#yuck never tagging that again

[yudgefudge]

Footballers as tweets pt5!

[vroomian]

Well that was the most disgusting hour of my life! I need seven showers and a memory wipe!

[themeraldee]

The Price of Love - Part 2

[Masterlist] [Part 1]

18+ Only | 3.8k | Homelander x fem!Reader | Early Season 2. Voyeurism. Dark themes. Breaking and entering. Manipulation. Fraud. Gaslighting. Office sex. Unprotected sex. Homelander being his own warning. I'm not really sure how to tag this properly tbf.

Homelander’s devious plan starts when he perfectly times when both you and your spouse leave your apartment empty. He knows you’re at the Vought tower, assisting Ashley in organizing photoshoots for the next issue of Vought Sports. Just the thought of that makes him roll his eyes. He’s got a four page feature with the Yankees, something about the importance of baseball to the American population. 

No. He can’t get distracted like that. Not when he’s already been so careful. Work can wait. 

He lands on your small balcony, testing the door handle. It budges immediately. Homelander grins at the revelation. You’re clearly one of those people who don’t think to lock the doors and windows just because you’re high off the ground. He’d have thought that after knowing him you’d know better than that. 

Homelander steps into your apartment. He’s planning to be thorough with his little impromptu visit. It’s only fair. Thanks to your job you have pretty much unrestricted access to his penthouse. You’ve seen what his space looks like. He should get to see yours too.

The first thing that hits him is just how this space doesn’t smell like you as much as he’d want. He can almost taste the bitter scent of your spouse in the air. Yuck. Homelander immediately walks through, exploring the kitchen, the living room for anything substantial at all.

There are letters with angry red words, shouting about bills being past due. Medical bills pinned to the fridge with some generic city magnet. Coupons and budgets all crammed on the small space on the fridge. Clearly, something isn’t working. Homelander has zero sympathy regarding your spouse but he cares about you. He doesn’t want you to suffer and with him, you’d never again have to worry about unpaid bills or having a roof over your head. 

He scoffs to himself. What kind of irresponsible and unreliable spouse have you got? You’re clearly working hard, he sees you relentlessly keep your head up at work and with your position only rising and more responsibilities being piled up on your plate he can imagine you earn a decent wage.

Clearly, it’s being drained somewhere. Whoever your spouse is, they’re a good-for-nothing leech that’s holding you back.

He could pay them off. Threaten them. Torture them. Kill them even. A thought that sends a thrilling shiver down his spine. But no, this has to be your decision. You need to be the one to decide to leave them. You need to seek him out. 

Homelander continues with his little exploration trip. Already forming a plan in his mind. What he saw the other day wasn’t coincidental. He feels a rift. Ever since that night he watched you pleasure yourself to the thought of him he knew it wasn’t a one-off. But for the first time Homelander gave you the ammo. He told you to your face that he’s interested. He allowed you to lean into these fantasies at the cost of having no leverage in his petty mind.

He can’t wait to put his plan into motion. 

Looking through the rest of your apartment should make him feel upset, agitated. Instead Homelander walks around with a huge grin on his face as he looks at the few framed pictures on the wall. They’re old. You don’t look like this anymore so decidedly your spouse hasn’t done anything worth remembering in recent times. Perfect. This is all working perfectly towards his plan.

Your spouse doesn’t value you. Clearly. He notices more signs of this behavior throughout your belongings. The cheap perfume that he smells on you everyday is so uninspiring he’s never even heard of the brand. The makeup is cheap, terrible enough quality that should only be used by teenage girls that are discovering themselves, not for a professional woman like you. Your clothes tell a similar story. You have a few nice outfits that you wear to your job. You only ever dress nicely for him. The rest of your closet feels like plastic, uncomfortably stiff and scratchy, it’s unlikely to last another season.

You will have none of these issues with him. Homelander will buy you only the best. Top of the line. All designer, original or handmade. Anything you’ll want, it’ll be yours. Only the best for his lover.

The more time he spends in your apartment the less he’s angry and upset about your initial rejection. He sees it now as a cry for help. Secretly, in between the lines you were rattling the bars of your prison begging him to save you.

And oh he will. 

The cherry on the top is the cheap ring that sits on your bedside table. No special case for it, no display, you don’t even carry it around with you. Maybe unconsciously you know how little your spouse values you. He picks it up to feel it. Cubic Zirconia on a small sterling silver band. Less than $100. Homelander scoffs at the cheap representation of your bond. So easy to scuff and crush. Maybe it directly reflects your marriage. 

Homelander leaves your apartment exactly the way he found it and over the next few days he watches. He watches you interact with your spouse, looking for any chink in the armour of your marriage and oh my does he find plenty.

Your spouse doesn’t deserve you, they don’t treat you with the same respect you give them. There’s room for insecurity to worm your way into your brain. He knows that now. You have sex at most once a week and even then it doesn’t look like it scratches the itch for you. Don’t worry, he’ll have you writhing under him in no time.

But it needs to be at your own pace. He knows you’re loyal to a fault, you’ve proven yourself with such quality over your time working for Vought. You won’t leave your spouse without a good reason. Besides betrayal. You clearly can deal with a non-spectacular life and even less remarkable sex life. But betrayal? A total annihilation of trust? Well, he knows you won’t be able to shake that off.

With that, he sets his plan into motion.

Nothing he does is by his hand of course, he needs to be invisible in all this. Instead he pays lackeys and he bullies Vought employees into scamming your spouse, stealing your shared banking details without them knowing any better.

Over the next month he periodically withdraws a sum of money from your shared account, slowly making his plan come to fruition. He keeps you busy at work. Really busy. You don’t have time to keep up with your household and worry about budgeting. You pull away from your spouse—a bonus he didn’t see coming. It’s even worth the stress it’s causing you. Each day you come in with dark circles under your eyes, tiredness just seeping out of your pores. But it’s okay. You can go through a bit of hardship while he plans your rescue. Things always get worse before they get better.

At the same time, your bills are going up, rent has skyrocketed—something about a new ownership, company you wouldn’t recognise as it’s outlined in the letter that came in the mail. More than ever now, Homelander sees you not skipping any overtime. Good, you spend most of your time with him now. He watches the late night arguments you have with your spouse about pulling their weight and how you can’t do everything yourself. Yes. Yes, it’s finally happening.

You haven’t even seen the main act.

When the next medical bill comes out and there’s not enough money in the shared account he waits it out. He’s planted all the seeds. All the money periodically taken out by the planted escort services. The bank statements laid out plain and clear. The call logs coming and outgoing to the same establishment. Your spouse’s lack of interest in sex with you only reinforced this notion.

Homelander isn’t there to watch the fall out. He’s too excited. Already waiting for you to spring into his arms at a moment’s notice. 

But you don’t.

Each day he gets more and more irritated. You should already be shouting his praises, showing him your signed divorce papers but instead you’re moping around like a sad dark cloud, raining oh his parade. 

Okay fine, he’s gonna have to nudge you a bit. It’s not going exactly according to his plan but that’s okay, he can adapt.

The next time you bring over some talking points for him to read and memorize, he stops you. He stops you from spilling out your rehearsed words, his gloved hand raised tearing you out of your mindless monologue you’ve been told to parrot back to him. You blink up at him, a little confused. You haven’t had many interactions these days so Homelander can’t blame you for acting like a deer in headlights.

“Hey, you okay? You look tired. Are you sleeping fine?” He gives his words the perfect amount of care and softness. Breaking through the shell you’ve put up around him. He gets it, you’re trying to be a strong woman—ladidadida. Normally he likes that about you but now you’re messing with his plans.

You sniffle and he smells the waterworks before they even burst the dam. One little question and you take two steps back, your back hitting the wall of the meeting room and you slide down onto the ground. Whimpering out a little wet ‘no’ you bring your knees up burying your face in them.

“Hey hey hey… what’s wrong?” He lowers to the ground in front of you.

“Everything’s wrong. My whole life is falling apart!” You sob into your knees. You start spilling as if he’s the first person to ask you how you’re doing. You rattle off an unintelligible ramble of hiccups, sobs and half-spoken words. 

Homelander was lucky that you still had your face buried in your knees because he could not stop the grin spreading across his face as he heard you hiccup the word ‘divorce’. After the little indulgence, he trained his face back into a sympathetic pout and he ran his hand down the back of your head, petting your hair.

“Slow down, say what now? Did you say you’re getting divorced? What happened?” If only Vought productions could see this Oscar-worthy performance they’d be making more interesting movies than the cookie cutter action flicks he has to waste his time on.

“Yeah…my…well, my ex now. They cheated on me. I mean they poured all our money down the drain, spent it all in a strip club or on some escort or whatever. Fuck. I don’t even know. I don’t want to know the details.” You look up at him and in that moment Homelander has never seen anything more beautiful. The tears in your eyes, the swollen red rim around them. All because of his doing. This is the start of a new chapter. 

A chapter dedicated to you and him.

He stops himself from smiling widely, he’s meant to be supportive now. Sympathetic. He nods as you continue.

“I’ve been breaking my back just to afford the insane rent and bills and this is what I get back?!” You flip flop between bouts of rage and fresh tears bursting at every other word. 

“Shhh, shh come here.” Homelander pulls you in close to him and back on your feet. He lifts you off enough where you feel the floor underneath your feet but most of your weight is being held up by him. As if he’s saying ‘you don’t have to carry it all on your own’.

“I’ll help you, okay? Anything you need. I’m here for you.” He cooes into your ear, rubbing soothing circles into your back as he hugs you close to him. 

Homelander knows you’re meant for him. But to actually have you in his arms for the first time is different. He wants to bury his face in your neck and inhale as much of your scent as he can. And forever carry that with him.  

But he doesn’t have to wish. Instead you pull away from where you buried your head in his neck, you place your hands on his jaw and you forcibly kiss him. Take the air right out of his lungs. Homelander immediately squeezes his eyes shut, doing his very best to not moan out loud. That’s it! Finally, he’s got you right where he wanted this whole time.

He squeezes you closer, his one hand slides down to your thigh, hoisting your leg up. And like the good, obedient girl you are, you bring your other leg up with him, wrapping yourself tight around his waist.

The taste of you is sweet and salty at the same time, the pure flavor muddled with the tears your ex doesn’t deserve. It doesn’t matter, Homelander kisses you desperately regardless. Hungry for the taste he’s been dreaming of for months. 

“Do you still want me?” You breathe out, less actively sobbing and choking on breaths, now the tears are just freely going down your cheeks.

“Always.” Homelander looks at you in reverence. You’re welcoming him in so freely. He doesn’t even need to push you to it. That’s how he knows you’re perfect for him. Barely just free out of the prison he rescued you from and you’ve already come running to him.

“Make me forget.” You kiss him again and Homelander swallows up everything you have to give. He pins you against the wall, his hands gliding from your thighs to your ass, the leather of his gloves sliding up the sleek fabric of your skirt. Through it he squeezes handfuls of your ass, before pushing the fabric up and out of the way.

“Please…make me feel good.” You sound broken and in need of good fuck that Homelander’s sure you haven’t had in years. Right, he can totally do that for you. He supports your weight easily, pinned between his body and the wall. One hand slides down from your ass, giving himself enough room to slide in between your legs, cupping your pussy. 

“I will. I will. Don’t worry about anything anymore. I’ve got you.” His fingers pinch the sheer tights and with a snap, he rips the fabric, immediately pushing your panties out of the way.

He brings his hand to his mouth, biting the leather of his glove by the fingertips, pulling it off his hand. His bare hand goes back down in between your legs immediately dipping his fingers in your wetness. He feels how excited you are. How for the first time in years your body is finally gonna feel satisfied. You yearn for this. He can almost taste it. 

His lips part and he moans at the feeling of your pussy just inviting him in. So hot and wet just for him. He strokes the back of his fingers up and down your slit, making your legs buzz with excitement. All nerves coming back to life. He sees that in you, the way you light up. Your heart rate elevated, breaths shallow, your muscles twitching. Homelander takes pride in the way he can make your body sing with just a few well-placed touches.

He turns his fingers around, gently, precisely, rubbing circles around your clit. He kisses you. No, he devours you. Parting his lips, he pries yours open, licking the taste of him into your mouth. He grunts into the kiss, moaning with each press of your lips. Each time you shove your tongue into his mouth he shudders, full of want. 

His fingers eagerly move down, pressing two digits steadily into you until he’s knuckles deep, grinding them into your pelvis, shallow strokes in and out. Crooked upwards and thick inside you.

He’s so hard it hurts. Achingly throbbing against the uncomfortable rigidity of his suit and he cannot wait to just fucking bury himself into you.

As if you were reading his mind your hands blindly and clumsily reach for his belt, unclasping it. Eagerly with more dexterity than he expected you to have in a moment like this you undo his pants, pulling them down along with his underwear.

Homelander hisses through his teeth, throwing his head back as your hand touches his aching cock. It’s so overwhelming he barely catches your awe at seeing it. 

“Oh fuck… Can I have you? Please?” You squirm in his hold your hand wrapped around his cock, stroking the head up and down. 

Jesus. You’re begging for him so easily. He could cum just from this. Your hand, warm and soft around him, stroking his sensitive head all while you’re beginning for him to take you? Good god, if he knew you’d be this pliant he would have had your ex killed in an ‘accident’.

“Course you can.” He mutters out, strung out on the pleasure that’s sending sparks up his spine with each twist of your wrist. He takes his fingers out of you, sucking them clean. God you taste good. He definitely needs to come back to that. He shimmies his pants down lower, releasing his cock fully. “Course you fucking can. It’s yours.” Straining he whimpers out, positioning his cock right against your wet cunt, the head spreading you open. “I’m yours.” He almost sounds close to crying. All that effort was so fucking worth it. You are so his. Who else could you want after you’ve had him. He’s so close to euphoria he forgets that you were crying a few minutes ago.

He wraps both arms around the underside of your thighs pinning your knees closer to your body as he sinks deep into you with one push. You’re so fucking wet and warm for him he could cry out of happiness. You want him so bad!

“Fffuck me, that’s tight.” He utters, all broken and whimpering as he buries his head into your neck, inhaling the scent of you like he wanted to earlier while he stills his hips, his pelvic flush against yours.

He’s so overwhelmed with the physicality of it all. Even through all the layers he feels the heat of your body, the thrum of your muscles and the rhythm of your heart. It’s intoxicating. 

He pulls out just to sink himself into you again. And again. And again. The feeling of splitting you open with each slide of his cock gets him so worked up, his own breaths coming out stuttered. 

“Homelander please… just… fuck me. Need it.” You beg him to continue, and as much as he’s enjoying the warm welcome on each wet, loud slide he gets it. You just need him to pound you hard and make you forget. Erase all memories of your shitty ex and the mediocre sex you’ve learned to live with. It’s okay. You’re with him now. And everyone knows there’s nothing mediocre about him.

Homelander kisses the plea out of your lips stepping a little closer so that he’s sat deep, deep inside you. Every thrust of his pelvis is a short snap but you feel it so deep it rattles your spine with every move. The way he’s got you angled is just about rubbing his pubic bone into your clit and he can’t help but grin at the way he’s already feeling you desperately claw at him, trying to hold onto reality.

You moan for him sweetly, your body quivering around him. And he doesn’t relent. It’s frantic, sharp and needy. This is about that quick release. He will have plenty of time to explore your body and make you cum a thousand times over later. Ideally from the privacy of his bed where he can watch you from every angle.

When he feels you clench and pulsate around him he stutters, one of his hands landing on the wall, making a dent in it. More than anything he wants you to cum. He wants to show you how much better he will be to you. The pure euphoria of feeling you cum on his cock pushes him over the edge. He moans a deep guttural sound into your neck, parts of it muffled. As your pussy deliciously squeezes around him in a stuttered rhythm he empties himself into you. His cock gives you one last spurt inside before he slides out, letting you get back on the ground to regain your footing. 

He’s mildly delirious and the next thing he wants to do is take you up to his penthouse and hold you close. He craves the intimacy of the afterglow.

Unlike his fantasy you don’t look to be ready to be swept off your feet and carried to his penthouse for some quality cuddle time. You look almost horrified.

“Oh my god…” Homelander watches with a frown as you push your underwear back into place, your skirt down over your thighs. You try to make a sense of the torn, tattered mess of your tights but you decide it’s better to take them off. He takes the chance to tuck himself back in while you sort your clothing situation and the turmoil in your head.

Before he can even question what has you so upset you continue. “I’m so sorry. That shouldn’t have happened.” What was a warm buzzing feeling that made his whole body vibrate pleasantly just turned to ice. 

What the fuck do you mean it shouldn’t have happened? 

He doesn’t get a say in again as you continue before he recovers from the blow. “I just fucking used you. I’m sorry. That’s—That’s terrible! I’m no better than my ex. I–I—” You visibly panic, your eyes wide as saucers and looking around almost everywhere but him.

But your eyes land there anyway. He almost laughs with relief. This is your problem? How cute.

“Nothing like that happened. Hey, none of that talk. You’re perfect. You’ve done nothing wrong alright?” He took one step closer, his hands immediately cupping your jaw from either side. Only one hand ungloved, using that one to feel the skin of your cheek as he tenderly strokes you. 

“I want to help you in any way I can. How about you move in with me until we sort this out, huh? I don’t want you staying with a person like that. Come on, I want you safe. And Vought’s got some great lawyers that can help you with the divorce.” He deploys his sweet tone, so persuasive, charismatic and charming. He knows what he’s doing and already you’re melting into his hands. Good. He grins at you. “Alright, sweetheart?”

You nod with your big watery sweet eyes and it’s then he knows that he won. Fair and square.

You were his long before you even knew it.

Finally, you recognize it too.

Taglist (you can add yourself to be notified anytime I publish a new Homelander story)

[sanguineterrain]

i'll put us back together at heart - s.h.

Summary: It's 1987. You haven't spoken to Steve Harrington in nearly five years. Then Dustin Henderson tells you about a sweet deal he has at Family Video, where he can rent any movie he wants.

Pairing: ex-best friend!Steve Harrington x fem!reader

Word count: 8.8k

Warnings/tags: friends to strangers to lovers. the reader is twenty in 1987 and i technically made steve twenty-one/about to turn twenty-one. s4 happened but eddie's alive and vecna's dead. no earthquakes or anything like that; reader has no idea about what really happened. lots of angst, mentions of billy hargrove (yuck) and steve's s1 asshole friends.

A/N: oh my lord. i don't know where this eighteen-wheeler of a fic came from but here it is. there is a happy ending, not to worry. i'd never do that to y'all <3 feedback and reblogs are always always appreciated!

divider by firefly-graphics

August 1981

"I wish we could stay eighth graders forever."

You lift your head from your orange pool floaty. Steve drifts on the surface of the water. His hair is longer, way longer than you've seen it in the three years you've been friends. He says it's better for styling that way; he's even bought a gel and cream for his hair. You don't understand why he wants to change something that doesn't need changing. 

"Why?" you ask. "I thought you were excited for high school."

He hums. The sound echoes in his backyard. 

"It's bigger than middle school. More kids, more teachers, more work. I like eighth grade."

"I'll help you with your work," you say. 

Steve turns his head and smiles at you. Part of his face is in the water, the image distorted. 

"You'll do great," he replies. "You're so smart."

Steve doesn't say those things to get you to help him like other kids do. Steve means it. 

"You'll do great too," you say. "You're funny and nice and my best friend. People will like you."

"You think?" 

You nod. Steve turns his head and closes his eyes again. 

"We'll stay friends, right?" he asks. 

The floaty squeaks as you move to sit up. You paddle to Steve so you can look at his face. 

"Why wouldn't we?"

"I dunno." His eyes are still closed. "You might make super smart friends. And I'll just be a dumbass holding you back."

You shove Steve's shoulder lightly. 

"You are not dumb, Steve."

One muggy June night had had Steve admit he wasn't thirteen, like you and all the kids in your class, but fourteen. He had been held back in third grade after his parents moved from Illinois. It's why my brain's mush, he'd said. I was born dumb.

He had made you swear not to tell anyone. 

"You're not dumb," you say again. "Say it, Steve. Say you're not dumb."

His frown deepens, but he still won't look at you. 

"Tommy says I am."

"Tommy Hagan is a shithead," you shoot back with so much venom, Steve's eyes fly open. "It's not true, whatever he tells you."

You hate that they've been hanging out more this summer. You can't tell Steve that, because it's not like you own him. He can be friends with whoever he wants. But you can't help that your skin crawls when Tommy and his stupid girlfriend, Carol, drops by and pulls Steve away from you. 

“Promise?” he asks.

“Yes, Steve. I promise.”

“‘Kay.” Steve smiles a little. “Thanks.” 

You nod and lay back on the floaty. 

“Wanna get ice cream after this?” he asks. 

“Just us?” 

“Just us.”

Now. (January, 1987)

You slam the phone back onto the receiver. A girl playing Pac-Man carefully glances at you. 

Whoops. Right. You're still at work. 

You smile and give a thumbs-up. She turns around. You return to your wallowing. 

You’ve called three different video rentals. Jewel Films, which is about to go out of business; More Movies, whose attendant hung up on you before you could say Molly Ringwald; and finally, Blockbuster, which is thirty minutes outside of Hawkins. None of them have a copy of Pretty in Pink. 

And okay. You could just watch another movie. You don't need that specific one. But this year has been shit. You'd thought after starting college, you'd finally break out of the Hawkins forcefield that had limited your social life. You'd thought you'd make friends and not be so terribly lonely. Life is supposed to get better after high school, isn’t it? 

Obviously, whoever said that is a big, fat liar. 

“Dude!” you hear a familiar voice exclaim. “Stop hogging the game!”

Tawny curls peek from under a green and yellow hat. The hat hovers over an older boy who’s glued to the Tempest booth. You go to them. Dustin Henderson lights up when he sees you. You can read his hat now; it says Camp Know Where ‘85.

