#zed necrodopolis x fem!reader

[exceptional-z]

zed necrodopolis x reader

this is an au where zombies were never allowed to go to human high school. so zed is aged up (though age is never mentioned so you can imagine whatever) but has never been on the other side of the barrier. i attempted not to use gendered language but i tend to write with fem!reader in mind.

also please ignore any inconsistent verb tenses. english is not my first language and verb tenses are literally the bane of my existence. + i wrote this in like an hour

your family didn’t have much money growing up, hence why you lived so close to the gate. real estate was cheap since no one wanted to live near the zombies. but it also meant you learnt how to save money in as many ways as you could.

seabrook was all about perfection. if a mattress was two years old, it was time to throw it out and buy a new one. if a bike had a single scratch, it was thrown into the dumpster. all of the old items deemed as ‘garbage’ were brought to a warehouse that was emptied around every two weeks. and this was your favourite place to be.

you sneak into the warehouse. it’s late at night and there’s never any security around. you’re immediately greeted with piles of furniture and clothing and trinkets that are too unique to fit into the seabrook aesthetic.

you start to rummage through with the plastic gloves you always wear just in case any bugs or mice decide that this is a perfect place to burrow. lost in thought, you don’t hear the creaky door open, but you do hear the sudden shout that erupted from behind you.

your heart nearly stops beating at the sudden noise and your head swivels around. the lighting isn’t great, and you can only make out the vague shape of the person blocking your only exit. he looks fairly lanky, and if you squint you could make out some of his features. he doesn’t look much older than you and he certainly doesn’t scream “imposing”. he’s taller than you, but maybe if you caught him off guard you could knock him out with one of the many heavy objects splayed around you.

“i was told no one ever came in here,” the boy says. fuck, his voice is attractive.

“they don’t. in the three years i’ve been doing this i’ve never run into anyone else.” you answer, obviously suspicious.

“i’m uh- i’m just looking for a gift for my little sister,” he explains, “it’s her birthday soon and she said she wanted a new bike but we can’t really afford it.”

you relax a little at his explanation, sharing that you’d gotten into the habit of coming here to rummage for things since your family also doesn’t have much money. “i could help you look if you’d like? and even if we can’t find a bike, there’s a ton of cool stuff you can find if you’re willing to dig.” you offer.

you can’t be sure, but you think he smiles as he answers. “i’ll take any help i can get. my friend eliza told me to try coming here to look, but honestly, i’m a bit overwhelmed.”

you talk and laugh together for what must be at least two hours. you don’t end up finding a bike, but you find an old cheerleader outfit that looks to be in perfect condition. you can’t imagine why anyone would throw it out unless it just didn’t fit anymore. the boy -who still doesn’t have a name- literally jumped up in joy when he saw you holding the skirt from the set, doing a little celebratory dance that should have been embarrassing but was somehow endearing. (that’s how you figured out his little sister was obsessed with cheer).

eventually you have to part ways; it’s getting into the early hours of the morning and you both need to be getting home. he’s halfway down the street when you realise you never shared names and you yell out, “wait!”

he stops and turns around, and you jog to catch up to him.

“what’s your name, stranger?” you ask, “just in case we run into each other again.”

he tells you his name is zed, and you tell him your name in return. for a few seconds the both of you just stand in the street, memorising each other’s faces until you look away, shaking off the thoughts of how attractive he is under the starlight.

(bonus: when zed gets home, all he can think about is you. he wonders if eliza would recognise your name, or if he would possibly run into you if he chose to go to school for once instead of always skipping. he wonders where you live in zombietown, since he doesn’t recognise you and is sure he would remember seeing someone as gorgeous are you. he spends the next few days wondering, and then is in for the shock of his life when he sees you through the fence that blocks off zombietown from seabrook and learns that you’re human.)

[cades-outsider]

Stupid Z-band

Zed Necrodopolis X fem reader

Warnings: Smut, feral zed, breeding kink (basically), creampie, unprotected sex, this is just filth and me living out my feral zed moment.

Summary: Zed keeps tampering with his z-band in order to win the football games so him and the rest of the zombies can be accepted into Seabrook. His z-band malfunctions unexpectedly after he wins yet another game, but this time, it isn't a frenzy for human brains, it's a frenzy for you.

Seabrook High School erupted in cheers as Zed, once again, won another football game. He had tampered with his z-band to do so, but he didn't think it was a big deal— even though his arm felt like it was going to burn off any moment. You were cheering proudly along the rest of the cheerleaders— for Zed.

  Bucky shot you dirty looks, as a way to tell you not to cheer for zed— but as always, you dismissed them. Zed was your boyfriend after all... although, no one else in Seabrook High knew that. It was still too dangerous to out your relationship, since most humans still hadn't really came to terms with accepting Zombies.

  You wanted to run up and kiss Zed, but ultimately knew that wasn't the best thing to do in front of all of Seabrook. As the minutes passed by and it became later, more people left the football field. The cheerleaders were the only people left on the field, putting your stuff in your duffle bag you watched as the rest of the cheer team eventually scattered off, leaving you alone.

  Meanwhile, Zed was in the locker rooms. He threw his helmet on the bench as he panted, his face and jersey were covered in dirt and sweat, as well as his green hair, which was messily stuck to his forehead, his pale skin sticky and hot.

  Zed wanted nothing more than to take off the clad football jersey, until his wrist started burning and his Z-band started beeping red, the bold words 'OFFLINE' flashed across the small screen of the band.

  Zeds veins immediately darkened and trailed up his arms, all the way to his face. He grew paler, and the veins in his face grew darker. His fists clenched in an effort to control himself as he started to pant, though a light growl erupted from his zombie and he quickly realized this was more than a frenzy.

  He felt hot and.... aroused...

  Zeds 'game' pants felt unbelievably tight and restricted, he needed you. So, he rushed out of the locker rooms and went to the last place he saw you, the football field. Which, was completely empty now... not like his zombie cared in the moment, he would take you in front all of Seabrook in this state.

  You were bent over slightly, zipping up your cheer bag when you heard feet to grass movement and a noise between a growl and a pant. You turned around and were immediately met with Zed, you smiled before you noticed the state he was in "Zed! I'm so proud- hey, are you okay?" You asked, your face twisting with worry and concern. Zed would've melted from how sweet you sounded, but right now he couldn't control this frenzy.

  When you were in his reach, he grabbed you, yanking you with him to the middle of the football field. You let out a yelp in surprise "Zed, what are you doing?" You gasped, your voice was small and meek, and for some reason that turned on his zombie more. He said nothing, he couldn't say anything but let out a series of strained growls as his chest heaved up and down from panting; it was as if he was in heat and your eyes widened when you notice the strain in his pants.

  One of his hands went to the back of your neck, wrapping his hands around your hair, in an attempt to expose your neck to him. When he realized that wasn't enough, he yanked your head back with the hand wrapped in your hair, not hard enough to hurt you but enough to make you squeak out a moan.

  Zed hurried his face into your neck, sucking and kissing at every spot he could, smelling your sweat vanilla perfume which caused the veins in his hands and face to grow darker. He nipped at your neck, not enough to actually bite you, but enough to mark you. Your hands gripped onto his chest as a way to steady yourself, and your touch set him off, he growled as he threw you on the grass of the football field, not wasting a second before he climbed on top of you.

  You weren't scared, you and Zed had done this many times but not when he was like this. He was feral and didn't give you a moment to breathe, but when he ripped your cheer top in half— exposing your bare chest, you finally remembered where you both were "wait, Zed what if we get-" You gasped, but were quickly cut off when he kissed and nipped at your boobs, forcing your thighs open with one hand and sitting him self in between them.

  You were panting now, looking at your zombie boyfriend as your hands went to touch him, but again, his zombie growled as you touched him, bringing him back to the main thing he needed you for. Zed loved you, and he was always so sweet during sex, he was almost never rough, but you couldn't help how soaked you were from this whole situation.

  Zed didn't even bother to take off your cheer skirt, he only ripped the center of it and your underwear in one clean tear, you gasped when you felt him lifting your skirt up so it bunched up on your hips, you were exposed to him and his face now rested in between your thighs. Everything happened so fast you barely had time to adjust to his mouth attaching to your clit. Your eyes rolled back and your hips jolted in surprise, you managed to rest on your elbows to look at him, his arms were tightly wrapped around your waist so that his hands rested on your stomach, you looked at his arms and moaned at the sight of his dark purple veins throbbing. Your eyes moved up to his face and before you could get a good look at his face he forced you back down with one of his hands that rested on your stomach.

  Zed ate you as if you were his last meal, his tongue circling your clit so effortlessly and his mouth slurping up your juices. The sounds were lewd and filthy, but it only seemed to turn his zombie on more. He ate you out as if it was for his pleasure, not staying long enough for you to cum. His zombie didn't know whether or not he wanted you like this or on all fours, and he growled impatiently as he finally decided to flip you. His zombie strength allowed him to flip you over with ease so that you were on all fours.

  You whined softly at the quick movement and turned back to look at him, your eyes widened once you realized his pale cock was now exposed, it seemed as if he was even bigger now that he 'zombied out'. He wasn't just bigger or paler, but the veins in his cock had grew darker as well and you moaned softly at the sight, but were quickly cut off when his hands grasped your hips and he forced your ass closer to him.

  Zed ran his cock back and forth between your folds, collecting your wetness just enough for him to slide into your pussy, but he didn't just go halfway in, he completely bottomed out and you let out a noise between a moan and a yelp as the tip of his cock reached the spot inside of you that made your toes curl.

  "Oh my god- Zed" You babbled out, head falling against the grass. He didn't allow you any time to adjust, but you were so soaked that the stretch didn't hurt. His zombie growled at your already fucked out tone, gripping your hips harshly as he set an unforgiving pace. The tip of his cock reached your sweet spot with every harsh thrust he gave you, you were so drunk on his cock that you didn't even care that you were in the middle of the football field.

  Zed was unable to say anything, only grunts and growls came from his lips while he panted and fucked you harshly. He couldn't stop, with each thrust he grew more animalistic and feral. His zombie wouldn't stop until he had you cumming on his cock and until he was spilling into you. The thought of him finally filling you up made his nails dig harder into your hips and his pace speed up.

  The side of your face was forced into the grass when he leaned over and pressed your head into it. Your mouth fell open as a series of moans fell past your lips. You cried out his name as he snapped his hips against yours, and you felt the coil in your lower stomach when the tip of his cock hit that place inside of you with each thrust. The hand that was on your head, which happened to be the one he had his z-band on, went to the side of you as he used his other hand to keep your hips in place.

  One of your hands gripped onto the arm he placed beside you, clawing at his arm for dear life as he fucked your brains out. Zed growled but didn't remove his arm from you, instead he fucked you even harder as he felt his release near. The need to cum inside of your pussy overwhelmed him and his zombie wasn't going to give out until he filled you up. He was so deep inside of you that you could've sworn you felt him in your stomach, and that thought alone made you cum. You cried out as your cum splashed against his cock, making him thrust even easier than before.

  Zed panted harder as his zombie kept him going, he wasn't tired by any means, but he needed to cum. So when you clenched around his cock from being so overstimulated he growled and finally spilled his cum deep inside you. You let out a gasp and your hand kept its hold on his hand that was on the ground next to your head, you whined as he didn't stop cumming. His hips had slowed and his cum dripped out of you while he was still inside of you. Your hand clawed at his z-band by accident, causing it to beep and turn green, the words 'ONLINE' finally popped up on the small screen.

  Zeds veins slowly returned to normal, but he was extremely tired and his whole body ached. He was still panting, but once his vision cleared and he noticed how fucked out you looked, he slowly pulled out of you, his cum leaking out of your pussy almost immediately and you whined. "Oh fuck, I'm so sorry baby" he repeated constantly, despite the hurt his body felt from his zombie taking over for so long.

  You let out a whine in response, not able to move and he quickly realized and lifted you up and into his lap after he put his pants back on. He covered your bare chest with the ripped cheer top and pulled your cheer skirt back down as his hand cleaned off your cheek and hair which was covered in grass. Despite how sore you already started to feel, you noticed the harsh color of red on his wrist, around his z-band. "Zed... that was amazing, but you've got to stop tampering with your z-band" You managed to say, your voice weak from all the moaning and crying out you did.

  Zed cracked a small smile when you confirmed that you were okay and you enjoyed it and he sighed when you mentioned him tampering with the z-band "I know.... Just... I have to win one last game and then I'll stop" He reassured you, and you hated the fact that he had to hurt himself just to be accepted into Seabrook. You nodded softly, "promise?" You said softly, looking into his brown eyes and he gently kissed your lips "I promise..."

[whoopsyeahokay]

October Sun

summary: after you'd sent Xavier a text that told him not to meet you, you'd ventured to the school at dawn, alone, bouquet in hand as promised.

pairing: Wally Clark x fem!reader

warnings: eventual smutty smut smut. and mad spoilers. and obvious Canon divergence. very involved, very dense plot.

🚨💀⚠️thank you for bearing with me, guys. this is entirely new material. PART 24/25/26 have been combined here to create a massive fluffing installment (6509 words 😮‍💨). i'd suggest rereading at least the latter half of PART 23 beforehand if you need a refresh of the point in time we're returning to. please pretend that the old parts never happened. erase them from your memories 🕰️👁️‍🗨️💤🌀

bon reading, frens

___________________________💀

OCTOBER SUN pt.24

It was barely 6AM. You'd hardly slept after Dave had returned you to the house. He'd watched you climb the stairs to the second floor, ever the persistent warden, before you'd heard him slink down to the basement he and Aurora had converted into their private apartment. Besides the numerous big reveals that had unfolded last night—Ajay's odd friendship with your sister, Simon's warped inverse of your ability, Maddie's soul penetrating the field of your cosmic artery, the soul-tie you and Wally somehow shared—besides all of that, something, a feeling of profound unrest, had kept you up. Had you staring at the green stars on Aiden's ceiling until your alarm began to chime.

Sharing a soul-tie with Wally should've been the thing that terrified you most amongst all that'd transpired. It was unheard of, curious, downright impossible in nature. Soul-ties were as fragile as they were strong and required both souls to be alive, together in the same lifetime in the world of the living, to exist. That Wally was extremely not alive should've made you question the validity of the connection you and he had. Especially given there was evidence of magical tampering on school grounds, a spiteful, bitter essence sickened into the ether that surrounded the campus.

And yet, that nor the symbol etched into the tree, that bastardized amalgamation of runic lines, hadn't been what you'd kept ruminating about from the moment you'd laid down until dawn. No, it'd been Dave. Something about how he'd come out of the trees, so steady and sure-footed; how his eyes had held your gaze as he'd marched toward you.

You pressed your fingers into your eyes and groaned. There was no use thinking about it further. Not now. You had a bouquet to put together and two friends to save. Dave's feline equilibrium had to wait. With a grunt you rolled out of Aiden's little-kid bed and shuffled into your room, not daring to check your appearance in the mirror. You could feel the bags under your eyes. Heavy and dark like someone had injected squid ink beneath the delicate skin.

Showering was a groggy, clumsy affair, appendages weak and a step behind your brain's transmissions. You did what you could to make yourself presentable, hoped to conceal the fatigue behind a cute outfit: A thin, loose, autumn-orange destination sweater tucked partially into a slim, black denim skirt with opaque black tights underneath. You applied makeup where you needed it to hide the sleep deprivation and called it at that, unable to muster the strength for much else. It was going to be a long, long, l o n g day.

But worth it, you reminded yourself firmly in a voice not unlike Wally's, because you were going to find a way to help Simon and once Simon was helped, you'd both find a way to get Maddie back on the right side of the veil.

A sweep of berry-tinted lipgloss and you dragged yourself outside into your Nanna's garden, brandishing a pair of pruning shears from the mud room you'd passed through on your way out. You clipped a variety of flowers and piled them on the bouquet paper you'd liberated from the stash Nanna (and now Aurora) kept at the house. Once accomplished, it was time to head out and you sighed in regret that you'd texted Xavier to sleep in, telling him you wanted to be alone that morning to center yourself before having to face your classmates after yesterday's ordeal.

It wasn't entirely false. It couldn't have been. You didn't lie to Xavier as a personal commandment. But it wasn't entirely the truth either and you felt queasy from it. Still, you sucked in a deep breath and forced yourself to move forward. Nanna was in the kitchen when you walked in with the bouquet, sitting at the table as she waited for the kettle to boil. You could smell the floral tea blend Nanna, Aurora, and Dave drank. Even dry the scent was potent, overwhelming the herb and warm spice aroma the kitchen usually held. You nearly gagged as you passed the open teapot, the concoction inside like a punch to the nose when you got too close.

"Good morning, Maypie." Nanna smiled warmly, patting the table in front of the seat beside her. The nickname irritated you, too close to the one you'd scolded Xavier for using yesterday, but it was Nanna and you couldn't find it in yourself to say something.

Instead, "Morning, Nanna," you greeted with a yawn, setting the bouquet on the counter as you traipsed toward the sink to fill a glass of water. "Can't sit. Gotta get to school."

Nanna hummed in acknowledgment and you could tell she was checking the time on the stove before she turned to face you in her chair. "Awfully early, isn't it?"

"So early," You agreed with a sob of disdain as you brought the glass to your lips for a sip of cold water. Your skin began to feel warm and wherever you rested your gaze seemed irrationally farther than where it should be. Shaking your head to dispel what you assumed was a lack of sleep, you took a deep drink from your glass.

Nanna tilted her head and raised a snowy brow at something near your elbow, "And who are those for?"

For a brief moment, you didn't grasp the question, casting about to understand. When your eyes landed on the bouquet beside the sink, you blinked slowly at it, lids like lead. The floral aroma itched your nostrils, traveled into your skull, a thick fog dampening your mental processing.

Sedate, you panned your head and stared properly at the bouquet, told Nanna, "It's for Maddie," confused as to why you'd believed you shouldn't. That desperate, nagging feeling you'd had earlier when thinking of last night—last night?—growled in warning in the back of your mind, but it was so far away you easily ignored it.

"Oh, how lovely," Nanna replied, standing to put her hands on your shoulders and rub your arms kindly, "I'm sure she'll appreciate the gesture when she comes home."

"Who will appreciate what gesture?" Ginny croaked from the doorway, slugging into the kitchen in a silk robe and thick, knitted socks up to her knees. You knew she wore them to keep in place the gauze she slathered in anti-aging creams and wore overnight. Grumpy and rumpled, she questioned, "Who're the flowers for?"

You huffed a laugh as you watched her pull out a chair and drop into the seat, seeming as ill-suited to the morning as you.

"They're for Maddie," Nanna explained and, immediately, Ginny straightened, her glazed eyes turning sharp as they landed on you.

"She's back?" She asked.

You shook your head, "No," and you were tired, so tired, and couldn't quite seem to formulate the words to explain why you were taking flowers to school for Maddie who hadn't actually returned from wherever she'd run off to in order to accept them.

"Is it a shrine thing?" Ginny asked.

A feeling of awareness clawed through the mist that had filled your head. You felt an insidious tickle in the back of your nose, gasped a breath, and then released a cathartic blast of a sneeze, expelling that horrible, heady floral scent.

You blinked several times as you recovered your wits, glancing at the bouquet and then between Nanna and Ginny, at last able to think clearly, "Something like that. We're just trying to stay positive. Principal Hartman said he'd pass along whatever we bring in to Maddie's mom." And there you were, feeling like yourself again, able to map out a plausible lie to keep Wally (and, by extension, Maddie-as-a-ghost) safe from whatever Ginny or your mother could do if they discovered you were conspiring with the school's dead.

Ginny returned to a slouch, propping her head on her fist, "That's nice of you." She looked halfway back to sleep when you gave her a kiss goodbye, patting your thigh limply and muttering a slurred farewell. As you shrugged into your leather jacket, you heard Ginny scoff at Nanna, barking, "Don't you bring that nasty stuff near me, I don't know how you drink it," and couldn't help but snort because, truly, not even a man dying of thirst would accept a cup of that tea.

"I'm taking mom's car." You announced, peeking back into the kitchen. Your mother was on what constituted for her as a work trip; taking money to perform a ceremony that had no bearing on the ghosts—if they hadn't already crossed over as many of them had—at all. The concept was as stupid as it was a scam and you were revolted that someone in your family, who you'd once respected, was capable of performing such a farce.

Fucking. Ghost weddings.

You pressed your lips in a line in an effort to control the disgusted expression you knew you'd make upon thinking about it. Without looking at you, Nanna and Ginny gave their assent and carried on bickering after wishing you a pleasant day.

‗‗‗‗•‗‗‗‗

"So," Maddie said in a neutral tone which set Wally's teeth on edge, "How long have you guys really known each other?"

It was just him and her outside, lingering by the door waiting for you and Xavier to arrive. Wally leaned while Maddie sat on an empty bike rack adjacent to the entrance, looking out over the parking lot like watchmen on duty. The others were inside; Ajay had vowed to coax Mina down from the rafters while Charlie and Rhonda had simply wanted to observe how that interaction went after learning Ajay and Mina were entangled in their own version of a relationship. Strange and unconventional and, apparently, wholesome though Wally had no idea what that meant coming from Ajay.

"I was wondering when you were gonna ask me." Wally said, ducking his head sheepishly and rubbing the back of his neck. He lifted his gaze to Maddie, "Not long. Since Field Day."

Maddie's brows raised, but she remained composed. After a few moments of silence, Maddie spoke again, a smile in her voice, "She talked about you a lot."

Wally swallowed, his heart fluttering at the information, unable to repress the feeling of giddiness that fizzled through him. Regardless, he tried to play it cool, "Yeah?"

"Yeah. She always said her 'ghost was so hot' and that she was 'saving herself for her ghost'." She paused, chewed her lip, and stared down at her lap as she thought about what to say next. "Looking back, I guess she thought she could hide in plain sight." And then, with a snort, "And it worked. None of us believed her for a second. It never even crossed my mind that it could be true until I got here."

Wally nudged her side in a friendly motion. "Was she right?" He snickered, teasing, "Am I hot?"

Maddie shoved his head down playfully with a laugh, "You're an idiot." Another comfortable beat. She hummed quietly before she revealed in a gentle tone, "You two are cute together. If it means anything."

"It does," Wally said and it was true. It was more reassuring than it should've been to have someone on the outside see what he saw. Cemented it somehow.

Another few minutes passed before a car pulled into the parking lot. Maddie jumped down from her perch, face screwed up in confusion, "Wasn't she bringing Xavier?"

Wally could see the tension she'd been holding in her shoulders slowly diminish as you parked and climbed out. Alone. He and Maddie made their way over to greet you, twin smiles of relief on their faces. Wally hadn't been keen to see that dickbag anytime soon. It was better for everyone that you'd decided to leave him behind.

"Hey guys," You said, eyes automatically finding Wally's, his heart beating that much harder in his chest. You seemed to read the unspoken question and informed, "I thought we'd get more accomplished if Xavier wasn't here."

Maddie nodded, "Smart," visibly grateful for your forethought.

Wally treaded around the front of the car you'd driven and scooped you up into a solid hold, one arm under your thighs while the other clamped at a diagonal on your back, his hand tangling in your hair. Looking at you closely, he could see the exhaustion beneath the surface and felt a pang of guilt for agreeing with everyone (including you) that you should come as early as permissible by school standards.

"Hey, baby," He uttered, pressed his forehead to yours with a lopsided, affectionate grin, and hinted greedily for a kiss that you supplied without complaint. He almost groaned as your lips yielded under his, the simple touch striking a match low in his belly. Fuck, he wanted you. Like, always. Was hardwired at this point to get aroused whenever you were within arm's length. It was driving him half insane that he couldn't climb into the back of the car with you, have you straddle his lap, and show you how affected he was by you.

"Rhonda's right," Maddie commented from the sidelines, referencing something Rhonda had said the previous night after you'd left with your brother-in-law. "You guys are gross."

You pulled away from Wally with a cackle, prompting him to place you back on your feet, and said, "Oh, like you and Zav aren't just as bad."

Twirling around and bending (very nicely) into the backseat of the car to collect your things, you didn't see the look that flashed across Maddie's face, one of hurt and betrayal and anger, but Wally did and it made him want to grab you by the shoulders, and shake you until you stopped thinking the world of Xavier Baxter. He wouldn't dare do that, of course, you were too precious, and he couldn't imagine doing anything to frighten you like that. On the contrary, he'd proudly do things to Xavier that would earn Wally a spot on a Most Wanted list if he'd still been alive.

He pushed those thoughts down when you straightened, lifting a lush, full bouquet into your arms which you handed over to Maddie in a way that signaled to Wally you and she were used to each other's motions and mannerisms. Again, you reached into the car, grabbed your backpack, and hoisted it out of the backseat. Wally noticed that it seemed to weigh more to you than normal and took it from you, slinging it over his shoulder with a broad grin.

"Such a gentleman," You teased, though Wally could see how much you enjoyed the gesture by the way you pinked up so sweetly. He slung his arm around your waist and pulled you into his side as you and he walked, stamping a kiss to your hair and openly breathing in the scent of musky vanilla and coconut.

"Wait." Maddie said, just as you and Wally were about to reach the door. You and he paused, turning to look at Maddie as she regarded the bouquet in her hands and then the backpack on Wally's shoulder, an intense cast to her features. "How..." She squinted at you, "Where are the originals?" Scanned back to the car, then you, then the bouquet.

"Originals?" You asked, completely lost, though Wally recognized what Maddie meant. It hadn't occurred to him how unfeasible it was that he still had the notes you'd given him stashed away in his private, just-for-him corner of the school; none of the resets between now and then had vanished them as resets were wont to do.

"Yeah, the originals." Maddie repeated.

