#*side. while I am fairly positive i do like to take as much pressure off my shoulders as possible
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hey bestie,,, uhhh for those NSFW alphabet fun things,,, you know I gotta do it… leigh shaw PLS I am begging and offering french toast 😌🙏🏼
Ignore that I'm finishing this at 8pm
We all know I love Leigh endlessly and god, doing this was so so fun!! I'm excited to do the others!! Also this is a good time so post this because this is the week my Leigh fic comes out hehehe 💖 so without further ado..
NSFW Alphabet: Leigh Shaw
A = Aftercare (What they're like after sex)
Oh she's so sweet. Even if Leigh is dead tired, she'll make sure you're feeling okay and that you're both all cleaned up and settled properly. When she's too out of it to do it herself, she'll prod you to do get up, have some water, get all cozy, etc.
Above all, she's so very caring and she wants to make sure you're in your best headspace after sex. If Leigh knows you're alright, she'll feel a thousand times better.
B = Body part (Their favorite body part of theirs and also their partner's)
Leigh loves her legs, mostly because she obviously does a lot of work with them at the studio and in her classes! She doesn't mind showing them off, laying them over your lap, letting you massage her thighs while you watch movies, and she absolutely melts whenever you mark up her legs with dark hickeys.
Her favorite on you are your hands. Before she met you, she was in severe drought for a caring touch. While you were just friends, you still always met her with such love, it almost brought Leigh to tears.
C = Cum (Anything to do with cum basically)
When you first started dating, Leigh was more squeamish about it. Not in a prudish way, but she always looked away whenever you licked your soaked fingers after pulling them out of her.
Now she thinks it's hot and typically she's the one to pull you up for a kiss after you've finished eating her out.
D = Dirty Secret (Pretty self explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)
It's a simple thing, something she doesn't truly need to keep secret, she just hasn't been able to figure out how to ask you for it: Leigh is fairly sure she's got a bit of a degradation kink, based off the times you've gotten more carried away and said things you apologized profusely for later.
She wishes you'd stop apologizing and call her your pretty little slut again because she's never cum harder.
E = Experience (How experienced are they? Do they know what they're doing?)
While she's very much not a virgin, Leigh had never been with a woman before she met you. That meant she often felt really out of place/unexperienced whenever she was with you, but you never looked down on her for it.
Leigh's a smart woman, hates feeling out of the loop tbh, so let's just say she was very intent on not being inexperienced for long. There was a lot of reassurances because as much as you'll never say no to Leigh wanting to take control, you didn't want to pressure her, but nowadays she is very knowledgeable and very good at what she does.
F = Favorite Position (This goes without saying. Will probably include a visual)
She loves being on top, even if you're the one calling the shots. Especially if you're using a strap. There's nothing better than that deep, full feeling when she gets to ride you until she's fully spent.
G = Goofy (Are they more serious in the moment, or are they humorous, etc)
It's very easy for Leigh to fall into her head and that's when she'll get more serious about it, or when she wants you to fuck her for a distraction. Either way, she loves that you always try and bring levity in- if you tickle her sides, she'll giggle; if you blow raspberries on her tummy, she'll poke at you for being silly.
Some days it can be hard for her to truly let go, but she appreciates it so much when she can. Leigh loves to laugh and have fun during sex, it's more satisfying for her that way!
H = Hair (How well groomed are they, does the carpet match the drapes, etc.)
The girl is so Type A I feel like she's always well groomed. Not that she waxes necessarily, I don't see her doing that all the time, maybe more for vacations or beach days. On the daily, I'd say she's trimmed and neat about it!
I = Intimacy (How are they during the moment, romantic aspect...)
She likes intimacy, but she doesn't need it to be romantic to enjoy sex. The first few times you fucked certainly were nooot intimate at all; they were quick and had no strings attached... but then she started having feelings for you.
As soon as she did, Leigh needed that intimacy, needed you to know how much she felt... her demeanor changed, her kisses lingered, she wanted sex to last longer.
If she's in a relationship, she expects some sort of intimacy even if it's just a quick wellness check in before you fuck her into the mattress.
J = Jack Off (Masturbation headcanon)
Leigh splurged and bought herself a lovense lush toy, fully thinking it was gonna be super overhyped, but when she got it, she found out it really was just as good as it seemed. For a while she just loved the discreet nature of it, how she could put it in while she was on FaceTime with you and if she was sneaky enough, she could get herself off even while you were busy working.
Eventually she let you connect to her toy control's though and you made up for all of those times you missed out on her orgasms.
K = Kink (One or more of their kinks)
We already talked about the semi-hidden degradation kink, but on the whole, Leigh is unapologetic in asking for what she wants. This kind of goes in hand with the degradation, but she absolutely loves dirty talk.
Talking in general is a big yes from her because it helps her stay present, but talk her through her orgasm well enough- "fuck, you're taking my fingers so well, already clenching around me and everything... I want to watch you cum for me" and you'll find her eyes rolling back to her head, nails scraping down your back, etc.
L = Location (Favorite places to do the do)
Her favorite of all is bed; sometimes she thinks that makes her boring, but she doesn't care. She likes being comfortable and she can go longest by herself or with a partner sprawled out in bed.
Also it's perfect for falling asleep right after you're done and she doesn't have to worry about anything past changing her sheets after particularly messy nights.
M = Motivation (What turns them on, gets them going)
Leigh adores feeling wanted. Nothing turns her on more than watching your face light up when she wears a nice set of lingerie for your enjoyment or honestly, something as simple as telling her what a good job she's done planning a new event as work.
During sex, whispering about how good she feels, how pretty she looks, etc. can make her cum on the spot
N = NO (Something they wouldn't do, turn offs)
Any hard kinks, specifically anything that involves pain. The last thing she wants to do is hurt you or mark you permanently nor would she want you to do it to her either.
O = Oral (Preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc)
She ends up receiving most often, but doesn't have any problems giving. It's partially due to Leigh's inexperience (as we mentioned before) with going down on a woman prior to meeting you; you never want to push or overwhelm her and typically fall into making your way down her body and staying until her brain is too fuzzy to function.
That being said, Leigh isn't bad at oral by any means! She's great, you taught her well.
P = Pace (Are they fast and rough? Slow and sensual? etc.)
100% a fan of slow and sensual if she's in charge. She wants to see you, needs to know you're real and present and not going anywhere. She loves holding onto you, scratching her nails down your back, burying her face in your shoulder, really surrounding herself in all of you.
She's not opposed to rough though, loves it too, but she doesn't ask for it that often. Usually you're the one who'll manhandle her or set the tone for some fast sex that she'll fall into it. Which works because some nights the poor girl just doesn't want to think and she needs you to force it all away.
Q = Quickie (Their opinions on quickies rather than proper sex, how often, etc.)
For Leigh, they're a means to an end. She prefers proper sex, but she won't say no to a romp in the car or even in the park if you promise to be quick about it.