“Hey, Y/N!” he greets brightly. “This guy has been here for a half hour. I left to get nachos and when I came back, he was still here.”

“I’m this close to beating my score!” the kid insists.

“Come on, guy," you say, one arm on the machine. "You gotta give other people a turn."

The kid, evidently demon incarnate, sneers at you.

“Who’s gonna make me? You?” 

You lean against the side of the game, considering.

“How old are you?”

“Sixteen,” he says.

You snort. 

“Sixteen? And you’re still on Tempest?”

He glances at you. 

“So?”

“Everybody your age is playing Rampage, that’s all.” 

You wink at Dustin. He beams.

“And, uh, I saw a couple girls hanging around Rampage,” you add. 

The kid turns to you. You tilt your head innocently. 

“Seriously?” he asks.

“Seriously. People always flock to the new games.”

Which is true. The girls part is not, but he doesn’t need to know that. With that attitude, he won't be getting many phone numbers anyway. 

You drum your fingers on the game like you have all the time in the world. And sure enough, the kid takes his quarters and heads towards Rampage. Dustin jumps in delight. 

“You’re awesome, Y/N!" 

You grin. “I try. Where are the others?”

Dustin sours.

“They ditched me. To hang out with their girlfriends! Can you believe that shit?” 

“No way!"

He shakes his head.

“I know, right? My friend told me that that’s what happens in high school. People change, y’know? And he’d know, I guess. He’s old like you.”

You scoff. “You make me sound like some kind of ancient. I’m not that old, Henderson.”

“It’s okay, Y/N.” He pats your arm. “In many cultures, the elderly are wise. Now in my experience, this hasn’t been the case. But I think you’re wise.”

“Gee, thanks.”

Dustin smiles like the little shit he is and puts his change in the slot. 

“Well, contrary to what this other friend says, I’m sure it’ll pass,” you say. “You guys will hang out again." 

You swallow your acidic truth. Dustin's a good kid, and so are his friends. You don't want him to turn cynical like you have. He's too young. 

Dustin shrugs, starting the game.

“I guess so. I got a copy of The Lost Boys for us to watch on Friday. They said they’ll be there.”

“Whoa, seriously? That one just came out, how’d you get a copy?”

“My friend,” he says. “The one I mentioned. He works at Family Video and reserves stuff for me.”

“Huh. I thought Family Video was closed."

You'd applied to work there last year and never got a call back. You'd gone by once and it had looked abandoned. Hence why you now work at the arcade across town. 

"It almost did, but Keith took over so now it's barely scraping by."

"Ah. Sweet deal on the movies."

“Yeah,” Dustin agrees, eyes crinkling. “My friend's pretty cool. You'd like him."

"Would I now?"

"Absolutely," he gushes. "He's a total badass too. He won his first fight last year. He used to be a jock but he's recovered." 

"Wow. Impressive."

"Mmhm. I could ask him to hold stuff for you too, if you wanted.”

“You would?”

The game makes a sad game over noise. Dustin sighs and takes a gulp of his slushie.

“Yeah, totally,” he says through a mouthful of blue raspberry ice. “Which one do you want?”

“Pretty in Pink? I missed it in theaters."

“Sure. I’ll tell him to hold it tonight and tomorrow you can pick it up.”

“Cool. Thanks, Dustin.”

Dustin gives you an apple-cheeked grin.

“Gotta stay in good graces with the arcade attendant who lets me play Tempest as long as I want.”

"I don't know what you're talking about," you say, walking away. "Don't get slushie on the game."

"'Kay!"

Dustin only gets a little bit of slushie on the game, but he cleans it up with about a million of the cheap snack bar napkins. When he leaves, he tells you to mention his name at Family. 

"Who do I ask for?" 

"You can talk to either of them," Dustin says. "Doesn't matter. Except Keith. You know Keith, right?"

"Unfortunately.” Keith used to terrorize the arcade before he blessedly moved on. “He works there?"

"Barely." Dustin scoffs. "He's almost never there, so don't worry. And feel free to ask for more movies. They owe me one."

Your sole interactions are with professors and a gaggle of high school freshmen. But now you get to watch any movie you want. Maybe this year won't totally suck. 

The bell rings pleasantly as you step inside. There's a few people on line, so you take your time walking in. There's a movie display with about thirty copies of RoboCop. A cardboard cutout of RoboCop stares back behind his red helmet.

"Can I help who's next?"

You go to the counter. A girl about your age with a choppy haircut smiles at you but it's sort of strained. She has a pin on her green work vest that says Ask me!

"Please don't ask for Adventures in Babysitting," she says. 

"Oh. No, I'm, uh, Dustin's friend?" 

You can't believe you're name-dropping a high schooler. 

She nods in realization. 

"Oh, yeah. God, I keep telling that dweeb not to promise holds."

You wince. 

"Sorry. If it's going to get you in trouble…"

Her brows raise. She smiles a bit. 

"No, it's okay. Usually my coworker deals with it but, well. He's taking an extra long break today. So, what movie was it?"

"Pretty in Pink," you say. 

"Classic," she replies. "John Hughes fan?"

"Somewhat. I didn't get to see it in theaters. I like Molly Ringwald."

She grins.

"Me too. She's pretty."

"Super pretty," you agree. 

The girl considers you, then sticks out her hand. 

"I'm Robin," she says. "Nice to meet you."

You take her hand. "Y/N.”

"Did you go to Hawkins High?"

"I did. Graduated last year."

"Oh, cool. Are you in college?"

You nod. 

"Hawkins State. Twenty minutes from here."

"Sweet! I'm taking a gap year, but afterwards, I’m gonna apply there. It's cheap. College is college, right?"

"College is college," you agree. "But I wish I'd gone away for school."

You don't know why you're telling her this. You've known Robin for all of two minutes. But she seems friendly. And her sense of style is cool. She wears a blue blazer and tie underneath her vest. 

"How come?" she asks. 

"Everybody from Hawkins is there," you say. "And I… I just want a new start."

Robin smiles sympathetically. 

"They're jerks," she says. 

You huff. "Yeah."

You'd turned yourself into a social recluse a million years ago. It's your own damn fault you can't befriend anybody in this town. At least, not anymore. 

Robin types into the computer, then smacks the monitor. She groans. 

"Ugh. Gimme a second," she says. "Stupid technology."

"No problem," you say, smiling. You like her. Maybe you can integrate Family Video into your regular routine, become friends. You can see Robin becoming a good friend. One you wouldn't grow apart from. 

She disappears into the back room. You browse the old releases and stop at Die Hard. This one you saw in theaters. John McClane is a badass. 

You think of Dustin, and his supposedly badass new friend. It's too bad you didn't meet today. Dustin has a good sense about people. If he says so, it's possible you and this friend really would get on. 

The bell rings again. You're slow to look up. The entrance is empty when you do. You keep reading about John McClane's adventures. 

"Have you been waiting long?"

You turn at the new voice. The video slips out of your hand and clatters onto the counter. 

Steve’s hair has grown since you last saw it. He looks different too, though he has yet to break out of his signature church boy polos. There's a smattering of stubble on his jaw. His arms are lean with muscle. He wears a matching work vest like Robin's, name tag printed Steve in blocky font. 

He looks at where you've dropped Die Hard and smiles. 

"This is a good one," he says. "John McClane is a total badass."

You blink.

"Did you want to rent that one?" he continues, meeting your eye. 

"No," you manage. 

"Okay, no problem. Just browsing?" 

He doesn't remember you. 

You stare and stare. Steve leans in, concerned. He's changed, but he hasn't. He's still handsome with his swoopy hair and big, dark eyes, but the Steve you knew wouldn't have been caught dead working at a video store.

And he doesn't remember you. 

"Are you okay?" he asks, sounding genuine.

You take a step back from the counter. The blood roars in your ears. Robin comes back in, Pretty in Pink in hand. She looks at you, then at Steve. 

"Got it!" she tells you. "Computer should work now."

"I have to go," you say. 

You don't look at Steve again, instead focusing on Robin. 

Her brows rise. 

"Oh. Is everything—"

"I forgot my wallet," you blurt. "I can't pay for the movie. Sorry."

"That's okay, we can just—"

You run. The bell chimes over her words. You keep running until you get to the bus stop, three blocks away. 

Only there do you stop to catch your breath. 

And then you cry. 

February 1982

"What do you think about Marie?" 

You look up from your textbook. Steve is doodling in the margins of his notes. You gently prod his arm. He returns to reading but his leg starts to bounce under the table. 

"Marie Iverson?" you ask.

"Yeah." 

Steve glances at you. He pushes his hair back. It had taken him freshman year to get his bearings with all the gels and creams, but now, his hair is a point of pride, always perfectly coiffed. Seniors call him "The Hair" and high-five him in the hallway. You hate it. 

"I don't know. I don't know her that well."

"She's cute." 

"I guess so," you say. 

It's harder to get Steve to focus on homework these days. Last year, he happily made flashcards with you and even bought fancy gel pens to share for your notes. Now, he prefers to talk about girls or—

"I was thinking of asking her out."

The tip of your pencil breaks. You really ought to start using pens, but you don't like being unable to erase. 

"Shit, here. Take mine." 

Steve offers his still perfectly sharpened pencil. You stare at it. 

"Y/N?" 

"Yeah." You take the pencil. "Thanks."

"Sure. So what do you think?" 

"I don't know, Steve. I thought you talked about this stuff with Tommy."

"I would, it's just…" Steve shifts uncomfortably. "He can be rude about it sometimes. He doesn't even get why we're friends, y'know? Doesn't understand why I don't just date you."

Tommy is a moron, but you've said that since last year, and Steve's never listened before. 

"Some people don't get it," you say mildly, because you have an upcoming French test and there's no use in getting upset over Tommy Hagan right now. 

"But you do. And you know about this stuff better than me. Girls and all."

"Just because I'm a girl doesn't mean I know what girls are best for you to date, Steve. It's weird to talk about."

Steve deflates. 

"Oh. Yeah, I guess so. Sorry."

You sigh and rub your temple. 

"I thought you knew all about that," you say, extending an olive branch. "Asking girls out and stuff."

"Well, I mean, I've kissed girls but I've never… you're, like, the only girl I really know."

Something like pride swells in your chest. Selfishly, you want to keep Steve. You don't want to help him if it means losing him. Oh, you're so greedy, aren't you? You watch Steve run off with Tommy and Carol and nameless seniors and seethe, because Steve was yours first. Steve is yours.

"Y/N?"

"Yeah." You give him back his pencil and fish for another one in your bag. "Did you ever think about writing how you feel?" 

"Writing?"

"Yeah, like a poem or a letter."

"I'm terrible at writing," Steve laments. "The letters get all jumbled and I never spell a damn thing right."

He'd told his mom once how letters melt into each other, how b's become d's. She'd taken him to get his eyes checked, and when the doctor said Steve was fine, Deborah Harrington had told her son to stop begging for attention. 

"Someone who really likes you won't care about spelling mistakes, Steve," you tell him. "As long as you write from the heart. Don't do that cheesy shit and quote Romeo and Juliet. They're young, impulsive, and they die at the end, and that's not romantic."

Steve laughs, nose scrunched. 

"What!" you demand. "What's so funny?"

"Nothing, 's just—of course you'd have something to say about quoting Shakespeare."

"It's overdone," you say, crinkling your nose. "And girls would much rather read your own words." 

"So you think I should write Marie a letter?"

"If you really like her," you say. "Only write letters for girls you really like. Otherwise they lose their meaning."

Steve frowns. "I don't know if I should write her a letter, then."

Don't, you want to say. Don't write any of them letters.

You shuffle your papers into a stack. 

"Can we study now?" you ask.

"Oh, sure, yes. Sorry."

"You don't have to keep apologizing, Steve."

He shifts closer to you. His leg has stopped bouncing.

"Lemme take you out," he says. 

You nearly swallow your tongue. 

"Wh–what?"

"For ice cream," Steve clarifies. "Like we used to. Dairy Queen."

"Oh. Okay, sure. But after we study."

Steve beams. "I'll drive you."

Steve's dad had bought him the BMW as a birthday present this year—not that Richard Harrington actually knows when his own son's birthday is, considering the gift was three months early. Still, it's another point of pride for Steve and about all anybody talks about whenever his name comes up. Steve is the only person in your grade with a car. Junior girls hit him up for rides. You make yourself scarce when they do. 

You don't care. You liked Steve before the car. And the clothes. And the hair. 

Your throat feels tight. You want your best friend back. 

"Just us?" you check. 

You can't tell these days. Steve seems to hang out with everybody but you. You're shocked he'd even asked to study together. 

"Oh, sure," Steve says. "I just have to drop off Tommy and Carol first, okay?" 

You check your watch and close your book. 

"I have class," you lie. "I'll see you later." 

Steve catches your wrist. He looks at you and you're struck by how sweet his face is. It's not like you didn't understand why girls want him but it's Steve. Your Steve, who still sleeps with a nightlight and who framed a picture of a sports car he cut out from a magazine because he'd thought it would make him cooler (it didn't. You still tease him about it.) 

"Please," he says. "For helping me."

Your eyes slit. "I didn't help you to get stuff, Steve. I helped you because you're my friend."

Steve blinks like he's forgotten what it's like to be friends with someone just for the sake of being friends. 

"You're right," he agrees. "You're not like that. I'll tell Tommy and Carol to find another ride. It'll be just us. I promise."

You perk up at that. "Really?"

"Really. You can sit in the front with me and we'll play Bruce Springsteen, like we used to. Please?" 

"Okay, Steve." You ache. You’ve never been very good at telling him no. "I'll meet you in the parking lot."

And maybe… maybe your best friend is still in there after all.

Now

You ask your shift manager if you can work at the snack bar today. It's in the back and you won't have to deal with any game hogs. 

"You didn't put enough syrup in my slushie."

You might have overshot the perks, though. 

Slushie Girl's hair is bleach blonde and hairsprayed to God. You want to tell her that all that hairspray doesn't keep friends. Or brain synapses. 

"I don't make the slushie," you say for the third time. "That's how it comes out of the machine."

She shoots you a mean look. 

"I'm complaining to the manager."

You paste on a smile. 

"You do that. Have a nice day."

She finally walks away, probably on the hunt for your manager, who's definitely smoking a joint outside to avoid this exact situation. 

Dustin comes around the corner and this time, he's with the rest of his party. You smile. 

"Hey, Y/N!" Dustin greets.

Lucas waves at you. Max and Mike are arguing and therefore are in their own world. And there's their newest addition, El, whose story you're still not clear on, as well as Will, quiet as always. 

You lean your elbows on the countertop. 

"What'll it be, gang?"

"Six nachos and six slushies, please. One blue raspberry, three cherry, and two Coke."

You fill up the slushies first. Dustin dances on his toes. 

"So did you pick up the movie?" he asks.

"Oh." You try to smile. "I went there but I couldn't. I forgot my money. Pretty dumb of me."

Dustin accepts this with no argument. 

"Well, you can go back. They'll hold it for a few days."

You're never setting foot in there again, but you don't tell Dustin that. 

He takes his slushie and immediately starts drinking. 

"Slow down, dude. You'll get a brain freeze," you say. 

"You sound like Steve," Dustin informs you. "Doesn't Y/N sound like Steve?" 

Lucas nods. 

"Yup. They're both parents."

You feel queasy. You focus on making the nachos, the cheese pouring out thick and gooey. 

"Did you meet Steve?" Dustin asks. "You probably know him from high school, but he's different now."

"Yes," you say quietly. "I knew him."

"I promise he's different. Even Mike likes him, and Mike hated his guts. Right, Mike?"

Mike pauses in his animated discussion with Max and looks at you. 

"What?"

"I'm telling Y/N about how Steve is cool now," Dustin explains. 

"Oh." Mike shrugs. "He's fine. Much better now that he's not dating my sister."

"He's not?" you ask. "But they were in love. I–I mean, that's what I heard, at least."

"She dumped his ass," El says, and it sounds a little ridiculous in her soft monotone. 

Max scoffs, taking her Coke slushie. 

"Did you live under a rock? It was a huge thing."

"Now Steve is lame," Mike says with a snort. 

"Getting dumped doesn't make somebody lame," you say with an old ferocity you'd thought had disappeared. 

"Okay, jeez." Mike holds up his hands. "Steve's alright. He's different, that's for sure."

"He's our paladin," Lucas says. "A protector." 

Dustin nods eagerly.

You blink. "He protects you guys?"

Max elbows Lucas. You have no idea what that's about. El steps forward and smiles softly. 

"Yes," she says. "He's our babysitter."

"Aren't you guys freshmen? I thought you were too old for babysitters."

"Oh no, Steve doesn't get paid for it or anything," says Mike. "He just does it 'cause he has nothing else to do."

"That's not true!" Dustin argues. Then he shrugs. "Well, it's a little true. But he does like us. He's a good guy. He cares about his friends."

You bite your tongue, not wanting to reply to that. 

"That's great, guys. The girl, Robin? She seems pretty cool too."

"That's Steve's best friend," says Dustin. "She's great."

"Oh." You wince. "Best friend?" 

Dustin huffs. “Yeah. They don’t date. He won’t say why."

"Platonic with a capital P," Max confirms. “It’s obviously because he’s in love with somebody else.”

“Not Nancy!” Lucas protests.

“There are other girls besides Nancy, Sinclair.”

You busy yourself with serving the last set of nachos. The kids pull out crumpled bills and coins in return. You count the money and stack it directly into the register; you know there won't be any change. 

When you turn, they're still there. Dustin has his signature grin on, eyes squinty. 

"Yeees," you drag out. "Can I help you?"

"We need a favor," Lucas says. "Please."

"Hmm." You lean over the counter. "What's up?"

"They're showing Prince of Darkness on Friday," Dustin explains. "But it's rated R."

"So just sneak in. Isn't that what you guys did at Starcourt?" you ask.

"We had an inside man then. They're a lot stricter at the new one," Lucas frowns. "They ask for IDs 'cause some mom complained after her kid snuck in to watch Risky Business." 

"And why can't your babysitter take you?"

You sneer at the thought. Steve spending his Friday nights herding a bunch of adolescent teens into a movie theater. There's a reason you consider Dustin affectionately delusional. 

"He has a stupid date," Dustin groans. "He's a serial dater, Y/N. It's terrible. He gets lucky once and totally ditches us."

Now that sounds like the Steve you knew. 

"I see. I don't really like horror stuff."

"You don't have to stay!" Dustin insists. "You can watch whatever you want after we’re in. I'll pay you back for the ticket."

“This would be so much easier if Steve still worked at Scoops,” Mike grumbles.

You blank for a moment, the image of Steve in a sailor’s hat and those ridiculous shorts whiting your brain.

“Um,” you begin. “You know I don’t have a fancy BMW to cart you guys around in, right?”

“It’s cool. We’ll get there,” Max says.

“So?” Dustin bounces on his toes. “Sooo?”

You sigh. It’d been nice of Dustin to get you the movie, even though you’d chickened out and ran. And it’s not like you have anything better to do.

“Okay,” you say. “I’ll get you guys in.”

Dustin pumps his fist. “Thanks, Y/N! You’re my favorite old person.”

You roll your eyes. “Funny. Any funnier, and I might rescind my help, Henderson.”

“Byeeee!”

They all disperse to the arcade. You wonder how on earth Steve got involved with them.

March 1983

“Okay, but if you had to choose.”

“Pass. I would literally rather swallow pennies than kiss Principal Coleman’s bald-ass head, Steve.”

Steve takes a triumphant swig of beer. “So you’re saying you’ve got the hots for Benny the janitor.”

“No!” you insist through giggles. “I don’t. God, you’re gross. Can’t believe I’m being treated like this on your birthday.”

“Exactly! My birthday.”

He rolls onto his side in his deck chair and nearly faceplants on the cement. You reach out, reaction time delayed.

“Steve!” you yell. “Careful.”

“I am, I am,” he mumbles, and rights himself on the chair. “Jus’ wanna see you better.”

“I keep telling you you need glasses.”

“I do not,” he whines. “My vision’s ten outta ten. Could a guy who needs glasses do this?”

He crumples up a Twinkies wrapper and throws it towards the garbage. The wind picks up and sends the wrapped into the pool. 

“Shit,” he says.

You belly laugh in delight.

“Wait, wait, redo. Go fish it outta there.”

“Oh, as if. I’m not going in there. I told you you need glasses. Even Mother Nature agrees.”

"She does not. Mother Nature thinks I'm a doll."

You hum and close your eyes. Alcohol always makes you sleepy. 

The chair scrapes against the concrete. You hear a crinkle of a chip bag. Those are your only warning before you’re crushed by two hundred pounds of drunk boy. 

“Steve!” You wheeze, squirming as his hair tickles your face. “Get off!”

"’M sleepy,” he mumbles.

“Well, don't sleep on me, weirdo.”

“‘S cold.”

“You run, like, a hundred degrees, don’t lie.”

He lifts his head. “So you’re saying I’m hot?”

“I’m saying all that booze cooked your brain,” you reply sweetly.

“I’ve been wounded,” he moans and plops onto your shoulder.

“Ugh.” You resign to your fate and lean back. Steve’s not actually that heavy; even drunk, he has a lot of control over his weight and he’s situated himself so he isn’t crushing anything important. No, you squirm underneath him for a very different reason. 

“Steeeeve,” you whine. “You’re gonna squish me into a pancake.”

“Can’t believe no one else came.”

You still. Steve’s face remains buried in your shoulder. His body is beside yours, and he has an arm slung over your belly.

“I didn’t—didn’t want a party,” he continues. “I always throw parties. I thought I’d do somethin’ different. An’ none of them even wished me a happy birthday. ‘Cept you.”

You rest your hand on the back of his hair. It’s wind-blown and messy from the drinks, free of his heady hair gel. You’ve never loved it more.