Wally stepped in, taking over the explanation since Maddie appeared to struggle with how to phrase that every object they, as ghosts, picked up was just a clone of one that stayed anchored in the living world. He did his best to describe it, beckoning both you and Maddie to follow him so he could show you an example with a piece of chalk in an unlocked classroom. He lifted it, of course wielding the copy while the original remained in place, untouched, not even a sign that it'd been tampered with.

You cocked your head, lifting the original and handing it to Maddie who took it without issue. Experimenting, Maddie placed it back on the chalk ledge, left it there for multiple seconds, and then instructed Wally to, "Pick it up now."

Wally did.

As in he actually did. Picked up the original, no immense, herculean emphasis of energy required (and that very, very rarely worked, normally resulting in a brief flicker of an already on-its-way-out lightbulb). How had Wally not noticed before?

"Gnarly," Wally laughed, tossing the chalk in the air and catching it. "Do you think the living see it floating if I'm holding it?" He began to zoom it around like a toy airplane. "I wonder if it works the other way."

"What do you mean?" You asked.

"Like, things that we brought with us into the afterlife," Maddie clarified, "Do you think you could make them real on your side?"

You shrugged and admitted, "I didn't even know I could do this until you guys pointed it out." And then you sighed and rubbed your temples, "Another thing to add to the laundry list of stuff I have to look in to." You looked at Maddie, "I'd probably need someone who can't see you guys to confirm whether or not it works both ways."

Wally strode over to you, putting the chalk back down on the ledge as he went. He adjusted the weight of your backpack on his shoulder so he could cradle your face in both of his big palms. "One thing at a time, baby," He said, brushing a strand of your hair behind your ear, "Let's check off giving Mina the flowers and then go from there, okay?"

You slumped, thankful, and slanted into him so that your forehead was pressed to the center of his chest, "That sounds like a good plan."

Together, you, Wally, and Maddie strolled to the theater, passing Mr. South who welcomed you with a friendly wave and a short hello. His eyes seemed to flicker this way and that, as if sensitive to the school lighting, as he watched you walk by, Maddie close to your side, Wally a half-step behind and falling farther back as he studied Mr. South. Vaguely, he heard the man mutter, "Mm, dahlias," but that was about as much fuss as he expressed. Nothing to indicate Mr. South saw a puppeted bouquet or levitating backpack drifting down the hall of their own volition.

Wally caught up to you and Maddie quickly, his hand finding the small of your back on instinct. Rhonda and Charlie were already outside the theater when you, Maddie, and Wally arrived, Charlie rising from where he'd been seated on the floor as Rhonda pushed herself off the wall, today's lollipop stuffed into her cheek.

"Well, Ajay got her down," She announced, rolling her eyes, "But she refuses to talk to us. She won't even answer Ajay if he asks because she knows the questions aren't his." Belligerent, Rhonda shook her head, "And I thought Janet was a diva."

Charley shook his head, "I'm sorry, but that," He hooked his thumb over his shoulder to stipulate Mina's behavior, "isn't anywhere near as bad as Janet was. At least Mina was polite when she told us where to go."

Rhonda conceded with a bob of her head, pursed lips, and raised brows. Upon noticing the flowers, she remarked, "Huh, you came through, strawberry pie," her tone impressed, "Next time you should bring lover boy a new wardrobe," a smirk at Wally and a coy look at you, "He looks pretty good in jeans."

Wally cleared his throat and squeezed you to him tightly, his gaze soft and imploring as he said, "Ignore her, you don't have to bring me anything," then to Rhonda, "She's not our personal gofer."

Rhonda raised her hands in surrender, glimpsing at Charley in amusement, "No need to blow your jets, superstar, it was just a suggestion."

Charley added, "And a joke," as he gave Rhonda a sardonic side-eye. "So, should we get this over with? See if our Split River Phantom has anything useful to share?"

You patted Wally's chest to signal for your backpack which he handed over with a pout, disliking the idea of you hauling it around when you were so tired.

"You guys go do that. I'm going to steal Ajay and see if we can figure out what these symbols mean." You looked at Maddie, "If you guys find anything, let me know."

"How?" Maddie wondered. It wasn't as if she still had a means of communication in the afterlife; the decoy phone had been with Xavier when she'd been thrown from her body, and, as far as Wally knew, her real phone was in pieces. Even if she did have a phone...would it have worked? Wally had heard Dawn brag about her 'socials', but she wasn't actually capturing or uploading selfies...was she?

Before he could fall too far down that rabbit hole, he felt your hand grasp his, fingers twined, skin smooth under his thumb. You grinned at Maddie, "That's the best part," you brought your and Wally's joined hands up, "If Ajay and I don't get back before you're done, just manipulate the connection. Wally and I—"

"Don't know if it'll work!" He interrupted, worried that you might've forgotten that all those times he'd felt your emotions like his own or found you in crowded spaces had happened before last night.

It seemed you had because you blinked those darling Bambi eyes up at him, visibly uncertain. Wally saw the instant you realized your mistake, could see the gears turning as you backtracked and reassembled your speech. It didn't take long, maybe a second or two, and then you picked up where you'd left off, saying, "—but it should make it so he can find me."

Rhonda twirled her lollipop, whistled in surprise, "Magic is in.sane."

"It's not magic," You stated mildly, "It's connectedness. I promise there is a difference." You listed into Wally's side, turned your head to hide a yawn, and then seemed to try to shake yourself awake.

In response, Wally, cupped the back of your head and kissed your hair, rubbing his hand up and down your arm while holding you closer. "You gonna be okay?" He asked, concerned that you might not be able to stay upright much longer.

"I'll be fine," You said, however, the assurance you'd meant to offer was dimmed by another yawn you couldn't suppress.

It was then that Ajay appeared. He held the door to the theater open for Charley, Rhonda, and Maddie who waved their see-you-laters to you. Wally released you in measured degrees, careful and considerate, so you wouldn't fall into the space he left behind.

"I'm coming to find you as soon as we get something, okay, baby?"

You nodded, a forced smile on your face that made Wally want to carry you home and tuck you into your bed. Innocently. Innocently. But he couldn't help himself, dipping in to capture your lips in a gentle kiss that still somehow made his breath catch and his heart pound and his belly coil tight with desire.

"Okay, we get it, you're hot for each other, can we go now?" Ajay's voice cut through the muggy atmosphere that now permeated between you and Wally, exasperation pitched shrill as a school bell.

Wally untangled himself from you, hated having to do it, but understood that it needed to be done in order for both you and him to focus on what was important. That was finding clues or proof that Mr. Anderson was involved in Maddie's circumstances and pointing the police away from Simon. Right. Wally was an independent, capable guy who could do what it took to help. He just didn't want to do it without you plastered to him in some way.

"That face is exactly why you two can't be around each other right now." Ajay stated flatly, all but shoving Wally aside and ushering you back down the hall.

With a chuckle, Wally called after you, "I'll see you later, baby!"

"If either of you say 'I'll miss you', I'm boycotting this relationship until I can cross over." Ajay declared, not allowing you to stop and respond.

‗‗‗‗•‗‗‗‗

Xavier sat behind the wheel of his truck, nervous, jittery; inching toward full-blown paranoia after having stopped at your house to pick you up. He'd received your message earlier, the one that had gently told him to stay home and sleep in since you weren't going to crusade after evidence against Mr. Anderson until a more appropriate hour.

But he hadn't been able to get back to sleep, had instead sat in bed contemplating how fucked up everything would inevitably get. And he was scared. Your newfound friendship with Simon made Xavier's veins clog with cold, slimy fear. He had no idea if Maddie had read the message he'd accidentally sent her ("The coast is clear, I'm alone. Wanna see you, babe, so hurry up."). Had no idea if she'd told Simon about Xavier and Claire. Simon hadn't outright accused Xavier of cheating on Maddie—not to Xavier's face, anyway—but, if Simon did know, it was only a matter of time before it came up and Xavier lost you forever.

Fueled by anxiety and desperation, Xavier had dressed and left the house in a flurry, drove over and at the speed limit in frenzied intervals as he'd forgotten and remembered it by turns. He'd arrived at your place faster than ever before only to discover that, according to Abigail, you'd left about forty-five minutes earlier. Granted, you hadn't explicitly said you'd want to spend the morning by yourself at home, but Xavier couldn't shake the feeling that something was utterly and profoundly wrong.

Why go to the school alone? Why leave him out of it? An agitated growl ruptured from his throat as he smacked the steering wheel, tears springing to his eyes unbidden. He pulled in huge gulps of air to stop himself from tipping into a panicked breakdown, begged the universe or God or whatever was out there that he was overthinking it, that you weren't slipping away from him and everything was okay, it was all going to be okay.

Except it wasn't okay. He'd fucked up and fucked around and made you participate by sending texts about band practices that'd never been scheduled, lies about how you'd needed help around the house and Xavier was family so he'd been obligated to assist. Jesus Christ, what had he done? He couldn't breathe, a balloon in his chest that expanded the closer he got to the school. When he pulled in and saw your mother's car, he was already one foot into a mental crisis.

He parked beside your mother's car and sat for a moment, filtering through a litany of excuses and reasons and apologies to retch at your feet in libation. Xavier couldn't. lose. you. Not you. The only person left in his life who fucking mattered. Hurt and anger and grief and hopelessness funneled into him, a tornado of self-deprecation howling insults that ricocheted inside his skull, the torment building and building and—

"FUCK." He belted, smashing the steering wheel over and over again until his body collapsed forward and he heaved a thick, wet sob.

‗‗‗‗•‗‗‗‗

The other vertices in the barrier projected outward from symbols that varied slightly from the first you'd found. Two were etched in stone, one in a tree planted on the same alignment as the other, and the last had been burned so thoroughly into the dirt that you couldn't dig under it or dig it up.

"Can we call it magic now?" Ajay folded his arms and thinned his lips in a dour line as he watched you dog-dig at the dirt from a new angle. "Because this feels like magic."

You huffed and let yourself fall back on your bum, mopping the sweat from your brow with the sleeve of your sweater. "I mean, it's harnessed energy," you countered, still reluctant to call it something so fantastical when you had dirt caked under your fingernails and math class in twenty minutes. Those mundane, ultra-ordinary truths made it difficult to reconcile the existence of something Harry Potter fought a war with.

Ajay wasn't having it, "Girl, just say it. It's magic."

A squawky noise of denial later and you snapped a picture of the symbol on your phone, finally standing and returning to your backpack which you'd left at Ajay's feet. You dug out the notebook you'd used to scribble down the Futhark alphabet last night before tiptoeing back into Aiden's room and compared the symbol in the dirt to the runes on the page.

"It's like the others," You observed, "It has all the binding elements, except this one also has an extra line here..." You indicated, chewed your lip in thought, frustrated when nothing jumped out at you. Whoever had created these symbols and performed the ritual that accompanied them had either not known anything about the Futhark runes or they'd known too much. Which meant that you had no way of decoding the bastardized symbols by yourself. At least, not without major effort.

"An extra line?" Ajay echoed, "To make us extra trapped?"

You slanted him an unimpressed look, "No, Sassy McQueen...but also kind of yes."

Ajay flashed a victorious grin then crouched to look over your shoulder at your notebook. "Why would someone want to trap ghosts here?"

"Maybe they didn't." You considered as you brainstormed aloud, "Maybe they wanted to trap something and didn't realize the effect their spell—"

"Which is magic."

"—Nghyah," You declined and then continued, "The effect their spell would have on the different realms within the parcel they created."

"I know English isn't my first language, but I can tell that wouldn't make sense to anyone."

You rolled your eyes, clapping your notebook closed and filing it away in your backpack. "Think of the spell like a box. Whoever cast it brought that box down on this specific location, trapping everything in this location in it. But it only affects things outside of the physical world because it's not a physical box."

"...Have you ever seen the Witches of Eastwick?"

"Have you?"

You straightened, bowing your back to loosen the stiffness that had collected in your spine. Ajay took responsibility of your backpack and together you and he walked back toward the school.

After a short silence, Ajay spoke, "You know, Wally mentioned a cult that used to practice around here. He's really into that spooky-ooky, creepy shit." He emphasized with spirit fingers.

You stopped and stared after Ajay, eyes round and mouth ajar, "Wally? Golden retriever, football bro, Wally?"

Ajay turned to walk backward, smiling, "Oh yeah. He was into it before he died, too. A real savant of the deranged history of Split River." He pondered you for a moment and then muttered, "You know you two are allowed to talk when you're alone, right?"

Kissing your teeth, you resumed your stride, waving Ajay off, "In our defense, we haven't actually had a lot of time to be alone since we started talking."

Ajay snorted, but merrily settled his pace to match yours, his gait slower and longer, "He was alive during the rise of the Satanic Panic. If I'm remembering right, he told me about a cult called the Something-Something of Dagda."

"Very helpful."

"They were established before Milwaukee was founded and then faded out of history for awhile."

You sighed drearily, having heard similar tales through the family grapevine as well as your own special-interest research, "Let me guess, the Something-Something of Dagda made a comeback in the '20s when it was fashionable to be associated with the occult?"

Ajay nodded, "I think that's what Wally said. Apparently, they crawled back into the shadows, never to be heard from again, just after the Second World War."

"Typical," You chuckled, shaking your head, "You join a resurrectionist cult and then leave when—"

"How do you know it was resurrectionist?"

"I'm assuming." You confessed, "Dagda is a Celtic god whose staff can resurrect or kill whoever he clubs with it." When Ajay acknowledged your answer with a low oh, you expanded on your previous point, "I guess the members didn't like that their sons didn't all come home in one piece." To put it crudely. Unfortunately, that was the reality of many cults borne from the spiritualism boom in the 1920s. People either got bored or got bitter when their prophet couldn't stand and deliver in the face of a catastrophic global event.

You and Ajay entered the theater from the side door to avoid the students who began to flood the halls as the morning trundled toward the first bell. You found Maddie rising like the second coming out of the center of the stage, followed closely by Wally and then Rhonda, Charley, and lastly, Mina who turned and closed the trap door behind her.

"You find anything?" You inquired as Wally neared you, eagerness writ all over his features.

"Yeah!" Wally grinned, planting himself in front of you to band his arms around your waist, "You?"

"The symbols are definitely based on the Futhark alphabet and they're all designed to keep energies in." You said, snuggling into his front, happy to let him take your weight. He shifted you around so you and he could walk toward the stage, everyone gathered around a spot at the end of the center aisle. Rhonda and Charley sat on the edge of the stage, Ajay joined Mina who leaned beside Charley's legs, and Maddie stood with her back to the door, facing everyone.

As soon as you were within reach, she held out a piece of paper, informing you that, "It's a receipt for new band uniforms signed by Mr. Anderson." You scanned the paper, trying to absorb where it fit in the puzzle, but your brain was rapidly losing steam. Seeming to read your fatigue, Maddie interpreted it on your behalf, "I think he's been stealing money from Booster Club. He's got a whole operation under the stage to sew new patches onto old band uniforms."

All you could think to respond with was, "Holy shit."

"It doesn't prove he had anything to do with what happened to me," Maddie went on, "But I think it'll help Simon."

"Maddie this is awesome." You smiled encouragingly and shambled forward to hug her. With your arm still around her shoulders, you and she looked over the receipt again, particularly the cash amount at the bottom, "Is that how much you figure was in the closet?"

"I'd say it for sure is." She answered, her gaze turning a trepidatious sort of hopeful, "It's Friday, so there's a staff meeting tonight. If we give this to Simon, he can prove that Mr. Anderson is guilty of something and then we can try to figure out where my body is. Together."

"Together." You repeated with a grin because, God dammit, finally, you felt like progress was being made. While not the kind of progress you'd hoped for, it was something, and now that you knew Simon could see Maddie, you didn't have to swerve around landmines in conversation to hide your abilities; you could let him in instead.

It was one step closer to bringing Maddie home.

‗‗‗‗•‗‗‗‗

Xavier hated himself more than he had before his breakdown, having succumbed to the siren call of his vape in the dissociative aftermath. He skulked into the school, shoulders up and hands stuffed in his pockets in an effort to make himself invisible. He wasn't going to his first class, wasn't entirely aware of where he was going, but he followed his feet nonetheless. Since the blissful first hit, his mind had quieted some, though his nerves were still ragged, eyes puffy and bloodshot, hair rumpled, a scab on his lip where he'd bitten it too hard to redirect the emotional pain he'd inflicted on himself.

He was distantly surprised to find himself standing in front of the theater when he eventually lifted his gaze from the ground. Without giving it too much thought, he reached out and opened the door, stepping into the shadowy space beyond. For a moment, a cotton-candy static fuzzed across his brain and made it hard to process whether or not what his eyes saw was real.

It couldn't be, could it?

At the end of the center aisle, you stood, body wilted from exhaustion. Around you were incoherent silhouettes that phased in and out of focus, nothing substantial to them, just distorted shadows that seemed out of place against the direction of what muted light filtered into the theater. What made his breath catch and the balloon in his chest swell bigger wasn't you, standing in the dark, or the uncanny shadows, it was—

"Maddie," He croaked, voice reedy and tight, "You came back."

The fuzziness in his head was instantly replaced by fear when his gaze slid to you, an expression on your face—wide eyes, parted lips, furrowed brows—that Xavier readily interpreted as betrayal. The darkness crowded against him, the rampage of wailing curses picked up within him again, screaming at him for how worthless and stupid and vile he was to do what he'd done.

"I-I'm so sorry," He choked out, pushing the words past the balloon that had expanded from his chest into his throat. Maddie's expression didn't change, something akin to alarm or hate or defeat or all three, he didn't know because his vision was beginning to cloud. "I'm so, so sorry." And then he stumbled sideways, falling into one of the empty seats, curling himself into a ball as if he could make himself disappear. Everything would be better, so much better, if he could just...stop being.

Xavier didn't realize he was crying until he felt your hands on him, pushing his arms away from his head, forcing him to kneel on the ground with you.

"Zav? What's happening? Are you okay? Zav!"

Your words sounded spoken through water and he couldn't get his head above the surface, couldn't breathe, couldn't answer, his body wracked violently with stinging sobs as he kept trying to apologize. He grappled at your back, pinned you against him, a buoy to keep him afloat as the waves crashed over him and threatened to pull him down into the cavernous abyss below.

"I'm sorry, please, don't leave me, I'm so sorry," He begged you, but couldn't hear himself, so he repeated them louder and louder until his throat scraped.

This is the moment, a facsimile of Maddie's voice told him, this is the moment you lose everyone.

And then another voice, unfamiliar, louder than Xavier's, louder than Maddie's, began to roar:

💀___________________________

PART TWENTY-THREE

note: i am of the belief that Mr. South is spooky in his own right and doesn't need Reader to expose him to the supernatural. agree with me or not, his ominous words to Simon at the beginning of the season set me on a path that i can't ignore 🤭

i really hope you guys are okay with how i'm reworking this. i know i gave away a pretty major spoiler, and i regret that so much because i dearly want you all to enjoy this, but it had to be done. otherwise i was more than likely going to throw in the towel. rest assured, there is SO MUCH more to unfold.

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ABOUT THE TAGLIST: y'all know, it ain't a thing around here anymore due to the overuse of ritual magic, some demon-summoning, and an unfortunate sacrifice that resulted in more technical issues than tumblr could handle 🔮🗡️ if you'd like to be kept up-to-date, please FOLLOW ME and TURN ON NOTIFICATIONS. we have fun here (•¯ ��� ¯•)

[naok-iyuu]

Love is about details - Zed Necrodopolis x fem!reader

Summary : On a Halloween night, you meet a boy that will soon become your best friend. Until feelings get in the way.

word count : 8.2k

My masterlist ! No major warnings, just reader having an existential crisis mid fic and Zed being a golden retriever.

(Autor's note) : I AM FINALLY ALIIIVVEEE !!! I am soo lazy, I've struggled so much to finish this one. And even when I get ideas, I always end up with those blank page syndrome or with too much drafts on my account.

I hope this fanfic will be liked by some of you, I don't really know where I was going at some point but I couldn't bring myself to delete and do something else ahah. I wanted to do a small fic... Well it ended up with 8k words. ENJOY!!

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You never believed in love at first sight. Hell you even thought it was the most stupid thing the world ever created to entertain Terrians. Maybe you could be really attracted to someone at first sight, because ‘gorgeous’, surely, would be the first word coming to your mind while crossing path someone like Joshua Bassett. But to truly fell in love, you should be able to remember their eye color and describe it as something precious. Or so you thought.

Your first encounter with the boy you would fell in love with was on Halloween. Your friend group thought it would be funny to cross Seabrook’s border to enter Zombietown, something about showing each other that you weren’t chicken-hearted. A stupid teenage idea.

You weren’t interested in those things, but you followed your bestfriend who was a total lab nerd that would smash the Seabrook barrier to see a real zombie outside of your school. Natural habitat analysis thingy going on in her head.

It didn’t last long though, each and every person looked every two seconds behind them and jumped at every street common noise their hears caught.

They finally all went running back to the so called ‘normal side’ when a zombie, woman, screamed at them from the other side of the road. The sound as surprised you so much that your body frooze instantly. Your heart started beating even faster when the door near you suddenly oppened rapidly, making you jump and gasp.

Your eyes met one of a boy, it was easy enought to discern the surprised and concerned look on his face, his gaze looking strangly at you. You were disguised as a zombie for Halloween, well, the kind of zombie filmakers showed in their movies. Torn clothes, messy hair, pale skin with a lot of scars. Not really looking like the young zombie you had in front of you. Green hair styled with skills you surely did not have, grunge clothes, but a nice call on the pale skin.

"What are you doing here ?" His words came out skeptical, for what on earth would a human be on the wrong side of the wall. Well, there was Halloween of course, but nobody ever had the courage to come here.

He had caught on your dressing up, you were a convincing enought zombie for normal people, but not for a zombie apparently. He could admit that your make up was impressive, those scars looked real.

"Hm… Well with Halloween going on, my friends came to scare themself."

His eyebrows raised when you answered him. He was more prepared to receive a scream followed by one of the biggest sprint he’ll ever see. He looked from left to right, but found nothing other than his old, moldy town. "Seems like they got scared, right ?"

His conclusion got a chuckle out of your lips and you nodded your head, looking in the direction your friends took a run for their life. In the back of your mind, you thought about the fact they totally forgot to look out for you. They would be hearing about it for at least the next 10 years. "Yeah, they completely took a run for it."

Your eyes met his again, the situation was quite awkward. For him taking in the sight of a human in front of his house, and for you, who, for the love of the sky above, couldn’t even move to end this nightmare. "I should… Probably get going."

Your eyes lost their way on the scenery around, thinking that you should go home before everyone calls the police to get you out. Your parents would lose their head if they knew something had happened to you. You finally found in you the energy to move a foot when his hesitant voice stopped you.

"Can I ask for your name ?"

You turned around, returning to the spot you were so eager to leave. It took you a few seconds again to gather your thoughts. He wasn’t the one responsible for the fact you were right in front of his door, just stairs away from him. Maybe you were just disturbed by how calm you actually were. You were going to blame the Halloween effect on this one, green haired people weren’t that weird and scary compared to some costume people came up with.

"Huh yeah. I am Y/n." A breeze stopped your own question to let your name simmer in the air. The fact being that you were two people trying to get each other names after a weird encounter and not a girl and a zombie in that very moment felt like something you shouldn’t be allowed to do. Zombies were still hated by your people, they haven’t stopped talking trash about them even when they got welcomed in your school. Change must be scary for humans.

"And you ?" His own mouth went dry, maybe from the exact same fact you realised or from his father's voice hurrying him inside. His words got stuck for a time more, remembering his own name and yours.

"Zed. I am Zed Necrodopolis." He nodded to himself, at least he didn’t mispelled it nor hesitated too much. Zed was friendly to everyone, even when he started his first year at Seabrook high. Yet, having an intruder in Zombie Town had taken him aback, that was quite the shocker. He tried to remember if he ever saw you at school. No, he surely hasn’t… has he ?

A wave of your hand paused his thoughts. He waved goodbye back, looking at your silhouette. Once you were far enough and his father's voice loud enough, he came back inside his sweet little home.

Another idea occurred, did you even know where you were going ?

. . .

The few other encounters were less awkward.

After a good scare endured by your friends who thought you had been devoured by a thousand zombies, deserved. You had to go back to school, tossing aside your friend questions about how the zombie you talked to looked like, smelled like, dressed up like. You couldn’t remember a single thing, just a bunch of green hair that could be seen all around the school now. Or maybe, you just didn’t really want to talk about it.

You crossed paths with him, between classes and lunches. Both too hesitant to talk and too distracted by your talkative friends. You had waved, waved, and waved again at each other. He noticed how you would only use your right hand to greet him, and you acknowledged how dark colors were the ones that suited him most. Your wavery earned a gasp from your bestfriend and a side angry eye from the zombie girl following Zed around.

. . .

Grabbing the library table, your friend looked at you with the biggest eyes possible. "It was Zed Necrodopolis ?" Her voice whispered in disbelief.

She had finally noticed your wavering habits with the zombie after seeing him near the lockers on your way to the library, when you already had done it 10 times today.

You frowned, moving slightly your head like something would jump on you if you moved too much. "You know him ?"

She shook her head with her mouth open in shock, her eyes rolled back in her head. "He’s the one zombie who got into the football team ! Do you live under a rock ?"

"Since you forgot me back in Zombietown, yes. I feel much more secure." You slid your joke with a thin smile and a raise of your features to make your point and annoy her.

She breathed a quiet laugh in your direction with a smile. She was ready to get back at you when a voice interrupted her.

"Hi, sorry to disturb you both, can we sit here ?"

