a drink?" He asked indifferently, looking at her from a distance. She swallowed hard, feeling her whole body tremble.

She thought that maybe this was the moment.

"What are you drinking? Wine?" He asked, but she shook her head.

She nodded, and he took the other glass from his bar without a word. She walked into the living room hesitantly, watching as he poured himself a drink.

He looked at her expectantly.

She saw the surprise in his eye, and then something like amusement flashed across his face. He made the drink she asked for and gave it to her.

"Vodka. Vodka with orange juice and ice." She said softly, the corner of her mouth lifted in a smile.

He walked around the couch and sat on it, sighing heavily, covering his face with his hand. She sat down next to him at a safe distance, pulling her legs under her buttocks, making herself comfortable. For a while they just drank their drinks in silence, not even looking at each other.

"My mother never stood up for me, and a strange girl did. Funny, don't you think?" He chuckled lowly, but he didn't sound like he was enjoying it at all. She dropped her gaze, sighing softly.

"I'm sorry. All my life I watched my mother humiliate my father. I tried to defend him, but one day he told me not to do it." She said, pressing her lips together, inhaling loudly.

She realized that she had never said that out loud to anyone. She was afraid to look at his reaction – after a moment, she turned to face him. He looked at her thoughtfully, his expression unreadable.

"Your father is a gambler." He said lowly, more stating than asking. She nodded, embarrassed, looking down, taking a sip of her drink, fiddling with the glass in her hand.

"Did your mother ever hit you?" He asked suddenly, and she looked at him in surprise.

"When she was angry with me, she pretended I didn't exist. Sometimes for a day, sometimes for a week. She didn't answer me when I spoke to her, she didn't look at me, she didn't make me breakfast or lunch, she didn't drive me to school. As if she didn't have a child." She mumbled and swallowed hard, feeling tears welling up under her eyelids.

She didn't want to tell him about it, in fact, she'd rather forget about it altogether – she looked away, her body began to quiver.

For a moment she was unable to utter a word.

"That's why I can't stand it, when you pretend I don't live here." She said with a shrug, tears running down her cheeks one by one.

"I have no intention of imposing on you and I swear, I didn't know my uncle would take my college money from you." She cried out, having more and more problems with breathing normally, her body shaking all over.

"Look at me." He said softly, almost mildly for the way he usually spoke. She was unable to comply with his request, her body froze completely, trembling slightly.

A strong, violent shudder went through her, as she felt his wide hand brush her thigh – she wasn't able to move as it traveled higher, to her hips, then lower again, to her knee.

She thought it was the alcohol, that they both didn't know what they were doing, but she felt wetness between her thighs anyway.

She shifted and twisted as she felt him tease her there with slow, gentle strokes of his fingers, wonderful, tickling sensation building inside her lower abdomen.

Her lips parted with a sigh as she felt his hand slowly move to her hips again, but this time it slipped between her thighs.

Her breath caught in her throat.

She didn't flinch as his thumb pushed the fabric of her panties aside and his fingers ran over her wet, throbbing, hot slit – she heard him draw in a whistling breath, her hand set her glass lightly on the table next to her, her breathing ragged and quick.

She thought that she needed this.

She desperately needed someone's closeness, relaxation, pleasure, acceptance.

Everything at once.

"Do you want me to stop?" He asked so quietly and uncertainly that she shivered.

She parted her swollen lips, his fingers pressing steadily against her folds, teasing her clit with słowy, circular strokes – she couldn't stop her hips from rolling towards his hand, a wonderful warmth spreading over her cunt every time he rubbed her.

"No." She whispered and he jumped up suddenly.

In one swift motion, he placed her on her side, laying down behind her back – she heard the sound of her belt being unfastened and shivered all over, her a drop of her moisture running down her thighs – she didn't look at him, breathing loudly just like him, wondered what they were doing.

She squealed softly as he pulled her against him, feeling the material of his shirt against her back, his hot breath, his mouth against her ear, his nose teasing her cheek.

"– how about we get to know each other better now? – for the sake of our common, platonic acquaintance –" He hummed, she heard him undo his trousers, his throbbing, hard manhood hitting her buttocks hidden under her dress.

She felt a tickling heat run through her body at the sensation.

A soft moan escaped her lips as she felt him slide her panties off her thighs in one, swift motion, his large hands pulling up the fabric of her dress so that she could feel him now, hard and swollen.

"– y-yes – I guess –" She mumbled embarrassed, unable to believe that these words left her mouth – it seemed to her that everything around her was hazy, her head was spinning with lust and desire.

She thought it was pathetic, but all she wanted was to feel him inside her.

She involuntarily lifted her thigh, allowing him to slip in, rubbing against her hot juices. She heard him inhale loudly at the sensation, snuggling her closer to his chest. They both sobbed as the tip of his cock began to press against her, pushing a little into her throbbing, fleshy inside.

"I'll just slide him in for a moment." He whispered, panting with her, their bodies shivering as he thrust deeper into her, pushing her hot walls to the limit.

"Mhm" It was all she could muster.

She moaned sweetly as he slid all the way into her, then began to move inside her suddenly, imposing an intense, fast pace, his thighs slapping wetly against her buttocks, soaked in her juices. They both gasped loudly and groaned alternately, her hand tightening on his arm which wrapped around her waist.

"Jesus Christ" He panted, feeling how tight she was, clenching around him, all hot and wet.

He sped up even more, thrusting into her more aggressively, his cock digging in with a loud slap, stretching her throbbing, swollen muscles, they both felt surprisingly close to fullfilment. He tightened his hand on her thigh which he held slightly up, allowing himself to thrust even deeper.

She sobbed loudly, as she felt his cock rubbing her exactly where she needed to, building up unbearable tension in her. She could feel his hot, quick breath on her cheek, she knew he needed it as much as she did.

If she could think coldly at that moment, she would wonder why he didn't go to his woman, but right now all she wanted was to be fulfilled.

"I'll stop soon, I promise" He whispered in her ear, and she felt such a strong shiver at his words, that she just came. She sobbed loudly, her eyebrows twisted in pain, her mouth parted in a silent moan. She heard him groan low, feeling her walls begin to tighten on him, his thrusts quick, brutal and sure.

"Oh, fuck, yes" He gasped loudly and came hard, moving for a moment longer, his cum flowing in waves inside her. They were both panting, trembling in disbelief, his terrified voice rousing her.

"You're taking pills, right?" He asked as if the pleasure had taken away his common sense. She just nodded, not having the strength to say anything.

She heard his loud exhale of relief, then his nose buried in her hair. They lay there, trying to calm down, she felt his chest rise and fall steadily, his soft cock still throbbing inside her.

She felt that both of them realized what they had done. He slid out of her suddenly, and she covered her buttocks with the dress, swallowing loudly.

She could feel his cum flowing out of her straight onto the couch. He saw it as he got up, zipping up his pants. He swallowed hard, looking at her with black eye. He got up from the couch, obviously not knowing what to say for a moment. In the end he managed only two words as he headed towards his bedroom.

"Good night."

_____

Aemond Taglist:

(bold means I couldn't tag you)

@its-actually-minicika @notnormalthings-blog @nikstrange @zenka69 @bellaisasleep @k-y-r-a-1 @g-cf2020 @melsunshine @opheliaas-stuff @chainsawsangel @iiamthehybrid @tinykryptonitewerewolf @namoreno @malfoytargaryen @qyburnsghost @aemondsdelight @persephonerinyes @fan-goddess @sweethoneyblossom1 @watercolorskyy @astral-blossoms @randomdragonfires @amirawritespoorly @apollonshootafar @padfooteyes @darylandbethfanforever9 @fudge13

[soongyeopsal]

Imported

Summary: Seungcheol can hold a conversation and liquor, but that’s not what counts, is it?

▸ Pairing: Seungcheol x AFAB!reader

▸ Rating / Genre / AU: 18+ (MINORS/AGELESS DNI)/ smut, pwp / fuck buddies to ? If you are a minor AND/OR if your account has no age in the bio, you will be blocked upon interacting (liking/reblogging) with this post.

▸ Warnings: infidelity, creampie

▸ Word Count: 2k

▸ A/N: This is another take on the “people making bad choices at a wedding” idea explored in Like I Want You, though the perspective is closer to Imported (Jessie Reyez & 6LACK). Yes, I am a garbage character enjoyer. Perpetually trading favors with the loml/beta/banner maker @shuadotcom! <3 Starting with a read more due to the opening vulgarities.

The first time you and Seungcheol hook up, he’s simply looking for a good fuck. The second time, too. The third time is a thinly veiled dick appointment, but he’s not against being a booty call for a hot piece of ass. When the drunken hypothetical idea of being an Official Sidepiece comes up with friends, he’d said that’s only for losers, yet when you call him for a fourth time - after you’d said the first three were a mistake while you were on a break with your fiance - his pride goes out the window. Seungcheol isn’t the type to fall in love at first sight, but he was pussy-whipped at first lick. When that fourth call comes he figures maybe he can help you get over that prick by getting on top of you, just the way you like. And it seems to work – kinda. Eight months later he’s still on your speed dial, which is his personal best for staying as a legitimate contact in a woman’s phone. 

But nine months later your engagement ring is joined by a matching silver band and calm, cool Seungcheol has never had to try so hard not to make an ass of himself in a room full of people. 

You look stunning in your wedding dress - almost better than you look naked. Those rings look good on your finger too, though he can’t help the thin-lipped frown that settles on his face when that clown slides the band on. He barely hides a disapproving “eugh” with a cough when you kiss your beloved a little too long at the altar. The collective applause from the rest of your wedding guests is the only thing that saves him.

By the time the ceremony has crawled by and everyone breaks for cocktail hour, Seungcheol’s thoroughly irritated and has an itch on his palm that he can’t seem to scratch. He’s this close to going home, but then the DJ announces your grand entrance as “Mr. and Mrs. L/N” and despite the much less hidden “eugh”, he stays. Fuck the wedding dress. This shorter dress with your garter just barely peeking out is less of a dream and more of a tangible treat. Seungcheol’s stomach is doing acrobatics as he stands on the sidelines of the dancefloor with a drink in hand, watching you make the rounds to each of your guests. No matter how much time passes, he never gets tired of looking at you. He is tired of watching you turn around in search of your husband, only to plaster on your fakest smile when you spy him roughhousing with his groomsmen on the other side of the room. The man is completely oblivious to your needs - your words nine months ago at the bar - and frankly, is a complete embarrassment next to someone as immaculate as you. 

The groom drives that very point home soon enough. When he finally does rejoin your side, drink in hand, it only takes one good joke from another guest for him to nearly spit out his drink as he roars with laughter. And although he spares everyone his spit, he’s generous enough to slosh some of his beverage onto your dress. Most people can’t see the aftermath, but from Seungcheol’s corner he can see the way you barely mask your vexation and politely excuse yourself before too many people notice anything’s happened.

The idiot returns to his friends. Seungcheol opts to down the rest of his liquor and quietly exit the reception hall and follow you to the bathroom.

You’re dabbing at your chest with a paper towel when he lets himself in and locks the door behind him. “O-Oh!” If you’re trying to sound nonchalant, you absolutely suck at it. “Cheol, hey. Thank you for coming.” Seeing you like this twists his innards into a knot that sits heavy in his gut like bad indigestion. He has to choose being being mad at your beau or being mad and you - and there’s only one person he can punch in the face so… “Why are you so fucking fake?” “I– What?” You stop fussing with your dress to fix Seungcheol with a belligerent look that you used to give everyone but him at the bar all those months ago. 

Seungcheol takes a few steps toward you, but is careful not to get in your face. His mouth isn’t as cautious as his body language, however. “Why? Are you? So? Fake?”

“Are you serious? You’re fake. What are you even doing here?” “Are you serious? You invited me!”

You show the least amount of restraint you’ve had all night, closing the gap between the two of you to square up with the man who could easily throw you into the toilet headfirst.  “Stop copying me. I invited you because we’re friends, but I wouldn’t have if I thought you were gonna be a jerk.” Seungcheol’s laugh is more bitter than he’d intended when he scoffs, “How many other ‘friends’ are you sleeping with? Besides, you’re already married to the biggest jerk in existence.”

You’re fixing your mouth to bite back at his casual slut-shaming, but the second comment gives you pause and you conspicuously eye the locked door. “What is this about?”

What is this about? Seungcheol had been taken with the idea of swooping in to comfort you, swept up in the idea of being a rock (instead of just a cock) for you to lean on. He needed to step in as your man, not just a lover. The realization shakes him and when he falters, you ensnare him in your web yet again. 

“Ooh, Cheollie,” you coo, wrapping your arms around him and pressing your chest into his. “Are you jealous? You want me that bad?”

Is Seungheol experiencing a cardiac event? No, but the way heat seems to radiate from your joined chests and into his bones is startling. He enters autopilot as he wraps his arms around your waist, pulling you to rest your core on his thigh the way he knows you like. His dick reminds him that common sense wasn’t invited when this conversation started and isn’t welcome now, not when your bedroom eyes are dragging him into the depths of his greed need to make you his. “Cheol~” Your siren song calls him back to the reality of you grinding against him weakly, asking for more. 

You’ve been picking him apart piece-by-piece for ages and even though Seungcheol knows it, he decides he’d rather you eat him alive than leave him to rot without your touch. 

“Babe…” it sounds so normal on his tongue - it’s sick. “It should be me and you know it.”

“Prove it, then.” With the way you try to plant your feet in your heels, Seungcheol knows you’re going to roll your body into him again. He stops you before you can steal another ounce of pleasure - he’ll give so you don’t always have to take, take, take. Crowding you toward the sink, he spins you around so you’re leaning your elbows on the counter and arching your back to leave little to the imagination as your dress shifts halfway up your asscheeks. Not that Seuncheol has to imagine - he does the rest of the work for you, pushing the fabric to rest on the small of your back and leaving only your thong and garter to cover your supple skin. A finger pulls your thong to the side and you keen impatiently, watching him in the mirror as he marvels at the way your lower lips glint with the shine of your arousal. 

“Cheol–”

“Shut up, Y/N.” He finally scratches that itch on his palm by slapping your ass so hard that you’ll have to explain yourself to that other dickhead later. Seungcheol’s dick is out of his pants and battering your walls before you can say much about it, his weight keeping you trapped between himself and the cold granite as he mounts you the way you deserve. Your pussy does most of the talking, squelching every time the plush of your ass meets his hips in a sloppy, barely coordinated dance. That’s ok - Seungcheol doesn’t need you to talk when he can watch your brows knit together and your mouth open in that perfect, silent “o” in the mirror as he hammers into your g spot again and again and again. 

When your legs start to shake, Seungcheol pulls hard at your bunched up dress with one hand and uses the other to grip you possessively by the front of your neck, almost making you stand straight up so he can spear you on his fat cock (your words, again) the way no one else can. “Say it.” He loves the way you go pliant under his touch and flutter around him when the low gravel of his voice scrapes the shell of your ear. “Say that no one else can fuck you like me.” He’s so caught up in the pursuit of his own climax that he doesn’t hear the quiet knock at the door. “Answer. Me. Y/N.” Each word is punctuated by a thrust harder than the last and your whimpers in response are hoarse.

“O-Occupied!” you call weakly instead and it’s only then that Seungcheol’s brain touches back down to where you are and what you’re doing. It’s too late to stop anyway. He lets you go in favor of pushing you back down to the counter and pulling you into him by your hips, watching your ass jiggle in the shitty bathroom lighting as he continues to serve take you. A few more thrusts are enough to establish that this is how he’d finish you off and he underlines it by snaking a hand around to press messily at the hard nub of your clit. Seungcheol doesn’t even need an answer anymore. “No one is ever gonna fuck you like this. Nobody can. Only me. You can only cum like this from me.” 

“Is everything ok in there?” The night’s biggest fool is on the other side of the door and his voice only serves to make Seungcheol fuck you harder - he almost puts you straight through the mirror with the way he’s damn near forcing your torso into the sink. 

“Y-ye-heh… Yesss, I’ll be rrright out! Just…fixing! My dress!” Your words are slurred with pleasure and you should have some shame, Seungcheol thinks distantly, but shamelessness is what got you both here in the first place, so who is he to judge?

“Ok, honey, love you,” the moron calls from the hallway. You just barely manage to wheeze out “I love you too” before you’re gasping loudly, a hand flying back to scratch at Seungcheol’s wrists as your orgasm seizes your muscles where they are so you can ride out the pleasure. Seungcheol keeps his momentum for just a minute longer before he cums inside you like fate intended, groaning loudly behind you as he throws his head back.

The euphoric wave of his release is dampened, however, when his eyes slip open to meet yours in the mirror. Seungcheol regards you like a priceless piece of art. You look at him like a plump black widow, sated for now. 

Seungcheol release you and pulls out as quickly as he can without injuring you. “Let me get you something.” He shuffles into a stall behind him and grabs a wad of toilet paper to present to you. You can clean yourself up for once.

“Lose my number, Y/N.”

Another month goes by and Seungcheol is moving on by laying beneath another gorgeous woman, ogling at the endless wonders of her tits as she rides him to completion. Pussy and tequila cures all, he muses lazily when she falls asleep beside him. He grabs his phone to set a timer as a reminder to kick her out after a quick nap when an instragram banner glides across the top of his screen. Message from **Y/N:** You blocked my number fr? 😒Let me make it up to you. Bar @ 11?

[herarcadewasteland]

Tears Like Raindrops

A/N: the way i sobbed while writing this is crazy 😭 just needed to get some angst out of me honestly so y’all get this.

i suggest listening to Empty Box while reading for extra angst cause that’s what i was listening to

——

mafia!ateez au

ANGST ANGST ANGST ANGST

mentions of guns, shooting, character death, mentions of alcohol

—————

You watched him with a heavy heart, his eyes staring straight through your soul as tears slipped down your cheeks. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. Nothing was supposed to go wrong. Yeosang said he had it all under control, his eyes watching the security cameras in the mansion with an intensity you couldn’t fathom. Your breathing hitched, thinking back to what had happened so quickly.

—

Your steps echoed in the long hallway, the fancy dress Hongjoong gave you brushing against your ankles with its glittery fabric. You thought it was excessive, your Captain disagreed and so did your husband. You met him through Hongjoong one day while you were walking through your favourite park late at night. He had quite literally run into you, Yunho behind him and him following closely as he laughed at the clear embarrassment flooding his leader's face as Yunho apologized to you. You waved off their apologies easily, observing them and introducing yourself shyly, tucking your hair behind your ear as you made eye contact with each of them.

You were attached to their sides for the rest of the night, racing through the park and the empty streets with carefree laughs… and then you were hooked on him. The rest was history and needless to say your now husband loved everything you wore, because it was on you. You scoffed to yourself at the thought, eyes tracing the walls of the hallway as Yeosang piped up through your in-ear.

“Guard coming from the left. Do your thing, Y/N.”

You straightened your posture, stumbling your steps to the left so you crashed into the guard with your empty wine glass in hand. The glass shattered and you gasped, bending to pick up the pieces as the guard moved to help you.

“I’m so sorry! I tripped over something and couldn’t catch myself!”, your eyes were wide and full of tears as you looked up at the guard when he stood with the broken glass.

“No worries ma’am. Can I help you get somewhere? Guests aren’t allowed to be up here.”

“I’m so sorry! I was just looking for a washroom to freshen up! The one downstairs was taken and it’s urgent. You understand?”, you said, acting coy.

The guard hums and points you in the direction of the washroom, watching you go with a suspicious look as he reports the activity. Yeosang catches on, having hacked into the radios, and calls to everyone about your incident with the guard and his following report. Everyone finds each other’s gazes in the crowd, slight panic washing over them and you as you pushed your way into the washroom. You sighed heavily, speaking freely as everyone but Yeosang had an open connection. 

“Fuck. I didn’t think he’d be so suspicious! What now?”

“Make the switch, Mingi will be up momentarily.”

You hum at him, lifting the long skirts of your dress off and shove it into the garbage can, pulling a new dress from under the sink and changing into it in 30 seconds flat. You hum a little tune to yourself as you wash your hands afterwards, making your way back out into the hall just as Mingi comes up the stairs, a guard hot on his tail.

“Ah! That’s where you went, love. I was wondering where you had gotten too!”

“I’m so sorry to worry you, baby. The washroom was occupied downstairs.”, you pout up at him, your hands finding a place on his chest even though you cringed internally at doing it with someone who wasn’t your husband. 

The guard walks past you, seemingly not recognizing you with your dress change. It changes in a split second when you smile at Mingi while the guard walks past you both. The realization crosses his face and he presses something on his belt, Yeosang missing it by a single second as he talked to him about the escape route. Your head spun with the speed of the following events, Mingis hand grabbing your own and pulling you into a sprint as five guards booked it at you from around the corner, Hongjoong calling a retreat as Yeosang panicked, his voice frantic in your ear as he guided you down the stairs and through the crowd that had almost completely vanished except for your group.

 You looked around in shock at how fast the large group of people had cleared out, calling out for Yeosang as Hongjoong ushered the rest of you to the door with frantic waves of his hand, a gun in his other. Your feet hit the bottom of the stairs and then so did your body, your ears ringing at the echo of the gunshot that hit your arm. You cried out, falling into Mingi as your husband rushed over, shooting at guards as the others followed suit. Mingi double wielded guns to make up for your injured arm, bullets flying left and right as chandeliers shattered and guards dropped like flies. You almost breathed in relief until Yeosangs voice blocked out everything.

“Y/N WATCH OUT”

Everything slowed in that moment, your eyes darting around frantically to try and find the threat. A lone shot ringing out through the ballroom from the second floor, your eyes meeting your husbands as he was suddenly in front of you with a sad smile. And then he wasn’t. Time moved normally again, your knees buckling as your hands shook violently, Yeosang talking about more and final guards that the boys shot down without hesitation. A heart wrenching sob broke through your chest as you rested hands on his, blood seeping through your fingers as the boys surrounded you with tears in their own eyes.

Yeosang was shouting about him and Seonghwa coming to help, but you pulled the in-ear out, the blood rushing past your ears too loud for more noise. You heard muffled voices, the boys trying to talk to you. But you couldn’t move. You applied as much pressure to his chest as you could until he grabbed your hands in his own trembling ones.

“It’s okay, my love.”

“NO. LET ME HELP YOU!”

He smiled at you sadly, his eyes creasing lightly as tears fell down his cheeks like they did yours.

“Shhh, shhh. It’s okay. Listen to me, Y/N.”

You sniffled, nodding at him lightly so he would continue even if it broke your heart into a million more pieces the more time passed without Seonghwa at his side as well.

“I would do this a million times over, my love. Only for you. I wouldn’t change a thing about our time together, it’s the happiest I’ve ever been. It’ll be okay, don’t worry. The boys will take care of you now. I love you, Y/N. More than I ever thought possible.”

You sobbed harder as you screamed into the air for Seonghwa to hurry his ass up, Hongjoong placing a gentle hand on your shoulder as you looked back down to your husband, his eyes glassy as the tears fell like raindrops from your cheeks onto his own. 

“I’ll find you again, my love. We’ll meet under the stars once more.”

You shook your head, your grip tightening on his hands as his fell limp. The scream that tore at your throat made the boys cry, the tears they were holding back for your sake falling heavily as they watched their brother take his last breath. Your scream rang through the room for a moment longer as Seonghwa and Yeosang burst through the doors, slowing to a stop when Hongjoong looked back at them with tear-tracked cheeks and shook his head. The two walked up slowly, completing the circle around you and your now dead husband. It felt bittersweet, having them all around you like they had been at your wedding in that same park. But now you could only sob from the pain as you watched the twinkle leave his eye.

—

Now, Hongjoong squeezed your shoulder gently. You looked back at him as the tears tracked down your cheeks in an unstoppable downpour, his eyes filled with the same pain. An unspoken apology spoken through his eyes as he nodded at you.

“We need to go.”

Your tears picked up in speed, your breath hitching again at the thought of leaving him like this. You shook your head frantically, fighting San’s hold as he picked you up to carry you out, your husband’s blood staining his shirt as you clawed at his back with heart wrenching sobs. 

“Let me go! We can’t leave him!”, you managed to escape from Sans grip, running straight back to his side as you clung onto his body.

You whispered and whimpered ‘I love you’s into his hair as you cried harder, rocking back and forth as San grabbed you from under the arms again. You screamed ‘no’ at him, his hands leaving you slowly as he looked back at his friends with teary eyes, pain written all over his face as they shared your loss. They all felt your sobs like a shot to their own hearts, memories of your happy giggles and bright smiles with him by your side running through their heads. 

As they thought about the happiness you experienced with their brother at your side, you clung to him harder. Until you didn’t. You set him down slowly, the boys watching as you closed his eyes gently and laid gentle kisses over both as your tears glossed his face.

“We’ll meet again under the stars, Jongho. I love you.”

You stood slowly, letting San guide you away with heavy steps and hearts as you stared at the ground. We’ll meet again, you thought, sitting in the back of the van with tears falling from your cheeks. Like raindrops. 

[pherelesytsia]

Better man

Pairing: Thomas Shelby x John Shelby x female/Reader

Summary: Y/N finds out that Thomas is warming another woman's bed and suddenly she finds herself in John's arms.

Warning: Fluff, panic attack, Angst, Divorce

Word Count: 1.4k

a/n: Requests are open!!!

Part One

Light seeped mutedly through the window into the barely furnished bedroom of the house at the edge of the world. The smell of rotting wood and whiskey lingered in the air. Fine dust particles danced and birds chirped, singing a delicate serenade of love and adoration conquered the morning sky, painted in bright shades.

Sleepily, Y/N opened her eyes, fluttered open, turned and closed them again in hope of finding herself in a world of lovely dreams. Silence reigned, unknown, but Y/N enjoyed the unusual peace. Shocked, she awoke, realising the room was not the bedroom she woke up in every morning. Memories rushed back, clouding her mind. Y/N compressed her lips into a fine line, saw clearly and she didn't know whether to cry or laugh, whether to be lightened or joyful, how to feel. The dreadful memories flooded the room.

Slowly, fearing reality, Y/N braced herself and lowered her gaze. No ring adorned her finger. It is not a wicked dream, Y/N thought. Nobody rested by her side, but the crumpled blanket next to her let her know that once somebody was resting near to her. She exhaled deeply, tried to find out where she was, convinced she had fallen asleep during the ride. Her gaze travelled across the unfurnished room. The door was half-open. The wardrobe of dark wood faced the window obscured by curtains, preventing her from finding out where she was. Y/N attempted to remember the events, but all she could recall was the betrayal.

Footsteps echoed. Her fingers dug into the gauzy blanket and covered her body. Fear clouded her mind. A low prayer escaped her lips. Dressed in a pair of boxers, John entered the bedroom, did not close the door. Deep in thoughts, John turned and glanced at the woman sitting on his bed, guessing she must be asleep, but he was mistaken and the young man smiled as he saw Y/N was already awake.

            "Good morning," he whispered.

He felt unsure how to address Y/N, whether he should call the woman by her name or his love, but he knew he had to give her time, saw the pain raging in her eyes like a ruthless storm.

The memories of the previous evening returned and the painful wound gaped, but no crimson oozed. Weakly, Y/N smiled, unable to understand herself, feeling like a mere fool. She was happy to be close to John, yet her heart ached terribly, realising her worst fears had come true.

Pain struck her heart like hundreds of poisoned arrows, realised Thomas had never loved her, and John spotted the sadness in the eyes of the broken woman close to crying a river immediately.

Slowly, he approached the bed, knowing exactly what Y/N was thinking. The bed squeaked under his weight. He threw the blanket to the side and settled down right by her side, but he didn't place his hands on her body, didn't know if he was allowed to do it.

            "I'm sorry, but Thomas doesn't fucking deserve you. You are way too good for him. He is a disgusting piece of garbage." John said calmly.

Y/N chuckled.

            "If you wish, we can call him. I will stay by your side and hold your hand." John breathed.

The words left a horrible aftertaste in his mouth. Nervously, Y/N played with the hem of John's shirt covering her body and shook her head in response, couldn’t pronounce the words resting on the tip of her tongue. Y/N took a deep breath, tried to be strong, knew she had to say what was weighing her heart.

            "No, I don't want to see him. I found out that my husband has been warming another woman's bed for several months. It hurts. I loved him, at least I think I did. I am glad I have found out the truth, but what are you going to do? I should be on my way, and you should apologise and hope he forgives you." Y/N interjected.

She should be happy and Y/N knew it, but the truth pained terribly, made it impossible to feel happiness or love and Y/N wondered again why she had accepted the proposal all those months ago, why she had listened to her parents.

John looked forlornly at the woman an arm's length away from him, wanting to brush away the tears sliding in torrents down her cheeks and did not seem to stop in the next few moments. Carefully, he placed his hands on hers cramped into the gossamer sheets. Gently, his fingers stroked the back of her hands, trying to loosen her firm grip, trying so carefully to loosen one finger at a time and he did not fail and as each finger was released, he clasped her hands.

Y/N felt like an idiot, a fool, like a doll, a mere replaceable object, never cherished. She didn't notice as more tears travelled down her features, didn't notice John sitting right in front of her, trying to heal her broken heart with words of love and soothing touches.

            "Y/N." he breathed over and over again.

John pronounced her name like a prayer, like a sweet melody she wished to memories and never forget. She was lost in the ocean. Her boat was shattered, had no place to call her home. The ripples grew greater; the shore was out of sight, and the eye of the storm was drawing dangerously closer.

Y/N fixed her eyes on her saviour, realising she had been crying, not wanting to cry, needing to be strong, but she could no longer fight. John released her hands and Y/N longed for his closeness, but the pleading words didn't escape, couldn't say it out loud. Lips did not touch, Y/N looked up and threatened to lose herself in his eyes telling beautiful tales of walks under the setting sun shrouding the world in a reddish veil, of beaches, and romantic dinners.

John's hands rested on her body; felt she was threatening to collapse like a house of cards under the weight of the world. Carefully, he settled Y/N on his lap. Hearts clashed. Smiling, John brushed the strands of hair clinging to her cheeks behind her ear as her vision cleared. A lovely tale escaped his lips and the melody of heart carried the pain into oblivion.

            "You don’t have to worry about me. I made the right choice. I would always choose you, my darling." John objected.

            "What did Thomas mean by that?" gasped Y/N.

John knew what she was talking about. Y/N felt how his body stiffened under her touch, but she said nothing, embraced him, forbidding him to leave her side, to leave her alone in the dimness of the world.

            "You have always loved me, but you feared my reaction. I loved Thomas yet I did not and when I told my parents that I gave my heart to some else, they told me Thomas is a better match for a woman like me, but I know now that I made a mistake.” Y/N breathed into his ear.

Through watery eyes, Y/N saw the puzzlement in his eyes, the shock, didn't believe her words but then realised there was no lie darkening her eyes, telling a lie, wasn't uttering words as sweet as nectar to befuddle his senses.

Walls crumbled.

            "Thomas meant exactly what he implied. I never found the courage to tell you how much I love you, what you mean to me." John answered.

            "Why didn't you tell me before?", "What should I have told you? I am John, not Thomas Shelby. I have money, but at the end of the day I am not him.", "You are better." Y/N whispered affectionately.

            "Can I kiss you?" John asked hesitantly.

The question was needless. Tenderly he kissed her, placing his hands on her cheeks, delicately caressing her skin, and closed his eyes, hoping it was not a vivid fantasy, a fever dream he was about to awaken.

[gukyi]

love me or we both go down | kth

summary: after going through with an arranged marriage to please his parents and secure his inheritance of the family business, kim taehyung thinks he’s got it all figured out. he doesn’t. apparently just being married to you isn’t enough, not when everybody and their mother can pick up on the fact that the two of you absolutely loathe each other. but taehyung wants his inheritance one way or another, so he decides that desperate times call for desperate measures: the two of you need to fall in love, and you need to fall in love fast.

{enemies to lovers!au, arranged marriage!au, rich kids!au}

pairing: kim taehyung x female reader genre: fluff, angst, smut (i know, crazy right?) word count: 32k warnings: oral sex (m & f receiving), fingering, penetrative sex, multiple unprotected sex scenes (they’re married y’all), fat cock tae, tae has a wife kink, lots of praise, alcohol consumption (but they’re safe), minor character death (not explicit), mentions of heart attack, slow burn like there is no tomorrow a/n: hello and welcome to the fic everyone, literally everyone, has been waiting for! i am so, so, so excited to share this with you all, especially because none other than rose @kinktae​ helped me write the smut, and i am literally forever indebted to her. you all better go spam rose with all the love and support you can because this fic would not be here without her and i love her so much. 

also, to all my readers who aren’t comfortable reading smut, please know that the smut in this fic is not imperative to the storyline, and you skipping past it will not affect your reading experience., enjoy!

Never in your life have wedding bells felt so ominous.

The sound of them is akin to the sound of strings, of a single piano note in a horror movie, right when the film opens and someone random is about to die on screen for the sake of proving to the audience that this is, in fact, a horror movie. Make no mistake about it; these wedding bells spell doom for you, too. And the most horrific part about them is that just like that poor, helpless soul in the movie, there is no way for you to escape your fate either. 

With only seconds left to go before you have no choice but to promise yourself to the man waiting at the other end of the aisle, you desperately try to think of any last-ditch efforts to get out of this. Many, if not all of them, are utterly useless. 

Feigning sudden illness won’t work, because then your parents will just reschedule the wedding to a later date. Running away is fruitless. Where will you go? The parking lot?

If only you had a lover out there in the audience somewhere that could object to the marriage when the officiant says, “Speak now, or forever hold your peace.” A knight in shining armor that could whisk you out of the venue and off to a new life, far away from here. Too bad all of the people you’ve dated before hate you now. 

Maybe getting married isn’t such a bad thing after all. Instead of having relationships with multiple people who will eventually despise your existence, you only have to have a relationship with one. And the feeling, as has always been, is mutual. 

You bristle as your assistants do some last-minute prepping, fixing your sleeve and adjusting your necklace and making sure you don’t trip on your enormous train. They flutter around you like a swarm of well-meaning but ignorant butterflies complicit in the agenda of your family. None of them have said a word to you about the wedding ever since you arrived at the venue, choosing to talk more about things like the weather. Not that you were ever under the impression they had been hired to entertain you. Maybe they were told to not engage you, just in case you try to conspire with them.

As if they could be of any use in your wildly unrealistic escape plans. 

The truth is that, unless you were to drop dead on this marble flooring right now, you’re getting married. Whether you like it or not.

The doors open. 

You’ve attended red carpets, galas, award shows, and balls. You’ve had hundreds of cameras flashing in your face, the bright light capturing each and every centimeter of you. You’ve had paparazzi waiting outside the restaurants you eat at, the stores you shop at, desperate to catch a picture of you in sweatpants without a drop of makeup on. You’ve been on dates with ex-lovers that looked at you like you were a piece of meat with a credit card. And yet, for some goddamn reason, walking down the aisle in a white dress the size of Pluto, with the rest of your life waiting for you at the other end, makes you feel fucking transparent. 

Face resolute, you clutch onto your bouquet so tightly the flowers feel like they’re about to pop right out of your grasp. Determined not to look at anybody in the audience, you stare straight ahead, right into the eyes of your future husband.

Kim Taehyung, for someone you have seen multiple times drunk off his ass with hickies dotting his neck and jawline, cleans up pretty well. For someone getting married, at least. He dons a simple black tuxedo that still probably costs more than the average car, his caramel brown hair is pushed back off his forehead, and his expression is firm and still. He most certainly has had an equally expensive team prepping him, but they haven’t done too bad a job. The silver lining is that he doesn’t look any more thrilled than you are to be doing this, right here, right now. But to his credit, this is definitely the best he’s ever looked, as far as you’re concerned. 

When you reach him, he offers his hand out to you, a hand that you only accept for the sake of professionalism. The bouquet in your hands is handed off to one of your bridesmaids, and the two of you take your position at the front. Your train drags along the aisle, draping over the few stairs you had to climb to reach the altar, this satin trail behind you that cements you to the floor. It may as well be a ball-and-chain. It’s about as heavy as one, anyway. 

This is the longest you and Taehyung have ever held eye contact. Not that you’re really keeping track of how long the two of you have met each other’s gazes, but if you had to make an educated guess, this would definitely be the victor. Most of the time you end up sneering at each other ten seconds in, but to be fair, those other times you were also not getting married. To one another. In a ceremony attended by hundreds of people. And cameras.

There can be no sneering here. 

“Don’t you look nice?” Taehyung whispers, loud enough so only the two of you can hear. He has that drawling, sickly sweet tone to his voice, the one that you hate because it makes him sound like he thinks he’s so much better than everyone else. “Surprised they were able to makeup that scowl off your face.”

This, of course, brings on a hearty scowl only he can see, your backs both facing the rows of attendees. “How much concealer are you wearing to cover up all of the hickies on your neck?” You quip back easily. It’s not like the two of you are going to pretend he doesn’t waltz around at every club or bar or private venue he can find, looking for his next treat. 

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Taehyung grins, and if you weren’t standing in front of hundreds of people about to get married, there’s no telling what next you would do.

The two of you would probably go on like that for another ten minutes if it’s not for the officiant, who coughs once he’s ready and opens the book in his hands. Next to you, Taehyung straightens, hands clasped together at his front, and lips pressed into a neat line. You do the same. There will be no giggles, no laughter nor smiles, nor any genuine emotion at this wedding. This is a wedding for the sake of politics, for economics, for security, and anyone in attendance would be a fool to think otherwise. Especially you. 

“Ladies and gentlemen, family and friends, loved ones, and esteemed guests,” the officiant bellows, listing off as many groups of people as he possibly can in an effort to both include and compliment every person in the audience, “We are gathered here to celebrate the wedding, and future life, of Taehyung and Y/N…”

Taehyung turns to you, grinning in that god-awful way, the way he does when he feels like he’s got something over you. And sure, you can’t think of any punishment quite as bad as this, but what’s Taehyung got to smile about? He’s marrying himself off to a woman he hates, kissing goodbye his days as a free-spirited, heartbreaking bachelor, and promising what may very well be the rest of his life to loving you. That is not cause for celebration. 

But perhaps, to him, your suffering is enough to bring a smile to his face. 

Your vows are, to put it simply, total bullshit. Your family hired someone to write yours and there’s not a doubt in your mind that his family did the same thing. This nonsense talk, this complete and utter garbage that spews from your perfectly-glossed lips, shit about how you promise to love each other until the end of your days, how you promise to take care of each other when you’re sick and accompany each other at every event, every gala, every ball. Shit about how you promise to look only at each other, promise to uphold your family traditions and become a dependable spouse. 

The words don’t belong to you. But the thing is that this marriage was never yours anyway. 

When the kiss comes, there’s a part of you that thinks maybe you should have psyched yourself up a little more for this. When Taehyung pulls you in, placing a stiff hand on your lower back as he brings you towards his chest, your stomach turns and shivers run down your spine. The feeling of his hand on your body, the breath from his lips brushing against your own, are enough to keep you frozen in place. 

He smiles at you, almost as if to ask, “Are you ready?”

And you squeeze your eyes shut, almost as if to respond, “Let’s do this.”

When his lips meet yours, there is almost nothing. Nothing runs through you, nothing explodes, nothing strikes. But when he pulls away and cheers and applause rings out throughout the room, there is something. A little heat, a remnant of a flame, left on your lips. A little sting, just to remind you it happened. 

The entire hall is cheering but nothing about this is worth celebrating. The fact of the matter is that you and Taehyung will never love each other the way that you are supposed to. 

“Ugh, finally.”

The elevator doors haven’t even properly opened by the time Taehyung is loosening his tie, tugging it off over his head as he stretches his head back and runs a hand through his perfectly-styled hair. As he rakes his fingers through his caramel locks, the hairspray and gel loosens, strands falling down by the side of his face, framing his temple.

“Don’t sound so relieved,” you huff out, deciding now is as good a time as any to start getting undressed yourself. Reaching down to lift up the hem of your reception dress, you tug off your heels, already feeling lighter on your feet. Who cares if Taehyung is watching you pull off your stilettos like a defeated movie heroine? You don’t think you can walk another step in those shoes. “We still have to live together, you know.”

“Don’t remind me,” Taehyung says gruffly, brushing by you roughly as he stomps out of the elevator. “I’m just glad the fucking night is over. I swear, seeing that fake-ass smile on your face made me want to gouge my eyes out.”

You storm after him, refusing to be the helpless damsel in this situation. “Oh, like you didn’t also have that exact same fake-ass smile on your face. It almost made me think you were actually enjoying yourself tonight.”

“I was only enjoying the fact that I know you hate this just as much as I do.” It’s perhaps the only thing you will ever be able to empathize with him on. Mutually relishing in the other’s destruction. Taehyung fumbles with the keypad to the door to the penthouse for a moment before you hear the lock click, the door sliding open as the entrance lights flicker on. 

The reason Taehyung’s penthouse is so clean is because he’s never lived here before. Neither of you have—Taehyung’s parents bought it just for the two of you. And as much as you absolutely despise the idea of having to live with him, at least it was not you who paid for your place of residence. 

You can tell Taehyung’s never lived here before because it’s actually quite nicely decorated inside. The ceilings are high and the sleek velvet curtains are pulled open, revealing a shimmering skyline. The furniture is modern and functional, and the whole damn place smells brand new. You’ve had the unfortunate pleasure of entering the place Taehyung lived in before now, and it looked nothing like this. The furniture was worn and stained despite the live-in maid, the house reeked of five hundred different spices that wafted from the kitchen to the living room, and the bookshelves were covered with comics, graphic novels, and old textbooks. 

If it weren’t for the fact that you and Taehyung are rich kids in their twenties that hate each other, you might have actually thought the place looked… homey. 

You don’t have time to be impressed by the interior design and architecture skills of whoever designed this place. Right now, all you can think about is tugging yourself out of your airtight reception dress and passing out on the nearest bed. Which, hopefully, will be as far away as possible from Taehyung’s bed of choice. 

“How many bedrooms does this place have?” You ask, shimmying along the floor so you don’t trip over the hem of your dress. From the looks of it, you can see one giant hallway to your right and a massive, double-sided staircase leading up. 

“Enough,” Taehyung grumbles in response. The hazy stupor from all of the fancy champagne is starting to wear off for the both of you, leaving behind two grouchy, begrudgingly-married individuals who want absolutely nothing to do with each other and have no problems making that known. Whatever golden light of the evening that was making Taehyung at least a little bit more attractive than usual has faded, and now you see him for what he really is: an unceremoniously tired man in a suit. “You want upstairs or down?”

You gaze up at the marble staircase in front of you, then back down at your too-long dress. “Down.” The last thing you want is to trip in front of the man you have to see, every day, for the rest of your life. 