Occasionally she'll say no because the location embarrasses her (i.e. a store fitting room or the locker rooms at the gym), but if you get your hands on her fast enough, it's not too hard to weaken her willpower.
R = Risk (Are they game to experiment, do they take risks, etc.)
It's rare she initiates an experimental thing, mainly because she wouldn't know the first place to go looking for things to try. But if you bring something up to her and it's clear you really want to give it a go, usually you can persuade her into doing anything at least once.
Even if she complains about it.
S = Stamina (How many rounds can they go for, how long do they last...)
Ohhh when you first met her, you thought she'd tap out after just one, but you were pleasantly surprised Leigh can go all night if you pace her out enough.
She wants to hate when you do... the edging, the overly-sensitive orgasms, how sleepy she gets only to be met with your smug little grin inches away from her face... but she can't; you make her feel too good.
T = Toy (Do they own toys? Do they use them? On a partner or themselves?)
I'd say Leigh owns a few vibrators, definitely at least one dildo. She uses them on herself mostly, but there have been times where she uses them on you. She doesn't admit it often, but she loves to watch you squirm and shake, especially when she can take credit for it.
U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)
She'll tease if she's feeling up to it, like if it's a special day or if she wants your attention. She can be very persuasive when she feels neglected!
In general, Leigh's a cute tease above anything, examples are: bending over in shorts she knows you can see her ass in, going in for a sweet kiss only to blindside you with her tongue in your mouth, sliding past you in tight spaces to wiggle against you.
V = Volume (How loud they are, what sounds they make)
Leigh tends to be fairly quiet; not because she's necessarily ashamed, but she worries that if she's too loud you'll tell her to hush.
Further into your relationship, you start noticing how she bites her lip or finger to hold herself back and you're quick to stop her, forcing her jaw open or pulling her hand away from her face. Now she knows you like to hear her... but she still makes you work for it.
W = Wild Card (Get a random headcanon for the character of your choice)
Early in your relationship, Leigh was still learning your schedule, assumed you were at bored at work, and sent you a... quite suggestive picture of herself in her post-class outfit half out of it really.
Turns out you were at home and, living pretty close to the studio, you rushed down there and fucked her in the same room you found her in. Thankfully she was between classes, but every time Leigh looks at the mirror panel in the far corner and remembers how you'd stretched out her shirt and nearly ripped her leggings with how frantically you needed to get your hands on her, she shivers.
X = X-Ray (Let's see what's going on in those pants, picture or words)
For lack of a better word, Leigh is just... beautiful. The first time you were allowed to go down on her, you stared until she closed her legs out of nerves, but as soon as you could coax her to part them again, you dove straight in.
Y = Yearning (How high is their sex drive?)
It ebbs and flows really. Some weeks she'll be on you every time you turn a corner, pulling you to some secluded area for a quick fuck, or anything she can get out of you in the limited time she bought.
Other times, when Leigh isn't having a great brain time, she's just more shy and reserved. If she asks for something, it most likely comes in the form of her arms around your waist and gentle kisses until you catch on to what she's after.
Z = ZZZ ( how quickly they fall asleep after sex)
If she's not too in her head, Leigh will snuggle up and sleep so easily, it startles you. Truly she can be mid-sentence and then you'll hear silence and after, light snoring.
Sometimes, she'll beg you to fuck her to sleep which of course, you oblige happily.
#leigh shaw x reader#leigh shaw imagine#leigh shaw fic#leigh shaw smut#sorry for your loss fic#maximotts#motts writes.
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Bound to a Rock and an Eagle - 17
Chapter 17
No. 17: Hanging by a threat
Breaking point | Stress positions | Reluctant caretaker
1 | prev | Read on AO3
The rest of the car ride for Victor was a blur, or would have been if he had been able to see anything. He remembered the sound of his wheezing breath and trying to make sure his lungs kept drawing in air, all while worrying about Henry and Elizabeth.
When they’d arrived at their destination, Victor couldn’t tell how much time had passed, nor where they might be. He was dragged from the car, propped up over someone’s arm - probably the doctor’s - and carried inside a building before being laid on a solid metal surface. For a moment, the mental image settled in his head of his creation, laying on the bench in his lab. He felt absolutely vulnerable to anything they wanted to do to him.
Another stinging needle in his arm and his glasses were lifted again, a warm hand was placed over his eyes and gently rubbed. He hadn’t realised how irritated they were becoming from the lack of movement, but the motion soothed them somewhat.
“I’ve given you an anticholinesterase that will counteract the paralysis. You’ll start to regain movement soon, but I wouldn’t recommend any sudden movement. You were a little tachycardic in the car and your blood pressure can do strange things that might cause you to faint for one, and also, the people with guns in the room probably won’t be too impressed with you, so watch yourself.”
Victor would have thanked him if he’d had control of the muscles in his face, but as the drugs wore off, he started breathing easier and was able to slowly open his eyes. The room he was in was lit a bright white by fluorescent overhead lights, but the walls were a slate grey colour. His head lolled to one side and he was able to see a pair of metal chairs, very minimal, painted white. There was a mirror built into one wall, but no windows; he realised it must be a two-way mirror and that he was in an interrogation room.
“How’s he doing?” The woman’s voice came from somewhere outside of Victor’s range of vision.
“Seems to be fine, I’m a bit concerned about the bruising, might have some tracheal or laryngeal damage - but this wasn’t our guys, was it?” He couldn't hear or see the response, but assumed it was a no.
“Didn’t think so. He’s had a run in with him, then, fairly recently too, last night, I would guess. Am I right?” He looked at Victor when he said it, but it was the woman who replied.
“Yes, the boys tracked it into the city, lost it for a few hours but were able to match the area with an address that had popped up on several of the phone records. And so now we have the pleasure of the company of the infamous Mr. Frankenstein.”
She finally walked around to where he could see her.
“My name is Agatha, this is Felix,” she spoke in a tone that felt like she was trying to be gentle but it didn’t feel like it came naturally to her. She had that tone that made it sound like she was used to getting what she wanted. It reminded Victor of some of the more pretentious lecturers, the ones who thought it was a rite of passage for students to be hazed and treated like crap. The sort that always seemed to provoke an argument from him, even if that wasn’t his intention. He wondered if anyone that day had given real names, but highly doubted it.
“We’ve been investigating an individual who we think you’ve been in contact with, and we would appreciate your cooperation in assisting us to track him down and find out more about him,” she went on. “I believe you know him best as the Ingolstadt Bigfoot.”
Victor had been laying still, but was aware of the growing control over his muscles again, he was tensing them experimentally and they were now responding more reliably. He might be able to take them by surprise…
It was a hopeful thought until he heard the door behind him close heavily and the oddly distinct sound of handcuffs unlatching. He practically threw himself off the table, almost directly into Agatha, who deftly stepped back as his legs gave out from under him and his head swam. The next thing he knew, Felix had propped him in a chair and was checking his pupillary light reflex, while Max handcuffed his arms through the chair behind him, which he now also noted, was bolted to the floor.