You two looked up from your conversation, locking your eyes with the ones you couldn’t escape even if you tried. Schools aren’t that big after all. Zed was standing here, a zombie girl clearly angry and a taller zombie boy with the biggest smile right next to him.

Your mouth oppened and closed a few times, your words hiding themself in the back of your throat instead of helping you in creating a sentence. You turned to your best friend and saw her eyes popped out of her face, her mouth wide open enough to swallow at least 3 whole families of flies. Her eyes stared in your direction, her face not moving an inche from her surprised and excited features. You didn’t need to ask for her permission, she would beg you to say yes. Slightly nervous, you faced Zed again who was waiting for you with a gentle smile.

"Yeah of course." You slided your chair closer to your wide eyed friend next to you to let the three zombies sit on the three available chair.

When they sat down, silence followed. Zed, who sat on your other side, looked at you with shy eyes. Something that cringed the girl with a messy bun. He discretly waved hello to you, a ritual that seemed to please him more than you could imagine. You waved back discretly, the tiniest ‘hi’ falling from your lips to greet him. His eyes quickly caught the color of your pencil case, f/c. Somehow, he felt like he could have guessed this as your favorite color.

A sigh caught everyone attention and the green haired girl crossed her arms. "Why are we even here ?"

Zed was quick to quiet down any fight he thought could happen due to his friend being grumpy and the two humans girls feeling hurt by her words. "To say Hi." He caught both your attention, introducing his friends. "This is Eliza, don’t mind her she is getting used to human, still. And this is my buddy Bonzo."

Bonzo smile grew even bigger, showing all of his teeth as he raised his hand to say what seemed to be a ‘hello’ or a ‘nice to meet you’ in zombie. Phrased by some ‘zogzigzargzog’, or maybe it was ‘zigzagzargzogzarg’, you couldn’t remember.

"What did he said ?!" Your friend high pitched voice surprised everyone, she was quick to react to Bonzo words. Her hand was nearly breaking her pen by squeazing it too much, her other hand flipping pages of a new notebook you had never seen.

"That’s Lucile. Sorry about her she just really loves zombies for some reasons..." You tried to ease their surprise by introducing your highly excited best friend who seemed to live her biggest dream.

"That’s completely fine." Surprisingly, his words gently eased your mind. Maybe handling both girls wouldn’t be that hard. "He said ‘pleasure to meet you both’. "

You heard her excited gasp before she started writing what she heard. How could she even remember what the other boy said ?

"I only wrote what I heard but could you check ?" Her question was more of an affirmation as she slided her notebook right into Zed’s hands, passing it in front of you. He was careful not to disturb your work while grabbing the book.

His dark orbs looked at you with an amused grin before asking for a pencil, which Lucile gladly and almost throwed at him in a hurry. Getting a scared ‘Jesus !’ from you. "You heard it right, but if I may, here’s the zombie way of writing it."

When he handed it back to her, you were sure she was going to explode on the spot. "You guys have a whole different alphabet to speak zombie ?!"

Zed seemed proud of her reaction, he was cute. You could see in the corner of your eyes Eliza slowly relaxing herself. Maybe she had been worried that you would be as mean as the cheerleaders when they first arrived.

"And twenty-three different ways to write the word ‘brain’. " His head nooded to her in affirmation.

"Oh my god this is awesome ! If you guys can teach me all about it somedays, I want to know everything !"

"We’ll be glad, right ?" He turned to his friends. Bonzo cheered with his usual bright smile while Eliza shrugged her shoulders, mumbling a 'why not'.

You smiled at them, happy that everyone seemed to get quite along for a first encounter. You felt like you didn’t know how to act around Zed, for a fact, you didn’t know each other except for those stolen hi’s after all. You could say that socializing wasn’t really something you were good at.

Zed seemed to notice your shyness, maybe he could help you by showing his friendly side. "Your friend seems great. She’s funny."

You looked up to see his brown eyes looking at you. For some reasons, you were sure that that one sunray directed right to his left eye was there on purpose. "Yeah, she’s the best."

Zed had made the first step toward you, hoping to see bloom a friendship between the fake zombie girl he had seen on his doorstep and himself.

Mainly thanks to Lucile and her inconditional love for zombies, she got the three of them to stay at your table for an hour.

. . .

Day after day, you were gradually seen hanging out with Zed and his crew along with Lucile more and more. Forming a lovely mixed group of five.

You opened up slowly, and conversation started to feel more natural once you knew each zombie better. You didn’t need Zed’s help anymore to feel comfortable, your questionable jokes already sliding in each and every sentence you could form.

Bonzo and Eliza seemed to like you both, even if you couldn’t communicate with the taller boy. You still found ways to understand him and he did the same. Eliza and Lucile both fell for their nerd side, not looking like total polar opposite anymore. Eliza being a zombie was Lucile fuel for knowledge and Lucile being always impressed by Eliza knowledge and technology made her feel understood.

Fast enought, without anyone questioning or noticing it, every single second you could spend glued to Zed became your mission number one every day. You had your routines, your habits, and somehow in the mist of it all, the jocks found his way to be your new and unique routine.

The same could be said for him. Even if Zed would never be ruled by any routines, having you and Lucile gang up with Eliza and Bonzo went from something nice to his essential. Even when the group couldn’t be together, the boy always found his way to you and you to him. He somehow quickly noticed your love for quiet places and books, which made it easier to find you. You were, too, quick to find Zed everytime you were looking for him. His loud voice and love for football were easy enough to spot in every room he could be in.

Free hours in school were spend in his company, lunches were eaten right next to him just so you could mock his choice of food, and you surprised yourself with even seeing him on weekends. Zombies had won freedom for their own actions, seeing your friends was now a piece of cake. You started with simple hang outs with everyone to going to Zed’s house, him to yours, and even to include ice cream rituals in town. You could never be thankful enough for those, especially for the coach's peanut butter n’ bones ice cream.

Your parents never saw you out of the house this often, you could even say that your mom had started to grow a soft spot for the green haired jock. Something you would have gladly erased from your memories if not for those family meal where his name seemed to always end up in.

. . .

That’s why you never believed in love at first sight. For you, you had to know the person, hang out with them and remember everything special about them. You could never have fallen in love by just seeing Zed for the first time next to his crusty door. You believed that love was about details. And this belief would be the one hitting you full speed right in the guts.

. . .

"How can you say that zombies have different eye colors ? They are all bloody brown !" Lucile hands fell on her thighs, smacking them in the process with exasperation.

Your best friend sitting on your bed had talked about her zombie knowledge again for the past twenty minutes, a knowledge you had started to be really interested in recently. She’ll never mention it, but it surprised her when you suddenly asked about their language, culture and even tradition.

You knew a bunch, thanks to your zombies buddies, but Lucile was a goldmine of information. If you wanted to know anything without sounding too weird or suspicious, you knew she was your best option.

Today’s new debate started when Lucile talked about physical differences between zombies, noticing how all hairs weren't exactly the same shade of green. However, she had maintained her statement about their eyes being only a very dark brown.

"No they are not. There are different shades too." You contradicted her again, looking at her notes and judging some of them as enormous lies, just the hater you were.

"Okay, give me an exemple." She moved her hand to invite you to elaborate your point of view, obviously curious to know why you were so reactive to this fact and not any other ones.

"It’s true that Bonzo and Eliza have dark eyes, but Zed doesn’t."

"Oh he does."

"No he does not." You looked at the ceiling, starting to feel frustrated. You let Lucile’s zombies notebook fall on your bed right in front of you both. You chewed your bottom lip before speaking again, your eyes looking at every detail of your room and not at your best friend, who’s gaze didn’t leave you for a second. "Zed’s… Well his eyes are slightly the same color as milk chocolate, only a little darker I'll give you that. And when the sun hits them, they glow with this orangy brown color… Like those pictures you find when typing ‘autumn forest’ on google. Seriously, it’s funny when you think about it."

You looked at your fingers, not giving more thoughts to what you just said. Lucile though, looked at you like you were talking crazy. Her famous wide open mouth and her frowned eyebrows couldn’t believe what she just heard. She knew what you thought about boys or romance, luckily her brain was quick to connect the dots. You always talked about details, for you, love should be remembering their eye color and describing it as something precious. You once told her.

She silenced her gasp, finally understanding why you changed so much recently and why zombies suddenly got your interest when you couldn’t care less before. She never gave second thoughts about your relation with Zed, you both were really good friends who liked to hang out often, if not every single day. (Weird ) And friends who, she thought, were glued by the hips like twins would. But maybe this closeness, at a point in time, crossed a line even you haven’t noticed.

"Pause Y/n, Pause." The sudden seriousness in her tone made you perk up from your nail analysis. You had never seen a face like that on her. It made you overthink the words you have just spoken, could you had said something wrong ?

"Did you heard yourself ?"

"W-What ?"

"I am not angry, nor frustrated, nor scolding you." She tried to easy your mind. "I am only asking, did you heard yourself ?"

"What ? That Zed’s eyes looks like dumb autumn forest pictures ?"

She nodded slowly, biting both her lips in a thin line. "Can you now remind me what you always said about remembering someone’s eyes color."

You felt as if your brain spun on itself and gave your whole body a warning sign while ringing simultaneously the biggest bell that could exist. You gasped loudly, your hands flying fast to cover your mouth. "You are shitting me."

"YOU are shitting me ! Since when ?"

You stood up from your bed, realization striking you. You felt the air becoming colder in your lungs with your heart beating crazier than when it’s an exam day. Your hands felt cold, than hot, than cold, than hot again. You looked back at Lucile who was just as surprised as you, just less freaked out.

"I don’t know ! Oh god it’s bad." You were starting to feel too freaked out by this new revelation. Luckily, the scent of your room and being a calm person on a daily basis helped you step out of your mind roller coaster faster.

"I mean, you always go out together. Maybe that made it harder to notice."

Another, but tiniest, gasp escaped you. "We have an ice cream thingy tomorrow." Lucile could hear tiny ‘it’s bad’ coming from you and ‘oh god’ ‘s.

"I never undertood that ritual, every week ? Ice cream ?"

"You’re right, I am calling in sick. " You were ready to grab your phone when she snatched it away.

"First, we are going to talk about this, analyze things and won’t freak out, okay ? It is not as bad as it looks."

"I am not that freaked out, and yes it is bad. Not falling for your, other, best friend is like an unbreakable rule."

"So you are in love with Zed ?"

"I absolutely did not say that."

The girl frowned again, even with your calm demeanor you stayed in a total denial mindset. You always loved romance, but it seemed like it wasn’t the thing you were expecting to crash into your life right now. Or maybe your weren’t expecting to fall for Zed. She stretched out her hand for you to take, encouraging you to come back on the bed. You sighed, taking it before sitting back on your bed, a light sadness building in your chest.

"Can we talk about zombies culture instead ?"

"If you want, but before we’re going to dig into that little heart attack moment you just had."

"It’s just… Like I said, we’ve been like best friends lately and I just feel like I am betraying him." Your eyes met hers, a sad expression painting your features. "It’s like I am asking too much out of him. We’re friends, and now feelings get in the way and I’ll start acting weird because now I am aware of it. And what if I get even more into my head and he just feels weirded out, rejects me of some sort. I still want to hang out with him."

"Wow you got the time to think about all of that in just a minute ?" Her sentence teared the tiniest chuckle out of your lips. Lucile squeezed your hand, trying to keep you grounded in any ways she could. "I think you should be kinder to yourself. It happens to fall for friends, even if it changes things, ultimately. It is not a bad thing."

"Why him though … ?" Your question was more of a frustrated and sulking sentence to show how surprised you were.

She laughed. "I should ask you girl !"

And you followed her laughter. Maybe you got ahead of yourself and got slightly carried away by the new realisation, just maybe. You talked a bit more with Lucile, and you were thankful for her patience and the way she understood your point of view. Even if she thought that Zed looked like a very green and moldy potato, which made you laugh. She even teased you by saying how your mom would be happy to hear the news, making you grunt another slight laugh.

You knew the boy for nearly a year now, blossoming feelings shouldn’t be surprising when you knew deep down how good he looked. Getting to know each other and your souls clicking together like you just lost a thousand years finding the person that could make you spit out your whole stomach laughing along with flipping your whole mood upside down with just a word should have been a warning sign. You had fallen in love with Zed Nerodopolis.

. . .

The next day went smoothly, even if you had to mentally scold yourself every now and then because you kept looking at Zed for no reasons. You tried to brush your new feelings off, acting like usual with maybe less confidence.

He noticed, and you hopped it was just once. "Do I have some ice cream left on my face ?" A finger pointed toward his face, he stared at you.

"Nop. Not at all."

"Oh, I thought. Since you can’t stop staring." You caught on his teasing tone, his smile already trying to get under your skin just so you would say something back to him.

Usually, you would have laughed and made fun of him for suspecting you of staring. But now, all his sentences and smirks did were increasing your heartbeat and wished that your cheeks haven’t turned a deeper shade of red.

. . .

The next week at school, you thought you were doing a good job at hiding anything your heart was begging to let out. You denied with force the fact you avoided your usual safe spots to study or read, knowing full well Zed would be waiting or searching for you there. You couldn’t avoid him everywhere and everytime though, you both were too familiar with each other schedule and you could tell the boy sensed something different coming from you.

Trouble knocked at your door when Eliza found you in a room you wouldn’t usually want to be, the cheerleaders rest room. Bree offered you this refuge when Bucky and his henchmen weren’t around, nobody ever spilled the beans and you were grateful for that.

The door opened with a certain force and hurry, making you jump on your sit. Eliza stared right into your soul and a long silence followed before her voice came out of her throat.

"What is going on ?"

"What ?"

"Please don’t play dumb with me." She closed the door behind her, guarding the entrance to prevent any escape tricks from you. "Zed’s been whining all day long because you are avoiding him."

"I am not, we just saw each other." Lying wasn’t your best ability but you still tried to convince her of your enormous lie.

"According to him, he haven’t seen you since lunch." Her eyes were big, and it felt like your mom was giving you a life lesson. With this eye contact, you knew she wouldn’t be fooled by you. You always spend the next hour with Zed because of your free period in common. And for some reason, you could tell everyone noticed your change in character, even if you had tried to minimize it. "And we both know that you’ve been very discret and absent lately." And here it goes, you were doomed. "I’ll ask again, what is going on ?"

You growned in frustration and embarassement. "I don’t want to talk about it..." Running a hand over your face, you closed your laptop tossing it in your bag.

You didn’t see Eliza concerned look. "Is it something serious ? About your family or did something bad happened ?"

You were grateful for her concern, it showed you once more that the girl you first met in the library was now one of your friends.

"No, no. Nothing major. Just something really troublesome for me."

"And it has to do with Zed ?"

"H-How do you even get there when asking for my family seconds ago ?" You blushed once more, wishing you would have wore a turtleneck sweater to hide your face.

"I promise I won’t tell him, I just think we could all help you if we had some idea of what’s happening." Even trapped in the room you would have thought of a good hiding place, you knew Eliza was telling the truth and genuinely wanted to help you. You were thankful for Lucile too who haven’t said anything. With all the time she spends with the zombie girl, you always wondered if she could have let it slipped up accidentally.

You sighed, fighting your own hesitation about telling the truth or denying your crush for the rest of your life. Maybe it was time to take a step forward and get some advice from someone who knew Zed for a long time.

"I like him." You were quick to pronounce those words, afraid they would run away from you and make you lose your courage.

Eliza surprised face chased away the words she was about to say, ‘yeah, we know.’ The look on your face showed her it wasn’t the type of like you used to feel month before.

"Oh, like… Love like ?"

"I know I shouldn’t."

"I did not said that."

You pursed your lips, averting your eyes from hers. Somehow, telling Zed’s long time best friend your feelings for him was as hard, not really, as telling him. You were scared of Eliza already knowing the boy opinion on the question and that her words would come and cut every string you had tightly knotted.

"You’ve realised it last week ?" Your head nodding to her words confirmed her suspicions. After all, you’ve started making yourself more discreet a week ago. "And why not telling him ?"

"We’re best friend ! It will ruin our friendship for sure."

"And if it does not ? Maybe he feels something for you too." She didn’t want to talk for Zed, but she knew him. Even without telling her a word of his feelings, she noticed how he cared and looked out for you. If he wasn’t even the tiniest bit in love… Well screw him.

"He does not."

It felt like talking you out of your thoughts was out of the question. "If you say so, but I am warning you, he is behind the door and ready to follow you for the rest of the day."

You chuckled, shaking your head at the image of Zed almost going crazy behind the door. "I am ready for it captain."

Eliza sighed desperately at your words while you stood up, opening the door to reveal a Zed who haven't heard a thing from your girl talk.

"Oh my god finally ! I was starting to think that I should add you on my Christmas wish list to see you again." The zombie girl nearly got the time to step out of the room when the boy charged in to stand himself right in front of you.

"So I am a Christmas present now ? I knew you wanted me." His rolling eyes and frustrated features won a giggle out of you. At least your feelings didn’t wipe out your sense of humor.

"On a serious note, is everything okay ? » His tone instantly made your amused smile drop, you could see the worry in his eyes and what your avoidance made him experience. You felt like a fool.

"Yes, I promise. I just had a lot on my mind recently, but now I realise, nothing worth putting my friends aside."

Eliza stayed out of view but heard your words, it made a sweet smile grew on her lips.

"Of course it wasn’t worth, should I remember you that we are the best ?" He waited for you to confirm his words and your shaking, amused head gave him just that.

"Yes, I am sorry. Come here stinky dork." Your circled his body with your arms right below his chest to encourage him into a hug.

He chuckled at your attitude, something he had missed over the past days. His own arms came around your shoulders to pull your head into his chest, ever so careful to never squeeze you too hard.

Eliza cough made him turn his head and your own tried to look at the girl by sticking out your head from his warm hug.

"Don’t forget about the zombie party tonight." She raised her eyebrow at her zombie fella.

"Of course I won’t." His smile and nod was her cue to leave.

"You guys are having a party in Zombietown ?"

His gaze came right back to you. "Yes, I was going to invite you."

"And what made you wait that long ? " Your quirked eyebrow painted his face with false surprise, tease floating all around in the air. You freed yourself from his grasp, crossing your arms on your chest.

"Huh, I don’t know, maybe the fact that I couldn’t find you around school anymore ?"

"I deserve that one. But you could have texted me."

"I am a gentleman. If I ask a girl out, I at least put the tiniest bit of effort."

"That is the tiniest bit of effort for sure. Where are the flowers and the knee on the ground to beg me to accompany you ?"

He shook his head and his right arm came back on your shoulder to bring your body out of the room with him. "I am still pretty hurt by having been pushed away by my bestest friend, so no flowers and no chivalry demand for you. Maybe a next time. "

"So there will be a next time ?" Your sly smirk reminded him of why you both were impossible to put up with when together. The endless back and worth was inevitable. It almost looked like the other would lose the biggest battle of their life if they didn’t respond.

"You hope for a next time huh ? I got you girl." You called it quit on that one when you felt your heart scream, yet again, for the fourth time since the conversation started .

. . .

The day soon came to an end, and you heard your mother's voice calling you from downstairs.

"Comin’ !"

You applied another spray of perfume before going down the stairs at a rapid pace, the entrance hall already opened to let you take in the sight of a waiting Zed.

"Here you are honey." Your mother rested a hand on your shoulder when your body stopped next to her. She surely had been talking with Zed while you were in the bathroom. "I wish you both a good time, but be home before midnight, got it ?"

"No problem Mrs.L/n, I am sure we’ll be home before midnight since she gets sleepy pretty quickly." His eyes shared a reassuring look to your mother, but you knew better than to be fooled by a Necrodopolis. You could see under this sweet and gentleman smile of his that he was gently making fun of you.

"I am pretty sure I will not." You retorted, your head moving childishly.

Zed was amused by your usual picked on reaction and smiled even more. You didn’t noticed it, nor him, but your mother quickly looked at the both of you with a suspicious look. She was used to your forever gentle bickering with the zombie, but she could swore she felt something unusual.

"Even though, midnight it is." You mumbled a fake annoyed ‘Yes mom’ before taking your leave with the boy right next to you.

The walk until Zombietown was filled with lively conversations, yet again, reminding yourself not to look too closely or too often slipped your mind every single time.

"I can’t wait, zombies party really are the best."

"I am glad you think that. I am pretty sure the first time I brought you to one you almost got a heart attack."

He didn’t mean to fully tease you, but you took the bait anyway. "You know I can’t really handle a lot of people ! But now it’s okay, I am used to it." You tried not to sulk, even the slightest, but you still huffed like a sulking puppy.

He smiled, feeling his chest warm up in your presence each step he took. The week he spends, mostly, without you almost got him into a crazy teenage frenzy. He felt like he had lost his north star and that no path could ever bring him back to you. He had wondered, just for a second, if the feelings he felt for you could be painted by many other meanings. But as a best friend, he denied them and acted like nothing changed.

"We’re here, let’s go inside."

To be sure you wouldn’t get lost or trapped in a wave of young zombies, he took your hand in his, clearing a path for you while he had tucked you closer to him.

In the middle of it all, you could have swore your eyes caught a glimpse of Eliza bun. You were quickly diverted from that thought by Zed who tried to find a quieter spot for you to enjoy the party. The old building room was crowded, he opted for a spot near the huge escape door, enough for you to enjoy the musics and people energy without getting overwhelmed. However his attempt drowned as quickly as he got to the corner he wanted when you spotted Bonzo.

"Look it’s Bonzo mixing ! Let’s get closer !"

"Don’t you prefer to stay here ?" His hand prevented you from leaving without him.

You turned around, realizing he just did all this room search for you. You felt your heart flipping in your chest along with you cheeks turning slightly pink, that detail had completely gone over your head.

"For this once, I’ll take the zombie heat full speed ! Come on !"

You dragged the boy along with you while he murmured ‘Why don’t you take my heat full speed’ under his breath, a sentence you couldn’t possibly hear with all that noise. Once near the stage, the boy you were excited to see locked eyes with you and started waving at you two.

"Y/n’ska !" His voice got caught by his microphone making you laught. You raised your free hand as high as you could, waving it and cheering for him. He greeted you with a tumb up before turnig his attention back on his tech.

You turned your head to center your attention on Zed again, only to see his gaze already focused on you. For some reason, it felt like his eyes haven’t left you even when you had waved to Bonzo. Your lungs warned you of a lack of air before new notes of musics reached your ears. A gasp made you breath again and a look of excitement took over your features when your head turned in every direction to look at the old speakers.

"Oh my god it’s that song from Hotel Transylvania !" Your hand let go of Zed’s, only acknowledging the fact that you didn’t let go sooner now. "They usually don’t play that kind of songs." You offered him a confused look, only for his smile to grow wider. You remembered yourself vibing to the song before the lyrics laughed at you because you were, indeed, in love with a monster now.

"I may or may not gave some of your playlist to Bonzo." His voice perfectly covered the song, making you able to only hear him.

You felt the floor slip under your shoes even if your body didn’t move an inch. "Why would you do that ?"

"Because I know how much you love the songs you listen to on a daily basis. I just thought it would make you happy to hear them here too."

‘Cause I’m in love with a monster.

You bit your lower lips, your heart ready to explode. You were going to let ip slip up, the words threatened to blurp out.

Friends say I’m stupid and I’m out of my mind, but without you boy I’d be bored all the time.

"You dance ?" You offered him the same hand you had taken away from him.

"How could I say no."

Everyone danced around you and Zed and even if you weren’t that good of a dancer, you allowed yourself to bounce around like you would do in your room. Your partner successfully made you drop some coordinated moves along with him. For a few seconds, it didn’t felt like a huge and moldy old building filled with hormones and sweats. You were in your own little world where only your best friend was allowed to appear when he made you twirl and move along with him.

The song soon ended to reveal another one that you knew a little bit too well. You turned around once more to look at Bonzo vibing behind his soundboard. Zed took the chance to offer a thumb up to his bro who looked up for a second, he quickly hid his hand when you looked once again at him.

"You’re joking..." Your voice wasn’t audible with all the fuss, and he didn’t noticed your lips slightly moving with intoxicating emotions.

"What ? Told you we choose some of your favorite songs !"

He was doing it on purpose, he had to. His voice started to sing along with the song, both his hands now holding yours to make you dance out of you surprise.

A shaky sigh escaped from your mouth, you weren’t sure your body could follow more of his tricks and energy, nonetheless, you tried to dance a bit more.

‘You and me belong together all the time.’

Soon his energy got to you, and you couldn’t help but sing along as he made you twirl more and swing from left to right. You laughed a few times when his foot got tangled in the weird choreography of other people, making him move a bit less for a few seconds.

His body towered over you, and he leaned closer to sing along with your voice, "This love is all we need !" He seemed so happy, so caught up in what was hapenning. He enjoyed this moment with you, he even went as far as asking Bonzo to add songs you loved to the party. It was the details even you didn’t notice, how on the way here he had looked to see if you weren’t cold, how he had searched for a quiet place so you wouldn’t get overwhelmed. How he remembered and kept the playlist you showed him.

And from those little things, greater gesture from him came to your mind. You weren’t the only one paying attention to all the little things about him, he was paying attention to you too.

Screw your denial, you couldn’t take it anymore. You couldn’t hide nor lie a second more, your body wouldn’t allow it. « Gar gargiza ! »

Zed had stopped moving nearly at the same time as you, his eyes widened with his mouth slightly open in shock. He felt his mouth turning dry, yet, he swallowed what seemed litres of saliva. "What did you say ?" He had to make sure, he had to hear it again.

You bit your lower lip, frustrated and scared, your body slightly shaking. "Gar gargiza you dumbass !"

"You know what that means right ?"

"Oh my god I am going to kill you ! I love you Zed, and I am going crazy about it !"