“Fine by me.” Taehyung’s halfway up the stairs by the time he turns back around to say something else. “I’ll see you tomorrow, I guess?”

“Yeah.” There’s no point in being hostile now. The both of you are too exhausted to mean anything by it. Besides, what else can you say? Everything to complain about has already been complained about. At least the two of you managed to wrestle out from your parents the stipulation that you would not be going on a honeymoon together. Now that would have been your worst nightmare. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

It’s as good of a goodnight either of you are going to get. Taehyung heads up the stairs and disappears around a corner, and you start wandering down the hallway. All the bedrooms look the exact same other than different colors on the walls and bedsheets, but they all look serviceable to you. Clean. Empty. Far away from wherever Taehyung is. 

You pick the one at the very end of the hall just to be as much of a diva as possible, and don’t even bother drawing the curtains before tugging off your dress. It’s past one in the morning, and you’re so high up you don’t think anyone will be able to see you anyway. By the time you’ve stripped naked and are tugging up the too-tight sheets tucked into the mattress, your legs are about to give out beneath you. The bed could be made of rocks for all you care. Anything to lie down on is fine by you. 

Sleep comes fairly easily to you tonight. Once your head hits the pillow you can already feel yourself drifting off, eyelids fluttering shut, but you don’t sleep quite yet. Not before you can think about how this is your life now, sleeping in a foreign bed in a foreign place with a foreign husband upstairs. This is what you will be living in now. Now and forever. 

Living with Taehyung is, in both the best and worst ways possible, like living with a roommate that doesn’t give a shit about the fact that they live with another person. It’s good, because you and Taehyung hardly see each other and speak even less, which was pretty much the only thing you were asking for when it came to living with him. But it also sucks, because whenever you do happen to cross paths, Taehyung acts like you don’t exist, barely sparing you a hello or even that tight-lipped smile you send to drivers on the road when they let you cross the street. 

Not that the two of you ever engaged in energetic conversation before you got married. But at least the two of you would acknowledge each other, even if only to shoot a glare and a scowl the other’s way from opposite sides of a hotel ballroom. Maybe it’s just because it’s him, but you did always find yourself actually relishing in those little interactions with Taehyung. In this strange, twisted way, it seemed to provide some sort of continuity to your ever-changing life. Like no matter what happened, at least you would know that the two of you would always despise each other. 

To be frank, right now you’re not sure if Taehyung even remembers he got married at all.

Nights have been a lot more sleepless since your wedding day. After two weeks, the reality of it has finally started to settle in. This is your life now. And ever since you realized that, your bed has felt much less comfortable. 

“But the place is nice, right?”

You look around the living room from where you’re sat on the sleek, white suede leather couch, eyes glossing over the bookshelves, the floor-to-ceiling windows, the draping velvet curtains. From here, you can see the entire city skyline, flecks of gold from the windows of skyscrapers against a navy blue background. Slowly, as the moon creeps over the sky and the clock gets later and later, those lights will soon begin to flicker off, one by one. 

“Yeah, it’s not bad.” Nothing to write home about. That is, if home were a place other than here. 

“That’s good. At least you don’t live in, like, a total dump or anything,” Victoria says on the other end of the line. “How’s Taehyung?”

His name alone elicits this deeply-exhausted sigh from your lips, like it’s been ten years since you married and every day has felt worse than the last. “Fine.” You can’t really complain about anything yet, considering that you hardly ever see the man. 

“Just ‘fine’?” Victoria sounds skeptical. 

“Yeah,” you draw out the word, as if trying to convince yourself of its truth. “I mean, it’s like he doesn’t even live here. I barely see him. And when I do, we don’t even speak to each other.”

“That’s good though, isn’t it? You hate him.” Victoria says it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. And in a sense, it kind of is. 

“I mean…”

“I know that your life hasn’t exactly… gone the way you had planned, but isn’t this your best case scenario when considering everything?” She asks. “If Taehyung is as distant as you say he is, isn’t it almost like you never married him in the first place?”

As if on cue, you hear footsteps coming down the stairs, heels clicking on the marble as they make their way to the entrance. You whip your head around to find Taehyung, all dressed up in loose, flowy slacks and a flowery silk button-down, strolling down the staircase as he scrolls through his phone, paying you zero attention whatsoever. 

He notices you briefly when he reaches the bottom, meeting your eyes with his own. He offers this measly, unenthused half-smile your way before he grabs his wallet and some house keys from the table by the entrance, opens the door, and vanishes off into the night. 

If you hadn’t been in the living room, you probably wouldn’t have even realized he left. Not that you being present as he’s planning on leaving would have stopped him anyway. This is the sixth night he’s done this in the past two weeks. You could stand by the door and stare him down as he emerges from his bedroom, all dressed up for something you’re definitely not invited to, and he would offer you that same goddamn smile and walk out the door without even blinking. Who he was before you got married and who he is now are no different. Not even a ring could change that. 

“I guess,” you tell Victoria. At least Taehyung hasn’t turned into a helicopter husband. “I don’t know. Maybe I just wish that I didn’t have to deal with him at all.”

Wish you could turn back time. Wish you could worm your way out of an arranged marriage before it was too late. Wish you could go back to the way things used to be. 

You and Victoria talk for another couple of minutes before she regretfully has to end the call, citing both her beauty sleep and an 8AM meeting tomorrow morning as her reasons for hanging up. The moment you put the phone down, you sink back into the couch cushions, staring out the windows at the world below you.

Here’s the deal. What Taehyung does in his free time is none of your business. But also, it’s totally your business, because you are his spouse. A spouse who is an equal amount in the public eye as he is. What he does and does not do has a direct impact on what you do and do not do. 

It’s no secret that when you catch Taehyung sauntering down the stairs looking like a Gucci runway model, it’s not because he’s planning on catching a movie with a college friend and then playing video games for four hours on a couch in a basement. He is going out. To clubs, to parties, to exclusive events that he’s been invited to by his equally-rich friends, all of whom are acting like he’s the same bachelor he’s always been. 

And maybe that’s the real problem with your whole marriage—other than the glaringly obvious issue that it’s a marriage wholly unwanted by the two parties involved in it. Despite the ring on his finger, Taehyung is going out and pretending that nothing in his life has changed while you’re trapped at home, desperate to save you and your family’s reputation by keeping as low a profile as possible. You would give anything to march around the city all day, flashing middle fingers at paparazzi as you shop at your favorite high-end stores and frequent your favorite clubs. But you can’t, because your family’s fortune and influence is on the line. 

And apparently, Taehyung’s isn’t. 

It sort of makes you wonder why it was even Taehyung you ended up marrying anyway. His family isn’t any richer or more powerful than yours. Your spheres have always been sufficiently separate. What was it about him, and perhaps more importantly, his family that drew your parent’s eye? And what was it about marrying you that prevented him from saying no? Money? Prestige? Influence?

You suppose you’ll never know. But whatever mystical force that convinced Taehyung to agree to this must not be as important to him as your reasoning is to you, because it’s become exceedingly apparent that Taehyung does not care that he’s married. He doesn’t care about the ring on his finger, he doesn’t care about his public image, and he most certainly doesn’t care about you.

Perhaps you were naive for thinking this, but you actually believed marriage might tone him down a little. Might age him into a real adult with real world obligations. Instead, it’s only given you a firsthand look into who Kim Taehyung has been and always will be: a selfish rich kid.

You don’t bother waiting around in the living room until he gets back, but you are still awake by the time you hear the door creak open. Taehyung makes no efforts to hide his return. You can hear him chattering loudly on the phone as he stumbles up the stairs, can tell from his gait alone that he is most certainly wasted. You don’t want to know what he did tonight. You’ll probably be able to figure it out anyway when you wake up tomorrow morning and check your social media. 

What were you thinking, marrying him? That he would change? That he would suddenly become someone that you could rely on? You had no choice when you said, “I do,” but you were at least hoping that maybe one day, one day in a long, long time, the two of you would finally see eye to eye. Maybe there would even come a time when you would genuinely love him. How foolish. 

You close your eyes and try to imagine a world where you have married someone you love, someone who loves you back.

Not unlike the many nights preceding it, tonight is sleepless. 

Unlike your marital status and general disposition, one thing that hasn’t changed about you is your love for extravagant events. Call you conceited, but there is something so much fun about putting on a fancy, expensive dress that you love and getting your hair and makeup done before going to an exclusive gala and posing in front of five hundred cameras. 

Actually, now that you think about it, maybe your wedding could have actually been pretty good, considering it let you do all those things. It’s a real shame there happened to be a storm cloud in the form of Kim Taehyung there to ruin it. Otherwise, you think you would have rather enjoyed that day. 

Tonight is the first event since your marriage where you and Taehyung are both required to show up and act like a happy married couple. Which would probably be a lot easier if you and Taehyung had exchanged more than ten words over the past two weeks. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but there was a part of you that thought you could use your arranged marriage to actually cultivate some sort of meaningful relationship between the two of you. So events like these wouldn’t be such a drain on both of you. 

When Kim Taehyung comes down the stairs, he actually doesn’t look too bad. You don’t know why this sort of thing keeps catching you off guard—like you don’t expect him to look that good whenever you see him. The problem is that you can’t even chalk up the surprise to him wearing tailored clothes or having his hair done. He just looks… good. 

Well, you suppose you do have to look at him every day for the rest of your life. It’s a good thing he’s attractive. At least he’s not sore on the eyes. 

Taehyung and his unfortunate attractiveness aside, the two of you don’t say a word to each other as you join up at the entrance, grabbing any last-minute items like house keys, chapstick, and whatever dignity you have left to spare. You send forced smiles and tight nods each other’s way in the elevator, staring straight ahead in the lobby of your building as the car pulls up to the front door.

By the time the two of you sit down in the back of the limousine, the built-up tension between the two of you is so thick you’re almost positive that even the chauffeur can feel it through the closed partition. 

If you were any more idyllic, you’d probably spend the drive over to the gala staring out the window and imagining yourself in a different life, on a train to nowhere, flowers in your hair and a journal in your hands. Or perhaps you’d be the CEO of your family’s company instead of having that responsibility passed down to a husband you don’t even want, sitting in an office at the top of a skyscraper overlooking the city. Anything. Anything but this.

But the idyllic part of you died when you realized that fantasies like that are nothing but distractions and that daydreams are for romantics and optimists and losers. 

“What’s our plan for tonight?”

Taehyung scoffs. “What do you mean, ‘what’s our plan’?”

You frown. “Well, we’re married, so we at least have to act like it, don’t you think?”

“Isn’t standing there and smiling enough?” Taehyung asks, an unimpressed eyebrow raised. 

You bristle. Maybe that sufficed for your wedding, but there was so much going on it was easy to distract yourself from the gravity of it all. But this event is not about you. It’s not even about either of your families. It’s about someone the two of you are, at best, distantly connected to, through work, through fame, through power. Which means that though the focus will not be on you, there will still be eyes looking your way. Eyes watching your every move. 

“Do you think it will be?” You challenge. Doesn’t Taehyung realize that things are different now?

Taehyung’s lips curl downwards. “What do you expect us to do, shower each other in kisses? We don’t even sleep on the same fucking floor.”

“Maybe I just expected you to act less like a stranger and more like a husband!”

Taehyung sighs. “Don’t.” The word is clipped, short. “Don’t tell me you actually want to be married.”

“I don’t.” It’s a response that you hardly have to think twice about. “But we are, and nothing can change that.” Unfortunately. But it’s a fact that you and Taehyung have both had to grapple with over the past few weeks, and it’s becoming increasingly obvious that you are more aware of it than he is. If Taehyung could have his way, he would ignore you for the rest of his life and keep partying with the rest of his bachelor friends until he keeled over and died. 

He huffs next to you, eyes staring straight ahead. You don’t think the two of you have met each other’s eyes in a week. Maybe more. They’re starting to feel as soulless as your marriage itself. “Whatever. What do you want me to do?”

“What do you think?” You cross your arms over your chest. “Just act like you don’t hate me. Can you do that?” The way Taehyung’s behaving right now, you expect that will be a challenge for the both of you.

“Only if you can. I’ll even hold your hand to prove that we love each other.”

“Fine.”

“Fine.”

The idea of holding Taehyung’s hand makes you want to implode. The mere thought sends shivers down your spine. But it’s better than nothing, and that’s good enough for you. At least you won’t have to kiss. 

The rest of the ride there is silent. You drive to this gorgeous mansion just outside the city, bathed in lights hidden amongst the bushes, illuminating both the architecture and the enormous fountain that sits in front of it. In a house this size, you imagine you could probably go your whole life without ever having to come across Taehyung. It actually makes you consider investing in a home that big. 

Taehyung helps you out of the back of the limousine, a cold hand clasping your own as you rest your palm against his. You can feel the way his fingers hesitate as yours make to intertwine with his as you walk towards the entrance, smiling at whatever camera flashes you encounter on your way. If you didn’t know any better, you’d think you were holding hands with a ghost. 

The moment you step inside and are ushered out of the door’s view, Taehyung’s grip relaxes on yours. For a moment, you think he’ll actually spend the rest of the night like this, a gentle hand wrapped around yours, but then he pulls it away entirely and shoves it back into his pocket. Oh. You frown quietly to yourself. So that’s how tonight’s going to go. 

You don’t make an effort to reach out towards him again. 

For an event concerning people you don’t know a damn thing about, everyone sure seems to know things about you. Other than greetings, you don’t think anyone’s said anything to you about anything other than your recent marriage to Taehyung. Every conversation is punctuated by a Congratulations! you do not feel that you have at all earned, considering you and Taehyung could barely look at each other on the way here.

Maybe Taehyung was right. All you really can do is stand there and smile.

“Oh, don’t tell me… Y/N, is that you?”

The champagne swirls around in the flute between your fingers as you turn towards the sound of your name, looking up to see a familiar face headed your way. 

Kim Seokjin is nice enough. He’s terribly handsome and got a flawless smile, but you know better than to trust those pearly whites of his. The sight of him alone is enough to make your body tense up. There was a reason you had explicitly told your parents not to invite him to your wedding. 

“Seokjin, what a surprise to see you here,” you say, forcing a smile. “I thought you were supposed to be in Switzerland right now.”

“Change of plans,” Seokjin grins back in that awful, awful way, the kind of grin that makes you feel like he’s looking right through you. “I came back early. It’s a shame, though, I missed your wedding.”

You shrug. “It was a humble affair.” It wasn’t. And you’re positive that Seokjin knows it wasn’t an accident that you didn’t extend an invitation to him or his family. 

“Ah, I see,” Seokjin says, nodding his head. He turns to Taehyung next to you, who is making no effort to hide how wholly uninterested in this conversation he is, and holds out a hand. “You must be Kim Taehyung, then. I’m Kim Seokjin. Congratulations on your wedding.”

Taehyung shakes his hand firmly, the air between the three of you growing unbearably palpable. 

“Seokjin’s father is the VP of News Daily,” You explain, eyebrows raised as you try to signal to Taehyung what exactly it means when Seokjin is speaking to the two of you. “And his mother is a popular journalist for the city’s post.”

Seokjin grew up in the world of media, and it seems he’s picked up his parent’s affinity for sticking their noses in places they don’t belong. You know he’s not talking to the both of you out of the goodness of his heart. 

Seokjin laughs, his hand waving away the mention of his parents. “Oh, please. That’s them. I’m just a bored socialite like the rest of you.”

You resist the urge to scoff. 

“Marriage treating the two of you well?” He changes the subject to what he really wants to talk about: you. 

“Of course,” you say quickly, preventing any hesitation on your end. Your empty hand reaches towards Taehyung’s, fingers searching for his between the two of you. But his refusal to join hands does not go unnoticed by you nor Seokjin, who is eyeing the space between your bodies with an eyebrow raised. “It’s just been—well, it’s just been difficult to adjust to a new life. That’s all.”

If you were to describe the face of a non-believer, it would be the exact expression on Seokjin’s face. “Perfectly understandable,” he says, that same toothy smile lacing his features. “But it must be nice, you know, to marry someone you love.”

“I couldn’t be happier,” you say, almost challenging Seokjin to say something even more inflammatory. He must know that all you’re trying to do at this point is save face. Love? Ha! As if. 

“And Taehyung?” Seokjin motions to your husband. 

You can feel the way Taehyung is stiffening beside you. “I suppose we are both lucky and unlucky in many ways when it comes to who we love.”

It’s enough of an answer to get Seokjin off your tail. For now. He bids the two of you a tense goodbye before sauntering off to go poke his nose in someone else’s business, fish for drama, a thread of a rumor he can pick apart with nimble fingers. You wonder if anybody actually likes him. 

The moment he disappears from earshot, you grab Taehyung’s wrist tightly and pull him close to you. “What the hell was that?” You hiss into his ear. 

“What?” You can’t tell if he’s playing dumb or if he really is that dense. 

“You!” You exclaim. “Kim Seokjin is the one person who could easily expose how fake this marriage is and you pull away from me? Right in front of him? You can’t even hold my hand for two seconds, that’s how much you hate me?”

“Who cares what he thinks?” Taehyung says. “He’s just another media rat. No one will even remember we were here tomorrow.”

“But if you keep acting like this, people will start to notice! Why can’t you just act like you don’t hate me, for one night? Is that so bad? Is it that torturous, to spend one night with me?”

“Do not turn this on me,” Taehyung orders harshly. “You’re making a scene. Come on.”

You don’t have time to shout at him for bossing you around like you’re a toddler throwing a tantrum before he drags you out of the venue, the two of you finding a back door to the building that leads outside. The cold air blows against your body, goosebumps popping up against your skin, but you find that the chilly night provides quite the respite after practically overheating indoors. Taehyung makes fire rush through your veins but at least the air can cool you back down. 

Nevertheless, your conversation is not over. It’s just been moved to a more private location.

“You do realize that our marriage isn’t going to suddenly go away, right? That we’re going to have to keep doing this for the rest of our lives?” You remind him, eyebrows raised. There’s a part of you that genuinely thinks he’s completely forgotten that your marriage is permanent.

“Oh, and not holding hands for five minutes for this one event is totally going to change the course of our lives, isn’t it?” Taehyung fights back.

“Don’t act like you did the right thing,” you spit out. “You don’t have to pretend in front of me. I know you don’t give a shit about our marriage.”

“What marriage is there to even give a shit about? Just because we had a wedding and signed some documents does not mean there is a real marriage between us. Look at us,” he motions between the two of you like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “We hate each other. Is this what you would call marriage?”

“But at least I’m trying to get past that!” You exclaim. “You make it seem like being as miserable as possible is some sort of badge of honor. Do you actually want to spend the rest of your life hating the person you married? Or do you want to grow up and try and move on?”

Taehyung frowns. “What I want is for the person I married to stop acting like they’re doing me such a huge favor by pretending to care about us. Especially when all they really care about is their family’s goddamn reputation.”

“No,” you tell him sternly. You are doing him a favor. He just can’t admit that he actually needs help from you. “You are putting zero effort into this. What am I supposed to do?”

“Let it go!” Taehyung shouts. “Maybe one day we’ll actually start getting along, but right now it’s obvious that neither one of us can stand the other. I don’t need you to do favors for me. I can handle it myself.”

You look away, rolling your eyes. “Doesn’t look like it to me,” you mutter to yourself. 

Taehyung cracks. “Fine. You want me to pretend that I actually care about us? I will.” Thank God. Maybe now the two of you will finally start seeing eye-to-eye. “But make no mistake about how I feel about you,” he spits. “Getting married to you ruined my life.”

You stare straight at him and his eyes are swirling, so obscured in the darkness of the night that you might even think he doesn’t have a soul at all. His pupils bore into yours and for once, for once in your goddamn life, after so many years of staring each other down at debutante balls, so many years of witty refrains and snarky insults hurled each other’s way, it feels like the two of you might actually snap. 

Then, a camera flashes.

Trouble in Paradise! would be a suitable title for the front page of the city’s biggest tabloid… if anything about your life with Taehyung could be considered paradise. Unfortunately for the both of you, that is not the case. 

You don’t need to keep reading the rest of the trashy article on the front page of the daily tabloid to know how much trouble you’re in, nor do you even have time to scroll beneath the terrible photo of you and Taehyung literally shouting at each other before you hear your phone ring. 

You don’t even bother saying hello to whoever’s on the other end. You know it’ll go in one ear and out the other. 

“I assume you know why I’m calling,” your mother’s harsh tone spits from the other end of the phone. There’s no doubt in your mind that she’s standing in the middle of her office, snapping her fingers at her fifteen secretaries as they partake in the worst damage control your family’s had to deal with since your cousin two years ago was caught with a mistress outside a high-profile restaurant. 

“Can I take a wild guess?” You’re about to be scolded into the next century, so you might as well enjoy your last few moments. 

“Don’t get cheeky with me,” your mother warns. “Care to explain why you and your beloved husband made the front page of the Daily Post today?”

“I know,” you sigh, a hand coming up to rub at your temples. It’s eight in the morning, you’ve barely looked at your phone, and you haven’t even brushed your teeth yet. It feels like you’re still asleep, and most certainly lack the energy to deal with this right now. 

Your mother, on the other hand, thinks otherwise. “You know? You know, and you still go out and do this? For everyone to see?”

“We tried to take our argument outside,” you begin to explain, but your mother isn’t having a single word of it. 

“The fact that you thought it was even appropriate to have an argument in a public setting at all astounds me, Y/N. We raised you better than that.” There’s no need for you to even see her face. You’ve grown so used to that disappointed frown over the years that it’s burned into your brain. 

“Maybe you should have thought about that before marrying me off to a man I barely know so I could be someone else’s problem instead of yours,” you bite. 

“We did this for your own good,” she hisses back. “You are married because we love you, and we want you to succeed outside of this family.”

“Then why do you care what the tabloids print about me?”

“Because being married does not mean you are no longer a part of this family,” your mother informs you sternly, lips smacking together. “Your marriage reflects on all of us, and you know that. What will people think of us when they see how terribly behaved you are?”

“Everyone acts like that, and you know it.” How could your mother preach good behavior when everyone, everyone you know, is just as spoiled and entitled as you? There’s no such thing as being altruistic when it comes to people like you. Being genuine, and good, and pure—that will get you ruined. 

You can hear her breathing into the phone when your mother responds, “But not in public, and that is the point. We expect better from you.”

“If you were so worried about me behaving so badly, then why did you even marry me off anyway? You knew that I didn’t want to. What did you think would happen?” It’s a question you wouldn’t have dared ask three months ago. Hell, even a year ago, when it was first revealed you were to be engaged, you wouldn’t have dared open your lips. But things are different now. You’re married to a man that hates you just as much as you hate him. He is making no effort to improve your relationship and seems hellbent on despising you forever. There is no way to get out of it. And if your parents really foresaw all of that, then what was the point in the first place?

“Your grandmother.”

Your mouth shuts. 

“You know she wanted to see you married before she passed,” your mother says, words clipped and biting and harsh. “She cares about you. She wanted to make sure you’d be taken care of.”

“I don’t need anyone to take care of me,” you mutter to yourself like a petulant child. In a way, you sort of are.

“If you want to stay in her will, I suggest you change that mindset.”

You freeze in your tracks. The will?

“Is that a threat?” You ask, positively dumbfounded. Are you being coerced into staying in this marriage because of your grandmother’s will?

You can hear your mother laugh, that muted, knowing chuckle of hers. “It was the deal all along, remember?”

Vaguely, you do. You remember fighting your parents tooth and nail over getting married until your grandmother revealed it was her dream to see you wed. You remember the look on her old, wrinkled face, that soft, sad smile that said she knew she didn’t have much time left. You remember agreeing, because how could you deny her? You remember her promising to remember what you’re doing for her. 

“You’re kidding.”

“I’m not.”

“But—”

“That’s the end of this conversation, Y/N. You fix things with your husband or you’re out of her will. She’s made that clear. I expect you’ll make the right choice.”

She hangs up. 

Well. 

There are a lot of ways to describe how you’re currently feeling, and you most certainly had an expensive education that would provide you with plenty of the vocabulary, but you think the most appropriate words for the current situation would be: you’re fucked. 

At least the feeling is mutual. 

Hardly two minutes after your mother’s brutal phone call, Taehyung comes storming down the stairs, hair still mussed from the night prior, his own phone clenched tightly between is fingers. Even from where you stand in the middle of the living room, you can see the way his eyes are glinting with anger, the veins popping out from his skin. 

“I just got off the phone with my parents,” Taehyung begins, not even bothering to spare a ‘good morning’ your way, “and they are fucking furious about last night.”

You shrug. “Join the club,” you mutter, arms crossed in front of you. What, does Taehyung really think you got off scot-free?

“Don’t act like this means nothing to you,” Taehyung says as he approaches you, footsteps calm despite his demeanor being anything but. “You’re the one who’s so obsessed with keeping up their family’s perfect reputation. You’re the reason we’re even in this mess in the first place.”

“What do you mean, ‘I’m the reason’?” You ask, astounded. Like he’s totally absolved of all blame and just an innocent third party. “You are the reason we went outside. You are the reason we had that argument, because you refuse to accept the fact that we’re actually married and there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“Right, because holding hands is really gonna show all those people how in love we are. I bet your parents are so thrilled right now.” Taehyung drawls. 

“It’s a start!” You shriek. “God, you’re just so—so infuriating! You can’t accept that this was your fault, too. You just have to turn everything against me and you always, always have to get the last word. It’s like you think you’ll die if you don’t.”

“Like you’re any better,” Taehyung huffs back. “You think I’m the villain because I don’t want to pretend to be in love with someone I’m not in love with. You act like us not holding hands is going to ruin our lives. It was one event! One! It’s obvious we hate each other, so why even try?”

“What, do you expect me to just sit around and do nothing? To act like everything’s fine? Like I’m happy?” As if. This marriage is the worst thing that’s ever happened to you. “While you prance around the city with your rich boy friends, going out to clubs and parties and pretending that I don’t exist? Is that what you expect from me?”

Taehyung laughs, this loud, disbelieving sort of noise, like he’s never heard such nonsense before. “Just because we’re married doesn’t mean the rest of my life has to change. Am I not allowed to enjoy myself with my friends? Or are you determined to keep me chained to your side for the rest of our lives?”

“What I want,” you punctuate every word, “is for you to stop acting like you haven’t got stakes in this, too. You think I don’t know how your family works? What being married to me means for you? Because I do. And I know that if we were to divorce, it would be you who would get the short end of the stick. Make no mistake.”

That’s enough to shut Taehyung up for a good few seconds. And it shuts him up, because he knows it’s true. Taehyung’s family may have a little more money, a little more power than yours, but you’ve got a family intimately more connected with the media. One phone call and Taehyung may have a rather messy, rather public breakup to deal with. 

“You wouldn’t,” he says, calling your bluff. 

“Are you sure about that?” You say, sticking your ground. You would never really divorce him, of course, but he doesn’t need to know that.

“I am,” Taehyung says firmly. “Don’t think I don’t know what being married to me is in it for you. What is it? Money? Power? Your father’s CEO position?”

“That’s none of your business,” you snap quickly. Maybe you’re more transparent than you thought. Bristling, you straighten your shoulders and turn back to meet his eyes. “Regardless, it seems we both have a reason to stay in this marriage.”

“It seems we do,” Taehyung agrees with a thin, contained smile. “Then I suppose we can reach some sort of agreement.”

“As in…?” Your interest in piqued. 

“I’ll stop going out with my friends if you stop picking fights with me all the time,” he says economically, like he’s killing two birds with one stone. 

“Only if you agree to also act more like my husband when we’re in public,” you tack on, because you just can’t settle for anything less. 

“Public only,” Taehyung specifies. 

You scoff. “Like I’d even want to pretend to be your wife when we’re in private.”

“Good. It seems we’ve come to a deal.”

“What’s in this for you, huh?” You prod, just to be annoying. Taehyung’s right. There’s a reason you’re not divorcing him the second you get the chance. But there must be a reason why he’s not doing the same thing. 

“Does it matter?” He challenges, a single eyebrow raised. “My life is just as awful as yours.”

Fair enough. 

“Do we have a deal?” Taehyung asks, holding out his hand, that sneaky, devilish grin lacing his features. 

Taking his hand in yours and grasping it firmly is the easiest decision in the world. His palm presses against your own, hot hand meeting your cold skin, and it feels like the two of you are finally finding some sort of balance. You look up into his eyes, burn your gaze into his pupils, watch them glint in the white ceiling light of the living room. 

“Deal.”

For two people raised on the values of reading the fine print and making educated choices when it comes to business deals, you and Taehyung sure haven’t worked out any of the intricacies of the deal the two of you agreed to. Unlike those business deals your parents constantly agreed to, however, knowing all of the stipulations and provisions of your strange, strange agreement with Taehyung may prove more harmful than helpful. 

Like right now. 

“Wait, we don’t have to be by each other’s side the whole night, do we?” Taehyung asks you, eyebrows furrowed in a knot, as you sit in the back of a big, black van on your way to a mutual friend’s twenty-first birthday bash. 

“There are going to be a lot of cameras there,” you respond. 

“Yeah, outside the entrance to the damn club. You know they won’t be allowed in, so who cares?” Taehyung rebukes. 

You huff out a little sigh, not wanting to get into an argument when you’re literally minutes away from your first public appearance since the whole tabloid debacle from three weeks ago. You and Taehyung could both do with being a bit more relaxed than you normally are when you’re around each other. 

“Hasn’t Clarissa invited hundreds of people? They’ll all notice if we aren’t together,” you remind pointedly. The girl whose birthday party you are attending is an heiress who grew up on the money of two people with a monopoly over the current artificial intelligence market and has millions of followers on social media. There will be notable people there. And people will know the two of you, as well. 

Taehyung rolls his eyes. “That’s the point, Y/N. There’ll be so many people, no one will even care. It’s her twenty-first birthday. Do you think people are going to be sober?”

You purse your lips together. He’s got a point. “How about when we are together, we hold hands. But if you see a friend or something then feel free to say hi.” Taehyung can be afforded that luxury. Especially because the chances of him not bumping into someone he knows is exceedingly low anyway. 

Taehyung nods in agreement. “You too. But I won’t leave you unless I know you’re with someone you’re close with.”

“You don’t have to stay, I’ll be fine,” you say with a small chuckle. What, is Taehyung suddenly worried, or something?

“Yeah, but it would be in bad taste if I left you with someone you didn’t know well. Or alone. Just wanna make sure you’re taken care of.” He shrugs nonchalantly, turning back to look out of the window on his side of the car. 

“Okay.” 

You don’t really have anything else to say to that. You’re sure you can handle yourself if you’re left alone for a few minutes while Taehyung says hi, but you actually find yourself rather appreciative of his resolve to look after you. Or, at least, make sure someone else is looking after you. It’s quite… chivalrous. Strikingly out of character for the Taehyung you’ve become well-acquainted with over the past couple of months. 

By the time you arrive, it’s obvious that Taehyung was right about there being so many people you two practically don’t even exist. Other than the herds of camera crews waiting outside the joint, photographing everyone that steps out of a black car to see what they’re wearing and who they’ve come with, no one seems to be paying you any attention. And in a way, that sort of nonexistence, that anonymity, it’s refreshing. Your entire life you’ve felt like all eyes were on you, like there was constantly a spotlight above your head, but here, the party centers around someone else. 

Despite that fact, Taehyung keeps his promise. He keeps himself pressed closely against you when there’s not enough space for you two to stand side by side, and he makes sure to have a hand gently intertwined with your own as you weave your way through the dozens of bodies in the room. He doesn’t say anything, of course, always looking up and forward instead of beside him, where you stand, but you find that you’re actually quite relaxed with his presence. He spots a bit of a clearing near the back of the first floor of the club, where a whole bunch of leather couches are pressed up against the brick walls, where the two of you can take a breather. 

“Damn, Clarissa knows a lot of people,” you say when you finally settle down, happily plucking a martini from a tray held by one of the many caterers wandering through the venue. 

“I doubt she’s even spoken to half of them,” Taehyung comments. “She and I have maybe spoken once… three years ago.”

“It was enough to get you invited, wasn’t it?” You point out with an eyebrow raised. 

Taehyung nods, chuckling a little. “Touché,” he says, clinking his own cocktail glass against yours. 

You take a swig of the drink, letting it wash down your throat. You’re not exactly sure how else you’re supposed to survive the night. “You must enjoy this, huh?” You muse, looking up at Taehyung from where you’re seated on the couch. He’s standing next to you, looking around the room with a distant gaze in his eye. 

“Enjoy what? The drink? It’s nice,” Taehyung says, having another sip. 

“No, I mean this,” you say, motioning toward the crowd. “The clubbing, the dancing, the drinking. I’ll bet that if you could do this every day for the rest of your life, you would.”

“I’m honored that you think so highly of me,” he deadpans. 

“Just making an observation,” you say, holding your hand up in surrender. “I mean, isn’t this what you used to do every weekend before we got married? Get wasted and party? Wake up in someone else’s bed the next morning? Muscle your way through the week just so you could do it all over again?”

Taehyung shakes his head, a knowing grin on his face. “Looks like someone keeps up with her tabloids. Let me guess, you would scroll through all of those trashy articles on your phone whenever you woke up so you could see what your future husband was doing?”

“I could have never even met you and I would know that that’s exactly what you do,” you say, even though you definitely did do those things before your engagement was announced to the public. “You’re a heartbreaker, Kim Taehyung. I don’t need to read a tabloid to know that.”

“Well, you must be quite the lucky girl, then,” Taehyung comments. “You seem to be taking up so much of my energy that I don’t have the time for that anymore.”

You place a sarcastic hand on your heart. “I didn’t know you were always thinking about me. I’m touched.”

“Don’t get used to it,” Taehyung huffs out, making the two of you both shake your heads as you chuckle to yourselves. First civil conversation you’ve had with each other in a long while, even if there may have been a few blows exchanged. 

The privacy doesn’t last long. Soon after, a huge crowd of people that could honestly still pass for teenagers herds towards the back of the club, all of them wanting to take pictures with each other. You and Taehyung do your best to stay out of the way, but one of the girls recognizes him from the Elle photoshoot he did about a year ago and begins to strike up a conversation with the both of you about your recent marriage. If she was paying attention to anything the tabloids leaked three weeks ago, she doesn’t mention it. Taehyung smiles and happily answers all of her questions, and even offers to take a picture of the group for them. The conversation ends before the two of you even catch her name. 

You’re standing by the line of buffet tables laid out against the staircase leading up to the second floor, no doubt as crowded as this one, when the opportunity for you to speak to someone other than Taehyung finally presents itself. 

“Y/N!”

You’d recognize that voice anywhere. You turn around to see Victoria barreling towards the both of you, not even caring when she accidentally spills a bit of her piña colada on the floor as she does. 

“Hey!” You exclaim excitedly. “I didn’t know you’d be here.”

“Are you kidding? I’m pretty sure Clarissa invited everyone on her, her best friend’s, her best friend’s cousin, and her best friend’s cousin’s dog’s contact list,” Victoria says with a laugh. “It’s nice to see you. I feel like you’ve been holed up in that big ol’ penthouse for weeks.”

“Damage control,” you remind her succinctly. Victoria knows enough that that’s all the explanation she really needs. 

“I don’t know if the two of you have ever met formally,” you say, thinking back to your wedding, where Victoria spent most of her time schmoozing with your parents (who love her) and didn’t even engage with any of the people who Taehyung’s family had invited. “Taehyung, this is Victoria. Victoria, Taehyung.”

“Pleasure,” Victoria says in that loud, unabashedly forward way of hers, holding out a friendly hand. Taehyung smiles back curtly, taking her hand and shaking it gently, so as not to spill any more of her drink. 

“Mine as well. I remember you were at our wedding.” Oh? So he does know her?

“That I was. Oh, I miss that day. The food was excellent. Tonight’s isn’t too bad either. Hope you’re doing well, the two of you. It’s nice to see you getting along,” she says, always the observer. 

Taehyung’s eyes widen a little when he picks up what Victoria is not-so-subtly putting down, but you place a hand on his upper arm to calm him. “It’s okay,” you tell him. “She won’t say anything.”

“My lips are sealed,” Victoria adds. 

“If you wanna go spend time with some of your friends, you can,” you say, giving Taehyung a nudge. He looks positively helpless standing in between the two of you as Victoria out-extroverts him. 

“Alright,” he says hesitantly, even though you know he’s already spotted at least ten people you’re sure he’d want to spend time with over you. “I’ll come find you soon, okay? Don’t go too far.”

You nod, and Taehyung disappears off into the crowd. Not two seconds later, you hear someone else call his name in a familiar tone. 

“I thought you said you hated him,” Victoria points out as the two of you watch his caramel brown hair makes its way throughout the crowd. 

You take another sip of your drink. “I do,” you say. 

Victoria looks at you like you’ve just told her you’ve sworn off custard-filled doughnuts. 

“What?” You ask, feeling suddenly defensive. 

“Nothing,” Victoria singsongs. “It just doesn’t look like that to me.”

“We just need to keep up a good appearance in public, that’s all. You know how mad my parents got when the tabloids leaked all that shit a few weeks ago,” you explain. You’re not sure what all the fuss is about. Taehyung said he would do these things. And he did. That was him upholding his end of the deal. This is you upholding yours. 

“If you say so…” Victoria says, not looking at all convinced. “I guess I’m just surprised that—that you two seem to be getting along so well. Maybe you being married isn’t going to be the worst thing after all.”

You stare back out into the crowd, scanning the top of people’s heads for Taehyung’s familiar locks. In the dim light of the club, you have a difficult time finding his, squinting your eyes slightly as you look around, but eventually you spot him, dancing happily with some old friends of his you recognize. He looks like he’s having a good time. And that makes you feel like maybe, just maybe, this might end up alright. 

“Yeah,” you say, though with the pounding of the bass and the alcohol already rushing through your veins, it doesn’t really feel like your voice belongs to you. You look back at Taehyung, knowing exactly where he is now, and you smile. Just a little. “I guess he’s not so bad.”

You never do get a chance to meet Taehyung’s friends that night. By the time he joins back up with you and Victoria he’s by himself, a little more drunk than when he left, and ready to go home. And for once, instead of fighting him, instead of insisting you stay an hour more just to make sure you’ve done all of your rounds, you let him take you home. 

Taehyung has been spending a lot more time at the penthouse lately. Perhaps his family’s business happenings are slow, or perhaps he’s actually starting to get more comfortable with inhabiting the same space as you, but he has definitely found himself quite the rhythm in that house of yours. He even comes down to the first floor rather regularly. 

When he’s home, Taehyung is a lot quieter than you thought he would be. Granted, you don’t exactly know what you were expecting in the first place, but it certainly wasn’t him ruminating in one of the home offices while the Beatles play softly on the stereo, nor was it him reading a book in French in one of those big old grandfather chairs in the living room. If you didn’t know any better, you’d probably think he was still absent in that old way of his, ghostlike and silent, like he was occupying the space instead of truly living in it. 

But you do know better, and even though Taehyung is just as noiseless as he used to be, the house already feels a little bit fuller. 

Perhaps the reason you’ve become so keenly aware of his presence over the past few days is because of the notable fact that Taehyung has indeed held up his end of the deal, and no longer goes out with his friends in the evening. Or at all, for that matter. Which strikes you as rather odd, because he’s the epitome of a social butterfly, a thousand contacts in his phone and a whole group of friends he regularly spends time with. Maybe his parents told him to tone down the public appearances, too. And that’s understandable, but don’t they know Taehyung? Can’t they see how much he thrives on social interaction? It almost makes you feel… bad for him. 

To remedy this, you suggest he invite over his friends. Just for a few hours, you swear you won’t mind. 

“Seriously?” Taehyung looks positively shocked when you tell him he can, standing in the doorway of the office he seems to have designated as his own. 

“Yeah, why not?” You say with a carefree shrug. Besides, you’ve never met his friends anyway, and now seems as good a chance as any to introduce yourself. You are his wife, after all. “Unless your parents say you can’t. But it’s not a problem for me.”

“You… don’t mind if I have my friends over for a bit? Honest to God, we’re probably just going to play FIFA for three hours straight,” Taehyung says like it’s some sort of warning. Like the idea of him and his buddies from college are going to sit in the living room screaming at the television, leaving you alone to do literally anything else, is somehow bad. 

You laugh. “It’s fine, really. Call them. I’d actually quite like to meet them.”

Taehyung picks up his phone almost instantly, as if you’ll change your mind in the next five minutes so he better get them over soon, and already you can see the way his face is lighting up, the way his eyes crinkle as he chats to his friends and the way his lips curl upwards when they crack a joke back. Isn’t it obvious? He feeds off of the energy of others. Who are you to deny him such a simple pleasure?

As it turns out, Taehyung’s friends actually end up being quite nice anyway. 

He invites over three, because four people is apparently the perfect number for a hardcore game of FIFA on his Playstation, and they are all very handsome men you have never met before. You suppose like attracts like, after all. 

“You must be Y/N,” says the first one you see when you open the door to let them in. He doesn’t look a day over twenty-one—in fact, he could probably still pass as a college student—and has rather long dark hair that drapes over the sides of his face, covering the edges of his big doe eyes. “I’m Jungkook. This is Jimin and Hoseok.”

“Nice to meet you all,” you say, stepping aside so they can enter.

The shortest one, Jimin, grins in response, and Hoseok, behind him, gives you a wave. It’s refreshing enough as is, not having to exchange formal greetings and shake each other’s hands like you do with everyone else. Hoseok even gives you a bit of a nod, too.“You, too,” he says. “We’ve heard so much about you.”

Oh, have they, now? Interesting. 

“All good things, I hope,” you say awkwardly, forcing a small smile as Taehyung comes bounding into the room, ears perked up at the sound of his friends’ voices. 

“Definitely. Thanks for having us over. We didn’t wanna intrude on the sanctity of your new place,” Jungkook says, gesturing vaguely to the house as a whole. He’s got this excellent, genuine grin on his face, the kind that people who are just happy to be alive always wear. 

Already he’s said enough to charm the shit out of you. Who knew Taehyung’s friends could be so�� friendly? “Please, you’re welcome any time. I was just thinking Taehyung was getting a little lonely.”

“There he is!” Jimin shouts excitedly when he spots Taehyung behind the two of you, looking a lot more casual than he normally does when he’s alone with you, having abandoned his usual silky button-down and wide-leg slacks for a loose shirt and some sweatpants. You didn’t even know he had those things in his closet. 

“Hey, everyone’s here!” Taehyung exclaims, just as happy. He squeezes past you to give the three of them a big hug, and it almost makes you feel like you’re intruding on something you shouldn’t be in. Even though this is literally your house. 