“Did you tell them your birthday is today?” you ask gently, even though you know he did.

“Yeah,” he says. “Told all of ‘em. Guess they weren’t listening.”

“I listen.”

Steve looks up at you. His eyes are glassy.

“God, I miss you,” he says.

You feel the wall you’ve built this year crumble, just a little. 

“I’m right here, Steve.”

“I know but—been a jerk lately. I know I have. You’re my best friend, okay? Nothing’ll change that. I–I love you so much.”

Your breath hitches. Steve barrels on, not noticing.

“And I’ll be better. We’ll hang out more. Not–not here, drunk. But for real. We’ll go to the movies. Y’wanna see a movie?”

“Yeah,” you whisper. “I wanna see a movie.”

“‘Kay, what movie? Anything you want. We’ll get popcorn and Raisinets.”

“You hate Raisinets,” you choke through a watery laugh.

“I’d eat Raisinets anytime with you.”

You lay there, in the dark, the only sound being the pool filter.

“Let’s watch the new James Bond.”

“Hmm, okay. But you’ll have to say the name eventually.”

Your nose crinkles. “I am not calling it by its name.”

His laugh is warm in your neck. 

You don’t tell Steve to get up again. He snuggles into you, leg over yours. You fall asleep like that, curled underneath him.

Now

“Wait.” Max stops. “Shouldn’t we have, like, a game plan?”

“Game plan?” El asks quietly.

“Yeah. Some of us aren’t so great at playing it cool.”

She stares at Lucas.

“I play it cool!” he squawks. “I am so cool!”

“Right.”

“Just let Y/N do the talking,” Will says. “She’s technically the adult so she should act like this is a conscious choice.”

You shrug. “Makes sense to me.”

Dustin beams. “This is gonna be great!”

“Or a total disaster,” Max says.

You go to the counter, the kids trailing behind like ducklings.

“Six tickets for Prince of Darkness, please,” you say. “And uh, one for Dirty Dancing.”

The attendant looks at you, then at the kids.

“Don’t you mean seven tickets for Prince of Darkness?” she asks. “It’s rated R.”

Shit. “Right, yes. Sorry. Seven tickets. And one for Dirty Dancing. We have another friend who’s late.”

“Uh-huh.” 

The attendant, whose bored expression you’ve recognized on your own face after long days in the arcade, hands you your tickets without any questioning. 

“I think we’re in the clear,” Lucas whispers when you enter the concession area. 

You wait for them to buy their snacks. Max persuades Lucas to let her mix M&Ms into their bucket of popcorn. He agrees and shuffles closer so they’re pressed shoulder to shoulder while they share. 

“Okay, last stretch,” Mike says, shoveling a frighteningly large handful of sour worms into his mouth. “We just have to get past the ticket guy.”

Said ticket guy is a kid who can’t be much older than you. You think you might’ve gone to school together, but you’ve made it a point to eviscerate everything about high school from your mind.

“Hey,” you say, trying to act cool. Maybe you’re the one Max should’ve been worried about, instead of Lucas. “Uh, here are our tickets.”

He takes the tickets, then looks behind you.

“Prince of Darkness is only for people seventeen and older,” he says.

“I’m an adult, so I’m with them,” you explain. “I’m, like, their guardian?”

“Yeah, uh—” He hands you your tickets. “No can do. There needs to be an adult for each person under seventeen.”

“Come on,” you cajole. “They’re high schoolers. It’s not like they’re gonna be scarred for life watching some zombies, or whatever.”

He shrugs. “Rules are rules.”

“She’s an adult!” Dustin argues.

“Look, if you’re gonna hold up the line, I’m gonna have to—”

“Yo, Gillespie! That you?”

Dustin turns and lights up. The seven of you part for Steve Harrington and his date, a pretty strawberry blonde you think you had biology with.

“Harrington, man, what’s up!” 

Ticket Prick gets up to slam Steve into a bear hug. You barely resist an eye roll.

“Shit, I haven’t seen you in a year! Where’ve you been all this time? Hey, did you hear about that shit with Munson?”

Steve flinches. It’s a tiny movement, indiscernible to the trained eye. But it’s there all the same.

“Gillespie, c’mon. Don’t bring the party down with that,” Steve says, all sweet charm. 

“Sorry, sorry. Daisy,” he greets the girl attached to Steve’s arm.

“Gil,” she replies with a giggle. “You smell like popcorn butter.”

America’s future taxpayers. Terrifying. 

“Are you gonna let us in or not?” Max interrupts, arms folded. 

You feel a burst of pride.

Gil shoots her a dirty glare and puffs up, ready to fight a fourteen year old. Steve cuts in smoothly.

“Gillespie, listen. I know her.” He points to you. You bristle. “I can personally vouch that she’s just trying to do right by these kids. They wanted to see Prince of Darkness, y’know? Get away from the parents.”

“It’s a sick film,” Gil agrees. “You seen it?”

No, of course Steve hadn’t seen it. He hates horror. 

“Planning on it,” Steve says, the ultimate image of playing it cool. “Look, you remember sneaking into the movies. Fast Times? Ring any bells?”

Max rolls her eyes. You’re inclined to do the same.

Gil laughs dopily, and nudges Steve. “Hell yeah, I do. That was a crazy night, Harrington.”

Steve smiles thinly. “Sure was. So whaddya say? For old times’ sake?”

Gil considers your little troupe. Then he shrugs.

“Why not. Manager’s not here anyway.”

He takes the tickets and tears them to stubs, then gives them back.

“Theater six. On your left. Enjoy.”

The kids stampede into the left theater wing. You hang back with your own ticket. 

“Appreciate it, man,” Steve says, all smiles. “Take care, alright?”

“Hey, you too, Harrington! We gotta catch up!”

Steve and Daisy go in. You expect them to walk right past you, and Daisy does, predictably. But Steve stops.

“I’ll catch up, okay?” he tells her. “Find us some good seats?”

She paws at him a little, then goes, sodas in hand. You stiffen as Steve walks and stops three feet away from you. 

“Hey,” he says. “Sorry about that. Gil’s an asshole.”

“I know. He yawned during my poetry reading sophomore year. And then you guys went to the movies together.”

Steve shrinks. “Your poems were great.”

You’re suddenly exhausted.

“What do you want, Steve?”

“I just… I wanted to see you. Say hi.”

“Okay.” You cross your arms. “Hi.”

“You forgot your movie,” he says. “The other day.”

“I didn’t want it that much.”

“Dustin said you looked everywhere for it.”

“Well, in the end, it didn’t really matter,” you say. “Not enough to stay.”

“Y/N—”

“I think your date’s waiting for you,” you interrupt. “Better get back to her. Wouldn’t want to taint your reputation.”

Steve makes a noise like he’s been wounded. You turn on your heel before you can think better of it. 

“Wait.” He catches your wrist. Steve’s grip is light, like you’re something precious to hold. You wrench your arm away. “Y/N, I want to apologize. I’m sorry.”

“For what?” you ask. “For forgetting me? I didn’t expect you to remember, Steve.”

“I didn’t forget you,” he insists. “I could never forget you. I wasn’t—please, can I just explain?”

“I don’t need your explanations,” you snap. The hurt corrodes your tongue like acid. “I know what happened. We were both there. You left.”

Steve’s eyes are huge and dark. He looks like you just stabbed him in the heart, and that makes you feel worse. You’d thought telling him how much it hurts would put you back together, but all it did was break you more.

So you run. Again. 

You slam through a back exit and rip your ticket into a million pieces. The wind is cold and unforgiving. Your eyes sting. 

You call out sick for two days in a row. You kind of expect to get fired, but then again, people have been leaving Hawkins and if you’re not here to serve the masses their slushies, who will be?

So, after lying in bed not thinking about movies and strawberry blonde girls and how sick you are of this town, you get up and put on your arcade vest.

Now it is two in the afternoon. You’d heard it was supposed to snow today.

Robin eyes the snack counter like it holds the next plague outbreak. You don't blame her; you make it a point to wash up to your elbows after work.

"Slushie?"

She looks at you like she’d forgotten you were there. "What?"

You point a thumb at the machine. "Are you here for a slushie?"

"Oh. No, sorry. Red dye makes me insane in the brain. Steve actually—"

Robin stops, grimaces. So he's told her. Probably everything, if the kids had been telling the truth. 

You're honestly surprised she's here. Unless it’s to, like, swirlie you in the vat of artificial cheese. 

"Are you here to drown me in nacho cheese?" you ask.

Robin's eyes go wide as dinner plates. "What? No!"

"Just checking." You lean against the counter. "What can I do for you, Robin?" 

Robin suddenly looks like she's never interacted with a human being before. You like her a lot. Steve probably does too. 

"I came to drop off your movie." She holds the tape over the counter like it's a pool of lava. 

"But I didn't pay for it." You shove your hand in your jean pocket; you only have a couple dollars on you. "I guess I can get you the money tom—"

"It's on the house. For a fellow Molly fan."

Robin wiggles the tape with two fingers. You take it and wait for a catch. There is none. 

"Thank you," you say. "You didn't have to do that."

"Actually, it wasn't me," she confesses. "I'm just the mailman."

You prepare to hand it back but Robin shakes her head. 

"He's not going to pop out of the slushie machine, okay? He's just trying to make it up to you."

"He doesn't need to make it up to me," you bite, except those aren’t the words you mean. "Why does he even care? We're not in high school anymore."

Robin smiles a sad smile. 

"I know," she says. "We’re not. I know he should've known to fix things earlier. He's received a lot of blows to the head, though, so he's still catching up."

The thought turns your stomach. More? More you weren’t there to protect him from?

"He doesn't owe me anything," you say and wave the tape again. "You can take it back and leave it for somebody else."

"Y/N, I know we don't know each other, like, at all. But it's important to me you know that Steve cares about you, because you’re important to him. And you knew him way before I did, and you probably know a lot of stuff I don't, and that's good because he has a friend like me, but he should also have a friend like you too, Y/N."

"I don't want to be his friend," you mumble. 

"Yeah," Robin says. "I figured. But I don't think that's a confession he should hear secondhand."

You look at her, stunned. She's such a clever girl. You hope she treats Steve well.

"If you two are—"

"We're not," she says, like this is a regular explanation she goes through. "Steve and I are friends. Steve has crashed and burned with every single date since his fall from regency. Steve is the best person I've ever met." 

"Yeah, I’ve heard. You and Dustin are his biggest fans."

Robin snorts. "Trust me, I'm not proud of it."

You shake your head. Your eyes feel hot. 

"This town is so shit," you say. 

"Yeah," Robin agrees. "It really fucking is. But I'm not asking you to give this town a second chance. Just him."

"Why are you trying so much?" you ask. "You don't even know me."

Robin shrugs. "No, but you're the one person Steve used to be friends with who's not an asshole, and I think us non-assholes need to band together."

"I can sometimes be an asshole."

"Me too. So are those little dweebs. How about calling ourselves the Semi-Assholes Club?" 

You laugh. "We'll get jackets."

"With partially drawn butts on the backs," Robin says with a giggle. 

You look at the tape in your hand. 

"Does Steve like John Hughes?" 

"He does. He's a total sap for those. He thinks he's in his own coming-of-age movie because he's delusional."

He sounds perfect. He sounds like the friend you loved. 

"I did want to watch this one," you say. 

"It won't hurt you to," Robin promises. 

You suppose not.

December 1984

You don't believe the whispers. All week, the rumor mill spins tales of Billy Hargrove finally pushing the King off his throne. There's no way he'll show his face, a girl at the adjacent lunch table astutes. I sure as fuck wouldn't.

Steve Harrington is a loser. Steve Harrington got dumped for Jonathan Byers. Steve Harrington may as well be dead, and on and on. 

Every line gets you angrier. A boy who sits behind you in chemistry taps his pencil like he always does. Tap, tap, tap. 

Halfway through class, you snap at him to quit it. He does, but not without a tinge of embarrassment. You’re so angry this year. Angry at your loneliness, angry at the unfairness of said loneliness. You might’ve done this to yourself, and that fact only gets you angrier.

You see Nancy Wheeler in the hallways with Jonathan Byers, and the confirmation of that rumor should make you happy. It doesn't. 

A week later, most of the excitement has died down. Everybody’s moved onto the next big thing, which is to deduce who fucked in Vice Principal White's office. One look at V.P. White, and it had been decided that it can't have been White himself. 

You can't care less. Once upon a time you might’ve laughed about it with a friend, but you don't have any more of those, and high school is bullshit with or without them. So.

Steve walks in twenty five minutes into the period. Mrs. Kaplan gives him a downright beastly glare and demands to know where he had been. 

"I'm sorry," is all he says. "If you give me detention, I understand."

There are a few snickers that rub at an old hurt, one that had flared up whenever somebody dared to make fun of your best friend. It doesn't bother me, he'd said, and you'd known it was a lie. 

It bothers me, you’d replied, and Steve had hugged you tight.

Mrs. Kaplan seems more stunned Steve hadn't swaggered past her like a peacock escaped from the zoo and lets him go sit down without a fight. He takes the only empty desk, two rows across from you. You stare. You can't not. 

Half of his face looks like it was mashed in a garbage disposal. It's purple and a sickly yellow. His eye and lip are still swollen. You stare and stare. You feel queasy. 

Billy had done that. You're so angry. You think you might never get past this grief, this loss of a once permanent fixture in your life. 

No one wished Steve a happy birthday this year, you realize out of nowhere.

You stare and stare and stare until Steve looks right back. You're blindsided by thick guilt, like blinking through a milkshake. And then the familiar curl of anger returns because why the fuck should you feel guilty? You aren't the one who fucked everything up, who mascerated this good thing. Steve did this to himself. Steve deserves to walk the halls alone. It's Steve's fault. 

But when you look at him, at his raw wounds, at his bruised knuckles, you know that he already believes he deserves every punch Billy Hargrove gave him. 

You hate Steve Harrington. But you really wish you'd been there to drive him to the hospital. 

Now (And Forever)

The tape sits buried in your drawer for three days. You don’t know what Family Video’s return policy is, but you hope you’re not racking up late fees. You doubt name dropping Dustin will work again.

It’s Saturday when you decide to watch Pretty in Pink. You remove the video from its sleeve. An envelope falls out.

The front has your name printed in squished, loopy script. You remember January at Steve’s house, a stack of thank-you cards courtesy of his mother awaiting the Harringtons’ sign-off. Steve’s hand would cramp and you’d take over while he made grilled cheese for the both of you. Love, The Harringtons, and there was no love in that house, but you think maybe Steve loved enough to make up for it. 

Hi, the letter begins. I hope you’re good. Robin told me you’re going to Hawkins State.

That’s fucking amazing. I’m so proud of you. Are you still writing poetry? I liked that one you wrote about the birds who shared a branch and kept each other warm. I still have it in my notebook in my room.

I’m sorry for the other night. I’m sorry for every night since freshman year, honestly. I’m kind of a dumbass, but you know that, so it doesn’t really excuse anything. I think I’ve actually lost brain cells since we drifted apart.

You crumple the corner, suddenly hot with anger. Who keeps telling him he’s dumb? You want names.

I didn’t forget you, you know. I got scared and I thought maybe I could ease into it, but then you recognized me and… well. I don’t blame you for running.

Anyway. I’m talking too much about myself, when there’s nothing to say. I’m really sorry about what I did, or, actually, what I didn’t do. Somebody told me I was living on autopilot, and that it wasn’t really living at all. I think it was you. 

I’m not living on autopilot anymore. I woke up. And I realized that you’re the best fucking thing that’s ever happened to me. I love Robin and the kids and this little family that has apparently invayd invaded your life too. Sorry about that. They never leave and they eat all your food. Good luck. 

But I miss you. I always have.

Shit happened these last few years that I’ll tell you about one day, if you want. I’d rather not, though, because you’ve always been the paranoiac (like that one? Robin said it’s an SAT word) of the two of us and I feel like this would just make you even more of one. But I will tell you, if you want to hear it. I want to tell you everything. I want you to tell me everything too. Like we used to.

I want you to tell me how college is going. Who the annoying jerks in your classes are so I can go beat them up (kidding). I want you to stop by to rent movies so I can lend them for free and you’ll yell at me about taking advantage of fre friendships. 

Fuck, I miss you. It’s always been there, bubbling below the surface. I never stopped missing you. I never stopped loving you. I’m sorry I didn’t write this sooner. I know you said writing is how we express things we can’t say. You were right. You always are. Can’t believe I forgot that. 

It’s okay if you don’t want to be friends. I mean, it hurts, but I respect it. I understand. Most days, I can’t believe people can bear to be around me. But then I hear your voice in my head, telling me that most people are shitheads and that I’m golden and. Well, I don’t know if I believe that, but you were right that most of the people I surrounded myself with were shitheads. Except you, of course. And then I went ahead and fucked that up.

I’ve been working on finding the non-shitheads of the world. I think I’m doing pretty well. And I wrote this because I realized that while I will probably end up buried in this fucking town, you’re going to do something incredible. And nothing incredible ever happens in Hawkins, so I figure you’ll be far away when you do it. 

I didn’t want to miss this chance to write things I never said. So here they are. And you can do whatever you want with them. You’ve always been the best of the two of us. I trust you.

You should watch Dirty Dancing. You’ll like it. I did. I’ll see it again if you want. I’ll watch anything with you.

Did you know there’s another Bond movie coming out in the summer? We could watch that one together too. If you wanted more time to decide.

Sincer

Lo

Your friend,

Steve

You don’t bother ejecting the tape. You run all the way to the bus stop, Steve’s letter in hand. 

You have to see him. No other thoughts register except that one. You have to know if Steve wrote these words because he can’t say them or because you won’t listen.

It isn’t too late when you get to Loch Nora. The neighborhood is dead, which is weird. Steve’s house looks frozen in time: his parents’ car isn’t in the driveway. You wonder if they’ve ever come back since you’ve been gone. You wouldn't be surprised if the answer is no.

There’s a tarp over the pool. The gate is locked with a chain. You can’t sneak in through the fence like you used to. Not that you would. You don’t think strangers can sneak through pool gates.

You knock on the door three times. And wait.

Steve’s car is in the driveway, a duller burgundy than when he first got it. There are a few scratches in the paint. No longer a prized possession. Maybe well-loved instead.

The door swings open. 

Steve says your name like a prayer. You swallow and steel your spine. 

“I got your letter,” you say.

“Oh.” He rubs the back of his neck. His hair is damp like he’s just showered. It curls around his ears. Waves of want hit you. 

“I don’t want to be friends,” you continue before he can speak. “I don’t—I can’t do that again.”

Steve’s mouth draws into the saddest frown you’ve ever seen.

“Okay,” he says softly. “Thank you for telling me.”

“No.” You shake your head. “No, that’s not—I don’t mean it like that.”

His brows knit. “What?”

“I…” You pull out the letter and wave it. “Did you mean it? Do you love me?”

“Yes,” Steve whispers. It’s like a shout in the quiet street. “I meant it.”

“Like a friend?”

“If that’s what you want.”

“Will you love me like a friend forever?” you ask. 

“Always.” 

You squeeze your eyes shut.

“I love you as something more,” you blurt, watery. “I have for a long time.”

You hear the door shut. This is it: your heart on the line, all for nothing—

“Then I’ll love you as something more back,” Steve says. “I’ll love you any way you want me to.”

And he holds you the way you’d held him so many times. You inhale and wrap your arms around his neck. You’ve got an iron grip around the letter. Tears slip down your cheeks.

“I missed you,” you confess.

Steve nods against your shoulder.

“Yeah,” he says, and it sounds a little wet. “I missed you too.”

“You were wrong,” you say into his neck.

“Hmm?”

You pull back to look at Steve.

“Incredible things do happen in Hawkins.”

“Oh, yeah?” Steve smiles, cheeks blotchy. “Like what?”

“We found each other again.”

[boopshoops]

C'mon now, we don't HAVE to stick to one set genre. Music is about self expression!~ ...Though I wouldn't be against one-upping some competition.

Yuu Shi is strutting on down to debut as a vocalist and backup dancer for GLOWCHAIN! With eccentric flare and powerful vocals, she's here to push the boundaries of EDM and pop to new heights. After all, if it isn't experimental, it isn't her.

Part 2

Ragu Music Week is a fanevent by @raguiras!!! :D

Set to home screen: Mic check, one two!~

Groovification: ???

Home transition 1: Day three of asking Allen to let me join Hazard, no such luck as of yet. Is this how Epel feels about Savanaclaw? Maybe a bribe would work...

Home transition 2: Ohh I just love this boa! It's so cute and fluffy! Come here and touch it, it's so soft that I could use it as a pillow.

Home transition 3: No need to worry much about your performances, hon, I'll make sure to outperform you regardless! You can take that as a promise and a threat.

Home transition/Groovification: ???

Tap home 1: You think I'm getting a bit competitive over this? Hmm, Maybe, maybe. Well, this is finally my chance to show off my prowess! I didn't go to performing arts school for nothing.

Tap home 2: I'm able to keep up with Vil fine enough, but after the chaos that was VDC, I'm beginning to feel bad for my other group members... but not bad enough! Let's go again!

Tap home 3: No, no, no- That's not it. Your movements aren't big enough! You need to gesture enough for the whole crowd to see. Remember, the people in the back row want a show too. You need to hold out your arms like so!

Tap home 4: As much as I enjoy an organized, set performance, I much prefer to go with the flow. I want to get the whole audience involved in ways you haven't seen before, you know? Make it feel more authentic? It'll leave a lasting impression of me in their minds!... Oh, and the rest of GLOWCHAIN, of course.

Tap home 5: Hahaha! What, am I towering over you in these heels? Should I kneel down, is that what you'd like? What? I'm just teasing!

Tap home/Groovification: ???

Home after login: As much as I love this outfit, I could do with a little less sparkle... When the stage lights hit me and the other members, I can't help but feel like a damn disco ball. What do you think?