As soon as the word left your lips, his arms quickly squeezed you in the biggest, neediest hug you had ever received. You squeezed him as hard as you could before he, as quickly, pushed you from him, his hands tightly holding your arms.

"Tell me I can kiss you." You eyes widened at his words, and the seconds you took to respond were enough to burn out his patience. "Please." He begged.

You felt an urge, the same one Zed’s was trying to suppress to give you space and time to think. Your hands reached to his neck, landing on his skin as you stood on you tiptoe in a quick motion. Your lips touched his. It was a rushed move that ended as soon as you tasted him. However, he didn’t want to let you go just yet. His own hands rapidly but gently grabbed the back of your head to stop you from moving too far away from him, and with a last glance at your sparkling eyes, he kissed you. This time longer, sweeter. He wanted to remember the taste of your fragile lips, he wanted to stay connected to you as long as he could. He was tender and soft against you, keeping you close yet never too strongly so you could stop him at any given moment.

He felt his last bit of control being sucked out of him when your lips moved against his. He parted from you, against his will, your eyes almost pulling him again in your touch. He looked all around him, and you wondered what was happening. Your brain had completely pushed the off button and you were barely emerging from your ecstasy when Zed hand tugged you across the room.

"W-Where are we going ?"

It took him only a few seconds to find the exit. "Sorry to drag you out, but I can’t stay in there."

You soon found yourself in a smaller room that still seemed pretty big for both of you. He turned around to face you, his hand pulling you against him as his forehead touched yours. "I love you Y/n, so so much. I don’t know why it even took so long for me to say it."

His words hit you like a truck, he had rushed you out but you now understood why. You too wanted a moment alone with him, to finally know what it feels to be loved by him. What it feels to be loved by you.

"Maybe the fact that I avoided you because I was scared of my own feelings." You breathed heavily because of the run the boy put you through, it was hard to follow mister long legs with your tiny ones.

He laughed at the inside joke you made, remembering how he had bugged you about that exact fact today. "You were ?"

"Didn’t want to lose my best friend." You confessed with teary shining eyes. Even if it wasn’t the case anymore, you could have lost him back there. His hands made their way to your cheeks, smoothing the skin under your eyes to chase any tears that threatened to pour.

"Me too." His voice admitted soon after you. "But look, now you have a lover who happens to be your best friend of all time."

You exhaled an amused breath. "Girlfriend boyfriend huh ?" You wanted to keep on saying those words, and you wanted him to keep on approving what you thought.

Luckily, Zed knew you like the back of his hand and was aware of the things going through your head. "Y/n L/n, my sweet and beautiful girlfriend." He won another shaky smile from you. "Come here gorgeous, I haven’t had enought of your kisses."

With the slightest force, he brought your face to his to smother your lips with a million kisses. It made you laugh against his skin, and he soon pampered kisses all over your face.

"S-Stop ahah !"

"Never."

Your hands grabbed his wrist to show your, non-existent, protest. When he attacked your lips again with quick kisses, your own opened to surprise him with a bigger and even more needy kiss. Your move worked as his face stepped back with a really surprised look.

"What was that ?"

"What was what ? " You played dumb, earning a childish smile from him.

"What was that big kiss just now ? Were you trying to bite me ?" He kissed the corner of your mouth, giggling with you.

You took him in your arms, resting your head on his chest. His breathing appeased your emotions and thoughts, and you sensed the same could be said for him as his head came to rest on yours.

"Can I sleep at you place tonight ?" His demand was quiet.

"You’ll have to ask my mom."

"She loves me, of course it's going to be yes."

You sighed, of course she would say yes to Zed, it was Zed."She spoils you too much... "

[zombieluvr101]

ACCIDENTALLY ON

PURPOSE

Fandom / Zombies

Paring / Zed Necrodopolis x Fem!Reader

Prompt / accidentally confessing feelings ; longing stares

Summary / a hot guy likes you fr‼️ DOESNT THAT SOUND GRAND?!

Word Count / 971

Gif by / @megedonnelly

Prompt / @luvfae

Seconds left on the clock. Which is counting down the last few seconds of the most important game of my life. This game determines if I have what it takes to play football at Mountain College.

“Alright team, we only have 25 seconds on the clock. Zed, if you make this, we win,” Coach says wearily as we are timed out.

Just hearing Coaches voice, I can tell he’s nervous. I mean, yeah I am too. This is my big game. If I don’t get into Mountain College I won’t be with Y/n.

Yeah, yeah, I know! Y/n isn’t even my girlfriend yet. But she’s so smart, and witty, and the most beautiful girl I’ve ever laid my eyes on.

Okay Zed! Focus.

“Alright Wynter, I need you too be open in the center field so Maximus can throw you the ball so you can try to make the touchdown,

but if that doesn’t work try and pass it to me,” I instruct.

We get into position, the whistle blows.

Our quarterback starts us off, “White 80, hut hut!”

Wynter catches the ball and makes her way over but get tackled in the process. But she was able to pass it to me. I turn to switch my Z-band.

Seven seconds left..

The ball brushes against my fingers. But I catch it.

Six seconds left…

I use all my speed to run to the end zone.

Five.

I duck and jump over the opposing teams players.

Four.. Three… Two….

One!

I land in the end zone on the very last second.

“And the Seabrooks Mighty Shrimp have done it again! They have won the last game of the season!”

The cheerleaders are doing their thang, while the crowd goes wild.

“Seabrook! Seabrook! Seabrook!!!”

My friends and family go out for celebratory frozen yogurt. Bonzo, Bree and I are sitting at a table together. And the Acy’s and the rest of the cheer squad are talking about whatever is amusing to them.

“Actually Bonzo.. I don’t have the answer to that,” Bree stated.

Just as I start my sentence, the door to the fro-yo spot jingles. And a pair of blue converse enter the establishment.

“Hey guys!” Y/n say with a cheerful tone.

“OrR!!” Bonzo greets. Meanwhile I can’t get a single word out of my mouth. She makes my brain mush.

“Congrats on your win Zed,” She says with a smile as she takes a seat next to me. All I can do is blink and stare.

“T- hank you,” I mumble in awe of her presence. Gosh I’m such an idiot. But overall she seem amused.

“Welp I’m gonna get my frozen yogurt..” Y/n says getting up from her seat.

“Oh here! Let me pay for it,” I suggest. I jumped out of my seat and grab her hand. Walking over to the register.

“You really don’t need to pay,” She reassures.

“No, no, no I got it Y/n,” I confirm.

Once we since sit back down, Bonzo and Bree have gone outside, leaving just us two to talk. And Y/n continues to eat her fro-yo. I find it funny that the most outgoing, and spirted person I know loves the most basic flavor there is. Vanilla.

I’ve had feelings for Y/n the moment I locked eyes with her on my very first day at Seabrook. I figured that she would be like everyone else and harass me for being me. But she was the opposite.

She treated me with such kindness. She would volunteer to help me with my work if it was something I haven’t learned at Zombie school.

Or if Eliza and Bonzo would pair up for a project and I didn’t have one, she would immediately sit next to me. Making her my partner for most of the projects we’ve done.

Snapping out of my daydream I look up at her again. But this time she has some vanilla yogurt on the right side of her mouth.

Out of instinct (and a very messy little sister) I go to wipe it off of her.

“Oh you have some—” I start.

The only thing is, she turned her head towards me a little more than expected. Making my thumb press against her lips.

Our eyes meet. I’m blown away. No air left. We don’t break apart. I keep my thumb on her lips, gently stroking it.

I can’t tell if I’m imagining it or not, but I see the same passion in her eyes. Just like when I’m looking in the mirror practicing what I’m going to say to her.

Moving my hand, I place my hand on her cheek.

“Thank you,” She says in a whisper. Not once looking away from my eyes.

“No prob,” I reply with a smile.

Gravity pulls us closer and closer.

“God she’s so beautiful—”

She laughs softly, “You think so?”

huh? OH.

“Did I say that out loud?”

She nods sweetly.

“Oh yeah, mhm yea— I 100% meant too. Like I kne- like I know that I did. I was just making sure that YOU— know that I did—” I stutter out, trying to keep my cool.

She interrupted, “Zed, I know what you mean, really.”

“It’s just that I really really like you. I have since freshman year. I don’t know why I haven’t told you. Well actually yes I do. You make me so nervous. Like everything you do makes me flustered,” I confess with speed.

I can tell my words are making her flustered. She looks down but I use two fingers to push her head back up.

“I — I like you too Zed,” She says in a shy tone.

My smile begins to get bigger, “Well you should let me take you out sometime.”

“I’d like that,”

Mind you, we were still holding hands.

end 🫶🏾

[p0guelife]

SOMEDAY

FANDOM. disney zombies

CHARACTER. addison wells x fem! zombie reader

PRONOUNS USED. she/her

SUMMARY. zombies have been allowed to attend seabrook high but are forced down into the dirty basement, away from everyone. zed necrodopolis wants to try out for the football team and talks his friend into going outside with him. turns out, it is the best decision y/n has ever made.

WORD COUNT. 1,633

GIF MADE BY. @megedonnelly

The town of Seabrook had always seemed like a tight knit community. The citizens did tend to know everyone around them as well as everything that went on. Each person in the community was different but they all shared a hatred for zombies and anyone who was not human. That’s how Y/N L/N grew up, the fear of someone harming her present in her everyday life. She dreamed for a bright and better future filled with love—but never had believed it would come true.

Sure, there were the occasional humans who were more understanding but that was pretty rare. She never thought that anyone would love her romantically due to her being a zombie but she hoped that would change once her first day at Seabrook High came around. The fact that her kind was able to attend was a huge step for them and she was proud to be one of the firsts. However, she still had that sense of fear and worry coursing through her.

The green haired girl snuck around with her best friend, Zed Necrodopolis. She was not sure how she’d let him talk her into leaving the basement with him. How had the two of them not gotten caught yet? She honestly didn’t know but didn’t want for them to. She couldn’t help but to look around at the stairs that were nearing. Y/N frowned when Zed’s taller frame stopped walking. “Is everything okay,” she asked simply.

He turned around with a smile on his lips. “I am going to try out for the football team. Do you want to come with me? I know you were interested too.”

Zed’s words were true—Y/N had wanted to be part of the football team rather than the cheer team. The zombie was just too scared to go through with it since they weren’t the most popular in the school. There were lots of people who were either afraid of them or wanted to potentially hurt them in some way. The girl thought about it before having a final answer. She shook her head, signaling that she didn’t want to follow.

Her best friend understood her worries but he tried to be more on the optimistic side of things. It’s the only attitude that would get zombies more accepted in society. “Alright, you don’t have to. I’ll let you know how it goes.”

With that, Zed made his way to the football field, which left Y/N in the hallway alone. He was excited for this so she didn’t try to stop him or anything. She soon heard the sounds of footsteps nearing so the girl turned to run in the opposite direction, not wanting to be seen. She needed somewhere to clear her mind—her internal wish finally coming true as she came across the “Zombie Safe Room.”

Y/N couldn’t help the eye roll that came but made her way into the room regardless of any negative thoughts she had about it. Did this count as a bad idea? Probably.

The green haired zombie walked around to take in her surroundings. Once she got to the other end of the room, she sat down on the ground. It wasn’t very comfortable but she thought it was better than being in that basement. “Why is it always us,” She quietly questioned herself aloud.

She allowed her thoughts to run wild inside of her brain which helped pass the time. She wasn’t sure how long she planned to be in there but she’d have to come out eventually. It wasn’t like she could hide away forever, at least not in the room she was in. Each of her thoughts were about her kind and their future. She was so deep and lost in her mind that she almost didn’t hear the sound of an alarm going off—it was the rogue zombie alarm.

Y/N sighed before standing up. “Zed, what did you do?”

She hesitantly started to move her body but stopped once she heard the door open and close again. Who was in there with her? She was curious…she just didn’t want to draw any attention to herself. The girl wasn’t really paying attention to her surroundings and it wasn’t long before she tripped over a book that was on the floor.

Her eyes widened and she heard the person gasp, it sounding like a girl.

“Who’s there,” The voice called out.

Y/N slowly stood up straight and took a deep breath. “H-Hello? I’m sorry if I scared you.” Her words held sincerity and she felt bad about tripping. Honestly, she felt like she should have looked around before doing anything.

“It’s alright, I just wasn’t expecting anyone to be in here. Hey, are you new here? I don’t recognize your voice.”

The zombie smiled to herself before giving a simple response. “Yes, it’s my first day.” The fifteen year old didn’t know what else to say if she was being honest. The girl could be a little awkward depending on the situation. It was something that her loved ones knew very well and they were used to it. Zed and Eliza were always teasing her about it, but she didn’t mind.

She hadn’t realized but her fingers had begun absentmindedly twisting through her hair. It was something that the zombie did a lot.

“I’m Addison.”

Hearing the words was comforting to Y/N as she could now place a name to the person in the room. She then moved a little closer to Addison in order to get a better look. As soon as she set her eyes on the human, her brain seemed to stop working. She thought that the blonde haired teen was beautiful, it being one of the first things that went through her head.

The green haired teen was able to gather her words. “My name is Y/N—it’s nice to meet you.”

She didn’t know where it came from but she felt a wave of confidence crash in her. Y/N’s body slowly moved closer to Addison and it wasn’t long before she was in front of her, a little ways back though. The zombie hoped it would be too dark for the human to see that she was a zombie but that was ruined once the alarm stopped and the lights soon turned on.

The sight of a zombie caused Addison’s eyes to widen and her body reacted almost immediately. She let out a shriek before she slapped Y/N’s cheek, not realizing what she was doing. It wasn’t until the zombie had grabbed her cheek in pain that the blonde’s brain understood what had happened. That was when she felt the immense guilt spark inside.

Addison frowned before apologizing, “I am so sorry—I have just always been taught that zombies are these monsters. You don’t seem like that though.”

Those words seemed to throw the zombie off at first but she couldn’t help the smile that slipped past her lips. She was interested in the human, that’s what she was sure of in that moment.

“I understand, there’s been a lot of negative things told about us but we just want to live in peace.” The fifteen year old had always wanted for that to happen; peace among the human and supernatural worlds was not a likely occurrence so her parents had kept expectations realistic.

Sometimes it felt like she was a mix of each of her friends; optimistic at times but also a believer in the realism. It was something she didn’t mind but the zombie did often enjoy Zed and his wanting to change things for all zombies. It was surely a goal to strive for!

The Wells girl nodded, confirming what Y/N had just told her. It was terrible that people were so quick to judge without knowing the person or group of people being judged. She knew what it felt like to not fit it—at least to feel like you didn’t fit in. The fact that she’d been taught to hide her hair and wear a wig, it was something she had tried getting used to but just couldn’t.

Addison went to speak but was interrupted by the safe room door opening; it was the Acey’s and her cousin Bucky. She glanced towards Y/N but didn’t have time to give her a saddened expression. The blonde did not want to stop talking to the other teen. Addi had honestly forgotten that they were at the High School for a couple of seconds. That’s how much she had enjoyed the girl’s being there with her.

The group of four walked closer to the two girls with looks of disgust present on each of their faces. It made Y/N feel like she had done something wrong even though she’d not. The feeling of hands pushing her back caused her to stumble and she noticed that it had been Bucky’s doing. The smell of hand sanitizer filled the room afterwards. It was as if the older male was afraid of getting a disease from her.

“What are you doing associating with a zombie?” Bucky’s obnoxious voice filled the silence but he didn’t give Addison any time to respond.

He snapped his fingers and the next thing the blonde knew, she was being carried away from the zombie teen by the Tracey and Stacey. The cheer captain gave Y/N one last dirty look before he and Lacey followed the others outside of the room.

A sigh was given but all the teen could think about was Addison; her smile, her eyes, her kindness. It was refreshing to the zombie girl and she could feel a familiar emotion swell inside of her—happiness. She wanted to get to know the blonde better…she had to. She had never met anyone like her before so it made sense.

Maybe they could be something, someday.

[heliads]

Disney Masterlist

Descendants

Ben Florian

Happily Ever Afters - Based on this request: “Ben x VK!Reader. Soulmate AU where the bad things you think about yourself are marked on your soulmate's skin. Reader only has 1-2 things because Ben has a good life. Ben has around half a dozen. During the lake scene they notice Ben is their soulmate and try but fail to hide it thinking he deserves better” Soulmates AU

Carlos de Vil Masterlist

Harry Hook

One Story Leads to Another - Based on this request: “AU where everyone is "chosen" to be parts of fairytales. Heroes get love ballads and villains get traditional villain songs. Reader and Harry are friends on the isle and get chosen for a story, and are both super excited because they think they'll both be villains together. So imagine their surprise when they get their first song together and it sounds an awful lot like a love song.” Imagine

So In Love That You Acted Insane - Based on this request: “Harry Hook x reader based on 'the way I loved you' by taylor swift. Childhood friends to lovers, to strangers to lovers again” Imagine

Jay

Reaching - Based on this request: “Jay x Fem! Reader. Jay coming behind reader holding her waist while reaching to get her something she was struggling to get off the top shelf” Imagine

How to Train Your Dragon

Hiccup Haddock III Masterlist

Teen Beach Movie

Butchy Masterlist

Seacat Masterlist

Z-O-M-B-I-E-S

Willa Lykensen

Family Woes - Based on this request: “Willa has a younger sister y/n. her and the wolf pack are overprotective and y/n can’t leave their sight. So y/n runs away and the pack finds her and they make up and live happily ever after” Oneshot

Wyatt Lykensen Masterlist

Zed Necrodopolis Masterlist

[blondsauduun-reads]

The Almighty Masterlist

Okay so like 99% of the fics are not mine, so I’ll credit the writer too (and you can go check their work out, because some of these are GOLDEN). And I will be linking my fav fics here because I’ve got 200 fics on here as of now (but all other fics are tagged with the character that they’re about so you can find them and read them).And they will be in chronological order of reblog, because I’m lazy, mostly. All these are character x reader/oc self-inserts.

If you read any of the fics below, make sure to like and reblog them and show the writer your support with a comment, doesn’t matter if it’s a simple I love this! Or something more elaborate and personal, it does make a difference.

Edit: since Reggie from JATP had officially a last name, the fics which I reblogged until the 9th of December will be tagged as jatp reggie, but all the ones I reblog from now on will be tagged as reggie peters.

TAGLIST HERE

————————————

My requests are always open, but I only write with OCs (of the person who’s requested it) and X Reader. Fem!Reader, Male!Reader and Gender-Neutral/NB!Reader are all welcome. I don’t write non-con, p*dophilia or z*ophilia.

My Fics:

JATP - Reggie - We’re The Revolution That’s Been Singing In The Rain

JATP - Juke - Really Something

————————————

EDIT: tumblr doesn’t allow more than 50 tags so the continuation of my recommendations will be linked

HERE. Or SCROLL DOWN to see the reblog directly <3

Personal Faves:

Special Mention to my bestie’s @heliads masterlist because all her work is amazing * edit. Somehow most of her links don’t work so if you want to read them just visit her masterlist linked above! She has it all perfectly organized and is great, definitely worth checking out!

MLWTWB - Alex Walter - Drunken Make Outs - @mattybstqrn

MLWTWB - Alex Walter - I’m Yours - @julieloves074

Stranger Things - Eddie Munson - she’s the devil in disguise - @letterstotheflre

Zombies - Zed Necrodopolis - Team Player - @heliads *see pink above for link

TW - Brett Talbot - The Bite - @heliads *see pink above for link

Marvel/TASM - Peter Parker - The Two Of Us - @/heliads *see pink above for link

MCU - Avengers - Kiddo - @redstarwriting

DC - Harley Quinn - Cherry Soda - @sapphicwhxre

HP - James Potter - Truth and Declare - by fave @heliads *see pink above for link

SaB - The Darkling - Time Can Heal (But This Won’t) - by bestie @heliads *see pink above for link

SaB - Jesper - Guns Blazing, Tides Rising (+part 2 +3 +4 +5) - @heliads *see pink above for link

TW - Brett Talbot - The Spring Break Lie - @heliads *see pink above for link

MCU - Bucky - First Glance - @royalwildswriting

SPN - Dean - The Hunter With The Dragon Tattoo - @watermelonlipstick

AiB - Arisu - Gaming - Part Two - @koreaweeb​ 

JATP - Juke - in his arms - @unsaidnessa

AiB - Chishiya - Marionette - @koreaweeb​ (there’s parts, this is the masterlist and this is my fav chapter and these are the reasons why)

AiB - Chishiya - Red Strings - @koreaweeb (second story to Marionette)

Hannibal - Will Graham - Lonely - @gunpowder-and-smoke​

Hannibal - Will Graham - Gradually - @darling-i-read-it​

Hannibal - Will Graham - Sparring - @darling-i-read-it​

Hannibal - Will Graham - Lost Time   - @darling-i-read-it

JATP - Luke - Shirtless - @littlemissaddict​

JATP - Reggie - About Love - @darlingsteveharrington

JATP - Reggie - Eyeliner - @julies-molina

JATP - Reggie - Little Miss Perfect - @unholyobsessions

JATP - Reggie - The Perfect Christmas - @calamitykaty

JATP - Reggie - Perfectly Entwined - @thefandomimaginesandwritingblog

JATP - Reggie - A Moment In Time - @calamitykaty

JATP – Reggie – Who Are You?  - @himoonlight (this is the first part and the other parts are here: 2 - 3 - 4

JATP – Julie Molina – My Captain - @n0wornever (there’s also a second part to this and its this )

JATP – Reggie – Second Chances  - @pythagothug (also multiple parts but are linked in the og post)

JATP – Reggie – Swedish Hologram Crush - @jaskiers-sweetkiss

JATP - Reggie – Dinner Gal  - @nooneactuallyasked (that’s part 1 there’s at least 4)

JATP – Reggie – Marker Messages - @carnationcreation

JATP - Reggie – The Four Times They Almost Got Caught (And The One Time They Were) - @carnationcreation

JATP - Reggie - Akai Ito  - @intoanothermind

JATP - Reggie – Embarrassing Encounters - @billboardofbrokendreams

JATP – Reggie – Unsteady Hands  - @sunsetgillespie (this is like, one of my most treasured fics of all time.)

Teen Wolf – Theo Raeken – Back From Hell  - @xplrreylo

JATP – Reggie – Leather Jacket  - @xplrreylo

Obey Me! – Mammon – Bangin’ Birthday  - @mammor0n

FBAWTFT – Newt Scamander – Not That Dress - @12tardis (there’s i think two more fics by this person, one with a jumper(? And one with a shirt(? Make sure to check ‘em out too!)

TO x SPN – Elijah Mikaelson – Funny-Man  - @zodiyack

TO - Klaus Mikaelson – Every King Needs An Heir  - @zodiyack (i think two parts?)

TVD – Kai Parker -  Lunchtime Sabotage - @zodiyack

TO - Kol Mikaelson – Trusting You To Trust Yourself  - @zodiyack

OBX - JJ Maybank – Study Sessions  - @ptersparkers (7 chapters of pure smut)

[whoopsyeahokay]

October Sun

summary: a near-death experience hadn't been enough to deter you from getting to the bottom of things. one of those things had been, holy shit, Maddie!? and there had been questions, and Ajay and Wally hadn't known what not to say, but who'd cared because, "Oh my god, Maddie, I can see you!"

pairing: Wally Clark x fem!reader

warnings: eventual smutty smut smut. and mad spoilers. and obvious Canon divergence. very involved, very dense plot.

bon reading, frens

___________________________💀

OCTOBER SUN pt.23

With great reluctance, Wally separated from you, his heart still lodged in his throat from what had almost unfolded. He scanned you up and down to ensure you were in one piece before he turned and walked toward Maddie. She looked distressed, wracked with guilt, her eyes watery and her mouth severely anchored at the corners.

She gazed up at Wally, utterly distraught, and sniffled, "I didn't...I didn't mean to. She can see everyone else, I just wanted..." Her shoulders shook with the effort it seemed to take not to break down right then and there, "Tell her I'm sorry, please, Wally, tell her I didn't mean it."

Wally wanted to fold Maddie into a bear hug like the ones his grandma used to give him; to give her the solace she seemed desperately to need, but first, he had to understand why you'd asked him to touch her shoulder. It'd taken him a second to figure out that that's what you meant, that something had happened when he'd tried to pull Maddie back before she'd collided with you in her effort to get your attention, but once he'd realized, he couldn't suppress the hope that blossomed within him.

With a sympathetic look, "I know," he told Maddie in a quiet voice, "it was an accident." She nodded miserably, body curling away from Wally even as he reached out and placed his hand on her shoulder. He turned to look at you, and asked, "Like this?" before stepping aside to see if anything had changed.

Indeed, something had shifted, Maddie becoming just that little bit more solid under his hand. He'd never noticed how she'd been slightly apart from himself and the others, a faint breadth less tangible, until it was made abundantly clear when you gasped and bolted forward, gathering Maddie against you in a wholesome embrace.

Wanting to give you and Maddie a moment, Wally removed his hand and, instantly, you were left holding nothing, arms collapsing against yourself and your body slouching sideways, out of Maddie's hold.

"Do it again!" You implored Wally, clutching his wrist and yanking him back into place. The connection flushed under the skin beneath your palm, white-hot through his veins, and it took everything in him not to pin you to him and kiss you deeply; to stake his claim in front of the others. You must've felt similarly because your next instruction was forced out, breathy, "And don't let go of her."

He did as told, placed his hand back on Maddie's shoulder, and felt her become a sturdier presence once more. Wow, Wally gaped, acutely aware of how in the dark Rhonda and Charley must feel, probably unable to tell the difference between Maddie before and after. You bundled Maddie into another hug, Wally's hand forced to fall to her shoulder blade, his other hand unconsciously moving to rest on your hip.