“Nice place you got here,” Hoseok comments, eyes drifting around the living room. “Very minimalist, I like it.”

“Sure hope you don’t spill anything on those nice leather couches of yours,” Jungkook says. 

“Yeah, unlike Kook, who has spilled tomato soup on every shirt he’s ever owned,” Jimin jokes, earning laughs from Taehyung and Hoseok and a punch from Jungkook. 

“Moved after we married,” Taehyung says simply, shrugging his shoulders. It’s an easy enough explanation for why it doesn’t look at all lived in. Here’s hoping none of them realize you sleep in different bedrooms. 

“Yeah, congratulations on that, man,” Hoseok says, giving Taehyung a celebratory nudge in the shoulder. “Who’d have thought, out of the four of us, Kim Taehyung would be the first one to settle down.”

The way Taehyung’s body tenses up at that comment does not go unnoticed by you. 

“Seriously, I would have never guessed,” Jimin adds on. “You’re showing us a new side of yourself, Tae. But I’m happy for you.”

Normally, you’d probably take offense at such blatant insinuations that your husband was a former playboy, especially from his equally noncommittal friends. But truthfully, it’s not like you were blind to Taehyung’s transgressions either. And what matters most is the fact that since it was announced publicly, you are the only woman he’s been seen with since your engagement. 

“Me too. You seem to really like her. I’m glad,” Jungkook pipes up, sending a smile your way. You definitely feel like you don’t belong in this conversation. “I think the two of you will be good for each other.”

“Yeah, I hope so,” Taehyung says with a nervous chuckle. His eyes quickly shoot your way, the two of you meeting gazes, your hesitant expressions matching. At least the two of you are on the same page. “Alright, alright, enough,” Jungkook says. “Who’s ready to get their ass kicked in FIFA?”

“You’re on, Jeon. But when I win, you owe me a five-star dinner,” Hoseok challenges. 

“Deal.”

Hoseok, Jimin, and Jungkook immediately crowd towards the couch, and you take that as your cue to leave. But before you can disappear down the hallway, you and Taehyung look awkwardly at each other, hands tied. It’s not like you can say anything to them. 

The truth is that, sometimes, it’s easy to forget that not everyone else knows that your marriage is just for business. Sometimes it’s easy to forget that there are still people out there that believe you marry for love. 

Isn’t it crazy to think that you used to be one of those people, too?

“Hey,” Taehyung says when you meet up at the bottom of the stairs again. 

“Hey,” you respond. 

“You look nice.”

You scoff a little to yourself. What, are you exchanging compliments now? “Thanks,” you say, looking him up and down. “You’re not so bad yourself.” Like he ever is. 

“I knew you had taste,” Taehyung teases, and it’s the sort of comment that would have earned him a melon ball to the face back when the two of you were teenagers at a debutante ball, but today only earns him a roll of your eyes as you join hands. You don’t have anything big tonight—just a small dinner to celebrate some sort of business accomplishment for your family, which means that all you have to manage is not ending up in some sort of food fight by the end of the night. 

“I didn’t have a choice, did I?” You retort easily as you get into the car. 

You don’t normally speak a lot on the way to events. Not that you ever did, but even as your relationship has slowly faded from pure hatred to attempts at compromise, you both seem to relish in being able to stare out of your respective backseat windows and into the city that surrounds you. Just out of curiosity, about halfway through the ride you look towards Taehyung to see what he’s up to, and find yourself genuinely surprised to see him leaning against the window with his eyes closed. Is he sleeping? A couple more minutes of gazing at him tells you he is, because his body has gone lax and his breathing has evened out, soft snores leaving his mouth. This ride can’t be longer than twenty minutes. Has he not been sleeping well? Up in that enormous second-floor bedroom of his?

He’s awake by the time the car parks outside the restaurant, this fancy name brand steak place that was chosen solely because the biggest beneficiaries of your family’s new business deal are two sixty-year-old men whose entire diet consists of beef and beer. No cameras tonight, just a small family affair. You and Taehyung hold hands as you enter the restaurant and are led to the private room in the back anyway. 

You and him are seated on the far end of the long, rectangular table, alongside all of the other adult children dragged along to celebrate something that has no effect on their lives. But it’s nice, because the space alone prevents your parents from actively speaking with you, and you and Taehyung can stay in your own little bubble, only chiming in for a toast when necessary. 

“What are you going to get?” He asks you, the two of you gazing at the menu. No matter how fancy this place is, all the options seem to boil down to steak, steak, steak, steak, and caesar salad. Classic. 

“Oh, so you actually care now?” You counter, an eyebrow raised in amusement. 

Taehyung laughs. “Aren’t I supposed to?”

You narrow your eyes at him suspiciously, wise to his usual shenanigans. It’s hard to tell if Taehyung really means what he says, or if it’s all for show. But perhaps he’s asking because he’s genuinely curious, since no one else seems to be paying you any attention. 

“The choices on this menu are simply overwhelming,” you say, motioning to the six options in front of you. 

“I know, I’m so torn,” Taehyung jokes, making you huff out a little giggle. At least he’s still got that same sense of humor. 

You both end up going for a pretty classic steak dinner, which neither of the two of you finish because the damn portions are the size of your head. Dinner is, in and of itself, absolutely mindless, all of your parents talking about things that don’t concern you whatsoever, leaving you and Taehyung to your own devices as you desperately try to make the night go by faster. 

At one point, you notice Taehyung’s foot brushing up against yours, the leather of his loafers brushing against the toe of your patent heel. Thinking someone of it, you push back, foot nudging his back to his own chair. It’s not a second later that Taehyung retaliates, the two of you dancing around each other underneath the table. 

If the two of you were any younger, or perhaps any less resigned to your fate, there’s no doubt in your mind you would be attempting to get Taehyung to fall off his chair in an effort to do the same to you. Footsie means war. But when the both of you know that, at the end of the day, you’ll still be going home to the same place, and waking up the next morning in the same house, it doesn’t feel like this is a battle.

It’s just life. 

Eventually, you meet Taehyung’s eyes with a hesitant smile, shoe pressed against his, stuck in ceasefire. And for once, he doesn’t have that devilish look in his eye, that smug little grin on his face that tells you that he’s going to make you regret whatever it is you just did. He’s just smiling back at you, all pink lips, having found real fun in the little things. 

And that makes you happy. 

The rest of the dinner is uneventful, which, in your book, is about as good as a dinner can go. You cheers to the future of your parents’ relationship with their newfound partners and say a quick goodbye to them both, hurrying out of there before they can ask you any questions on your relationship with your husband. But you don’t spend the car ride in silence on the way back. 

Instead, you say, “Have you been sleeping well?”

The question seems to catch Taehyung off guard. He was already getting in position to take a power nap on the ride home, head pressed up against the window of the car. 

“What?”

“Have you been sleeping well?” You repeat. “I noticed you fell asleep on the way here.”

“Huh? Oh, yeah, I guess,” he says, a hand scratching the nape of his neck. “I mean, it’s been hard adjusting, I suppose. But I’ll get over it.”

Hard adjusting? You’ve been together for nearly three months now. Three months worth of sleeping in the same penthouse bedroom, on the same soft-as-a-cloud mattress, underneath the same weighted blanket. And he’s still having trouble? 

“Oh. I mean, I just wanted to ask because you seem really tired lately.”

“I got a lot on my plate, what can I say,” Taehyung says with an empty smile, forcing a chuckle. “I’ll be fine, seriously. You don’t have to worry about me.”

“Isn’t that my job?” You remind him. “I am your wife.”

Taehyung doesn’t say anything to that. He just lets out an audible breath, the kind you let out when you’re amused and have something snarky to say, but don’t have the energy to get the words off your tongue. 

The rest of the ride is pretty quiet. 

When you get home, you place your house keys in the bowl by the entrance and take off your shoes, just about ready to take a hot shower and collapse in bed, when Taehyung’s voice stops you. 

“Hey,” he begins, almost hesitantly. You look back at him inquisitively. “I was thinking, maybe, if you wanted, we could start sleeping in the same bed?”

You scrunch your nose up. Not in disgust, but in surprise. In bewilderment. What brought this on, all of a sudden?

“Really?” You ask, because you can’t help yourself. “I thought we liked the separate bed thing. Gives us privacy.”

“Yeah,” Taehyung says with a shrug, “but—I don’t know, it’s stupid. I just thought, you know, since we’re married and all. And it’s been three months.” He looks about two seconds away from backtracking, from shaking his head and going upstairs before you can say anything else. 

“Alright,” you say quickly, nodding your assent. Taehyung’s eyes widen when he hears the word, like he had completely expected you to shut him down the moment he made the suggestion. “If that’s what you want. We can try it.”

“You sure?” He asks, that same hesitant smile from earlier lacing his features. It’s strange. He almost looks… sweet. Nervous. 

You grin back at him. “Yeah, I am.”

Taehyung lets you grab some of your toiletries and your pajamas from your designated bedroom before you head up the stairs together, towards the bedroom he’s claimed for himself. Funnily enough, this is the first time you’ve been in his room. Three months of living together and you haven’t dared step foot on the second floor. 

You don’t know what you were expecting when he opens the door to let you inside. Maybe a room that screamed ‘Taehyung’ a little more than this one does. One that looks like an actual human has been living here. But other than one of his classic silk button-downs draped over a chair, there’s not a shred of evidence someone has actually been sleeping here. You could honestly be fooled rather easily that the shirt, too, is just decoration. 

“You can pick a side,” Taehyung says casually. He grabs his own sleepwear—an old t-shirt and some sweats—and heads into the bathroom to change. 

You wonder why Taehyung has had such a difficult time adjusting. This room is about as lavish as a bedroom can get. And yet. 

Sitting down on the left side of the bed, you begin to remove your own clothes, unzipping tonight’s dress and stepping quickly into your pajamas, hurrying to make sure Taehyung doesn’t catch you half-naked. How funny is that, you think to yourself. You’ve been married for three months and you still can’t bear the thought of Taehyung seeing you without a shirt on. 

When Taehyung comes out of the bathroom, hair all messy and clothes all casual, he grins lazily to himself. “I sleep on the right anyway,” he comments mindlessly. 

Within twenty minutes the both of you are about as ready to pass out as you have ever been, the only lights still on the ones on your respective nightstands. 

“Goodnight,” Taehyung says, reaching an arm over to switch his off. 

“Goodnight,” you tell him, turning off yours as well. And all of a sudden, the room is shrouded in darkness. 

You fall asleep instantly. 

When Taehyung wakes up the next morning, the first thing he says to you is that he hasn’t slept that well in ages. 

“You slept together?” Victoria shrieks, so loud you actually have to move your phone away from your ear as you punch in the code inside the elevator for access to your floor. 

“We did not sleep together,” you emphasize. “Okay, well, we sleep together, as in, in the same bed. But we are fully clothed. And not the slightest bit interested in doing anything other than sleeping.”

“I thought you said you liked having your own space,” Victoria points out. “When was the first time you—uh…” she pauses to find the right words, “shared a bed?”

“A couple weeks ago. It’s really not so bad, I don’t know why you’re so hung up over it,” you say, lips pursed. You squeeze the phone between the side of your head and your shoulder, hands full of shopping bags, the string of the handles burning your skin. Maybe you should look into getting a personal shopper. 

“I’m hung up over it because, for the longest time, you have sworn off Kim Taehyung. Called him dead to you. Insulted him every chance you get.” 

You scoff. You don’t need reminding of how much you hated him, how much you can’t believe you have to spend the rest of your life with him. “It’s different now. We’re married. And he said he wasn’t sleeping well. I felt bad.”

“He wasn’t?”

“Enough about him,” you say, shutting her up. You don’t feel like talking about him with Victoria anymore. “Word through the grapevine says that your parents are actually thinking of letting you start your own company?”

It’s enough to distract Victoria. For the rest of the ride in the elevator, she talks animatedly about a new streaming service her parents are considering letting her launch, under their parent business, of course, but it’s her own company nonetheless. And you’re proud of her. Proud she could do something your parents would never dream of letting you do. Proud she could make that happen. 

You push open the front door with the side of your hip after entering in the security code, phone still snug between your ear and your shoulder, when you hear Taehyung call out your name. 

He comes into view from the kitchen, which surprises you because you have, on multiple occasions, made fun of how much of a disaster chef he is, especially because he’s admitted to you he’s not a very good cook. 

“I made brownies,” he says, holding out a plate of the chocolate treats in front of you. Instinct has you dropping your bags on the floor by your feet and reaching out, but you eye him first, suspicious. 

“I have to go,” you tell Victoria, hanging up before she even gets a chance to object to your sudden departure. “You made these?”

“Yes, I did,” Taehyung says, rather proud. 

“And the kitchen is… still standing?” You ask, skeptical. 

Taehyung frowns at you, clearly unimpressed. “How bad of a chef do you think I am?”

“Pretty bad,” you admit with a shrug. 

Taehyung pouts sadly to himself for a moment. “These are good, I swear. Nothing weird in them like vegetables or anything either. I used a box mix.”

“No wonder they look so nice,” you comment snidely, hesitant hand reaching out to grab one. They feel like brownies. So that’s good. 

“Hey, I was the one who had to crack the eggs and shit. Three eggs! And not one eggshell in the bowl!” Taehyung says, clearly very pleased with himself. 

You laugh at his enthusiasm, taking a bite. It’s good. And exactly what you needed after a long day of shopping. “I’m proud of you. They taste good.”

“I knew you wouldn’t doubt me.” Taehyung grins.

“They’re really good, actually,” You amend, genuinely surprised. And the best part is that you can count at least ten brownies left on that plate, which means that you get at least five more. Which, if you had any less self-restraint, you would probably eat all at once within the day. 

“I’m glad you like them. They’re all for us, you know. No one else to share them with,” he says.

“Honestly, I’m probably going to finish them by tonight. You’ll have to make more tomorrow,” you say sheepishly. 

“We can make some together,” Taehyung suggests. 

“I’m looking forward to it,” you respond. The words come off your mouth easily, tumbling from your lips without you having to think about it. You aren’t saying them because you have to. You’re saying them because you want to. Because baking with Taehyung doesn’t actually sound too bad. Especially if it means more brownies. 

“You’ve, uh, you’ve got something,” Taehyung says, gesturing vaguely to the side of his lip. 

“Oh, I do? Yikes,” you say, a little embarrassed. Your hand comes up to wipe at the left side of your mouth. “Is it gone?”

“Wait, here, let me do it,” Taehyung says, reaching out towards you. He presses his palm against the side of your face, cradling your cheek and jaw in his enormous hands, and all at once it feels like your skin is on fire. 

Your body freezes up at the touch, at the way his thumb swipes at the corner of your mouth, right against your lips, wiping away nothing but a goddamn brownie crumb. You look at him, look right at him, how can you look anywhere else when he’s right in front of you like this, and it feels like you are caught in his gaze, a rain droplet trapped on a web, a bee stuck in its own honey. His big, brown eyes sparkle from the ceiling lights, a chocolate sky that mirrors the food he just made for you. He looks at you and his eyes are so soft, so open, so happy to be looking right back at you. God. 

“There,” he says, a moment too late. 

“Thanks,” you stammer out, speechless otherwise. 

You both stand there, looking at each other, wordless expressions drawn all over your faces, no idea what to do next. 

After a while, Taehyung breaks the silence. “Do you wanna order takeout tonight?”

“Okay,” you nod, still a little breathless. Taehyung smiles before retreating back to the kitchen, leaving you standing in the entranceway, shopping bags abandoned by your side. 

You look over to where he’s vanished. There’s a part of you that wishes he hadn’t left. A part of you that makes you want to see him again. 

Phone calls from your mother are never good. The last time she called… well, you know how that went. So when you see her contact information light up your home screen, it’s only instinct that you feel your heart rate spike. 

“Hello?” The voice that comes out doesn’t even sound like yours. 

There’s no good way to put what comes next. Your grandmother has died. Heart attack. The paramedics got there too late. It was over before it even started. 

For a moment, for a split second, it feels like everything is frozen. Like the world has come to standstill. Your mother’s voice echoes in your ears, suspended in time, the words turning into stone as they crash onto the floor. And when they do, it is as if everything comes back to life. 

Truth be told, you don’t know how long you stay there, sitting on the edge of the left side of the bed, your phone resting lifelessly in the palm of your hand. It feels at once like an eternity and only a second in time. You spoke to your grandmother two days ago. You had promised that you and Taehyung would visit her soon. How can this be happening?

Your phone buzzes relentlessly in your hands, condolences pouring in from every person in your contacts, sorry’s and heart emoticons and If you need anything, I’m always here’s filling up your screen. There’s a part of you that vaguely registers your mother, alongside some of the other members of your family, trying to call you. But nothing can seem to shake you. 

Until—

“Y/N? You still up here?”

You hear Taehyung before you see him. Hear his voice, hear his footsteps, hear the door creak open as he enters your bedroom. Slowly, almost sluggishly, you twist around to look at him, the mere act knocking the wind out of you. Or maybe you were already breathless. 

“Hey, you alright?” Taehyung knows instantly that something is wrong. 

“My grandmother died.” The words sit heavy on your tongue. There’s no point in not telling him. He’ll find out soon enough. He’s… he’s family, isn’t he?

“What?” Taehyung freezes in place. “I—I’m so sorry to hear that, Y/N. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” you say, voice weak but steady. You blink up at him, once, twice, three times, and then suddenly you feel tears running down your cheeks. 

Taehyung doesn’t say anything else. He rushes to your side and sits himself down on the bed next to you, arms wrapping around your body. And you don’t think about the fact that it’s him, about the fact that this is the closest the two of you have ever been. You just let yourself be engulfed in his frame, let yourself be enveloped in his hold as the tears stream down your skin, little hiccups jolting your throat. You close your eyes and press yourself into his arms, head resting against his chest, and wish so desperately that so many things about your life were just a little bit different. 

It must be at least five minutes before either one of you dares to move. Your phone begins to rattle incessantly, that familiar and insistent buzz that the both of you are hard-pressed to ignore. 

“I think you should answer that,” Taehyung whispers into your skin, lips right by your forehead. 

“Yeah,” you sniffle, sitting up next to him and wiping the remnants of wetness by your eyes. Well, Taehyung’s seen you cry. There’s no going back now. “You’re probably right.” You look down at the phone. It’s your father. 

“I’ll be downstairs, okay? Unless you want me to stay,” he offers, looking hesitant. 

You shake your head. “No, it’s—it’s okay. I’ll be fine.”

“Call me if you need me,” he makes you give him a nod of understanding before he finally gets up, hands slowly removing themselves from your skin, leaving little sparks in their wake. Remnants of warmth. Suddenly, you feel much colder. Hardly a minute later he’s out of the room, and you can hear his distant footsteps as they make their way down the stairs. 

Sighing, blinking, and swallowing all at once, you pick up. 

The call passes by in a blur. Your father says the will will take at least half a year to be executed, but that the funeral is already being planned. Your grandmother had hoped you would eulogize her. You agree, but you have no idea what you will say. He says Taehyung is invited but does not need to come if he cannot make it. He says a lot of other things too, about your mother, about your cousins, about your aunts and uncles and your poor grandfather, who passed five years ago, but you can’t even remember them moments after he’s said them. 

When he hangs up, the tears on your cheeks have dried, patches of them left along your skin. You head to the bathroom, getting off your bed for the first time that day, and try to wash away everything that has stained the morning. A part of you doesn’t even want to bother, just wants to slug downstairs and eat as much sugary cereal as you can get your hands on, but you can’t go down there looking like this. Looking so helpless. 

By the time you reach the kitchen, Taehyung is already standing there, on the opposite side of the counter island, a big stack of pancakes in front of him. They look mouth-watering. 

“Hey,” he says softly. “Thought you might want something to cheer you up.”

“Did you make these?” You ask, a little endeared. That was thoughtful of him. 

“Yeah. They’re still warm,” Taehyung says. He holds out a fork. 

You grin. 

The funeral is a week later. It sucks in every way that something can suck. But not in the same way your wedding sucked, or even the announcement of your engagement. It sucks because it’s a funeral, because you have to stare down your grandmother’s casket when a part of you still doesn’t even believe that she’s gone. Because everyone there is so sad, so melancholy, dressed in all black and looking down at their feet. Because everyone is so sorry for you, so sorry for your loss, everyone has nothing but condolences to offer you. What will those do? They won’t bring her back. They won’t change things. They won’t make you feel even the slightest bit better. 

Taehyung comes. He comes because he offers, and because you want him to. You want someone whose hand to hold. Want someone to smile at you when you’re speaking in front of your entire extended family and trying not to cry. You want someone who is familiar, and warm, and there for you. 

And most of all, you want someone who won’t keep the conversation going when you get home. 

“Do you wanna order Chinese?” He asks, coming into the living room, where you have been sulking on the couch ever since you stepped foot inside the door. 

“That sounds nice,” you force out. 

“Okay. Your usual?”

“Yes, please.” You don’t bother asking how Taehyung already remembers what you like to order when you’ve only gotten Chinese twice in the last three months. 

“I’ll call them.” He disappears off into the kitchen. 

What you do appreciate about Taehyung is how he has defaulted to food as a comfort measure, and how the thought alone genuinely brightens you up a little bit. You don’t know each other very well—still, after three months, you couldn’t even say his favorite color—but he is doing his best, and he is trying his hardest. In some ways, you were unlucky to marry him. To marry someone you didn’t love. To be forced into a union you had no say in, with someone you had so much antagonistic history with. 

But in some ways, your luck has changed. In some ways, marrying him was perhaps the best thing that could happen to you. Taehyung is snarky, a little devilish, and absolutely full of himself, but he is not thoughtless. He is not heartless. He has proven that he is willing to put in the work. That he can grow to care. To change. To compromise. And isn’t that the luckiest thing you could have gotten?

“I’m sure you’re probably sick of hearing people tell you they’re sorry for your loss.”

His voice breaks your reverie, carrying throughout the wide open space of your living room. He’s grinning honestly where he stands, slowly making his way over to you. 

“Kind of, yeah,” you admit. “It’s not going to bring her back. Most of those people probably don’t even mean it.”

“Don’t say that,” Taehyung says, sitting down next to you. “I’m sure they do.”

You look at him skeptically. 

“I mean, they’re sorry for your loss because that loss is causing you pain. And that sucks,” Taehyung explains, albeit a little less eloquently than you thought he would. “I know it sucks for me.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t like seeing you sad,” Taehyung says honestly, shrugging to himself. 

You scoff a little to yourself. “I would have thought my downfall would be the exact thing the great Kim Taehyung would wish for himself.”

“Maybe a couple of years ago.”

You narrow your eyes. 

“Okay, maybe even a few months ago,” Taehyung admits with a laugh, making you smile, ever so slightly. “But it’s different now. I like it when you’re happy. When you’re snarky and funny and a little evil. Seeing you like this… I don’t like the way it makes me feel.”

“That’s called empathy,” you point out. 

“I’m trying to tell you that seeing you sad makes me sad, stop being a smartass,” Taehyung chides, and that really makes you grin. “There. There’s that smile I was looking for.”

“You’re so annoying,” you say, even though there’s no malice behind it. You give him a little push, palms of your hand pressing lightly against his shoulder as you roll your eyes. 

“Only for you,” he promises. He manages to grab a hold of your wrist as your hand meets his torso, pulling you into him as he wraps an arm around your torso. You gasp a little at the sensation, head falling against his body, fitting snugly in the crook of his neck. He gives your side a comforting rub. “I’m sorry today was so shitty.”

“It was,” you agree. “But Chinese food will make it a little bit better.”

Taehyung looks positively scandalized. “What? ‘Chinese food will make it better’? But not your loving, doting husband?” 

You pretend to think for a little bit, tilting your head up to the sky as you tap your chin with your finger. “Okay. Maybe that, too,” you cave after a bit of waiting, just to be extra bothersome. 

“That’s what I thought,” Taehyung says proudly, looking down at you, eyes sparkling. You can feel his grip tighten as he presses you against his body, letting you rest your head on his side. It feels like the longest hug ever, like you’re wrapped up in a weighted blanket. Only it’s not a blanket. It’s Taehyung. It’s your husband. 

He’s your husband.

“Tomorrow will be better,” he says, and it sounds a lot like a promise. 

You nod against him, letting your eyes drift shut. Things are pretty awful right now. Your grandmother’s dead. The funeral was the saddest family event you have ever attended. You have no idea what’s supposed to happen next. 

But he’s right. He seems to be right a lot these days, actually. 

Tomorrow will be better.

Taehyung lets you sleep in for the next few days. Next several days, actually. Every time you wake up it’s close to noon and your husband is nowhere to be seen, the right side of the bed cold to the touch. It’s nothing to be worried about, though, because you can still see the noticeable dip in the bed from where he lies upon it, sinking his weight into the mattress. Taehyung’s an early bird and you’ve been having fitful nights ever since your grandmother passed. 

Today, you pull yourself out from underneath the covers around noon, sluggish and still tired, squinting as the near-afternoon light streams through the enormous windows of the bedroom. Taehyung must have thought to keep the curtains open today. 

You pull on the first casual clothes you see in your shared closet, some wide-leg sweatpants and a drapey t-shirt, and trudge downstairs like a raccoon to a trash can, hoping to fish through the kitchen cabinets to find something to eat. 

Taehyung is, as far as you can tell, nowhere to be seen. You can’t seem to hear him anywhere, and a part of you wonders where he’s at when you stumble upon the note left on the granite counter. 

Had a meeting downtown, be back around 1! There should be smoked salmon and some cream cheese and bagels in the fridge. 

Taehyung.

You chuckle to yourself as you read his flowy handwriting, amused that he thought to let you know of, of all things, the available breakfast foods in the kitchen. You check the clock. It’s nearly noon. Which means you have just over an hour of the house all to yourself. 

Having the house to yourself for five minutes is infrequent enough as it is, let alone for a whole hour. So often is Taehyung around, somewhere, holing himself up in one of the dozens of rooms or mindlessly wandering down the hallways. And for how much Taehyung is present, the funny part is that you still have no idea what he gets up to most of the time. Despite your voluntary abandoning of the separate bedroom rule, the two of you are still firm proponents of the sanctity of your personal spaces. There are rooms in the penthouse Taehyung has never been in, rooms filled with your clothes and makeup and accessories for when stylists come over before an event. A sewing room that you had specifically asked your parents for, because a part of you never let go of that childhood dream of being a fashion designer. 

And there are rooms in the penthouse that you have never been in. Rooms with dark wooden doors that have always been kept closed, that you have never stepped foot in. It’s not that you aren’t curious as to what Taehyung gets up to. He could have a goddamn evil lair in one of those rooms and you would be none the wiser. But you don’t go, because he doesn’t go into your rooms. Because you two, despite all the vows you have broken, promised each other you wouldn’t.

An hour to yourself is almost a good enough excuse for you to head back up to the bedroom and take a nap. Not that you don’t get enough sleep on a regular basis, or that you even had a fitful night last night—hell, you woke up near noon today and already you want to go back to sleep—but what else is there to do when he’s not around? What new freedoms have suddenly been given to you?

You head back upstairs, much less groggy after that delicious bagel of yours, when you catch a whiff of what smells like wet paint coming from down the hallway. It’s potent and immediately invades your senses, prompting you to wonder if that has always been there, or just magically appeared. Maybe you were so sleepy earlier, you didn’t notice it. 

Well, you notice it now. Unable to help yourself, you start to wander down the hallway, towards the source of the smell. God, it stinks. It takes you back to those days in middle school, when you would spray paint projects inside a tiny little classroom, have to step outside for fifteen minutes while you cracked the windows and aired it out. It gets stronger the further down the corridor you go, like a thick, smelly cloud stationed firmly within the walls of the penthouse. And then you realize where it’s coming from. 

It’s an art studio. 

A very messy art studio, you amend to yourself, as you peek inside. The door is wide open, and all of the windows are popped too, but the extra air circulation doesn’t seem to have made a dent in the scent. And all over the floor, the walls, and the tables are canvases covered in paint, denim jackets and pants and shirts with these wide, unafraid brushstrokes. Open cans of spray paint lie discarded on the hardwood floor stained with splotches of red, yellow, and green. 

Is this what Taehyung does in his free time? Is this where he goes, this bright, sunny room at the end of the second floor hallway? Is this what he is making?

You look down in awe at the clothes resting on the floor, splayed out to maximize dry time. Abstract faces, landscapes, and words are painted onto the backs of jackets, the fronts of old white t-shirts. What hasn’t made it onto the clothes has been put on canvases instead, blurs of color mixed together in this purposeful pattern, confidence emanating from every stroke, every dot. It’s not art in the way that the gorgeous landscapes of Monet, the picture-perfect portraits of Kahlo, the messy, unplanned splatters of Pollock are. It’s art in a different way. In a Taehyung way. 

Who knew he loved it so much? 

You almost feel like an invader encroaching on his territory when you lean down to start cleaning up some of the mess, throwing out empty spray-paint cans and tossing out grey paint water. You don’t dare touch any of the work, don’t dare try to move it. You do what you can, washing out the brushes resting in the water and cleaning up the wet splotches of paint on the hardwood. Over time, the thick scent of still-wet paint slowly fades, disappearing out the window as the fresh afternoon air seeps in. And you stand there, in a room full of art, in a room full of pieces that Taehyung has undoubtedly poured his heart into creating, and you smile to yourself. 

That’s how Taehyung finds you ten minutes later, peering into the room after declaring that his meeting had ended early. 

“Thought I’d find you in here,” Taehyung says with a grin as you jump at the sound of his voice, eyes widen when you turn around to see him standing by the door. 

“Oh, hey,” you say sheepishly. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

“Maybe because this is the farthest room in the house from the front door,” Taehyung teases lightly, coming up behind you. “I see you found my studio.”

“I know I’m not allowed in here,” you admit. 

Taehyung scoffs. “Who says?”

“Didn’t we both agree on that?”

He shrugs. “Sort of. I think we just reached an unspoken understanding we wouldn’t invade each other’s personal space. But it was not in the fine print, no.”

“The fine print of what?”

“That deal we made.”

Right. That deal you made, four months ago, That deal, where the two of you agreed to pretend to be in love with each other during public appearances so you wouldn’t get burned at the stake by your families. Where the two of you agreed not to interact with each other otherwise because you hated each other so much. 

“Oh, yeah,” you say distantly, feeling naive for already forgetting about it. It doesn’t seem to have slipped Taehyung’s mind whatsoever. 

“It’s okay, I don’t mind that you’re up here,” Taehyung says, interrupting that piercing little voice in the back of your head that is asking you why on earth you forgot about that deal in the first place.

“Yeah, I—” You scratch at the nape of your neck, trying to find the words to say. “It just smelled like paint, so I wanted to see what you get up too. And it’s this, apparently.” You motion vaguely to the entire room.

“You sound… surprised,” Taehyung muses correctly. 

“I guess I am,” you surmise. “I’m rather impressed, too, actually.”

“Really?” It’s Taehyung’s turn to sound surprised. 

“Yeah,” you tell him honestly, looking into his eyes. “I—you know, I just came in here because the entire hallway smelled like wet paint and I wanted to know why. But I didn’t know you loved art so much.”

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me,” Taehyung points out. 

You suppose that’s true. You don’t know his favorite color. His favorite song. His favorite book. For a long time, you didn’t know what he got up to on his side of the penthouse. You don’t know how he met his friends. What he studied in university. Who he has loved in the past. Who he loves now. You don’t know why he does the things he does, and why he doesn’t do the things he doesn’t do. 

But you do know his Chinese takeout order. 

And you do know his hobbies. Well, one of them, at least. 

Who’s to say you can’t learn more?

“Well,” you start with a smile. “I’m your wife, aren’t I? Shouldn’t I begin to learn?”

Taehyung picks up what you’re putting down instantly, grinning in response. “Only if you’ll tell me things about you, too,” he requisitions. 

“I will,” you promise. It’s the easiest one you’ve ever had to make. 

His face is light, bright, bathed in the rays of the afternoon sun. His eyes shimmer as they meet yours, golden flecks more pronounced like this, in this gorgeous, open space, daylight streaming through the windows. Looking at him makes you feel like you are surrounded by warmth, makes you feel like the sun is opening its arms out to you. He has always been gorgeous. Beautiful. But looking at him like this, standing in the middle of a room filled with all the things he loves, a yellow halo surrounding him—he is ethereal. 

Taehyung smiles. “Then I will, too.”

The hand-holding comes naturally tonight.

The funny thing is, actually, you don’t need to hold hands at this gathering. It’s not an event. Or a public appearance. It’s not even a business dinner. It’s your aunt’s sixtieth birthday party, reserved exclusively for family. Isn’t that strange? That Taehyung is, technically, family now?

For so long you had vowed to stay as far away from him as possible. Vowed to stick it to him whenever and wherever you could, do anything you could to get on his nerves, rile him up. Vowed that when you, one day, took over your family affairs, you would never, ever invite him. Make it known that he wasn’t to be a part of your life. And yet, here you are. Clinging to him despite being well-acquainted with—loved by, even—every other person in the room. Holding his hand like a goddamn lifeline. 

To be fair, Taehyung doesn’t look a hair out of place here. Dressed relatively casually, a smart sweater with a collared shirt underneath it, he smiles warmly at all of your relatives and presents your aunt with a beautiful and very expensive scarf the two of you had commissioned from a designer in Italy, which she absolutely loves. She pinches his cheek and proceeds to wear it for the rest of the night. 

“Damn,” you murmur to yourself as you wander around your aunt’s house, hand wrapped around his arm. “This place hasn’t changed a bit.”

“When was the last time you were here?” Taehyung asks. 

The question actually makes you think for a moment. “I don’t know, maybe five years ago? Last couple of birthdays I was overseas or in school. Had to send her a card.”

“Bet your parents were real pleased with that,” he jokes, making you both laugh. At least you two will always be able to share your experiences of domineering and influential parents with each other. 

“Oh, I’m sure. Just as pleased as they were when they realized how much we hated each other.” You expect that little jest to elicit a laugh out of Taehyung as well, but he just smiles tightly, huffing out a breath of acknowledgement. 

“Eh, it’s not like that now, is it?” He offers up. 

“I suppose not,” you muse, sitting down together on her ancient grandma couch in the living room. No matter how rich your family gets, she’ll never get rid of this thing, that’s for sure. 

One thing you’ve picked up over time is that, for every second Taehyung spends basking in the spotlight, he spends an equal amount of time lingering by the wall, watching the rest of the world turn without him. He’s an observer. He is one by nature, feeling an irresistible pull to understand humans in a way only artists could ever do. He sits down next to you and watches your family in an environment where they can relax, where they can feel comfortable and be casual with one another. 

Very seldom have you ever brought friends to events like these. Small family affairs. But Taehyung isn’t a friend, is he? No, he’s your husband. He belongs here just as much as you do. 

“My family seems to really like you,” you point out. Not that anybody has ever harbored as much disdain for him as you. Your parents called him respectable and polite when they told you you were to be wed. Your grandmother had said he was a dashing young man. He doesn’t exactly have to reach far to be loved around here. 

“That’s my job, isn’t it?” He replies snidely. 

“Oh, just take the compliment,” you say with a roll of your eyes. Taehyung always has to be so difficult. “I’m surprised you aren’t nervous as hell. Last boyfriend I brought to meet my parents was shaking in his Louis Vuitton shoes.”

“Last boyfriend, huh?” Taehyung’s interest has been sufficiently piqued. “And, uh, how many of those have you had?”

You narrow your eyes at him suspiciously, smile twitching on your lips. “Wouldn’t you like to know, Mr. Heartbreaker.” Pretty rich of Taehyung to be asking you such a question when he’s probably had more girlfriends than you can count on both hands. “Not as many as you’ve had girlfriends, that’s for sure.”

“Guess I’m a lot different than all those trashy guys you’ve dated, aren’t I?” He asks, an eyebrow raised as he looks at you. 

“You are?”

Taehyung nods assertively. “Well, yeah. First of all, I’m your husband. Second of all, your parents love me. Third of all, you love me, too.”

You scoff. “Don’t humble yourself. You don’t know me that well.”

“Speaking of which,” Taehyung says, eyes wide as he points to you knowingly, “how about you tell me a little fact about yourself? It’s my job to learn about you, isn’t it?”

“That is my line, watch it,” you sneer, pointing back at him. You wrack your brain for a fact that you can tell him, something more exciting than your favorite color but less weird than one of those terrible icebreaker exercises you had to do in college seminars. Something that has pertinence to who you are. Who you’ve become. “Alright. I used to want to be a fashion designer when I was little.”

Now that catches Taehyung off guard. “Really?” He says, genuinely intrigued. 

You shrug. “Yeah. I learned to sew when I was really little. Been tailoring and hemming clothes all my life. But I always wanted to design my own stuff.”

“Is that what’s in your room?” Taehyung asks. “A sewing machine?”

“Bingo.”

“Wow,” Taehyung says. “I didn’t know that.”

“Isn’t that the whole point of this exercise?” You say, just to be smart. 

Taehyung shakes his head, eyes rolling. 

“What about you?” You ask. You can’t imagine what he’ll say. Astronaut. Veterinarian. Or, if he really wants to surprise you, a business executive. 

“A museum curator.”

It is an answer that simultaneously surprises and doesn’t surprise you at all. 

“Fitting,” you muse. “You could have put your own art on display.”

“Pretty sure that’s, like, super unethical,” Taehyung reminds you. 

“So? You’re rich. Start your own museum. Put your own art on display. Live your dream,” you amend. “It shouldn’t be holed up in that studio of yours forever. It deserves to be seen.”

Taehyung smiles at you. “You think so?”

You nod. “Of course. You create beautiful things, Tae.” It’s the first time you’ve ever called him that. And that is not lost on Taehyung, either.

“Thank you,” he says softly, blinking as he looks at you. He doesn’t say anything else. He doesn’t need to.

Later that night, when everyone’s gotten a few drinks into their systems and Bruce Springsteen is playing low on the stereo, Taehyung disappears off towards the bathroom, no doubt because of the excellent soup that was served that night. All by your lonesome, you feel a little stranded, surrounded by your old relatives dancing on the hardwood floor of the dining room, your other cousins too young to actually spend time with. 

In the commotion, your mother comes up to you, swirling a rather large glass of red wine in her hand. 

“Where’s Taehyung?” She asks. 

“Bathroom.”

“No wonder you were alone,” she says with a hearty laugh. “The two of you have been glued to each other’s sides all evening.”

“He’s my husband,” you offer as an explanation. 

“I know, I know,” she says, shaking you off with a smile. Your mother is a lot more casual once she’s had her fill of wine, no doubt her favorite, Bordeaux. A lot more loving, too. “You really made your grandmother proud, you know? She loved you so much.”

“I know,” you say, trying not to get choked up at the mere mention of your grandmother. 

“She was so happy to see you with Taehyung. It made her feel safe that you would be taken care of,” she continues on, barely paying you and your swimming eyes any attention. “She would be so happy to see you with him now, too. How much you love her.”

“I miss her,” you hiccup out, trying to compose yourself. Nothing kills a birthday party like some sad sack crying over her deceased grandmother. 

“I know, darling,” your mother says, calling you by a nickname she has hardly used ever since you turned eighteen. She squeezes you tightly, a small hug of comfort. “I miss her, too.”

Someone calls your mother’s name, distracting her as she wanders off to your uncle, who is asking what the best way to cut the three-tiered cake on the dining room table is. She bids you a goodbye before disappearing towards the kitchen, no doubt ready to make the cutting of the cake an affair all on its own. 

Taehyung comes back soon after, spotting you instantly as you stand around in the living room. 

“Hey,” he says, noticing the wet shimmer of your eyes. “You alright?”

You nod, feeling better already now that he has returned. Now that he is by your side. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“I hope those tears aren’t because you missed me,” he says, wiping away a stray one that has escaped from your eyes. You close them as his thumb brushes against your upper cheek, your eyelashes, opening them only when you’ve felt his touch vanish from your skin, leaving little sparks in their wake. 

“No,” you say. But the night makes you honest, and a couple of drinks, even more so. “But I’m glad you’re here.”

Taehyung smiles. “Me, too.”

For all those days you have spent together, never have you and Taehyung had a night in. Which isn’t necessarily completely surprising, considering how many evening events the two of you have had obligations to attend, considering your differing work schedules and meeting times. Considering that, for a very long time, the two of you had no desire to spend any time with each other at all. 

But tonight, there is nothing on your calendar. No galas, no dinners, no meetings, no schedules. There is only Taehyung, who has spent the entire afternoon up in his studio, inhaling spray paint fumes and doing what he loves. And there is only you, who has spent the entire afternoon wondering what the hell you’re going to do tonight when there is nothing else planned. 

You knock on the door to his studio, catching him right as he’s finishing up another piece. This one is a single flower, painted in broad, confident strokes, bright green and red and sunflower yellow decorating the canvas. 

“Hey, what’s up?” He asks, turning around to face you. 

“Wanna order takeout tonight?” You suggest. 

Taehyung grins. 

Thirty minutes and your favorite Chinese food later, you and Taehyung have settled onto the couch, trays of dumplings and noodles and rice in front of you, an unfunny movie playing in the background. 

You can’t remember the last time the two of you sat on this couch together. Maybe that night you had made the deal? Perhaps not even then. It wouldn’t at all surprise you if you found out that this was the very first time you and Taehyung have sat together on your couch, in your living room, in your house. So often is it occupied by others—Victoria, who sometimes comes over to ooh and ahh at your closet, Jimin, Jungkook, and Hoseok, who sit on this couch and play FIFA like it’s their job, your mother, when she wants to make herself at home in a place that doesn’t belong to her—but never you. Never you and him. 

“This is kinda nice, isn’t it?” You ask, swallowing a bite of dumpling. 

“Chinese food is always nice,” Taehyung responds over a mouthful of cold noodles. 

“Not that,” you say with a sigh, “this. Sitting together. Watching this shitty movie.”

“It’s not that shitty,” Taehyung tries to reason. On screen, the main character is getting pied in the face during some weird college fundraiser. “Okay, it’s a little shitty. But it’s good background noise, right?”

You nod halfheartedly. “I guess.” Silence. You take another bite of your dumpling, not really sure how to continue the conversation. “We don’t really get to do this a lot, you know? Sit and eat dinner and watch a movie together. Like a date.”

“We’re on a date now, are we?” Taehyung muses, eyeing you snarkily. 

“Isn’t that what this is?” You retort. 

He shrugs. “I suppose it is.”

“Tell me another fact about you,” you request, looking over to him where he sits on the opposite side of the couch. 

“About what?”

“Anything.”