“Victor, we don’t want to make this any more difficult than it has to be - than it has been already. Running from us, avoiding the questions, arguing… All of this makes me think you know more than you’re letting on, or maybe you’re involved in something that you shouldn’t be. I don’t much care if you are, if I'm honest. Like I said, we’re not the police and we have no interest in arresting you for legal wrongdoings. What we do want to know is everything you know about this man. Including how you made him.”
Oh right, he’d said that, hadn’t he? Shit.
“And if you don’t-” Max piped up behind him- “we have your friends just next door.”
Victor tested his voice, coughing to clear his throat before finding it was actually somewhat clearer now than it was before. “They honestly don’t know anything, Elizabeth only arrived this morning and Henry I’ve never told anything - he wouldn’t have believed me anyway. You can ask them, but they won’t be able to tell you anything.”
Max leaned down next to his ear and his voice grew dark. “I wasn’t implying I’d ask.”
Victor froze, emotions registering from fear to rage inside him.
“Your partner hurt my partner, what goes around… well, if you tell us everything we want to know, it won’t have to come full circle.”
Deep inside Victor, something finally snapped.
“So,” the woman smirked. “What do you say?”
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— 𝕤𝕖𝕔𝕠𝕟𝕕 𝕤𝕖𝕝𝕗 ❣ 𝕙.𝕠
⌜mature content • minors do not interact⌟
「 contents: mature language + handjob ━━━━━ word count: 2.4k 」
: a.n : hiya! it's been long since i last posted something but here i am! this is my entry for @worldoftom's lolbrosgetsicktoo writing challenge. be gentle with me please, i'm really awkward writing in second person but i really wanted to make this gender-neutral.
: prompt : Harrison injures his right hand. He’s sexually frustrated, and his left hand just isn’t doing the job. Reader notices something is up with her poor roommate, and asks if there’s anything she can do to help. Even though they haven’t been anything more than friends up to this point, reader offers to “give him a hand,” or whatever of her other body parts he likes.
For two weeks Harrison had had his right hand clasped in a splint from taking a rather nasty fall from his skateboard. The night he had come home from the park with his jeans ripped on the knees and his hand clutched to his chest you hadn’t wasted a second to start taking the piss out of him at the clear picture of him eating shit at the skatepark but when he let out a pained groan after trying to take his jacket off your laughter died down and worry settled on the pit of your stomach.
His hand turned out to be badly sprained and well, the next couple of weeks had been spent in him trying to navigate his days with his non-dominant hand and with the initial panic of your roommate hurting himself gone you resumed the lighthearted piss-taking. Although he laughed with you at the jokes you made you could see how it really bugged him that he wasn’t as useful and agile with his right hand being in mandatory rest. “Told you, H. Whatever you have trouble with I can give you a hand.” You reminded him waving both your hands in front of you in a somewhat mocking manner.
“Yeah, heard you the first time.” He grumbled while struggling to button up his dress shirt. “Damn it.” The blonde cursed under his breath when his fingers seemed to not be working properly. That was enough for you to put your cup of tea down on the breakfast bar to walk up to him taking over the task he was growing frustrated with. He sighed defeated, letting his hands drop to his sides allowing you to close his shirt for him.
“Really, Harrison. I don’t mind helping you out.” The reassurance prompted Harrison to nod in understanding, running his fingers through his hair clearly irked by his situation. As if after you repeating it ninety-nine times before hadn’t sunk into his brain until the hundredth. “There you go, all done.” You patted his chest a couple of times then stepped back away from him to grab your mug again watching him leave the flat in a hurry after thanking you. You had been joking about what happened to him but you really felt bad for him, Harrison was a very active and independent guy who rarely asked for help and now that he was close to useless at doing simple tasks you could see how much it troubled him.
In the evening when he returned home he headed directly to the bathroom barely uttering a greeting back when you welcomed him, the sound of the running water splashing around let you know he was running a bath, you sighed at the fact that he had beaten you to run one for yourself though you were still busy making dinner for the both of you you didn’t duel much on it. About thirty minutes had passed since he went in for his bath and you figured it’ll be enough time for him to be about done with it to come out and eat, hence you walking up to the end of the hallway to knock on the door to make him aware that the food was ready.
However, the noise of water splashing a bit too aggressively accompanied by Harrison’s angry cursing made you believe something was wrong. With not much time to think you tried for the door and found it unlocked, swinging it open swiftly. “Are you okay!?” You asked in a panic, eyes wide when you saw the walls dripping and the floor flooded with soapy water. “Are you hurt?” You insisted, daring to step inside the room, bare feet coming in contact with the wet ground making comical splashing sounds.
“Yeah-no. I just…” He frantically tried to gather the few bubbles that floated on the scarcely-filled tub, bringing them closer to his body to cover himself a little.
“You just what, H?” Your voice still held concern and he noticed, finally looking up at you with seemingly pleading eyes. “You need help with your back or what is it?”
“No, y/n.” He huffed, brushing his wet hair back with his splinted hand wincing a little with the action. “This time you really can’t help me, alright? Just, let me get dressed.”
“Harrison, I told you I don’t mind help—” You started but was soon cut by the blonde’s voice rising above his usual level.
“I need a wank! That’s what I need. And my fucking left hand ain’t cutting it anymore.” Harrison blurted out a bit worked up, breathing heavily with cheeks burning hot showing in a bright crimson colour that stood out against his milky skin. Your mouth closed immediately after he acknowledged his problem, a warmth crept up your neck settling comfortably on the apples of your cheeks as your fingers toyed aimlessly with the hem of your oversized bed t-shirt. He wasn’t looking at you anymore, he had thrown his head back on the edge of the tub and covered his eyes with his injured hand while the other was under the water.
The way the muscles of his arm were flexed made the heat of your cheeks travelled to new places that could be labelled as inappropriate. Boldly, you stepped further into the room your steps marked by the sloppy meeting of them with the soaked tiles, not knowing exactly how you conjured the confidence to do so. “I-I don’t mind... helping,” You stuttered out, stopping right by his side. Wide eyes hanging on the young man’s hidden face that was instantly revealed as soon as those words left your lips.
“What!? Don’t be silly, y/n. I could never ask you to do that.” He sat up, making starts to get up but you stopped him by placing a hand on his bare shoulder keeping him inside the tub.
“You’re not asking, I’m offering.” You gave him a sincere smile, irises dancing between his crystal clear ones as you waited for him to accept or decline your proposal. Harrison’s teeth clenched as he swallowed thickly making his jawline look even sharper. When he delayed in giving you an answer you felt as if you had overstepped his boundaries and panic began to invade you fast.
“Okay.” He agreed with a nearly imperceptible wobble in his voice. “But don’t look at it. It’ll make me feel less guilty if you don’t know what it looks like.” The chuckle he let out was nervous and awkward, causing you to match it with one of your own as you nodded your head.