"I'm so sorry," Maddie apologized in a quick current of words, "I swear, I didn't mean to make you fall! I would never hurt you."

"I know, it's okay," You squeezed her tighter, "Oh my god, Maddie, I can't believe I can see you!"

"And...touch her, apparently..." Charley commented, making a close circle around you, Wally, and Maddie in examination. "How can you do that? Living people can't touch us."

"Yeah, we usually repel them like a bad smell," Rhonda added, voice marginally less spiky than before, "But Wally grabbed you like it was nothing."

The interrogation concluded with Charley asking, "And why couldn't you see Maddie until Wally touched her?"

That's when it clicked, "You have to invite her in..." Wally muttered, remembering the conversation you and he had had about the intricacies of In Betweens. At once, everyone's eyes slashed to Wally and he gulped, sweat gathering at his brow as it dawned on him that he'd spoken his thought aloud.

Thankfully, you dove in to save him, cutting to Ajay and giving him a pointed look. "You told Wally about In Betweens, huh? I asked you not to do that."

Ajay nodded, lips pressed into a line, "He's my bro," he shrugged stiffly, taking monumental strides to keep up with the lie as it developed. "I told him everything you told me about In Betweens, which are things I know about because you and I talk about them. In Betweens. C r a z y."

Rhonda rounded on him, a whiplash scowl that Wally was eternally grateful not to be on the receiving end of, even though he was the one who deserved it. "And you decided not to share with the rest of the class because...?"

"I told him not to and he probably made Wally swear to keep it a secret, too," You interjected. "Look, my family has a very strict rule against speaking to the dead. If anyone finds out I've been talking to Ajay—" Wally "—and now you guys? I'm fucked. My mom or my great-aunt will step in and I don't exactly know what'll happen, but it won't be good for me or you."

Charley seemed to contemplate your warning, fiddling with the cuffs of his jean jacket, then supplied, "We already decided it's better if we don't tell anyone about Simon." He gave Rhonda and Wally a curt nod which they both reciprocated. Wally didn't know what else to do but play along and consent to something he'd been doing since yesterday. "I think we can all agree to keep this between us, too."

"Yeah. You and Ajay aren't the only ones who can keep a secret." Rhonda commented, every letter dripping with condescension. She barreled ahead like a battering ram and imposed, "You wanna tell us why you couldn't see Maddie until Romeo over there got his mitts on her?"

"And what's an In Between?" Charley included, though he wasn't looking at you. Instead, he eyeballed where Wally's hand rested on your hip, his gaze flicking between there and Wally's face.

Wally did his best to avoid Charley's intense scrutiny, looking everywhere but at him and, oh, the moon was bright; was that garland of stars Orion just above the trees over there? Yeesh, someone should've cleaned up the littering of cigarette butts in the corner... Nothing to see here. Totally normal. Innocent whistle. Moving right along.

Or not.

"Actually, if you wanna start with whatever this is," Charley flapped his hand at you, Wally, and Maddie, though it was very clear what he meant to encapsulate with the gesture, "that'd be nice."

Wally barely held back the whimper of dread that tried to squeak out of him, his grip tightening on your hip.

"That would be nice," Ajay agreed, "I've always wanted to know. Especially after the hoops I had to jump through trying to keep you two apart."

Your face scrunched up adorably in confusion, "Hoops?" Ajay's eye twitched just before Rhonda and Charley served their attention to him. "Hoops!" You rectified. "So many hoops. All those things you did to keep me outta trouble when this weird, mysterious connection tried to derail my life..."

"Okaaay," Charley surveyed you with a trickle of doubt in his tone.

To your credit, you didn't let Charley deter you as you proceeded, "I've never felt it this strongly before. It's like a pull that I can't resist."

"Same," Wally wheezed, "It's like I have to be near her or I'll explode." He used his excuse to his advantage—at least he wasn't lying—and dragged you into his side, wrapping his arm more securely around your waist, all while maintaining contact with Maddie's back.

Rhonda arched a brow, "Explode, huh? Kinky." Wally opened his mouth to protest, but she continued, "Is that why he spent months following you around like a puppy a couple of years ago? I've seen him moon over plenty of little crushes on the living, but that was a lot, even for him."

"Thanks. Rhonda. Really." Wally glared, eyes darkening at her further when a surprised laugh bubbled out of Maddie. You shifted to look up at him, a sweet, playful smile on your lips that Wally wanted to feel on his skin.

"I remember that," You said, quiet, private, just for him, although you had to be aware the others were listening. "I'm sorry I... If I'd thought I could get away with it, I would've said something back then," You confessed and Wally's pulse quickened. You panned back to the others, offering each a significant look, including Maddie whose hand you scooped into your own, "I'm sorry I never reached out and tried to help you, but I'm here now and I will do everything I can to make it up to you."

Finally, Rhonda appeared to soften—not by much, but by enough that Wally felt himself relax for the first time since stepping foot on the roof. Her shoulders sank away from her ears, stance loosened marginally, and she nodded in acknowledgment of your apology.

"Alright, strawberry pie," Rhonda invited, "does this magical connection between you and lover boy have anything to do with why you couldn't see Maddie?"

Wally sensed your relief as if it were his own, your body melting into his side. You and he were off the hook, even if he did suspect he'd be questioned about the connection later. He could already hear Rhonda and Charley (even Maddie) grilling him for information: Why didn't you say anything? Did you always feel it? What does it mean?

"Honestly?" You began, "I don't know how the two are connected but I think they have to be. Not that the connection is responsible for why I can't see Maddie but why I can if Wally touches her. The only logical thing I can come up with is that the connection Wally and I have is actually some kind of manifestation of a soul-tie and that's why he can invite Maddie into my, uh, okay, so the thing about In Betweens—"

"Which is a thing I know about." Ajay inserted.

"—is that they're really...hard...to explain..." You rubbed your temples, obviously trying to gather your thoughts. Wally began to stroke his thumb over your sweater to encourage you to continue. Sinking into him further, you appeared to center yourself, flashing him a small, grateful smile before launching into the same spiel you'd given Wally. As you spoke, Wally pondered the complexities of In Betweens. Now that he thought about it, the fact that you and he shared a soul-tie that transcended life and death and time totally explained parts of why the connection existed in the first place.

He didn't know how or why whatever higher power had decided you two were meant to be whatever you were meant to be, but he felt all the more compelled to preserve the connection. The amount of devotion he'd developed toward you in under twenty-four hours was proof enough that you were or had been or were going to be someone profoundly important to him and he didn't want to lose that. Didn't want to lose you. A feeling he could only convey by pulling you as close to him as possible.

Charley, Rhonda, and Maddie (with Ajay forcefully maintaining an air of previously informed) listened to you, rapt, absorbing the information silently until you finished. Your brief lecture ended with a comment about Maddie and Simon's ineffable bond, that one of them likely had latent abilities similar to yours that allowed them to reach through the veil and communicate with the other.

"Right," Ajay seemed comfortable enough to drop the charade and ask genuinely, "But if Maddie's dead, why is she In Between and we're not? What makes her so unique?"

Wally felt you go rigid beneath his touch and he pressed himself into you, his front a hard, reinforcing line at your back. He observed the others slowly coming to the same conclusion as you struggled to say what needed to be said. To relieve you of the burden, Wally uttered, "She's not dead...is she?" sliding his hand up Maddie's back to hold her shoulder. A friendly, supportive touch that she seemed to appreciate when his statement sunk in.

She gaped at you, "Is it true?"

With a weak smile, you said, "Yeah. At least, it's the only thing that makes sense. Mads, I can see dead people, but I couldn't see you until Wally invited you into my circle. You can't be dead."

"You're sure it's not a fluke?" Maddie asked as tears sprang to her eyes.

"No," You shook your head, "Like I told Wa—Ajay, this shit," A swiping motion in front of your face, "Doesn't get glitchy. I've seen people leave. their. bodies. If you were dead, you and I would've been having a lot of conversations a lot sooner."

The instant you mentioned having witnessed death firsthand, Maddie's face crumpled in anguish. "You mean Ai—"

Rhonda interrupted, "Even though you're not supposed to talk to ghosts?" her snide remark disguised behind a question.

You didn't back down. Gripped Maddie's hand and brought it to your chest, swearing in no uncertain terms, "She's my friend, I would've risked everything to help her," your features fixed in resolution.

And then, just like that—

"Ack!" Wally sprung back, shaking his hand after a jolt of what felt like electricity pricked his palm. The palm of the hand that had been on Maddie's shoulder.

At the same moment, you released her, shifting away, cradling your hand as if you'd also been shocked, staring in disbelief at your hand, then back at Maddie, then back to your hand. It took several beats before either you or Wally realized you could still see her without Wally's intervention, but when it clicked, you darted forward and embraced her all over again. Maddie sniffed into your shoulder, whispering something Wally couldn't hear though it sounded like she was coming to terms with still being alive.

"Are you guys okay?" Charley wondered. He glanced between you, Maddie, and Wally, shifting closer, one arm out in front of Rhonda in an action that reminded Wally of his mama when he'd been in the passenger seat of the car and she'd hit the brakes too hard. Protective in a situation Charley didn't understand the makeup of. "What's going on?"

"The universe just needed to hear me say it," You grinned, parting from Maddie to explain to the others and Wally, "We can Travel the same stream now," and, damn, you were cute when you were excited, eyes alight and cheeks dimpled.

It took tremendous effort not to throw you over his shoulder and carry you away to somewhere you and he could be alone. Wally grinned back when you looked at him. And then his eyes widened in surprise as you decided for him that his effort wasn't necessary and jumped into his arms. He caught you easily, one hand shamelessly on your ass while the other spread wide at the middle of your back.

"Thank you!" You said, face tucked into his throat, and hugged him tightly. "It wouldn't have happened without you." Leaning back slightly, you smiled, as bright and beautiful as springtime, and Wally had to worry that his limbs were about to turn to Jell-O.

"Yeah," He replied, "Anything for you, pretty girl."

From behind Charley, Rhonda announced her disproval to the open display of affection, "Blech," and then shared, "Great, so cherry pop is alive," Wally detected a bitter note beneath the pragmatic tone she used, "Now what? Do you escort her out of here and back to her body?"

"I wish it was that easy." You admitted, brows furrowing. Wally placed you gently back on your feet with a kiss to your hair, no longer concerned that the others would find it suspicious now that you and he had established you were both under the influence of a mysterious connection. He hooked an arm around your collar, placing himself at your back as you reported, "But, according to...Ajay... something is keeping you guys stuck here. The fact that you supposedly can't leave school grounds isn't normal. As ghosts, you should have a lot more agency than that, like, way more than the living."

"And the plot thickens..." Rhonda muttered, the muscles in her jaw ticking as she ground her molars.

Charley and Maddie wore identical expressions of alarm. Recovering quicker, Maddie asked, "You're saying that someone is trapping ghosts here on purpose?"

"Seems that way, yeah."

"What about Mr. Anderson?" Wally could see the gears turning in Maddie's head, "Could he have done this somehow?"

"He wasn't around until ten years ago," Wally answered her, repeating what you'd said that morning, "He might've just taken advantage of the situation."

You nodded to confirm, "Simon and I definitely think he's got something to do with how Maddie was forced out of her body in the first place." Looking at Maddie, you said, "Simon told me about the phone call he overheard and the money in the supply closet. I'd hoped he'd be able to get something out of Anderson's phone but—"

"He stole Mr. Anderson's phone?" Maddie gawped, "Is that why the cops took him?"

"Possibly," You replied, "And now they're not even looking at Anderson because they think Simon had something to do with your disappearance."

Maddie's temper flared, "But he didn't!"

"I know that and you know that, which is why I'm here. We have to find something that'll make the cops take Anderson in."

"We should try the theater," Wally suggested, recalling how freaked Anderson seemed when he'd found you. "He went nuts on a student in there last night."

Rhonda studied Wally briefly before asking, "Is that where you went after supper?"

"Yeah," Wally cleared his throat, "Just wanted to zen out for a bit, but a freshman came in looking for something in the seats," Oh hell yes, he could do this! He stuck close enough to the truth that he could fill in details if anyone tried to poke holes in his defense, probably more proud of himself than he should be for fabricating a decent lie. "Mr. A found them and lost his shit. There's probably something in there he doesn't want anyone to find."

Rhonda gave Wally a look of sardonic glee, "See, doesn't it feel better to act normal instead of pretending you're an idiot?"

"You're never going to let that go, are you?" Wally grumbled while Charley unsuccessfully tried to stifle a laugh behind his fist.

"What's going on?" You asked.

Wally huffed, "Don't ask. Rhonda is a lying liar who lies."

Rhonda snorted, demeanor adjusting to something Wally hadn't expected from her. Casual, borderline friendly—well, less standoffish which was as friendly as Rhonda got toward newcomers. "I'll tell you about it sometime," She offered you, a rare olive branch in the shape and weight of Group gossip. Then she brought everyone's attention back to more pressing matters, "Okay, so we check out the theater, right?"

Staring at Wally carefully, Maddie fished something out of her pocket and held it up for everyone to see, explaining, "Simon told me about something that went down in the theater last night." Wally's stomach clenched. Busted. "I tried talking to Mina. She wasn't exactly a fountain of information, but I found this on the floor. I was hoping to ask her about it..."

You reached for what Wally identified as the Split River High Devils patch Maddie had shown him, Rhonda, and Charley just before Ajay had retrieved them. Maddie handed it over and you inspected it, chuckling, "Wow. I didn't think these were still around."

"You know what it is?" Maddie asked, "Because I didn't until tonight."

"Rora was a Blue Devil," Ajay said as if lost in thought, staring at the patch. "She played tuba."

"Which is something I told you because we talk. About things. Like my sister." You blurted to cover Ajay's mild fuckup. "Yeah, she was in the band. She still has her uniform and everything."

Maddie mumbled, "I keep forgetting she's, like, twenty years older than you."

"Seventeen," You corrected, and then, "She could've easily ended up being one of the bus crash kids, but she was sick that day. I wasn't even born, so I don't know much, but the way Rory tells it she got food poisoning from the cafeteria lunch the day before. Best worst day of her life."

"Jesus Christ," It fell out of Wally's mouth before he could stop it, stunned that your sister had almost wound up a ghost like the rest of them. Would she have been a looper, too? Or would she have been the only one of the bunch to snap out of it? Fuck, it wasn't worth thinking about, Wally reprimanded himself, his arm sliding down to band around you, his hand unconsciously slipping under your sweater to rest, skin-to-skin, on your waist.

"I know," You mused, solemn, "If she hadn't eaten the fish sticks, she'd be dead."

"This was on the floor in the theater and I think there's something to it." Maddie said, "I don't know if Mr. Anderson is involved or not, but Mina must know something and we need to find out what. It could be what we need to help Simon."

Everyone gave their assent, ready and willing to help, as you offered, "Tell me what to do, Mads, and I'll do it."

Filled with determination, Maddie said, "We need to find some flowers."

"Butter Mina up a bit, huh?" You grinned conspiratorially, "Alright, I'm on it. I can get something together in the morning and bring them to school with me."

"Can you come early?"

"Not gonna lie, I already intended to. Zav agreed to pick me up at dawn so we could sniff around." The face Maddie made when you mentioned Xavier was cold and angry. Wally wasn't sure what you knew and what you didn't, but he remained certain of the fact that you had no idea Xavier had been cheating on Maddie with that cheerleader. "We're all on Simon's side," You assured Maddie, "Even if he and Zav didn't get along before, Zav wants to help."

Maddie cut the conversation there, "Yeah, I'm sure he does," forcing a smile.

"Great, now that that's settled," Rhonda began in an uncharacteristically helpful redirect. Whatever moment she and Maddie had shared during Field Day seemed to have established a fledgling bond between them, Rhonda actively changing the subject so Maddie didn't have to. "How about we go back to why Goldilocks can't get back into her body because we're trapped?"

As you were about to answer, Wally glanced at Ajay and saw him steeling himself for what he was about to expose, "Uhm, about that. There's something I want you guys to see."

‗‗‗‗•‗‗‗‗

Ajay was ahead of you; Rhonda, Charley, and Maddie brought up the rear, leaving you and Wally to walk together in the middle.

"I thought I was going to have a heart attack," He admitted, slinging his arm around your shoulders and pressing a tender kiss into your hair. Butterflies erupted in your belly, the casual affection he'd been doting on you during and since the rooftop making you swoon, pleasantly dizzy from it. "I think Maddie figured out that I wasn't alone in the theater last night."

"If she did, she won't say anything," You promised, cheeks pinking as you regarded him. Wally looked particularly handsome in the moonlight, his features striking. Your pulse quickened as you soaked him in, those sweet-sultry eyes blinking at you when he panned his head to grin down at you. "She's loyal like that," You finished, tongue suddenly sticking to the roof of your mouth.

Ajay stopped a few meters in front of a tree you recognized as one of several that students carved their initials into. It was unspectacular, normal; bushy leaves in autumn colors, and twisty with knots and thick roots. The others caught up eventually, Charley marching a couple more steps ahead of Ajay before Ajay caught him by the back of his jacket.

"Don't want you to end up back in the cafeteria," Ajay said, pulling Charley back to a safe distance.

So, this was the almighty barrier Wally had mentioned. At least, a section of it. You produced your phone from the pocket of your sweater, turned on the flashlight, and carefully neared the tree. With great mindfulness, you picked your way around the bottom of the tree, still managed to stumble and trip here and there where the roots were difficult to see. Nothing stood out to you; some hearts, some graduating years, even a few profanities and one clumsy dick with a crudely marked phone number beneath it. Ordinary stuff that most high schoolers thought was hilarious or edgy.

Returning to the starting point, you placed your hand on the truck, the bark ridges rough under your palm. Closing your eyes, you focused on your breath, deep and even inhales and exhales as you attempted to connect to whatever magic might be hidden within the tree's heartwood. You'd never tried to feel out another person's magic before. You'd never truly referred to it as magic before, either, so this was a night of firsts in many ways. You could sense the spectral weave of the ghosts behind you, the vibration of their buoyant, antigravitational energy. You felt something else ahead of you, barely a hum, as if caged within a lead box—blurry and distant and altogether difficult to pinpoint. In tandem phantom and human.

Then, quite suddenly, a piercing thrust of malicious, vantablack magic made itself known, shoving into you through your palm and sending you stumbling back over the raised roots. Your heel caught and you landed hard, phone falling face-down in the dirt.

"Are you okay?!" Charley called, arms braced against Wally who'd clearly tried to dash forward to your rescue, likely forgetting that he'd be transported back to the football field.

"Babe!?"

You raised a thumbs up and took a moment to let the adrenaline settle. "Fine," You assured, "Probably gonna bruise nasty, but nothing I can't handle." You heaved yourself into a sitting position, eyes scanning up the tree, following the cone of light from your phone to just above the faintest part of its reach. Frowning, you rolled yourself forward onto hands and knees, grabbed your phone and held it up to bring more light to a specific portion of the tree.

"No. Fucking. Way." You gawked.

"What is it?" Rhonda wanted to know, staring at you with a hard expression before glancing between the others. They all shared her question, each taking tiny, measured steps forward.

"It's...it looks like a ritual mark." You told them because, above all the depravity and memory-making, a strange symbol was etched into the bark, the cambium beneath blackened with age. A vertical line that bisected an unsymmetrical diamond with an X slashed through it. You took a picture of it, examined it on your phone as you rejoined the others. The symbol was as familiar as it wasn't; something in its nature niggled at the back of your mind.

In the years before everything had gone to shit, Ginny had spent countless afternoons delighting you with lessons on the craft. She'd taught you about the flora and fauna that harbored ancient energy; what talismans actually benefited the wearer and what were cheap, souvenir shop gimmicks. You'd enjoyed two whole days listening to her lilt the runic alphabet—fehu, uruz, thurisaz, and so on.

The symbol in the tree appeared to be a personal representation of a ritual rune, unlike any you'd seen before; its design unique to the individual and whatever purpose they'd needed it to serve.

"The barrier feels weakest here," Ajay said, "I'd hoped you could find a way to break it."

You hummed in acknowledgment, completely transfixed as you continued to search your memory for the runes Ginny had shown you. "Yeah..." And then, when you'd processed what Ajay had said, "No. Even though it feels weaker, it isn't. The energy is just stretched outward."

"What does the mark mean?" Wally asked, arm already outstretched for you to tuck yourself under. An invitation your body instinctively accepted before your brain caught up to how you'd slid into Wally's space like you were meant to be there.

You lifted your phone to show him the screen, "It looks like someone just hacked random runes together to make their own, but..." Skirting your attention to Ajay, "I bet there are other places around the school where the barrier feels different, too?"

"Four others." Ajay nodded.

"About equidistant apart?"

"That sounds about right, yeah."

Maddie ventured closer, "What does it mean?"

A shiver ran down your spine as you shifted your gaze back to the tree, the weight of the truth looming in the deep, eerie blackness behind it. "It means this was planned."

At that precise moment, a twig snapped in the shadows. Wally repositioned himself, shoving you behind him so he could put himself between you and whatever was out there. The others were on-guard around you as well, the circle they'd stood in shrinking as a figure appeared from out of the darkness. You held your breath, heart racing, and took an instinctive step back. Wally's form blocked you from seeing who it was, but your gut screamed at you to run run run, get out, leave, run, that sense of phantom-human energy shuddering through your veins.

You were ready to submit to the feeling only for, "There you are!" a familiar voice to split through the night, god dammit, seriously?!

"Who the hell is that?" Charley inquired to the group at large.

Quickly, you shoved your phone back into your pocket, moving around Wally in as natural a manner as possible to call out, "Jesus, Dave, you nearly gave me an aneurism!"

Dave emerged from the shadows, blond hair and bright white teeth catching the distant lamplight. He wore an expression of concern, eyes boring into yours, steps measured and steady as he treaded over the raised roots and pitted dirt toward you. Despite predicting what was about to happen, you weren't ready to have Dave haul you into a friends-and-family hug, his arms pinning your elbows to your sides and wringing you hard enough to expel the air from your lungs.

"Aurora sent me out to look for you," He told you, his tone grating against your ear. "I've been driving around for an hour!"

"Well, here I am," You coughed with as much enthusiasm as you could muster. Which wasn't much considering how pissed you were that Dave of all people had been the one sent to perform a search and rescue. And, of course, that your progress with the barrier had been interrupted. Mostly that.

You wriggled out of his embrace, putting some necessary distance between you and him as he motioned to usher you to his car, "I parked down the street. Come on, let's get you home."

"I'm fine, Dave." You said, really, really fighting not to sound as unpleasant as Aurora nagged that you always did when speaking to him. You wanted to argue, to stay and have Ajay show you the other points where the barrier's intensity was altered, however, Dave seemed insistent on returning you to the house. Covertly, you glanced at Wally, wordlessly asking for his input.

"It's okay, baby, we can show you the rest tomorrow morning." He said and the others followed, murmuring their reassurance at separate intervals. All but Rhonda who peered intently into the darkness where Dave had materialized.

"We've totally got this," She added belatedly, distant, distracted, but you took it for the endorsement of your surrender that it was and resigned yourself to trailing Dave to his car.

A scant step or two from the school property line, you heard footsteps behind you. Dave was far enough ahead, nattering on about whatever Aurora or your mother or Nanna had said about you sneaking out at midnight on a Thursday, that you risked turning to see who it was.

Wally jogged up to you, all cheeky smirk and boyish charm, and grabbed you by the arm, abruptly drawing you flush against him and, in a flash, delivering a deep, heated kiss to your lips. His large hand cradled your jaw, thumb caressing your cheek, as he teased your bottom lip with his teeth. A streak of want burned through you, coiling in your belly. A whimper escaped you that Wally swallowed greedily and you could feel the shape of his smirk against your mouth.

As soon as it had begun, it was over. A one-and-done moment. So fast that by the time Dave noticed you weren't at his back, Wally had already detached from you, cheeks flushed and eyes glassy. "Been wanting to do that all day," He chuckled, licking his lips as if to savor the taste you'd left behind.

You hated him just a little bit because you couldn't say anything back. Couldn't tease him or tell him how much you wanted more; couldn't yank him into another searing kiss and have him lay you down in the grass; couldn't do anything except—

"Let's go, champ!" Dave called with his patented Real Estate smile, jingling his keys to signal for you to come. Like a dog. Your faced pinched in bitterness, an expression Wally seemed to find endearing because he chuckled and shook his head fondly.

"Better go, baby, or he might try to hug you again."

"Oh my god, I hate him so much." You grumbled under your breath and Wally all but cackled as he retreated toward the school, catching up with the others as they filed through the door.

‗‗‗‗•‗‗‗‗

In the darkness, meters from the tree you'd been inspecting only minutes ago, a girl wearing your friend's face scowled down at a hand that didn't belong to her, biting her tongue as she pulled one of the loose fingernails from its bed.

Time was starting to run out.

💀___________________________

PART TWENTY-TWO - PART TWENTY-FOUR

also available on AO3!

MASTERLIST

[whoopsyeahokay]

October Sun

summary: Wally had needed a moment alone since you two had parted ways earlier that morning. it had given him a chance to lay out the facts and finally see what trainwrecks of ghosts he and the others had been.

pairing: Wally Clark x fem!reader

warnings: eventual smutty smut smut. and mad spoilers. and obvious Canon divergence. very involved, very dense plot.

bon reading, frens

___________________________💀

OCTOBER SUN pt.15

Wally skulked into the teacher's lounge, bypassing the gathering in the main space where Mr. Hartman held court. The words 'footprints' and 'service road' filtered above a firing squad of sharp questions as Wally made his way to the back, into the kitchenette, where he grabbed an empty mug off the rack.