Taehyung pauses, ponders for a moment. But he could never say anything wrong. Not when there is still so much you don’t know about him. Still so much you want to learn, so much you want to commit to memory. For so long you have stared at the planes of his face, the curve of his nose, the twinkle in those dark brown eyes. Those you will always remember. But what about who he is? What he loves? Those are things you still don’t know. 

“The very first time I met you,” Taehyung begins, “I asked Jimin what your name was.”

“When was that?” You ask. Despite you being someone who has spent the better part of the last several years vowing never to give Taehyung the time of day, you sure don’t remember when it all started. 

“That debutante ball,” Taehyung remembers fondly, “when we were fifteen. I asked Jimin what your name was because I wanted to ask you to dance.”

“Shut up, no you didn’t,” you say with a scoff. 

“It’s true. You were standing there in that poofy white dress and I wanted to ask you to dance,” Taehyung points out. The fact that he even remembers what you were wearing is shocking. 

Who knew. Who knew, back then, that you would one day grow up to marry him. 

“And what did I say?” You demand more. 

Taehyung laughs at the memory. “I came up to you, and I asked you if you wanted to dance, and you said, and I quote, ‘Who are you?’”

“No,” you say, aghast at your own behavior. Were those really the first words you ever said to KIm Taehyung?

“You did. Don’t you remember?”

You think back. Think back to every year you have ever known Taehyung, every year you have spent scowling at him from across ballroom floors, making some snide remark as you pass by each other in the hallway. Every year you have spent cursing his existence, willing him away from you so he could bother someone else. Every year you have listened to rumor after rumor of girlfriend after girlfriend. You think back and somewhere, somewhere in there, in those dusty corners of your brain and cobwebbed boxes of your heart, is that first memory of Taehyung, too. 

Of him standing there in some generic black suit, black hair swept over his forehead, shoes too big. Of him coming up to you, trying to be as suave as a fifteen year old could be. Of you saying to him, instead of a hello, or even a what’s your name, “who are you?” 

Of him saying—

“And you said, ‘your dream come true’.” Like a dam bursting open, the memories flood back to you all at once. “I remember that.”

Taehyung laughs out loud at the thought of him saying something so cheesy. “Unsurprisingly, you didn’t want to dance with me.”

“You were so—” you begin, but you don’t have the words. Don’t have the words to express how you felt about him that night. Don’t have the words to express how you feel about him now. Thinking about this, talking about it, it is a bridge. A bridge between what was then and what is now. A bridge between who Taehyung was and who you were and who Taehyung is and who you are. “—so unthinkable. I couldn’t believe you had come up to me and said that. I couldn’t believe you had the audacity. But something about that night made me remember you. Made me remember your name.”

“You thought about me after that?” Taehyung asks. “Is that what you’re telling me?”

“There is something about you that is unforgettable,” you say, honest and real and true. What else can you tell him? The truth is that you have always thought about him. Whether you liked him or not. 

You finish your dinner and place your trays on the end tables next to you, stacking your empty bowls and plates on top of one another as the movie rumbles on in the background. 

“It is kind of a shitty movie,” Taehyung admits after a while of being wholly unenthused. 

“Yeah,” you agree. “But it’s good background noise.”

Taehyung laughs at your little mockery, warm and deep and from his belly. You look at him. He feels so far away, on the other side of the couch. Feels like he’s miles apart from you. You have spent countless nights clinging to his harm, hand gripped tight in his. And sitting like this, a full couch cushion of space between the two of you—it isn’t enough anymore. So you inch closer. 

And closer. 

And a little closer. 

Until you’re pressed up against his side, legs touching as they rest neatly in front of you, backs stick straight as you stare at the television. 

Taehyung holds his arm up. An open invitation. 

Without asking, you lean into him, resting your head in the crook of his shoulder, in the space right underneath his jaw. You pull your feet up onto the couch and curl into his frame, pressing yourself against him. He is warm and firm and inescapable. He smells of coffee and paint and Chinese spices. He wraps his arm around you and pulls you in, as if there were any other place you’d rather be. 

You sit like that for a while. Wrapped up in each other. Lazing around on the couch as the stars twinkle above your head. The movie ends and the two of you don’t even bother skipping the credits, letting them and the cheesy 80’s pop song play on, a distant soundtrack. 

“I never thought any of this would happen,” you breathe out. 

Taehyung looks down at you curiously. “What? This?”

“All of it,” you admit. “Us. Getting married. That stupid tabloid picture. My grandmother. This. It’s all so new.”

“New things will happen all the time,” Taehyung muses aloud. “We can’t help when things change.”

“You don’t have any regrets?” You have plenty. Regrets that you’ll never become the CEO you wanted to be in college. Regrets that you’ll never become the fashion designer you wanted to be as a little girl. Regrets that you will come to resent this marriage, resent Taehyung more than you have in years past, all because you had no choice. Regrets that your grandmother couldn’t see you now. Regrets that there were so many things in your life you could have changed, but didn’t.

“I thought I did,” Taehyung tells you. “I wanted to spend more time with my friends. I wanted to major in art in college. I didn’t want to marry you. I know you didn’t want to marry me.” He looks down and you look up at the same time, eyes locking, inches apart. “But looking back on it, I’m happy where I am. With what I have.”

“I never thought it could ever be like this,” you say, words falling off your tongue before you even ask them to.

“What?”

“Us.”

There’s no need to elaborate. Taehyung understands. He understands that, half a year ago, you both would have thrown yourselves into a volcano before holding hands with each other. He understands that getting over your hatred for each other seemed like an absolutely insurmountable task. He understands that you had never wanted to marry each other, that you couldn’t believe you would have to spend the rest of your lives with each other. 

And he understands that now, things are different. 

“I’m glad things happened the way they did,” Taehyung begins. “I’m grateful for us.”

You press yourself impossibly closer to him, feel his grip tighten around you. Like this, you can hear his heartbeat. Hear it thump like a drum, steady and firm and unwavering. His heart beats against his chest and you wonder. 

You wonder if he can hear the way yours beats for him, too.

There were lots of things that made your night in together special. But one of them is the glaring fact that you don’t get them very often. That their infrequency makes them all the more valuable. 

This has become blatantly obvious to you, because right now you are not spending a night in together. Right now you are stuck at a gala that you have to attend for the sake of business, drinking thin flutes of champagne and mingling with people you barely speak to. 

The one good thing about nights like these is that Taehyung looks positively gorgeous in suits. He sort of always has, but you’d never admit that to his face. At least not until now. And as his wife, you are lucky enough to have a front-row seat. 

“I can feel you staring at me all the way from over here,” Taehyung deadpans as he helps himself to a chocolate-covered strawberry from the buffet table. 

You’re too obvious to have any shame about it. “What can I say, I like the view.”

“Hard to believe I was the once the one being shouted at for being inappropriate in public,” Taehyung says with a shake of his head. He bites into the strawberry and eats it all in a single go, tossing the stems into a bin nearby as you join back up in the heart of the crowd. 

“It’s only inappropriate if other people hear,” you tease, letting him guide you, hand intertwined with yours, towards an empty corner where the two of you can snuggle up to one another in (relative) peace. 

“I don’t think the champagne was very good for your filter, Miss Y/N,” Taehyung hisses into your ear, warm breath tickling your skin. 

“Don’t you mean Mrs. Kim?” You pose, an eyebrow raised. 

That seems to do something to Taehyung. It’s not very bright in here, with it being nighttime and all, but even still you can see the way his eyes darken. See the way his lips curl upwards, feel the way his grip on you tightens. It sparks something within you. Something deep in the pit of your belly. 

Something that makes you want more. 

You test the waters. “Mrs. Kim has a nice ring to it, don’t you think, Tae?”

Taehyung looks about a moment away from losing control. But instead of slamming you against the wall in front of all of these people and giving you what you really want, he growls out, low and powerful, “Home. Now.”

He doesn’t need to tell you twice. 

You hail your car outside of the venue and it’s all the both of you can do to not jump on each other right then and there, in the backseat of this giant black van, overcome with want, with need, with everything in between. Taehyung’s leg bounces impatiently the entire ride back, and the feeling of your hand pressed against his doesn’t seem to be calming him down. He pulls you close to him in the backseat of the car, a hand resting on your thigh. You eye him carefully, as if challenging him to be any more daring. He grins. 

Home cannot come soon enough. The two of you tumble out of the backseat and into the elevators, where you mash the top floor button after entering in the security access code, desperate and shameless. The ride seems to take hours, and the heat that surrounds you practically smothers you, covers you, fills up your lungs and chokes you. 

There is nothing left by the time you reach your door. The moment it slams shut behind you Taehyung presses you up against the back of it, pins you against the wood as he hovers over you, eyes tracing your lips. 

“Tell me something,” he demands. 

“What?” 

“A fact. Something I don’t know.”

It doesn’t take much thinking. “I want you,” you breathe out, watch it hit his skin, watch the way his eyes glint in the light of the entranceway. “Please, Tae. I want you.”

It’s enough for him. 

This is not the first time you and Taehyung have kissed. The first time was nearly five months ago, in a chapel, at an altar, surrounded by hundreds of people. It was so unfun that you seem to have eradicated the mere thought from your memory. But you remember that feeling from that day. That feeling you got when you pressed your lips against his, cemented your marriage with a kiss. That heat. That sting. 

Kissing him now—that feeling has returned tenfold. When his lips meet yours, it feels like fire is rushing through your veins, setting alight every nerve it passes, unforgiving and relentless. His enormous hands come up to cup your jaw, fingers pressing against the skin of your cheeks as they pull you close to him, keep you trapped in his hold. This is not the first time you and Taehyung have kissed but it feels like it is—it feels like there is a lotus blooming on a lilypad in your heart, it feels like you have been struck by lightning, it feels like nothing else you have ever felt before. It feels brand new. 

Pressing back against him, he slowly releases you from the cage he has created against the door, spinning around so the two of you can tumble up the stairs and into your bedroom, unable to resist sneaking in pecks here and there as you make your way upstairs. Every step you take you stop, giggle as he presses you against the railing just so he can steal another kiss from you, put his hands all over your body. It’s a wonder the two of you even make it into your bedroom at all. 

When you do, however, all bets are off. Taehyung presses you against the still-made bedsheets with a glint in his eye and a growl on his lips, pupils blown wide as he stares down at you, at your body.

"Aren't you a sight? Laid out so pretty for me," he purrs, robbing a breath from you.

It's a tone you have yet to hear from him. You find yourself growing impossibly hot under his stare, burning with an uncharted desire.

You can hardly wrap your brain around it. Here you are, craving the man you had spent the better half of your young adult life loathing. Maybe it’s the champagne; maybe it’s the way his fingers are running slowly up the length of your clothed torso. Whatever it is, your stomach does flips, unfamiliar to the way your body preens under his touch.

"Don't let it go to your head," you tease, simply because you could.

Taehyung hums disapprovingly, pressing kisses into your neck as he grabs one of your thighs and wraps it around his waist, riding your dress up in the process.

You sigh, exposing your neck further for him as he paints bruises into your neck. It feels like just yesterday you had called him out at the altar for his habit of sporting the very same marks you were soon to wear.

Perhaps you should have thought twice about letting the man you had married purely under business pretenses press his hips against your clothed center, but as he rolls his into yours, your mind falls blank, silencing any and all reservations you should have.

Whimpering, you beckon his mouth back onto yours, tongue meeting his wantonly. 

You feel his fingers creep up the outside of your bare thigh, thrilling you in the most primal way. Reaching the band of your underwear after what felt like entirely too long, he runs the pad of his thumb against the lacy fabric.

 You could scream. He is doing this on purpose. He must be. Surely he knows how badly you were aching for him? For him to fill you– whatever the manner may be.

You let out a whine before you can help yourself, frowning as Taehyung looks pleased with himself, confirming his knowledge of your prolonged pleasure.

"What's that? Did you say something?" he mocks, looking cruel and yet strikingly gorgeous as he smirks above you.

"God, you're irritating,” you huff, hips jerking up against his as he pulls at the band of your underwear, the elastic snapping back into the flesh of your hip. "Just fuck me already."

He tuts, clearly unimpressed by your impatience, "Now, where is the fun in that?"

Your eyes flutter shut as his fingers suddenly snake their way between your thighs. Mouth falling ajar, you grip his shoulders as he runs his middle finger against your clothed slit, trailing up and down your warmth. To think he was still dressed while he was touching you like this...

"No... I think I'll take my time with you," he says.

You mew against his hand, arousal forming against his long digits' ministrations. You have to hand it to him. Taehyung knows what he’s doing. The life of a bachelor has seemingly served him well.

You aren’t usually vocal in bed, but the way he’s purring words of filth to you, breath hot against the shell of your ear as he tells you how hot and slick your pretty pussy felt against his hand, has you gasping and sputtering, your own fingers wrapping around his wrist.

The fabric of your panties provides a friction that toys the line of pleasure and pain, making you thrust up to meet his motions, your humility slipping from you.

Taehyung watches you intently, cock growing hard under the constraints of his dress pants. You look better than he could've imagined, eyes watering and body shivering under his touch, his fingers soaking with your arousal. He can only imagine what you'd feel like with his fingers fully buried into you, rocking them against your velvety walls.

He lets out a groan of his own, turned on by the idea of you fucking yourself onto his fingers, whimpering out his name in ecstasy.

There’s this part of you that faintly recognizes that Taehyung has done this plenty of times before. Plenty of times with plenty of other lovers. But there is a different part of you, that part that bursts with light and hope, that reminds you that he was never married to those other ones. That his allegiance lies with you. And that thought, knowing that deep within you, he is yours, makes your jaw fall slack, pretty noises tumbling from your lips and your thighs clamping around him.

You were close, closer than you care to admit. Every touch against you is careful yet deliberate as he reads the signs of your body, the way it keens and arches into him, offering you words of encouragement as your climax finally hits.

"That's right. Good girl. Let go for me," Taehyung coos, eyes dark and focused on your writhing form.

You cry out into the familiar space of your shared room, head thrown back as you ride out the high, letting it wrack your body, send jolts throughout your veins.

You barely have time to catch your breath when he presses his mouth back onto yours, kiss still as eager as it was when you both first entered your home. You are alight with satisfaction as he pulls away to press a trail of kisses against your jaw.

"I want—f-fuck," you stutter as he finds your already hypersensitive clit once more, rolling his thumb over your now soaked panties in tantalizing circles, "want to make you feel good, too."

Admittedly, this fantasy had crossed your mind once or twice, brought on by the way he carried himself in a suit and the way his large fingers wrapped around the champagne glass; confident, collected, and entirely charming. Who are you to shy away from a man like him? He certainly has always been rather good-looking. 

He pauses his motions, pulling his hand back to sit on your waist. Your dress is of the finest, most delicate satin, and after tonight's activities, completely wrinkled. You can almost hear your stylist's cries of dismay. Whatever. You have a steamer. And why focus on the dress when it’s obvious the two of you are focused on what lies underneath it?

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." You nod, skin still burning from your past climax.

Helping you back up, Taehyung stands. You lick your lips as you sit back up on the edge of the bed, watching intently as he unbuckles his belt, audibly hissing as his pants fall to his ankles, cock visibly straining against the fabric of his underwear. Thank God you don’t have to stand. With the way your thighs still felt weak and how your husband looks like a goddamn Adonis towering above you? Your legs surely would give out underneath you if you rose.

Brows furrowed, Taehyung palms over himself briefly before pulling down the waistband of his underwear, his painfully hard member slapping against his torso.

Your eyes widened on instinct. While the last thing you wanted to do was help inflate Taehyung's already large ego, you were certainly impressed at his size; thick and girthy, his tip red and shining with precum.

He couldn't help but smirk, thoroughly pleased by the way you stared at him unabashedly, chest rising and falling heavily.

"Open up for me," he orders.

And who are you to deny a request from your dear husband?

Your pretty lips wrap themselves around his engorged tip, all remnants of lipstick long gone by now. Taehyung hisses, a hand finding the side of your jaw as you run your tongue against the underside of his cock.

"Fuck, you're so pretty," he grunts, fighting off the urge to grip the back of your head and fuck your throat. As much as he'd love your have you choking and drooling all over his cock – and boy would he – he lets you set your own pace, not wanting to overwhelm you.

It doesn't take long for you to sink your mouth further down, however, clearly set on making Taehyung feel as good as you could.

A low moan erupts from his throat, digits pressing into your jaw in request to take more of him in, which you happily oblige.

You had your eyes trained on him, completely obsessed with the way he panted through pink lips, hissing slightly every time your tongue rolled over his sensitive tip.

Lolling his head to a side, his eyes meet yours, gaze primal and wolfish as he watches the way you worked his cock.

"Doing so good, love. Doing so fucking good for me,” he murmurs.

You hum against his skin at the sound of the sudden pet name, an unfamiliar feeling fluttering in your belly. You push aside the feeling, focusing instead on the way he grunts at the new sensation you had just given him.

Giggling, you pull off his cock, opting instead to press a kiss against his leaking tip, making sure to hold his eyes as you run kitten licks against it.

"God, you're such a tease." He shakes his head in disbelief. 

He looks so good above you, shivering and cursing out praises on how good your mouth feels, how well you take his cock. Running your tongue along the length of his shaft, you become certain that this is a display you can’t imagine yourself ever getting tired of. But you have all the time in the world, right?

"Y/N,” he gasps suddenly, hips jerking towards your face. "Love, I'm gonna-- gonna cum."

"Cum in my mouth, please." Your voice was pleading and desperate. Taehyung had never heard such words spoken more sweetly. 

"Fuck's sake."

You let out a yelp in surprise as his fingers work their way through your hair, bringing your head back down onto his cock. You relax, though, when you feel the hot ropes of his cum hit the back of your throat, your hands finding purchase on his thighs as you do your best to swallow it all down.

Pulling yourself off him, you let out a small cough, eyes watering slightly as you hadn’t managed to prepare yourself with a breath before his release. His large palm runs across the top of your head as you caught your breath, expression flickering with something unfamiliar. Could it be... fondness? 

Your heart stammers at the thought as you stand, slowly stepping out of your dress, letting it drape off of your figure. Taehyung looks absolutely gobsmacked, pupils dark as he gazes at you, eyes unabashedly raking your body. He’s shameless. 

You both are. 

Slowly, you step towards him, fingers reaching out towards his shirt, carefully undoing the buttons as you gaze at each other, expressions unreadable. 

"Tae?” You ask innocently, blinking up at him. “Fuck me?" 

Your polite request makes Taehyung chuckle. 

"Please?" You bring your bottom lip between your teeth, eyes blinking up at him adoringly for good measure. You reach the last button, let his dress shirt drape open. He brushes it off himself, stands there for a few seconds just to let the way you’re ogling his toned chest go to his head. At least he’s good-looking. 

He sighs, probably contemplating some clever rebuttal, but eventually decides against it as his cock is already twitching back to life.

"Alright, love. Turn around. On your knees for me," He orders, making your stomach flip.

To your surprise, you are hardly in place when the warmth of his large hands finds the soft of your tummy, pressing you back into his chest as he pressed a peck to the back of your neck.

You squirm in his hold, whining as that same hand of his grabs hold of your breast, long digit rolling your nipple between their tips. You can’t help but press your ass back into him. His cock feels hot and heavy, pressing against the back of your thigh, making your pussy clench in anticipation. 

You want him.

You want him so bad that you don't know what to do with yourself, shuddering as his free hand runs along the side of your ass, leaving scorching hot trails on your skin wherever he kneads into your flesh. He's touching you everywhere – everywhere but where you need him the most, and the arousal that drips down your thigh mocks you.

"Dammit, please!" You exclaim, running out of patience.

"Please what?" He says, an eyebrow arched.

You shiver, committing the way his middle finger traced your pelvic bone to memory forever.

You puff out a frustrated breath, nearly at your wit's end. "Please fuck me, Tae."

Taehyung pauses, grip on your breast and hip tightening as he lets out a moan. You let one out yourself as you feel him readjust, cock pressing against your slick entrance.

"Fuck, you sound so pretty when you say my name," He grunts. "Okay, baby. I'll fuck you. Begging so nicely for my cock."

You let out a squeak as you're suddenly pushed down onto your hands, back arching as he pushes his fat cock inside your heavenly cunt. He's thick, so thick, that you instinctively grip the sheet underneath you, fingers curled around them tightly as if it means to hold onto your sanity.

Taehyung lets out a shaky breath, angling your hips up so that you could take more of him.

"You feel—feel so good," he admits above you, and suddenly you wish you could see him. See the way his bangs stick to his damp forehead—see the way his tongue swipes over his bottom lip wickedly.

You let that thought go, however, as he thrust into you, making your jaw fall slack and eyes flutter shut. Profanities roll off your tongue unabashedly, helpless under the way his thick member pulls out of you, only to slam back into you.

You weren't expecting this. The way he stretches you out further than anyone had before. Your pussy clenches around him, reveling in the sweet, sweet burn.

He digs into the flesh of your hips, holding you steady as you mew and cry out, pushing your hips back in time to his, trying your best to meet his movements.

"Tae... fuck, fuck, fuck—"

He was filling you to the brim. Filling you tight and deep.

God, the way he was panting behind you was music to your ears. His cock pulses every time you call out his name, voice muffled and buried as you had your head pressed into the mattress, hair messy and bouncing with every hard thrust.

"S'good! Fuck... so, ah, big..." you cry out.

You feel drunk. Intoxicated off this beautiful man and the way he makes you feel a way only he can.

You nearly let out a sob as the rough pads of Taehyung's fingertips suddenly reach around you and find your neglected clit, rolling light circles on the soft and swollen bundle of nerves skillfully.

You are a mess, whimpering and drooling into your expensive sheets, and he filled every inch of you, leaving no place undiscovered. Your high nears, stewing on low heat somewhere near the pit of your belly, waiting for a chance to erupt and wash all over you. Taehyung must be close to, you realize, as his thrusts began to slow down, slamming into you roughly as if chasing after his high.

"Gonna take this load? Huh? Gonna let me cum inside your pretty little pussy?" His voice is straining, as if trying to breathe evenly but merely moments from falling apart.

If only you could formulate an intelligent response, but instead, you are a blubbering wreck, thighs shaking as they threatened to give out underneath you. But somehow, Taehyung knew. He had you. Quicking his motions against your delicate pearl, he could tell you were close too, and he was going to make sure you got there.

Suddenly, you're crying out and convulsing, tears brimming at the ends of your eyes as you feel Taehyung empty into you, collapsing onto his hands as well.

You feel his hot breath against the back of your neck as he pants, breath growing more and more even as the two of you regain control of your bodies and minds.

Pulling out of you, he plops down beside you, and for a moment, the two of you hold each other's gazes, eyes speaking in ways words never could.

Finally, after what feels both like an eternity and just a moment, you work up the courage to say something, moving closer to him as you place a hand on his chest, cushioning your chin as you rested on top of it.  

"Psst," you beckon, voice hushed.

"Yeah?" His voice is husky and tired.

"I’m grateful, too."

"Huh?"

"I’m grateful for us, too."

Taehyung's gaze is soft, and it lingers on you for a second before the sides of his mouth curl up tenderly. He grins down at you, eyes drifting shut. You feel him squeeze you closer, pressing you against his skin. And then, you hear his breathing steady, see his lips part slightly. 

You lean into his chest, eyelids fluttering. “Thank you, Tae.”

Not unlike the many other mornings you have awoken in this bed, when you open your eyes as the morning sunlight streams through the windows, Taehyung is nowhere to be found. The sheets on his side of the bed are flipped aside, revealing that soft outline of his body from the night before left imprinted into the sheets, a dip in the mattress where he slept. You had fallen asleep all wrapped up in each other, tangled up like vines, but must have separated sometime during the night. Distantly, you register Taehyung’s voice outside, notice his phone missing from his bedside table. He must be on an early morning call. 

You check your phone for the time. Ten o’clock. 

A late morning call, then. 

Still basking in the afterglow of the night prior, you slowly inch your way out of bed, shivering as you pull the covers off you and scoot your legs around so they hang over the edge of the bed. You rub at your eyes until you faintly remember you did not take your makeup off last night, and when your hand comes away covered with black streaks and flecks of mascara, you wince to yourself. There goes five hundred dollars worth of a skincare routine. 

After washing yourself up and applying as many serums as you can to your skin, you wrap yourself up in one of his button-up shirts, the torso so wide that it drapes over you. The tips of your fingers peek out from the ends of the sleeves, and you cross your arms lightly over your chest as you make your way to the door, ready to entice your husband back to bed for round two. What? It’s Saturday. 

You peer around the door to find Taehyung standing a few feet away, facing away from you. He’s shirtless, and as his wife you have absolutely no problems ogling him, the toned curves of his back, the muscles in his arms. He’s always been a looker. You just finally have an excuse to look for yourself. 

You approach him quietly, not wanting to interrupt nor broadcast your sex life to anybody on the other side who may be listening. Already, the idea of crawling back in bed together sends goosebumps along your skin, makes you giddy with anticipation. You’re just about to tap him on the shoulder, lips curled upwards in suggestion, when he says—

“And my inheritance? That’s secured now, right? Because I said I would pretend to be in love with her in public—?”

And it is as if Medusa herself appeared in this room, turning you to stone as your heart thuds to the floor, a hollow, empty noise. 

You don’t hear the rest of Taehyung’s conversation. You don’t even hear the sound of your own heartbeat. This terrible, aching sound rings in your ears, silencing everything in its wake, drowning out even the sighs of your own breath. It is as if you have been frozen solid. As if you have been shot in the stomach. You stand there, feeling absolutely nothing, and all you can do is brace yourself for what is to come. Taehyung’s words were the knife but his next actions will be its removal, leaving in its wake an irreparable wound. 

He turns around, casual and cool, voice still hushed. As if you were still asleep. As if you hadn’t heard anything at all. But when he twists his body and sees you standing there, staring back up at him, lips parted in shock. 

“I’ll call you back,” he tells whoever was on the other side of the line, looking more panicked by the second. He opens his mouth so he can explain himself, but you don’t need him to. You’ve heard everything already. 

“I should have known,” you say, feeling angry and betrayed and sad all at once. “I should have known it was all an act.”

“Y/N, wait, let me explain—”

“What is there to tell me, Taehyung? What are you going to say? That you didn’t mean it? That you thought I wouldn’t find out? That last night was just a one-off?” You demand. The heat from your veins hasn’t left. Still, it simmers through your blood, burning you up from the inside out. “That you didn’t want to lie to me?”

“It’s not like that and you know it,” Taehyung says defensively, brows furrowed. “Just give me a chance to explain myself.”

“Explain yourself? How you pretended, every day and every night, just so you could get some more money in your bank account? So you could make sure you would get your father’s business when he died?”

Taehyung bites back easily. “Don’t act like you weren’t also faking it at some point. I know you were almost removed from your grandmother’s will.”

Your tongue is bitter at the mention of your grandmother. As if Taehyung ever even knew her. “My grandmother has nothing to do with this.”

“Really?” Taehyung challenges. “So you wanting to stay in her will was just a little bonus, right?”

“Don’t,” you say sharply. “It’s different.”

“Different how?” Taehyung spits. “Because right now, to me, it looks pretty similar to what I’ve done.”

“My grandmother died months ago,” you remind him. Her will is no longer the question. It has been written, settled, and executed. There was no reason for you to continue playing along once she took her last breath. No reason—unless you wanted to. “Meanwhile you’ve been keeping your inheritance a secret from me this entire time.”

“We made a deal,” Taehyung says. “A deal that said we would both act happy and pretend to be in love because we both had things we needed to worry about. Family things. Money things. You were a part of this, just like I was. You pretended, too.”

“Well, maybe I stopped pretending!” 

You can’t take it anymore. All this anger, all this emptiness, it’s been bubbling up inside you ever since you heard those first words come out of his mouth. It spills out of you all at once, an eruption from your lips, your heart’s doors bursting open. You have held his hand tightly in your own. You have pressed your lips to his. You have laid yourself bare in front of him. What is there left to protect? What part of you has not already been stained by him, by his touch, by the feeling of his fingers against your skin?

The hallway is silent, but you can hear your cry echo down the corridor. Hear the way it bounces along the walls before fading away. 

“Maybe I stopped pretending,” you repeat, softer this time. You blink and already can feel the streaks along your skin, the tears falling from your eyes. “Did you ever think about that?”

“Y/N, what are you talking about?” Taehyung looks like he’s in disbelief. Like he cannot believe the words you are saying to him. 

Well, that makes two of you. 

“Can’t you see, Tae? Can’t you tell?” You ask, the nickname falling from your lips before you can even help it. You must remind yourself to change that, later. “I’m in love with you.”

They are words you have never said to someone before. Not even your old boyfriends. Words that you always knew you would reserve for someone special. Someone who would touch your heart and make it their own, someone who would leave imprints of their fingers against your chest. Someone who would brighten you up from the inside out, leave you bursting with light. 

Ironic, that Taehyung has become that someone. When he is the one person you never thought could. 

When he has proven, time and time again, that you two just cannot mix. Oil and water. Pastel and acrylic. Satin and silk. 

“You don’t have to say anything,” you spit out quickly, before Taehyung has a chance to respond. “I know it doesn’t matter to you.”

“Y/N, yes it does,” Taehyung begins, desperate and pleading. “I know you heard what I said, but I swear, it stopped being an act for me, too. Things are different now, just like you said.”

“Don’t. Please.” You pull away as he reaches out towards you. Faintly, you remember that it is his shirt you are wearing. Remember that no matter what you do, he will always surround you. “Please, Tae.” You have nothing left. You can’t bear to look at him, but where else will you go? You cannot believe the things he’s said, the things he’s done, but where else would you go?

“I love you, too,” Taehyung says, and a part of you wants so badly to believe him. 

A part of you wants so badly to ingrain those words into your head, carve them into your heart, let him wrap his arms around you and promise that everything will be alright. But things are different now. Just like you said. You and Taehyung are not the same people you were six months ago. Or six weeks ago. Or even six minutes ago. You are helpless and he has proven that he does not care. 

“I have to go,” you say, looking away. You don’t think you could handle turning back to him again. “Please, Tae.”

“I’m sorry,” Taehyung says, and he reaches out once more but you are not there to meet him halfway. Were you ever?

“I know,” you whisper back.

You duck into your bedroom and pack a suitcase of everything you need. Being here is suffocating. Being with him is like setting yourself alight. 

Victoria has no questions when you show up at her door later that day, suitcase by your side and this ridiculous bottle of Merlot in your hands. You had picked it up on the way over. You sort of figured you might need it. 

“You don’t wanna talk about it, do you?” Victoria asks. 

“Tell me about your streaming service,” you hiccup in response.

Victoria is happy to oblige. She even tells you that she still hasn’t picked a CFO, and that the position would be open for you if you ever wished to take it. 

Funnily enough, what will become of you once your father retires and passes along the company is the furthest away from your thoughts. 

You remember being so worried about that. Being so worried that, once they married you off like every good daughter should be, you would be absorbed into your husband’s life, cut out of your family’s. Your father would choose a cousin, an uncle, or even a friend to take after the business, bestowing upon you a thoughtful inheritance but nothing more than that. All of those years of schooling, finance in college, your MBA soon after, would be wasted, just so you could hang on the arm of your husband for the rest of your life. 

It’s thoughtful of Victoria to think of you for the position. She knows just as well as anyone else that you would be an excellent fit. And if things were just a little bit different, you would be jumping at the offer. 

But your future career plans are on the backburner, along with the rest of your life. 

All you can really do, right now, at this very moment, is wait for things to change. As they always do. 

“Don’t you have an event tonight?” Victoria asks about three days into your stay. She’s given you her favorite (her words, not yours) guest bedroom and an enormous closet to match, despite you only coming over with a carry-on’s worth of clothes. 

You scoff to yourself. “Like I’d want to go to anything with him.”

“Have you even called your parents?” 

“No,” you say, not even caring about the repercussions. There’s no doubt in your mind that they’ll be ringing you soon. And when they do, maybe then you’ll finally work up the courage to tell them what really happened. Tell them that you can’t go back there. Not yet, at least. 

“I’m sorry that this happened to you,” Victoria says as she hands you a bowl of vegetable soup, homemade from a couple of days ago. You nod to yourself, sniffling as you curl into the couch cushions and wish they would absorb you whole. 

There’s no need to ask her what she means by ‘this’. Everything. From your engagement to the marriage, from those tabloids to the deal, from your grandmother’s death to now. It has all been unfair. Life is unfair. And while you’ve always known that, it has been particularly cruel to you as of late. 

Still, when you wake up sometimes, you can still feel him tracing over your skin. Feel his lips hovering over yours, breath fanning out over your cheeks. You turn over and expect to see him lying there, on the right side of the bed, sheets mussed as they cover his figure. You wake up and for a brief moment, for that split, split second, there is peace. And happiness. And love. 

And then there is nothing. 

“Yeah,” you sigh. “Me, too.”

Maybe he really does love you. Maybe things really did change. But you have always been a pragmatic person, always let your head guide you rather than your heart. The secret’s out. Taehyung had an inheritance he needed to secure. You were his path to doing so. Those things haven’t changed. No matter if his feelings did. 

“Hey, look at this,” Victoria says, brows furrowed as she holds out her phone in front of you, revealing a livestreamed interview from the event tonight. 

You peer over. 

It’s Taehyung. 

Of course it’s Taehyung. Who else would she be showing you?

He stands in a clean-cut gray coat, draping over his figure, black dress shirt and slacks underneath, belt wrapped neatly around his hips. He holds his hand up in a wave and smiles politely to the cameras, to the reporters, letting the flashes wash over him like waves in the ocean. 

“Mr. Kim! Mr. Kim!” Someone calls. “Where’s your wife?”

Oh, God.

Taehyung grimaces a little, pursing his lips. “My wife won’t be joining me tonight.”

“Can you tell us why?” They shout. 

“Sorry, no more questions. Thank you for asking though. She’s well,” he says, quickly ushering himself along, entering the venue so no more reporters can bombard him. When he disappears, the livestream immediately moves on to the next guest, but you hardly pay them any attention. 

“Huh,” Victoria says aloud. 

Indeed. Taehyung’s response strikes you as rather odd. Why would he tell the public that? Why not make up a lie, say you’re sick, or you’re overseas, or you’re just late? Why simply tell them that you won’t be there? Surely, Taehyung is just as aware of the consequences of arriving at an event without you as you are. There’s no doubt that his parents will be in contact with him soon, too. No doubt that this will leave a stain on his family. His image. It might even threaten his inheritance after all.

So why not lie?

You frown to yourself, nose scrunching up in confusion. You don’t like where this train of thought leads.

“You okay?” Victoria asks when she sees the bewildered expression on your face.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” you say. Just completely befuddled. It escapes you, why Taehyung wouldn’t just make up some sort of excuse as to reasoning behind your absence. Why he would even show up at the event at all. Certainly, going to the event without you is worse than not going at all. It prompts questions. It spreads rumors. 

Later that night, you get a call from your parents, demanding to know why you weren’t there with him. You say you got sick. You plead with them not to question anything. 

You wonder what happens next. You and Taehyung still have two more events this week. A dinner and a ball. What will you do then?

Taehyung goes solo for the dinner. You suppose you could have predicted that, considering his apparent willingness to arrive alone for the first event, too. He hasn’t made any efforts to contact you and for once, you’re glad for his silence. Not that you even know what he would say to you, anyway, but at least he isn’t begging you to come back to him. 

The sad truth is that if he did, if he got down on his knees right in front of you and willed you to come back home, you probably would. He has always been impossible to resist. Even when you first met him, when he sauntered up towards you and told you he was your dream come true. You didn’t know it then. But he was. He was everything you would ever want. 

Why would he lie? 

Why would he do that?

You can’t wrap your head around it. What is he getting out of it by telling the truth? By admitting to the paparazzi, to the reporters and the cameramen, that you won’t be there with him. That you will not be joining him. Nothing, certainly. His parents must be furious. His inheritance may be on the rocks. His image might tank. 

So then, why do it at all?

Could it… could it be?

Is it true?

You have loved Taehyung for a long time. Longer than you probably even care to admit. You have always held your head high at events, spoken loudly and without fear, but being with him made you feel safe. Secure. You would hold his hand and know, know that he was holding yours, too. It grounded you. It soothed your worries. 

Does he really love you back?

Taehyung smiles politely and laughs when he needs to at these events, but he doesn’t look the same. Even through the screen you can see those bags under his eyes, that spark that has faded. You hardly recognize him. He looks so lonely, without someone by his side. So distant. 

When you know the dinner has ended, you almost pick up the phone and call him. 

Almost. 

Instead, when the ball rolls around, you ask Victoria if she’s got a spare dress she can lend you.

 Kim Taehyung, for someone you have seen covered in paint splotches, wearing old college hoodies, and fresh out of a restless night’s sleep, cleans up pretty well. For a married man, at least. 

You wonder what the past few days must have been like for him. If they have been as empty as your own. Wonder what it was like, riding alone in a big black van to this hotel ballroom, no one to tease, no one to laugh with, no one to hold. No one to poke him awake if he accidentally fell asleep. No one to make sure he’s okay. 

Taehyung stands right outside of the entrance, waving politely to all of the paparazzi, smiling as the cameras flash, giving them the time of day for a moment before he heads inside and muscles his way through another event without you. 

Or so he thinks. 

You spot him just as he opens his mouth, ready to repeat those same lines all over again.

My wife won’t be joining me tonight. She’s well, though.

And maybe it’s just because you haven’t seen him in nearly a week. Maybe it’s just because he is about to lie to those reporters once more, ready to face whatever consequences come his way. 

Or maybe it’s just because you miss him. Miss him terribly, have been missing him terribly. Being away from him was necessary, but that didn’t make it any less unbearable. Not getting to hold his hand, see his smile, meet his eyes. You and Taehyung may not have always liked each other, but you saw him every day regardless. He became a constant in your life. Not an if, but a when. If everything went to shit, you always knew he would still be there. 

And there he is. 

“Wait! Taehyung!”

Taehyung’s eyes widen as he hears your voice, gaze darting around wildly, mouth parted in surprise. He looks around desperately, scanning the crowd, meeting the eyes of every single person in front of him until he finally looks to the left, sees you rushing up towards him, hiking up the skirt of your dress as your heels tap against the sidewalk. 

And when he spots you, sees you running up to him, his body relaxes, a weight lifted from his shoulders as he beams back at you, relieved and thankful and filled with joy, all at once. And you know, then. 

You know that everything will be okay. 

“Sorry I’m late,” you say sheepishly, cheeks burning as he looks at you, takes in every inch of you, breathes you in and lets you fill him up. 

Taehyung doesn’t respond. You reach out to hold his hand but he grabs your wrist and pulls you in, presses you against his body as he presses his hands against your cheeks, palms burning as they meet your skin, and he kisses you. In front of all these people, he kisses you. 

And goddamnit, you will kiss him back. 

It feels like lightning, like a thunderstorm, like the waves of the ocean are crashing against your heart. It feels like fire, like flames are licking at your veins, sending sparks through your blood. It feels like home. 

You and Taehyung ignore the shouts of reporters, the flashes of cameras, the honks of the cars on the other side of the road. When you part, he presses his forehead against yours and lets the tip of your nose meet his. And you smile. 

“Don’t be alone any longer, Mr. Kim,” you whisper, loud enough so only he can hear. 

“When I’m with you, I never am, Mrs. Kim,” he murmurs back. 

You wonder what those tabloids will be saying about you tomorrow. 

The rest of the night finds the two of you pretty much inseparable. You wrap yourself around his arm and for the first time in a long time, he presses his hand against the small of your back, keeping you close. Like he’d ever lose you again. 

One of your least favorite parts about attending balls used to be the dancing. As a young and eligible bachelorette, you would always have to lock hands with another, let him awkwardly guide you along to the music as you made the worst small talk imaginable, forcing laughter and smiles whenever he said something he thought was particularly funny. 

But, like so many others, things have changed. Things are different now. 

The waltz comes on and you and Taehyung are the first to reach the center of the ballroom floor, letting him rest his hand on your waist as you press yours on top of his shoulder. Let him twirl you around the room as the orchestra plays in the background, a soft, sweet, light little melody that carries you along. 

“I missed this,” you say softly. 

“I missed us,” Taehyung corrects. He pauses for a moment, swallowing hard. “I’m sorry for not telling you about my inheritance.”

“I’m sorry for storming out. I should have listened to you.” you respond easily. You both have plenty to apologize for. But night is darkest right before dawn. 

“I should have said something,” Taehyung says with a shake of his head. “But I was just so—so worried that something would go wrong. And I didn’t know how to explain how I felt about you. I acted in the beginning, too, but then things changed.”

“They always do,” you muse with a grin. 

“I couldn’t believe I had you,” Taehyung admits. “I mean, look at you. You’re gorgeous. And funny. And true.”

“Go on,” you tease, even though you do nothing to hide the smile inching its way across your face, the heating of your cheeks, the simmering of your skin. 

“Oh, shut up. You know what I mean.” Taehyung rolls his eyes. “I just—I felt something for you I couldn’t explain. I still can’t.”

You don’t have to prod any further. You know. Deep within your heart, you know. There is love blossoming in his to match the garden that has bloomed in your own. The flowers that have sprouted in the ashes. He has them, too. And when those petals open and the light streams in, he will know. He will know, too. 

“You make me crazy,” you tell him, whispering gently into his skin. “But I’m a better person when I’m with you. I know I am.”

“I meant what I said, that night,” Taehyung says. Makes you wonder which night he’s actually talking about. “That I’m happy that things have changed. That things happened the way they did. I’m grateful for us.”

“I am, too,” you say. And you are. 

You rest your head against his chest as you dance together, swaying back and forth to the beat of the drums, to the strums of the violins, all wrapped up together like ivy, like vines. Those, too, sit in that garden of yours. Keep you tethered to his side, keep him close to yours. He holds you in his arms and he smiles, because he knows, too. Knows that that garden in your heart will soon have a matching one in his. A mirror image of who you are. Who you’ve become. 

Things change. They always will. But so long as he is by your side, and so long as you are by his, you know. Everything will be okay. 

It's different, this time, when Taehyung presses you into the mattress. 

There is no rush. Because now you know for certain that all the time in the world is yours. He is yours forever. You are his.

The two of you are a mixture of tangled limbs and shared breaths, the feverish, irrepressible need to give yourself to each other nearly tangible. He breaks the kiss suddenly, and you’re about to break out in protest. That is, until you see him unbuttoning his shirt.

Inspired, you wiggle out of your own clothes, eyes locked on Taehyung's soft torso and the idea that you had married such a beautiful man, inside and out.

Looking back, you wonder if that was always inevitable. If you and Taehyung falling into each other had been written in the stars from day one, sealed as your fate from the moment he came up to you at that ball when you were teenagers. He was going to be a part of your life no matter what. Whether or not you ended up marrying him. But having him like this?