ALRIGHT RAMBLING TIME. Yuu shi is having a hard time abandoning her instruments for GLOWCHAIN. Therefore she takes every chance she can to be petty about it and be another headache for vil (sorry bbg). She is very jealous of Hazard/Riff due to this- but she's not letting that stop her from trying to outperform other groups or even vil himself.

As for music- I did a lot of research into KPOP i never had before KJGDSBKGJSD and I think mamamoos vibe fits Yuu Shi very well!

also I listened to the inspiration playlist, saw lady gaga, and blacked out

Charli XCX fits her more experimental style too- its her way of pushing the boundaries of the genre

KIMPETRASKIMPETRASKIMPETRAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As for dancing- ive had Royal Family brain rot lately. THEY ARE SO TALENTED AAAAAAAAAAAAA. Theyre flowy, energetic, fast paced moves fit yuu shi very well imo!!! Though she would definitely need a lot more practiced to be as organized as them sob. 3:25 in particular drives me insane:

OK RAMBLING OVER TAG TIME

@lowcallyfruity @skriblee-ksk @kitwasnothere @cecilebutcher @justm3di0cr3

@thehollowwriter @distant-velleity @the-trinket-witch @techno-danger @scint1llat3

@beneathsakurashade @twsted-canvas @qsoap @prince-kallisto

[luvhughes43]

love at first sight | jamie drysdale

[luvhughes43 masterlist🌷]

request: jamie x hughes reader plz! :)

summary: you quickly fall for the looks of one of your brothers friends… friend.

note: this is very silly but i hope u guys like it!

word count: 0.5k

early june 

summers at your brother's lake house were all the same. 6 foot tall boys would flock to the house in droves, staying for weeks at a time under the guise of training when really they hung around the house playing pool and lounging on the boat. 

therefore, when your brothers friend trevor zegras said that he invited one of his friends to the house for a few weeks, you paid absolutely no mind to his statement. 

that was until you were bikini-clad on the boat - which was rocking each time a new hockey boy jumped on - that you became aware of said friend. 

you looked up from your book and to yours and everyone's surprise, you gasped. the dark haired man you had never seen before was standing a little ways away from you - shirtless. looking… well hot!

“did you just gasp?” trevor asked, not one to miss anything. 

“i-” you start, but are immediately cut off when trevor's friend catches your eye. bright blue met yours, and wow… jamie smiles at you awkwardly, not catching onto your reaction to his… physique. his awkward smile causes giggles to bubble up your throat and you quickly bring your hands up to your mouth to try and mask your smiles. 

“way to go jimmy! made her speechless!” trevor jokes, slapping jamie on the back who stumbles forward. 

“what’s going on?” jack asks, holding a heavy cooler in his hands. 

“it seems your sister has a little crus-”

“no i don’t!” you shout when you finally get yourself together. you shoot an almost pleading look to trevor - silently begging him to keep his mouth shut. so what if you thought jamie was insanely attractive! with all the men that were invited over to the house there was sure to be one that would catch your attention. 

your eyes shoot to jamie next, who was awkwardly shifting his weight from foot to foot. “well like… you are hot don’t get me wrong!” you try to amend your words but it all comes out wrong. 

luke groans loudly. 

“...thanks?” jamie says, his face flushing at all the newfound attention. 

trevor whistles annoyingly high pitched. “she’s never reacted that way to anybody. like she literally giggled when she saw you” trevors eyes crinkle as he speaks, one of his tell-tale signs that he’s about to either burst out into laughter or say something wildly inappropriate. 

possibility number two isn't acceptable and so you rush, “i’m sorry! you’re just soo…” you break out into a fit of giggles again, this time unable to stop. 

“there’s no damn way…” jack speaks up again, looking between his sister and jamie. “she’s usually normal,” jack turns to jamie who has a wide smile plastered across his face. 

“It’s okay, i think she’s pretty cute too,” jamie speaks smoothly and you swear your heart stops. luke groans again, and trevor falls into another fit of giggles. 

after the awkward–semi cute meeting, you and jamie spend the rest of the day getting to know each other. aside from your attraction to each other, you guys have a lot in common and by the end of the summer you guys are an exclusive couple. 

end of august

ynhughes

liked by jamie.drysdale, trevorzegras, jackhughes, and 12 892 others

ynhughes it’s been an interesting summer for sure🌊💐

tagged: jamie.drysdale, _quinnhughes, trevorzegras, and 3 others

view all comments

trevorzegras call me mr. matchmaker👩‍❤️‍💋‍👨

jackhughes nobodys calling you that

trevorzegras HATER!! BOOO👎🍅

jamie.drysdale the best summer❤️

bestie love this for u

lhughes_06 yuck

colecaufield 😎😎

user1 JIMMY????

user2 yn hughes and jamie drysdale…. ohh we won

user3 they’re so cute wtff

user4 yn looking hot as always

user5 THAT PIC OF JAMIE??? I JUST FELL TO MY KNEES!!!

[a-killer-obsession]

Can i please request 3 + 4 with some G 🙏 i really liked your kink headcanons about how wire is heats dom, could we maybe get a SO who is too sweet to degrade heat so wire guides them? Maybe even your take on what you mentioned about heat being into water sports if your comfy writing that 👉👈

Yeah fuck it, lets go. This turned into a bit of a Heat-kink-athon. I can't help it, I just love that man so much...

Guidance

Prompt: Degradation

Additional Tags: afab reader, she/her pronouns, safe words, praise kink, handcuffs, cock and ball bondage, sensory deprivation, fingering (reader receiving), impact play, squirting, foot fetish, ball crushing, watersports, face sitting, p in v sex, deepthroating, creampie, cumshot, threesome, aftercare

Foot stuff and watersports marked as between the *** so just skip that section if they're not your thing!

WC: 5.4k

Event Masterlist

🔞 Minors DNI 🔞

You'd been Heat's lover for close to a year now, and your sex life was great to say the least. His libido was far higher than you could manage, but you had an open relationship, not wanting to force him to give up sleeping with Wire when you knew the two of them had been friends with benefits for almost a decade. They didn't have romantic feelings for each other as far as you knew, but you knew a little of their sexual relationship, knowing that Wire was what Heat referred to as his Dominant, while Heat was his Submissive. Heat always came back from sessions with Wire covered in bruises and grazes, usually unable to sit comfortably from the ache in his asshole or the tenderness of his reddened rump. It made you cringe to see him hurt but you didn't say anything, you weren't going to yuck his yum, you knew he greatly enjoyed whatever it was he did with Wire and you weren't going to shame him for that. You just didn't really understand how someone could take pleasure from hurting anothet person like that though, especially someone they were supposed to care about, and it made you think differently of Wire. The two of them had noticed how uncomfortable you were with the tall man, especially after sessions, and it made both of them uneasy. The crew relied on trust to keep each other safe during battles, it wasn't good for you to not trust Wire.

“I think you'd understand if you took part,” Heat suggested.

“I don't want him to hit me!” You quickly replied, squirming out of Heat's hold.

“My flame, I'd never let anyone hurt you, you know that,” he crawled over the bed to take you back in his arms, the two of you still naked from a heated love making session. “I was more suggesting you play his usual role. In fact, I'd really like it if you did”

“I don't want to hurt you,” you pouted.

“I know to you it just looks like pain, but for me it feels really good,” he sighed, “I know you don't wanna hurt me, but I promise Wire knows my limits. If you let him guide you, you'll see for yourself how much I enjoy it”

“Is this… something you really want?” You asked softly, picking at your cuticles. Heat enveloped your hands in his to keep you from hurting yourself with the nervous tick.

“It is, I've wanted it since we first got together,” he replied surely, “but I didn't want to spook you. I know it can be… intense. It's not something you just jump straight into. But I trust you with my life, and I trust Wire. I need you to trust him too, this unease you have about him isn't good for crew dynamics. Just give it one chance, if you hate it I'll never ask you to do it again but hopefully you'll at least understand that Wire does what he does because I want him to.”

“Okay,” you relented, “I'll… give it a go. For you.”

“Thank you sweetheart,” he pulled you in close and kissed the top of your hair, nuzzling his nose against it, “it means the world to me for you to just try. I'll talk to Wire and get him to set it up okay?”

“Okay,” you replied in a small voice.

⋆★⋆★⋆★⋆★⋆

As per Heat's instructions, you climbed down the ladder to the hold and made your way through the empty cells at the agreed upon time. Heat and Wire were already down here, in what the crew referred to as the ‘Playroom’. Usually it was used for torture, but a few more hardcore members of the crew also used it for sex, Heat and Wire included. You'd never even been inside, and you knocked on the door nervously, dressed only in panties and a satin nightgown as you'd been asked to, as well as a set of strappy toeless heels that Heat had picked out. Wire called from the other side for you to enter, so you quickly slid inside, locking the door behind you, facing it anxiously. You slowly found the bravery to turn and look at the room, which was about what you expected. It was a mostly cold, metal lined room, with large hooks hanging from the ceiling and a table in the corner covered in what looked like various tools of torment, as well as some displayed on the wall. There were a few more sex-exclusive items as well, leather covered furniture in strange shapes you didn't recognise, currently pushed out if the way against a wall, as well as a comfortable three person couch, leather as well for easy cleaning. There was another table beside it, currently laid out with items like horse crops, leather paddles, various gags, dildos, lubricants, scissors and a stack of clean, soft towels, as well as a jug of water and several glasses.

Heat was in the middle of the room, naked with his wrists bound in cuffs, connected by a chain that was hung over one of the ceiling hooks, forcing him to stand. His cock was red and angry looking, erect and bound tightly in black ropes. There were thin red marks over his chest, likely from the crop, and he had a blindfold over his face, his thick wavy blue hair pulled up behind him in a high ponytail. You couldn't deny the shiver of excitement you got from looking at him, so vulnerable and excited for what was to come, squirming occasionally as he let out heavy breaths, the chains rattling above him as he fought the restraints.

Wire approached you slowly, not wanting to spook you, offering you a hand which you took nervously, letting him lead you to sit on the couch, Heat now directly in front of you. He offered you a glass of water and sat beside you as you drank.

“I know Heat has explained to you a little of what we do in here, and I'm sure by the marks I leave on him you have your own ideas,” Wire started, his voice deep and smooth, “I'm uneasy about your distrust of me, so I'm happy you're allowing me this opportunity to prove to you that I mean no harm to Heat when we have our sessions. I wanna lay some ground rules before we start though, okay? This is your first experience with BDSM, correct?”

“Yes,” you replied anxiously, practically chugging the water as your mouth went dry.

“I want to make it clear that today, you are in charge,” Wire explained, “I will be making suggestions, but you don't need to follow them, and you won't be punished for refusing. Understand though that I've been Heat's dom for a long time, I know his limits, I know what he enjoys, and we've spoken at length about what he'd like out of this. I won't suggest anything he can't handle or wouldn't want, my suggestions will all be with the intention of bringing you both pleasure. That being said, there are safewords that any of us can use. If something needs to stop and change, we can say ‘orange’. If something needs to stop altogether, we can say ‘red’. If you hear one of those words, you stop immediately, okay? As will I if I hear you or Heat say them. Use them to your advantage, okay? I don't want you feeling anxious because you didn't feel comfortable enough to speak up, nothing bad will happen if you use them. BDSM is about pain and pleasure, but it's also about trust, do you understand?”

“Yes,” you replied. He refilled your empty water for you before continuing.

“Right now, Heat has ear plugs in,” Wire explained, “he's entirely deprived of his sight and hearing, but if we need to stop there are signals I can use to communicate to him wordlessly, so don't worry about that. If you're ready, we can get started. Am I allowed to touch you? I'd like to show you how excited he is for this, but I'll need to touch between your legs. I won't be penetrating you today though unless you ask me to, just using my fingers okay?”

You nodded anxiously and put down your half finished glass, resting against the back of the couch. Wire slowly untied your satin robe, pushing it aside to reveal your breasts and panties, skin prickling and nipples pulling taut as the cool air hit them. He ran his hand slowly down your front, watching your face carefully for any signs of discomfort before his fingers threaded under the waistband of your panties. You were watching his hand slowly disappear under the fabric, breath hitching as his long fingers made contact with your folds, finding you already wet and wanting.

“Good girl,” he cooed, running his fingers between your labia and circling your clit, making you whine. He wasn't usually soft with his partners, but he was making a special exception with you, under Heat's firm order that he was to only be gentle when handling you. You weren't like them, you were soft and sweet and innocent, you didn't have an inclination for pain like they did. You moaned quietly as Wire dipped two fingers inside you, pumping you slowly, dragging his fingers against your spongy g-spot with every pull. It didn't take him long at all to work you up, his thumb circling your clit while his other hand fondled your breast, pinching your pert nipples delicately, just enough to make you whine. He'd hadn't intended to make you cum, but you were pent up from all the nervous anticipation, so he decided to get you all the way instead of just harvesting some of your honey as he'd originally intended to. Hopefully it'd help you relax as well before things got more intense.

“Good girl [y/n], let go for me,” Wire purred, curling his fingers and making come hither motions that had you quickly panting and cumming on his fingers. “There you go, just rest for a moment now okay? I'm gonna show you what I meant”

Wire pulled his slick covered fingers from your wet panties and approached Heat, making sure you were watching and could see well as he brought them to Heat's nose. You could see Heat's nose wiggle as he caught the familiar scent of your arousal on Wire's fingers, his cock twitching and his whole body writhing as he moaned your name wantonly. He searched for Wire's fingers with his mouth, greedily sucking your honey from them, running his tongue between the digits to get every drop of your essence. It made your pussy throb to see how Heat reacted to just the tiniest hint of your cum, and your thighs pressed hard together as you watched Wire pull his fingers from Heat's mouth with a pop.

“Come here sweetheart,” Wire suggested, and you stood with a small stumble, a little wobbly on your legs from your orgasm. You let your wet panties fall to the floor, feeling more comfortable without them on, but Wire pointed to them and made a clicking motion with his fingers to indicate he wanted them. You handed him the damp fabric and he held it in front of Heat, your boyfriend immediately burying his face in them like a hunting dog catching a scent, before greedily sucking on the fabric with a moan. “See what you do to him? You drive him wild,” Wire smiled fondly, pulling the panties away and discarding them on the floor.

“Can I kiss him?” You asked shyly.

“It's your session, you can do whatever you like,” Wire assured you, “but be gentle if you touch his cock while it's bound, it's very sensitive right now. I recommend giving him a few light touches as a reward”

You nodded and stepped forward, glad for the tall heels that allowed you to reach Heat's mouth easier. You ran your tongue over his bottom lip, and he quickly captured your lips with his own, hungrily devouring you and pressing his tongue against yours in a needy kiss, moaning into your mouth as you tasted yourself on him. His hips bucked towards you, so you let your hand run down his front, making him shiver, till you reached the rope at his base and ran a gentle index finger down the top of his shaft. He let out a long whine as you kissed him, and it made your thighs rub together to think such a small touch could drive him so wild. You touched him a few more times, running your finger down the topside of his cock like you were petting a small animal, feeling it twitch under your touch before you stepped back and watched him desperately try to seek you back out.

“[Y/N],” he whined, “come back, I love you, hnng, touch me more please”

Wire didn't miss the grin on your face as Heat begged for you, but was momentarily distracted by an alarm going off. He quickly silenced it before coming to stand in front of Heat, indicating for you to give him a little room. “What's the alarm for?” You asked curiously.

“Gotta take the ropes off his cock,” Wire explained, “they can't stay on for too long or the loss of circulation will cause damage”

Heat let out a harsh breath as his cock and balls were released from the restraints, Wire massaging them carefully to encourage blood flow before returning the rope to the table. “We'll leave these off for now, I don't want you to worry about the alarm going off all the time. Here,” he handed you a small leather paddle and you examined it carefully.

“Um.. how hard do I hit him?” You asked nervously. You were slowly warming up to the idea of hitting Heat now that you'd seen the intense pleasure Wire was already giving him, starting to trust that maybe Wire knew what he was doing.

“Come round to his back,” he guided you with a gentle hand on your elbow, “only hit the flesh of his ass or his thighs, but you can hit him as hard as you want. Go slowly though, you'll see why”

You raised a brow at the cryptic comment but moved to a comfortable position anyway, Wire pressed softly against your back in a way that soothed your anxiety, his breath brushing against your shoulder as he brought his chin to rest on it. His arms were around your waist as you made your first swing, the flesh of Heat's ass jiggling with the impact as you left a red, rectangular mark on his ass. He made a hiss and whined before letting out a stuttered “one.”

You turned a little in Wire's hold to raise your brow at him, and he had a proud smile on his face. “He's well trained,” he chuffed, “go to ten”

You laid out more hard smacks, spreading them over his ass and thick thighs, each smack followed by a whine and a count, his voice slowly becoming more strained as he struggled to keep count through the mixture of pain and pleasure. You could feel Wire's erection against your back, and you couldn't help but press yourself against it, your pussy throbbing with need. He made a little warning growl and held your hips sturdy to keep you from grinding on him, but with the way you were laying into Heat, standing in only your heels and open satin robe, he wanted nothing more than to ignore Heat and fuck you silly instead. This wasn't about him getting off though, this was about gaining your trust.

Heat was panting, moaning and fighting his restraints by the time you laid down your tenth smack, and Wire took your empty hand and encouraged you to run it over Heat's tender skin, making the bluenette shiver under your soft hands. “You did such a good job [y/n],” Wire cooed, “do you need to cum?”

You nodded eagerly and he had a shit eating grin as he walked to you stand in front of Heat. “I'm gonna bring him down soon so you can ride his face, but I want you to tease him a little longer okay? You're doing so good,” he cooed as his erection pressed against you again. You tried to reach back for it but he swatted your hand away, making you whine. “Hush now, I'll let you blow me later if you keep being so good, but right now we're focusing on you okay? Run your nails and tongue over Heat, kiss him if you want, you can touch his cock but not enough to make him cum okay? I'm gonna warm you up so you're nice and wet for him”

Wire gently tapped the inside of your ankles with his foot to indicate he wanted you to spread your legs, and he reached down to press his fingers right where you needed him, your legs almost buckling at the touch. You concentrated your horny energy into teasing Heat, pulling long strings of hisses, curses and moans from him as you flicked his nipples with your tongue, nipped and sucked his chest and neck, ran your nails over his sides and abdomen and gave him the occasional teasing pump of his cock, making him buck into your hand each time you touched him there. Meanwhile Wire pumped you with two fingers, your pussy making sloppy sounds as he got you good and wet. He decided he had a extra plan in mind but had no intention of edging you in the meantime, so he pumped you harder and rubbed your clit with his other hand, effectively pinning your against him and supporting your weight as you came hard, making Heat yelp as you suddenly bit his shoulder and moaned against him. Wire's harsh finger fucking had made you squirt, liquid pooling in his hand and splashing against the steel floor as your legs shook.

“Fuck, good girl [y/n],” Wire praised, offering Heat his hand to clean off, which Heat eagerly accepted, making sloppy sounds and drooling around Wire's fingers as he sucked and licked them clean, moaning the whole time. “Go drink some water and sit down for a moment sweetheart,” Wire pushed you gently in the direction of the couch, pressing a kiss to the top of your head, and you collapsed on the couch with a sigh and sipped at the rest of your glass of water. You watched while Wire reached up and unhooked Heat's chains from the ceiling, removing the cuffs from his wrists while he stood patently. Wire inspected his wrists and shoulders carefully, giving them a small massage that made Heat sigh. He tilted Heat's head up towards him and kissed him tenderly, and you watched with newfound arousal as their tongues mingled, Heat's hands resting on Wire's hips. Wire pulled one of the ear plugs from Heat's ear to check on him.

“Doing okay my love?” He asked. Oh, perhaps there was more between the two of them than you thought.

“Yeah, I'm good,” Heat smiled, “I might die if I don't cum soon though”

“Soon,” Wire hummed, “make her cum first and then I'll let you have her. I think she's well prepared for what we discussed”

“Yeah?” Heat's head titled like he was listening for where you were in the room, still blindfolded.

“Earplug is going back in, just a little longer,” Wire held his chin as he replaced the earplug, giving Heat one more soft kiss before shifting back into the rough dominant you more expected him to be. He walked behind Heat and grabbed his ponytail, pulling him to stand on a blue pleather gym mat at the other end of the room. Heat understood what was wanted of him and lowered himself first to his knees before Wire released his hair so he could lay on his back. A new set of cuffs with no space between them was added to his wrists, binding them together to rest over his stomach.

“[Y/n], come here sweetheart,” Wire cooed. You stood and stretched a little before walking over, and he indicated for you to stand in front of him, the two of you standing with feet either side of Heat's thighs, which were pressed together. His cock was soft now, but slowly twitching back to life knowing he'd get to taste you soon. “Do you know why Heat chose these heels?” Wire purred, wrapping his arms around your waist and resting his chin on your shoulder again.

“Cos he thinks they're cute?” You replied unsurely.

“Because your toes are out,” he hummed, “but we'll get to that. Be a good girl and crush his balls for me would you?”

“Wire!” You yelped at the surprisingly forward request.

***

“Come now,” Wire chastised, supporting your weight with his arms around you as he hooked one of your ankles with his foot, guiding it to rest over Heat's cock. Heat whined at the light pressure and your brows raised. Wire's foot left yours to keep you both steady. “You don't have to go hard if you don't want to, but put a little pressure on him, rub your foot over his cock and balls, I promise he likes it”

Heat's whines and his hips rolling to rutt against your shoe agreed with Wire's sentiment, and you curiously stroked his cock with the sole of your shoe, occasionally putting pressure against his testicles. He groaned as you experimentally pressed the sharp stiletto heel against his cock, making him whine out your name, and making arousal pool at your core. Wire had a shit eating grin feeling the way you shuddered pleasantly at Heat's whining, knowing full well he'd just awakened something in you. You pushed harder against Heat and precum leaked from his cock, pooling against his abdomen.