Obviously, the police had been in touch. He wondered vaguely if Maddie had heard the news. He hoped so. It would be tremendously weird if he knew something about what had happened to her before she did, the feeling like sludge in his throat.

Wandering back out, he kept an ear open to Mr. Hartman's speech and set himself up at the coffee machine. Filled the mug almost to the brim, added two sachets of brown sugar, and stirred. Placed the dirty spoon in an abandoned, half-empty glass of water and then tucked himself quietly away back in the kitchenette.

Mr. Anderson wasn't amongst the faces Wally recognized as the teachers who held senior classes. A good thing since Wally was still pissed. Never mind that the guy might be solely responsible for Maddie's ghost; how he'd behaved toward you last night left a nasty taste in Wally's mouth. Made his knuckles itch to punch until Mr. Anderson swallowed his own teeth. Until his eyes pulped and his nose caved in. Until Mr. Anderson was one of them.

Although, Wally thought with bemusement, he didn't want to be stuck with Mr. Anderson. If what you'd said was true—that Wally and the others were trapped—Jesus, imagine having to exist for the rest of eternity in proximity to a monster capable of abusing women.

And that was the crux of his somber mood right there, wasn't it?

Trapped.

They were trapped.

He was trapped.

Wally sagged in his chair, staring at nothing. Steam wafted over his chin and cheeks as he took an absentminded sip of his coffee, the heat and bitterness burning when he swallowed. He set the mug down, held it, and continued to stare blankly ahead.

In the absence of your closeness, a chimera of pain-hurt-betrayal sunk its teeth into his heart and spread under his skin like poison, coming to erupt out of him in an uncharacteristically violent display.

The mug crashed against the wall. Ceramic tinkled to the floor. Wally dropped his head into his hands and heaved a dry, noiseless sob that ended as soon as it began.

He was supposed to have had the chance to say goodbye. To his friends, his girlfriend, his parents—fuck. Even though they wouldn't have been able to hear him, those moments were meant to be HIS.

His choice, his freedom, his right.

But, he'd been denied. Locked in with no escape because he'd had the bad luck to die in a place infected by, what, malevolent devil-cult energy? A witch's final hex on the land? Disrespected ancient fucking burial grounds?

According to the notes you'd written him, even crossed-over, Wally would've been able to reach out and reassure his mamma that he was fine. That he missed her and loved her and everything was going to be alright—

The dull sound of ceramic being set down in front of him interrupted the barrage of hate, rage, grief storming through Wally. Head shooting up, he saw Ajay stepping around the small table to take the seat beside him, sad smile and sad eyes mirroring the pain Wally felt.

When he glanced across the table at the wall, the broken mug and splattered coffee were gone. Reset and then remade and delivered to Wally in an unspoken offering of support.

Eventually, "Are you okay?" Ajay asked in even syllables.

Wally didn't look at him, couldn't find it within himself to fake a smile and pretend. Ajay was a divine kind of perceptive and would see through it in an instant, anyway.

So, Wally opted to avoid giving Ajay an answer by asking a question of his own, "Have you ever thought about why we're having such a hard time crossing over?"

The weight of Ajay's gaze spoke for itself. He didn't say anything for several moments, watching Wally watch the wall—acute, analytical. What Ajay said, when he finally responded, made Wally jump to attention.

"You're talking to her, aren't you?" A statement disguised as a question. Ajay's features conveyed mild amusement.

Wally hesitated and then squeaked out, "Who?" though he could tell that Ajay knew. Had clearly known about you for a while. But, just to be safe, "Maddie? Dawn? Dude, we know a few chicks, you'll have to be more specific."

"Bro," Ajay deadpanned.

"Bro!"

Ajay leveled Wally with a flat look, mouth a slash of disappointment, "Bro..."

Wally's knee began to bounce under the table, sweat beading at his hairline. "Bro?"

"Bro."

Ajay folded his hands on the table and leaned in, as if about to divulge classified information—heavily redacted and for Wally's eyes only, the introduction to which was a kick to the gut.

"My parents," Ajay began, "Were deported the day before my funeral."

Wally released a puff of air from his cheeks, gaze dropping to his lap. His problems suddenly felt minuscule in comparison. "I'm sorry, man, I had no idea."

While it had seemed completely off-topic, Wally considered Ajay a close friend and was familiar with how he operated. Every word he shared had meaning, and, sure enough:

"Neither did I." Ajay said, matter-of-fact. "Her sister was the one who told me almost a decade after they were forced to leave."

Stunned, "Her sister went here?"

"Graduated the year before Katelynn died."

Wally did the math, "Damn, that's an age gap." That put her in her early thirties. Your mama had either been very young when she'd had your sister, or you'd been an unexpected surprise...Or both. "She can see ghosts, too?"

"Naw, but she can feel us."

"The hell is that supposed to mean?"

"She's an empath." Ajay explained, "She used her senses to feel me out. Apparently, when I'm happy, I smell like my mother's biriyani." He chuckled lightly, gaze distant, fond, tinged in the creases by the hurt of missing someone important.

Wally sipped his coffee and gave Ajay a minute to reminisce. Once Ajay's eyes were focused again, Wally asked, "Was it different for her? Because she couldn't see you, I mean. 'Cause the way my girl put it, she'd get into some serious shit if she spoke to me."

Ajay snorted, shook his head, and waved a hand, "Absolutely not. Ora had to follow the same rule. 'Don't interfere' or whatever." He slouched sideways over the table, head in one hand, fingers of the other tracing nonsense patterns into the vinyl surface.

"But she did it anyway?"

"She didn't see how the rule applied to her. How could she interfere when she couldn't even tell if anything was going on." Ajay rolled his eyes the way people did when they talked about their siblings' antics. "I cared more about it than she did. That's why I never told you." His voice sobered, "I never told anyone."

He got up and fetched himself a drink. Took a glass from the cupboard and moved to the sink to fill it from the tap. One sip. Two. Three.

Back still turned to Wally, Ajay further professed, "I knew she was Ora's sister as soon as I saw her. They could be twins," He shuffled back to the table, sat down, "The resemblance is uncanny, I'm telling you. She looks so much like how I remember Ora." A tender smile, "As soon as I confirmed it, I kept an eye on her. Doing what I can to keep the others from discovering her abilities."

"But not me?"

"Oh, believe me, I tried. But it was like herding fucking cats, man. Something greater than all this," Ajay motioned to encompass beyond the room they were in, "Kept working against me. You two found each other no matter what I did." Aggrieved, "Her sophomore year was a bitch."

A laugh burst out of Wally unbidden as memories of that fateful year rolled across his mind like old film, only now the scenes played from Ajay's perspective.

Yeah. It'd probably been a bitch.

As confident as he was that Ajay wouldn't betray him—or you—Wally needed to be doubly sure: "I guess I don't have to ask you to keep our secret then, huh?"

Ajay mimed locking his lips and throwing away the key, punctuating the promise with a friendly wink. "I'll never utter a word."

Wally breathed a sigh of relief, wrapping both hands around his coffee and relaxing into his seat.

They sat in companionable silence for a few minutes as Wally collected his thoughts. He returned to the conversation he'd had with you that morning, and then to how Ajay had responded to the question of crossing over. As if he'd been guided to the same truth you'd revealed to Wally. Had your sister—Ora?—figured it out when she'd been a student?

"Why us?" Wally voiced the thought aloud. "Why the school?" He glanced at Ajay who was studying him closely, like a professor watching their pupil solve an unsolvable riddle. "Why can't we cross over?"

"And why did Janet get to?" Ajay granted with a sour line under her name.

On paper, Janet had been as polite as had been expected for a young woman raised in post-war America. All quaint mannerisms and Christian smiles. Voice always set to a reasonable decibel. However, there'd always been a current of disdain underscoring every interaction Janet had had with Mr. Martin.

Of their ragtag ensemble, Janet had been the most hostile toward Mr. Martin's brand of gentle parenting. Unlike Rhonda, who was openly resistant, Janet had playacted through the Group sessions she'd deigned to attend and had giddily punched holes in Mr. Martin's logic whenever she'd had the chance.

It didn't make sense, then, that she had been the first one of them to move on.

"Did you know we're supposed to be able to leave?" Wally said apropos of nothing. "We should be going to movies and bars and, fuck man, I should be able to go to the mall and get a pair of goddamn jeans."

Ajay laughed, adding, "And I could get some real food," with a demonstrative look of yearning.

"Whatever's trapping us here, in the school...what if that's why it's taken so long for one of us to cross over?"

"It makes sense." Ajay shrugged. "Ora never said that it was weird that we couldn't leave the school, but she said enough that I figured it out, and—" He stopped himself abruptly, mouth snapping shut with a clack that made Wally flinch.

Ajay seemed reluctant to continue, eyes zipping left and right as he weighed the pros and cons in his head.

Just when Wally thought that was it, Ajay cleared his throat and scuffed his chair as close to Wally as he could get it without sliding into Wally's lap.

"There's something I think you need to see." He whispered, eyes on the doorway, as if afraid of being overheard.

"Yeah, alright." Wally dragged his chair back and was on his feet in a flash.

Pressing his lips in a regretful line, Ajay nodded toward the clock in the main space of the teacher's lounge. It was empty now, save for a few teachers whose classes didn't start until later.

"Mr. Martin wanted to get started soon." He pointed out, "But after that, I'll show you."

"Does anyone else know?"

"No. It's just me and you, buddy." Ajay rose and clapped Wally on the back before leading them out of the teacher's lounge and into the hallway. After about a minute, Ajay broke their amiable silence and said, "So, you and the baby Paranormal Activist, huh?"

"I'm telling her you called her that." Wally groused without bite. "And I don't kiss and tell."

"Oh, you don't need to." Ajay assured, "I heard enough about that already."

Wally choked on a swallow. Eyes watering and tongue stuck in his throat, he coughed, "How!?"

"Mina saw you two last night," Ajay revealed, deceptively nonchalant. Before Wally could protest, Ajay signaled that there was nothing to worry about. "She won't say anything. My baby's a vault."

Wally choked again on the endearment, missing a step and staggering forward for two. "Your what!?"

Passive, teasing, "Bro, it's like you don't know anything about me at all," Ajay heaved an enormous, theatrical sigh.

"How does it even work!?" Wally demanded once he recovered. "How long have you two been together??"

With a sly, cheeky look, Ajay simply responded, "Come on, buddy, I'm a gentleman, I don't kiss and tell."

Wally halted on the spot. Sputtered indignantly for a few seconds before he put his hands on his hips and glared at Ajay's retreating back, "Oh, you are such a dick."

💀___________________________

PART FOURTEEN - PART SIXTEEN

also available on AO3!

MASTERLIST

[whoopsyeahokay]

October Sun

summary: you and Wally had finally had a chance to talk, reviewed the information at your disposal, which, by then, had included the text you'd received from Xavier. Even with everything you'd been taught, had researched, had a profound knowledge of, things still hadn't made sense. Had Mr. Anderson really been the Big Bad of your Nancy Drew story? Or had something darker been afoot?

pairing: Wally Clark x fem!reader

warnings: eventual smutty smut smut. and mad spoilers. and obvious Canon divergence. very involved, very dense plot.

bon reading, frens

___________________________💀

OCTOBER SUN pt.13

"—and then this morning, Zav texted—"

"Who?"

"Xavier? Maddie's boyfriend?"

Recognition dawned, "Oh, yeah. I know him," spoken with a sour inflection.

"Yeah, him. He's like my brother from another mother." One who'd flounced out of Xavier's life in 8th Grade and had taken half the family assets with her to Milwaukee.

"Anyway," You resumed your summary of events, "He sent me this." Leaning forward, you showed Wally the picture of Maddie's ticket on your phone. "They found it in the woods not too far from here."

After yesterday's series of unfortunate interruptions, you and Wally had ensconced yourselves halfway up the rows of spectator seats in the stadium. Apart from a groundskeeper on the field and a maintenance worker floating about the upmost level of the grandstand, you were blissfully alone.

You sat sideways, Wally's varsity jacket balled up and shoved behind your back so the armrest wouldn't dig into your spine (his idea). Your knees were bent over the armrest that divided your seat and Wally's, socked feet on his lap, lounging as comfortably as was possible in your position.

Wally, meanwhile, held your ankle, thumb occasionally stroking under the hem of your jeans, and had his legs splayed wide to accommodate their length in such a tight space. Arm stretched across the backs of your seats, fingers of his other hand absentmindedly lifting and placing strands of your hair at the back of your head.

It was nice. Casual.

You and Wally were totally and utterly attuned as if sharing space was a regular occurrence. As if he'd always been part of your story, alongside Xavier and Hana and Lucas, trading easy touches and unfiltered thoughts the way people did when they'd known each other since baby teeth.

It was the connection, of course. A tequila glow under the skin that removed the awkwardness of getting to know someone new and replaced it with the opinion that everyone was ohana.

Once again, you'd spent the night with your nose in the gutter of every book you'd thought could be relevant, and not one had had the insinuation of an answer. If you'd been allowed to ask Nanna, you knew she'd say something ridiculous about soulmates, or twin flames or some other buzzword for 'meant to be'.

She was a diehard romantic like that, despite having suffered the loss of Grandpa Jack mere days after your uncle Andrew was born. She'd never remarried. Never dated. Was content to wait until her body expired and she reunited with Grandpa Jack in the afterlife.

It wasn't fair that Nanna couldn't Travel. That she couldn't see ghosts like you and your mother and Ginny. That the family rule prevented you from speaking to Grandpa Jack so you could relay his messages to Nanna.

In the absence of the swarms and storms and squalls you'd been threatened with if you ever spoke to the dead, you were beginning to hate that rule.

Wally pinched the top knot of your spine, lips swept into a roguish grin. "Lost you for a second there, pretty girl."

Deep brown eyes roamed your face for signs of where your mind had drifted. Having Wally's full attention made your heart beat a little faster, your stomach squirm, your breath catch. It brought with it a sense of empowerment; Wally, former star athlete and school hero, looking at you like you'd hung the moon.

"Uhm~." Eloquent.

Wally chuckled, breezy, and tucked a strand of your hair behind your ear. "I feel it, too." He admitted, catching his lip between straight, white teeth and glancing away with a blush. "It's not as crazy as it was yesterday, though."

"True." You said, "But it's still pretty intense. It's like taking one shot. You aren't quite tipsy, you're just vibing and it's—"

"Nice." Wally cut in, sloping a few inches forward.

Heat rose in your cheeks and you knew your eyes had gone honey-soft and dreamy under Wally's gaze. "Yeah. It is."

You gave yourself a moment to take in the feeling—sit with it, and accept it—before you decided it was time to get back to business.

"Alright," Wally crooked his arm at the elbow and propped his head on his fist, "Things we know so far: Mr. Anderson paid Maddie off."

"Check."

"But he's paranoid, so he decides to tie up loose ends and remove Maddie from the equation."

"Check."

"He lures her to the boiler room, attacks her, manages to hurt her enough to get blood on the walls, and then..." Wally's voice and expression turned dubious, "Maddie runs?"

You quickly picked up where Wally left off, "She heads through the woods where she drops her ticket, and then she makes it to the service road."

"Where Mr. A finds her—"

"Drugs her into a coma." You and Wally said together before he continued alone.

"—and then he brings her back here?"

You tried not to sound too hopeful when you asked, "How do you know he brought her back here? Did Maddie tell you?"

Wally had mentioned that Maddie couldn't remember anything about what had happened to her last Friday, but if she'd started to get her memory back, maybe this whole thing would be wrapped up before the weekend. Simon would have his best friend back, Xavier wouldn't be looked at like the school pariah anymore, and you and Wally could...

Focus on each other? Mathilda's face smirked at you in your mind.

Or something, You snapped back as you pictured yourself using a chalkboard eraser to erase Mathilda's image from the inside of your skull.

"Nah, babe," Wally said, "She still can't remember anything. At least, not that she's told me. But it doesn't matter because she's haunting the school, right?"

You peered at Wally who looked so eager to be helpful, and tried to fit the puzzle pieces together. Unfortunately, the pieces you had were turning into blobs of color without a picture for reference.

"Well, I mean, it could mean something," You supposed, willing to approach the theory from a new angle. "But she also could've followed him back here without realizing she wasn't in her body."

Wally's hand slipped up from your ankle to your calf where he began to massage the muscle, almost sympathetically. Like he was about to say something offensive and wanted you to be calm when you received it.

With mild suspicion, you listened to what he had to say, though by the end, you couldn't conceal your shock.

"I don't know what you read about ghosts, baby, but we can't move around like that. We haunt where we die. If Maddie's ghost is in the school, it's because that's where she left her body."

Internally, the blue screen of death crashed down as a bullhorn shrieked fatal system error.

Wrong Wrong Wrong.

Grandpa Jack had died in New York and you'd seen him plenty of times in Wisconsin. Hell, you'd seen American ghosts in the UK when you'd visited your dad. American ghosts who'd died on American soil. The books in your family's library verified that ghosts were at liberty to go wherever they pleased, having earned the right after they were relieved from the 'burden of living' (as one rather staunchly Catholic author had written).

And then you remembered, "You mean more trapped than the rest of us?" Wally had said yesterday.

Jack-knifing into an upright position, you gasped, "You're stuck here?!"

Slowly, as if scared to animate you further, Wally said, "Yeah. Whenever we step off school property, we end up back where we died." He glanced at the field warily. "It sucks."

"Wally," You breathed in and out deeply, heart hammering for a reason that had nothing to do with Wally's closeness, "That's not normal."

💀___________________________

PART TWELVE - PART FOURTEEN

also available on AO3!

MASTERLIST

[whoopsyeahokay]

October Sun

summary: Simon had been on the verge of getting the fuck out of Dodge, the enormity of everything he'd found out starting to bog him down. He hadn't been able to do it alone, not anymore, not even for Maddie. Thankfully, the universe had heard him and had held out an olive branch.

pairing: Wally Clark x fem!reader

warnings: eventual smutty smut smut. and mad spoilers. and obvious Canon divergence. very involved, very dense plot.

bon reading, frens

___________________________💀

OCTOBER SUN pt.11

Simon crept to his car, a tactical advance, hunched low to the ground and clinging to the shadows as far as they would take him. He was afraid, adrenaline pumping, heart pounding in his ears; he didn't want Mr. Anderson to find him sneaking around the school a second time. Not after what he and Maddie had uncovered in the supply closet.

Mr. Anderson had propelled up Simon's short list of suspects to the top spot, the cache of money a sure sign the man was up to no good. Simon didn't have a lot of experience with society's seedy underbelly, but if movies had taught him anything, it's that normal people didn't hide stacks of cash outside of their homes unless they expected a police raid.

Was Mr. Anderson a drug dealer? Some kind of kingpin moonlighting as a high school English teacher? It was the perfect disguise. Cops would never think of a man who works with teenagers capable of that level of corruption. At least, not in Split River. No matter how many problems the town had, it wasn't that degree of shitty.

Only, Mr. Anderson had seemed nervous; a man forced onto a ledge at gunpoint. Threatened. Scared.

Okay, Simon reasoned, so Mr. Anderson wasn't a high-ranking drug lord. But he was definitely on the wrong side of the law and was obviously desperate. And desperate people were unpredictable when they felt backed into a corner.

He'd claimed he'd given Maddie what sounded like had been a large sum of money. A bribe, maybe. One that, in the end, hadn't been enough to convince Mr. Anderson she wouldn't rat on him. The thought made Simon's stomach churn, bile burning the back of his throat.

Maddie had been wrecked by the discovery, hands shaking from a surge of emotion too enormous to contain. She'd held it together long enough to caution Simon not to contaminate the evidence by touching it, assuring him she'd count it after he was safely off campus.

She'd shooed him from the classroom, "You have to leave, now," eyes watery as Mr. Anderson's betrayal had finally seemed to register. "I've got this, okay? Just go."

Simon had done as ordered. What good would he be if Mr. Anderson took him out next?

He peeled out of the parking lot and into the road, lightheaded as a thousand and one questions flooded his brain. His chest tightened, breathing labored, and—God, shit, he hadn't had a panic attack since middle school but, since Maddie's disappearance last Friday, they'd made a grand comeback. Kept him awake at night when there was nothing left to distract him from what could've happened to his best friend.

"Fuck." Simon rasped, smacking the steering wheel with his palm. And then, increasing in volume and intensity, "Fuck. Fuck. FUCK!" He beat the steering wheel, accidentally hitting the horn once and startling a woman walking her dog.

"Sorry!" He called, sheepish, through the open driver's side window, flashing a hand in apology. He didn't wait for a reaction, simply continued to drive home.

The thought of interacting with his parents put him on edge. He didn't know how he was supposed to stay quiet about Mr. Anderson. Noticeably off the last few days, Simon had already endured three separate lectures about drug use, depression, and sexuality respectively.

His parents' unconditional support, though amazing, made him feel like garbage—or, more accurately, a landfill—for causing them to worry to the point of draping a rainbow flag over the back of the couch and reassuring him that, "Love is love, mijo. We just want you to be happy."

Even if he could slip past his dad, his mother would undoubtedly pick up that whatever plot she suspected Simon of hiding had thickened. And, frankly, if she asked just right, Simon knew he'd crack and tell her everything. About Xavier, about Mr. Anderson...about developing The fucking Shining and assuming the role of Watson to his best friend's ghost.

Buying himself some time, Simon took turns he didn't have to; drove through random neighborhoods as he tried to think up a plausible excuse for his behavior that wouldn't result in another intervention. He didn't have it in him to watch his mother's face crumple as he lied to her again. The umpteenth time that week.

He needed to talk to someone. To get it out of himself and share the burden. His skin felt too tight and his bones too heavy and he couldn't carry the weight of Maddie's murder mystery alone.

And then, as if God had heard him, Simon's prayers were answered.

Without thinking it through, he pulled over and beeped his horn to get your attention before you turned onto the path that margined the small, neighborhood greenspace.

Clambering sideways to get out of his car, his foot caught on a pedal, seatbelt still hooked, Simon called out, "Hey!" grunting when he was knocked back into his seat by the strap. He took a second to collect himself, unbuckled his seatbelt, and climbed out in a less frenzied manner.

"Uhhhmm, are you okay?" You asked, your face displaying how not okay you thought Simon was. You glanced up and down the street, puzzled, "What are you doing here? Don't you live in Cedar Bank?" A suburb on the other side of the river that bisected the town.

Simon debated whether or not it had been a good idea to stop, but he didn't think he could give you an excuse and drive away, either. He dimly sympathized with how Mr. Anderson had felt back in that classroom; splitting threads pulled through the eye of a needle.

He summoned his resolve and turned to face you, "I need to tell you something."

You cocked your head, looked Simon over, and nodded slowly. Simon could tell you were trying to determine what this was about. Realized as you walked him into the little playpark and took a seat on one of the two swings, that he'd come out of nowhere in a move that could easily be interpreted as stalkerish.

"I could give you a lift home if you wanna talk in the car?" He offered, settling into the second swing all the same. The park was deserted, dark, the glow of the streetlights falling short by a few meters.

You shook your head and hooked your thumb over your shoulder, "That's literally my backyard."

Simon followed your indication and saw the top half of an antique build, painted a deep royal purple and trimmed in evergreen, that peaked over a tall, bushy hedgerow. A wooden fence several inches shorter than your family's hedges divided the public space from private property, running the length of the park behind your house and a few others.

"Huh." Simon returned his gaze to yours, "Never mind."

"Did you talk to Nicole?" You asked, possibly thinking that that was what Simon wanted to discuss.

He fiddled with his hands, closed his eyes, and supported his head on the metal chain that held the swing up. "No." He stated honestly. He needed to tell you about Mr. Anderson. Just. Start talking. But the words kept sticking in this throat.

"Simon? You're starting to scare me, is everything okay? Is this..." You trailed off and when you spoke again, you sounded worried, "Is this about Maddie?"

"Kind of," Simon admitted, pressing the meat of his palms into his eyes. "Screw it," He spun the swing so he faced you completely and then uncorked the bottle, "I found a shit ton of money in Mr. Anderson's classroom. Like, wads of it. Probably thousands of dollars hidden in the wall in the closet."

‗‗‗‗•‗‗‗‗

What the f u u u u u u ck.

One minute you'd been on your way home, trying to parse out why the connection between you and Wally had gone dormant as soon as you'd left him, and now, there you were, listening to Simon basically tell you that he'd unmasked Mr. Anderson like a Scooby-Doo villain.

You didn't have that on your Everything is FUBAR bingo card, that's for sure.

Okay. Okay. This was...big. Huge. And, "Holy shit, maybe it has to do with why he freaked on me in the theater," you said, mostly to yourself though you knew Simon would hear it.

"He what?"

You looked at Simon, "Earlier, I was—" Lie like a smart girl, "—looking for something Tilly forgot in the theater and he found me. But, Simon," You stood, started to pace, "He was acting paranoid like I found his dead mom à la Norman Bates. He practically threw me out of there." Which was, fine, a mild exaggeration, but Mr. Anderson's paranoia hadn't been. "I've never seen him like that. And he kept getting these phone calls that made him even more angry."

"Wait, what do you mean 'phone calls'? Did you hear anything?"

"No, just that he needed a minute. I guess to go find somewhere I wouldn't hear him."

Simon was standing now, pacing in a pattern the opposite of yours.

"He was on the phone when I saw him. Talking to someone about how he shouldn't have given Maddie money."

You felt like the sky had fallen on your head, "He gave Maddie money? Is that why she..." You'd wanted to say ran away, a kneejerk reaction borne from days of convincing yourself she'd just put Split River in the rearview. With what you knew now, you settled for, "Disappeared?"