It makes it all worth it.

"Do you like what you see?" That old cocky smirk of his makes an appearance.

You raise a brow, choosing to omit a response as you unclasp your bra, letting it fall from your chest.

Taehyung swallows.

"Do you?" You tease.

His response comes in the form of bites down your necks and licks down your chest, stealing your breath from you. 

Your clothes are somewhere dispelled beside your passionate bodies, growing cold beside the way your two hot bodies warmed one another.

"You are so beautiful," Taehyung praises, fingers coming up to cup your breast, bringing it up to his mouth.

You mewl, wrapping an arm around his shoulders as his tongue toys with your pert bud, teeth grazing it ever so often just to hear the broken gasp that'd always follow. 

"And so sensitive too," he giggles, making you pout. His hands are gentle as if every touch means something. As if you mean something—no, everything—to him. And the most wonderful part is that he means everything to you, too. 

"Shut up." You roll your eyes playfully, gasping as his palm comes down the side of your thigh suddenly in warning. You bite down your swollen bottom lip at the gush of arousal that dampened your underwear in response.

"Watch your tone, love. Of both our positions, you are in the most compromising one." He reminds you. It isn't a threat, and while usually, that kind of tone would thrill you, you couldn't help but want his mouth back on yours already.

"You talk too much." You flop back onto the bed with a sigh. Taehyung watches with interest as your pretty tits bounce in consequence. Extending your hands out towards him, you give him a pouty look. "Just wanna kiss you."

"Is that all I am to you? Just a pair of lips for you to mack on? I've got news for you, sweetheart, there's a brain behind these ravishing good looks." He scoffs in feigned offense, sitting back on his heels.

You giggle.

It seems as though even during the most intimate of moments, Taehyung still found a way to be, well, Taehyung. At least that hasn’t changed. 

"Whatever, pretty boy. Why don't you come over here and put that mouth of yours to good use?" You purr, making his eyebrows raise in surprise.

"Oh? I don't remember you being this assertive when I was pounding you into the mattress last time."

“What, I can’t have a little fun as well?” You tease, grinning as you look up at him, raking your eyes over his figure. 

"Wanna have fun, love?," He murmurs into your ears, hands gripping either of your plush thighs. "Then spread those pretty legs for me, and I'll show you exactly how much fun you can have."

God, you love this man.

You oblige eagerly, breath quickening as he helped you press your knees by your chest, leaving the wet patch in your underwear on full display. 

"My pretty little wife." He sighs dreamily, making heat rush to your core.

Taehyung's cock stood loud and proud, a hot reminder of where the night would eventually lead to. Seriously, how did you get so lucky? You must've been a saint in a previous life, you decide right then. Or at least, the stars have chosen to be rather kind to you in this one.

"Gonna take these off," he mutters, mostly to himself, tugging the ruined fabric over your ass and down your legs, with your help, of course.

Despite your usual display of confidence, lying beneath your husband, spread out like this, has you feeling vulnerable and slightly insecure. But that insecurity vanishes, however, as he lets out a soft moan, fingers moving to spread your glossed lips apart.

"So fucking pretty, baby. Gonna make you feel so fucking good," he groans, leaning down to press his face near your most intimate part.

Pressing a tentatively lick against, his eyes flicker up to yourself, curious to see if you’re okay with him proceeding. And, well, it’s not like you’re going to say no, are you?

Embarrassingly, you rut against him, making him laugh as you drown in your own mortification.

"Need it that bad, huh?" He coos.

"Yes, please."

The rest of your plea is lost in a moan as Taehyung finds your clit, wrapping his pink lips around the sensitive muscle and giving it a generous suck. Your hands are in his hair before you can think to stop yourself, tugging at his scalp deliciously as his mouth makes its way with you.

Thank goodness for this apartment belonging to just the two of you as the noises that tumbled from your lips surely would've left a roommate blushing.

You're panting, begging for more even though you aren't sure how you'd even handle more. It comes as a delight and slight surprise as fingers suddenly slip inside, wasting no time to rub against your velvety smooth walls, curling themselves inside you.

"Fuck, Tae!" you cry out, eyes squeezing shut.

It was pure reflex. Up until now, you had been watching Taehyung intently, completely consumed by the way his mouth moves against you. How his tongue flicks against your needy clit cruelly. It just felt too fucking good.

You're so wet, positively dripping down his chin as he runs his hot muscle up and down the length of your pussy, devouring you like he hadn't eaten in months, and you were his first meal.

Taehyung’s nothing short of addicting, completely and utterly intoxicating, and you slip further and further to your demise with every lick he takes, every press of his tongue against your clit.

He has a hand pressed against the lower half of your torso, feeling the way you jerk and squirm as he makes a mess of you. You’re close and you know it, too, if not by the way you’re calling his name over and over again, then by the way your thighs tremble, hardly even strong enough to stay up.

"Let go for me, love. I've got you." He sounds so sweet, so angelic, despite how filthy what he was doing to you was.

His words are the push you need, and, like a rubber band that has been stretched past its limit, you finally snap, back arching off the bed as you come with a cry. White fills your vision, and your mind goes blank, only sounds of blissful static filling your ears.

His fingers hold up your quivering legs, mouth pressing kisses onto your pussy encouragingly until you simply can't bear it any longer, pushing his mouth away as you stutter out words of sensitivity and overstimulation.

“I’m going to have to request more of that throughout this marriage.” You manage to say once your vision and breath come back to you.

Grabbing one of your hands, Taehyung brings it to his mouth.

“All you need do is ask,” he replies, making you laugh as he presses a kiss to the back of your hand, always a gentleman

Not long after, you find yourself pressed against Taehyung, tongue running against his as he presses his hips into yours. He isn’t coy about his want for you, rolling his cock against your already sensitive center. Warm precum leaks onto your lower abdomen, and suddenly, all you can think about is having him inside you again.

“Taehyung?”

You don’t even need to ask. Hitching your leg around his thigh, he knows exactly what you’re seeking, lining up his leaking cock with your swollen entrance.

Pressing into you, he buries himself to the hilt, groaning out as your warmth envelopes him. You moan out so prettily for him, feeling tight and full with your first orgasm only minutes ago.

“You okay?” he hums, kissing your cheek.

You nod, ears warm at the intimacy of the moment. In many ways, this is nothing like your first time together. You are face to face, eye to eye, heart to heart. Between your bodies could be found more than just desire, but commitment. Devotion. Love. 

“I love you, Tae.” You gush, sighing out as he begins to rock into you.

He falters slightly at your confession but recovers quickly, intertwining his hand with yours and pressing it by your head.

Faintly, you realize. 

That was the first time you had ever told him that.

You look up at him, expecting some wide eyes or even a bit of a nervous tilt to his lips, but all you are met with is a glow. He beams down at you, and your heart swells. 

“I love you, too, Y/N,” he whispers, but you hear the words in your ears loud and clear.

Soft noises fill the room as the two of you become one—hearts synchronizing with one another in silent promise.

It was a promise unlike the one you had made to each other that day at the altar, for this one was real. This one was true.

You shutter with every thrust of his hips, your abused clit finding itself in the crossfire of Taehyung’s passionate motions.

Whimpering, you cling to him, overwhelmed and emotional, like your heart was about to burst. Taehyung lights a fire in you, sends lightning straight through your core. Every word, every smile, every kiss, every touch, they send shivers down your spine, tingles throughout your skin. It’s like you’re falling in love with him all over whenever you see him, whenever his deep brown eyes meet your own.

You remember being so afraid of love that you broke up with all your old boyfriends because of it. Because you couldn’t commit, because you were worried about your career, because they just didn’t give you that spark. But lying here pressed against him, against your husband, you aren’t afraid. Wrapped up around him, tangled up in him, you know. 

Between messy kisses and words of adoration, you find yourself growing closer and closer to your release. Brows furrowed and neck flushed, you come with a soft whimper of his name, coaxing his own orgasm out of him. He lets go inside you, painting you with his seed in a way that pleases you to no end.

Hand still in yours, he gives it a squeeze, pressing a kiss onto your damp chest, right over where your heart beats for him.

“I love you,” Taehyung says again when you meet his eyes, firmer this time, louder. Like he’s worried you didn’t believe him the first time. 

“I know,” you say with a giggle, the words going straight to your head—and your heart. 

Taehyung scowls. “What, no ‘I love you’ back? Is that what I’m hearing?”

“Well, only because you want one so badly,” you tease, pressing a quick kiss to his round button nose. “I love you, too, Tae. Always will.”

“I think I knew, then,” Taehyung says with a fond sigh, nostalgia overcoming his expression. “That first time we met. I knew you would be mine, one day.”

“You got lucky,” you scoff slightly. “But I’m glad things happened the way they did.”

“You’re my dream come true, Y/N,” he says. 

“And you are mine,” you murmur.

As the two of you drift off, all twisted up in each other, so mixed up you can’t figure out where you end and he begins, you think back to that night. That ball. 

“Who are you?” You ask, nose scrunched up in distaste. Before you stood a boy you had never met before, wearing shoes that were too big for him and a suit that was a touch too small. 

He grins at you, running a hand through his perfectly-styled hair fringe swiped neatly over his forehead, and he says, “your dream come true.”

And so it was. 

don’t forget to message me! ~ and don’t forget to message rose!

[falcor-thee-luck-dragon]

Dark Shenanigans - Nandor x (f)reader

Summary: It’s Nadja’s something hundredth birthday, with that said, you’re on a mission to make it great.

Warning: fluff, general vampire nonsense

Masterlist

“Yeah being a half vampire half human does have its perks. I mean for one I can do all that cool vampire shit and I can go out in the sunlight...so that helps for when they’re all being really annoying.” You admit with a casual shrug to one of the documentary cameras before turning to an isle of party supplies. “So anyways we’re at this store.”

The camera shifts to the multiple arras of supplies and materials at the local supermarket in Staten Island that you and your vampire lover’s human familiar, Guillermo, currently are. Specifically on the hunt for birthday decorations for Nadja and ghost Nadja who’s possessed a strange looking doll for the time being.

Since the other four actual full vampires can’t shop for themselves at this time of day or really in general, you and Guillermo have been given such an honorable task in making Nadja’s birthday the best one yet. Considering she’s the most well balanced in the head out of the four of them and is the only other lady of the manor.

“Hey Y/N, how’s this look?” Wonders Guillermo as he holds up a bunch of Mardi Gras beads of yellows, purples, and greens. “Comments, questions, concerns?” He adds with a small smile.

Eyeing up the beads, your head shifts over to the other various colors, “Hrmm, G I’m feeling the vibe you’re going for this year and I like it, but let’s go with Nadja colors.”

Guillermo’s dark eyes light up at your positive suggestion, “Right! So the red and black ones then?”

“Yup. She’ll love that shit.” You state with a satisfied nod of approval, “Let’s get some black and gold confetti from over there and oh, those masquerade masks look cool as fuck.”

You pick up and test out various masks in the background as Guillermo adds some bits of dialogue for the documentary crew, “Um yeah she’s really cool isn’t she.” He says with a smile while glancing at you then back to the camera, “Which is kind of odd since Y/N’s been with Nandor since 1793 so you’d think she’d be a little more like them but no, she’s super chill and really nice.” Suddenly his face goes a bit serious as he leans in to whisper, “But she did kill a whole street gang once when they threw a slur at me so I wouldn’t mess with her. For your safety.”

The camera pans back over to an oblivious you who’s put on a masquerade mask and is swinging a plastic light saber around with a whole lot more accuracy and grace then would a normal person. The camera then pans back to Gullimero, “Um, I’m just gonna....make sure she doesn’t smack anyone.”

——

Arms full of groceries of food for you and Gullimero, as well as random party decorations for Nadja’s birthday tomorrow night, you use the bottom of your boot to skillfully open the door as the documentary crew and Guillermo follows suit. Guillermo now on the verge of falling over with the large heart shaped pillow in his arms that’s covering most of his body.

You don’t feel tired in the slightest due to your half vampiric abilities so this is nothing to you, “Alright.” You state, turning on your heel to face the crew and Guillermo, “They’re asleep so we gotta be extra sneaky now, I don’t want Nadja catching us with all this cool spooky birthday shit. Everyone to the attic!” You whisper yell before leading the charge to the attic.

They all follow as quietly and as quickly as they can and then soon enough in no time are you and Guillermo back outside in the sunny garden trying to figure out if you should blow up the giant sea monster pool floaty.

“I mean it would look cool as hell and no doubt out-do whatever the fuck boring thing Lazlo probably has planned.” You quip with a shrug while the two of you stare thoughtfully at the small gloomy dark pond. “He’s got no chance with us. I’ve won best decorator and card maker for two hundred years in a row.”

Guillermo side eyes you in honest amazement, “Wow that’s a lot of years. And cards.”

“I know. I was an artist in the 12th century but my no good terrible good for nothing piece of garbage trash sexist human husband, who I was forced to marry when I was only sixteen, took all the credit for my artwork in that era.” You confirm with a growl, “But it stings less because once I finally grew into my powers and strength at eighteen I simply made his untimely demise look like an accident.” You add with a smirk.

“Oh, wow.” Mutters the intrigued familiar.

“Precisely. The old fool was thrown off his horse because I told Philip, the horse, to throw him off. And he did. Which killed the idiot so I got the house and all of his money.”

“That’s......neat.” Mutters Guillermo as he shoots the camera crew from behind you and him a nervous look. “Uh the suns going down so I should probably help Nandor out of his coffin.”

Raising your head to the sky you immediately see how the sun has begun to paint the clouds in beautiful colors of oranges, reds, light pinks, and darkening purples. “Oh, how bout that. Yeah alright let’s get inside.” You nod to Guillermo before turning to walk towards the manor’s giant mahogany doors.

——

Turning the handle and walking a couple feet into the large main room that holds itself as a sort of crossroads for all the other various connecting hallways and staircases. You don’t make it even three more steps towards the left ascending staircase before you hear the highly recognizable voice of your one and only.

“Y/N! My lovely wife and favorite person still ever so lovely!” Announces Nandor loudly with a grand smile showing off his pearly white fangs, “How I have missed you and your morning kisses. Where have you been off to?” He wonders softly as you smile a big dumb love-struck grin right back up at him, you’d absolutely die to hear that accent one last time.

“I can’t tell you right now it’s a secret!” You whisper yell back, causing his thick dark brows to scrunch up in confusion.

“But I am your lovely strong puff dragon Y/N.” Whines Nandor adorably as you roll your eyes at the cameras before looking back up at him.

“Fine. Come here then.”

In an instant he’s at your side, excitedly awaiting what secretive news you will tell him, “Okay, so we know it’s Nadja’s birthday tomorrow right?”

“Yes. I remember because she hasn’t shut up about it.”

“Right. So me and Gullimero got some fun surprise birthday party decorations and they’re in the attic and we can’t tell Nadja.”

Nandor gives you a knowing look of affirmation as he leans in closer to you, his demeanor suddenly shifting into a more saddened one, “You went shopping without me?” He says quietly.

Leaning up to give him a quick peck on the cheek your hands instantly find his, “Just for a little while, but I still need to find more stuff so....you wanna come?”

Nandor’s big dark eyes light up with joy as you hand him a kind smile, “Yes! Let us go in search of unknown treasures for our lady friend Nadja so she will not be mad at us for terrible dull gifts of friendship.”

Laughing you give his hands a playful squeeze, “Come on I’ll race you to Party City!” You say before leading him past the camera crew and Guillermo who simply watches the two of you leave, glad to have an hour of peace.

“There’s a whole city for partying? Y/N why have we never been to this place?”

——

“Y/N there are no people partying here.” Whines your vampire lover in puzzlement as he follows you from the entrance to a side isle. “You said this was a city for partying.”

“That’s just the name of the store Nans.” You retort with a small chuckle as he looks from right to left at all the color coded party plates and napkins galore.

“Well the title is very misleading.”

“Agreed.”

Turning to the right you guide him towards the decretory pirate themed isle in search of something that will peak his interest. Also you wanted so badly to make it to this spot but Gullimero was a man on a mission so your intention was thwarted for when you had Nandor with you.

Speed walking down the pirate themed isle you quickly halt all movement as Nandor’s large body stops within less than an inch from your back. Smiling brightly you snatch the desired object in front of you and as swift as a cat turn to face him.

“Have you come for a dual my old enemy?” You speak slyly, eyes narrowed as you hold the foam sword right in front of his face. “I sense a nervousness about you. Tell me, are you ready to face your inevitable bloody end?”

Staring at the pointy foam, his dark puppy eyes shift over to you as an adorable fangy grin breaks out across his pale face, “Seems you have come prepared, oh radiant and alluring seductress. Well, so have I!” Shouts Nandor before grabbing two foam swords from off the rack and swinging them in both hands like a mad man.

Taking a cautious step back you hold your pathetic five dollar sword in both hands like a true warrior ready for battle, “Only one shall leave this place alive.” You affirm with a smirk, “And it’s not going to be you.”

“Arrrrrggg.” Bellows your lover as he charges you like the true conqueror that he once was. But all to soon do you swiftly duck under his arms and swat him over his stomach with a confident thwack sound.

He makes a puny little “oww” as you turn around to face him once again, “Y/N you hit me kind of hard.” He complains, looking rather defeated and genuinely hurt that you could have intentionally injured him on purpose.

Bringing the plastic weapon down to your side once again, your face suddenly softens as you walk over to him, “Come here you big baby.” You quip sincerely as he leans down so you can give his cheek a quick kiss.

Rising back to his full height, Nandor almost blushes as the corners of his eyes crinkle into a happy smile, “Actually it didn’t hurt at all I just wanted you to kiss me.” Reveals the vampire with a proud grin as you simply roll your eyes.

“Should have known.” You add before turning and snatching up four more plastic foam pirate swords for the others. “Alright let’s get outta here, follow me my love, to the checkout line we shall purchase our weapons of war and partying on the high seas.” You announce with gusto as Nandor stands proudly at your side, ready to follow you anywhere.

“Yes. To check out.”

——

Kicking open the unlocked door, Nandor bursts into the vampire residence with bags full of goodies for Nadja’s birthday party. You right behind him but less dramatically, “We’re back!” You shout to no one in particular as Colin Robinson suddenly appears from out of nowhere, looking ready to leave with his funny little hat and usual beige jacket.

“Oh hey guys,” He starts with a friendly nod, “I’m just heading out on the town tonight. I guess there’s a fair or something in the park and I wanted to test my skill at the ball toss. I’ve been reading up on the body mechanics and how the game is set up which seems pretty basic all in all. Also I really want to win a stuffed bear this time, it might add a little pizazz to my room. Welp see ya’round.” Adds Colin before walking past the two of you without another word and out into the night he goes with some of the camera crew following close behind.

Nandor turns to you with a look of annoyance, “Jeesh I thought he would never leave. Let’s go to your room I want to kiss you some more now.”

“Why my room?”

“Because since you are half vampire you get to sleep in a bed and because I am a full vampire I sleep in a coffin.” Inquires Nandor while looking at you with those big beautiful dark eyes of his, “And my coffin is too small for cuddles so your room will suffice.”

“Yeah that’s a fair point.” You shrug before following him to your room.

After many cuddles leading to other more rated R type activities that lasted until just about sunrise, you finally got some well needed rest while the sun shone high in the sky until she began her dramatic descend back into oblivion. Opening your eyes you slowly rise from out of your comfy bed, already missing the presence of your obsidian eyed lover.

He gets too nervous about your closed windows for fear that the sun might burn him which would be impossible because you black out the glass. But alas, he’s very cautious about these types of things and won’t risk it for anything, though he feels bad about leaving you in the morning, you understand.

Suddenly it dawns on you that today or perhaps tonight, is Nadja’s birthday and you completely forgot to set up any decorations. Shit, how stupid. Throwing the blankets off of you, your feet move quick as you speedily change yesterday’s outfit for something a bit nicer and more clean.

Racing out of your room and into the dimly lit manor hallway, you make a bee line for the attic but before you’re able to reach the steps, Guillermo runs into you, just about knocking you into a wall of various stolen ancient weapons. Sharp ones at that.

That was close.

“Y/N are you okay!” Worries the familiar as you quickly gather your bearings.

“Guillermo! The decorations! Nadja’s birthday!” You whisper yell as the human man simply smiles. “Why are you smiling, this situation does not call for smiles.”

“Don’t worry. While you were sleeping I set up all the decorations.” He replies with a shrug, “No problem.”

“What? But that must have taken you all day, you could have asked me for help. I would have come.” Your brows furrow as he shakes his head, though you still feel bad for not helping with anything.

“Well I did try, but um,” Gullimero awkwardly clears his throat, giving the camera a quick glance, “Nandor was with you and last time I asked for you while you and him where having alone time he threatened to carve out my eyeballs and force feed them to me.”

Pinching the bridge of your nose in annoyance you take a deep breath, “Sounds like him. Very creative when he wants to be, alright, well....where’s everyone?”

“Oh, they’re not up yet. I was actually on my way to get you. I made blood popsicles and the pool floaty is all done and in the pond.” He says with a sense of pride for his decorating skills. “I think she’ll like what we’ve come up with this year.”

-

Standing in the living room with your three fellow immortals you search a dresser for her card, “Oh shit where’s my card? I could have sworn I had it yesterday on my dresser but I don’t remember seeing it there in the morning. Maybe it’s in this one?”

“Witches!” Hisses Nadja as you huff in frustration, where the hell did you put that damn card?

“Oh, Y/N my love,” Intervenes Nandor with a gentle tug of your sleeve, “I took it with me when I left your room before sunrise because I wanted to put my name on it too so she would know it’s from us.”

“What?” Replies Lazlo dramatically, “Now hold on just a damn minute, this card competition is individually scored so I won’t be having any of this nonsense. I worked really hard on mine this year.”

“Oh lick a donkey’s arse, look here,” You retort with, quickly holding up the card for Nadja, “there are two separate drawings on ours so either way if one of us wins she gets both our pictures. So you better hope your drawing doesn’t resemble a night clubs bathroom wall.”

“Yeah.” Mutters Nandor, who’s hiding behind you while resting both hands on either one of your shoulders as you glare at Lazlo.

“Fine.” Agrees Lazlo begrudgingly, “And mine will be amazing, this bitch of paper took me a whole six months to plan and produce. Can’t get quality this good anywhere else I guarantee it.” Adds Lazlo with a firm nod of self approval as you glance at the nearby camera.

“Right, okay everyone sit it’s time for presents. I want to know what you all got me.” Beams Nadja excitedly as she smiles a fangy grin in delight, plopping herself down in one of the arm chairs. Lazlo quickly finding the other one while you and Nandor seat yourself on the large couch. Colin and Guillermo finding somewhere to sit close by respectfully.

“Well, all I can say is hold onto your socks my dear cause this is going to blow you away.” Smirks Lazlo as he pulls a small box from out of his jacket pocket.

“If it’s a self made business card that says invitation to sexy town I will puke.” You deadpan while Nandor laughs from beside you, causing Lazlo to lose his smirk as Nadja hides her amusement the best she can manage.

“He he, sexy town, nice one Y/N.” Mutters Nandor with a proud grin as you raise a brow at Lazlo who’s giving you a hard glare.

“Oh, my dear pumpkin pie love, don’t listen to Y/N I will love anything you gift me.” Encourages Nadja with a bright welcoming smile, no doubt immediately boosting Lazlo’s once irked mood.

Rolling your eyes you shift a bit to find yourself leaning into Nandor’s body as Nadja opens up the rest of the vampire residents various gifts. A joyous fangy smile gracing her pale features every single time, revealing this birthday party was a thrilling success.

After much more fun that just about lasts throughout the whole night, and some rare but hilarious attempts at dancing between the five of you vampiric individuals. You’re feeling rather sleepy and you can tell Nandor is ready for a trip to dreamland as well.

Swaying to the lowly playing record instrumental, you hold Nandor tight while simultaneously enjoying the feeling of him so close, him doing just the same as he keeps you firmly pressed against his chest. His long dark hair tickles your face as he presses his head to your cheek, doing his absolute best to keep the flow without tripping up.

Sensing his growing fatigue, you gently squeeze his hand, “My love the sun will be up soon, let’s get you to bed, yes?”

A small lazy smile tugs at the corners of his lips while he looks down to meet your gaze, “But my dark angel I’m not tired. I want to dance with you a little longer.” He whines adorably before failing to conceal a big yawn.

Giggling, you lean back to slowly lead him towards the door, “That yawn says otherwise.”

“That wasn’t a yawn Y/N, I was just smiling really big.” He protests, though he still follows your lead to the door.

“I’ve never seen anyone smile like that.” You add with a raised brow.

“Well maybe that’s just how I smile.”

Letting out a breathy snort, you pull away from him to at last take his one hand, “Come. I can’t have a single ray of that dreaded sun to get a taste of your precious skin. Not on my watch.”

Glancing at the closed front door, Nandor squeezes your hand, “Well um, now since you’ve mentioned the sun...I think I’d like to go to my crypt now.” He says, the flash of worry crossing over his face for only a brief moment.

“You sure? I mean a sunrise is pretty beautiful if I’m being honest and I know you never get to see them...”

“Not funny Y/N. And not fair, you know I can’t because I am full vampire.”

“And you’re missing out.”

“And I’d like to stay alive Y/N.”

“Aren’t you dead?”

“Yes and I am your only husband so I need to stay not burnt to a crisp.”

Chuckling, you follow him down the hallway, “Oh really? Don’t want me finding myself with another vampiric lover? Some new beast to sweep me off my feet and take me away into the night.” You tease.

Side eyeing you, he frowns, “No. Don’t I sweep you off your feet?”

Stepping into his crypt you stop him with your hand against his bicep, “Always.” You whisper sincerely with a quick wink, causing him to break out into a big fangy grin.

“Good. And if anyone would try and whoo you I would make sure there would be no more whooing again!” Exclaims Nandor, making the candles rise in flame for only a short second at his rise in emotion for how much he loves you.

“I don’t doubt they would fall by your blade. Not for a second.”

[nightowlfandom]

CEO! Min Yoongi- My Favorite Secretary

Why hello there!

ANON ASKS

Hi! Want to make a nasty petition pls. I want CEO Yoongi but he is so mean and strict with y/n he discharges all his frustrations and stress on her until he gets to fuck with her. I want a hard smut plsss

With these :

3, 15, 21, 60, 66

OOOOH FUN!!! LET’S GET INTO IT I was not too proud of this one...but here you go! Yo this one was LOOONNGGG, like shit. 

3- I said FUCKING BEG!

15- Whose gonna stop us? I own this fucking place, baby.

21- That’s right, you fucking worship me don’t you? Look up at me like I’m your god.

60- I found that little journal you made about me. I think it’s so cute how you fantasize about me, darling.

66- I’m gonna corrupt your mind. I love to play with you like you’re a fucking violin.

CHECKOUT MY MASTERLIST HERE!!

leggo!!

... (Monday)

“You’ll have to redo these reports.” a stack of papers was thrown onto your desk. You stared up at your boss in disbelief. 

“And just what’s wrong with them?” you raised an eyebrow. 

“There are exactly 15 typos in these reports and since I don’t care enough to go through them with you, I want them redone.” 

Min Fucking Yoongi. CEO of Bangtan Enterprises. You of course were a humble secretary who wrote reports on every idol and client that walked through the damn door. 

“I spent hours on those!” you tried to defend. “I already deleted the stupid file to save space on my computer!”

“You have until the end of the week.” he walked away without another word. 

“Sora didn’t even turn in her reports because she stayed up playing fucking Doki Doki Handsome Husband Haven and you gave her an extension!” 

Yoongi didn’t respond as he turned the corner. 

“Are you fucking kidding me.” you seethed. 

... (Thursday Afternoon)

“Y/N!” you heard the horribly scary voice. 

“What now?” you whimpered. You turned around in your chair to see your boss fuming. “Yes, Mr. Min?”

“YOUR REPORTS ON MY CLIENT ARE LATE!”

“No they aren’t! They aren’t due for another three days!” you tried to defend. Everyone else was starting to stare. They all knew how they treated you and they all felt super bad that he chose you to bully. 

“I SENT AN EMAIL YESTERDAY SAYING I WANTED IT TODAY AT 10:00 IT’S NOW 2:00!”

“No you didn’t! I would have seen it-” you tried to speak.

“YOU HAVE TWENTY MINUTES TO HAVE IT DONE OR YOU CAN SAY GOODBYE TO YOUR JOB.” 

“Y/N, don’t cry...you’re doing that thing you do when you’re about to cry.” your friend came over to your side. “Don’t waste your tears on that asshole.”

You inhaled dramatically, starting to type furiously through your blurry vision. You felt the tear slip down your cheek and you went to furiously wipe it.

...(Lunchtime: Thursday Afternoon)

Sobbing in the bathroom was a thing right?

Your two friends, Dahyun and Sana stood outside the bathroom stall as you sobbed into your hands. They were convincing you to not quit.

“Y/N, You know this is the only job that will let you live comfortably in this city. Other than being a teacher...and who’d want that?” Sana shuddered. “He’s done this more than TWICE now.” (...I’M NOT SORRY)

“I HATE HIM! I FUCKING HATE HIM.” You cried. “WHY IS HE ALWAYS MEAN TO ME!” You furiously wiped your eyes.

“Y/N, Open the door.” Dahyun sighed. “Let us in.”

The stall door slowly open and your two friends were met by a totally distraught woman. Your hands were stained with your eyeliner that you hand managed to completely wipe off leaving your tired face. 

“Y/N, he’s working you to the bone. You don’t even smile anymore.” Sana kneeled in front of you, taking your dirty hands into hers. “Why do you let him bully you?”

“Because if I don’t, I won’t have a job.” you sniffed. 

“Is someone dying in here?” you heard Miss. Hyuna, another boss walk in. “Aw honey, did a boyfriend break up with you...do you want me to ‘accidentally’ get his car towed?”

Miss Hyuna was both Sana’s and Dahyun’s boss, you guys just liked to have lunch together.

“It’s Mr. Min.” Dahyun spoke for you. “He’s working Y/N to the bone. He only ever bullies her and no one else. I’ve seen it personally.”

“Is that so?” she raised an eyebrow, looking less than happy. “Is that true Miss. L/N. Is Mr. Min treating you unfairly?”

You couldn’t speak, so you just nodded. 

“All he does is yell at and belittle her every chance he gets.” Sana looked at Miss. Hyuna.

“Hm, I’ll go talk to him, right now. If he fires you, he’ll answer to me.” was all she said before she walked away. She ignored Sana trying to hold you back from stopping her.

Hyuna walked out of the bathroom with fire in her eyes. She walked by your desk only to see what looked like an open notebook with the words ‘The Min Yoongi Files’ written in permanent marker on the first page.

“This must be her case.” she shut the notebook, ignoring the childish looking anime stickers on the inside page. “I should take this for evidence, I hope she won’t mind.”

“Yoongi!” Hyuna stormed into his office, shutting the door behind her.

“Hey Hyuna, what’s up?” Yoongi looked up from his lunch. “What can I do for you?”

“What’s this I hear about you mistreating a worker? One of YOUR workers?”

“Pardon me?” he raised an eyebrow. “Mistreating?”

“Two of MY workers are busy consoling Y/N L/N in the ladies restroom on their lunch break of all times because according to all three of them, you’ve been unfairly treating her!!” she glared. She slammed the notebook down on his desk. “This should speak for itself.” she sighed. 

“I don’t mistreat Y/N L/N, She’s insolent! She needs discipline.”

“SHE’S YOUNG.” Was Hyuna’s comeback. “You can’t treat her like she’s a piece of garbage just because she makes one typo!” 

“Her typos cost us time.”

“So does your shameless reprimanding her for missing a semicolon.” she rebutted. “Think about it! Are men always this stupid.” she looked him up and down before walking out of his office.

Yoongi watched dumbfounded. He took at look at the notebook she left behind.

“Property of Y/N L/N.” he read aloud. He flipped it open to the first page to see a bunch of shiny and matte stickers all over the inside cover. “The Min Yoongi Files? Speak for itself, huh?” (read more below the break)

...

(The Next Morning) (Smut Warning)

You begrudgingly trudged into the office. Not only were you tired, but you were dreading. You had multiple deadlines.

“L/N, MY OFFICE.”

“Shit...” you seethed. You walked past your desk into Yoongi’s office. He was sitting at his desk, flipping through the pages of a very familiar looking book. “You wanted to see me sir?”

“Yes, I did.” he shut the book and slid it over to you. “Care to explain?”

“Holy fu- ” You had forgotten you left your diary on your desk. How did he get a hold of that?

“ I found that little journal you made about me. I think it’s so cute how you fantasize about me, darling. Hyuna gave it to me thinking it was a list of every terrible thing I’ve done to you. I didn’t know it would be a list of every terrible thing you wanted me to do to you.” his face spread into a smirk. 

“You read my property-”

“My name is on it, which means it’s company property by association.” he was still smirking. “Y/N, Y/N Y/N...I didn’t know you were such a needy little girl. On my desk, in the breakroom? The elevator of all places?? I didn’t even know you enjoyed when I raised my voice.“ he raised an eyebrow. “You do realize I could have you fired for writing about me in such a way.”

“Yes sir.” you whimpered. “I’ll have all my sh-..stuff off my desk by-”

“Y/N what on earth are you talking about?” he raised an eyebrow. “Surely you don’t think you are fired.”

“I’m sorry?” you raised an eyebrow, becoming very confused. 

“Even though I’m an asshole, a big jerk, and the bane of your existence, you still want me?” he raised an eyebrow. “Maybe you have more of a backbone than I thought. I sure as hell wouldn’t want to miss a chance to break that spirit of yours.” he rose to his feet and walked around his desk to face you. “Get over here.” he urged.

He grabbed you by the hand and yanked you to his chest. He crashed his hot mouth over yours, capturing you in a kiss. He held both sides of your face gingerly. In a shock, you held onto his blazer jacket to stop from falling over.

“Hmm.” he moaned. 

“Mr. Min!” you gasped. “We can’t- I’m your secretary!! And I don’t know if you’re aware of this but you hate me.”

“ Whose gonna stop us? I own this fucking place, baby. “ he laughed manically. “And who the hell said I hated you? Plus you want this. I know you do because you wouldn’t have written about me throwing you on my desk and eating that little pussy...fuck that was my favorite story to date.” he spoke in a babyish voice. “Shit I’ve always loved what that ass does to me.”

You felt yourself melt in every way. The thought that someone would storm in didn’t even cross your mind. He back you up against the table, sitting you on the desk. Yoongi tore off his blazer and hastily undid his necktie.

He broke away from you, allowing you to suck in air. You took a deep breath as you felt your lips. He practically tore his shirt open, buttons flying everywhere to reveal that body. To say you were taken aback was the understatement of the century.

“ That’s right, you fucking worship me don’t you?” he smirked as you stared him down “ Look up at me like I’m your god” he quoted the exact words from the entry you had written just 5 days ago. 

“Oh, you read the whole thing.” you squeaked. “I am so fucked.” you whimpered.

“I’ll be honest, I’ve been needing a good way to unleash my stress.” he shrugged. “This is perfect..” he motioned, tugging the hem of your shirt, playing with and unfastening each button. “I can take out my stress and you get to feel the real thing instead of writing shameless fan fiction.” he laughed. “Don’t make any mistakes,” he drank in your body. “I want this to be more than sex.”

Before you could say another word, Yoongi wrapped his arms around your waist again. He leaned down and softly kissed your lips. You just prayed he didn’t taste the bacon, egg, and, cream cheese bagel you ate this morning. You didn’t know what to do, so you shyly returned his affections.

“Come on, act like how you write about. Moan for me, grab my hair-” he mumbled through kisses. “Kiss me like you hate me.” he grunted. “Unless-...”

He abruptly yanked down your skirt along with your panties. “Maybe we should do this right. Spread em, secretary.”

He wasted no time in hooking your legs around his shoulders. 

“Mr. M-min.” you whimpered, feeling something wet trailed up your slit. 

“Shit...you taste so fucking good.” he moaned. “Damnit Y/N, you coulda told me you wanted me earlier.” he flicked his tongue against your clit. “Maybe if you had a good fuck, your reports would be more punctual.”

“That report wasn’t due and you know it.” you found it in you to reply. You tilted your head back, feeling his fingers be introduced into your tightness. “F-fuh”

 “Come on, you love this shit.” he laughed, lashing his tongue against you. “Beg for me, beg for my mouth, beg for me to make you cum.” he moaned into your heat. “I said FUCKING BEG! ” he thrust his fingers even deeper. “Come on, scream my name.”

“M. Min, I- we- you....”

“Not that...my first name...fucking say it I wanna hear it. I wanna hear if its as cute in my mind when I read how I made you squirt all over my fucking desk.” he kept moving his mouth and fingers against you.

“Y-yoongi.” you obeyed. This only encouraged him.

 “I’m gonna corrupt your mind. I love to play with you like you’re a fucking violin.” he giggled.

(3 days later... )

You were sitting at your desk when a stack of papers was thrown on your desk.

“There are 8 typos, fix them.” was all he said before he walked off. 

“Not again.” your work friend, seethed “what is it this time.“ She didn’t look up from her computer as you flipped through the pages.

My office, now secretary ;). Followed by a whole bunch of gibberish that lasted several pages.

“I’ll go talk to him” you rolled your eyes, taking the pile with you. You walked into his office. “Okay sir-” you began, walking through the door. You closed it behind you. “What seems to be the-”

Before you could talk any more, you felt his hand trail under your skirt. You felt his breathy laugh on the back of your neck. 

“I was hoping...we could go over your reports last week. I don’t think we got enough done, do you?”

(I was on a deadline....BUT I DID IT, my head is POUNDING)

[pterodactylterrace]

Pop

Title: Pop

Pairing: Syverson x OFC (could also be a reader insert)

Rating: T

Summary: Very, very fluffy. Almost indecently so.

Warnings: language, nudity mentioned, pregnancy, birth, slight daddy kink if you squint a little?

“Oh my God! Fuck you!” She squealed her head snapping to look over her shoulder, wide eyes fixed on his equally surprised blue gaze, confetti still dancing to the ground around them.

“Uhh… surprise?”

“Theodore Leslie Syverson, I swear to god if you just made my goddman water break.” She ranted, staring down at the pool of liquid at her feet, schooling her expression to remain fearful and angry, making sure the empty water balloon was hidden within her tiny hand, the other full one tucked out of his view.

“Shit… I… Oh shit.” Syverson sputtered, staring in horror at his wife’s back, his mind desperately trying to catch up.

“Oh Fuck, SY!” She squealed, quickly spinning and launching the remaining water balloon at him, laughing as it exploded over his baffled face.

“I what… That…. WOMAN!” Sy eventually forced out, staring at her incredulously. “Did you seriously just fake going into labor? That is too far!”

“Sucker!” She laughed, merrily dancing away from her still fuming husband.

“Oh, it’s on.” Syverson whispered to himself, already grabbing the broom from the hall cupboard to clean up the mess he’d made.

~*~

“Understood, sir. I will have those reports filed by EOD.” Syverson affirmed into the webcam, his major giving a curt nod of understanding. Sy jumped at the loud pop going off, groaning and shaking his head as confetti rained down around him. He got a glimpse of his wife dancing away with a confetti cannon on his monitor, the cardboard tube being launched and thumping harmlessly off his head.

“Apologizes, sir. It’s the hormones.” Syverson apologized with a straight face, trying to pretend he wasn’t covered in tiny multicolored pieces of paper.

“I do not envy you, Syverson.” His Major snorted, shaking his head. “Make sure you file that leave paperwork. She looks like she could go any day now.”

“Yes, sir.” Syverson nodded, saluting before ending the call, groaning and letting his head fall forward. “You’re lucky, Sugar!”

“Lucky how?” She laughed, poking her head back into the room. “Lucky your major is my dad?” She teased, Syverson breaking out into a grin and opening his arms up to her.

“Well, I was gonna say you’re lucky ‘cause I love you so much. Now I’m hurt; making it sound like I slept my way to where I am today.”

“I mean, you kinda did.” She giggled, perching herself on his thick thigh, rubbing a hand over her swollen belly.

“True, that is how we ended up with this.” Syverson agreed, rubbing his own calloused paw over her bump. “Now go on, lemme finish this and I’m all yours for the rest of the day.”

~*~

“That is NOT funny!” Her voice rang out, yanking him out of the sound sleep he’d found himself in on the couch, the credits to the romcom he’d been conned into watching rolling up the screen.

“What?” Syverson half yawned, sitting up and looking for her voice.

“My cup!” She pouted, stomping her foot angrily, vainly trying to stretch up to the second shelf where the ceramic sat just out of her reach.

“You always said the second shelf was the limit, Sugar.” Syverson teased, sauntering over to the kitchen, leaning against the archway as he watched her trying to maneuver her belly out of the way to extend her reach just a little bit more. “Come on, now. One more time, you almost got it.” He chuckled, watching as the fabric of the shirt she had blatantly stolen from him slid up over her backside again, giving him a view of the dark cotton material.

“Daddy!” She whined, pouting over her shoulder at him, Sy groaning softly and pressing himself up behind her, pulling her hips back into him.

“I think I have a better way of getting you to sleep instead ‘a that new age hippie garbage.”

“How is tea new age hippie garbage?” She laughed as he easily reached over her and took down the cup for her.

“Ain’t nothing older than getting’ it on, Sugar.” Syverson chuckled, grinding his hips against her back.

~*~

“I just can’t sleep, Teddy!”

“I’m so uncomfortable!”

“I’m tired but I’m not sleepy!”

There was no way the little spitfire that spouted all that nonsense was the same one napping away on the couch. He’d called her 3 times and she was still snoring. At this rate they were going to be late for their appointment. He snatched up the sharpie from the side table, uncapping it with his teeth he tugged her shirt up, exposing her stomach, which looked painfully swollen at this late point in her pregnancy. He scrawled across her stomach, the woman barely moving as he wrote.

“Sugar!” He bellowed out again once he had hidden the evidence of his misdeed.

“Stop yelling, I’m right here!” She groaned, shooting him an irritated look as she sat up.

It wasn’t until over an hour later when she finally realized what he had done. She lifted her shirt up and pulled the extended waistband of her maternity pants under her belly, finally catching a glimpse of her husband’s signature, proudly signed across her stomach.

Captain T.L. Syverson

Reported for BOOTY

“I am so sorry.” She sighed, slumping at the ultrasound technician’s strange look. “My husband thinks he’s funny.”

“Well, he’s getting an early start on the dad jokes.”

~*~

“Ah! Fuck!” She hissed, clutching her stomach as it contracted again. “Teddy?” She called, reaching out and gently shaking his shoulder, instantly snapping him awake.