“He's been so good, you should give him a reward,” Wire suggested, “put your shoe in his mouth”

You didn't understand the appeal but if Wire knew that's what Heat wanted then you'd do it, wanting to give Heat your all. He made a sad little whimper as you released the pressure on his cock, quickly replaced by a surprised moan as you tapped your shoe against his mouth. He eagerly opened for you, sucking on the end of the shoe as you curiously shifted it in and out if his mouth. More precum was leaking from him as his hips rolled, bucking against nothing, his bound hands coming up to grab your ankle so he could hold your foot still, pushing his tongue between the shoe and your toes to separate them so he could take your toes in his mouth. You were glad for Wire holding you steady as the ticklish feeling made you squirm.

“Fuck, [y/n],” Heat moaned as he released your foot, “let me taste you, please”

You looked back at Wire as though asking permission. “You're in charge here, if you think he deserves it then go ahead”

“I um… I want to but..” you shuffled uneasily.

“Need to pee?” Wire whispered knowingly in your ear, his hands travelling further and pressing against your bladder, making you whine. “Do it then”

“Wireeeeee,” you complained.

“I'm not gonna force you, you can go upstairs to pee and come back if you want,” Wire assured you, rubbing your belly, “but you should know that he wants it. Like, really wants it. You've done so good already though, he won't be upset if you don't want to do it”

“Oh.. okay…” you relented quietly, still determined to give Heat the best time you could. You said you would try, so you were gonna do your damn best, even if you felt squeamish about it. You'd felt squeamish about this whole experience, but thus far you'd only found yourself enjoying it. “What do I… I mean where…”

“I'll hold you steady,” Wire hummed, “he wants it on his cock”

“Okay,” you replied anxiously, pulling off your silk robe and tossing it aside, not wanting to get it dirty. “Are you sure?”

“Positive,” Wire replied firmly. “We do this all the time. I know you probably feel really anxious and embarrassed right now, I think everyone probably does the first time, but think of it sort of like marking your territory. Claim him as yours, claim his cock, make sure everyone knows who it belongs to”

When he put it like that you sort of understood the allure, so you let him support your weight as you squatted over Heat, leaning back a little and spreading your labia with your index and middle finger. It took a few moments to relax enough to let yourself go, but you couldn't bring yourself to actually watch yourself pee on Heat short of making sure your aim was right, that was too much for your little heart. That was at least until he registered the hot liquid hitting him and started to let out feral sounding growls mixed with moans that sounded like he might cum at any moment, writhing underneath you. “Fuck, fuck,” he whined, prompting your eyes to open and watching his hips raising off the mat to meet your stream. You let out a stuttered whine as you finished, Wire cooing praises in your ear and running his hands over your abdomen and breasts, rolling your nipples pleasantly between his fingers.

***

“Look at him,” Wire cooed, “look how good you're making him feel”

You whined as you looked down at Heat, his bound wrists reaching desperately for you. He caved on behaving and sat up, feeling around and crying out for you till he found your leg, following it up and burying his face in your cunt. You moaned and your knees buckled as he lapped at it, vibrations from his own moans making your pussy tingle. Wire pushed you forward, forcing you to your knees and taking Heat with you, his arms sliding under you and pressing against your back to press you forward, till he was flat on his back with you sitting on his face. You barely registered Wire cleaning up your mess behind you while you gripped Heat's hair and rode his tongue, the two of you moaning in unison. Heat had you riding his face on the regular so you were well practised at this part, eyes closed and head thrown back as Heat bullied his tongue inside you.

Meanwhile, satisfied with the good-for-now cleaning job, Wire stripped his clothes and settled himself on the couch, stroking himself while he watched Heat eat you out. He was looking forward to stretching that pretty mouth of yours, but he would wait patiently until Heat had made you cum first. Which, to be fair, didn't take long at all. Heat knew exactly what he was doing and what you liked best, and soon you were gushing on his face with your head thrown back and a goofy fucked out smile on your face as you pulled on his ponytail.

“One more sweetheart,” Wire cooed as he helped you off Heat, getting you to kneel on the mat next to Heat, who whined at the loss of your cunt. You nuzzled against Wire's cock, making him hiss as you put kitten licks up and down the base.

“Can I have it?” You asked him so sweetly, god the look you were giving him made him want to watch you choke on his cock.

“In just a minute baby, you've been so good,” he ran his thumb over your chin, letting you suck on it. “Just gonna get Heat in the right place first, kay?”

You pressed your tits down against the mat and put your ass in the air eagerly, Wire noting with pride your submissive pose. Man, he was gonna have fun ordering the two of you around in future, already thinking of all the ways he could use you both to tease each other. He grabbed Heat by his hair, pulling him to his knees and turning him to face you. You backed into him till your ass pressed against his front, notably clean and dry thanks to Wire's efforts, and the second Heat registered your soft flesh against him, it was like something snapped in his brain. His bound hands scrambled desperately at your back until Wire freed him, his cock bucking towards you trying to find your entrance till his hands were able to grab your hips and allow him to slam into you, knowing from experience exactly how to angle himself to bury himself inside you, making you scream.

He was like a rabid animal as he fucked you hard, finally getting the pressure he needed on his cock with your wet warmth after what felt like an eternity of teasing. Wire knew it wouldn't take long for Heat to cum now that he was buried inside you, so he fisted himself a few times before lifting your chin to look at him. You opened your mouth for him, realising you were finally getting what you wanted, and Wire's thick cock stretched your mouth to its limit, the corners of your mouth stinging from the strain. You did what you could to balance yourself on one hand while Heat was brutally slamming into you so you could stroke the base of Wire's cock, taking what you could of his impressive length in your mouth as deep as you could. You gagged as he hit the back of your throat, holding your hair and chin tight as he slid himself in and out of your mouth, slower pace contrasting with Heat's merciless pounding.

Your moans were vibrating Wire's cock, spurring him on and making your eyes water, Heat's pace starting to get messy and erratic as he got close. He reached around you and rubbed hard circles on your clit, making you let out a muffled scream around Wire's cock as you came hard. You saw white and your body turned to jelly, Heat holding your hips up while your hand fell away uselessly from Wire's cock, giving yourself over like a ragdoll for the two of them to use you for their own pleasure.

Heat was no surprise the first to cum, unbearably pent up from all the teasing, seeing stars as he slammed into you till every last rope of cum was deposited inside you, collapsing against your back as he panted. Wire came soon after, stilling deep down your throat, your nose pressed against his pubes, unable to breathe while hot cum flowed down your throat before he pulled out with a satisfied groan and gave your face a little appreciative slap, lletting you take a much needed breath. You and Heat collapsed against the mat, a pile of panting limp noodles, his chest warm and comforting against your back as sweat pooled between the two of you and made your skin sticky.

You were in a fucked out daze as Wire took care of the two of you. For your part he mostly just removed your heels, cleaned you up, put your robe back on and sat you back on the couch, forcing a fresh glass of water into your hand. You sipped at it while you watched him take care of Heat, running a damp cloth over his body and massaging his sore muscles, the blindfold and ear plugs now removed as Wire sat cross legged on the ground and Heat leaned back against him. He looked at you with a half lidded smile, full of affection.

“I love you,” he mumbled sleepily while Wire worked a knot out of his shoulder, making him groan. You giggled sleepily, slipping off the couch and crawling over to rest your head against his thigh, essentially forming a cuddle pile with the three of you, sighing contently as he scratched your scalp soothingly.

The whole session had certainly had the intended effect, you no doubt trusted Wire a great deal more now. And hey, maybe this whole BDSM thing wasn't so bad after all…

[impishjesters]

Jax with a s/o scared of nothing but that spider is MASSIVE

warning(s): big spider, one-sided crush, empty threats/manipulative behaviour, light Ragatha bashing, possessive Jax, anger/temper issues note(s): The one-sided crush is Ragatha on the reader, the Ragatha bashing is on Jax's end (he doesn't like her), and the possessiveness Jax has is okay (and enjoyed) with the reader. A/N: I gave up on the tags, I also gave up near the end my brain is fuzzy...I just wanted to write something for myself for once...

You’d been stuck with the task of cleaning out the closet, and in theory, that shouldn’t sound like such a daunting task. Except this closet held heaven knows what when it involves Jax, not like you’re expecting a jump scare or anything, it’s his closet too. But he has a tendency for throwing a lot of bizarre things in here and you’re just a tad afraid of what you might stumble across.

There’s little that scares you, especially now in the circus. Caine’s little activities going south? Eh, that’s normal. Someone going missing for a few hours and the fear thought that they finally succumbed and abstracted? Okay, mildly worrying but not scary—unless it was Jax—which was unlikely.

But spiders?

A scream leaves your mouth before you can properly react, and the item in hand falls with a loud thud, followed by fast and loud footsteps from outside the room. “What’s wrong?!” Jax slams the door open, knocking over a few nearby items before rushing in.

He barely has the time to assess the situation before you lunge at him. What the fuck was happening? He’s never heard you scream like that and the only one allowed to make you scream at all was him.

“Kill it!”

Jax hisses as you try climbing him, tugging on his clothes and ears to get as far as possible from whatever it is you are screaming about. Despite the yelling and his confusion, he does hold you off the ground before calling your name.

“What the fuck are ya talking about?! Kill what??”

Burying your face into his neck you point over towards the closet. “Kill it!” Confused and irritated with you screaming in his ear, he takes a step closer to the closet only for you to scream again. “No! I don’t wanna go near it!”

“Christ doll…” Jax glances at the nearby bed and places you on it before turning towards the closet. The hell has you so bent out of shape? Kill it? Kill what? You do realize that he can’t just necessarily kill—oh so that’s where that went. He eyes the large spider and laughs. “Fuck, I forgot how huge this thing is.”

It takes a few minutes for the words to process through your panic. Forgot? “Excuse me?! You mean that’s yours?! Jax what the hell!”

He snorts and throws you a glance before looking back down at the ugly thing. “Oh yeah, I got it to throw in Pomni’s room. Must’ve forgotten about it.”

“Must’ve forgot—Jax… how the fuck do you forget a spider that big?! That thing pays taxes it’s that big! Don’t you fucking laugh!”

Jax bends forward, hands on knees in full unbridled laughter. Taxes, oh that’s a good one. “Oh c’mon, you scared of a little spider?” he mocks between laughs.

“That thing is not little!” You hiss. God, you forget how much of an asshole Jax can be, it’s rarely ever aimed at you. “Are you going to get rid of it or not?”

That spider is big enough to work a nine-hour job, pay taxes, and have a full family.

Your boyfriend is still yucking it up despite your suffering. Fine, two can play that game. Clouded by a mix of fear and frustration, the words left you before you could even fully process them. “If you don’t take care of it I’m moving out and staying with Ragatha, at least she’d get rid of the spider and comfort me instead of laugh.”

His laughter stops at the mention of the doll, a scowl replacing his previous smile. You aren’t wrong, Ragatha would easily get rid of the spider, she wouldn’t like it but it wasn’t a centipede which was fair game. After all, you’d gotten rid of the centipedes for her whenever he had left them in her room, something he’s still annoyed with. Let him have his fun.

He also knows it is an empty threat, you wouldn’t actually move out—not that you realistically could, you were both trapped here. But mention of that raggedy doll was enough to set him off.

Both of you were aware of her crush on you, something that only recently started to wane with the arrival of Pomni. She wasn’t manipulative like Jax, but she often voiced her thoughts on how you deserved someone better than Jax. As if implying she was the better choice. It always pissed him off, as if he doesn’t already know that, but you were his, not hers.

It felt wrong to use Ragatha’s crush on you like this, she was a sweet woman but your heart fully belonged to the asshole standing a few feet away. In truth you aren’t quite sure what led you to say that, it felt awful to use Jax’s methods against him or even to use them at all.

Jax wanted nothing more than to lash out but managed to hold back. He knows you didn’t mean it, you weren’t like him skilled enough to utilize the whole crush in a manner to break someone down, to hurt them. But boy if he didn’t want to just wreck some shit at the thought of that rag doll with you.

Instead, he channeled that irritation and energy into leaving the room, the door left wide open. Your loud whine went unheard until he returned with a plastic container that originally held his collected bug subjects. The spider had hardly moved still resting on one of the many things that came tumbling out of the closet.

He reached out to grab it and he heard you shudder and whimper behind him, no doubt flailing your hands in disgust at how he was just touching the spider so casually. It was always cute how you were such a big baby over him touching bugs.

With the spider contained he exited the room again, and like a child afraid of the monsters under their bed, you stayed perched on the bed until he returned.

“There, the little spider is gone.”

“That was not little…” you hiss lowly.

Jax chuckles but it’s strained, it’s easy to see your words are still eating at him.

You glance at the closet before looking over your boyfriend, tending to him trumps over the unimportant messy closet. “H-hey.. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that, I was scared and angry and—”

“It’s fine, angel.”

“Not it’s not!” You finally climb off the bed and step closer to him, this wasn’t gonna be brushed off so easily.

Jax pinches the bridge of his nose before exhaling, of course, you aren’t going to make this easy on him. Christ he’d prefer to pretend this whole thing didn’t happen but no, you want to talk it out, make him vulnerable, and shit.

“I was scared and angry, scared because I hate…hate…spiders. Angry because you weren’t taking it seriously,” Jax scoffs. “You were laughing Jax, don’t give me that look.” At that, he at least has the decency to look a tad guilty.

“I wasn’t gonna let it near ya let alone hurt ya.”

“I…I know that…” Christ this is awkward, neither of you was good at this sort of thing. “Look, I am sorry about what I said. Bringing her into this wasn’t fair, you know I don’t like her like that. It was unfair of me to bring her up like that when I know how you feel about it, about her.”

On the outside Jax was playful with everyone, but on the inside, you knew he’d throw Ragatha off a cliff if he could—well he could but, never mind.

Jax gradually relaxed, at least enough to let his shoulders drop, watching you suffer and struggle through apologizing was reward enough. Looks like he wasn’t the only one shit at this whole thing.

“Look, we both suck at this whole thing so why don’t we just..” He groans and rubs his face before getting on his knee to be closer to you. “I’m sorry for being a jerk, and you’re sorry for bringing her up. We can leave it at that, capiche?”

Your eyes cross in momentary annoyance and it causes Jax to snort, which in turn gets a smile out of you. Of course, he wants to be blunt and get this over with. “Capiche, but,” he rolls his eyes and you take his face in your hands before he can pull away. “But, I want it said that I would never, leave you for her. I had no plans of leaving you at all, period.”

And he knows this, he knows but she still gets on his nerves. You belong to him, possessive behaviour be dammed. Sides, you liked it. You'd even told him so once when he’d gone off on someone in the past for trying to make a hard move on you. Not that that sucker was a problem anymore.

“Alright, I get it, enough mushy shit. Sides, ya too soft to use my methods against me like that, or anyone for that matter.” Jax stands despite your protests and pulls you to his chest in a hug that shuts you right up.

The two of you stand in silence holding one another, your face happily buried into his chest, his arms loosely wrapped around your waist. It’s calming and sweet after everything that happened until it’s not.

A scream echos through the hall and you can’t help but flinch, Jax’s gives you a gentle squeeze before grinning down at you. “Welp looks like Pomni found the gift I left her.”

Oh, that poor girl. She’s on her own with that spider though, fuck going a round two with that thing.

[brucewaynehater101]

I miss the feeling I had when I first joined this fandom, I knew virtually nothing so everything was correct and I loved everything, even if that stuff just isn’t true, i was like

Bruce is a bit emotionally constipated but loves his kids? Hell yeah sounds legit

dick is a silly happy flippy man who is a bit promiscuous? Love that for him

Jason is a mega feminist literature nerd who is also buff and takes care of the street kids? Perfect man honest

Tim is a nerd who never sleeps and is queer and has never known the touch of a man nor woman? Sweet

Steph is waffle obsessed goofball? Well I prefer pancakes but right on

Cass is a mute badass who loves her fam? I love her

Duke is a normal dude? Well someone has to be and he seems neat

Alfred can do no wrong? Aight, I love old perfect tea men

Damian is a little prick? So are all middle schoolers give him time

But then I had to go learn about the characters and now I have complex opinions about them, and can see the inherent racism and sexism in how they are portrayed

You know before I joined the bat fandom I did not use the exclude tag in ao3? Like tmnt and dp have some bad stuff but usually I could just scroll past.

but now I am having to avoid fics where whole ass adults are bullying and/or oversexulizing a child

Im constantly on the look out for untagged batcwst

I struggle to find fics that don’t describe dicks ass

I have been in this fandom for probably about two years now and y’all I swear

sorry for ranting, and don’t worry I love all your stuff and I know the just back click don’t leave mean comments rule

I’m just tried bc most of the stuff I thought was true turned out to be false

Mm. I do find it a little exhausting trying to navigate the lines of what's canon, what shouldn't be canon (but is due to racism/sexism/homophobia/etc.), and just having fun.

I'm also trying to cultivate the mindset of what I've seen on Tumblr about not policing other people's ships/ideas. I am highly uncomfortable with some (particularly underaged people and adults dating), but I'm also not leaving hate comments. Like you said, the backspace exists for a reason.

Idk. There's a toooon of takes/ideas about the batfam that are inherently false, but as long as they aren't racist/sexist/etc takes, I don't see the harm in them. So what if someone wants a coffee obsessed Tim? So what if Jason's kill code is very strict? As long as they don't claim it's canon, let them be

But yeah. I have a mile long exclude list for fics on AO3. I used to use it only for triggers (I can not do stockhold syndrome, my lords), but now it's got other weird ass shit I've stumbled upon (I saw a fic where the batkids were spanked as punishment??? Like I said, not gonna leave hate comments or single anyone out. Just not my cup of tea).

I also am usually not a fan of romance/sex. It's why the batfam intrigued me so much (found families usually don't have that in it). I like exploring dynamics outside of romance and thus love the batfam. They've got so much going on that romance/sex is not needed. They are such a mess without that dynamic being added (talking about the Bats getting with a third party, but, again, trying not to yuck anyone's yum).

However, I agree. There's a ton of misinformation within fandom. I like how complex canon gets with the characters, but there's also widely different takes with them (mostly talking about Bruce here. He can either be trying or just a straight up horrible dad).

[yudgefudge]

What Saudi Arabia is currently doing is sportswashing, and it is NOT okay.

Sportswashing is a term used to describe the practice of individuals, groups, corporations, or governments using sports to improve reputations tarnished by wrongdoing. [wikipedia]

By signing multiple [washed] players for their league and not producing any young "talent" all they're doing is drawing attention away from their own nationals and trying to fit in already popular footballers. They want you to watch the Saudi league without thinking of Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia, along with basically the rest of the middle east has committed multiple human rights violations in terms of migrant workers, sexism, racism, homophobia, transphobia, the list goes on. And they get away with a lot of it because they are viewed as "unflinching" religious states - the same unflinching state that bent their own Islamic law just so Ronaldo could play for them, reportedly - and get conservative backing. But when the left (or to be honest, decent human beings) try and criticize them and bring these things to light, they disguise them through participating in sports events. I'm only familiar with the [recent] football examples of this:

Manchester City & Newcastle being [majorly] owned by Emirati and Saudi GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS. Newcastle is literally DIRECTLY OWNED by the Saudi government through their treasury jesus

PSG literally being fucking owned by Qatar???

The 2022 World Cup being held in Qatar (Saudi also bid on the 2023 Women's WC as well but lost)

And obviously, Saudi Arabia beginning to push its own football league by signing (poaching) multiple players and not fostering any of their own talent.

Human right violations are not Muslim doctrine.

By playing for, and promoting, the Saudi league, you are either saying you don't care about the human right violations going on in the region, or you agree with them.

Every player is part of the problem. Including that one you like.

In these trying times, let's not lose the plot. I've seen people on Twitter, Instagram and even on here try and spin Saudi league criticism into some sort of islamophobia thing when that's as far from the point as you could get. It is anti-Muslim to commit the violations that are currently going on in the middle East.

Just had to remind you all.

Read more abt sportswashing on the wikipedia article and its attached sources

[barleyo]

Red Wings.

Recom! Miles Quaritch X Fem! Reader (smut)

A/N: Hello, lovelies! This drabble is a big “Don’t like? Don’t read!” situation. Be sure to read the tags to be sure it doesn’t involve anything that makes you uncomfortable, and if it does, feel free to scroll right past this! No need to comment on the post if you don’t like the subject matter, as it’s never okay to “yuck” somebody else’s “yum.” Remember, by clicking on the "read more" button, you're agreeing that you do in fact want to "read more." Love you all bunches, happy reading!

Wordcount: 1.3K

Tags: period sex, blood play, menstruation, p in v, fingering, vaginal sex, wet and messy sex, sleepy sex

Tagged users: @drinking-tea-and-be-obsessed

(Y/N) felt herself sweating. Even while half-asleep, she could feel how drenched her arms, legs, and face were. It wasn’t the work of the warm body next to her, and certainly not any of the few articles of clothing she had worn to bed. Sweat drenched the sheets under her, coating her ass and thighs in an unpleasant stickiness. 

The soaked clothing and sheets were not just from sweat, she realized as a tight cramp made its way to her abdomen. 

Normally, it would not have been a problem. Had she been sleeping alone in her own room, she could have simply stripped the bed and washed herself up, however, she could not do so in Colonel Quaritch’s room. 

Trying to slip out of his toned, blue arms, she squirmed and pushed at his hands. 

“Miles,” she whispered his name, smacking at his hand to wake him up. She felt a chuckle hitch in his throat. “Miles, I know you’re up. Let go of me.”

“Hush, girl. Go back to bed. Wakin’ me up for no reason.” He yawned and tightened his grip.

“Miles, let go. I bled on your sheets.”