Simon appeared to notice your choice of wording, peered at you like a math problem, but didn't mention it, instead revealing, "It's a line of inquiry."

You rubbed your temples to ease away the migraine that was building. Today had been too much; too many things unfolding one after the other: First hearing from Wally that Maddie was a ghost, and then just Wally and everything you had to unpack with that, and now Mr. Anderson's apparent criminal activity that may or may not have had a direct impact on Maddie's being a ghost in the first place.

Of course, you reminded yourself, she wasn't a ghost because you couldn't see. her. Which meant that, if he was involved, Mr. Anderson had drugged her to the point of a coma and had hidden her body somewhere.

"Oh my God," You moaned dismally, "This is so f u c k e d." As the gears turned, a thought clawed for your attention. "Simon," you ceased pacing to lift your gaze and regard Simon closely, "Why were you there?"

‗‗‗‗•‗‗‗‗

Simon knew he had to give you something, but, Jesus Christ, he was nervous. He'd already decided not to admit he could see Maddie, unable to believe that you wouldn't tell a trusted adult. And he wasn't keen on getting pumped full of antipsychotics and locked in a padded room, thanks.

You watched him, eyes hard, jaw set, more serious than he'd ever seen you, "Simon, what the hell?"

He swallowed, opting for half-truths, because he'd come this far. He needed help. A confidante. Would've preferred Nicole but she'd galivanted off with Xavier, apparently, and took the choice out of Simon's hands.

"I've been looking for clues about what happened to Maddie," Simon confessed, a weight lifting from his shoulders. "Since the search on Monday, when Xavier got arrested—"

You interrupted, fierce, loyal, "He wasn't arrested, Si. His dad was just taking him to the station to give an official statement."

"In the back seat?" Simon deadpanned.

"There's no room in the front of the cruiser!" You threw your hands up as if dealing with the situation would drive you to drink.

"With the lights on?"

"Because there was a crowd of people practically throwing themselves at the car to get Xavier's face on video."

Simon conceded and resituated himself on one of the swings. You followed his example, though, this time, you shrugged off your backpack and dropped it in the sand beside you.

"So, what do we do?" Simon wanted to know, close to getting on his knees and begging you to take the reigns on this because he was exhausted.

"Alright." You shifted to straddle your swing, hands in front of you as you counted details on your fingers. "We know that Maddie went missing on Friday. We know Xavier had nothing to do with it." Your eyes narrowed, daring Simon to comment. He didn't. "We know that Mr. Anderson is hiding money and that he gave some to Maddie. To keep her quiet?"

"That's what we-" Simon tensed, quickly undoing his mistake, "I'm thinking."

That intense look of scrutiny was back on your face and Simon resisted the urge to gulp. Three days ago Simon had figured you for the only person who'd believe him about Maddie's ghost. My how times have changed.

"If he was hiding money in his classroom, he could be hiding other things around the school, too." You rationalized. "Like the theater. I bet you anything that there's something in there he doesn't want us to find."

True. In fact, "Do you think he's hiding Maddie in there?"

"What, like, under the stage? That'd be pretty risky. And the cops went through every room in the school with search and rescue dogs and everything. Wouldn't they have found her if she was down there?"

Simon deflated, "Good point," reluctant to add that those dogs probably weren't the type trained to find cadavers.

"Right." You paused, either to organize your thoughts or analyze Simon further, he wasn't sure, but you soon continued, tone weak, "Simon, if he did have something to do with Maddie...I take back what I said before."

"About?"

You shrunk into yourself, forcing, "Maddie being okay," as if the words had to be wrenched out of you. "I don't want to believe Mr. Anderson could've hurt her but..." You blinked a rapid dozen times up at the sky, visibly shaken as you considered the worst, "I don't think she's okay."

A lump formed in Simon's throat. He was all too aware of the painful truth. His vision blurred, nostrils prickled, the enormity of the situation closing in on him.

"Yeah," He sniffed, "Me neither."

‗‗‗‗•‗‗‗‗

Neither you nor Simon were aware that, only ten feet away, crouched in the bushes, a figure wearing Simon's best friend's face had heard everything.

Cold.

Hungry.

And without an iota of guilt.

💀___________________________

PART TEN - PART TWELVE

also available on AO3!

MASTERLIST

[whoopsyeahokay]

October Sun

summary: Wally hadn't been able to make sense of what you'd said. How had it been possible that he and the others had been trapped for so long without knowing it? With that truth out for him to examine, Wally hadn't been sure he'd wanted to look any closer. He'd felt violated. Betrayed. Lost. What other lies had he been unwittingly a part of?

pairing: Wally Clark x fem!reader

warnings: eventual smutty smut smut. and mad spoilers. and obvious Canon divergence. very involved, very dense plot.

bon reading

___________________________💀

OCTOBER SUN pt.14

The world fell away as your words penetrated. Wally stilled, didn't breathe, didn't blink, didn't make a sound. As if he could delay the impact of that truth if he shut down critical functions.

Weakly, "What do you...mean?" Wally croaked, but something deep within himself had always known.

Known it like common sense; the feeling like looking at a green sky and knowing it was supposed to be blue. Like being sick since birth yet knowing that that wasn't what healthy felt like. He'd known and yet never questioned it because he and the others had had no way to be sure their situation was terribly, tragically wrong.

In the earliest days succeeding his untimely demise, Wally had tried to leave the school.

Not to follow his mother home after she'd donated his trophies, helmet, and jacket to display in the stadium entrance. Not to join his friends in Rodney's basement to get stoned after his memorial service. Not to break his own heart by stalking Jenny to the motel where she and her second choice prom date, Gary fucking Reid, lost their virginities together.

Rather, to go for a walk for the sake of getting some air. Despite having been flung back to the field multiple times by then—a lesson that had drilled into him the habit of remaining perpetually vigilant of his surroundings—Wally had had this intrinsic understanding that he could roam beyond what the barrier permitted.

So much so that, one evening, he hadn't kept track of where he'd been going (partly because he'd trusted himself to veer away from the perimeter, but mostly because he'd been relaxed. Not actively chasing down a loved one). It'd been an unconscious series of actions; one foot in front of the other, listening to Eddie Money's Can't Hold Back on a Lost & Found walkman, strolling into the thin smattering of trees on the edge of the grounds, and then wham—

Back to Start.

It had happened a few times after that, too. Rhonda would cackle around her lollipop du jour, roll her eyes, and tell him to, "Get smart, Jockstrap."

When Charley had come along, he'd experienced the same thing. And then Ajay and Katelynn. Learning the lesson after the lesson had been learned. Mr. Martin had calmly and wisely informed them that it was merely the result of not having internalized being dead yet.

But that hadn't sat right with Wally, similar to having been given the excuse of roughhousing when he'd caught his parents in a compromising position one innocuous summer-break afternoon before he'd aged into double digits.

"Babe..." Wally croaked, just above a whisper, the weight of what you'd unveiled slamming into his chest and leaving him winded, "What are you saying?"

Your eyes, marbled and bright—though not outright glowing like they had in the theater—stared right into him for a moment. You were obviously calculating what it meant that Wally couldn't leave the high school, all the hows and whys flittering like dust motes between you and him.

"Unless you're a residual haunter, like Mina or Yuri, you should be able to go wherever you want. How long have you been stuck?"

Wally's throat clicked when he swallowed, "Since I died."

You pressed your forehead to his, hands slotting under his jaw, and, voice laced with grief, said, "That's not possible."

"I mean, maybe it is?" Wally tried to reason, slumping back in his seat and staring at the 5-yard line as he stitched together his own theories based on what he'd learned as an actual dead person. "It's not like ghosts wrote those books you read. Maybe whoever wrote them got it wrong."

Shaking your head, "Actually, they did. Not the physical copies, obviously, but those authors collaborated with ghosts to write those books."

Wally didn't know what to say to that. Didn't know if he could answer a lot of things anymore. Did he even know what it meant to be dead?

You seemed willing wait him out as he turned everything over in his head, one hand on his shoulder, the other lifting the one he'd had on your calf so you could string his arm through your legs and cradle his hand on your belly, your thumb rubbing soothing patterns between the bones.

"What does it mean?" He asked, distant.

Wally could feel himself slipping away, the revelation frosting him from the inside and making him numb. He'd had a similar experience when he'd been fourteen and had broken his collarbone. The pain so intense that his brain had immediately severed its connection to the feeling.

Shock.

"It means that something doesn't want you to leave." You answered once he'd returned his eyes to yours. Your features creased, "Or someone."

Wally felt that statement like a nail through the chest. "How?"

You stared at him helplessly, caressing his cheek and then tilting forward to press your foreheads together again. The action worked to ground Wally, reeled him back from the edge of an existential crisis he wasn't ready to have.

Regretfully, "I don't know, Wally. But we'll figure it out, okay?"

He nodded against you. Closed his eyes and absorbed the warmth of your nearness, the solidity of your touch. Allowed those things to calm him.

"At least we can rule out Mr. A having anything to do with that, right?" Wally snorted in an attempt to lighten the mood.

You pulled back, smiled gently, and nodded, "Right. But he could've used it to his advantage. With her soul stuck here, Maddie wouldn't be able to get back into her body and then go to the police. It also means that he could've safely stashed her body anywhere, so long as he has access to life support."

"You think he dropped her at the hospital?"

"Not here." You said, "Split River isn't big enough to pull that off. He could've driven her to another state? Dropped her off at a big city hospital as a Jane Doe?"

Wally grimaced, shaking his head at the depravity, "That's messed up."

"God, her body could be in Detroit for all we know and it wouldn't get back here until someone in the hospital there made the connection. Unless Sheriff Baxter decides to widen the search."

"Couldn't you ask him? It's like you said, Xavier's your brother from another mother. Wouldn't the sheriff listen to you?"

You didn't seem convinced, reciting in a satire of an upbeat tone, "Hey Sheriff, I think my teacher knocked Maddie out of her body and took it to another state all so she wouldn't tell you about the money he's hiding in his classroom. We should totally look into that."

Wally responded in a responsible manner, "That sounds like an awful idea, let's not do that."

Curling against the back of your seat, voice slightly strangled, you uttered, "So, Maddie's stuck in an In Between 'til I can find her body and bring it back to her."

Wally sensed the granite mass of the pressure you were already putting on yourself. Choosing to steer you out from under it, he diverted the conversation, "Still haven't told me what an In Between is, by the way."

It did the trick, at least for the time being. Your lips quirked up at the corners and the wrinkle between your brows vanished as you informed him, "It's exactly what it sounds like. A plain between plains."

"Yeah, pretty thing, you're going to have to dumb it down more." Wally said, willing to sacrifice his dignity for the sake of making you smile.

Grinning, you set the stage, "Think of plains like different worlds. I'm in the living world, you're in the dead world, right?"

"Got it."

"Now, pretend there are doorways into those worlds. In Betweens are the spaces between the doors." You nibbled your bottom lip and Wally's attention immediately slipped, the urge to lick into your mouth making him twitch. Sweetly unaware, you back-tracked and tried a different avenue, "Not doors...maybe glass walls?"

"The door thing made sense. I mean, I think I get it. In Betweens are those places that anyone can access, whereas the living world is just for the living and the dead world is just for the dead. Am I close?"

"Yeah, you got it." You praised and Wally had to stifle the desire to puff out his chest and preen. "Well, not anyone can access In Betweens, but if your soul can Travel, that's where you go."

"So, when you project, you're in an In Between." Wally stated, though he was hedging for clarification.

"Exactly."

"And you said Maddie's stuck in an In Between, too, right?"

Wally saw the moment you clocked where he was going with that train of thought.

With a lamenting sigh, you said, "Unfortunately, In Betweens are complex. They're unique to all kinds of things like bloodlines and soul-ties—" Wally opened his mouth to ask, but you got there first, "—incredibly deep bonds you make in life with another person." He closed his mouth and listened as you elaborated. "So, me and my great-aunt enter the same In Between and can see each other. But Maddie..."

"Isn't blood?"

"And she and I weren't close enough to form the type of bond you'd need to Travel the same In Between. Either she'd have had to invite me into hers or I'd have had to invite her into mine. It's extremely intimate. Not something you do with someone you only hang out with in a group." You perked up and finally gave Wally a full, supernova smile. "I actually wrote you some notes."

The implication conjured an image of you scribbling notes for him under light cast from a laptop screen, kicking your feet as you lay on your bed like a schoolgirl. All so that he could understand the twisty, twiddly secrets of the universe...

He swooned, barely holding back a wistful exhale.

And then his brain ticked back a few frames to you on an unmade bed. The collar of the oversized t-shirt Wally hoped you owned bearing one shoulder, and the smooth skin of your legs on display.

He couldn't care less about the state of his deadness now, and what it meant that he couldn't leave the school grounds. Instead, he let a slow, devilish smirk slant across his mouth, emboldened by hormones and how receptive you were as he leaned into your space.

He slid his hand from yours and placed it on your thigh, "Gonna let me copy your homework, baby?"

"Gotta get those grades up before the big game." You played along, "Don't want you kicked off the team."

Without hesitation, Wally struck, halfway out of his seat, hand gripping the armrest behind you to hold himself up. He loomed over you, little thing that you were, squished into your seat and completely caged in by him. He hovered, heard your breath hitch, and watched your gaze go hazy.

"Lucky to have a girl like you on my side, then, huh?" Wally said, voice rough, tightly controlled, closing the distance between your lips in increments.

You reached up, wrapped your arms around his neck, "Damn right, big shot," and dipped in.

A throat cleared somewhere over Wally's shoulder, from behind and moderately above, and drove him back into his seat at Mach speed, his hold on you resituating to a socially acceptable place on your ankle. The interruption was accompanied by that arcing of gravity that emitted from a living body which meant Wally was once more on the outside looking in.

"Okay there, hot shot, time to get moving. Students aren't s'posed to be up here outside'a game time." The maintenance worker said, illicit cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth.

Wally noticed the man wasn't quite looking at you, and, for the first time, he had to wonder what the hell people saw when you and he were together while you were still in your body.

You pulled yourself up as fast as the angle allowed you to without injury, foot still tucked in Wally's lap. As soon as your head peeked above the back of your seat, the maintenance worker clutched a hand to his heart and plucked the cigarette from his lips.

"Jesus, girl, you can't do that to folks." He scolded you, southern accent thickening, "Lookin' like a zombie comin' out the grave or what."

"Sorry," You said and sounded as puzzled as Wally was by the man's overreaction.

"Just hurry up and get goin'." His eyes swept in a strange pattern, away from you then back then away, fixing on a point that would have been Wally's nose if he weren't invisible. "You kids these days thinking you can be wherever you wanna be, huh? Ignoring the rules, like they don't apply to you..."

God, this guy. "Can it, asshole. Give her a minute to get up." Wally snapped, bolstered by the fact that the man couldn't hear him. "Bet you're bent outta shape because all that nicotine makes your dick about as useful as a wet napkin."

He heard you choke on a laugh that you quickly masked under a cough.

The man squinted, lips pursed in aggravation. Surprisingly, he departed with no more than a gruff, "Get gone!" and stuck his half-burned cigarette back into his mouth.

Wally glared after him as the man marched up the stairs toward a ladder open beneath a curtain of cables and metal that spilled from the ceiling. Clearly, the man had been in the middle of fixing something when he'd seen you.

"Fucker." Wally grumbled. He patted your leg, pressed a kiss to your knee before he released you.

"I appreciated the support," You giggled, "Even if it doesn't do much on my side of things, it's nice to know you have my back."

"I've always got you, baby." Wally vowed as he unfolded himself and rose to his feet. He couldn't help tacking on, "Every bit of you," with a wink that made you pink up so prettily.

You wetted your lips, ducked your face into your shoulder; shy after you'd been caught in what might’ve been a very awkward position. "I'm starting to get that."

Wally let you take the lead, enjoyed how you brushed up against him as you shuffled out of the row and onto the stairs. He shot the man one last angry look as he grabbed his jacket and then turned to trail you across the field and out of the stadium.

At the top of the grandstand, feet from the ladder, the man examined his cigarette through a profoundly glum expression.

With a grunt, he dropped it to the ground and crushed it under the thick sole of his work boot, simultaneously pulling the crumpled, two-from-empty pack out of his breast pocket and whipping it into a nearby trashcan.

💀___________________________

PART THIRTEEN - PART FIFTEEN

also available on AO3!

MASTERLIST

[whoopsyeahokay]

October Sun

summary: things had gone from weird to worse in a matter of seconds. it'd seemed all your secrets had decided to reveal themselves to Wally without so much as considering how you'd feel about it. you'd guessed that was the price you'd had to pay for your choice to share yourself with a member of Split River High's Afterlife Support Group.

pairing: Wally Clark x fem!reader

warnings: eventual smutty smut smut. and mad spoilers. and obvious Canon divergence. very involved, very dense plot.

bon reading, frens

___________________________💀

OCTOBER SUN pt.10

You were six, sitting on your sister Aurora's lap in a hospital room. Monitors beeped—long intervals, pitched notes—and, below that, your great-aunt's rattled breathing. Everything stank of disinfectant.

Ginny lay in the bed; pruned and pale, translucent skin hanging from her bones. She was just past seventy, but had aged several decades in the two weeks since the symptoms had started. Now, she looked like the skeletons your neighbors strung up for Halloween. Ghastly. Small.

Dead.

Mommy dozed in the armchair across from you, her head at an awkward angle, mouth ajar, one hand rested on her swollen belly. For days, she'd subsisted on nothing but good ol' fashioned Celtic stubbornness, running herself into the ground to undo whatever had put Ginny in the hospital. Nothing worked. Potions, pastes, blood spells, smudging rituals; it didn't matter what Mommy and Nanna did, Ginny's doctor insisted her condition was deteriorating.

It was so strange, you thought, that Ginny didn't just tell them herself. After all, she was able to stand in front of you without assistance and seemed much healthier than she had even moments ago.

She'd been asleep, silvery and thin and wheezy, and then her eyes had popped open and she'd gotten to her feet with the grace of a ballerina. Auburn hair in fluffy curls, pinned neatly away from her face; lips bright, Victory red, and skin peachy.

She was as pretty as a picture in a church bell skirt and smart, collared blouse, the colors much more suited to her than the starch white of the hospital gown. The pendant of her necklace was now one of a pair dangling from her earlobes, silver circles glinting in the sterile light.

"Are you better?" You asked her, marveling at her loveliness.

Ginny crouched to meet you at your level and placed her hand on yours, green eyes bright as emeralds in the sun. She smiled, "Don't tell mummy. This will be our little secret." She addressed Aurora next, "I'll be back as soon as I can, pet."

Aurora nodded, solemn, and you both watched Ginny greet a young man in similarly outdated dress as he entered the room. You didn't know who he was, but Aurora must've because she offered him a watery smile, eyes glistening.

"Where's Ginny going?" You asked her.

She shushed you, murmuring, "You can't tell mom, okay?"

Annoyed, "I won't." You weren't 3, you knew how to keep a secret. You'd kept plenty for your new friend Hana. Like her crush on the crayon stealer, Simon Elroy, or how she always took two milks at recess instead of one.

"She's saying hello to Grandpa Jack." Aurora told you, but you sensed there was a lot more to it than that. You gave her your best glare. She rolled her eyes, "They're probably going to try and find out what's wrong with her."

But, "She's better, dummy," you said, craning your neck to watch her swan out of the room with a man who'd died before you were born.

Aurora sighed the way she did whenever she thought you said something stupid and pressed her hand to your cheek, forcing you to look at the bed.

You gasped, astonished that, there, under the layers of quilts your Nanna had brought, was Ginny; breath rattling, monitors beeping, white as a china doll and asleep.

That was how you learned that Traveling meant something different to your family.

‗‗‗‗•‗‗‗‗

One second you were clung to Wally like a limpet, the next you'd vanished into thin air. Snapped out of existence like you'd never been there at all. Frantic, Wally looked left, right, to the back of the stage, and then spun around to face the rows of seats.

His jaw dropped, blood draining from his face. You stood at the top of the center aisle, shirt no longer rucked up the way Wally had made it; hair as tidy as it had been before he'd run his fingers through it; skin no longer sporting the perfect blush he'd coaxed to the surface.

Even from where he stood, Wally could see that your eyes burned a nebula of colors, the way they had when Wally caught up to you outside the school earlier. As soon as he'd registered it—proof that something magical had just transpired—they dimmed to their normal hue, just as the man behind you, Mr. Anderson, Wally identified, demanded, "What are you doing in here?"

He seemed angry, more so than the time Wally had watched him chew out a group of boys in the locker room showers for smoking weed. Mr. Anderson grabbed you by the arm and hauled you out of the theater like you'd been trespassing.

Wally charged up the aisle, thoughts of how you could fucking teleport taking a back seat to the desire to shove Mr. Anderson to the ground for assuming he had the right to touch you like that. The connection between you and Wally bittered, shrieked, fear and fury swirling together to pump through Wally's veins.

Oh hell no.

"I'm sorry," You apologized. Mr. Anderson released you, causing you to stumble from the momentum he'd used to force you into the hallway. "I won't let it happen again."

In an ill-fated attempt to wedge himself between you and Mr. Anderson, Wally checked the man's shoulder with his own, but little happened. Mr. Anderson had repositioned himself, almost like he'd anticipated the action, and the intention waned into a light graze. One that had no impact on the man, but that caused Wally to trip into the wall.

Mr. Anderson escorted you through the school toward your locker, gravely explaining that you'd overstayed your welcome by an hour and a half; the Wednesday team practices and club activities already packed up and gone.

Glancing outside, Wally was shocked to see the sky was dark. Apparently, making out with you was the equivalent of pressing a giant PAUSE button on the fourth dimension. He was sure no more than twenty minutes had passed since you'd jumped into his arms and kissed him within an inch of his sanity.

Teleportation and time manipulation? Wally gaped, images of his favorite comic book heroes swarming his mind. Holy shit, you were an X-Man. He had big fat feelings for a Mutant prodigy. Was he the Cyclops to your Marvel Girl?

Needing to do something to ensure Mr. Anderson wouldn't try to grab you again, Wally inserted himself between you and him. A move that appeared to influence Mr. Anderson to maintain the space Wally enforced with his presence.

Good, Wally thought, cracking his knuckles, because while he had no problem trying to beat his way into the living world to knock a few of Mr. Anderson's teeth out, he knew that would take a lot more than noble intention to pull off.

He loathed feeling helpless. Back in the day, he'd stood up for the kids who got bullied, had done his best to fend off the misguided idiots who'd used their post-puberty size for evil. Trouble was that now he couldn't do more than make a light flicker by concentrating really, really hard.

Don't be fooled: Dawn made it look easy, but it wasn't.

Finally reaching your locker, Mr. Anderson reiterated, "What were you doing in there?" His demeanor all wrong. Wally knew enough about the guy to know that, usually, he was a cool kind of dorky. Relatable. However, something had obviously possessed him because he was acting like you'd discovered his hidden collection of porn mags.

Wally didn't like it. He wanted Mr. Anderson to fuck off and leave you alone more than he'd wanted anything for a long time. Retaining his position between you and Mr. Anderson, chin up, hands balled into fists at his sides, Wally willed Mr. Anderson away.

You began, "I was just—" when Wally gritted out, stare fixed on the man's haggard face, "You don't owe this dickhead an explanation, baby."

But you spoke over him, "Mathilda asked me to look for something she'd forgotten in there yesterday. She's in the Mean Girl's Musical?" You supplied, and, jeez, you were quick on your feet.

Mr. Anderson was unimpressed, "For two hours?"

"No! No. I was studying in the library when she texted me."

Wally began to wonder how many yarns you'd had to spin for it to come so easily. Part of him was uncomfortable with the notion that it seemed like second nature to you, while another, bigger, part of him seared the way lemon juice stings a papercut.

He recognized it was self-preservation. A lifetime of harboring a massive secret that, okay, might not get you carted off in a straitjacket these days, but definitely wouldn't make it easy for you to go through life normally. He'd seen people ostracized for less. Like Katelynn who, a week before her death, had been spurned by her scene kid friends because she'd admitted to being a fan of Hilary Duff.

"Do you have to get anything from the library, then?" Mr. Anderson wanted to know, the V between his brows deepening when his phone buzzed in his blazer pocket. The third time in the short minutes since he'd found you.

"No." You said, cowed, even though you shouldn't be. He'd been the one whose conduct had been inappropriate. He should be begging for your forgiveness, not making you feel terrible like it was his job. "I swear, I won't let it happen again."

Wally's blood boiled.

"See that it doesn't." Mr. Anderson warned. His phone buzzed again. "Get your things and go home."

"Yes, sir."

Mr. Anderson unpocketed and checked his phone as another call lit up the screen. Private, the caller ID claimed.

"You'll have to use the main entrance." He said, already backing away, "Everything else is locked up." Then he leveled you with a dark look of authority, "I assume you can make your own way out?"

Wally could feel the tension in your muscles, could hear your heart stutter behind your ribs. His fingers twitched, itching to bust the man's head right off his shoulders. And, damn, when had he last felt such violent inclinations? Even against those prima donna bullies, the rage hadn't distended into anything remotely close to this.

"Yeah, I..." You cleared your throat, "Yes."

Mr. Anderson retreated and took the next call that came through, his bark of, "Give me a minute," resonating through the empty hallway as he disappeared around the corner.

As soon as he was out of sight, Wally spun on his heel to face you. You shrunk against your locker, arms folded around your middle and eyes faraway, chewing the inside of your bottom lip as you lost yourself in thought.

Wally moved into your bubble, the connection between you calmed, and smoothed his hands down your waist; one into the back pocket of your jeans, the other gliding back up and into your hair.