“What’s wrong?” He asked, sitting bolt upright, straining his ears for any noises as he scanned the perimeter of the room.

“I’m having contractions. They’re getting worse.”

“Sugar… you promised me you wouldn’t use the baby in any more of your schemes.” Syverson warned suspiciously.

“Teddy, don’t be an asshole.”

“I’m just sayin’… is your water gonna break again?”

“Oh my God, Teddy, I will kill you!”

“You’re really in labor?”

“Yes, I… hang on!” She groaned, rolling over with some effort and pulling out the confetti cannon hidden just below, pulling the string and setting it off. “I’m in labor!” She cheered, Syverson rushing to help her out of bed.

“You’re in labor!” Syverson laughed, kissing the top of her head lovingly.

“Ouch, ok that hurts.” She groaned, gripping his forearms tightly as her stomach tightened again.

“Those are close.” Syverson muttered to himself, waiting for her to ease her death grip to gently tilt her chin up to look at him. “Hospital?”

“I think so… I don’t know, I haven’t done this before!” She groaned, shifting on her feet uncomfortably.

“Neither have I, Sugar. I’ll go put the bags in the car, ok?”

“Get dressed first you lunatic!”

~*~

“It’s likely the worst photo of me I’ve ever seen.”

“Aw, don’t be silly, darlin’. You look beautiful.” Syverson chuckled, planting a whisker roughened kiss on her cheek.

“Are we looking at the same picture?” She scoffed, shifting their newborn son in her arms, looking back at the screen of her husband’s phone. Her, hair pulled up into a disaster of a bun, body still swollen from giving birth, a hospital gown flapped open as she reached for something, showing off her very fashionable diaper made of mesh undies and the world’s biggest pad.

“I mean, I see the most beautiful girl in the world, right after she just did one of the hardest things a person can do. And she’s in her underwear. Look at those.” Syverson insisted, zooming in on her backside. “You can’t tell me that’s not hot!” He laughed, wiping a tear from his eye when she shoved his shoulder in irritation. “It’s like your comfy panties on steroids!”

“I actually brought those with me.” She snorted, Syverson’s laughter doubling at her confession. “If you ask nicely, I’ll let you take off my hospital grade slipper socks.”

“Aww, darlin’, talk dirty to me.”

“Yeah? You could take off these rough uncomfortable socks that someone else wore yesterday. I might even need your help to clip my nails while you’re down there.”

“Oh baby, you don’t know what you do to me.” Syverson snorted.

“And then? If you’re a good boy, I might need you to help me rub lanolin on my cracked nipples. I’ll even let you change my nursing pads.”

“Oh hell, I don’t know what any of that is.”

Tags:  @weallhaveadestiny @lunedelorient @summersong69 @mis-lil-red @lharrietg @amberangel112 @mansaaay @packerfan43

[semisgroupie]

 The Woman Who Used to be Mrs. Jones

Genre: smut, fluff (kinda at the end?), angst

Pairing: Aoi Todo X F!Reader

Word Count: 6.4k words

Warnings (some of the content can be triggering so please read through the warnings before reading this): cheating (in this Todo is the other man/reader is in a loveless marriage where her husband cheats on her/her husband is just a huge asshole), toxic relationship, sexual scenes, unprotected sex (don’t be silly wrap your willy), oral sex (f! and m! receiving), dirty talk, multiple creampies, bathroom sex, praise, risky sex (they fuck at a party the reader and her husband is hosting), mention of a small altercation between Todo and reader’s husband, mention of a child & brief mention of pregnancy (not detailed),  if I missed anything let me know

A/N: I do not condone, support or encourage cheating! It is not good, don’t do it! The song Me and Mrs. Jones by Billy Paul helped me with creating this piece so I recommend listening to it while reading this. This has depicted sex within this so MINORS DNI (I’m not gonna cry bc I don’t cry but I am not afraid to beat some ass) So I hope you all enjoy it, comments/reblogs are very appreciated!!! I also apologize in advance if formatting is weird on mobile :/

Flashbacks are bolded & italicized! Also separated by a border!

Todo walks up to the counter of the cafe and orders the usual for the both of you. He came early since he was done with work earlier than usual so after paying for the drinks he carried them to the special spot you two shared. Once seated he takes his phone out to check the time while taking a sip from his drink.

The time read 5:45. You got out fifteen minutes ago and your job wasn’t too far from the cafe, so you’d be there soon. The bell chimed to the cafe and Todo looked up to see you walk in.

His heart pounded in his chest, you looked as beautiful as you did the first day he met you all those years ago in high school. Once you two made eye contact you flashed him a smile and made your way over to him.

“Hey baby, I didn’t think you’d be here before me.”

He felt his cheeks flush at the pet name. You leaned down to hug him and give him a kiss, placing your hands on each side of his face caressing him as your lips met. Once you pulled away you sat down and started talking about your day at work.

He couldn’t help but lose focus as to what you were saying. He knew your day was tough from how your hair looked a bit disheveled from running your hands through it, a habit you had picked up when you were extremely stressed.

Time passed as the two of you spoke about each other’s days and then you were both done with your drinks.

“Wanna go home now Aoi? As much as I love it here I found this new recipe online that I would really like to try out!”

He nodded as you both got up, tipped the cashier one last time before heading to your shared home. The distance was short from where you both were currently and when you two were together even one hundred miles would feel like two blocks.

As Todo put the key in to unlock the door he sighed in content. Once you both were inside he took your jacket off and put it away. He leaned on the kitchen island while you started taking out ingredients for dinner.

“This isn’t a dream right Y/N?”

It just felt so unrealistic to him he just had to be dreaming. Your laughter filled the air as you walked towards him. You wrapped your arms around his body and looked up at him.

“While we did this in the most unconventional way it is very much real” you removed your left hand from his body to put your hand close to his line of view, “this ring you gave me a few months ago is proof of our love and the ring I gave you on your left ring finger is also proof of my love and dedication to you.”

Unconventional? Was that even the right word to explain the events that led you both to where you are now?

You started your arrangement with him two years ago. You became “Mrs. Jones” a year before that. A happy marriage was wished to the both of you, but your marriage was anything but that. Six months after you both said your I do’s you found your husband in bed with his boss. They didn’t even think about trying to conceal their affair.

To say it broke your heart was an understatement. You felt like he ripped your heart out of your chest and destroyed it slowly as you watched. Soon there were lonely nights filled with you drinking and crying yourself to sleep. Soon after you just became numb, you got used to putting up a facade whenever your friends or family asked how married life was.

The only one who knew of the affair and how horrible your marriage actually was, was your best friend Valerie. When she first found out you had to hold her back the next time she saw him because she was just filled with rage. You were trying to find a good divorce attorney, but you just didn’t have enough money yet, so you were stuck for the time being. Then it was time to plan how to celebrate one year since the day you married him.

Valerie said that she would bring a special surprise for you, but you just pushed it to the side. You settled on hosting a party at your parent’s house since it was big enough. The fake smile you had plastered on your face burned your soul more than the cheap ring on your finger. A cheap ring that meant the entire world one moment but now means absolutely nothing.

You were leaning on the wall, holding a glass of champagne, next to your husband as Valerie approached you.

“Y/N! You look absolutely stunning!” she gave your husband a side glance as she begrudgingly said his name, “Declan... anyways I have your surprise so come with me to the backyard!”

Before you could say anything she grabbed your hand and weaved both of you through the crowd of people. She opened the door and you almost dropped your glass at the sight.

“Aoi? I thought you were away in Sweden?”

Todo brings a hand to his neck.

“I was but my job relocated here, and Valerie told me everything. As much as I’d love to say congratulations, I can’t.”

Your body moves on its own as you approach him and hug him. He holds you on instinct and all that is heard is sniffles. You move back and quickly apologize for your abrupt actions.

“Hey, don’t apologize pretty girl” he brought his hands to cup your face and wiped the tears from your face, “Declan should be the one apologizing, how could he take someone like you for granted. I know you might not believe me, but you look just as beautiful as you did when we were in high school.”

The two of you were high school sweethearts but got accepted into different colleges. The inevitable happened and you both broke up, heading your separate ways losing contact. The last thing you heard about him was he had a job in Sweden and that was it. After college you met Declan and he seemed like a knight in shining armor, but it was too late for you to realize he was the devil in disguise.

You leaned into his touch as if you two were the only ones there. Only if he was the one you married; you both would be so happy. You wouldn’t have to worry about any mistresses or affairs because even in this moment you felt all his love. Todo moved in and before you knew it you felt his lips on yours.

You melted into the kiss immediately kissing him back until he abruptly pulled away.

“I am so sorry Y/N. I didn’t mean to you’re still married, and this is the anniversary party and he’s inside—”

“I don’t care about Declan. The only one I care about is you. Valerie always says I should be a little selfish and now is the time. I still care about you Aoi, I still love you. The piece of my heart that left with you is now back and I’m whole again. I understand if you’re not comfortable with this, I am trying to find a lawyer and once I get the promotion at my job I can finally pay for one.”

You looked up at him hoping he would indulge you in one last kiss even if it would be the last one you two ever shared. You watched as a smile grew on his handsome face.

“I love you too Y/N, I always had and I always will. When Valerie told me about everything I cannot explain the anger I felt not only at him but also myself. If I never left then you wouldn’t be in this situation. Maybe you would’ve been with me.”

He leaned down and placed another kiss on your lips. Before it could continue Valerie ran out to the both of you.

“Hey lovebirds as much as I love seeing you two together Declan is starting a toast and wants his wife by his side.”

She rolled her eyes as your husband’s name left her lips. You took a deep breath and turned inside, Valerie and Todo following you. You took another deep breath as you made your way to your husband putting up the fake smile. He handed you a glass of champagne and started the toast.

“This past year with my beautiful wife by my side has been the best year of my life. Waking up next to her every morning is what fuels my fire. I love this woman so much and marrying her was the best decision of my life. Thank you all for coming and supporting us. Here’s to a happy, healthy marriage and for many more years to come!”

As glasses clinked and cheers filled the room you were filled with disgust at his words. How could he spew such garbage knowing it meant absolutely nothing?

“Come on honey, you can do a better job with that fake fucking smile. Make everyone believe that we’re in love and that I haven’t fucked almost every single one of my coworkers. Maybe I’ll even indulge in you tonight.”

“Fuck you Declan, you piece of shit.”

You excused yourself to the bathroom shoving your heel into his foot making him wince in pain. Todou followed you upstairs a few minutes afterwards hearing your sobs. He knocked on the door once, twice until your shaky voice responded.

“Hey it’s me, I wanted to check on you.”

He waited hearing your heels click on the ground until you reached the door to open it. You looked up at him with tear stained cheeks, eyes puffy from all the rubbing and wiping your tears away. Todo looked at you with so much love it was as if Eros struck him with his bow.

He quickly placed his lips on yours, the kiss feverish but also very loving. As if he was telling you how much he loved you each time his lips met yours. He picked you up and placed you on top of the bathroom sink, quickly running to shut and lock the bathroom door.

“Please let me make you forget about him. Please let me show you what it is like to make love and not fuck. Please Y/N.”

All you did was nod before placing your lips back on his allowing your hands to slide down and undo his belt. He allowed you to undo his belt and pants letting them hit the ground while he was lifting the skirt of your dress up.

“As much as I’d love to take my time worshipping your body we have to make this pretty quick beautiful. But please if you want to stop at any time stop me.”

You nodded at him as you felt his hand lightly graze your clothed pussy. He moved your panties to one side as he slipped a finger in, slowly moving it then inserting a second finger moving it just as slow but each movement made you moan and shiver. You started getting impatient and you grabbed his wrist.

“Please Aoi, please make love to me.”

He slotted his lips against yours again as he removed his cock from his boxers. Moving the tip against your folds making you both moan in the kiss. Once he entered you, slowly and gentle, you broke away from the kiss to throw your head back and moan. Once you gave him the okay he started thrusting.

“Fuck, you’re so tight baby. Just holding me like you don’t want me to let go.”

He moved faster hitting all the right spots. It was as if his cock was designed to fit inside your pussy. Both of your moans and groans filled the small bathroom. It quickly became heated as the mirror started to fog up. He started thrusting into you faster and harder making you throw your hands on the mirror for stabilization.

He placed sloppy kisses along the column of your neck. He lifted himself from your neck to lick two of his fingers and place them on your clit, moving them in small tight circles.

“Come on baby cum for me. Cum all over my cock and I will fill you up. I’ll make this pretty little pussy so fucking messy with my cum and you’ll walk around in that party filled with it. You look so fucking gorgeous baby. I love you so much.”

That sent you off the edge, creaming on his cock with a high pitched moan of his name. He continued pounding your pussy through your orgasm as he was nearing his own. You pulled him in for another kiss running your nails up and down his clothed chest. Feeling your nails against him made him reach his own peak, filling you completely with his cum.

Todo peppered kisses along your lips, swollen and puffy from kissing so intensely, as you both came down from your highs.

“I’m going to pull out now okay?”

“Okay that’s fine.”

You didn’t need to tell Todo to be gentle, he was already treating you like fine glass. He slowly pulled out and quickly moved your underwear to cover your cum filled pussy. A low chuckle left his lips.

“Don’t want you leaking cum all over the place.”

He lifted you off the bathroom sink after picking up both his pants and boxers. Before you could even smooth out your dress Todo did it for you, fixing any flyaways in your hair and placing one last kiss on your lips. He unlocked the door and helped lead you to the stairs.

“We should head down at separate times so we don’t look so suspicious.”

You nodded, placing one last kiss one his lips.

“I love you Aoi.”

“I love you too Y/N.”

You went downstairs and walked to your parents. You had a small limp and it filled both Aoi and yourself with joy seeing how your husband stared, completely confused at you. Valerie leaned next to you close to your ear.

“I already gave Aoi your phone number, go get that dick again.”

She lightly smacked your ass, a small yelp leaving your lips. The party went on for a couple more hours, lingering glances shared between you and Todo. When the party ended you had to figure out a ride situation since your husband drank way too much and you were a little tipsy.

Declan’s brother offered to take him back and before he could offer you a ride Todo came up and offered to take you home, to which you immediately agreed. The ride was filled with laughter and talk of memories. Also, when Todo parked at a secluded area near where you live you thanked him for the ride with a mind blowing blowjob.

He dropped you off in front of your place, being the gentleman he is, he walked you to the front door giving you one last kiss.

“I hope to see you again soon beautiful angel.”

“How about tomorrow? We could go get drinks or dinner.”

“There’s a cafe near my job, I’ll text you the address. Meet me there tomorrow when you’re done with work.”

You nodded as you fished your keys out of your purse. Taking a deep breath you unlocked the door and put your things away, heading straight to the guest bedroom because you refuse to sleep in the same bed Declan had all his whores in.

You thought he went to sleep until you heard a groan of your name. You rolled your eyes and continued going to the guest bedroom, ignoring him until you felt a hand grab your wrist.

“What do you want Declan?”

“What, I can’t touch my wife? You looked really sexy tonight so I thought I might do you the favor of fucking you.”

Fire burned in your veins. Every time you tried to pull yourself away from his hold, his grip got tighter.

“Declan, you’re drunk, and I hate you. Even if I was drunk I still wouldn’t go to bed with you, so make good friends with your hand or call one of your whores up because I will never sleep with you again.”

He turned you around.

“Listen here you bitch, you will never talk to me like that ever again. I did you the fucking favor of marrying your sorry ass now you treat me like this? I haven’t touched you in fucking months and this is what you tell me? Fuck you.”

“My sorry ass? Did me a favor? Did you also do me a favor by cheating on me over and over again? Did you do me a fucking favor then Declan? Rubbing it in my face that you didn’t love me the way I loved you, fucking anything that had tits and bringing them back here. I. Fucking. Hate. You. Rot. In. Hell. I don’t know what those girls see in you anyways, I had to fake almost all my orgasms and your dick has a weird curve, you should go see a doctor for that actually. I can’t wait until I have the money to divorce you and properly leave your sorry ass in the dust.”

You snatched your arm from his grip and locked yourself in the guest bedroom. You took off the heels and unzipped your dress letting it hit the ground as you made your way to the bathroom that was connected to the room. You took off the ring on your left hand flushing it down the toilet.

“That’ll be the last I see of you.”

You turned on the shower letting the water run, steam filling up the bathroom fogging up the mirror. You slipped your panties off the memory of your time with Aoi in the bathroom of your parents’ house filling your mind as you picked up the cum stained panties and put them in the laundry basket.

You entered the shower letting the water run over your body. After your shower you put your pajamas on and sent a goodnight text to Todo setting up the time for meeting at the cafe tomorrow. The next morning you woke up to an empty house, you let out a sigh of relief not wanting to deal with Declan after the stunt he pulled last night.

Your day at work went fairly quickly then it was the end of your workday. Inputting the address Todo gave you into the GPS you realized the drive was going to be pretty short. Once you found parking you walked into the cafe, the little bell on the door chiming with the movement. You looked around and saw Todo sitting at a corner side table, isolated from most of the crowd.

That���s when you started the arrangement. He was fine with being the sideman for now until he could properly have you to himself. Little dates and mind blowing sex filled your lives for the next four months.

~Four Months Later~

Todo was sitting at the table that basically became the unofficially assigned table for you both as he heard the chime to the door. His head shot up expecting you to come through the doorway. It was just an elderly couple. He checked his phone again, checking for any new messages from you and nothing. Just the last message that read: “I’ll see you soon my love”.

Today was the day you would find out if you got the promotion. With the promotion you would get a huge increase in your salary and a $2,000 advance once it was official. $2,000 was the amount you needed to finally afford the divorce lawyer.

Ten minutes passed and Todo ordered another drink for himself. To say he was nervous for you would be an understatement. He was fidgeting like crazy. He received the drink and sat back down at the table. The door chimed again and he looked up to finally see you.

You waved at him and gave him a small smile. Worry filled him and he was afraid to ask you how everything went.

“There’s no way she didn’t get the promotion. She has the best relationship with her boss and she works so hard.” He thought to himself.

You greeted him with a kiss on his head and sat down. He stood silent watching you.

“So I should tell you about what happened at work right Aoi?”

“You don’t have to honey, it’s fine.”

A smile graced your face, a genuine smile, the only type of smile that you shared with Todo since he filled you with genuine happiness.

“I got the promotion.”

Todo sat there in shock.

“What? What did you just say?”

“I got the promotion. I just came back from meeting the divorce lawyer to fill out necessary paperwork, that’s why I came so late.”

He got up from his seat and lifted you up into his arms.

“I’m so happy. I could yell from the rooftops.”

So he did the next best thing, he yelled about your promotion to the entire cafe. The people inside applauded you and gave you words of encouragement. The elderly man approached the both of you after Todo put you down.

“Congratulations to you young lady. This young man seems to be extremely proud of you. I didn’t mean to interrupt the celebration but it’s just that the both of you remind both my wife and I of us when we were younger. While we met under unconventional circumstances we have spent the past 30 years together. I wish you both a happy, healthy relationship.”

You both thanked the old man and watched him walk back to his wife.

“Do you think we’ll be like them one day Aoi?”

He pulled you close to him.

“I don’t think we will, I have a feeling I know we will. Now let’s go pick up your things and bring you back to my place to properly celebrate.”

He drove you to your house and walked with you inside to pack your clothes. In the midst of packing things you both heard the front door slam shut, meaning one thing: Declan was home.

“Care to explain the car in front Y/N? I know you don’t have enough money to afford a new one.”

You sighed and continued packing with Todo.

“I was asking you a fucking question -- oh who’s this? Why are you packing? Oh I get it now, finally got a new guy to deal with your shit? Good luck buddy--”

Before Declan could get another sentence out Todo walked over and shoved him against the wall.

“Don’t you ever speak to Y/N like that again asshole. For your information, she’s leaving you and coming with me. A guy who actually loves her.”

Declan stood there shocked that someone stood up to him. Once you zipped up your bag Todo left Declan to help you. Todo walked behind you with your bag in his hand. You turned one last time to Declan.

“Oh by the way I’ve been having sex with Aoi for the last four months and the first time was at the anniversary party. The reason I was limping was because of him not because of my heels. And you’ll be getting my divorce papers soon, go fuck yourself Declan.”

You walked with Todo to his car and he drove you back to the cafe so you could bring your car to his place. Once you entered through the front door he was on top of you. Placing sloppy kisses all over your lips and neck.

“You looked so fucking sexy there Y/N.”

He picked you up and brought you to his bedroom while you were peppering kisses along his neck. He put you on the bed and started stripping, you followed suit until you were left in your bra and panties and he was left in his boxers.

He pushed you down on the bed and crawled over you. Placing kisses down your body, removing your bra once he got to your chest and removing your panties once he got to your hips. Not one inch of your body was left untouched by his lips except your pussy. The place you needed him most.

“Aoi please.”

“Please what baby? Tell me what you want.”

“Need you—your mouth on my pussy please.”

He wasted no time. He licked from your leaking entrance to your engorged clit. Making you throw your head back.

“I don’t know how but you taste better every time. I’m fucking addicted to how you taste.”

He dove back in, wrapping his lips around your clit and using a finger to tease your entrance. He was alternating between light sucks and harsh sucks making you buck your hips against his mouth.

“Aoi please fuck me. Wanna cum on your cock please.”

He gave your clit one last suck and took the finger he used to circle your entrance and put it in your mouth. The feeling of your tongue swirling around his finger made him even harder if that was possible. He stood up and took off his boxers, throwing them to a random area in the room.

He spit on his hand and pumped himself a few times as he made his way back on the bed.

“Are you ready my love?”

You spoke breathlessly “yes Aoi, please.”

He aligned himself and entered you slowly, going inch by inch until he bottomed out inside you. A moan leaving both of your lips.

“And correction my love, I don’t fuck you” you furrowed your brows but that expression quickly changed when he pulled himself back until only the head of his cock was inside you and he bottomed out again in a swift movement, “I make love to you.”

He leaned down placing his forearms on either side of your head slotting his lips against yours. His thrusts slowly increase in speed. He breaks the kiss to praise you.

“My beautiful girl is so talented. You look so gorgeous right now. So fucking beautiful, I love you Y/N. I love you so much.”

“Aoi, feels s’good. Please I’m gonna cum soon. You fill me so good, like you were made for me.”

You wrap your legs around his waist and he slides his hand down between the two of you to rub circles around your clit. Your moans start increasing in pitch signaling that you’re going to cum. You bring your hands to his back and rake your nails down, digging into his skin, sure to leave marks. His ruts increased in speed bringing you to your orgasm.

“Fuck baby you’re clenching my cock so tight. I’m gonna cum so deep in your pussy baby. I’m gonna fill you up every single day because now you are mine.”

He emphasized each word with a hard thrust. He buries his face in the crook of your neck. Once he cums he sinks his teeth in trying to conceal the guttural moan that leaves his mouth. Coming down from his high he lifts his head up.

“I’m sorry baby I didn’t mean to—”

“There’s no need to apologize Aoi, I’m sorry about the scratches on your back.”

“Don’t apologize pretty girl, with how often we’re going to be making love I’ll get used to it.”

He slowly pulled out and you felt the cum leak out of you. He picked you up and carried you bridal style to the shower. Let’s just say both of you were lucky that the neighbors were gone for the night.

~1 year later~

The both of you have been together for a year and four months. Todo was by your side the entire time throughout the divorce preceding. Comforting you and supporting you the entire time. Once your divorce was finalized your relationship received an official title.

Both of you were extremely happy but there was the voice in the back of Todo’s head that gave him doubts. When he went to go engagement ring shopping with Valerie the voice was there.

As he picked out the perfect ring for you the voice was there. His head was filled with doubts. Of course he loved you, he loved you more than anyone or anything in the world. He knew you loved him. His love for you was immortal, unconditional but he wasn’t so sure if it was the same for you.

That voice in his head hammering doubts over and over again it made him nervous. He started to wonder if he should bring the ring back. If he should change his mind. It was that voice.

“What if she gets tired of you like her husband did with her? What if she finds someone better than you? What if she doesn’t love you as much as you love her? Could you handle the heartbreak Aoi? Could you?”

He started getting distant from you, less kisses in the morning, leaving without saying goodbye, barely initiating sex, it made you worried. What if he’s getting tired of you like Declan? You texted him wanting to meet at the cafe after work. He just sent back a simple “okay”.

Reading it made you even more nervous than before. When you were done with work you drove as slow as you possibly could to the nearby parking lot. You opened the door to the cafe and once you looked around you saw Todo there, fidgeting.

“Is he going to end things with me? We were supposed to move to the new house next week.” You wondered to yourself, you both had so many plans for the future but the future is uncertain.

You sat down and it was silent. He nudged your drink over to you and that was the most interaction you got from him since you got there. It killed you to not talk to him and it was killing him too.

“Y/N, I’m scared.”

You looked into his eyes and saw the fear within them. But what could he possibly be scared about?

“Aoi, what’s wrong? What’s scaring you?”

“What if you get tired of me? What if you meet someone better than me? What if—”

“Aoi. Stop that please” your voice started shaking, it broke your heart to see the man you love being plagued with such fears.

“Aoi, I love you. I love you more than anything in the world. You’re my love. You’re my soulmate. You make me happier than anyone in this world. You brighten up my day, the small things you do make me fall even more in love with you.”

You got up and bent down to hug him. You pulled back holding his face in your hands.

“Aoi I will never get tired of you. I let you leave me once and I never plan on doing it ever again. I love you Aoi Todo, I will love you until my heart stops beating and I will love you long after that. In every life I will look for you to recreate this love over and over again. If I had to go back in time I would go through this all over again just to be right here with you.”

Tears were falling down both of your faces by the time you stopped speaking. You wiped his tears away and he lifted his hands to wipe yours away. He pulled your face closer to his and kissed you.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’m so so sorry.”

He muttered apologies against your lips and when you both pulled away it was his turn to speak. You sat back down holding his hands above the table.

“I just got scared Y/N. I love you so much and I just can’t imagine my life without you. I look forward to the future with you, I want you by my side through every single endeavor. You’re my everything. You’re the sun that brightens my day. You’re the stars that shine through my night sky. You’re the air that I breathe. I love you.”

You stood up and pulled him along with you as you both walked out of the cafe. You drove the both of you home and once you entered you led him to the bedroom. Once you entered you undid his work shirt and pants stripping him to his underwear. You led him to the bed and sat him down.

“I never want you to question my love for you ever again.”

You kissed him and placed kisses down his body. Little nibbles along his pecs, a flick of your tongue along his nipples, slow sensual kisses until you reached the waistband of his boxers. You tugged at the waistband and he lifted his hips to help you properly take them off.

His cock slapped against his abdomen. You took it in your hand and gave it a few gentle strokes. You placed featherlight kisses from the head of his cock to the base. You took his head into your mouth swirling your tongue around it and letting it go with a pop.

You took your hand and spit on it using it to lube his cock for you and you started to take more of him into your mouth. His moans and groans filling the room along with the sounds of you gagging yourself on his cock.

When you popped up for air looking at him he could swear he just saw a goddess in front of him. Even with your saliva and tears coating your face he has never seen anyone more beautiful than you. Even Aphrodite herself could not even come close to your beauty.

You got up and stripped off your clothing. You pushed him back gently to lay on the bed as you straddled him aligning his cock with your pussy. You sunk yourself down onto him, he tossed his head back into the bed feeling your warm slick walls welcome him in.

You started moving up and down slowly before gaining a rhythm bouncing on his cock. You moved your upper body close to his grabbing his face and making eye contact.

“I love you—ah fuck—Aoi. I love you so much. You fuck me so good. You are so handsome. Thank you for loving me.”

You felt his arms reach around your waist as planted his feet on the ground to pound into you. Once he started jackhammering into you repeatedly hitting your g-spot you felt yourself cumming around him over and over again.

He used this position to pull as many orgasms as he could from you until he had his own and with how tight you were around him it would be extremely soon. You felt his cock twitch inside you.

“Please cum inside me Aoi, please please please. I need you to fill me up please I need your cum.”

He pulled you down and his hips lifted bottoming out inside you, filling you with his cum. You let your full weight go onto him as you were catching your breath. Hard breaths filled the room. You looked at him and kissed him again.

“I love you Aoi.”

“I love you more Y/N.”

The following week you both moved into your forever home. Todo made dinner and ordered your favorite dessert to celebrate the move. It was also the day that he was going to propose. He knew how much you hated public proposals and receiving unnecessary attention so why not do it at home?

When you were doing the dishes making small conversation on how you saw a documentary about female serial killers he got the ring and went on one knee.

“So all of her victims were just random men who had green eyes, isn’t that—”

“Y/N.”

You turned around and dropped the sponge in your hand. Your jaw drops at the sight of the man you love and the most beautiful ring you have ever seen.

“Y/N, you have made me the happiest man the past year and four months. Time with you has been amazing. You make me feel like I have been floating on air and I never want to come down. I love you so much. Will you continue this journey of life with me, as my wife?”

“Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes!”

You bent down to kiss him and he slipped the ring on your left finger. A few seconds later Valerie called, already aware of what Todo was planning to do. You set the date of the wedding six months from the day of the proposal.

The wedding was small and filled with only close friends and family. It was the happiest day of your life and everyone preferred Todo over your ex husband, even your father, who never liked any of your boyfriends.

“I like this guy a lot Y/N, I mean I’ve always liked him.”

“Dad you threatened to hunt him down when we first started dating in high school.”

“Oh honey it’s just dad stuff but that was a promise and it still stands.”

“Dad! He’s not like that, he makes me feel like I’m the only woman in the world and like I’m a precious gem.”

You both looked over at Todo sharing a dance with your mom and when he looked at you, you could see your future in them. Wherever he would go you would be there beside him as his wife.

“this ring you gave me a few months ago is proof of our love and the ring I gave you on your left ring finger is also proof of my love and dedication to you.” Todo leaned forward and kissed you holding you in his arms. 

“I never thought that one person could make me feel so loved and make me feel so much love for them Y/N.”

Now married life was doing the both of you well. Nothing could tear the both of you apart. Not even the news on your one year anniversary that you both were going to have your first child. If Todo felt like he was on cloud nine before then holding your beautiful, healthy son in his arms made him feel he was in seventh heaven. 

A/N pt2: thank you all for reading this, I’m really excited about how this work turned out I hope you all enjoyed it. This is by far my longest fic so I really appreciate you reading it through. I have much more on the way, if you have any requests my ask is open! Again thank you so much for reading I appreciate you all! — D <3

[millenialfanfictionaddiction]

Go Go Nekoma! Push it, Push it Nekoma! Coaches Chemisty (pt. 1)

Warnings: Angst, breakups, mention of virginity loss, Swearing

⚠️THIS FIC IS 18+ NSFW, MINORS DNI ⚠️

Word count: 6000+ (split into 3 parts)

"I'm really sorry Y/N. I just don't see this going anywhere. We are both leaving for college soon and going to different schools at that" your boyfriend of the past 2 years, Naoi Manabu said as he looked down to the ground kicking the dirt below his feet.

Your eyes watered as you drown out the words he's saying.

"B-but we can make this work. I can come see you on weekends and we can still see each other over holidays and school breaks" you plead trying to save a relationship you know is doomed.

The past weeks had been rough to say the least. Manabu had been growing distant from you. Making excuses and staying later for volleyball practice to avoid walking home with you. To say it hurt would be an understatement. It broke your heart.

"Y/N I'm sorry, I just can't do this" Manabu said as he looked up seeing tears welling in your eyes.

"I love you. Doesn't that mean anything?" You say sternly as tears roll down your cheeks.

"Y/N-" he starts saying as you place your hand in front of his face.

"No. Don't. I gave you everything. I stuck by you through it all! I stayed late to walk with you home from volleyball practice. I came to as many games as I could! I stayed up late helping you study! Fuck I gave you my virginity!" You scream.

The emotions are just too overwhelming.

"Y/N-" Manabu tries to say as you turn.

"No. I'm done. Good luck with your life Naoi" you turn away letting the tears flow as you start to jog away.

Almost on cue the sky opens up and rain pours down on your head. This is just like one of those awful romance novels. The girl gets dumped by the love of her life only for rain to continue to dampen her day. Just fucking fantastic.

This was quite literally the worst day of your life.

*8 years later*

"Y/N darling can you please water the flowers outside. I forgot to have Vee do it this morning" Your boss asks you politely with a smile.

"Of course! Let me just finish this arrangement and I'll get to watering. You can head home if you like Bella. I know your poor husband must be starving waiting for you" you giggle as Bella rolls her eyes.

"Let him die. No good worthless piece of crap. Couldn't even take the garbage out last night like I asked him too" Bella huffed as she walked over to your table.

"Stay single Y/N, trust me getting married is for the birds. Sure you meet some handsome young man and he charms his way into your life but the MINUTE he says 'I do' its all down hill from there" Bella says to you as she sternly shakes her finger.

You can't help but laugh. Bella is in her 70s and has been married to the same man for 50 years. He's really very kind and helpful in the shop when he comes and visits. Sometimes you think Bella expects too much from her husband but she's quick to shut you up.

"If you don't establish dominance Y/N, these men will walk all over you! You are young and beautiful. You don't want any man. And if you do, find one who will worship the ground you walk on. A man who will lay his coat over a pile of manure for you to walk. A man who will put your pleasure before his own" she says as she lectures you for the 10th time this week.

Bella loved you like her own daughter. Her son had moved away years ago and wasn't around much. She often invited you and Vee to have dinner with her and her husband. The dinners were entertaining to say the least. Usually ending with Bella ranting about how naive women now a days are or how shallow men are.

You enjoyed your time with Bella and her husband even if you didn't share the same sentiment as Bella did.

You hadn't been on a date in over a year. Every relationship seemed to go the same way. There was never a connection. You tried hard through college and after to find someone but always managed to come up empty.

After you graduated college, you took a high paying job in Tokyo. While you were more than qualified for the job, it provided you with little pleasure. It wasn't until you stumbled into Bella's flower shop that you found yourself truly happy.

Surrounded by beautiful flowers and arrangements. It was like heaven. You returned to Bellas weekly to get a bouquet. Soon you found yourself becoming friends with Vee and Bella. It wasn't until Bella mentioned needing help that you made the decision to quite your job and start anew. While the jobs pay was much less than you had become accustom too, your lifestyle really didn't change. You sold your suits in exchange for overhauls, shorts and t-shirts. You got accustomed to dirt below your fingers rather than finely manicure nails. Sure it was a big change but you were so much happier.

You're days were long and busy. Often starting early and closing late. You didn't have family close by, and no significant other so you often took extra shifts and offered to help so the other two ladies could enjoy their husband's.

Both ladies knew about your past dating relationships and the "one that got away" as they so ironically referred to it.

You couldn't lie to yourself. You often thought of Naoi Manabu.

What was he doing?

You were sure he had to be married by now. It had been 8 years since you had last seen him.

After you broke up, you avoided the man like the plague. It helped you only had a week before school ended and you graduated. It didn't seem like he was too worked up over your break up. You had spent far too many nights crying over him.

You felt like you had lost the love of your life.

You, in fact, had.

💐🏐💐🏐💐🏐💐🏐💐🏐💐🏐💐🏐💐🏐💐

"KENMAAAA" Coach Nekomata screams "stop running from the ball! We've been over this a million times!"

"I'd like to keep my limbs thanks" Kuzome Kenma whispers as he turns back to see Kuroo Tetsuro snickering.

"Kenma you act like you've never blocked a ball in your entire life" Kuroo teases the setter mercerously.

"Well I wouldn't have to if someone had read into the switch" Kenma glares at Kuroo who's smile drops.

"Alright that's enough" Naoi shouts as the boys return to their practice match.

He sits next to Coach Nekomata as he sighs "do you think they will be ready for nationals? We've only got a month before we leave. They've still got a long way to-"

"Naoi have faith. They will be ready. They are strong" Coach Nekomata smiles as he watches the boys continue to practice.

The game ends as the boys begin to pack up the gym.

Yaku Morisuke sighs as he finishes his stretches.

"Yaku what's got you bothered" Kuroo says as he kneels down to the team libero.

"I'm just thinking about Mai. I really like her but how do I even tell her. Confessing isn't really my strong suit" Yaku says as he rubs the back of his head.

"How about chocolates? Or maybe flowers?" Kuroo says with a smug grin "girls love flowers!"

"Tsk like you'd know Mr. Periodic Table" Kenma says non-chalantly as he walks by.

Yamamoto Taketora and Haiba Lev laugh at the rooster headed team captain as he glares at the 2nd year setter

"Are you even sure she likes short guys Yaku?" Lev laughs as the team shakes their head.

Yaku runs up to Lev kicking him straight in his back.

"Dumbass" Yamamoto shakes his head as he puts the remaining volleyballs away.

"Why don't we go check out that flower shop on the way home? What's it called like Bella's or something. It looks pretty nice" Kuroo says as he gestures to Yaku.

"Kai, you coming?" Kuroo says to his fellow third year and co-captain, Kai Nobuyuki.

"Sure I'll tag along" Kai speaks softly with a smile.

"Alright guys good practice! Remember we have practice this Saturday as well in preparation for nationals" Naoi shouts as the boys groan.

"And Kenma no skipping out. I'll have Kuroo drag you here if he has to" Naoi glares at Kenma who shakes rolls his eyes and huffs.

The boys showered and change, preparing to head to the flower shop as they wave their fellow teammates off.

Naoi boards the train heading home to his small apartment. To say things have gone to plan in his life would be an understatement. While he was doing what he loved, his love life was lacking to say the very least. He had tried numerous relationships, only to have them fail because he could never fully commit. He often found himself in a one-sided relationship where his partner would confess their love but he couldn't.

It became draining for the people he was with so he ultimately stayed single. He knew, in fact, what the problem was. The problem was that he had messed up the only relationship that mattered to him. He'd blown his chances with the only person whom he ever truly loved.

He had blown his chance with you.

When he decided to break up with you, he really thought it was for the best. He knew you had a bright future ahead of you and he couldn't help but feel like he was weighing you down. He thought it would be best to let go before it became impossible. Not that it wasn't hard to do. It broke him.

He found himself unable to date for years. You had been his first everything and you had been it. He eventually forced himself to move on. Having one night stands and short term relationships but never more. Commitment was hard when it wasn't you. He still kept the ring he had wanted to give you for your third anniversary.

Unfortunately he never got the chance to after he inevitably broke you heart. He often found himself staring at it, wondering how life would have been if he had in fact stayed with you.

By now you must be married with babies he thought to himself. It hurt to think about but he knew it would never be. You'd never be his. And he'd never be truly happy.

[bookishofalder]

Pretty Girl - Seven

Summary: In which Pretty Girl and Flip take things to the next level after dating 6 months. 

Warnings: Smut, language, talk of period sex, copious amounts of fluff. WC-5,507

A/N: Ah! I can’t believe this is the final chapter-just the epilogue to go now! Thanks so much for enjoying this story, it’s been wonderful to share. [Just to be clear, I’m a cis female and speak from experience in regards to the embarrassment that occurs around period sex. That scene is basically inspired by my own incredible husband. We celebrate menstruation on this blog!]

“I think we have to break up.”

A soft breeze blew in the window over the sink, the promise of summer in the air. He was wearing an old t-shirt and jeans and a frown that contrasted against the warmth in the air. Flip stared across the kitchen at (Y/N), eyebrows shooting up in surprise. “Now why the hell is that, exactly?” He questioned, leaning back against the counter and crossing his arms.  

She gestured at him wordlessly for a moment, then pointed her finger at him accusingly, “I just don’t see how we come back from something like this, Flip. I really don’t.”

“It’s not that big of a deal, darling, come on!” He pleaded, giving his head a shake in disbelief.

(Y/N) marched to the fridge and flung it open, her back to Flip for a minute as she dug out what she was looking for, then spun around to face him. She had a can of soda in each hand-one Coca-Cola, one Pepsi, her expression indignant.

“These. Are. Completely. Different.” The pucker between her brows appeared as her frown deepened upon seeing him begin to laugh. “Flip! They taste entirely different!”

“Darling, they really, really don’t. It’s all the same, sugar and carbonation. That’s it.”

Setting the pops down on the counter, she huffed stubbornly, mirroring his crossed arms pose and glaring at him. Flip pushed away from the counter, no longer able to resist her, and wrapped his arms around her waist. He kissed the top of her head as he let out a rumble of a laugh.

She was pointedly not hugging him back.

“I can tell the difference.”

Flip leaned back and met her gaze, “You want to bet on that, pretty girl?” Her eyes sparkled with curiosity at his suggestion.  

“Go on then.” She replied, grinning up at Flip.

Inwardly, though it had been a playful disagreement, he was happy to have her smiling again. Six months together and he still couldn’t stand to see her anything but happy, his daily mission to ensure she smiled and laughed more than anything else-something he was often successful at. He felt like he pulled in oxygen from her laughs and giggles.

“Hmm, well how about I pour each of them into a cup, and you don’t know which is which, and then you taste them and tell me which one is Coke.” He tucked some of her loose strands of hair over her shoulder, simply an excuse to touch her. He watched her consider the offer, warmth and affection shooting through him.

“That’s easy,” She replied with a nod, “And what does the winner get?”

“What do you want?”

He hadn’t meant for the words to come out as suggestive as they did, but (Y/N) simply rolled her eyes, giving him a playful wink. “Well, if I win...then I want to go to your place after lunch and purge your closet!”

Flip groaned, releasing his hold on her, though she remained leaned against him, to run his hands through his hair. “Of all the fucking things, darling!”

Giggling, (Y/N) reached up and stroked Flip’s jaw. “It needs to happen, detective. And since we’re both off this week, there’s never been a better time!”

Flip scoffed, “We’re off because we’re on vacation, pretty girl. Why the hell would I want to clean my damn closet on vacation?”

“Because you won’t do it any other time, you big grump,” Patting his cheek, she arched a brow at him, “Now, if you win?”

He considered for a moment. Initially, he was just going to use this as an excuse for spending the afternoon in bed with her. But now, high stakes were on the line and Flip wanted to match her offer. “Ah, I know,” He said with a grin, “If I win, you’ll let me take you to the gun range to train you on how to use my gun.”

With an exasperated sigh, (Y/N) stepped back from Flip, “Not this again, Flip, I don’t wan’-“

“It’s not about wanting, darling. It’s about safety around firearms, you should at least understand the basics of the one I have on me, just in case.” He reached out and cupped her soft cheeks, thumbs stroking gently. They often bickered about his insistence on keeping her safe, and this was a point of contention for them they had yet to work through.

“Uhg, fine!” She stuck her hand out, and Flip took it in his own to shake, sealing the deal. “I’m going to wander outside and check the mailbox while you pour, I guess.”