“Okay, I won’t look.” You declared, pressing your lips together before sinking to your knees right beside the bathtub sitting comfortably on your folded legs. Taking in a deep breath you reached for his left forearm with your right hand, eyes focused on the edge of the porcelain trying your best not to look down as you let your hand trail down his arm ultimately meeting his own hand under the lukewarm water. “Let go.” In a soft voice, you requested. Harrison exhaled through his nose prompting you to shift your gaze from the tub to his face, sending him a reassuring nod and a faint smile, those sufficient for him let you hold him inhaling a tad sharply when you did.
With your hand now wrapped around his girth, you started to give him slow and long rubs with a fairly firm grip. Since your eyes were still on him you saw him sigh, momentarily closing his eyes with the first few strokes, his lips pressed together as he breathed through each caress you provided. It was hypnotising seeing him in that way: head thrown back, eyes closed, flushed face, brows pinched together; adding to all of that he was completely naked and splattered with water droplets. Your tongue darted out to wet your suddenly dry lips, swallowing thickly at the scene in front of you, subconsciously your grasp on the man’s erection tightened enough to make him let out an involuntary moan that echoed throughout the tiled room, travelling through your ears and finding a new home deep inside your brain.
Again, —you thought— do it again. You now craved his pleasure noises, with a new goal you lifted yourself from your sitting position back into your knees so you could move your arm at a faster pace, wrist twisting every now and again succeeding at drawing more moans out of your roommate. A whimper left your throat when your arm started to grow tired from the motion and the pressure of the ceramic edge underneath it prompting Harrison’s eyes to shoot open and you swore you felt him twitch against your palm. “S-sorry, my arm got sore.” You let out an embarrassed laugh when your eyes met his, your whole face burning hot.
The aching of your arm combined itself with the soreness of your knees forcing you to stand up and let go of Harrison in the process, with little time to think twice you swung your leg over the edge of the bathtub soon followed by the other before you found a comfortable new position straddling the blonde’s bare thighs. The weight of you coming into the water raised the level of it, permitting it to soak the bottom half of your top, Harrison’s eyes never left your figure as you moved that much closer to him, his stomach was a little sucked in as if he was holding in his breath. “Is this okay?” You quizzed, noting that you sitting on him might be too much.
“Ye-yeah.” He breathed out in a hurry. You proceeded to resume your ministrations now with a better angle and an additional hand to give your right one a minute of rest. The movement of the water around you both and Harrison’s heavy breathing was the only things that could be heard in the bathroom of your quiet flat. The view was intoxicating; chiselled chest heaving, Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed, jaw slacked, pink lips parted and eyes screw shut. You found it next to impossible to reap your gaze from the guy in front of you, the way he was reacting to your touch was rapidly becoming your favourite thing and you wanted more of him, your thighs tightened over his when he let out a particularly loud moan and you had to blink a few times to try and restore your morality without much success.
“Are you close?” Your voice filled the air around you, it surprised both of you for you didn’t know you had it in you to ask such a question when you were trying to keep your composure in front of the man. Harrison’s eyes were half-opened and on you the second you asked, the intensity of them draw you in closer and closer to his face until your forehead was pressed against his tentatively. Soon his healthy hand was back under the water only this time it landed on your bare thigh gripping it tightly, the simple touch causing your breath to match his ragged one, mixing together from the close proximity of your faces.
“Fuck, don’t stop.” Harrison ordered with a deep groan as his body began to tense up underneath you. You took the cue and doubled your efforts with both your hands subconsciously whispering encouragements eliciting louder moans from him. His poorly hand came up to cup the back of your neck, holding you in place —as if you really had the intention to move away— while his high very evidently approached. “Fuck, y/n.” The blue-eyed boy moaned in your face luring a whine out of your throat at the sound of your name being called in such a way.
“Cum for me,” You encouraged him, nudging his nose with yours silently prompting him to look at you, and he did. Hooded eyes fixed on yours mere centimetres away that you could feel his lips ghosting over your own teasingly, warm breath fanning over them. “Harri, c’mon.” A whisper was all you could manage at that moment. Your own throat had grown dry and you had to suppress the mewls that threatened to leave your chest when you started to feel his cock twitching in your hands. A loud grunt got stuck in the man’s throat the moment he toppled over the edge, his length spasming in your grip as you so clearly sensed it unload under the now cool water, the temperature of the liquids contrasting against your skin when his seed landed on your hands as it sank.
Harrison’s body shuddered with each slow stroke you gave him to help him ride his orgasm, moans continued to fall from his parted lips. He swallowed, finally releasing your neck from the clasp to be able to relax back in the tub letting out a long and deep sigh of content. You couldn’t help but feel disappointed the moment he pulled away but it was for the best, you couldn’t be wishing for him to do something for you when you were perfectly capable of taking care of yourself.
That was when it hit you, the position you were in wasn’t appropriate at all, it didn’t matter how willing you were to be his second self surely giving him manual relief was a step too far. So with overwhelming shame, you let go of him, leaning to the side to take hold of the edge of the tub, pulling yourself up to your feet in a daze. The water that dripped down from your soaked t-shirt far too noisy in your ears as they buzzed with the adrenaline that still coursed through your body, the wet fabric sticking to your skin making you self-aware that it was now see-through so you hurried to the railing stuck to the wall and grabbed one of the towels, quickly wrapping it around your waist.
Embarrassed, you started for the door, holding the doorknob ready to leave the room, “Di-dinner’s ready.” You acknowledged shyly, the tremble in your voice giving your remorse away. You frantically shuffled on your feet stepping out of the room and closing the door behind you. There was a weird feeling in the pits of your stomach, you knew you felt embarrassed of what had just happened yet, that wasn’t it, it was almost like a craving. A craving for his touch and that made the shame feel ten times worse. You marched to your room locking yourself in, forgetting about your dinner plate that was sitting on the kitchen counter, your hunger long gone. Though, despite the mortification, there was a new much problematic sort of appetite tingling deep inside you and the throbbing between your legs made it much too hard to ignore.
【 thank you so much for reading! ♡ please, consider reblogging and letting me know what you thought of this piece ♡ 】
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#lolbrosgetsicktoo#writing challenge entry#harrison osterfield#harrison osterfield x reader#harrison osterfield fanfic#haz osterfield#haz osterfield x reader#haz osterfield fanfic#smut#mdni#softfics
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Long Story Short (I Survived) | Din Djarin
Okay, I apparently write for Din now. This is set after It’s A Long Way Down and will feature the same Grey!Jedi reader, I am done with finals and am intending to write a fic between this one and the first one for Chapter 13!
i forgot that din took his helmet off in the first fic i wrote for him, so we’re going to call this - another separate instance in which reader could have seen helmet less din - and change one saber to two
if you’d like to be added to tags for when I write for din, please let me know! until then...