He pulled you gently against him, tucked your head under his chin and asked, "You good, pretty girl?"

He felt you nod into his chest, "Yeah. That was just every shade of weird imaginable. Something was off about him." You leaned away just enough to gaze up at Wally. "He's usually so...friendly."

Wally pressed a kiss to the top of your head, "I don't want you to stick around, babe. I don't trust that dude not to do something stupid if he finds you again."

"For real?" You sounded stunned, "Him?"

"Honestly? Yeah. He was giving off serious Bundy vibes. You didn't do anything wrong and he acted like you'd cold-cocked his mama." Wally glared in the direction Mr. Anderson had gone, concluding, "Maybe he's the reason Maddie's blood was splattered all over the boiler room."

"Jesus, Wally, it wasn't a Fear Street massacre." You shunned the idea, disentangling yourself from him to open your locker. After a moment of reflection, "Do you really think he's capable?"

As you grabbed your backpack and started to shove what you needed into it, Wally leaned on the locker beside yours, shrugging, "Like I said, Bundy vibes. And I can't stop him if he decides to come back with a machete, so please," he implored, "Get your stuff and let's go."

Thankfully, you took his advice without further argument. Pulled on your leather jacket, slung your backpack over one shoulder, and held your hand out for Wally to take as if it was something you did all the time.

Champagne-fizz burst in Wally's chest as he accepted the invitation, lacing your fingers together and setting a leisurely but purposeful pace toward the atrium.

"So," He began, "You lie like that often?"

Shame bled into your features as you cast your gaze to the ground. You didn't look at him when you said, "Only when I have to."

"Do you have to do it a lot?"

"More than I'd like, yeah." You shrugged, audibly unhappy about the fact. "Trust me, it's not that I want to. But my family has a strict No One Can Know policy when it comes to our..." You lifted your free hand and air-quoted, "gifts."

Wally bumped into your side sportively. He took a beat to consider his question before he asked it, unsure if he was ready to hear anything other than what he wanted to. "Do you feel like you have to lie to me?"

You stopped and drew Wally back the two steps he'd taken ahead. Looking him square in the eye, you promised, "I'm not going to lie to you, Wally. About anything. Ever." Once he nodded to accept he understood, you moved along, "And anyway, you're now in on the one thing I have to lie about. So, unless I'm under a Fidelius Charm, I honestly don't have anything else to hide."

"A what charm?"

"Do we not have Harry Potter in the library?" You asked as if to no one in particular.

"Oh man, yeah. Rhonda got really into those books for awhile." Wally sloped toward you to stage-whisper by your ear, "She's a total nerd for them. Says she's a Slytherin." Wally straightened and snickered, "Whatever that means. She'd kill me if she ever found out I told you."

You drew an X over your heart, "I won't tell a soul," before you released Wally's hand to push the door to the atrium open with both of yours.

As he followed you down the ramp toward the front entrance, Wally was unable to ignore the elephant in the room any longer, "When were you going to tell me you could teleport?"

It startled a laugh out of you, the kind that starts with a snort. A wave of fondness washed over Wally and he grinned stupidly at you, all teeth and soft eyes.

"I can't." You corrected. Rather, "I can, uhm, project...astrally."

Whoa. You were officially the coolest person Wally had ever known.

A barrage of questions threatened to spill out of him, ranging from reasonable to unhinged. And who could blame him? Normal people couldn't leave their bodies at will and surf the cosmos!

"Astral projection is real?" He asked in as even a tone as he could manage.

"Being a ghost is real." You countered bluntly.

And, "Touché." He conceded, "But you can't blame a guy for being surprised when something out of the Twilight Zone can happen in real life."

You seesawed your head, lips adopting a playful smile. God, you were beautiful. "Fair." You said, winking at Wally who was then forced to swallow the need to pick you up and pin you to the nearest wall with his mouth.

The air was crisp when you both exited the school. He walked you to the picnic tables near the bus stop, resting on the end of a tabletop and pulling you between his legs. Like this, you were pressed flush against him, body fitted so perfectly into his.

The connection rumbled and flared, erupting volcano-hot, piloting Wally's actions. He slid his hands from your waist down to squeeze the pert swell of your ass, and dragged your hips against his.

You gasped, delicate, and let your head fall to the side to expose the column of your neck. Wally took advantage. Brushed his dry lips from your collar to the hinge of your jaw, little darts of tongue and drags of teeth.

"Fuck, baby, you don't know what you do to me," He groaned, his dick fattening in his sweatpants. And he sure as shit meant it. The connection between you was driving him crazy, keeping teenage boy hormones in check an impossible battle.

He rolled his hips, chasing the friction, using the leverage he had with his hands in your back pockets to drag you into his lap. He rearranged himself on the table, slid back to sit more comfortably, and encouraged you to rut against him.

Wally kissed you like it was the last time, like this was the only chance he'd ever have to do it. Slow, deep, slick. The sounds you made, fuck, wanton and needy; moans and gasps and punched-out sighs.

And then, because, of fucking course 'and then'—your phone buzzed right in Wally's palm. Long, sequential blitzes of vibration. A phone call.

You groaned in annoyance, taking your phone when Wally graciously handed it to you, and answered.

"Hey," You greeted, head on Wally's shoulder and body still.

His mama had raised a gentleman, he reminded himself and curled his long arms around you in a loose embrace, repeating football stats in his mind to cool his erection.

"Yeah," You were saying, "Yeah, I know, but I got caught up in the...Well, mom's a big girl, I'm sure she can find someone else to shake the floorboards this one time."

Wally tried to give you an inquiring look but the angle was too awkward, so instead he filed that tidbit away for later, above astral projection but below In Betweens. And, shit, that's right, you were both supposed to discuss your fritzy ghost powers, not dry hump on school property. Oops.

You growled, climbing off of Wally altogether and hopping to the ground, pacing as you expressed with sarcasm and sass, "Why don't you get your new husband to do it, or are we still keeping him in the dark about the family business?"

Wally barely made out the, "Could you stop being such a selfish little brat for o—" before you hung up on who Wally surmised was your sister. With your back to him, he couldn't tell how you felt about the exchange, but from the tension in your shoulders and how forcibly measured your breathing had become, he thought it was safe to assume not great.

"You guys don't get along?" He ventured.

On a last, heavy breath, you twirled back around, "Actually, we get along really well." You sucked your teeth, "It's our mom's choice of occupation that puts us at each other's throats." Wally knew what was coming, couldn't soften the disappointment. "I gotta go." You said regretfully.

He plastered on a smirk, aiming for levity but sounding too dismayed to stick the landing, "You'd think the universe didn't want us to help Maddie."

In what Wally could only describe as a fit of absolutely fucking not, you strode right up to him, slung your arms around his neck and pulled him into a hot, middle-finger-to-the-sky kiss.

"Fuck the universe," You said when you parted, breathless, perfect, his, "I'll come in early tomorrow. Like, seven-thirty-early. Can you meet me in the parking lot?"

Repeating his words from earlier, "Anything for you, pretty girl," Wally vowed, grinning at the prospect of cuddling up somewhere intimate with you in the morning.

Although his thoughts weren't wholly innocent, he recognized within himself the genuine desire to do anything to be near you, for however long you'd give him. Whether that was two minutes or two hours, Wally would be grateful.

"Great," You smiled, bright against the dark autumn evening, "I'll see you then."

A final, sweet stamp of your lips to Wally's cheek and you went on your way, Wally having to watch as you stepped over the boundary of the school grounds and into a world where he couldn't follow.

"Can't wait," He uttered and the connection between you both quieted completely.

💀___________________________

PART NINE - PART ELEVEN

also available on AO3!

MASTERLIST

[whoopsyeahokay]

October Sun

summary: after he'd expended his pent-up energy, Wally had followed Rhonda out of the weight room and back up to the main floor where they'd encountered Simon stood outside the English classroom. neither had been sure what to make of him, but, for the briefest moment, Wally had been sure that there'd been more to Simon's ability than even Maddie or Charley knew.

pairing: Wally Clark x fem!reader

warnings: panic attacks. eventual smutty smut smut. and mad spoilers. and obvious Canon divergence. very involved, very dense plot.

bon reading, frens

___________________________💀

OCTOBER SUN pt.19

Wally reentered the school in a haze, his thoughts a discordant refrain of feedback noise as he traipsed down the flights of stairs to the weight room. He was antsy, manic, brain going a thousand miles a minute. The silhouettes of important information indistinct behind a sandstorm of jealousy and confusion. He needed an outlet and the punching bag in the corner was unoccupied.

In perfunctory motions, he wrapped his knuckles in gauze and tape, slashed the air with a few practice swings, and then stepped up to the bag to unleash his aggression.

Thump. Thump. Smack.

He should focus on Simon, Wally knew. On the fact that Simon could see Maddie. That was huge. A piece of the puzzle that reinforced your claim of In Betweens and Maddie's body being out there somewhere for her to slip back in to. Simon's ability explained why he'd dragged you to the bus stop on Tuesday. Why he'd asked you about seeing ghosts. It also explained why Wally had believed Simon wasn't like you and couldn't see what you could see.

Did you know about Simon? Had you simply played dumb last night? No. Wally knew in his bones that you'd have told him if you'd thought Simon could see Maddie. So, aside from Charley, did anyone else know about Simon? Fuck, aside from Ajay, did anyone else know about you!?

It was a game of Clue Wally didn't want to play. Did the person have a hidden cache of money? Did the person know about magic and ghosts and astral projection? Did the person ever use a service road to stalk a teenage girl? Was it Professor Plum in the boiler room with a wrench!?

How many players were sitting on secrets?

Thump. Thump. Smack.

That was the thing, wasn't it? Everyone on the board had a secret. You and Wally. Mr. Anderson. Xavier and his sidepiece. Maddie and Simon. Even Ajay, for fucksakes. And now Charley.

Unlike Rhonda, who was most likely coping on the roof with a pack of Ms. Fields' smokes and Mrs. Arsenault's contraband bottle of wine, Wally couldn't fault Charley for recommending that Maddie not tell anyone about Simon. Not just that it would make Wally a hypocrite, but because Wally had seen Simon. Exhausted and paranoid and scared. A boy who'd been charged with the responsibility of solving his best friend's murder by said best friend.

Wally didn't know what had motivated Charley to keep things on the DL, however, Wally finally understood the gravity of your family's Golden Rule.

It was something Wally had heard Rhonda spit at Charley before he'd been bowled over by the paingriefterror of your panic attack: "You just want to keep him all to yourself so you can talk to Emilio, am I right?" Wally wondered vaguely if Rhonda would regret having said that, no matter how much sense it'd made.

Thump. Thump. Smack.

Simon and Maddie's connection represented a way to reach out from the beyond. Not only for Maddie, but for all the trapped souls in her vicinity. Simon would be run ragged trying to explain the unexplainable: "Don't ask how," He'd have to say, "but here's a message from your dead son/daughter/friend/husband..." And fuck, okay, yes, Wally would spend an eternity in Hell to keep you from that, even if it meant losing his friends.

Or, alternatively, if it meant never seeking you out again; never speaking to you, never touching you—Wally's punches landed harder as images of Xavier holding you close flashed through his mind. Tight, vicious bursts of jealousy that spun the bag in wide sways on its chain.

Wally didn't hate him, but he sure as hell wished Xavier would break both elbows before contracting a chronic case of head lice. The guy was a deadbeat who'd probably never had to face the consequences of his stupid decisions because Officer Daddy had always bailed him out. More likely to abandon you for a new toy than protect you from the monsters like you trusted him to.

It drove Wally fucking crazy that you didn't see it. That, according to you, Xavier was the best thing since sliced bread. Wally had seen how you'd found comfort in Xavier's arms. How you'd gone all pliant and soft for him, molding into his side as if he'd created that space just for you. When, in reality, Xavier was the asshole who'd sought out some peppy, rah-rah pick me to get his dick wet because Maddie hadn't put out. The guy who'd stolen Maddie's phone to delete his mistakes the day she'd been cornered in the boiler room by someone with a grudge.

Xavier hadn't been there for Maddie, and he wouldn't be there for you. Thump. Not always. Thump. Not how you truly believed he would be there for you. Thump. Not how Wally would be there.

Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. SMACK.

The bag swung violently from the momentum of Wally's last punch, almost knocking him back a few steps when he caught it. He pressed his head against the leather, panting, sweat dripping from his hairline to his chin.

All at once, the anger and jealousy he'd been trying to assuage erupted out of him in a desperate, wild howl.

"FUCK~!"

He punched the bag again, over and over, harder and harder, damp hair matted, sweat stinging his eyes. Hitting a face that wasn't there until it was bloody and mangled, and Wally was spent.

"Whoa there, Rambo, maybe take it down a notch."

Wally stilled the bag with his hands and once more pressed his forehead against it, unwilling to turn around and look at Rhonda just yet.

"You mean Rocky." Wally corrected through labored breaths. She smelt like cigarettes and that Tweed Lentheric perfume she'd died with. Spring earth and chemical ash. "Rambo's the jungle, Rocky's the Eye of the Tiger."

"Po-tay-to, po-tah-o. Stallone doesn't exactly have range," She snided, taking a seat on the bench Wally had thrown his jacket over. "What's got you in a mood? And don't tell me it's about Charley. You wouldn't stay mad at him if he'd strangled your childhood dog with his bare hands."

Wally flinched, "That's...descriptive." He turned and regarded her with a put-off expression, "And Charley would never do that." Charley wouldn't even try to hurt someone's feelings. Sure, he armored himself with snark and sarcasm, but Charley was the most empathetic person Wally knew.

Rhonda shrugged, glaring at nothing as she sat in her sulk. Her lips were stained purple from the wine, eyes a little glossy, posture more relaxed than Wally had seen in a long time. Although she still seemed to have an axe to grind, her party-of-one on the roof had served to mellow her somewhat. No longer vibrating with rage as she had been when Wally had left her and Charley at the bus stop.

"So?" Rhonda asked, blunt, "Why are you beating the crap out of that thing?"

Wally used the bottom of his shirt to mop the sweat from his face, taking his time to decide what to say. There were too many landmines; things he couldn't tell her if he didn't want her knowing just how much he and Charley had in common when it came to keeping her in the dark.

"Thinking about talking to the living reminded me of Gary—" Xavier. "and Jenny—" You. "and everything that went down after Homecoming." Except you weren't going to weep about your dead boyfriend in Xavier's arms and then proceed to make out with Xavier under the bleachers. In front of Wally. "Just. How much I wish I'd had someone to beat the shit out of Z—Gary on my behalf, you know?"

Rhonda peered at him like an optical illusion, narrowed eyes and determination, like she could solve him if she looked hard enough. For a moment, Wally was worried she would. Or, at the very least, she'd make a guess so close to the truth, Wally would have to do something drastic to avoid answering.

Thankfully, he didn't have to as Rhonda stood—a little wobbly—and crossed her arms, hip cocked and brows knitted, "I get it." She looked up at him, focus suddenly sharp as a tack, "I wish I'd had someone to put a bullet between Mr. Manfredo's eyes on my behalf." Her expression slackened into something distant and deeply sad that made Wally's gut roll with guilt.

Wally swallowed, nodded, "Yeah," he said, sounding a bit winded as he leveled his gaze on his sneakers. "I wish that, too."

"Alright, fuck this pity party." Rhonda announced, grabbing Wally's jacket and tossing it at him, "Let's go see if Mr. Mueller still has that bottle of whiskey in his desk."

Snickering, "Because that's so much better," Wally trailed after her. When he stepped out of the weight room and into the corridor, the pits and back of his shirt felt instantly drier. Modest resets were fucking mindboggling but also came in clutch in situations like this, when he didn't have the chance to hit the showers.

Rhonda took her time up the stairs, pace quickly going from sluggish to sober as they entered the main floor. That was something Wally enjoyed about being dead: No hangovers. Their systems reset so quickly, it didn't matter how much they drank, the effects wouldn't last longer than thirty minutes, tops. Oh the fun they'd had (under Mr. Martin's nose, of course).

As Wally was getting into the idea of sharing the whiskey with Rhonda, he spotted a particular someone down the hall to his right, leaned against the lockers outside the classroom Wally had escorted you from earlier.

He wouldn't have bothered to stop, Rhonda certainly wasn't going to, except that—

"Hurry up, Clark, Mueller locks his desk before he leaves," Rhonda said, turning around to walk back toward Wally where he stood at the T intersection of the two hallways.

Distracted, "Yeah, be right there..." Wally answered even as he shifted his body to completely face Simon.

Simon. Who fidgeted with his thumb, in deep concentration as he waited for something Wally wasn't aware of. Casually looked up and down the hallway to give himself something to do.

"I'll go get it myself if you'd rather examine the freakshow," Rhonda said, only slightly nasty.

After she abandoned Wally, there was no one else around. No one and nothing to grab attention, though that would change in a minute when final classes were dismissed at the bell.

And yet...for a solid few seconds...

Simon's gaze fell on Wally and stayed there.

💀___________________________

PART EIGHTEEN - PART TWENTY

also available on AO3!

[whoopsyeahokay]

October Sun

summary: Wally had had no idea what he'd been looking at. Had barely had a reaction to it apart from subtle feelings of anxiety. In fact, it hadn't inspired anything more than a shrug and the thought of, "Neat. It's a tree."

pairing: Wally Clark x fem!reader

warnings: eventual smutty smut smut. and mad spoilers. and obvious Canon divergence. very involved, very dense plot.

bon reading, frens

___________________________💀

OCTOBER SUN pt.16

Group adjourned with Mr. Martin's instruction to pick anything but Rudy for tomorrow's Movie Night. Maddie split almost immediately; in pursuit of another lead or to stalk Mr. Anderson, Wally wasn't sure, but once he heard the door click behind her, he sagged in relief.

Too soon, he realized. When he looked up he saw Rhonda bolt from her seat and cut through the center of the circle like a shark through water, Charley on her heels.

"What was that?" She challenged, sizing the length of Wally up with a wave of her bare lollipop stem.

"What was what?"

Charley squinted at him, quickly scanned about before he leaned in and furtively said, "Oh, I don't know. How about that monstrosity of a performance you just forced us to participate in?"

Wally gulped, "I—"

"Spare us the crap, puppycat," Rhonda snipped, "We've seen each other's transcripts."

"I saw him misspell fundraiser," Charley added in a mockery of an anecdote Wally had shared during the session. And then, accusingly, "I know you know what a pun looks like."

Wally found himself on the back foot, mind going blank as he groped for an explanation that hedged the truth enough to get him out of Charley and Rhonda's crosshairs, but that didn't expose that he'd already known about the phone call and Mr. Anderson and the hush money.

"I was just...Uh..."

Unfortunately, Charley and Rhonda were too damn smart and your skill of inventing plausible excuses on the spot hadn't yet rubbed off on him. Inwardly, he reinforced his defenses and prepared for the Spanish Inquisition (nobody expects it).

"Wally," Rhonda said, blade-sharp, and Wally winced at her use of his actual name, "I know you think it's sweet to play clueless meathead in front of your crush—"

Oh. Okay. Sure. "That's—"

"—but, trust me, it doesn't work. Don't dumb yourself down just to get her to like you." Rhonda finished with a long-suffering roll of her eyes. An action that translated to mother-hen affection in a normal person.

"Besides," Charley said, a slack hint of sass to his syllables, "I think she just wants to figure things out. Not play tonsil hockey with a ghost who probably shared biology with the teacher that murdered her."

Wally tried to make his face react appropriately, had no idea if he pulled it off, but Charley and Rhonda didn't comment so he assumed it couldn't have been too bad.

"I don't think Mr. A is that old," Wally mumbled, scratching the back of his head sheepishly. "But...thanks, guys."

He had to acknowledge that it was nice that his friends cared about him. That they saw him as more than the overexcited golden retriever they often criticized him of being and wanted to make sure he wasn't trying to people-please his way into someone's heart.

Charley's expression mollified, "Anytime, big guy."

In feigned bitterness, "Well, I've done my good deed for the day," Rhonda announced, pushing past Wally to head for the door, "Let's go."

Wally turned as if to follow her, however, he caught Ajay's eye before he could commit to the action. He remembered then what Ajay had told him in the teacher's lounge about showing Wally something he 'needed to see'.

"I'll catch up in a bit," He called after Charley and Rhonda, backstepping toward Ajay to make his intentions obvious.

Charley shot Wally a lazy salute, "We'll be in the library for a while," and then turned on his heel to trail after Rhonda.

After decades of being in each other's pockets, it wasn't uncommon for members of their haunt to seek time one-on-one with each other. Everyone respected the unspoken exclusivity without comment and was especially understanding toward Wally, who had been the only teenage guy amongst them until 1992.

Bernie and Katelynn greeted Wally as he approached Ajay, though soon took their leave, Katelynn with a small and bashful, "See ya, Wally."

"Bye Katy-Cat." He said through a charming smile, ruffling her hair when she came into reach.

Katelynn shoved his arm away playfully, blowing Wally a raspberry before she continued over to the empty circle, immediately setting to work helping Mr. Martin and Bernie stack the chairs.

Wally turned back to Ajay, "Alright, my guy, where to?"

They exited through the side door, sunlight temporarily blinding Wally after having spent an hour sitting in the poorly lit assembly hall. Not giving Wally's eyes a chance to adjust, Ajay took him by the elbow and physically maneuvered him in the right direction.

"It won't seem like much," Ajay said as if in warning, "so you need to trust me." He released Wally's elbow when Wally began to move under his own power, and hurried his stride.

"I do trust you," Wally replied, voice bouncing as he picked up his pace to match Ajay's. "Whatever you're gonna show me, it's gotta be important."

Ajay's ears reddened. "Thank you."

They were headed toward the tree line along the backside of the school, the field spread out to Wally's right. Down the steps, along the path, picnic tables and chainlink fence. Cheerleaders practiced their pyramid and the junior gym class played kickball.

Anxiety began to creep over Wally as they neared the boundary line, a slow and subtle discharge of fear frequency transmitting across his brain in a cold flush.

"Heeey, are you sure this is the right way?" Wally had to ask, his skin starting to feel clammy and too tight on the bones of his fingers. He began to slow his steps, afraid of being circus-canoned back to the 5-yard line, but Ajay plowed ahead without concern. "Dude?"

Wally almost rammed into him for how abruptly Ajay stopped, the toes of Ajay's shoes so close to the invisible line it gave Wally heart palpitations.

"There." Ajay said, pointing at a tree that stood approximately two meters beyond the school grounds.

The tree wasn't anything special. Tall, leafy, burled in various places up its trunk, and roots weaved and whorled around its base, some thick enough to sit on comfortably. Carved initials and numbers and heart shapes by students who'd wanted to immortalize their memory in its bark. It was the kind of thing one would expect from a tree in a private area near a building full of teenagers, really.

"What am I looking at?" Wally asked.

"I don't know what it means, so don't ask me," Ajay stated, clearly preempting that Wally would have questions after whatever Ajay was preparing to demonstrate. Ajay crouched to gather a stone from the ground, "Watch this."

He tossed the stone. It smacked the tree, dislodging a piece of loose bark from the center of a crooked heart—bullseye—and fell without fanfare into a nest of roots, a thin poof of dirt raised on impact.

Wally waited for something to happen. And waited. A n d waited.

"I don't get it." He said after a few uneventful beats. "Was something supposed to happen?"

"It did happen." Ajay insisted, bending to pick up another stone.

That one, he handed to Wally and motioned for him to throw it at the tree. It hit, denting the bark, but again, that was the end of it. Wally peered up at the leaves—unruffled—then down at the roots—inert—and finally back at Ajay who pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Watch this." He commanded, scooping up another stone as he marched a few feet away. "Are you paying attention?" He asked, not unkindly; an earnest bid for Wally's focus.

Wally gave him a tight smile, "Yup," and a thumbs up, taking a few steps closer to prove the point.

Ajay flung the stone. Except, this time, it ricocheted back as soon as it pierced the barrier. Disappeared for a blink and then spat back out, flying in the reverse direction. Ajay threw his arms up and protected his face a split-second before the stone struck him, bouncing off his forearm to land with a thud at his feet.

Wally's jaw dropped, "What the shit?"

"Do you get it now?" Ajay questioned, dusting off his hands as he strolled back to Wally.

With a frown, "Sort of?" Wally reached for the barrier, not quite touching for fear of what could happen and where he'd end up, but just enough to feel its presence warm the palm of his hand. "I guess it would be too easy if we could go through, huh?"

"I attempted it a couple of times," Ajay shook his head, "Either way, the barrier is definitely weakest here. And," He paused, building suspense, "At four other points around the school."

Eyes fixed on the tree, Wally hypothesized, "If we figure out how to weaken it more at any of these points, we might be able to get out of here..."

"We just might," Ajay concurred, "I tried finding information in the library and the computer lab, but—" It was a Christian school board, he didn't have to say, and occult topics were heavily vetted.

There weren't likely to be any useful books available and the online network was limited, browsers blocking sites the school didn't want its students to visit. Wally's knowledge of the latter was an embarrassing smear on his reputation that he'd had to beg Charley to keep secret.

He shoved the memory back in its box and once more buried it in the darkest recesses of his mind.

Never again...

"You think my girl would know how to handle this?" Wally asked despite having already determined he was going to tell you about the barrier's weak points. He just wanted to make sure Ajay was aware and on board.

Ajay shrugged, "She certainly has access to more resources than we do. Couldn't hurt to mention it."

It was settled. Squaring his shoulders and straightening his spine, Wally broke his scrutiny of the tree and turned to Ajay.

"Alright, then, show me what we're working with."

💀___________________________

PART FIFTEEN - PART SEVENTEEN

also available on AO3!

MASTERLIST