Spinning, she barely took a step before Flip smacked her affectionately on the behind, “Trust me, it’ll be fun at the gun range!” He joked, watching her retreating figure with admiration.

Without turning, (Y/N) continued toward the front door and called over her shoulder, “Funny, I was going to say the same about purging your closet, detective.”

With a bark of a laugh, Flip shook his head and turned to the soda’s, grabbing a couple of glasses and setting to his task. Noting which one was the Coke, Flip set them back on the counter and moved the cans to the table, where a delicious looking lunch spread was waiting for their argument to end.

It had begun innocently enough as they prepared lunch together in (Y/N)‘s comfortable kitchen, until he let slip that he didn’t see any difference in the two drinks and his girl lost her damn mind. 

Flip had to admit, in addition to being a wonderful baker, she was a talented cook as well. But years of living alone and not wanting to clog his arteries from eating out constantly led Flip to become a decent cook himself, and he insisted on sharing kitchen duties, regardless of whose home they were at. And so, most days they would find themselves in the kitchen together, cooking, baking and chatting. They tended to spend more time at (Y/N)’s place, for various reasons including the proximity to the station, the overall warmth of her home and her formidable bathtub. Flip was a big fan of ending their days with a long soak before bed, whether he stayed the night or not-though, he mostly stayed the night.

Reentering the kitchen, (Y/N) tossed the mail onto the counter and glanced around at Flip, eyes twinkling. “Ready?” Flip responded by gesturing a hand at the drinks, his eyes sliding down her figure when she turned to them, admiring her curves in the high waisted shorts and a black band tee.

“Go on then, impress me.” He rumbled, watching her closely.

With a smirk, she took a sip of the first drink, loudly and unnecessarily smacking her lips. Her intent was probably to be obnoxious, but Flip found himself becoming semi-hard at her performance, eyes on her plump lips. She set the drink down and picked up the second, already smiling, and took the sip.

“Easy, detective,” She bragged, setting the second glass back on the counter. She pointed to it, looked at Flip over her shoulder and proudly announced, “This is the Coke.”

Damn it, she was right.

He didn’t even need to reply, as the expression on his face gave him away, and (Y/N) let out a gleeful shout before bouncing over to Flip, standing on her tiptoes and throwing her arms around his neck. One hand splayed out and pressed, urging his head to lower and meet her lips. She tasted especially sweet from her taste test, but Flip didn’t return the kiss, though his hands did settle on her hips instinctively.

“Yeah, yeah, you won,” He conceded grumpily when she pulled away to peer at him with a smug little smirk.

“Oh, come on Flip,” She breathed, rolling her hips into his slightly, “I can feel how not annoyed you actually are.” Groaning at the sensation, Flip shook his head before pointing at the table, ignoring his arousal.

“Lunch, then we’re getting this purge over with, and then maybe I’ll consider this,” He slid his hand between their bodies and patted his erection. “Maybe, if you’re a good girl.”

Cheeks blazing at his words, (Y/N) simply nodded at Flip with a small grin and then pulled away from him, moving to the table.

They let lunch stretch along, not rushing as they enjoyed relaxing together. (Y/N) did spend most of it explaining how the process of this clean out would work. Flip just knew he was going to be bagging a lot of clothes for donation or garbage at her insistence because she was right that he hadn’t done a proper tidy out in years. He hadn’t seen the point.

Though now, unbeknownst to her, he did have an idea of why it might be good to do one-in addition to the joy she would gain from doing it, that is. He just needed to ask her.

All in good time, he thought.

+

Four hours later, four, and they were still working away and Flip was starting to lose his patience. (Y/N) held up an old plaid shirt that had some minor tears in it, her face scrunched, “Well, how about this one?” He wasn’t sure if he was bothered more by her endless enthusiasm and patience for him, or her determination to seemingly leave him with little remaining clothing.

“I don’t see why I can’t keep that. It’s good for yard work.”

“Flip,” She deadpanned, “It looks like a bear mauled you while you were wearing this, it’s not suitable for anything.”

With an annoyed huff, Flip wordlessly gestured at the ‘dispose of’ pile. He grabbed a large garbage bag to put that pile into, knowing it would do no good to argue. (Y/N) was smiling away as she hung up a section of shirts he was keeping, ordering them by colour which, he had to admit, was visually very pleasing. After stuffing the throwaways into the bag, Flip had cleared enough space on his bed to lay down, stretching out the wrong way across, his joints clicking in places.

Closing his eyes, he relaxed for a moment, content despite the loss of many, he felt, quality pieces of clothing. Though when (Y/N) had made the point that, due to his overall largeness, his clothing would most certainly benefit men at the shelter who normally couldn’t find donations in their size, he had relented on many items that he didn’t wear anymore.

When he felt a couple of pieces of clothing hit his legs, tossed somewhat carelessly by (Y/N), Flip’s eyes snapped open and he sat up in protest, “Now what are you-Oh.”

Oh.

The clothing had been hers, shorts and shirt on the ground at his feet, (Y/N) stood in a simple white cotton panty and bra combination that instantly had him growing hard. It never ceased to amaze and disarm him, how fucking beautiful she was. Glowing skin, soft curves, plump lips, she was devastating. He often wondered what he'd done to deserve her.

Six months together meant they’d been on plenty of outings, either errands or dates, and he’d see the way others would admire her. He always kept a hand on her lower back when they walked together, both to keep himself steady, and to remind others that she was his, and he was hers. And maybe to remind himself, as well.

“Christ, beautiful, you getting a little warm?” He growled out, unmoving on the edge of the bed. With a coy smile, she walked over to stand in front of Flip, eyes only looking down slightly into his. He’d discovered pretty early in their relationship that she found their size difference just as much of a turn-on as he did.

“A little...worked up,” She admitted, closing the gap between them. With practiced ease, Flip lifted (Y/N) into his lap, her legs straddling his. Her fingers sunk into his hair as he latched his mouth to the curve of her throat, kissing her, then dragging his tongue along her skin. With a moan, she ground her hips down, rolling her heat across his hardness. “Maybe a lot, actually.”

With a groan, he wrapped his arms around her and twisted, depositing (Y/N) on the bed before jumping up to rip off his clothing, eyes never leaving hers as he did. When he pulled down his boxers and he sprang free, her gaze lowered and she licked her lips in anticipation.

“Pretty girl,” He growled, crawling over her and caging her body beneath his, his length resting against her thigh. “Do you think you’ve been a good girl, that you deserve to be fucked?”

(Y/N) gave a keening whimper, struggling to wrap her legs around him. Flip didn’t let her, he braced one hand on the bed next to her head, the other he used to still her hips. He began his assault on her neck and chest then, licking, biting and laving his tongue over the skin to soothe it, leaving light marks just how she liked it.

“Please, I’ve been good, so good, it’s been days, I need you,” She breathed out desperately, writhing under him.

Flip snorted, “That’s your own fault, darling, we could have been doing it every day this past week-“

Still whimpering, (Y/N) cut him off, “No, I told you, I was on my period.”

“And I told you,” Flip pulled back and met her eyes, his expression serious, “Unless it hurts, I don’t care what’s going on down there, it’s natural and it doesn’t bother me.”

They’d had this conversation a few times before, as spending so much time staying over at one another’s meant that, eventually, he’d been with her while she was on her period. And Flip didn’t mind, didn't care, going so far as to call his mother and ask if women were okay to have sex in such a state. After she spent five minutes roaring with laughter, she assured him that yes, with certain precautions taken, and it wasn’t on the worst of cramping days, it was perfectly fine.

But (Y/N) had shut down each time, insisting a few days without sex wouldn’t hurt all the while appearing shy and embarrassed. He hated that she felt that way, but he didn’t pressure her. He simply reminded her it was on the table, whenever she might be ready.

“I know,” Her small hand moved to his cheek, caressing it, expression softening, “Perfect man.” And then her lips found his and the sweet moment was over because it was fierce and possessive and Flip could feel her trembling with anticipation, with need. For him.

With the countless amount of times they had come together, Flip still felt an intense sense of rightness, of home, whenever he was inside of (Y/N), pulling sounds and curses from her lips as he moved. Whether it was a quick and passionate release like this or a night of never-ending pleasure, each and every time was always perfect. Exhilarating. Because they were made for one another, and every kiss or moan or touch only proved it; it was easy, so fucking easy to sink into that feeling of perfection, of irrevocable love so intense it was like taking a hit of a drug every damn time.

“Love you,” He murmured into her hair, his hips pounding into her relentlessly as her legs only encouraged him, tight around his waist to urge him closer, deeper.

Her response was automatic, “Love you more, Flip.” And then she was jerking beneath him as she crashed over the waves of her release, crying out as her walls fluttered back-arching, fingers digging into his shoulders.

His own orgasm washed over him, a long, low moan rumbling out of him as he filled her, his movements slowing, sloppy as he coated her walls with rope after rope of cum. “Fuck!” He finally cried, pulling out to jerk himself a few more times, another few spurts coating her stomach.

With a groan, he flopped on the bed next to her, careful not to push the pile of donation clothing off. Lazily, he draped an arm across her torso, kissing her shoulder. They stayed silent for a short while, catching their breath in the glow of the afternoon sun. These were always his favourite moments; when it was just the two of them blissed out and tired and content.

“I think we should move in together.” He blurted out suddenly. Inwardly he smacked himself on the head for His callousness. He had been thinking about it for a while now and had planned many ways to say it.

But of course, he just spewed out his thoughts with wild abandon. Christ.

(Y/N)‘s head jerked off the bed, and she leaned on her elbow, looking down at FLip with wide eyes. “Wait, seriously?” She was giving him a cautious but promising smile. His heart was pounding in his chest, harder than it had been just ten minutes ago.

Flip nodded, “Yes, pretty girl, seriously. Been thinking it a while,” He sat up, crossing his legs before reaching down to stroke her hair, “We don’t have to if you’re not ready, but I wanted you to know that I’m ready. I hate spending nights without you or coming here to an empty house. I love waking up with you, hell, spending all my time with you.”

He wondered why he chose this exact moment to ask her, when he was naked, his cock softening from their romp, her stomach coated in his spill. It wasn’t exactly romantic, though it did manage to increase the vulnerability he was feeling.

“I, wow, Flip. I’d love that, I hate spending nights apart too. I sleep so much better with you keeping me warm,” (Y/N) giggled, then sat up and took his hands into hers, “There’s a lot to discuss before we make a decision, but I’m ready too, Flip.” Leaning forward, she pressed her lips to his.

“Well, can I tell you what I was thinking, and then you can tell me if we’re on completely different pages?”

(Y/N) nodded, a smile splitting wide across her face upon hearing that he’d put so much thought into it. “Let’s hear it, detective.”

Flip grinned, “Well, I’ll be honest I like your place much more, not just for its proximity to the station. And I was thinking, I could rent out this place pretty easily, make some extra cash. Pay half the bills and whatnot at your place, and then maybe when we’re ready, we both sell and get a place a little bigger. Maybe something with a large backyard?” He’d meant to say less, but the more he spoke, the wider her smile grew, eyes sparkling in delight. A warmth was growing within him, spreading through his body. He felt almost giddy.

Instead of replying, (Y/N) launched herself into Flip’s arms, toppling them into the donation pile of clothing, and started peppering him with kisses.

"I'll take that as a yes?" He asked through his wide grin.

(Y/N) giggled, "Oh, detective, it's definitely a yes."

+

“Christ, it had to be the hottest day so far this year, didn’t it?” Flip grumbled, wiping his arms across his forehead and considering removing his shirt, though he wasn’t sure all of his latest love marks had healed up, so he kept it on begrudgingly.

(Y/N), as if knowing exactly when Flip would hit his limit in the heat, suddenly appeared at the propped open doorway, a large glass of lemonade in hand. John and Ron appeared behind her, following her outside with their own glasses. He watched, grateful for his sunglasses, as she walked toward him, hips swaying in her linen shorts, breasts curving beneath the thin white T-shirt she wore. Though she usually kept her hair down at home, it was too hot today and instead had it pulled into a high, messy ponytail.

Patting his arm comfortingly, she handed him a cold glass, “Here, take a minute, you guys are nearly finished.” And her eyes surveyed the remaining boxes, the armchair and the stereo system, all that was left of the items he’d brought from his old house.

“Thank you, pretty girl.” He leaned down and kissed her forehead before gulping down the lemonade like a dying man, already imagining the cold bath he’d be climbing into later on. Preferably with his new roommate.

“Bailey’s got burgers and beers ready in the back, so once you finish up you boys come through and have a rest, alright?” She smiled around at them, Ron and John both nodding eagerly, just as ready as Flip to be finished.

It only took twenty more minutes to get the rest inside, and Flip was impressed when he came through the door the last time and saw how neat everything was. Evidently, while they’d been hauling things inside, (Y/N) had made quick work of organizing anything she could lift. Even though Flip insisted she not do any of the hard work, he could tell by the number of missing boxes that she had carried a lot of them to the rooms they were meant for, getting a head start on the unpacking process.

When he followed his helpful friends outside, he found (Y/N) and Bailey laughing together on the back deck as they plated the burgers. Next to the grill, they had a table set up with all the fixings, including potato salad and, of course, more of (Y/N)‘s baking, this time in the form of mini sugared donuts.

Before he could make his way toward her, (Y/N) caught Flip’s eye and pointed at the lounger, a silent order to take a seat. With a grin he flopped down onto the seat, grateful to be off of his feet and out of the sun. Under the shade, it was much cooler, a soft breeze playing across his sweaty skin.

John walked up to his wife and kissed her on the cheek, thanking her for cooking for them. Ron had copied Flip, sitting in another lounger, his eyes closed. The atmosphere was relaxed, the best part of a busy moving day.

With a beer in one hand and a piled-up plate in the other, (Y/N) plopped herself into Flip’s lap and handed him his reward. With a grateful groan, he pulled the plate out of her hands and immediately started devouring the burger with one hand, the other snaking around her waist to hold her hip. She took a sip of his beer, watching him eat with a happy smile, her cheeks flushed from the heat.

“You two are such an affectionate couple,” Bailey pointed out with a smirk, “Even with a burger you find a way to cuddle, it’s almost annoying.”

The elder (Y/L/N) sister was, in many ways, opposite to (Y/N). She had a cooler, calmer personality, her humour more sarcastic and her gaze a little intimidating at times. Flip liked her, and her husband, quite a lot. They often had dinners together on Friday’s, and Flip had even taken John to the gun range a handful of times, discovering that despite (Y/N)‘s hatred of guns, John and Bailey were a little less wary of them.

“Nah, it’s groovy!” Ron amended with a grin, taking the plate Bailey was handing him with a grateful nod.

“I don’t know,” John said between bites of his food, pointing his burger between Flip and (Y/N), “I think of all the couples I know, you’d be the ones who’ve had sex on every surface and piece of furniture.” Ron and (Y/N) burst into laughter, Bailey shook her head, a small smile on her lips.

Flip flushed, his hand squeezing (Y/N)‘s waist, but made no reply beyond a slight grin. With a bark of warm laughter, John nodded his head, happy with himself.

The rest of that early summer afternoon was enjoyed in good company, the group casually conversing as they lounged in the shade, until the setting sun was low enough in the sky to capture their notice. They all pitched in on tidying up, bringing the leftovers inside while (Y/N) wrapped up a couple of donuts for Ron to take home. Congratulations and thank-yous were exchanged, along with heartfelt hugs and cheek kisses.  

And then, it was just Flip and (Y/N), waving goodbye from the front door with wide smiles; alone at last. His mind on drawing a cool bath, Flip was caught off guard when he was suddenly pushed against the wall, and (Y/N)'s lips were crashing into his.

Flip was never one to question these types of moments, instead, his hands found the curve of (Y/N)‘s hips, pulling her close as his tongue licked into her mouth, and a moan escaped them both. They stayed like this for a few minutes, making out as they clung to one another, until (Y/N) pulled back and smiled up at him with wide eyes.

“You don’t have to go back to your place tonight, right?”

Flip shook his head with a smile, “No, I’m meeting the new tenants there tomorrow afternoon.”

Her eyes darkened considerably at his response, pupils blown with desire. Flip’s hands tightened on her hips in anticipation, eager to hear her next words.

“In that case, wait out here for about three minutes and then meet me in the room, okay detective?” She murmured, then pulled away and danced off toward their bedroom.

Flip stayed against the wall, considering for a moment and then deciding to strip off his little remaining clothing. He heard the sounds of the tub being filled as he pulled his shirt over his head, and his cock twitched in anticipation. He then wandered into the kitchen, helped himself to a glass of water, and then figured it had probably been long enough.

Making his way down the hall, careful to skirt around a few boxes piled somewhat precariously, Flip felt an overwhelming sense of joy; the stressful work was over, and now he was living with his girl full time. If anyone had told him last year that he’d come back to work after that fucking Klan case and meet the love of his life, he’d have scoffed at them, convinced he was an unlovable son of a bitch.

And then (Y/N) came along and found her way into his heart, shattering every doubt he had of himself and somehow, amazingly, fell in love with him. He’d never been happier, a sentiment that he knew he thought almost too often, but if the other shoe was going to drop, it missed its chance. He even liked fighting with the woman, for Christ's sake. Though they didn’t argue much beyond occasional bickering, especially since she apparently had an unlimited supply of patience for his various sour moods, they did sometimes had what Flip considered a ‘blow out’.

After each one of these intense fights, they would somehow meet in the middle, always willing to compromise with one another no matter how passionately they’d been arguing. And then, the sex that would follow was always mind-blowing, fast and powerful, and selfish. They’d each work to bring themselves off, which was never the case otherwise, usually striving to bring as much pleasure to the other as they could.

But Flip had always heard that makeup sex was on another level.

He had known for a long time now that he wanted to marry her. They’d spoken of it a few times, casually, each sussing out the other’s reaction carefully. Flip had learned that she hadn’t ever wanted a big wedding, something her sister had wanted, which had solidified the decision in her mind that it wasn’t for her. This suited him just fine, as he wasn’t one for big parties and it meant he could invest more money in the ring, get her something she could be proud to wear.

But first, there was tonight.

When he walked into the master bath, completely naked and already mostly hard, his cock stiffened further at the sight in front of him. Of her.  

(Y/N) turned to face Flip, and though his eyes swept over her beautiful face, they didn’t linger as he took in the sight of her, standing wearing his favourite buffalo plaid shirt, unbuttoned with absolutely nothing else on. She’d taken her hair down, and it fell in waves around her shoulders, brushing against her stiff buds.

He couldn’t even form words, he was so turned on, seeing her wearing his clothes, standing ready for him to do whatever he wanted with her. He came undone entirely when, upon seeing his leaking, hard cock, she fucking whimpered.

With a growl, Flip closed the distance between them, swiftly lifting her onto the bathroom counter, which happened to leave her dripping heat at the perfect height for him to thrust forward, filling her in one motion. Fuck, she was tight around him, and so wet already.

“Fuck, pretty girl,” He groaned as she cried out his name repeatedly, “So fucking wet for me already.” He adjusted his arms, putting each under her legs so that she was pressed back and folded, exposing her enough to find an angle that tore screams of pleasure from her as he slammed his hips into her, splitting her open most satisfyingly.

“Fuck, fuck, that’s so good, so perfect Flip.” She whined, trying to keep herself steady on the counter as he absolutely ruined her with brutal thrust after thrust. He could hear himself growling and groaning out her name each time he pulled back, living for the way she screamed his when he would slam back in.

Keeping his arms hooked under her legs, Flip removed his hands from the counter and pressed them into her lower back under the shirt, both forcing her body a little closer and helping her to stay upright. He was impressed at her flexibility, though he checked her face as he moved, ensuring she was comfortable. The way her eyes rolled back told him everything he needed to know.

“You take my cock so well, you know that? Perfect little girl,” He broke off and moaned as he felt her walls tighten further around him as he spoke, her orgasm closing in. “Fuck, you love it when I tell you what a good girl you are, don’t you?”

Her mouth fell open for a moment before she could find the ability to speak, “I love it, I’m such a good girl for you, you fucking fill me so well, Flip,” (Y/N) whimpered out, her body beginning to tremble. “Fuck, I’m going to come!”

He increased his pace, her words bringing him closer to the edge, “Go on then, cum all over me, pretty little girl, and I’ll fill you up. Fucking give you all my cum.” He growled out, and her eyes rolled back again as her body seized up, her walls fluttering around him and her cries unintelligible. When Flip looked down at where their bodies connected, he saw just in time as her juices squirt out for him, splashing him in the warmth and fucking sending him barreling over the edge, his movements slowing as he pushed himself as deep as he could and releasing his cum into her.

It took several moments to come down from their high, the combination of the happy, emotional day, and the two days they hadn’t been able to have sex because of the busy work that was moving, made it so that their peaks were nearly debilitating. Flip could have sunk to the floor, he was so exhausted. Just able to remain standing, he instead slowly slipped himself out of (Y/N), both of them watching as their combined fluids seeped out of her deliciously. He was careful to let her legs down slowly, and she groaned in a little discomfort as he did.

“Bath time,” He whispered, helping her off the counter and to the toilet first. Once she finished, he stepped into the lukewarm water and helped her in after him, lowering them slowly until they could cuddle up, (Y/N) between his legs, her back on his chest. The water was a sweet relief to both the heat of the day and their sore muscles. They laid together for a long time; until the sun was gone and the twilight light was too dark for them to see anymore and sleep was a whisper away.

“You ready for a nice long sleep, detective?” (Y/N) asked him as they dried off, her eyes half-closed with exhaustion that he was certainly was mirrored on his face.

“In our bed, darling.” He replied, with a sly smile. She giggled happily, tossing her towel into the hamper.  

When they climbed into bed together, still naked, (Y/N) laid her head on Flip's chest. One hand trailed lazily along his flat stomach, leaving goosebumps in its wake.

“I love you so much, Flip Zimmerman.”

His heart stuttered. He brought the hand that wasn’t wrapped around her to tilt her face up, meeting her tired gaze. “I love you more, pretty girl.” And he leaned forward and pressed their lips together in a goodnight kiss.

Both of them fell asleep easily mere moments later, wrapped up in one another in all of the best ways.

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Tag list ✨

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[deepperplexity]

Black Clouds

Title: Black Clouds

Request: Hi! I just wanna start off by saying i love you’re writing ❤️ I was wondering if you could write a snape x fem reader where the reader is thinking about committing suicide because she feels like she's not worthy of living and she believes that he could have someone better and Sev notice that something is wrong and uses legilimency to find out the issue because she doesn't want to open up with anyone and he's shocked by what he sees and tries to help her. I'm sorry if that's too specific and if you don't feel like writing it, don't worry ❤️

A/N: First of all, before I say anything about this request, I want to tell EVERYONE who feels suicidal to find and ask for help. YOU ARE NOT UNWORTHY OF LIFE. This request hits home for me and I was deliberating if I should write this or not as it’s such a sensitive subject for me personally. But, that’s actually all the more reason to write it. Suicide is a hush-hush subject in society when it really should not be - this is something we ALL need to talk about and we ALL need to make sure that everyone feels safe enough to ask for help. And, as you all know by now, I am all for writing about sensitive/taboo subjects that need to be addressed more. 

Secondly, if you are suicidal or harm yourself in any way - THAT DOES NOT MEAN YOU ARE LESS WORTHY. You are worth all happiness, help, support and care in the world - you have a place in this world and it is ever-changing. What is today may be different tomorrow, what happened yesterday may impact what happens the day after tomorrow. There is always a new dawn to meet and a new sunset to cherish. If you are reading this, you are alive and fighting - go you! Like, seriously, it is fucking hard to be alive in this world but you are doing it! You are fighting, even on bad days, you are fighting and winning! Thank you for being here, thank you for staying with us, thank you for gracing the world with your presence and life! ❤️

As I mentioned this hits home and I will do my best to do this request justice as it is so damn important. I do want to mention this is fiction and I do not personally stand behind all the things that characters do even if I write it. Characters have their own will and sometimes that overrules my will as a writer (also, sometimes it’s just needed to get a good story). To intrude in one’s mind is not something I find to be a good thing - but as my loyal readers already know its a thing I use often because its fun to write and Severus just wants to bloody do it all the time; that man as no sense of privacy boundaries when it comes to others, let me tell you… So just keep this in mind whenever you read fiction - just because someone wrote it does not mean it is something they stand behind or condone. If that were the case the world would be way more bonkers - just think of all the murders and rape and war and devilry stuff authors write about O.O 

+A/N: I was writing with a female reader in mind but as I edited this I noticed nothing actually states that it is a female so the reader is GN - I hope Nonny doesn’t mind.

Pairing: Snape x Reader 

Setting: Post Second War, Spring 2003, Your home at Rosewood Hill 

Word count: 3540

Warnings: Suicidal thoughts, Angst, (Age Difference), Fluff, Mental Health, PTSD, Anxiety, Emotional Rollercoaster, Kissing...

Prologue:

You, like many others who had survived the horrible battle at Hogwarts in 1998, suffered from a series of illnesses. Survivors guilt, depression, anxiety, panic attacks and lately the thoughts had begun to overwhelm you. Collectively one could call it severe PTSD but to simply group all the different emotions and disorders like that simplified it a bit too much. Some parts were PTSD, of course, but some things had haunted you long before the battle. Like your struggle with self-worth, your anxiety and the intrusive thoughts that popped up more often than not. The fact that you had been mere 19 years old when you fought for life, justice and all things good probably made the experience even harder to handle. 

Fortunately for you, something good had come from the war. Love. Your previous professor, Severus Snape, had been severely injured - actually, he had been at death's doorstep - but pulled through after several months of care where you as a nurse partook in his recovery daily. He made a full recovery under yours and others care and once he was free to leave the hospital he had asked you out on a date. You had accepted happily and then everything just sort of happened. You fell in love, got married, moved to Rosewood Hill and renovated a rundown house together as money was tight - but it all turned out quite good in the end. Well, except the fact that things weren’t good. Not at all…

Masterlist page // Masterlist post // AO3

You had been unable to sleep in the early hours of the morning. Flashes of memories and the sound of screaming paired with falling bodies kept you company. It had gotten worse since Christmas four months ago. That was when it had snowballed out of control completely. You blinked and sighed before you carefully left the bed, and Severus, behind to get some coffee as you tried to keep the intruding thoughts at bay. 

Lately, despite all the love and happiness in your life, you had been feeling less and less worthy. Of life, of Severus, of everything. You did your best to hide how you felt. You smiled, you laughed, you baked and cleaned, did all of your hobbies and made sure Severus wouldn’t see how you were hurting inside. Made sure he wouldn’t notice how tormented you were by the mere fact you were alive. 

He had enough to deal with, he was so strong that it nearly brought tears to your eyes. He had been through pure hell. Had struggled and fought with all his might year after year while he was hurting, so deeply. You couldn’t fathom how he did it, how he survived and lived on. How he could stand it all. All the thoughts and emotions. Everything. What you felt simply couldn’t be anything to measure with against what he must have felt for so long. It pained you that your thoughts were so selfish, that you had such pain and hurt inside of you when he had a stronger right to claim such emotions. Weakling, worthless, unuseful piece of garbage...

The coffee burned its way down your throat and you winched slightly. “Careful, love,” the gruff voice of your husband echoed out. It startled you as he always slept late and the sun wasn’t even up yet. You smiled at him as you tried to arrange your face into a happy one. He arched a brow at you and you chirped out a ‘good morning, honey’ to him. He grumbled  at you, “no morning is good before nine.” You simply laughed at him as he grabbed a giant mug and poured it full with black coffee. 

“Why are you up so early?” He grumbled after a few sips, you shrugged and cradled your own cup of coffee in your hands. “I just couldn’t sleep, figured I’d get a headstart on the day,” you smiled out and he huffed. “You’re mad,” he grumbled and you shrugged again. “Why are you up?” “You left, the bed felt empty.” You smiled at him but couldn’t help the piercing thought that he would sleep better if you weren’t by his side at all. 

You snuggled up on the couch with a thick book, something to escape into. Something to cradle and lose yourself in for a few hours as Saturday passed by ever so slowly. You didn’t notice that Severus took up a place right beside you before he placed your legs over his own with gentle movements. He made sure the blanket covered your feet and then held a steady grip around your calves. You glanced up at him from the book with a smile etched to your lips. He arched a brow at you. 

“What?” you asked quizzically, his hands squeezed your leg for a moment before you felt his tender fingers stroke back and forth. “That is the question I would like to ask you, love.” You raised your brows ever so slightly before you closed the book. “What do you mean?” “What’s wrong, love?” he asked in a hushed tone and you smiled reassuringly at him. “Nothing’s wrong,” you said, “why would anything be wrong, darling?” 

Severus looked at you for a moment before he let out a small breath through his nose. His eyes left yours as he looked down at his hands placed on your legs. They were rough and pale, they were hands that you loved. “Do not lie to me, (y/n). Something is wrong. You are, not yourself anymore. Tell me,” he said gently yet firmly. You smiled wider before you placed your hand on his forearm. “Darling, nothing is wrong, I promise. I’m fine and happy, I have you.” 

For a long moment, there was nothing but silence and you felt as if your plastered smile might have failed you at any moment when he finally looked at you. “Love, do not lie, it does not suit you. Just, tell me.” You patted his arm as thoughts raced through your mind, wondering how you could reassure him he did not have to deal with your shit when he probably had so much to deal with from his own thoughts already. 

“Darling, come here,” you said and he leaned towards you. You stroked away one side of his black hair and hooked it behind his cute ear before you gently caressed his cheek and kissed his lips tenderly. I will not fail you, was the one thought that spun through your mind over and over as you tasted him. “Everything is great,” you whispered as you broke the kiss, “I’ll go make some tea for us. You seem a bit tense.” He nodded at you but there was sadness in his eyes that you could not ignore even if you stood and walked out to the kitchen.  

Your hands were shaking as you poured water into the kettle. The cups rattled as you placed them on saucers. Your breathing faltered over and over as you tried to calm your heart. Too close, too close, too close, you thought as you placed tea bags in the cups. I need to do better, he can’t see, I can’t worry him. He’s got too much of his own stuff to deal with, I can’t be a burden to him. I don’t want to burden him anymore… 

A small, glinting tear rolled down your cheek as you bit your lip to keep a sob at bay just as the kettle screamed. The water swirled as you poured it, stained by the tea in a gentle pattern before it all gained the same deep colour and you felt as if you yourself had been stained a deeper, darker colour throughout the depths of your heart.  

You had avoided him a tad after the tea. You busied yourself with laundry, cleaning, changing sheets on the bed and dusting. Not until evening came and Severus had set the table with a divinely smelling dinner were you forced to be still and in close proximity to him. Now, some might have thought this was just because you didn’t want him to notice it all, see it all, know it all. But no, no that was not the reason you had avoided him. At least not completely. 

You wanted to tell him, talk to him, get help. Or something along those lines. At the same time, you felt shame, pain and an array of doubt as to how he would react but also regarding your infliction of pain through verbally admitting what you felt to the one you loved so deeply. The storm inside you that was black clouds of endless dust that howled about your insignificant worth made you feel horrible in every way. Yet, the one thing you did not want was to hurt him. Drag him into the storm. Pain him with your selfish thoughts when you knew, knew what he had been through - for years . 

I have no right. No right to feel like this. I should be happy. Should be grateful. I’m alive, I have a home, a man who loves me and the world is safe again. I know I should feel all these things. Should be filled with love and joy. He survived, we found each other. Yet, he is just so damn much and I’m just, not worthy of any of it... 

“(Y/n), talk to me,” he said all of a sudden as he put down his cutlery. You lifted your head, allowed your eyes to meet his and tugged your lips up into a smile. “Darling, I don’t understand what you’re going on about. I’m fine, everything is good. I’m good.” “You are not good!” The sudden change of his tone startled you for a second. His gaze was intense and penetrating. As if he looked through you. You gasped as you felt his intrusion in your mind and you had no chance of blocking him out. 

He saw everything. Every little thing that you had desperately tried to hide from him. The hurt, the doubt, the horrors of your mind that filled your days with anxiety and sorrow. He slithered through your mind with such power and speed you barely had a chance at breathing as your mind raced with thoughts you had wanted to hide. But, it is as they say. If someone says ‘do not think of an elephant’, what do you think of? An elephant. And that elephant was all of your fears combined with all of the pain. 

His eyes watered and you stood with such speed that the chair toppled. “Severus-” you breathed out with a mixture of emotions that were nothing but bad. Your lip quivered as tears rolled down your cheeks before you dashed out of the kitchen and ran towards the bathroom. You closed and locked the door a mere second before he pulled at the handle. “(Y/n). Open the door,” he said with a slight shake to his voice. But you simply curled up in the tub and hugged your legs, your knees against your forehead as tears wet your clothes and skin. 

He banged at the door, twice, and you shivered. He saw it, he saw it, he’ll hate me, he’ll be furious with me. I have no right to feel this, I’m not worthy of, anything… The fear of him feeling such things towards you made you nauseous and afraid. “Please, love, open the door. Let me in,” he said through the wood that separated you. But you didn’t move. Then a click was heard and he had used the unlocking spell to let himself in. You hugged your knees tighter. Buried your head with more force as you tried to stop the sobbing that wanted to crawl its way out of your mouth from the depths of your chest. 

You felt his hand on your back as you heard the ruffling of fabric as he lowered himself beside the tub. “Love, please,” he whispered and pain was evident in his voice. You curled up further, as much as you could. I hurt him. I hurt him just like everyone else has done. You’d be better off without me, I know you would. I’m such a fucking coward, why haven’t I just- just- just ended it?! I’m not worthy of breathing the same air as you. I should have died. I should have died with the others. Someone else should have lived, I should have died in that war. “Love, don’t.” 

It was too late when you felt his presence in your mind as your dark thoughts buried you in such cold depths you barely registered that he lifted you out of the tub. His arms wrapped beneath and around you. His thin lips pressed themselves against your head and you let go of the clawing sob. It escaped through your quivering lips and Severus tensed. 

“Love, you are my everything. My whole world. You, are the very reason that I am living. You are-” “Unworthy of your love,” you breathed out in a hushed whisper. To say the words out loud felt as if someone drove a piping hot branding iron down your throat. “It is I who is unworthy of you ,” he whispered against the top of your head as he sunk to the floor and cradled you, “I should have seen, noticed, I should have been there for you like you have always been for me. I am so sorry, love.” 

Had this been one of those stupid romance novels I would have been all smiles and happy by now. To hear you say that. I would have been cured of these feelings. But apparently, life is not like that… The thoughts and feelings you had had for so long had not lessened in any way. Had not disappeared just because of his adoring words. They were as strong as ever. But now, now there was also the pain of having hurt him and made him feel unworthy or lesser. It was agony and you had no way to deal with it other than to cry. 

Darkness had fallen long before you finally stopped crying. Everything in your body ached and you knew Severus was stiff and sore from the odd position on the hard floor, with you in his lap. “I am so sorry, love,” he whispered for the umpteenth time. “I’m tired,” you whispered back as your mind kept spinning with all the things you had tried to bury. To hide. Things from before the war and after the war. Life, death, loss and gain. “Let’s get you to bed,” he simply said and the thunder in his voice felt subdued. A mere distant rumble and it made you feel strange.  

He rose with you in his arms, carefully cradled as if you would break with any hasty motion. You felt the stiffness in his movements, yet he didn’t say a word about it. He simply carried you through the hallway and placed you on the bed with gentleness. You turned and laid on your side as your mind echoed the words ‘insignificant, worthless, unbearable’ over and over and over as Severus pulled the cover up over you. “I’m so sorry, love,” he whispered before he kissed your head, “I will help you, in any way I can. Please don’t, don’t leave me...” 

The room was silent after those words and a moment later you heard him take a shuddering breath before he left. You were alone. In that moment, something desperate clawed in you. A fearful thought crossed your mind and pain travelled through your veins as if they were freezing with an ice-cold breath. He’ll leave me now, he’ll see that I’m not worth anything. That, that he is better off without me. Strangely enough, that scared you. Even if it had been the very epicentre of your dark thoughts and agonizing pain lately it was different now. He knew now. Perhaps it was the end and all you had feared was actually true? That you meant nothing, was worth nothing. Nothing at all.  

You shivered, turned to lay on your back and grabbed the cover to take it off but at that moment the door opened. You turned your head only to see a broken man in the doorway. His eyes glinted with unshed tears and his shoulders slumped. He looked nothing like your Severus. Nothing at all like the powerful and strong man you had fallen for.

“I will never leave you. I love you, (y/n).” You looked at him as the words vibrated through you in a low tone. “I would have been dead if it were not for you,” he continued and the words elicited a gasp from you. You could not even fathom the idea of a world without Severus. Such a place couldn’t even exist in your wildest fantasies. He was everything. “A world without you, would be worthless and empty. You are everything to me and I want to keep you forever, here, with me. No matter how selfish that may be, I need you with me. Or I shall perish.” 

Your heart fluttered with a need for his love as his words landed somewhere in the darkest parts of your mind. The parts where screams and falling bodies lingered. The part where dark clouds of dust swirled with sorrow and pain. The part where no dawning light had shined for years. There his words landed, settled. A small crack in the clouds allowed a single ray of sunshine to come through as gentle words of thankfulness for all who had survived could be heard, even if they were muffled by distant memory and buried beneath all the bad things. 

You removed the cover and sat up slowly. As your feet touched the carpet something jolted in you. You ran towards him, slammed your body into his so harshly that he took a staggering step back as his arms wrapped themselves around you with such haste you were nearly surprised. “Please, love, please. Stay and go through this with me. Together,” he breathed out and you nodded as new tears leaked from your eyes. “I will-, will try…” It was the only kind of thing you could say as you clung to that tiny sliver of light in the depths of the darkness. That tiny little ray of warmth that was your beloved and his love for you. 

 Epilogue: 

It had been nearly six months. For six months he had guarded you, tended to you, helped you through the pain and anxiety attacks too many times to count. He had cred, you had cried and several times it felt hopeless. As if nothing would ever change the darkness that clung to you on the inside, in the depths of your mind. 

But he had encouraged you, supported you, helped you in all ways possible. Even on days when you wanted to run away from it all and give up, he made sure you could see light and feel warmth. He had confided in you as well. His fear of losing you, his pain in seeing you turn into someone he did not know, the anguish of not knowing and not being able to help. The horror that had raked through him each time you had shut him out with lies of how great and good everything was. His fear that he was not enough for you, that he was not what you wanted. 

But now, after months of hard work, tears, open communication and desperate attempts at surviving through it all you felt lighter. The dark clouds of dust were nearly gone as light bathed most of your inner self; a warmth spread like the gentle breeze of a summer night. It was thanks to him, to your beloved, and your own hard work. Your own strength and determination to not yield and succumb to the darkness. Even on days when it was most tempting to escape it all swiftly. 

You had fought. Struggled. Won battle after battle. Some battles were lost but the war was being won, one fight at a time. You did that. You fought on and conquered the pain, the sorrow and despair. The abysmal voice that echoed horrendous words of unworthiness and shame had nearly been silenced and replaced with a growling noise of power and love. His voice, his sound, it saved you time and time again as you allowed love to actually unfold and be a part of your life. As you allowed yourself to be alive even if you were not always sure you should be. 

You did not give those thoughts more than a swift glance as they passed by in your mind. They were not worthy of your emotional investment. They were false and wrong. You would not succumb to them no matter what as you had finally found your will to live accompanied by a need to do so happily - despite everything your mind had whispered, you were worthy. You just needed help to break free of the darkness and see yourself for the worthy person that you would always be. No matter what, you would always be worthy of life.

Masterlist page // Masterlist post // AO3

A/N: I want to say thank you to the Nonny who sent this request and I want to yet again remind everyone that you are worthy of all good things and being suicidal or harming yourself does not take that away! If you are harming yourself or have suicidal thoughts, find and ask for help! You are worth it, worthy of help and of life! Thank you for being here with us. ❤️

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[Feb:2021]

[rapspud]

Bittersweet

Bittersweet    A/N: Decided to rewrite this one. Please enjoy.

Yoongi looked at your friends as he sneered at your prone form sprawled out on the ground, your fingers scrambling to find your glasses.

“Aw what’s the matter? The poor baby can't see?” He purred as he picked up your glasses and dangled them in front of your face before throwing them into the dumpster. “Have fun diving!” He cackles as he slides past your prone figure, cruelly stepping on your hand as he passes.

You could hear the snickers of his friends behind you. You watched as his best friend, Seokjin clapped Yoongi on the shoulder, and whispered, “Oi, I get the whole I hate “y/n” thing but seriously—that was a bit much don’t you think?”

Yoongi  couldn’t believe what he was hearing, “She ratted us out! So I fixed it-and now she can’t see to snitch! And shouldn’t you be on my side? You’re in just as much trouble as I am!”

Seokjin could only look at Yoongi like he had a third head, “ Yeah I guess, but still...there is-” at Yoongi’s raised eyebrow he swallowed what he wanted to say, instead choosing to leave rather than to help Yoongi’s victim, “Hey I gotta go I’ll catch you later okay?”

Yoongi smiled and waved good-bye before walking away from the group. How could he possibly explain how much he hated Y/N? No one here knew the truth about your families-how he had to share a home with you,  your family serving his. He had no respite from you. Yeah, Y/N deserved everything she got, he thought as he got into his car. Plus it's not like you wouldn’t rat him out when you got home about what happened. This time as he drove past you and saw you hunched in on yourself, he couldn’t help but feel a twinge of guilt as he saw you clutching your injured hand, staring resolute at the dumpster, knowing full well that you would go in after the glasses. After all, he knew how hard your mother worked to buy them for you, he knew how you worked 2 jobs and also kept track of your younger brothers. Deep down, he really hoped that maybe this time you would finally explode and tell everyone about all the horrid acts he committed against you. 

Except that you never did tell on him. 

In fact, you avoid Yoongi like the plague.  After finally scrambling into the dumpster and reclaiming your glasses, you clambored back out, hand still screaming in pain. As you stand there wiping the garbage from the lenses and picking off random refuse from your clothes you honestly don’t think you can sink any lower than this. You swipe grimey hands at your cheeks as hot tears run down them, thankful that you are alone. And as you walk away you begin to make plans. You couldn’t keep doing this. And with renewed energy you begin walking home, not didn’t looking back choosing instead to forge ahead, putting one foot in front of another until finally you were in your mid=twenties, and had your own little place. You were happy with your life. But you should have known. All good things must come to an end eventually. You hadn’t thought about him in years, attending school, graduating, opening up a bakery with your best friend. Essentially you were hiding, but not really. 

And then by some ill stroke of luck, he found you.