Quaritch released her from his grip and sat up, lifting the blankets up to reveal the fresh, crimson stains on his white sheets. 

(Y/N) stared at the large, splotchy stain. Quickly removing her shirt, she tried to dab at the mark until Miles took the shirt from her hands. 

“Don’t worry about it, it’s okay–”

“No, it’s not okay,” she sighed, holding her arms over her stomach. “Look at the stain, it’s never gonna come out.” Holding the thin material of the sheet, she noticed how her blood had seeped down to the mattress, staining it as well. “It’s never gonna come out,” (Y/N) repeated. Tears pricked her eyes and she coughed, trying to catch her breath as she felt her chest tighten. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to.”

Quaritch turned on a small wall lamp near his bed and eyed the discoloration on his bed. He paused for a moment before speaking. 

“The hell are you apologizing for?” his tone was blunt when he asked. 

“The mess, the mess I made.” She pointed at it. “See? It’s awful, I am so sorry. Here, I’ll just go to my own room, sorry.” She flipped herself around on his bed and tried to get up, prepared to return to her own bed to get cleaned up. 

She felt his grip wrap around her waist and hoist her back, placing her body in between his legs.

“No, I want you to stay, n’ I want you to stop apologizin’ for nothing,” Quartich said while resting his large hands over her lower stomach, slowly kneading and massaging it.

“You aren’t upset with me?” (Y/N) asked, leaning her head against Miles’ chest, not quite tall enough to reach his shoulder. 

“It’s nothin’ that you can control, could never be mad at you for that.”

She sat between his legs for a few moments, enjoying how the pads of his fingers danced around her lower abdomen, applying pressure where it was needed. It felt nice, but it had not eased her cramps fully. She hissed at the stinging jabs in her stomach every then and again. 

Quaritch’s hands slowly crept down past the waistband of her panties, dipping under them before (Y/N) grabbed his wrist. 

“Miles, what are you doing?” She turned around and looked at him, eyes still doey and glossy from the few tears that had slipped out earlier. 

“Just trying to make you feel better.”

“No, you don’t want to do that,” she tried to pull her hand out of her panties, “it’s all gross and messy, you won’t like it.”

“Nothin’ about you is gross, believe me.” He shook her hand off and returned to exploring her cunt.

She tried again to fight him on it until his fingers found her clit. “No, it’s icky–” her voice caught in her throat as if her words were fighting against her moans.

“Darlin’, you need to hush now and let me take care of you. You can get washed up as soon as we’re done, yeah?”

Biting her bottom lip to stifle her cries, she nodded, unable to verbally respond.

A thick, metallic smell filled his sensitive nostrils when he pulled her underwear past her ankles, throwing them into the corner of his room. His nose crinkled as he sniffed harder, leaning over (Y/N)’s shoulder to get a better grasp at the scent. 

“Are you smelling me?” she asked, horrified. 

“Yes. You smell…” he paused, considering his word choice, “primal.”

“What does that even mean?”

“Y’smell like prey. Dunno how to describe it, but it’s drivin’ me fuckin’ crazy over here,” he said into her ear, nose still twitching and crinkling. His boxers grew tight and tented. 

Pushing into her slick hole, he slipped right in, letting his fingers be engulfed by her cunt. Reaching around with his other hand, he circled her swollen clit, lightly tracing the bud. 

“Oh God, don’t stop,” she whined, hips lifting to follow Quaritch’s ghost-like touches on her clit.

He hummed and applied more pressure. Usually, he would’ve pulled away completely to tease her. Not tonight. Tonight was about her pleasure. 

Miles’ fingers continued to pump in and out of her, setting a steady pace to match the bucking of her hips, until he pushed his two digits as far as they would go, curling them and latching onto her sensitive spot. 

“Ah–” her thighs clenched over his hand and trapped it while she rode out her climax, hips stuttering and rocking into his arm. 

Her thighs relaxed and Miles put his fingers into his mouth, cleaning them off with his tongue. He pulled them out of his mouth with an obnoxiously loud pop.

“What? Did you really just do that?

“Yes I did.” He pulled her up lightly and slipped his cock into her. “Problem?” He barely had to push into her walls. She was slippery, and was able to fit most of his length with no problem, the stretch of his length being less noticeable than usual.

“God, you’re so gross,” (Y/N) tried to say disgustedly, but her tone was interrupted by a deep, grumbling moan that came from her chest. 

“Yeah? Maybe a lil bit,” Miles chuckled, burying his face into (Y/N)’s neck.

Holding her hips, he slowly lifted her and brought her back down on his length. The still bloodied tips of his fingers left red marks across her thighs and hips and he moved her, and the movement left a sheer crimson tint coated over his dick. 

“You know,” he said into her neck, muffled, “I can hardly tell if you’re bleedin’ a lot or just super fuckin’ wet. Starting to think it’s both, baby.”

She ignored his teasing and instead focused on how dangerously close she was coming to climaxing. Her walls fluttered lightly over him and she knew he noticed by how his breath hitched when it happened. 

“Gonna cum? Hm?”

“Yes, ‘m so close,” she said, holding one of the arms resting on her hip to steady herself. “Can I?”

“Don’t gotta ask tonight, baby. When you’re ready, you go ahead,” Quaritch groaned, baring his teeth as he felt his own orgasm approach. 

(Y/N) clamped down on him like a vice, holding him in place as she gushed and leaked. He found himself feeling much the same when spurts of cum came out of his cock.

A light pink mixture dripped from her hole, gliding down her thighs and onto the bed spread when Quaritch laid her back down on her side.

Her cramps had faded a bit, and while she was twice as sweaty as she had been, she felt like she could fall back asleep. 

“You really weren’t grossed out by it?” she asked again, still feeling self conscious. 

Miles turned her around to face him, a serious look spreading over his face.

“Not at all. Hell, I’d lick your pretty, little, red cunt now if you wanted me to.”

“You’re so fuckin’ nasty, Miles Quaritch.” She threw her pillow at his face, turning back away from him, but snuggling back into his chest. “I love you, though.”

[the-bar-sinister]

I wasn't going to say anything, because I don't want to upset anyone, and I believe that everyone has the right to their own opinions and headcanons, queer or otherwise. 

But at this point it's unavoidable.

The sheer prevalence of the "trans Apollo Justice" headcanon trend, and the way in which some of the fandom treat the idea and interact it with it is uncomfortable.

Speaking as a trans man, the way I see Apollo Justice presented in fandom as trans is deeply uncomfortable.

It's uncomfortable because the "evidence" people use for this headcanon is all deeply emasculating stereotypes about trans men, and reflective of the insecurities that trans men have. 

Saying that "Apollo could be trans" because he's short, small, unconfident, and has to work hard to be loud and be heard is reflective of negative stereotypes of trans men that many trans men feel uncomfortable, ashamed and like they'll never be seen as men.

Likewise, a lot of the way that people talk casually about trans Apollo Justice is anything but affirming of his masculinity. It's again emasculating– it's humiliating. It's all uwu soft bean, tboy swag, twink, so small so precious. It's not affirming of his gender.

There are 355 works on AO3 tagged with "trans apollo justice". Out of those works, 155– fully half of them– are tagged as explicit. They're about, or contain, explicit sex. This is not a bad thing. 

However, a quick glance at the last 2 pages or so "trans apollo justice" fics? They're all "vaginal sex" "breeding", "breast fucking", "cunnilingus".

I'm not one to cry "fetishization" but this feels like fetishization. 

Do you think I could find a fic where Apollo uses a strap on someone else if I tried? 

This doesn't feel gender affirming. 

This feels uncomfortable.

And I raise this point not to yuck anyone's yum. 

But it's becoming unavoidable. I have the tag "trans apollo justice" blocked on tumblr, and I still see uncomfortable posts about it because people don't tag it.

I'm not saying anyone has to stop headcanoning Apollo as trans.

But I hope you'll take another look at why you feel that way, how you're talking about Apollo and his masculinity, and why all of that might make some trans men uncomfortable.

[littlefingies]

I tried again reading a really sympathetic Izzy fic (well, not on purpose, it came at me like SURPRISE in the last act of a fic where he hadn't even been onscreen before) and nope. Can't do it. I gave it a solid try, and the author gave it a solid attempt. But he just turns my stomach. Any characterization where he really cares about Ed actually, or Ed needs to be managed actually, or they have a really positive backstory actually... it just never rings true to me.

And I truly don't mean this as a judgement, I'm not one to yuck someone else's yum. I think I just... engage with fandom differently. I can never leave canon that far behind. Give me bonkers AU's and monsterfucking and whatever, I love it, but the character beats need to ring true or it just doesn't hit for me.

I know there are people out there who engage so hard with fanon that they feel weird going back to canon, and that's definitely a way to do it. But like. For me.

Any super sympathetic Izzy that shows up in a fic just feels like some made up guy.

If you care about him so much, why are you manipulating him?

If you're not a bigoted prick and it's all about classism for you, why did you work with Chauncey fucking Badminton?

If you're really a super competent sailor why don't you care about like. Clouds. The weather.

It just seems like so much work to make him likeable, and for me, it's just not worth the effort.

And also it would be great if they'd put that shit in the tags so I'm not feeling vaguely nauseated all through act 3.

[sensitively-taken]

what's with your kisses? — park sunghoon

synopsis. Park Sunghoon has never had much time or even a slight care for dating, romance, love, or anything of that sort. so, when you kiss him at a rowdy party one night, as his first kiss ever, he’s surprised to find that he wants more. what he thought was going to be a one-time thing, he finds evolving into something he never wants to end—even if you two aren’t meant to be more than a summer fling.

pairing. park sunghoon x gender-neutral!reader ft. jake sim

genres. fluff, strangers to lovers au, summer (fling) au

warnings. underage drinking & all that implies! please let me know if i've missed any :)

word count. 10.7k (10737)

taglist. @soobin-chois @my5colors @kflixnet @jaeyunverse @heejojo @tbzloonar @odxrilove @aizzon

listen to! strangers, sigrid ⭑ i'll be down, talia goddess ⭑ lovestained, hope tala ⭑ yuck, charli xcx ⭑ feature me, flo ⭑ summer's over, tv girl ft. jordana ⭑ yellow cab, dpr live (click on the listen to for the spotify playlist, which i recommend listening to unshuffled)

notes. ermmm..... after more than a year and (almost) radio silence on this blog, here she is!! i'm rlly sorry ab how long it took for me to post this (esp when it was sitting in my drafts for a whole year..) 😭😭 but SHE'S HERE and that's all that matters!! since this was originally an entry for @/prettywon's soul symphonies collab, this song is based on yellow cab by dpr live, as you can probably tell by the title & playlist. i was rlly trying to reflect that boyish infatuation he's singing ab so if u cringe a bit i understand 😪 i did too tysm lola @ijhyo for beta reading this for me! (pls pardon me for tagging u a few hours late 🙏🏾) but enough rambling from me!! enjoy! ❤️

I – K is for Kiss

There was no such thing as the perfect first kiss.

Park Sunghoon, a nineteen-year-old boy who’d never been kissed, had accepted this fact long ago. A lucky few got to have their first kiss with their first love or a longtime crush, while a lot more people had embarrassing stories they’d share on drunken nights. He knew a first kiss wasn’t something out of a fairytale. But, he felt that, at the very least, he should have an adequate first kiss–preferably with someone he had some sort of feelings for.

So, he’d never predicted that he’d end up losing his lip virginity to a stranger at the summer party his best friend, Jake, was throwing.

Or that he’d like it. (Sunghoon wasn’t sure he could even admit that.)

He could admit this though: you were a good kisser. A very, very good kisser–at least, according to his standards. Even he–the nineteen-year-old who’d never even held hands with someone, let alone kissed someone–was able to realise you’d done this a dozen times before when you cupped his cheek–not aggressively, but softly, gently–whispered the question in his ear, and pulled him into a chaste, soft kiss as soon as he’d nodded awkwardly.

Then, moving your hand from his cheek to his neck and smirking slightly, you deepened the kiss.

That’s when he started wondering why he’d never done this before.

You didn’t move too fast, or too slow. It was almost like you knew exactly what he was thinking, what he was feeling, because the second it would start feeling a bit too much for him and his head would start swimming, you would pull back and rest your forehead against his. But, when he started missing the feel of your lips on his, your eyes would flicker to his, the question on the tip of your tongue, and lean in again.

He would never say it out loud, not to you or anyone else, but he was glad you’d taken the lead. Because with the way his hands were trembling to wrap themselves around your waist, and how he’d avoid your gaze every time you pulled back, he wasn’t so sure you two would’ve even been here if you’d left the initiating to him.

All of a sudden, you pulled back–the first time you didn’t do what he wanted–and Sunghoon chased your lips for a bit, cheeks reddening when he realised you weren’t leaning back in.

He stepped back, which was hard to do in a cramped shed but he managed and cleared his throat. Suddenly, he was very interested in inspecting the design of said shed. “Um… is something wrong? Did I, I don’t know, did I do something wrong?”

“No,” you smiled coyly and licked your lips (Sunghoon’s eyes may have flickered back up in time to catch the moment and linger on it), “the seven minutes are up.”

Oh. Right. That–a very silly round of seven minutes in heaven–was how he’d got here. Stuck in a shed. Kissing a complete, random stranger. Y’know, the daily, run-of-the-mill stuff for Sunghoon.

He nodded slowly, flicking away the few dark hairs that fell in front of his eyes. “Right, right. After you.”

“After you?” You laughed, a warm sound he found himself melting to (on the inside. On the outside, he was biting his lip so hard he could taste your chapstick on his tongue), “This whole time you haven’t done anything, but now you want to be a gentleman?”

His face reddened and he crossed his arms over his chest. “No one said gentlemen have to be good at kissing!”

“You do have a point, kind sir.” He rolled his eyes at your jab. “I’d just think it’d be much more gentlemanly of you to look me in the eyes, instead of, dunno, glaring at my lips.”

At this rate, Sunghoon was sure someone’s face couldn’t be as red as his was.

He made a point to look into your eyes for a good ten seconds, breath held, before looking at his flip flops and murmuring, “I wasn’t glaring… I think. Like, I’m not mad at your lips or anything.”

You laughed again, a deeper sound he was sure came from the depths of your heart, and with a small grin on his face, Sunghoon decided he liked the sound.

“I wasn’t saying you were mad.” You stepped closer to him and Sunghoon’s breath hitched. You reached out to him, and for a second Sunghoon thought you were going to cup his face and kiss him again–he wanted you to–but then you reached up and smoothed his eyebrows and the space between them. “Just relax these big boys a bit. They can get a day off glaring, don’t you think, cutie?”

You didn’t wait for a reply. Instead, you smiled and reached behind Sunghoon for the shed door, stepping out to hear a chorus of cheers from some other partygoers and leaving the boy dumbfounded and red.

It was only when Sunghoon moved to leave the shed that he realised he’d never caught your name.

II – I is for Infatuation

Sunghoon was not thinking about the kiss. Well. Kisses.

At least, that was what he toldhimself.

But, ever since he’d woken up at Jake’s place the morning after, with a head so heavy he wasn’t sure he could even lift it, it was the only thing on his mind.

First thing in the morning, when he couldn’t even remember what his name was, he thought about it. Late at night, hours past when he’d told himself he’d go to sleep, he thought about it. Even in his dreams, he couldn’t get the thought of you and your stupid lips out of his head. (Jake had called him obsessed, but he preferred to think of it as a little infatuation.)

He was sure he was going insane when he saw someone perusing the chapstick section in the grocery store and immediately thought of you, only for him to find out it was you when your hands landed on the same pack.

Sunghoon drew his hand back like he was stung, while you simply took the balm and murmured an apology without sparing him a glance.

He wasn’t sure whether to breathe a sigh of relief or disappointment. On one hand, it was you–the only person in the entire world who’d kissed Park Sunghoon on his very chapped, very dry lips (which was the reason he told himself he was in the lip balm section in the first place and not because he couldn’t get your lips out of his head). On the other hand, it was you–the only person in the entire world who’d kissed Park Sunghoon on his very chapped, very dry lips.

Sunghoon didn’t have much time to think about it though, because you suddenly looked back and raised your eyebrows at him.

He bit his lip in anticipation of what you were going to say, but he could’ve never imagined you’d say, “Nice jammies, cutie.”

Sunghoon was beginning to think you had a thing for embarrassing him, as his cheeks turned the shade of some of the chapsticks on display. He rubbed at the nape of his neck, murmuring, “Thanks, my grandma crocheted them for me.”

“Really?” Your eyes shone with actual interest, and Sunghoon’s blush spread across his cheeks. “Do you think you could send me her number or something? I’ve been trying to get the hang of crocheting recently, but it’s just not been working.”

“I would, totally, a hundred percent, but I don’t have your number yet, so…” He went silent, as he realised what he’d said and your eyebrows climbed further up your head.

Sunghoon wished the ground would open up. Pronto.

“Wow, cutie, I have to say, I’m kinda impressed.” You stretched out your hand, which made Sunghoon’s brows furrow, until you gestured for the phone in his pyjama pocket. “I never thought you’d be the type of gentleman to muster up the balls to ask for my number, but here we are.”

He groaned as he passed you his phone, a slight flush to his face. “Could we not rehash the whole gentleman bit? That was kinda embarrassing for me.”

“What?” You grinned, eyes flickering between his phone screen and him. “Do you mean the part where you didn’t know how to kiss back or the part where you stared at my lips the whole time after, cutie?”

If Sunghoon wasn’t sure before, he definitely was now. You had a thing for embarrassing him–and calling him cutie. He’d never admit it, but he was finding that he didn’t really seem to mind either.

He avoided your gaze and toyed with the hem of his sweater, the ghost of a smile on his lips. “Um, both?”

“’ Kay, got it.” You passed his phone back to him and watched him redden at what you’d saved yourself as.

“Couldn’t your name have sufficed? Why did you—” he groaned and buried his face behind his hands, his voice coming through as muffled— “Why did you have to save yourself as ‘seven minutes hottie?’ Isn’t that too conceited of you... and corny?”

You shrugged. “It’s not wrong, is it?”

Even though you couldn’t see his face redden, he figured you’d imagined it as you let out a small snort. “What? Are you gonna tell me I’m not hot?”

“... No,” came his reluctant reply, as he finally removed his hands from his face and went to change your contact name to your actual name, only to remember he’d never got it. “Ah, wait, what’s your name?”

“My name?” You hummed quietly, like you were considering something, and Sunghoon felt a certain type of anticipation grow in his stomach. “If I tell you my name, do I get a kiss, cutie?”

He scoffed, though he could still feel some blood rush to his cheeks. You were really something. “I thought you said I was a bad kisser.”

“Uh-uh,” you corrected, leaning in slowly, “I said you don’t know how to kiss. But, once you do, well… who knows?”

For the second time in a week, Sunghoon felt the distance between you two close and desperately wished you were going to kiss him. Yes, he was in a grocery store and yes, anyone could walk past at any moment, but when you leaned in so close to him–with your soft lips pursed and your eyes staring into his soul–he couldn’t help but fall victim to the pull you had on him. He was weak–so weak–to you.

But, just like before, you didn’t.

You simply brushed his bed hair out of his face and snorted a bit at his spaced-out expression, before stepping back into a space where Sunghoon could finally breathe and think of something else other than your lips on his.

“Yeah,” he murmured, so low that you had to lean back in to hear him.

Sunghoon had always thought of himself as a reasonable, patient person. He knew if he wanted quality things in his life, he’d have to get used to waiting often–at least, that’s what his parents had taught him. But, every time you came into his orbit, his usually thick line of patience wore thin with a simple glance or smile from you.

What were you doing to him?

“Sorry,” your tongue flicked back over your lips, “what was that?”

His line snapped.

“Yeah, you do get a kiss.”

And the words were gone before he could take them back. But, blood rushing in his ears and heart pounding out of his chest, Sunghoon found he didn’t want to take them back–even though, in the back of his mind, part of him was blushing and squirming at his wording.

“Oh?” you said, looking straight into his eyes–unwavering, for once. A certain tension filled the air, as you two stared at each other for a moment, the night of the party probably replaying in both your heads. Careful not to disturb the atmosphere between you two, you whispered, “_____. My name’s _____.”

The tension wasn’t cut, but simply deflated like a balloon as Sunghoon let out a long breath, cheeks painted a dark red, and asked, “But not here, right? I’m not saying we’re doing anything too scandalous, but my mum’s good friends with the manager here, so… Yeah. I kinda, um–maybe I, maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.”

There was a moment of silence, as you stared incredulously at the blushing boy, before you burst out into full-fledged laughter. You hugged your sides a bit and smiled so wide that any passerby would’ve thought Sunghoon was a comedic genius.

Before he could get the wrong idea, you cupped Sunghoon’s face and said, “You’re just too cute, cutie.”

And he smiled a little, slowly as his eyes traced your face, his brows finally relaxed.

You wiped an imaginary tear from your eye, sobering up, and asked, “So. Where's your car?”

III – S is for Scrapbook

You and Sunghoon had ended up kissing in his car.

When he’d told Jake about it later, he’d said you guys had made out–to embarrass Sunghoon, he assumed–but the kisses had been soft and chaste, where you’d been more focused on getting Sunghoon to reciprocate than just kissing him. He had, albeit slowly, and by the time he’d dropped you off at your house, he was able to proudly say that he had initiated a kiss between you two.

It had built his confidence incredibly, being able to say that he’d kissed you and not the other way around–not that he was saying it to anyone, besides Jake really–so much so that he’d texted you just a few minutes after he’d gotten home. He’d panicked then, wondering if you’d think it weird he’d texted you so quickly, but you’d responded just as fast that his nerves had calmed and he’d found himself laughing at your texts.

While talking to you face to face was something he didn’t think he’d ever get used to, texting you was something he could do with ease–well, somewhat.