@earthtokace / @demigod-dragonrider-schoolidol / @kyber-queen / @kaikai1324 / @snippy-tano / @fractiouskat / @doctorsteeb
SPOILERS FOR THE BELIEVER
Din is staring down at the Imperial console when he feels it creep up upon him. It’s a niggling fear, one that sinks deep down into the pit of his stomach and very nearly disappears - which gives him hope that it’ll just dissipate and die - until realization smacks him right back into reality.
“You’ll have to take your helmet off.”
He’d felt this same emotion when IG-11 had coerced him into taking his helmet off when he’d been injured. It had felt the same, affected him the same, paralyzed him the same.
Panic. It’s panic.
The last time he’d done this had been out of necessity, out of fear, and that had been the only reason he’d survived. He’d broken The Creed to save his own life and of those who had been with him when the Moff attacked. Now, staring at this console, the life of his son is at stake if he doesn’t take this helmet off.
Din whispers into the corners of his frightened mind. I’m scared.
You had accompanied Mayfeld and Din as the third party (since Boba and Fennec had Cara) and had displayed skill in aiding him with the bands of pirates who had attacked their transport of Rhydonium. His mind was still spinning with the sheer speed in which you had spun those lightsabers. He didn’t think a person could move that fast.
Around the corner and turned away from Din, you allow yourself to feel the whispers of The Force encircling your mind - the newly acquired bond you’d somehow formed with Din since having seen Ahsoka - and whispered in reply I know. A beat of silence passes before you continue. Remember who you’re doing this for.
In the moment that Din’s fear threatens to overtake him, you send waves of comfort and assurance through your Bond in the Force - which shouldn’t exist to begin with, it’s not that easy to create bonds with a non-force sensitive - to coax him into doing what needs to be done. Your eyes are turned. Your focus is on Mayfeld and the dozens of Imperial Officers who surround you.
As he removes his helmet, Din remembers. He remembers your boundless laughter playing with The Child. He remembers the way his son beams at you, the way he falls asleep on specific words of lullabies because that’s always the precise moment your voice goes just soft enough that he feels as if he needs no more comfort. Din remembers the way you’d watched on in silence, quietly mourning a relationship that had yet to reach its peak, and how breathless you’d appeared - and overjoyed, he still hasn’t recovered from the sudden hug you gave him upon return to the Razor Crest - when he’d brought Grogu back inside after Ahsoka claimed he could not be trained.
Remember who you’re doing this for.
Maker help anyone who dared to cross him when his child, his son - the one attachment he has not verbally acknowledged yet, but everyone else has, including you - is the one in danger. When you are the one in danger.
Maker help them.
You are not anticipating what comes next.
This was supposed to be easy. Get in, get the coordinates for the cruiser, and get out. Mayfeld had mentioned to you after Din had entered the mess hall that he’d need to take his helmet off in order to access the terminal, and on instinct you had turned away from the mess to survey the crowd around you.
Your lightsabers - now meshed together into the staff slung across your back - lay comfortably and within reach as dozens of Imperial troops brush past you and congratulate both you and Mayfeld on being the only transport to bring back the Rhydonium.
“Trooper? Hey, trooper!”
Mayfeld’s hand shoots out before you can protest, and your head is whipping back just enough to ensure that Din hasn’t been found out. “No.” Mayfeld murmurs, shaking his head. “Not yet.”
You’re not focused on him. You’re focused on the dark hair that frames the very visible head of the same man you’d resigned yourself to falling in love with.
His helmet is off.
Dread curls itself in your veins as you and the former Imperial turn to the mess hall. You’ve managed to respect Din’s wishes in refraining from both seeing his face - and using his name, you’re only allowed to do that in private - since you met, but circumstances have ruined the reverential act he would’ve saved for marriage. That was when he’d had removed his helmet to allow you to see him.
The thing is though.. You’ve always seen him. You don’t need to see his face to know Din Djarin’s heart, and his heart lays with you and that baby. The one he’s fighting to get back.
“No, son. What’s your TK number?”
Lucky for you, you’d been alive during The Clone Wars. You can worm yourself and him out of this situation fairly easily.
“This is our Commanding Officer TK-593, and First Officer TK-616, sir.” Mayfeld slaps your back as the two of you enter the mess hall and flank either side of Din. You cannot bring yourself to look at him head on. It would not be fair, not in the midst of the pure fear that’s coursing through his mind.
I’m right here. You whisper into the heart of the fear that plagues him, fingers idly tracing the inside of his hand as you stare the Imperial Officer down. As expected, Din visibly relaxes at the gentle trace of your fingertips against his palm. We’re surviving.
“I am Imperial Combat Assault Transport TK-111, sir.” Mayfeld continues, folding his hands over each other as he stands at relaxed parade rest at Din’s side. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to speak up to him a little bit since his vessel lost pressure in Taanab.”
This gives you the brilliant idea of conversing with Din in Tusken sign, something he’d been adamant to teach you after your excursion on Tatooine.
“She’s our interpreter. We call her Whip.’’
While Mayfeld guides the conversation with the officer, you and Din are easing into talking in Tusken about however many ways this can go wrong, but then he changes the topic to something you’re not quite ready to acknowledge.
You can look at me, you know. He signs, hands frantic as he tries and fails to find your eyes. You value him - and his heart - far too much to be the first person he knows to have seen his face.
No. You shake your head. I can’t.
And you don’t. You only look at his side profile for the remainder of that trip, refusing to allow yourself the satisfaction of being the one person he cared about that has seen his face. Seen him.
Like I said. You don’t need to see Din Djarin’s face to see him.
***
Din is almost positive he’s ready to accept how he feels about you.
The minute Mayfeld shoots that officer in the chest, you spring into action and whip that staff off your back - disengaging the lock that holds the two lightsabers together - and the world explodes in a flurry of blue as you perform the sword and shield method he’s seen you do flawlessly at least five times now.
You don’t look at him even after you’re back in Slave One. He and Cara have escorted Mayfeld back to the surface of the planet, and it’s just you and Fett in the cockpit. Despite the clone and bounty hunter being so much older then you, there’s something oddly comforting knowing you’re sitting next to has suffered as much as you have. If not more.
Long story short, we both survived.
“You know, I’ve been with you a grand total of a day and I can already see it in your eyes, Whip.” The nickname Mayfeld had come up with in the facility has already made its rounds on the ship, and Boba feels it’s more then appropriate for the first Jedi he’s met since the kids who put him in the Sarlacc to begin with. Being inside of that thing had mellowed him out. He had accepted his life for what it was now. Oddly enough.. Boba Fett is at peace. “You’re lovesick for the Mandalorian.”
“Boba-”
The older man, one who mirrored what you’d always envisioned the clones - may Maker rest their souls - to look like as they aged, removed his helmet to look at you. “Take it from someone who knows. He gets you. You get him.” Boba turned his gaze back towards the ramp of Slave One where Din was talking in low voices with Cara. “Wish I’d had a jeti like you who saw me despite the armor.”
He stopped speaking after that.