You awaken to the blaring of your alarm with a groan. Was it really 8 am? The flashing numbers of your clock inform you that it was in fact 8:59. Shit you were late. Cursing your snooze butten, you scrambled out of your bed and grabbed the cleanest clothes you could find off the floor and stumble as you attempt a whole new balancing act: pulling up your pants while holding a hot cup of coffee and a piece of toast dangling precariously from your teeth. As you run down the street towards the bus, slinging your backpack over your shoulder while you scramble to tuck your shirt in you promptly run into a solid wall and fall on your ass. Your hair is covering your face as you look up at  what you had plowed into, an apology already leaving your mouth when you got to the face. “Um…hi, uh…sorry about that.”

“Y/N. From YHSN?”

“Yes?” you become wary, no one around here really knows you as you chose to keep to yourself…“Do I know you?”

The grin that spread across the man’s face could be described as nothing less than cruel and vicious. “Yeah, Y/N L/N right? I am here to inform you that you have 24 hours to vacate the premises. Good luck.” He stated before unceremoniously dropping an envelope onto your lap and turning on her heel to leave you in a stunned heap on the floor.

What the hell had just happened? Maybe you were still dreaming?

You were dazed for a moment as your brain tried to compute the absolute absurdity of what had just happened and then you were on your feet chasing the man, yelling at him to stop but he just kept on walking.

Finally catching up to the man, you grab her arm, “What the fuck man?” you yell, “this is illegal as hell! Thirty days is the minimum!” You shove the notice back at the man, hitting him in her (very solid) chest hard.

“Y/n, Y/n, I see you're still full of venom huh? It’s completely legal actually-you see I” he leaned forward, “own the building now. And to my delight, what do I learn? I find out that Y/N L/N happens to be a tenant! Guess how happy I was to finally find you again after all these years and then get to have you vacate your home.” he laughs as you gape at him like a fish.

“Min fucking Yoongi, I do not have time for your petty ass childish bullshit! ” you hers, voice laced with venom.

“Aw kitten you remembered! I am truly honored! But alas I cant stay and chit-chat, and well, neither can you. Tata chica!” With that he jerks her arm from your grasp, sending you back to the ground in shock for the second time that morning, before climbing into an expensive black car and driving away.

You scream curses to the sky, because after 8 peaceful years, the man you had spent so long  running from and then finally forgetting, had found you. But of course, the sky only decides to rain. And as you trudge back home to call into work, (because seriously fuck this day) you can’t help but wonder how everything came to this moment. After a shower and change of clothes, you fall into your bed, allowing yourself one moment of respite before you begin to tackle this new problem, closing your eyes.

You were back there again, trapped both in a small body and the cave that haunts you as you watch helplessly at the rising water. Your tiny voice is raised, tinted with fear, “I told you we shouldn’t come here! My mama said-“

The boy next to you cut you off, “Crying ain’t gonna fix it, I will save us”

“You can't even swim,” You yell, unable to remain calm. 

“I AM GONNA SAVE US!” the small boy shouted, “so don’t cry Y/N.” He gave you a small smile, one that made you feel slightly safer and he took hold of your hand. “Follow me and don’t let go no matter what.”

“Okay,” you say, for some reason feeling braver after placing your faith along with your hand into the boy’s hand. He said he would, so of course he would save both of you. After all, he was your best friend and you don’t pick losers.

It was a lot harder though, when all was said and done. Yes, the two of you made it out of the cave alive, but not without nearly drowning, and you had slipped and injured your ankle along the way. Luckily, you did make it out, and while the two of you spent a cold wet night huddled together on the beach, you were alive. In the morning, you were rescued further as the search teams found. And while your mother had you wrapped up in her warmth and was crying and thanking the people over and over that had saved you, the same welcoming was not happening to the young boy. You could hear screaming as a woman in a fine dress and her husband yelled at the boy, your tiny hero, before there was a loud smack. You watch as the boy falls, hand clenched to her face, tears streaming down her face as her mother continues to land hard blows upon her body until she is dragged away. You cried out for you friend and as the two of you met eyes, for the first time you saw hatred reflected back at you. That was the day Min Yoongi stopped being your friend and became your tormentor.

He followed you everywhere, taunting you, breaking your things, and ultimately breaking you. Your mother finally quit working for her house the day he’d thrown your glasses into the garbage and you had come home, broken glasses in hand, face streaked with tears and reeking of garbage -you had finally confessed what had happened, what all had been happening. You had moved away, your mom working several jobs and then as well as yourself working, then you working to  pay your way through chef school and finally moving out into your own place. And all of it had just been destroyed because he found you.

You sigh looking up at your ceiling letting your anger consume you as you curse Min Yoongi to a lifetime of diarrhea. And an itchy butt. And you hoped her eyebrows fell out, just for good measure.

You look around your apartment one last time before closing the door with finality. this asshole, you think to yourself. “Just wait” you say as you look down at the address your brother had just texted you.

An hour later you stand before a gated house and ring the doorbell. And ring it. And ring it. And continue ringing it (after all it was nearly 6 am, and as you had learned that morning, if you want to ruin someone's day, do it first thing in the morning) until a sleepy figure stumbles outside and smacks your hand away. You take this opportunity to dart inside the gate and into the house carrying your things with you.

“What the hell do you think you're doing?” Yoongi yells at you from outside, beginning to stomp back to her front door. You could only grin as you take in the pajama bottoms and robe, while you stand there like a goddamn Amazonian queen, “You took my home. this is payback.” and then you dialed the police, “Yes? Officer? There’s a half naked man on my lawn, please send help! I’m so scared”

You couldn’t help the grin that covers your face as you smile at Yoongi, “Good luck asshole.” You say sweetly, before slamming the door in her face. Nothing had ever sounded so sweet as the sound of the lock turning over, followed a second later by desperate pounding at the door. And Yoongi could only pound on the door until the cops showed up and he explained that this was, in fact, her home, as well as that the intruder was actually you. The officers had asked him if he wanted you arrested and for once he let it go, telling them that you were having a lovers quarrel and apologizing that they had to come out over something so silly. As the cops pulled away, he went to the back of the house and slammed the sliding glass door open only to find the house seemingly empty. As he walked from room to room he couldn’t help but get angrier and angrier. But when he found you passed out on her bed, he paused, somehow her anger dissipating instantly. He stood there, looking at your sleeping body and wondered if you would ever know her real feelings for you. If he would ever be able to tell you. And the real question: could you forgive him? He knew it was asking a lot, but he could only hope. He sat and thought about how to express to you the things he needed to say. He wondered how exactly did one explain how guilty he felt about how he treated you, how he didn’t really understand why he went out of her way to make your life miserable back then…and then you had left him. How, when you left he realized just how broken he was inside. When he bought the building he couldn’t believe her luck when he saw your name as one of the tenants, but her old ways came back hard and for some ungodly childish reason he couldn’t control himself. That he should have been apologizing that morning and telling you how thankful he was that it had also brought you back to him. He guessed that it was far too late for him to ever have your forgiveness and he couldn’t help the smile that played on her mouth as he approached the bed. He reached out a hand to smooth back some hair that covered your face when you wherpered, “Yoongi...” he stilled, “…I’m sorry” you mumbled. What could you possibly be sorry for? He couldn’t help it, but it made him angry that you would apologize to him after everything he’d done and especially while in such a vulnerable state that the next thing he knew he was grabbing the blanket and ripping it away from your curled form. It’s momentum  sends you over the edge of the bed to land in a heap on the floor. You sit up cursing her very existence,

 “What the hell Y/N?!” He yells right back, while you could only manage to stare up at him from where you sat on the floor. But this time you weren’t having any of her bullshit. You jump up and get in her face “ What the hell? What do YOU mean what the hell? Who the hell buys a building solely to evict one person?! Are you that rich? Do you hate me that much?”

Yoongi yelled back, “Hell yeah I do!“ 

"You have issues, Min Yoongi! I did nothing to you except be born! Do you know how hard I worked to forget what you did to me? And you come just back,” you pause, swallowing thickly, you would not cry. Not here. Not now, “But not anymore! I won't let you break me again Yoongi. I am worth so much more than that!”

Exhausted, you  move to push around him but he grabs your wrists instead and pins you against the wall.

“Let me go you asshole!” you yell at him fighting back for once in your life, all while trying to hide your face and the tears that were no longer just threatening to spill over. “Can't you just hate me from a distance? I’m sorry your mom was a horrid cunt to you! I’m sorry, okay! But please, just let me go! Leave me alone” And then her hands were gone, and you were free. You couldn’t help it, you looked up and stared him in the eyes, for once determined to make him see how he wrecked you.

Yoongi could only stare at you, watching as the tears fell, tears once again caused by him, and then he heard the five words that ripped open her wounds, words he knew he deserved, said in a voice so broken he didn’t know where he should start to even attempt to repair it.

“I hate you Min Yoongi.“

He couldn’t stand it, he knew he deserved them but he just couldn’t stand there and just accept them. Accepting those words would be like giving up, and giving up probably the only pure thing he still had in her life. Had. And so he moved, not thinking about consequences, only a desire to cleanse those words from the air around him. He grabs you again, pushing you against the wall, capturing your face in one hand, forcing you to meet her eyes, while he brushes your hair away with the other, "Good. Never forget it.”

And then he crashes her mouth against yours.

You didn’t know how what was happening was happening and some stupid part of you was excited to have him pressed against you,  mouth was moving against yours and then you were responding and for some reason it felt so good–like coming home. It was like your body suddenly was against everything you wanted-you found yourself wrapping your arms around her neck and pulling him closer, deepening the kiss, a giggle bubbling up when you nipped at her lip and he groaned. and then you both were tearing at each other's clothes in desperation. And then the world stops making sense. You and Min Yoongi, enemy of the state #1 were having sex. And it was good. It felt so right, like you two had been made to fit each other only. When it was over he lay behind you, placing gentle kisses along your neck and down your collar bone. The last thing you remember before falling asleep in your enemy’s arms was Yoongi gently wherpering a muffled “I’m sorry” into your ear over and over.

When you wake, you are surprised to find an arm wrapped around your waist and you freeze as the memories of the night before come rushing back and you begin to mentally beat yourself up as you carefully slide out of the bed and grab your clothes, making a mad dash out of the house, dressing yourself along the way.

No way had you slept with Yoongi and enjoyed it. You were an idiot of the highest order. You slept with the man who wanted you homeless because he hated you.

You let out a deep sigh as you did a very new special walk of shame to your job, where your boss, Mandi greeted you by yelling, “Oi ! What cat pissed in your cheerios?”

Causing the other workers to laugh until you pinned them with your patented Crazy-eye ™, at which point they scurried away except for that moron Seokjin who slung his arm around your shoulders jovially, “So why is my favorite girl doing the walk of shame?”

You glare and shrug his arm off, “None of your business.” 

“Dude its obs-you’re like a whole 4 hours late-and you are never late. So what happened? Anyone I know?”

“You’ll just call me an idiot if I tell you.”

“I swear on cake I won't.”

You raise an eyebrow before saying a name you never thought you’d say just to see him eat his words. “Min Yoongi.”

“Shut the front door! You’re an idiot”

“The cake is ashamed of you and asks that you keep your distance.” You say as you move to the back rooms to put away your belongings.

Not giving up, Seokjin follows you, even going so far as to hand you your apron, “Seriously? Didn’t he like-”

“Terrorize me to the point of moving? Then find me years later and evict me? Yep.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah.”

“You okay?” Seokjin asked worriedly, For the shit talking between the two of you, you smile to know he does really care.

“I have to be.”

“Did you at least use a condom?” He asks.

“Oh my god.”

“You really are an idiot. But don’t worry…you know I’ve got your back right? Well, we’ve got your back.”

You could only stare at Seokjin as your mind whirls through the consequences of last night, “It should be fine right?” you ask.

“Sure, cupcake. Keep telling yourself that”

There is a ding from the door and you see your brother Jungkook shuffles in with your other brother Namjoon, and giving Seokjin a look that clearly says “Keep your mouth shut if you want to live” you take a deep breath and head behind the counter to wash your hands, greeting them as you go.

“COFFEE. COFFEE NOW.” Namjoon grunts demandingly, taking a seat and burying her head in her hands,  while Jungkook adds a half-hearted “Please…and a raspberry jelly for me.”

“Rough night?” You ask as you pour the two men coffee and grab Jungkook her donut and slide it in front of them.

Jungkook grins, “Nah, Joon thought he could out drink me. He thought wrong.”

“Shhhhhhhhh!! You’re so loud,” hersed Namjoon, shoving a hand at Jungkook’s face and missing entirely.

You grin and speak extra loud, “Shouldn’t you know by now to let the kids drink and you go home and sleep?”

Namjoon just glares at you, “I have a gun.”

“I aint scared of you.”

The shop bursts into laughter as Namjoon buries her head in her arms on the counter, “Why do you hate me so much?” He whines.

“Mom likes you more, and I’m a petty bitch.”

Jungkook grins, “But she likes me most!”

Both you and Namjoon glare at him, “Shut up!”

Yoongi wakes up to an empty bed and he frowns, crawling out of bed and pulling on her boxers. He wanders around the house looking for you, hoping that you haven't run away and when he can’t find you, her heart sinks. Was he that awful that you would still run away from him even after what you had shared? And worse, what if he had gone too far this time?

He makes her way back to her room and grabs her phone, calling her secretary.

“Yo.” Answered Hoseok.

“Really that’s how you answer the phone? You do know that I am your boss right?”

“Debatable today.”

Yoongi rolls her eyes, “Anyways, I need you to find someone…”

“Well you know Imma need a little more…”

“Y/N. You remember her right?”

“You mean the girl you tortured in school because you didn’t have the balls to tell her how you lurrrrrrrved her.”

“I see you wish to die today.”

“No, not today. So you wish for me to find your wayward love?”

“Yeah.”

“Mandi’s shop.” Hoseok cheerfully replied, as if this should be common knowledge. 

“Oh yeah, great idea bring me some coffee please?”

“No, you idiot, Y/N works there. She is actually her partner” Hosoek irritatingly says matter of factly.

“The hell?! Why do you know this but I don’t?”

“Dude, seriously? You do know they were friends growing up and just because you made her run away by being a complete ass doesn’t mean they stopped being friends.”

“My best friend and my sister have been lying to me.” 

“It’s not lying when you never asked. But Yoongi…you should let her go. It’s been a long time and I know you had feelings but with how you treated her–“

"She was here.” Yoongi grunted, running a hand over her face as he stood in her closet trying to think of what to wear. What says “I come in peace”? Maybe he could get Hoseok to dress up as Spock and talk to Y/N before he does. 

“What? And you’re alive?”

“Yeah. We…um…she was gone this morning,” Yoongi sits down on her bed, running a hand through her hair.

"Oh…” and as realization hits, Hoseok intones sagely,” ...oh my god you’re fucking moron.”

“You know I can fire you.”

“Please bitch, I know all your deepest darkest secrets you ain’t gonna fire me.”

“Just…shit…what should I do?” Yoongi asks, finally letting go of her big bad boss act.

“Dude, I don’t know. You slept with her…maybe you should just…”

“I um…fucked up more than that…” He thinks about how you had felt, how he had felt...how absolutely perfect it had been for just one night, A flicker of fear strums through her heart at the thought that this was not salvageable at all. 

“No. no way. Our friendship is over.” Hoseok cracks from the other side of the phone.

“Just help me okay?” 

There was a long pause before he heard a heavy sigh, “Fine, but no games. She has a good thing going on and you-”

“I swear it's different this time!” Yoongi pleads. 

“Whatever. I should warn you though.”

“Warn me about what?”

“Her brothers.”

“Namjoon and Jungkook? We were old friends, what about them?”

“You were old friends until they found out how you treated her. And bonus points-they are both cops now. Partners even, so you should probably pray for your soul.”

With a groan, Yoongi finally gets up and begins to get dressed putting Hoseok on speakerphone. “I’m so dead.”  

“Yep,” affirms Hoseok, “So does that mean I can have your stuff?” 

Rolling her eyes and thinking he really needs a new assistant, Yoongi growls out“See you at the office.” only to hear Hoseok laughing before he hangs up the phone. 

Yoongi finishes getting dressed, and running a hand over her face as he contemplates this new information. You’d been right under her nose the entire time and everyone had kept it a secret. He guessed he deserved it though, he was a complete and utter ass to you. He also guesses it’s time to make it up to you and hopefully, you would forgive him and let him into your heart, where he belonged. After all, you’d always been in his.

2 months later

Yoongi stands outside her (former) sister’s shop watching as you serve your customers, and realizes sadly that it was the first time in a long time that  he’d really ever seen you smile. He wanted that smile for himself and himself alone, but he wasn’t sure how to get it. When he had remodeled your former apartment, expanding it through the two vacant units on either side of you, you just got mad at him for evicting you, when he was just redoing the apartment and you claimed it was far too large for you by yourself now. But that was the point wasn't it? He was hoping that somehow you would just...come back to him on your own and he wouldn’t really have to put any work in. Yoongi realizes then that he is an absolute dumbass.

After all, nothing he’d done so far had managed to make you smile at him or hell just give him the time of day and he was beyond frustrated. Couldn’t you see how hard he was trying for you?

Mandi pokes her head out of the shop interrupting his train of thought,

“What the hell are you doing here?” she snaps at him.

“Wow, do you greet all your customers like this?”

“Yoongi. Listen. Whatever it this is about now isn’t–”

Realization hits for the second time that morning, “Were you ever going to tell me?”

Mandi pauses, looking him up and down, “There’s nothing to tell if you already know.”

He could almost feel the metaphorical walls slamming down around him as Mandi went on guard. “Mandi!”

“No. Not about ther.”

“I’ve known for almost a month.”

“Then you should go know somewhere else.”  Mandi stepped outside, becoming a most effective blockade. If someone was to ever wage war against his sister, his money, hell, his entire fortune would be on Mandi.

“Listen, you’re my brother and I love you and I know you know what you did wrong, and really it's sweet you want to make amends but …Yoongi, sometimes things…”

“I slept with her.”

“Do you want a trophy?” Mandi snapped, her fists clenched, before she  shook her head, “you have five seconds or I’m opening ther door and I’m calling her brothers out here.”

“We didn’t use protection.”

“Well then I guess today you die you little fucking weasel.”

“I love her.”

That’s when he remembered his sister’s left hook and then the lights went out.

Mandi stomps into the store grabbing you by the arm and dragging you upstairs ignoring your protests, shoving you into the bedroom and giving you a look reserved for her son’s Taehyung and Jimin when they are acting up. “Stay.”

Mandi goes back downstairs and motions Namjoon and Kookie over, “Listen, I know you hate Min Yoongi with like the passion of 7 fiery suns but I need you to hold that rage in and help me get his ass inside.”

Namjoon was already up and out the door at the sound of Min Yoongi’s name, and seconds later was dragging a barely conscious Yoongi in by the collar. While Kookie held open the door, Namjoon made sure Yoongi purposely whacked his head on the door frame and when Mandi winced he gave her a look that clearly said “sorry not sorry” before dropping Yoongi on the shop floor like the sorry sack of shit he thought he was.

“I’m sorry folks,” Mandi announces, “due to my crazy family, the shop will be closing early.”

The patrons all scrambled out of the shop while Jungkook handcuffed Yoongi to a chair and dumped a cup of ice water on him.

Yoongi jerked back, fully awake now and met by 3 pairs of eyes. 3 very angry pairs of eyes. He shook his head and tried to move but found himself handcuffed to the chair and he gives Mandi a look that says “Really?”

“Kook uncuff him. Seriously. And you and Joon leave.”

“No.”

“Did I stutter?”

“Okay, but we get dibs if you decide to kill him.” Jungkook, grumbles as he undoes the handcuffs.

“I’m not going to kill him. Today.”

“Fine.”

Jungkook finishes unlocking the cuffs and Yoongi immediately rubs at his wrists and watches warily as Jungkook and Namjoon leaves the shop, rolling his eyes when Jungkook gives him the international sign for “I’m watching you” while Joon drew his thumb across his neck. They were dramatic as fuck, but then again he might just be dramatically fucked.

Mandi pulls up a chair and sits across from Yoongi and stares at him for several long moments until Yoongi breaks the silence, “Just say it.”

“Why?”

“It just happened like that.”

“Bullshit.”

Yoongi sighed, “I’ve grown up since then. I no longer want to pull her hair.”

“Clearly. And you didn’t just pull her hair, you did a lot worse.”

“Shouldn’t you be on my side?”

“I am fucking Switzerland.”

Yoongi couldn’t help the anger that swelled up and choked him, “Clearly not. You knew where she was all these years and you never said anything. This is why you never let me come to the shop then? You knew I was looking for her, that I wanted-”

“Of course,” interrupted Mandi. 

“Why?”

“Because you are an idiot who doesn’t know how to communicate. Look at what happened--when you did find her, your first action was to take her home. Who fucking does that shit?”

“You’re right, I was. I was cruel and spiteful. Keyword: was.”

“Bullshit. Taking away her home wasn’t because you were being spiteful. You wanted what she had. That’s called envy. She left because she wanted to live, and the only way she could was to leave. You made it like this. I almost lost my friend. So of course I kept it a secret.” Mandi sighed, rubbing her hand over her face. “Look I know. I know what y

our mom and dad did. How they treated us. We were mere points on a checklist of creating a picture perfect family. But you had no right-”

“I was stupid. You think I don’t know? That I don’t regret it? I love her. I always have.”

“Actions-”

“Speak louder than words I know. I’m trying to fix that now!”

Mandi closes her eyes, debating her next few words  "Can I trust you? That’s the-“ ”

“Yes. I swear I'll spend my life…”

“Doing what?” You interrupt, “Sorry, since you seem to be discussing me I couldn’t stay put,” you say to Mandi. “Yoongi I don’t want your money and if you are worried because we didn’t…,” you swallow before continuing with a brave face, “....I’ll be fine. but you really have to stop sending me presents. I don’t want them. Can’t you just stay…”

“Y/N I’m sorry. I was an ass.”

“Still an ass.” Mandi interrupts, “Look, you two clearly need to talk this out so I’m out. Come on Seokjin, let’s go see a movie.”

With that Seokjin and Mandi beat a hasty retreat leaving the two of you alone.

“Your jaw is swelling.” You say after noticing the blossoming bruise that marred his handsome face. Handsome? What the hell were you even thinking?

“Mandi hit me.”

“Why?”

“I told her what happened. She’s very protective of you.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Y/N…that night…I shouldn’t have that.”

“I let you. It wasn’t just you alone.”

“Please, just listen. I’m sorry. For everything. And I’m sorry for not saying that when we met again. It's just…”

“It's just..what?” You questioned, meeting his eyes. 

“I don’t know. When I look at you I want you. You are so good and pure and you deserve the world. I wanted you to myself but I was scared…”

“Scared of?”

“You.”

“Me?” You scoff at the idea of anyone being afraid of you.

“Yeah,” Yoongi stood and walked over to you. “You had everything even though you had nothing. Brothers who worshiped you, a mother who did everything for you…what if I ruined that? What if my mother-”

“How would you ruin that?” You ask, finding patience from who knows where.

“I was messed up…and the older I got the worse…things got worse. You saw, you can’t pretend you didn’t. I took out my suffering on you because nothing good could possibly exist and you were just hiding your real nature. But you never retaliated. You kept reaching out to me over and over again. ”

“But I did retaliate.”

“By locking me out of my house after I took yours? Not really. I mean…I deserve far worse,” chucked Yoongi. He wanted so badly to touch you, to pull you into his arms and just...feel you. 

You stare at Yoongi. This broken version of Yoongi with tears in his eyes. Could you trust him? You wanted to give him a chance.

“Let’s….go on a date.”

Yoongi’s eyes widened, “What?”

“You like me right?”

“Well–I mean–I did when I was—I do”

“Take me on a date, final offer going in one–two..”

“Fine! I’ll take you on a damn date,” Yoongi smiles.

“No fancy shit tho. $100 limit.”

“I’ll take you on the best damn date of your life!”

“Good.”

Yoongi didn’t know why he was being snippy now, but as he left the shop he couldn’t help but do a little cheer when he got into his car. Hoseok rolled his eyes and politely ignored him.

Yoongi stood at the door of your apartment, and for the first time in his life he hesitated, hand poised to ring the doorbell, and then you swung open the door and suddenly the world stopped. You looked amazing. Your hair was curled, makeup accenting your eyes perfectly, wearing black skinny slacks, a hound’s-tooth patterned sweater over a white button down and pink heels. He took in the perfection that was you and thought, “She was made for me.”

And the fear was gone as he smiled at you and he took your hand, interlacing his fingers with yours, “Are you ready to go?”

“Yeah let me grab my purse,” you say as you try to let go of his hand to grab the bag on the chair beside your front door but he wouldn’t let go. You couldn’t help the blush that blossomed over your cheeks as he stepped inside and grabbed the bag for you and waited for you to lock up so you both could leave.

He pulled you along, never letting go, until he reached his car and opened the door. It was only enough time for him to run around and get the car moving before he was locking fingers with you again.

“What’s up with you?” You smirk.

“Just…making up for lost time.”

“What?”

“I just…I should have been doing this for years now.”

You couldn’t help but roll your eyes, “So…are you always this cheesy?”

Yoongi’s eyes went wide, “I mean…I’m not…no…,” Yoongi stuttered and then stopped, “I guess I am cheesy it's just…I can tell you I’m sorry but…”

“Actions speak louder than words?”

“I see you have met my sister,” he joked softly, “And we’re here.”

“A movie? Really?”

“I always had wished to take you…”

Yoongi’s eyes stared into yours, “Yoongi…” you say timidly.

“Yeah?”

“I’m not her anymore you know? I grew up…you grew up…let’s leave it behind us and start fresh yeah?”

“What do you mean?”

You stick your hand out, “Hi, my name is Y/N. It’s nice to meet you.”

Yoongi stared at you you’d suddenly sprouted a third eye on your nose before awkwardly taking your hand and shaking it, “Min Yoongi…the pleasure is all mine.”

You can’t help but laugh at his stunned expression, not knowing he was just in shock from receiving your smile. To him, your smile in that moment could have powered a thousand suns. 

Yoongi was quiet but still took your hand and you entered the theater with a smile on your face, happy that things were getting better, that you could almost believe you had your first love back.

2 hours later.

“Yoongi,  why are you pouting?” You ask as you take his hand.

“Look no matter how I look at it, it's just not fair.”

“What’s not?”

“Mandi. Seokjin. They have spent years with you…years that should have been with me.”

“I thought we were moving forward.”

“But.”

You sighed. “Look. You want to know the truth?”

Yoongi stopped and stared at you, “yes.”

“Okay then.” You face him, “You crushed me in every way possible. You were my world. I followed you everywhere. I trusted you, and you were always there and then you weren’t. The night we got stuck in the cave I gave you my faith—but it also is and was the moment I gave my whole heart to you, willingly, without any doubt. And the next day when we were found…you stomped on it. And you continued to stomp on it. I cried so many tears everyday because I hoped that one day my hero would come back. But he never did. He became a villain.” You couldn’t help the tears that fell down your cheeks, “And even through all that I still…” you sighed. “I can't do this Yoongi. I can't. I’m sorry,  I was wrong to try.” You turned on your heel and ran away, ignoring him yelling after you, you just ran until you couldn’t hear him anymore. 

And then you found the alcohol.

You sat at the outside bar drinking as you thought about the past two months. All the things you had done with Yoongi , and how disgusted you were with yourself for letting your old feelings come back so easily. You knew it wasn’t the right choice, but it was the one you wanted. You had decided to drown yourself in alcohol,  and you were on your third bottle when the object of your conflicting emotions, sat down across from you.

“Y/N.”

“Mmm?”

“What are you doing?”

“Drinking!” Your giggle turns to a frown when you hear the heavy sigh come across from you, “Are you judging me? It’s not nice to judge you know! “

“Why are you drinking Y/N?”

“Because,” you leaned forward, whispering conspiratively, “I’ve been bad.”

“Bad? How so?”

You sigh dreamily, a wistful smile playing upon your lips, “There’s this guy…”

“There always is.”

“Shhh! This is my story!” You shout.

“Sorry.”

“Where was I?” 

“Something about a guy…”

“SHHHHHH! So rude interrupting me! Anyways…I’m supposed to hate him but…” you thump your chest hard as tears prick your eyes, “But…”

“But what?”

“I can't…I remember him before…and the him that I remember…he’s still there…and all the warning alarms are going off and I’m so scared to love him but I…I think…”

“You think?”

You lay your head on the table, mumbling, “Think it’s too late…think I love him. Think it has always been too late for me. Even after all the bullshit…you see…he’s still here” You thump your chest hard and sigh as you feel the tears slide down your cheek to land on the table, “ I love him and I don’t want to…I didn’t mean too…”

“Mean to what?” 

“To love him, but…”

“You do.”

“Yeah” you whisper softly.

“Yoongi…” you can feel the man smile, you don’t know how you know but you do, “why do I have to love you?”

“You love me?” He asks, the hope wrapped in fear in his voice twisting your heart even more than all the past crap that had happened. You wanted to let it go. You wanted to love him. You can only nod your head as your eyes slide close, and you struggle against the darkness when you hear him whisper, “I love you too Y/N…I’m just scared…I’m not good enough…I was such an ass…and I know you said to let it go…but God Y/N…I should have treated you like a princess…because the truth is…”

Those words cause you to sit up, eyes squinting hard as you try to make out his face, “Yoongi?”

“Yeah?”

You lean forward and his face comes into focus, a smile spreads on your face and you lean forward to press your lips to his, softly at first, and then he responds, a hand sliding up your arm to cup your neck as you express to him what you can’t say in words. This was so much better than petty arguments and revenge pranks.  

You pull away, breathing heavy as you rest your forehead against his, “Yoongi,” you whimper, keeping your eyes firmly on the buttons of his shirt, scared to look up, scared to see the fear in his eyes. Does he not know?  “Can I…can I be yours?“ You ask in a voice so quiet it is almost lost in the noise of the world that surrounds you. 

"Can you forgive me?” The pain in his voice was sharp. “I forgive you.” You whisper into his mouth as you make promises with your lips.

He pulls away for a moment, and you lock eyes finally. “Then believe me when I say, I was always yours, and you were always mine.” 

“I was?”

The amount of disbelief in your voice causes Yoongi to tear up as he pulls you into his arms, “Kitten?”

“Yeah,” you say as you rest your head into the crook of his neck, breathing in his scent.

This time it was his turn to ask, “Am I yours?”

“You always were Yoongi. I was just waiting for you to remember where home was.”

Yoongi places the softest of kisses on each of your eyelids, and then he kisses away your tears and finally his mouth was on yours, and the kiss was full of yearning. “Y/N.”

“Yes?” You ask, sad he had pulled away. 

“Don’t leave me again…I love you too.”

“Okay.”

[evermoreholland]

Terrified | Charlie Gillespie

Pairing: Charlie Gillespie x Pregnant!Reader

Summary: You’re afraid of motherhood due to your own personal issues with your mother.

Warnings: ANGST, mentions of abuse and neglect, mentions of adoption and unwanted pregnancy. Happy ending.

Word Count: 1,452

A/n: This is intense. This fic was not planned but I think this is my best fic that I ever wrote. I hope you enjoy and reblog!

Your husband’s voice continued to ring through your head.

We’re going to be parents, Y/n.

You had been feeling nauseous the past few weeks and your period was around two weeks late. You took three pregnancy tests that morning and they all came back positive. Charlie was ecstatic and immediately began jumping for joy when he saw the positive pregnancy tests. He was the one that encouraged you to take them, and he had been correct. You were pregnant and you were fucking terrified.

Growing up you had always wanted children of your own. When you were four, you played with your baby dolls wishing you were a mother. As you grew up you realized how much you didn’t want to be a mother anymore, and that was all because of your emotionally abusive mother.

Growing up, you always felt neglected. Your mother would usually focus on the successes and achievements of your older sister. She was her pride and joy, but you were the “dumb” daughter, and the “weird” child too. You did alright in school, but you just weren’t a straight A student like your sister was. Your mother hated you for that. She wanted you to be “perfect” and you weren’t, at least in her eyes.

After your sister left for college, you were left with your recently divorced mother. In order to cope she began excessively drinking and smoking. She was often drunk and you would have to pick up the pieces and help her. You never once went to your sister for help because you didn’t want to disturb her new life away from your mother. Your mother treated you like garbage. She body shamed you and degraded you. She would make you feel unsafe in your own home. Once you got the chance to leave, you never returned.

You felt broken when you finally left your mother. She had completely broken you, and the thought of having your own children scared you. You never would want your children to grow up in an unloving home.

When you started dating Charlie, you didn’t talk about the future a lot. You didn’t know what you wanted, so there was nothing to really talk about. You were so damaged that you didn’t know what to look forward to in your life.

Charlie encouraged you to seek therapy, and you thanked him every day for that. It definitely helped and you realized nothing that happened between you and your mother was your fault at all. She was completely to blame and you finally accepted that.

After many therapy sessions, you were finally ready to plan your life out. You went to college, graduated, landed an amazing job, bought a house with Charlie, and finally got married after three years of dating. The one thing you didn’t think about was having a baby. That thought still scared you. You thought that you wouldn’t be a good mother.

Ever since you saw the positive test you have been freaking out. Charlie couldn’t get a hold of you. You did everything you could to distract yourself and ignore him. You didn’t want to face him.

“Y/n?” Charlie called out to you. You had been in your office for about four hours and Charlie was definitely worried about you. You would usually come out of your office once in a while to eat or spend time with him. He was concerned, to say the least.

You didn’t answer him and just continued typing an email out instead. Charlie decided to try calling out for you again.

“Angel, you need to eat. Remember you have to eat for you and the baby.” That’s right. The baby. The baby growing inside of you. You decided to step out of your office and make your way to the kitchen. You were getting hungry after all. You went to the fridge to get some leftovers.

“Hey, honey,” Charlie said as he made his way over to you. He pressed a kiss to your forehead and then kneeled in front of you to press a kiss on your stomach. Anyone else would think that your husband is absolutely adorable giving a kiss to your unborn baby, but you couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable.

“Char, we need to talk.”

“What is it?” Charlie’s voice laced with concern, especially when he saw your eyes water.

“I’m scared to be a mother,” you said as Charlie met your gaze. “I don’t know if I want to keep the baby.”

“What do you mean you don’t want to keep it?” Charlie asked gently, not in a rude way at all. Not like you expected. Charlie really loved you, but he didn’t want to hear the next words come out of your mouth. He wanted to be a father so badly and he wanted to raise the baby with you.

“Maybe we can put the baby up for adoption once they’re born,” you said. You didn’t want to, but you didn’t want to be a terrible mother.

“Y/n, why don’t you want to keep the baby?” Charlie asked, tears flowing from his hazel eyes. “Our baby.”

“I had a really bad childhood and I don’t want to give our child a bad life.”

“Y/n, I know for a fact that you’re not going to give them a bad life. We’ll give them the best life,” Charlie tried to reassure you.

“I’m fucked up, Charlie,” you snapped. “Don’t you get it?” You didn’t want to yell at your husband, but he wasn’t understanding you.

“Y/n, your mother was the bad guy, not you,” Charlie reminded you. “You’ve been working on yourself, trying to get better.”

“I can’t have a baby, Charlie,” you cried. “This is not something we’ve talked about. You know that.”

“Because I just assumed that what’s you wanted too.”

“I did,” you paused. “When I was younger.”

“What changed?” He asked.

“My mother,” you said and then walked back to your office. You couldn’t handle this anymore. You didn’t want to fight anymore. Charlie rushed after you but you slammed the door in his face. You knew it wasn’t right but you needed to be alone right now. You had way too much on your mind.

“Y/n, please, open the door,” Charlie said from the other side. You slid down against the door and put your knees up to your chest and hugged yourself tightly.

“Y/n, I know this is not what you want, but I really think we should keep the baby,” Charlie said, knowing you can hear him clearly. “I just know that you’re going to be an incredible mom. The baby is going to love you, Y/n. I promise you that.” You started crying while Charlie was speaking, which urged him to continue.

“I know that you didn’t have the best childhood, and that’s why I know you’re going to make sure our child has the best one. You realized that what your mother did to you was wrong, and I am certain that you’ll do what’s good for our child. I just know that you’ll love them so much. You picked up the pieces to your life and you’re successful now, and I know you’ll raise an incredible and beautiful human being.”

Everything that Charlie said was true. You managed to pick up the pieces of your broken life and escape your mother. You had everything in you to raise a child.

You wiped the tears off of your face and got up to open the door to reveal a saddened Charlie. You wrapped your arms around him almost immediately.

“Thank you, Charlie.” Charlie hugged you back and cried onto your shoulder.

“You’re going to be an amazing mom, Y/n,” Charlie said. “If you decide to raise it.”

“I want to have this baby with you, Char,” you spoke, voice barely above a whisper.

Charlie lifted his head from your shoulder and looked at you straight in the eyes. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah. Thank you for helping me realize that my childhood wasn’t my fault.”

“No, you realized that.”

“I couldn’t have done it without you, Charlie,” you said in appreciation.

“I’m just glad that you want to keep the baby,” Charlie said as he kneeled in front of you once again to kiss your stomach.

“I’m sorry about considering other options.”

Charlie looked up at you and said, “It’s okay to be scared, Y/n. Just know that I got you, alright?”

“Thank you. I love you so much,” You said as you kneeled down so you were on the floor with him.

“I love you, too,” He said and then kissed you gently.

“You’re an amazing husband,” you mumbled against his lips. “An already great father, too.”

[punkrockmads]

Expected To Be

Abby x Fem! Reader (Modern Au)

Tw: mentions of verbal abuse

"No no no, shit!" You curse through your teeth, watching the dark brown of the spilled coffee seep into the white rug you and your girlfriend had just bought for the living room. Abby will be back any minute. Fuck! How are you supposed to clean this before then?! You run to the kitchen, frantically reaching for paper towels and a bottle of stain remover. "Shit shit shit!" You've messed up again.

You can already hear your father scolding you like he did when you were a child.

"Everything must be spotless. You're always making a mess! God, why can't you be a proper young lady?!"

Even as a toddler, you were expected to have what your father considered a "perfect" life. In his eyes, that meant keeping the entire house clean, never making mistakes, having proper manners and etiquette, and settling down with a husband and staying home with the children. With no mother to save you, you were just... stuck.

The day after you turned eighteen, you packed your bags and took a train to New York, cutting off all contact with your father. However, his abuse had already left a mark on you. His constant shaming and bickering made you a bit of a neat freak. In the three years Abby's been dating you, she's noticed it. She sees it every time you wipe the bathroom mirror over and over again until there are no streaks. She sees it in the way you get frustrated when cups aren't on coasters or there's dust on the lampshades. She chalks it all up to you being a neat freak.

This is different, though. This wasn't dust or streaks on a mirror, this is a stain. A big, evil stain, glaring at you as it soaks into the soft white carpet. You spray the stain generously, falling to your knees and scrubbing with all of your force. You know for a fact it's not going to come out but something in you posses you to keep trying. Maybe if you keep trying it'll disappear. Your heart pounds in your chest as you watch the stain simply grow, your scrubbing making it worse as coffee soaks the paper towels and dampens your hands and jeans. You lean back, hitting the end table a little too hard. A water glass falls to the ground, shattering into tiny pieces as it hits the wood floor. You jump forward, the noise startling you as you scramble to your feet.

"Fuck!" You scream, seeing the broken glass on the wood and rug. Tears form in the corners of your eyes. "God dammit!" You don't think twice, kneeling back down to pick up the two big pieces of glass on the floor, not noticing the smaller shards cutting into your knees. Blood begins to seep through your jeans as you throw out the big pieces and sweep up the rest, tears falling down your face and blood trickling down your legs. Abby comes home just as you're dumping the rest of the glass into the garbage.

"Bae, I'm home!" Abby calls, walking into the kitchen to set her keys in the jewellery dish like she does every day. You turn away, wiping your face with your sleeves and taking a deep breath before turning to look at her just as she notices you.

"How was work?" You ask, trying to keep your composure as you open your arms for a hug. Abby looks you up and down, immediately knowing something is wrong. Her eyes stop on your red eyes and bloody knees.

"Hey, are you okay?" Abby asks, dropping her bag to the floor and walking over to you. "You're bleeding." She puts her hands on your shoulders gently. "And you've been crying." You look down shamefully, wishing you could go back and stop the coffee from falling. "Baby, what happened?" She holds your chin lightly, lifting you up to look her in the eyes.

"I ruined the rug." You mumble, almost too quiet for her to hear. There isn't a single bit of anger in her eyes. Of course there isn't. This is Abby, not your father. Abby loves you, no matter what.

"And the blood?" She asks softly, looking at you with concern mixed with pure love.

"I broke a glass." You admit, speaking a tiny bit louder. "I'm sorry." You look down again, avoiding her gaze.

"Hey..." Abby moves you to look up at her again. "It's okay." She assures, kissing your forehead. "You're allowed to make mistakes, baby. Nobody's perfect. I love you no matter what. Yeah?" You offer her a small but genuine smile, nodding to let her know you understand. She smiles back, looking down at your jeans. "Okay, bathroom, pants off. Let's get those cuts taken care of, then I'll take care of the rug."

Abby lifts you up, sitting you on the bathroom sink. She begins carefully removing the bits of glass, you wince with every piece. "My poor girl." She sighs. "I'm sorry it hurts, baby."

"It's okay." You say, resting your head on her shoulder as she removes the last piece. The dish rag she's been using to clean your knees has soaked up most of the blood, staining the tan color with big crimson patches.

"Alright, this knee looks like a normal bandage will work, I might have to wrap the other in gauze though." Abby digs through the med kit to find the supplies she needs. After patching you up, she helps you off the counter, carrying you to the couch instead of standing you on the floor. "You stay right here. I'll take care of the rug." It's an order, but her voice is gentle. You nod, curling up on the couch. You watch quietly as Abby rolls up the rug, setting it by the front door to take out to the garbage tomorrow. She walks back into the living room, sitting on the couch and opening her arms for you to crawl into. You do just that, curling yourself against her. She holds you close, kissing the top of your head as she tightens her grip slightly.

"You wanna talk about it?" Abby asks, knowing there's something on your mind.

"My dad didn't like when I made mistakes." You shrug, not wanting to go into detail. Abby doesn't need you to, she already understands.

"You don't have to worry about him anymore, baby." Abby assures. "You're allowed to make mistakes. I'm not gonna love you any less." You nod against her chest. "I love you so much, sweet girl."

You know Abby's words are genuine, her love for you is pure and true. It overwhelms you with joy, making you fight the urge to let happy tears fall. You settle with a small sniffle before responding.

"I love you too."