In the late afternoons, when he woke up with messy bed hair and mucus still in his eyes, he’d check his phone to see if you’d sent anything–which you almost always had. Whether it was a quick picture of something you'd seen on a walk, your poor attempts at making breakfast, or even just a morning selfie.

On some days, he’d feel too flustered and musty to send anything in return–Like, what if you realised he was wearing the same shirt he’d sent a picture in yesterday?—and on others, he had to shut off his phone to take deep breaths after sending something as simple as him brushing his teeth.

Okay, so he was still struggling to talk to you, but at least he didn’t stutter over text and go red every few seconds.

With his awkwardness out of the way, he could actually learn things about you. Like your favourite colour, your favourite spots in town, and your hobbies. He even learned you liked to scrapbook and every summer, you’d make a scrapbook of all your highlights. Polaroids, film stills, movie tickets, coupons, and more would go into the scrapbook and at the end of summer, you’d post little snippets on it on your Instagram page. He’d told you it was cute and jokingly asked if he’d be featured in this summer’s scrapbook, to which you’d responded with ‘we’d have to go out for u to be included wouldnt we?’

Which is what led to this moment. He had thought you were joking about the whole going out thing because it’d been late at night and you two had just been talking about the trips you’d been going on with your families in the next couple of days, but then the next morning–that morning–you’d sent two tickets to a film showing that evening–this evening. Right now–and a short, little ‘wanna go see this? my scrapbook’s feeling a little hoon-less rn :(’.

Evidently, he hadn’t said no, because he was now parked outside your house, trying to calm himself down as he waited for you to come out.

His hands were sweating a bit, and he kept checking his reflection in his rearview mirror, anxiously biting his lower lip and running a hand through his hair. Surprisingly, it wasn’t even the fact that he was going to see you that was stressing him out, it was more the fact that he didn’t know what this was. Were you guys just going out to see a late-night movie as friends? Was it a date? Should he have shown up with flowers or a gift? Were you guys just friends? Were you something more? Did you always ask your friends to see movies late at night so impromptu? Did he even see you as more than a friend?

All the questions made his head swim and his palms sweat, but he couldn’t stop thinking about them. He hadn’t been thinking of this the few weeks you guys had been texting, but now he felt like a broken record, gaze bouncing between his reflection and your house.

And then all his thoughts slowed to a stop.

You walked out of your house with a slight smile and a twinkle in your eye, and his brain turned to mush. You looked… good. That was all he was capable of thinking, as you walked the short distance to his car, waving, and slid into the passenger seat.

Sunghoon stared at you for a second, as you put on your seatbelt and said hi, his mind completely blank. Then, your touch on his shoulder and a furrow between your brows brought him back to the present and he spat out a jumbled mess of, “Good, yeah, yeah. I’m good, you’re good, so good.”

It was your turn to stare, confusion clear in your eyes, and panic rose within him.

“Wait, I mean you look good!” he said, gesturing at you, “I mean, not that you don’t look good all the time, but, like, you look really good right now. Like, wow, I–I should stop talking.”

You blinked at him for a second and then laughed that same laugh that melted his insides. He noticed, as you threw your head back slightly, that you hadn’t removed your hand from his shoulder, and Sunghoon found himself relishing your touch.

“Stop it, cutie, you’re gonna make me blush,” you said playfully, rolling your eyes and hitting his chest lightly. You sobered up slightly, but the smile was still wide on your face as you said, “You look good, too. Very suave, very cool. I can’t lie though, I miss the bedhead and your grandma’s sweater a bit.”

With your easy words lightening the mood, he found himself relaxing a bit–enough to pull away from the curb and start driving. “Really? Maybe I’ll wear it next time.”

You didn’t blink at his mention of a next time, though Sunghoon searched your face for any sign of discomfort or surprise. Instead, your smile grew slightly and you asked, “What type of date are you thinking? Like, an early morning IHOP or Waffle House thing? Or, more of an early-morning pancake date at home?”

If it weren’t for the fact that he’d stopped at a red light, Sunghoon was sure he would’ve crashed his car right at that moment. He gulped loudly and spared your expectant eyes a glance, as he could feel his blood rush in his ears and hear his heart pound out of his chest.

The light turned green and he cleared his throat. “Uh, so, does that mean this is a date?”

He was glad he couldn’t see your reaction to his question–you probably thought he was silly–but was also nervous because you went quiet for a  bit. Sunghoon considered turning on the radio and moving on from the topic, if that could dispel the momentary awkwardness between you two, but he wanted to hear your answer.

You laughed slightly, but he could hear the nervous undertones. “Do you not want it to be one? I’m sorry, I just assumed because, well, we kissed at the party and we’ve been talking and stuff since then, so… I thought you were more of a dating type of guy, but–”

“Wait, what?” he interrupted, a crease in his forehead as he spared you a glance. Something within him shattered at the sight of the uncertainty on your face. Had he done that? “What other type of guy would I be?”

“Well, you know…” You paused, shifting slightly in your seat. “There are some guys that just wanna have fun. Mess around, you know? I didn’t think you were one of those guys, but if that’s what you wanna do, then–”

“No,” he said fiercely, only realising how angry he sounded when you glanced at him in surprise. “I want to date you. I really do. I just… I thought you didn’t and I didn’t know if we were just friends, and I’ve never done this before so, I just–”

“You’ve never done this before?” you cut him off, visible shock in your eyes. “There’s no way, Hoon. You’re joking, right?”

And with that, the awkwardness dissipated, as his cheeks flamed and he avoided your wide eyes.

“I know, it’s weird–”

“No, no!” You smiled a bit at his flustered state. “It’s not weird. I’ve only dated once before and, even then, it wasn’t that serious, so we’re kind of in the same boat.”

It was his turn to glance at you with incredulous eyes. “Wait, really? I thought you had so much dating experience cause, like, you’re such a good kisser and you’re so confident and forward, y’know?”

You shrugged. “Like I said, some guys just wanna mess around. Sometimes, I do too.”

“And that’s not what you want with me, right? You actually want to date, right?” You’d already told him you considered this a date, and he’d already told you he wanted to date you–which you hadn’t objected to–but he just had to make sure that was real, and his mind hadn’t made that up.

“Yeah, Hoon,” you started softly, a shy smile on your lips–something he thought he’d never see on you.  “I actually want to date you.”

Immediately, his eyes flickered back to the road and his cheeks flushed, a wide grin slowly stretching on his lips. You laughed at his smile, loud and warm, and he closed his eyes in bliss and only opened them again to smile at you.

“So, this is a date? For sure?” he asked, one hand on the wheel and the other on the console as he flickered through the channels for a song.

“Mhm,” you hummed, your hand brushing his as you turned up the volume on a specific channel, smiling at the way his flush deepened. You held his hand, intertwining your fingers with his, and nodded. “This is a date.”

Sunghoon couldn’t even remember why he’d been so nervous, and why his palms–one of which was currently touching yours–had been so sweaty, as he gazed into your eyes and leaned in for a chaste kiss. He smiled into it and rolled his eyes to himself, all of his questions answered. Especially the one he’d been too worried to even ask himself.

If he’d had any doubt about it before, he was sure of it now.

He liked you. Maybe even too much for a summer fling.

IV – S is for Sorry

Over the next few days, Sunghoon found himself wishing you guys were more than just a summer fling.

It was wistful thinking, he knew that already. Just a few months prior, you guys hadn’t even been aware of the other's existence. Now, to him, it felt like you took up every inch of his thoughts, dreams, and being. And, in just a couple of weeks, you’d be off to your respective universities, leaving the short fling between you just that–a short, summer fling.

You two were avoiding talking about it, despite the palpable tension it added to your conversations when you brought up the future. You would mention how you were going to look into photography courses at your uni on a video call and Sunghoon would smile outwardly, while inwardly he’d wonder if you’d find someone else to call your muse–as he’d gotten used to you calling him.

He would mention how he was going to do a double major since he wasn’t completely sure what he wanted to do, and he’d notice the way you’d bite your lip like you were stopping yourself from asking him where. And, just now, moments ago on your video call, you had mentioned how you wanted to go on another date with him after you both got back from your hometowns, but before… (well, you hadn’t continued but he knew you meant before you two had to part.)

He knew you two were only prolonging your pain, and he was only wounding himself deeper by thinking so wistfully, but you two were happy at this exact moment. And, it wasn’t enough, but he’d make it be enough if that was what you two needed.

At least, that’s what he’d been thinking till his sister barged into his childhood room and said his grandma wanted to see him.

Now, legs tucked under himself and head lowered, Sunghoon sat opposite her, with a long table between them, and a tense silence filled the room.

He wasn’t sure what his grandma “seeing him” meant. She wasn’t very old, just in her early sixties, but she was a calm, wise woman who’d lived to see and experience a lot, so she may as well have had the wisdom of someone a century old. If she wanted to “see him,” that most likely meant she had a piece of advice for him that he wouldn’t like.

For once, he was right.

“So, your mum told me you’ve been seeing someone?”

Sunghoon coughed abruptly, patting his chest as a deep flush flooded his cheeks. “I’m sorry?”

“Sorry?” Sunghoon’s grandma scoffed and eyed him slowly. “What are you sorry for? Not calling to consult me first? Or, for trying to hide it from me? Or, is there something else, hm?”

He raised his eyes to meet his grandma’s eyes, but immediately lowered them at the fierce scowl on her face. He bowed deeply, palms flat before him. “I’m sorry, Grandma.”

She eyed his form for a second, before scoffing again and gesturing toward him. “Sit, sit. I didn’t call you here to hear you apologise all day.”

Sunghoon sat again and raised his head but still didn’t look his grandma in the eye. His mind was too preoccupied with wondering how his mum had figured it out, considering you guys had gone on your first date just a couple of days ago.

He jolted a bit when his grandma asked, “You’re not going to ask me why I called you?”

“Sorry,” he began and cleared his throat at his grandma’s glare.  “Why did you call me, Grandma?”

She continued eyeing him with the same, wary gaze she’d been eyeing him with since he’d entered her room for a few moments, before she suddenly became sombre. Without the glint in her eyes, Sunghoon could see how deep the pools in her eyes were and the lines surrounding them. He released a breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding.

“Well, what’s your plan? Hm?” Her eyes bore deep into his like her question was just a formality and she already knew the answer. Sunghoon wouldn’t be surprised if she already did. “Are you two going to be a campus couple?”

He knew her question was mostly rhetorical, but he couldn’t help but imagine it. Walking you to and from lectures; studying together in a library or a cosy coffee shop; going to endless parties with you; proofreading each other’s papers; you wearing his clothes in his dorm. Sunghoon felt himself grow warm.

Then, even warmer as his grandma cleared her throat and raised a knowing brow in his direction. She didn’t have to say anything for him to realise she was expecting an answer.

“I…” He faltered for a moment, remembering the hesitancy in your eyes every time a hint of the topic was brought up. “I don’t know, Grandma. I… well, there’s nothing I can really do, I guess. We’re probably not even going to the same universities, so I don’t know what the plan is.”

“Have you guys talked about it?”

A pause settled between the two of them, as Sunghoon lowered his eyes again and prepared himself to bow again.

His grandma scoffed, the loudest of all her scoffs so far, and sighed exasperatedly. “You two haven’t even discussed anything? And you’re here talking like you’re some handsome lead in a drama and _____’s life will be in danger if you two continue dating?”

“Ah, Grandma, are you saying I’m not hands–Wait, wait? How do you know _____’s name?”

She paused slightly and carefully schooled her features. “Is that important right now?”

“I mean,” Sunghoon’s brows furrowed, then he remembered your touch against them and he relaxed them a bit, “considering that I’ve never told Mum _____’s name or even the fact that we’ve been on one date, yes? Kinda?”

“I’m your grandma, am I not?” was her only response, with the ghost of a smile on her lips. He grimaced slightly, but his grandma continued without any regard for his reaction. “I know you guys are kids, but you didn’t even think of discussing anything? You were just going to kiss and say ‘bye bye’ and continue with your lives?”

“I mean,” Sunghoon started, trying to fight the blush climbing up his body. There wasn’t any point, though, because the apples of his cheeks were already shining. “_____’s not even my partner or anything, so it isn’t my place…”

“But isn’t that the end goal?”

His grandma stared at him, but he couldn’t hold the weight of her stare. Because deep down inside, Sunghoon knew she was right. And he knew he wanted nothing more than to be able to be called yours.

To see more pictures of the scenery from your morning walks and even join you on them too. To cuddle up in bed and watch some of your favourite animes together, only pausing to snuggle further into the blanket. To finally go on that early morning date at a Waffle House, eating your orders in his car where his passenger seat would be perfectly adjusted to seat you. To have a home, a space, with you.

But, he thought. There was always a ‘but’.

Before, that ‘but’ had been that he wasn’t even sure if that was what you wanted as well, if he even really wanted it. Now, that ‘but’ was the inevitable space and distance that would grow between you two. The space that would grow so large that you two wouldn’t be able to have any space for each other.

Sunghoon’s stomach sank as his thoughts spiralled, but he summed them up to his grandma with a simple shrug.

“Why are you, why are you so dramatic?” she asked, rolling her eyes at her grandson’s face. A fierce scowl was back on her face and, if it weren’t for the table between the two of them, she looked like she was about ready to pull on Sunghoon’s ear. “Why are you sitting here in my house moping and frowning like everything’s decided? Who knows? Maybe _____ is willing to make it work, to even travel to another city just to see you and your dramatic self. But how would you know when you’re busy here moping?”

He’d considered it. Judging from the talks you’d had and the sheer amount of hours you talked every day, Sunghoon was sure that you liked him as well (not as much as he did, he was sure–that wasn’t even remotely possible when he could barely get you off his mind–but enough to deal with his “dramatic self,” as his grandma had put it). But, there it was again, he just couldn’t get rid of that ‘but.’ It was festering in the back of his mind whenever he even thought of bringing it up to you.

“Sunghoon.” There was a note of finality in his grandma’s voice as she said his name. “Discuss things with _____ first. I understand sometimes we experience heartbreak, but I won’t let you break your own heart over foolishness.”

“But Grandma–”

“No ‘buts.’” His grandma folded her arms in her lap and glanced at the door of her room. “No more ‘buts’, Sunghoon.”

Despite the lingering worry settled in his system, he sighed and stood up slowly. Sunghoon bowed deeply, glanced at his hands, and left his grandma’s room with her words in mind.

V – E is for End

Sunghoon wasn’t too sure he’d be able to follow his grandma’s instructions.

He was back now from his hometown, back in the comfort of his familiar Seoul bedroom, but you weren’t here. He’d known you two wouldn’t get back at the same time, yet that didn’t stop him from feeling slightly lonely without you to go on dates with. It was a numbing feeling, that left him feeling empty if he dwelled on it too long, and he worried he’d go completely numb if you two truly didn’t end up working out.

The thought sent a chill down his spine every time Sunghoon’s mind strayed to it and Jake’s feeble comforts did little to quell his worries.

To make matters worse, you unexpectedly postponed your return date and said you couldn’t go to a pool party Jake was throwing anymore. You were very vague about the reason why when he asked and Sunghoon began worrying once again. He even brought up not going to the party to Jake, but his best friend wouldn’t have it and threatened to drag him to the party himself.

So, there he was. Standing at the edge of a crowd of strangers, nursing his second beer of the night, and completely alone. Well, he wasn’t completely alone. Jake and some of Sunghoon’s other friends had passed by him and invited him to the dance floor, but he couldn’t get himself to get out there and dance with someone who wasn’t you. The most they’d been able to get him to do was drink a little, even if the drinks only fuelled his moping.

A couple of people sent him inviting looks and winks, dancing in a way that made him avert his eyes immediately, but he didn’t budge an inch from where he was standing. Maybe if you were here, he would. No, definitely, if you were here he would. His mind wandered to grasp at the edges of the first night you’d met, trying to remember if you’d been dancing that night, but he couldn’t pull up a single image of you dancing.

If you were here, how would you dance? Would you dance with a lot of energy, completely letting yourself loose? Or, would you take your time to flow with the music, swinging your hips and smiling at him in that way that just drove him crazy?

Sunghoon smiled a bit at the thought and felt his hips move along to the beat, frowning once he realised what he was doing.

He missed you.

Just a few months ago, he hadn’t known he could miss someone the way he was missing you, but he was and he couldn’t do anything about it.

As if his best friend could read his thoughts, Jake danced off the dance floor to Sunghoon’s side, running a hand through his unruly, blond hair. Sunghoon could smell the booze coming off him, and he watched as his friend nearly lost his footing trying to lean on Sunghoon. Jake barely noticed, though, as he just kept smiling up at Sunghoon. Sunghoon made a point to look anywhere, except in the blond’s direction.

After a while of just trying to ignore his drunk friend, Sunghoon eventually rolled his eyes and raised an eyebrow in Jake’s direction. “What?”

“I can’t, I can’t just look at you now?” Jake asked, his wide smile never leaving his face.

“No, it’s not that. It’s the way you’re looking at me.”

“How am I looking at you?” His friend leaned in close, stretching an arm around Sunghoon’s shoulders. “Hm? I’m just looking at you with my normal eyeballs, my very normal eyeballs, actually just like you, you too.”

“You’re looking at me like, I don’t fucking know, you’re hiding some type of secret from me,” Sunghoon said, pushing Jake off his frame. “And I don’t like that look because the last time you looked at me like that I ended up kissing _____ in a shed for seven minutes.”

Jake’s wide smile grew into a slight, smug smirk. “And look how well that turned out for you. Someone’s not so bitchless anymore.”

Sunghoon rolled his eyes and took a swig of his drink but couldn’t hide the dusting of pink on his cheeks. (If he were to consider things between the two of you, you would be the one who wasn’t so bitchless anymore, considering he was more of your bitch than you were his with the way he was nursing a beer in the corner of a party like a loser just because he missed you. He didn’t need to tell Jake all that though.)

Instead, he feigned an annoyed scowl and crossed his arms over his chest. “What do you want, Jake?”

“I thought you would never ever ever ask.” His friend grinned. “Can you please get out the other floaties from the shed? Some people ripped these and, well, turns out not everyone at a pool party can actually swim. A bit crazy, I know.”

“Why can’t you? The shed was closer to where you were standing.”

“Um…” his friend trailed off, shaking his head incredulously, “I’m obviously inebriated, you know! Everything weighs a shitton of bricks right now.”

Sunghoon’s feigned scowl deepened into a real one, as he rolled his eyes and put his beer down on the ground. It was getting warm anyway and the alcohol wasn’t doing much for him, except make him miss you more. He shot Jake a look, before shouldering past him and making his way towards Jake’s shed.

It was surprisingly chilly for a summer night out, chilly enough at least that Sunghoon could feel some of the hairs on his arms raise as he stalked towards the shed. But, he welcomed the chill because his alternative was thinking about what had happened the last time he’d walked towards this shed. And once he started thinking about that, he’d start missing the feel of your lips on his, your arms around his neck, your eyes staring into his.

He cursed under his breath at his thoughts, wondering if, for even one second, he could think of something other than you.

Sunghoon immediately answered his question with a ‘no’ when he walked into the shed and he thought he smelled your signature fragrance. He would’ve recognised it anywhere (not because he was obsessed like Jake had once said, but because you’d borrowed his sweater on your date and your scent still lingered even after he’d washed it), so he was sure he wasn’t picking up someone else’s perfume or cologne, but he wouldn’t rule out him imagining your fragrance there as a result of him missing you so much.

So, he ignored the smell filling the shed and clambered around for the light switch. He’d been so sure it was by the wall, but he must’ve been more buzzed than he realised because his fingers kept grazing the air. By the time he finally felt the grooves of the light switch under his fingers and was going to turn it on, Sunghoon was so ready to grab the floaties Jake had asked for and get back to the party, or maybe even go home because–

Sunghoon froze.

He couldn’t think, speak, or do anything as the lights flickered on to reveal… well, you.

Sunghoon was going crazy.

He was so sure you were a figment of his imagination, brought about by how much he missed you, and he immediately frowned at the thought. Missing you was fine, maybe overkill when he thought about how often he thought about you, but creating images of you? That was a bit too much, even for him.

Despite his thoughts, though, Sunghoon couldn’t shake the nagging hope that maybe this was real. It didn’t help that “you”—or you–were smiling at him in a way that made his stomach flip, especially after being away from you for so long.

He felt ridiculous for even bothering, like when a horror film character asks who’s there after hearing a noise in the dark, but he cleared his throat slowly and whispered, “_____?”

You giggled softly and raised your eyebrows at what Sunghoon was sure was an incredulous look on his face. “Yes, Hoon?”

“Oh, my God,” Sunghoon started, feet still locked in place, “Oh, my God.”

You took a step closer to him and your grin only grew wider as he blinked slowly at you. Another step and he gulped slowly. Yet another and his eyes grew wide.

He put a hand up before you could take another step and close the distance between you two. “Wait, wait, wait!”

A small frown lit up your face, but you stayed where you were and slightly cocked your head.

“You’re real?” Sunghoon felt stupid asking, but he still had to check.

The feeling only doubled when your brows furrowed and you asked, “Am I real? … Hoon, is everything okay?”

He felt so warm at the familiar nickname that he could almost ignore the rest of what you said, but the growing concern on your face made him clarify himself.

“I just, I’ve had a bit to drink so I thought that my brain tricked me into thinking you were there.” Sunghoon paused at the bemusement on your face and he suddenly felt a whole lot warmer, despite the chilly air. “Actually, um, now that I say it out loud I do realise how ridiculous it sounds. Sorry.”

“Well,” you smiled at him with a sly glint in your eye, finally closing the gap between you two so your breath was fanning out on his face, “if you want to check, you always can.”

Sunghoon, being the guy he was, immediately thought of how he’d pinch himself in a shocking situation and went to do just that. It was only when you laughed at his actions, an incredulous look in your eyes, that he realised what you’d meant and blushed.