Taking a deep breath, you descend from the cockpit just as Slave One takes off again, the coordinates for Moff Gideon’s cruiser inputted into the navi-computer. Fennec and Cara move by you to join Boba in the cockpit which leaves you and Din alone in the cargo bay.
It’s deadly silent.
Ner jeti. He whispers. You can hear his thoughts as clear as you hear your own. Why will you not look at me?
Your eyes slam shut as his fingers curl around your hips. You cannot do this to him, no matter how much you want to - no matter how much you desire to finally kiss those lips you’ve dreamt idly about so many times - because here’s the truth of it: You have suffered, parts of you have died, everything you have ever known has died, you have lost everything and didn’t even try to save those on the other end of those attachments you’d formed... but something, something good, put you right here. Right here in this moment with Din Djarin mere moments before plunging into the subject of your night terrors after months of being tormented by nightmares of your fellow Jedi being tortured by the Empire for simply existing.
And quite frankly, there’s no one else you’d rather take that plunge with.
That fact terrifies you.
“I can’t look at you, Din.” You whisper. “I can’t look at you because then that would be breaking your Creed for me... and I can’t let you do that when the baby hasn’t even seen your face yet-”
“Oh, believe me.” A clunk echoes in the cargo-bay as the beskar falls from his hands. Your heart stops and your breath catches in your throat as you tremble beneath his grasps, eyes still closed as he steps into the curve of your body - chest to your back - and lowers his entire head to your shoulder. “I intend for him to.”
Din lays a kiss at the nape of your neck. Maker... he’s real. Your head starts spinning as his kiss ascends right to the shell of your ear, in which he then whispers, “Open your eyes, Sarad.” and it’s such an intimate act on the behalf of someone who has not known love until you and the baby showed up that you can’t not open your eyes.
When you turn around, your world is enveloped in a mirage of onyx. Brown eyes.
“Din-” Din chuckles at your obvious reluctance because he is absolutely terrified to let you see him, the real him, vulnerable and waiting and desperate for the same acceptance.
“I told you my name way earlier then I ever anticipated I would.” He begins, taking your hands in his own to lay them against his cheeks. It has been so long since he allowed himself to accept touch, to accept that people in the galaxy were still gentle, that he trembles when your warmth seeps into his skin. “After what Bo-Katan told me and what Mayfeld kept saying in the transport... I’ve done alot of thinking recently, and I’m coming to the conclusion that maybe the way I was raised was wrong. There’s nothing wrong with taking the helmet off.” He exhales on a shaky breath and turns his face to kiss the inside of your hand. “But then again.. I’ve always wanted to around you.”
Your voice is small as you ask, “Why?”
“Because you’ve always seen me.” Din replies. “Despite the armor and the helmet, you’ve always seen me for who I was. You saw me as a father for the-” He swallows the knot in his throat and leans inward until you are a hairs breath apart, forehead resting against yours as he pulls your body into his own. “As a father for our child. Not just as a bounty hunter, but as a man. A man I could never see myself as. When you came around, I stopped surviving. I started living.” He snorted sharply through his nose. “I almost forgot what that felt like.. I think you pulled me back right before I forgot entirely.”
He’s so grateful. It’s hard to live feeling like you’re a ghost.
Din tests the waters of this desire radiating from you both by applying just the barest amount of pressure of his mouth on yours. As to be expected, your entire body quakes at the contact and it takes all his physical control to not allow his spinning head to make his knees give out and send him falling on the floor.
Oh.. he could get used to this. Used to this feeling.
He’s felt this before.
Joy.
“That’s the thing.” Inward, outward, forward and back again, you slowly allow yourself to succumb to Din’s kiss and grip his face in your hands just a little bit tighter. “I’ve always seen you.” You pull away just enough to force your eyes open, and then you are graced with the face of the man you love. You do. You love him, and you’ve accepted it. Kriffing Boba Fett. “And you know what? I thought I’d died before I met you. I never thought I’d make it here, much less be with you.. and I am so lucky.” There it is then, that breathless smile Din has pressed the sight of twice now into his memories, that presses itself into your aspect as the two of you look at each other.
“Why are you lucky?”
You wink and shrug. ‘’Long story short?” You muse. “It’s a good thing I survived.”
Little to Din’s knowledge as he plunges into the mystery of his growing love for you - his flower, the one who made him bloom - that when he kisses you again, your eyes are wide open the entire time.
There’s never been quite so beautiful a sight as somebody who’s survived.
bonus: i am thinking about how beautiful pedro pascal was in this episode
#Din Djarin#Din Djarin x Reader#The Mandalorian#The Mandalorian x Reader#Star Wars imagines#Star Wars oneshots
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Not So Secret Anymore - Charlie Gillespie
summary: It’s hard to hide a relationship from the public, particually when both work on the same show.
words: 2.5k
warnings: fluff
a/n: not my fave but i still somehow like it.
Requests are open :)
MASTERLIST
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September
"When do we have our first interview?" you asked the boy whose head was in your lap. He looked up from his phone and your eyes locked with his green ones "Hmm, my calendar says in about 30 minutes."
You groaned at that and stopped playing with Charlie's hair which earned you a grunt and whine from him. "Sorry babe but I think I have to go, so I still have time to get ready and set up." You muttered and gave him a small kiss on his brown hair.
"Uhh fine." The weight lifted from your legs, you stood up and before you knew it you were thrown over his shoulder. Laughing, you slapped his butt and back repeatedly. "Babe! I mean it" you tried to press out between giggles, "we both decided to keep us a secret." He sat you down on the kitchen isle and cornered your body in between his arms, standing right in front of you, you're back hitting the kitchen cabinet.
"I know... come back later?" he asked and tilted his head, looking at you with big puppy eyes. "You know it." After a swift kiss, or rather a little make out session, you were on your way back to your own appartement. Just in time to change your top and put on a lip-gloss before opening your laptop and joining the interview.
"Hello everybody! I'm here with the cast of Netflix' Julie and the Phantoms that came out on Thursday. How are you guys?" the interviewer asked and smiled into the camera of his laptop. The whole cast chirped in with a good, great, or amazing.
"That's fantastic!" he clapped his hands "Now, Jeremy, how would you describe your Character and the show in general?"
"It's a show about ghosts from 1995 who come back 25 years later and join a band with Julie who didn't sing a note after her mother died. Reggie, the character that I play, is one of those ghosts and he is a loveable himbo. Did I use that word correctly Maddie?"
Maddie smiled and the interviewer changed the topic "Madison and y/n, birds have told me that this was your first ever acting job is that right?"
You nodded and signaled Maddie to speak first "Yes, and it was both amazing and traumatizing! I was so nervous, but the crew really helped to calm me down, especially y/n who just was in the same position as me, so we freaked out together most of the time." She smiled and the interviewer waited for you to answer. "Except, Maddie had a least some acting training at school, that's why she is the best. I more or less walked into the whole situation." You said laughing.
"I love this story." Jeremy exclaimed, making you slightly blush at his words.
"Would you be so kind and tell us?" the interviewer questioned and smiled at your little nod.
"Yes, yes of course. Well, I was on vacation with one of my good friends from back home..."
"She means Germany." Owen interrupted with a smile on his lips. "Yes, Owen. Thank you for adding important details. Anyways, we saw that there was an Open Audition nearby and though why not? We don't have anything to lose or to do on that particular day. And here I am, my friend sadly didn't get in."
"That really is an amazing story, I can see why Jeremy likes it so much. So, Charlie how would you describe y/n's and Luke's characters, she wasn't supposed to be in the script and was later added in right?" Charlie quirked up at the mention of your name and stated proudly. "Indeed, she impressed Kenny so much that he wrote a character just for her. He thought that Sunset Curve, the band name before we died, needed a female to handle their chaos or well... at least tries to. Y/N plays Allie, who against common speculation isn't any of the boys' love interest which is a very nice turn of events. She and Luke bud head a lot because Luke only thinks about music and the band and she tries hard to make him take breaks every now and then."
A lovesick smile sat on your face while you listened to your boyfriend of nearly a year, once you realized your expression you quickly shook it off. Hiding this relationship was definitely going to be harder than expected.
The Interviewer asked some more questions before the last and dreaded question was thrown your way. "So, most of your fans are wondering if any of you guys are in a relationship." You and Charlie had discussed a million times before what you guys would say in such a moment, the two of you shared a look.
Jeremy's eyes switched from Charlie's box on his screen to y/n's before answering "I have a lovely wife! The rest of us are happily single, right guys?"
"100%" Maddie added, while Owen only shrugged, his dog conveniently jumping into his lap.
"How about the other two?" he eyed up the last remaining.
"Very single" Charlie laughed, and you agreed "Totally."
As time went on it was harder and harder for the two of you to hide the relationship, as you two spent nearly every day together and therefore did the same activities. Particularly after your social media accounts have gained over a million followers and people started to ship actors and tv show characters. But you two loved the little secret bubble you've created, there was no pressure to take good pictures together, or to post stories, to be asked a thousand questions about your relationship and no hate towards any of you.
December
It has been 4 months since the show released and the hype it got definitely was way more than you ever expected. It blew your mind. Currently, you are on Charlie and yours one-year anniversary / Christmas / good deeds vacation. Charlie and you found a good mix, that made you both happy, between chilling and doing adventurous things.
It was Christmas eve and Maddie wanted to do a 'guess the song Christmas Edition' with the main cast. Eagerly you agreed and hurried from the beach, where Charlie currently took the quiz at the bar you both sat on just minutes before, to your shared bedroom. You shot Maddie a quick text that you were 'out of the relationship zone' and ready when she was ready.
"Helloooo. How did the others do?"
"Not the worst but I still have faith in you to win this. ARE YOU READY?" she screamed the last part.
“I’m going to read you the lyrics of a christmas song and you have to guess the next line. There are certain cards that give one point and others give two. Whoever has the most points at the end…”
“Hopefully get your earrings” you asked with a sly smile and your shoulders raised.
Maddie laughed but shook her head “Sadly, no. I haven't figured out the price yet, but I for sure will! I like your backdrop by the way.” she added and you quickly looked behind you. You sat crisscrossed on the hotel room floor, you used the coffee table and a water bottle as a phonestand and used a white checkered wall as a background to try and hide the fact that you didn't sit in your living room.
January
“This should be the last box.” you cheered into the empty hall and shut the front door with a light push from your hip. Charlie popped his head out of the bedroom and walked over to, dropping his head on your shoulder in exhaustion. Nothing was set up, boxes stood randomly all over the apartment, the fridge stood there still empty and a lonely mattress covered the bedroom floor.
“The walls look a bit bare don't you think?” you said about a week later, standing in the middle of the now a bit furnished living room. Strong arms sneaked their way around your waist and a head dropped on your shoulder.
“Hmm… you're right. What do you have in mind?” Charlie said and turned you around so you were facing him. He smiled at the spark in your eyes “I was thinking, a yellow akzent wall with random secondhand pictures and some pictures of us, all in frames of course. So it's gonna have this homey and creative atmosphere.” You rambled on for a while longer, telling him where you think his instruments could go, the pillows you saw online and thought they worked perfect with the colour of the couch. Charlie just stared at you, a dumb smile on his lips with his arms around you.
“Do you not like it?” you noticed that he hasn't talked for a while and got worried. “I love it. We could live in a dumpster for all I care, as long as I have you by my side.” You fake gaged at his romantic words and gave him a kiss.
The first time people got really suspicious was the time you accidentally walked in on a live he had on Instagram. He sat in front of his instruments, phone propped up before him. You thought that he was already finished but you were wrong.
“Do you think this…” you walked into the room, a shirt in your hand that you just took out of the dryer and lost your words the moment you saw him sitting in front of his phone. He looked at you with wide eyes, his brain clearly searching for a good excuse.
“Is that y/n?” he read outloud from the chat, gesturing you do sit next to him. “Yes it's her! We’re hanging out and she helped me with my washing because I somehow still don't know how to do it.” he laughed nervously, his hand grabbing yours out of the frame.
“He promised me food and I live really close by, so I thought I'll help this poor man out.”
May
Looking back at this moment now, you and Charlie weren't sure why you just didn't come clean. You didn't mean to hide the relationship this long, it just kinda happened and at one point it just got too awkward to tell. It was fairly easy to hide most of the time, you didn't most that much on instagram and Charlie only showed parts of his daily life.
The easiest was the time you filmed JATP Season 2. You were expected to hang out and live together. Back in 2019 you already lived with Owen and Charlie. This time poor Owen had to live with a couple instead of just two friends. (You were already dating for a while back then but didn't tell the cast, to not make a fuss.)
It wasn't like the fans didn't suspect a thing, especially after Owen posted a video of you two fooling around.
Everybody sat outside, enjoying the everwarming sun on their skin. Half of the cast was already in costume just waiting for the break to end. In typical Allie (your character) fashion you wore an overall with a tight tank top underneath, your makeup stood out from the others with the heavy blush, freckles and black eyeliner.
Charlie, in his Luke wardrobe, thought that it was funny to stand in front of you to shield you from the sun.
"Stop that" you whined and tried to shove him away, which was harder than you thought considering he stood before you and you sat on a bench.
"Make me." He flirted and stood even wider before you, puffing out his chest. Raising an unimpressed eyebrow, you stole his beany with a swift motion. His expresion quickly changed from cocky to shocked, snickering was heard from Maddie who was used to this type of behaviour.
"Ups… heavy wind blows in the shadows." You explained nonchalantly and pulled the beany on your head, sticking your tongue out at your boyfriend.
"Oh it's on my lady" he growled "I'm giving you a three second advantage. One…" your eyes widened and your heart rate picked up. "Two…" you got up and scanned the place internally making a good running line. "Th-.." you began sprinting across the lot. You heard the laughing from your castmates behind you as you and Charlie ran in circles.