“Oh, I, I–”

“Hoon?” you asked, cutting him off and waiting until he nodded, “You’re so cute sometimes, y’know?”

“Just sometimes?” Sunghoon recovered quickly, sliding his arms around your waist and grinning slightly. He’d missed this too much. “So, what am I the other times?”

“Oh?” You raised an eyebrow. “Someone’s gotten a little bolder, hasn’t he?”

“I’d say it’s your influence. You were bound to rub off on me after sticking around me so much.”

He grinned at the way your brows shot up.

“Sticking around you? Hoon, who was the one that–”

“_____?” It was Sunghoon’s turn to cut you off and his grin grew so wide at the realisation on your face. It felt good to finally flip the tables. “You talk so much sometimes, y’know?”

You rolled your eyes, but there was a slight tug on your lips. “Wow, you’re so original. What, first you’re gonna steal my line, next you’re gonna pull some cheesy rom-com line on me and kiss me?”

“So you’re telling me you wouldn’t like it?” he asked, as one of his hands slowly travelled up your side and settled on cupping your jaw. He didn’t miss the way you sagged into his touch. Sunghoon was going to explode.

The tug on your lips grew into a full grin and you wrapped your hands around his neck. “Now, who said anything about that? C’mere, Hoon.”

He didn’t need to hear it twice. Sunghoon tilted your jaw towards him and leaned in for a soft kiss. It wasn’t intense or desperate, unlike what he’d imagined it be like after being away from you for so long, but he preferred it this way. He could savour the taste of your familiar lip balm against his lips and take his time pecking small, chaste kisses on and around your lips.

He sighed out loud and felt his cheeks flush when you pulled back to laugh. “You really missed me, huh?”

Sunghoon wasn’t sure if it was because of the little alcohol in his system or how much he’d missed you, but he gazed into your eyes and whispered, “I did. I really did.”

And, just like that, the tension was back. The obvious hesitancy. The ‘buts.’ He could feel your hold on his neck loosen slightly and he wanted nothing more than to take his words back and rewind to before he fell too deep, but it was too late. All that was left was for him to either avoid everything or finally face it, despite the worries that built up in his mind.

“_____,” he started gently, like you would run away at any second (but he knew you too well to know that you wouldn’t–he would), “we… we should talk.”

“About what?” you tried, a burst of nervous laughter escaping your lips.

You were avoiding his serious gaze, choosing instead to focus on where your hands met his neck. Sunghoon couldn’t tell much of what you were thinking, but, knowing you, he knew you were only postponing the conversation. Maybe it was because this was supposed to be a fun night for you two–after all, you’d probably sacrificed some more nights with your family to get here. Or, maybe it was because you weren’t ready to discuss it. Either way, it was as much your decision as his.

Sunghoon lowered his hands to your lower back and squeezed lightly. “I mean, we don’t have to if you don’t want to… It’d just be a good idea because soon everyone’s gonna start leaving for uni and well, we don’t even know what’s gonna happen between us then, and it’d probably be best if–”

“Hoon.” You were looking into his eyes now, your brows drawn together. “You’re shaking.”

His eyes grew wide and left your face to glance at his fingers, which were trembling around your waist. He tried laughing, shaking the nerves off, but the sound came out choked and he winced. Without a word, he gestured towards the floor of the shed and slumped against the back wall. You followed shortly after, sitting with your knees bunched up to your chest, one of your shoulders brushing against his. At your touch, Sunghoon wanted to reach out and squeeze one of your hands, but they were balled up on top of your knees, a hard look on your face. He sighed.

“You’re right, Hoon,” you started, staring ahead through the open shed door. The party was still going on outside, the music and noise muted from where you two were, but it might’ve as well not been with the way you two were wrapped up in your own bubble. A tense bubble. “We should talk… about us.”

He nodded, crossing his legs and laying his trembling hands in his lap.

Despite what you said, a short lapse of silence settled between you two and, for a moment, Sunghoon was worried this wasn’t going to go anywhere and he’d made a mistake.

But then you swivelled your head towards him and whispered, “What do you want us to be?”

What does he want you two to be? He’d thought about that question one too many times. It’d only ever hurt, thinking of so many domestic scenes and possibilities with you two when he wasn’t even sure if there could be a ‘you two.’

“What do I want us to be?” he repeated, gazing out the shed. “I want us to be together. I want… I want to keep waking up to your pictures on my phone and to go on spontaneous, little dates with you and finally go for that Waffle House date and… just be with you. I want you.”

With his last words, he slowly looked at you and already found you looking at him. There was a little smile tugging at your lips, that was both sad and happy at the same time, and you just nodded slowly.

As his gaze lingered, you cleared your throat and averted your eyes. “I want that too. Really, I do. You don’t understand how many times I’ve wondered what it’d be like if, I don’t know, we’d met a little earlier. If we could’ve gotten to know each other during high school.

“You know Jake told me you were your school’s drama club star?” You smiled slightly and Sunghoon felt a small smile pull at his lips as well. “I would’ve loved to be in the crowds, cheering you on. Or, even maybe get up on stage with you. Jake told me your school never did Romeo and Juliet, but you’d make a pretty good Juliet, don’t you think?”

Sunghoon chuckled and you did too, your shoulders brushing against each other’s for a moment, till your laughter ebbed away. You stared straight ahead again, frowning.

“And then I wondered why I kept thinking of the past. I mean, it’d just make more sense for me to hope that we could stay together, you know? But instead, I keep wishing we’d known each other longer.” You smiled again, that smile from before, but Sunghoon was sure it was only sad this time. “And I realised that I, I felt like we were running out of time. That, I don’t know, when summer ends, we end. Like the changing of weather is some type of timer.”

You whispered the last part more to yourself, but Sunghoon heard it and the self-loathing in it. You loathed yourself for the way you’d been thinking. Sunghoon couldn’t help but relate.

Crossing your arms over your chest, you looked at Sunghoon, a flicker of uncertainty in your eyes. “Do you ever feel like that? Like this is all the time we’ll ever have? Like even thinking of a future where we’re together is… I don’t know, like, wrong?”

That familiar hurt Sunghoon felt or anticipated, whenever he thought of the two of you together on campus came to mind and he nodded slowly. The ‘buts were popping up in his mind again, filling him with growing dread and he was starting to regret his decision. Maybe he shouldn’t have said anything, shouldn’t have brought it up, and let you guys live in oblivious bliss for a little longer. But, deep down, he knew that wouldn’t be true bliss. Like his grandma had said, you would only end up hurting yourselves because of your foolishness.

“But that’s not true, is it?” he started, glancing down at his hands which had started trembling again, “I don’t even know, like, what even made us think we only have the summer? Just because we met in summer? When you think of it like that, you feel ridiculous don’t you? We could literally be going to the same uni and we’re here, too anxious to even tell each other where we’re going.”

You snorted, glancing at Sunghoon out of the corner of your eye. “You’re right.” Straightening, you turned your whole body to face him. “You know considering we’re going in a few weeks, we’ve probably put more effort into not mentioning uni in our conversations because it should’ve popped up in our conversations, at least, once before.”

“Exactly. We should just tell each other. Now. Before we, we lose our nerve or something.”

You nodded and bit your lip, while Sunghoon closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He felt your hand brush against his, so he opened his eyes and took your hands in his. Your hands were, surprisingly, clammy. He was going to say something about it, but, glancing at your face, he spotted the way your eyes were darting all around the room.

Instead of commenting on it, Sunghoon took another deep breath. “Ready?”

You nodded once. “Ready.”

A short silence ensued between the two of you, as neither of you said anything or even made a move to say anything. Your eyes finally landed on his and a nervous smile tugged at the edge of your lips. You were nervous, Sunghoon realised belatedly and squeezed your hand instinctively.

“On three?” he offered.

“On three.”

“One, two, three–University of Seoul.”

“Kyunghee University–wait, what the fuck?”

Sunghoon furrowed his brows at the shocked look on your face and your exclamation. He couldn’t even focus on the name of the university you’d said. All the anxieties that’d been bothering him were beginning to boil up and over at the simple lack of happiness on your face. He was almost sure he was the one with the clammy hands now and he moved to remove his hand from yours when you gripped his tightly and began to smile lightly.

“What the fuck,” you repeated, still as shocked, but with the beginnings of a grin on your face.

Sunghoon only looked at you with his brows still furrowed. He frowned slightly when you began laughing. “I’m confused.”

“I can’t believe I was so stressed about this,” you muttered, mostly to yourself, but still smiling directly at him. “Hoon, we’re so dumb. So fucking dumb.”

“I agree… I think? But, why, I–”

“What neighbourhood is the University of Seoul in?”

“_____, what? I–”

You placed a finger on his lips and shook your head. “Don’t overthink it. Just answer my question.”

He glanced between your finger on his lips and your face. “Dongdaemun-gu.”

“Dongdaemun-gu,” you repeated, your small smile growing into a full one now, “Guess where Kyunghee is?”

“Uh.” He looked away from your face, trying to picture a map of Seoul in his head, but he drew short (he’d always been bad at geography anyway). “Myeongnyun? Daehakno?”

He didn’t think it was possible, but your smile grew even wider. “Not even close. It’s in Hoegi-Dong.”

Sunghoon nodded slowly, while you just looked at him with an expectant look on your face. He shook his head sheepishly and you just rolled your eyes.

“Hoon, they’re like five minutes away from each other.” You paused to let it sink in and laughed as Sunghoon’s brows finally relaxed and his eyes widened. “This is fucking stupid. We’re so fucking stupid.”

Sunghoon could only blink dumbly at you, while you just laughed at his dumbfounded shock. Immediately, his grandma’s words returned to him and a huge sense of embarrassment washed over him as he realised he’d proven her right. But, glancing between your intertwined hands and your wide smile, he found that he didn’t mind the embarrassment if it meant he still had a space with you.

(He’d do nearly anything to have that with you, he realised.)

You broke him out of his stupor by wrapping your arms around his neck and whispering, “So, Hoon, how do you feel now knowing that we’ll be, like, five minutes away from each other?”

“Want me to be honest?” he asked, placing his hands back on your waist (where they just seemed to fit perfectly, he noticed) and grinning softly when you nodded. “I feel really fucking embarrassed. Like, for weeks I’ve just been thinking of how much I’d miss you and wondering if I should even ask you out since we might not even see each other ever again. And, in the back of my head, I knew it was dumb because, if we wanted to make it work, we could make it work for sure. But, it was hard to remember that and–”

“Hoon, hoon,” you interrupted, giggling slightly and tightening your grip on his neck, “now, you’re the one talking too much.”

Sunghoon paused, taking a second to process what was going on. You were in front of him, hands wrapped around his neck, and smiling widely like he made you the happiest person in the world. He was in front of you, hands wrapped around your waist, and still trying to wrap his head around the fact that you two would be five minutes away from each other nearly every day–the closest to a campus couple he could ever ask for. He didn’t believe in fate (the same way he hadn’t believed in perfect first kisses, but he’d seen just how well that’d worked out for him), but the more he thought about it, the more he was sure that something more than luck had landed you two in this situation.

He sighed out loud and rested his head against yours. ”God, I feel like I aged twenty years worrying about all of this. It feels a bit silly now, doesn’t it?”

“A bit is an understatement, don’t you think?” you replied, settling yourself in his lap. He froze a bit, and you moved to get up, but he shook his head and brought you closer. You smiled. “Besides, you’d probably still look good as a thirty-nine-year-old.”

“Oh, gross.” He scrunched up his nose as he moved closer to you, his hands running up and down your sides. “I don’t even want to imagine myself over thirty yet.”

“Really?” you raised a brow, arms locking around his neck and eyes flickering to his lips. “You’d be a hot DILF though.”

He snorted. “God, shut up.”

Your smile widened, a knowing glint in your eye. “Don’t make me say the cheesy rom-com line, Hoon.”

“Alright, alright,” he murmured, lips a breadth away from yours, before he kissed you.

Now, this was the desperate, intense kiss he’d been imagining earlier. He wasn’t sure if it was because of the anticipation you’d both been harbouring before or the elation at what you’d just found out, but you both pulled out the works with teeth, tongue–everything. Sunghoon couldn’t begin to describe how he felt, what you were making him feel, but all he knew was he didn’t want it to end.

And when you kissed him on his cheek, tugged on his hand, and pulled him out into the chaos of the party, smiling at him all the while like he was the only guy in the world, he knew it never would.

Epilogue – S is for Summer Fling

You two had decided on the early-morning pancake at-home date.

Evidently so, as you were in nothing but a hoodie of his and his old gym shorts (a fact that Sunghoon had known since yesterday, when you’d slept over at his after Jake’s party, but he was still struggling to grasp), he was in another one of his hoodies and sweatpants, and you were both still rubbing the sleep out of your eyes. The rich smell of butter wafted all around Sunghoon’s kitchen, accompanied by the sizzling sound of him pouring pancake batter on the greasy pan. Besides the sizzles, and the occasional yawn from you, it was a completely silent morning, as Sunghoon concentrated all his efforts into impressing you with his cooking skills.

“So does this mean you’re my boyfriend now?” you asked, breaking the silence and Sunghoon’s focus.

He blinked, glad he was facing the stove and not where you sitting behind the kitchen island, and found that he couldn’t stop blinking. Was he your boyfriend? It was like you read his mind because that’s all he’d been thinking of since the moment he woke up with you in his arms. He’d fallen asleep on many hot summer nights, but he’d never woken up as warm as he had that morning. It was a feeling he’d spent minutes basking in, tracing every one of your resting features with his eyes and wondering how he’d function as your boyfriend, waking up nearly every morning with this same warmth in his chest. It almost seemed too good to be his reality. And if he was your boyfriend, he thought, that meant you were his and–

“Hoon! The pancakes!” you yelled and Sunghoon cursed loudly.

He moved the pan off the stove and turned on the kitchen hood, but it was too late. The pancake was charred beyond recognition and, looking down at it, he wondered how he hadn’t smelt the tinging scent of the burnt pancake.

Sunghoon sighed as he chucked away the pancakes. “I’m sorry, _____, that was the last bit of pancake batter we had. If you don’t mind, I can quickly run to the store and–”

“Don’t worry about it, Hoon,” you said, cutting him off as you slid off the island seat. He couldn’t see where you were, or where you were going, so he stifled his breath a bit when you slid up beside him and thrust your phone in his face. “Besides, we can order in.”

He spared a glance at your face, preparing himself for any signs of disappointment or irritation, but you were just smiling at him with a soft look in your eyes.

His brows furrowed. “Aren’t you hungry?”

“Yeah, I guess,” you started, shrugging, “but I can wait a couple of minutes.”

Sunghoon bit his lip, a protest and another apology on the tip of his tongue, and furrowed his brows further. Your eyes traced his movements, and you placed two gentle fingers on the fold between his brows, smoothing them out. He didn’t say anything as you did. He just lowered his head and frowned slightly at the smoking scent reminding him of his failed attempt at breakfast. You simply grinned at the obvious frustration and disappointment on his face, a look rising in your eyes that he didn’t catch as he chewed on his lower lip.

“Hoon,” you called out softly, waiting for him to raise his head. When he did, you took a step closer to him, a coy look in your eyes. “You didn’t answer my question.”

He was about to furrow his brows again in confusion, but your words from earlier replayed in his head as your smile only grew more teasing, and Sunghoon was sure he was turning as red as the strawberries on the counter behind him.

The boy averted his gaze from you, murmuring, “Well, I was hoping to ask if I could have the honour of being your boyfriend after, you know, we had food that I’d made in our stomachs and proper clothes on our bodies, but I guess so.”

“The honour?” you repeated, raising an eyebrow and muffling a laugh. Sunghoon glared at you lightly when you let a giggle slip, at which you apologised. “Okay, okay, I’m sorry. I promise I’ll bestow you with the honour of being my boyfriend after we run to the grocery store so you can fix up some pancakes and ask me out already.”

You almost laughed again at how quickly he perked up at your words and, this time, he rolled your eyes and smiled slightly at your teasing grin.

As he grabbed his keys, held your hand, and slipped out the door, the same warmth he’d felt that morning bloomed from where your hands met to every other bit of his body. He’d never imagined this, kissing his soon-to-be something in his car before a grocery run, was where he’d find himself after he’d had his first kiss on a night that felt like years ago. He couldn’t even imagine where he’d be with you in a couple of years. All he knew was he was glad you’d ended up as more than a summer fling.

feedback & reblogs are welcome and appreciated! ♡♡

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copyright 2022-2023 soobisms, all rights reserved. no translations or reposts of any form allowed.

[skayafair]

Monty's Study

I haven't been to the fandom tag in a while, so maybe this was already discussed, but I want to talk about Monty.

First off, I've been reading what others say regarding his cage and connecting it to what he said himself.

the cage is too small for a crow (literally for any bird, actually)

the door is open, nothing that we could see was holding him in place

Monty still didn't try to get out and fly away

he said "being in the dark like that - it was... hard, not being able to make my own choices" about his previous life as a crow

Which makes me think Esther never cared much for her familiar and even left him alive after he failed her plan only because he could still come in handy in future but either cast a will-binding spell on him or simply trained to be tamed. In any way, he couldn't leave - neither before his human time, nor after.

Which still doesn't mean he should like being human.

Every time I see the takes about "Monty come back in s2", I can't help this thought scratching me even as I smile at the jokes and headcanons. Not to yuck anyone's yum, I'm all for shifter Monty, it's a very interesting idea that can unravel in soooo many ways, just give me all of them, - but at the same time I can't get rid of this uneasy feeling.

Here's the thing: I take a particular liking to the characters who aren't human but were forced to become one without their consent, and the way they feel about it and cope with it. Call that a projection, they're very relatable as an allegory, whatever. Says Skaya as an ND.

Some of them like the change, find new meaning in it. Some are 50/50 and uncertain. And some hate it. They never asked to be human, what the hell!

Malevolent podcast and some RK900 fics are partcularly good at exploring this

Since the first moments Monty was turned human, I've been looking forward to whether this question was going to be addressed and how. The show was going exactly in all the directions I liked the most, so I had hopes it will consider this, and suspected it would happen exactly the way I wanted the most.

And yay, that actually happened. The way I wanted the most. Added sad circumstances of Monty basically sacrificing his newfound life and self were really not that necessary okay q_q

Throughout the episodes I could see how initially all smiley and loyal familiar Monty felt more and more uneasy about the whole Esther's plan. He didn't like it. He liked his new friends. He actually fell for a guy. It was so fucking complicated and confusing but there was also joy in it! Until certain point, that is... Anyway! Being human is difficult. Monty didn't ask for it.

And he actually says that!

We don't know if he liked being a crow better, if he wanted to stay human longer - he doesn't talk about any of it. He liked the ability to make his own choices he couldn't make as a crow though - so maybe he would like to try this human experience to some extent again.

But we know he wasn't very fond of all those complicated human feelings. Crows are very smart, but it's a different kind of intellegence. Being a bird isn't necessarily simpler or easier than being a human, especially now that he's lost his owner and is probably out in the streets? I'm suddenly very much concerned, crows are very social and territorial creatures, what if they don't accept this boy?! But it's different. And it's natural for him. It's familiar, hence it's easier just by this fact. And no confusing emotions.

Maybe the fact that Monty liked making independent decisions so much and developed his rebellious side to some extent was what made him retain some memories and attachments when he was back to his crow form, helping Charles with his backpack.

I don't think he'd enjoy being fully human again, though. I think he likes being a bird, as he initially is. Hence why all the "Monty should come back in s2 and have a happy love story!" make me feel uneasy.

Still... since he liked some of it, maybe being given an ability to shapeshift at will and somehow merge a bird mind and a human one which should really be ONE HELL of a process into some comfortable chimera, he'd use it?

[moamidzyism]

yuck! (h.kk)

part seven: catch me if you can (+ 464 words)

“so do you just go to random waterfalls?” kai asks you, as he sits beside you on the balcony. after you arrived at the hotel, you went straight to the river with your camera and only got back an hour ago. the hotel receptionist recommended a local restaurant nearby to you, so there was takeout sprawled on the table in front of you. 

“no,” you giggled. “this place is just special to me.” you relax in your chair, and he looks at you intently, taking in every word that you say. “my parents used to bring me here when i was a kid. i used to come here every summer but i haven’t been in a while. something about being here, i don’t know, brings me clarity.”

“you’ve had a lot on your mind?”

“kind of.” it’s your turn to look up from your hands and look at him, taking in all his features, the way he pushes his wet hair out of his face, the way he plays with his food before looking back at you. “but i don’t really want to talk about it right now.”

“that’s fine.” you fall back into silence again. but silence with kai never feels awkward. it never feels like someone has to talk to fill in the space. it feels like you’ve known him forever.

“i should,” he began after a while. “i should probably go back to my room. since we have to leave early.”

“okay,” you stood up to walk him to the door. “thank you for coming here with me.”

“thank you for letting me tag along on your trip.” he rubbed the back of his neck. you stood at the door, slightly swaying, kai racking his brain to think of a reason to not go back to his room, to stay with you for just a moment longer. “i really don’t want to make things awkward.” he breathed out.

“what do you mean?”

“i really want to kiss you right now.”

“okay,” you softly replied. "you can kiss me."

time slowed down and you tried to think of something other than the feeling of your heart rate increasing rapidly, as he approached you, cupping your face. 

he hesitated. maybe this was a dream and his imagination was playing a sick prank on him. but his doubts were removed when he looked into your yearning eyes. your hands snaked their way to the back of his neck and you pulled him down so his soft lips met yours.

the kiss lasted for what felt like forever. when he pulled away, his face was still inches from yours. “goodnight, y/n.” he said, and with that he was gone. you retreated to your room, the smell of saltwater and his sandalwood scented shampoo still lingered in your nose.

ʚ♡⃛ɞ a classic story of girl likes boy, boy likes girl a little too much. previous masterlist next

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