Unfortunately, he was still fitter and faster than you and about a minute into the running he had you thrown over his shoulder.
"Surrender!" he screamed as you tried to wiggle out of his grip.
"Never!" You screamed back and wiggled even harder.
"Surrender or i'll have to tickle you" he warned and those were the last words Owen was able to film before a producer yelled that the break was finished.
February
“Baby, if I would believe this News Article, you have a secret girlfriend, but it's not me.” you showed him your phone screen.
“I’m not cheating on you. I would never, i'd die rather than…” his frantic expression made you snort. “I know. Oh my god! People saw you with Lia.” you held his hands comfortably.
“Lia as in your best friend Lia?”
“The one and only. People noticed the hickeys... At least they’re getting closer now. So are we still on for the masterplan? You by instruments and I'm gonna sit in the bedroom?" He nodded and smiled at the sight of your equally plastered neck.
Eventually, before you even were able to execute the as you'd like to say 'masterplan' your relationship got outed. I mean it was time, the two of you getting lazier with the hiding as time went by.
Fans noticed that you wore a lot of Charlie's things and that you and him always seemed to be at the same place at the same time. It was actually one of your lives that spilled the secret.
"That's a really nice akzent wall" you read outloud from the chat "oh thank you! It was a long process to get all the pictures but it was actually Charlie's idea to not only have pictures but also plane tickets, date memories and so on hung up on that wall. It really makes it homey. I think to get that wall this crowded it took us...what? About well since we moved in…" you didn't even realise what you said you just babbled and then it was out.
"Charlie actually is home! I could call him. Babe! Come here for a sec- oh my god!" Your hands flew up to your mouth in realizion.
From that moment on you were public and your social media exploded once again. However the two of you were happy to finally show each other off.
#charlie gillespie#charlie gillespie x reader#charlie gillespie imagine#charlie gillespie fanfic#charlie gillespie fic#charlie gillespie fanfiction#charlie gillespie x oc#charlie gillespie x y/n#jatp fanfic
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this cup of yours tastes holy (this lie is dead)
“I think you might have missed the part where I said that you almost died,” Logan says, and his voice is steady, but his hands are not, trembling where they have balled into fists on his lap.
He blinks, at a loss.
Janus attempts to save Logan from being poisoned. In the moment, switching out their glasses seems like a perfectly rational idea.
It is not, in fact, a perfectly rational idea.
Content Warnings: poisoning, mentioned blood, mentioned death (no actual death though), mentioned violence
Word Count: 5,772
Pairings: Loceit, background Prinxiety
Written for Whumptober2020 theme no 22. "Do these tacos taste funny to you?" with the more specific prompt: poisoned.
(masterpost w/ ao3 links)
The banquet hall is bright, noisy, and crowded, full of laughter and music and talking, and Janus is almost certain that the ambassador from Halledrin has just slipped poison into Logan’s wine.
No one else seems to have noticed. Janus can’t say he’s surprised. The formal dinner is over; now is the time for mingling, and everyone is deeply involved in their own conversations, their own social circles. Roman knows how to throw a good celebration, if nothing else, and now that the pressure is off of him to preside over all the little details, Janus spots him off to one side, shamelessly chatting up Virgil, who seems… exasperated, if not entirely displeased. He spares them a glance before turning back to Logan, who seems to be doing his level best to escape the conversation, but the ambassador— and just what is his name? Janus has entirely forgotten— is persistent, and Janus would think it no more than an annoyance if he weren’t fairly certain that he saw the man brush one hand against Logan’s wine glass while gesturing broadly with the other.
Which, no. That is absolutely not permitted.
He makes his way across the floor, snagging a glass of his own on the way.
“If I might cut in?” he says, as soon as he’s close enough. “I’m afraid I have a pressing matter to discuss with our illustrious court sorcerer.”
Logan inclines his head toward him, and Janus doesn’t think he mistakes the relief that flashes in his eyes. The ambassador stammers a bit, trying to come up with an excuse to stay, but a pointed look takes care of that, and the man retreats sullenly. Janus smiles at him, thin and knife-sharp, and then takes Logan by the elbow, escorting him to the other side of the banquet hall.
“Was there actually something you needed to discuss, or was that a rescue?” Logan asks dryly, and Janus laughs.
“Oh, you seemed like you were having so much fun,” he replies. “Here, switch with me.” And he presses his wine into Logan’s hand, taking Logan’s for himself. Logan frowns at him, but Janus shakes his head. Not here, that means, and Logan can read him well enough to understand it, little though he likes being unable to ask for clarification. In any case, as soon as the potentially-poisoned glass leaves Logan’s grasp, Janus finds himself able to relax.
“I’ll admit, the man is… long-winded,” Logan says. Janus sniffs at the wine as surreptitiously as he can. He can’t smell anything, but there are plenty of odorless poisons out there. “And yes, I am aware of how that sounds coming from me.”
“You’re not that bad,” he says, trying to keep track of the ambassador out of the corner of his eye. He’s positioned himself at the edge of the room, now, and he is staring at Logan, not even bothering to hide it. “At least you actually know what you’re talking about.”
“I would hope so,” Logan says, and then narrows his eyes. “Just what is Roman doing over there?”
Janus turns his head in that direction, but he’s too preoccupied to pay much attention. The problem with this is that he’s only about eighty percent sure that the drink has been tampered with, and the remaining twenty percent is enough unsurety to prevent him from being able to confront the perpetrator brazenly. Not that that would be his style anyway, but it also means he can’t go to anyone else with it; if he told Roman his suspicions, for instance, his sword would be drawn in an instant. And on the off chance that the drink isn’t poisoned after all, that would irreparably damage relations with Halledrin, and they can’t afford that.
So, he’ll have to be careful with this. Keep hold of the cup for the rest of the night and have it tested for toxins as soon as he can. Take the results, and move from there.
“Oh, dear Fates,” Logan groans, and Janus snaps his attention back to the present. It doesn’t take long to figure out what has Logan annoyed.
Roman’s climbed on the table. And as king, he can do what he wants, of course. But generally speaking, he’s supposed to keep the table-climbing to a minimum.
“My dear guests!” he calls out, his voice rich and booming. He doesn’t sound as drunk as Janus would expect from this kind of behavior. “If I may have your attention, I would like to propose a toast! To my dearest friend—”
“Oh my gods, Roman, stop,” Virgil groans.
“—Virgil of the Western Isles, who single-handedly—”
“Roman.”
“—rescued me from the clutches of the dread Dragon-Witch Alcara, thus saving this kingdom from utter disaster and ruin, and once again proving himself to be a man of the highest courage and determination, yes, courage, stop glaring at me like that, and also, did I mention he did this all by himself?” Roman raises his glass high, cheeks flushed red. Virgil has stopped protesting verbally in favor of trying to strike Roman down with his eyes alone, it appears. “So! To one of the best heroes this land has ever known! To Virgil!”
The crowd echoes the call, most of them smiling good-naturedly, a few laughing at the antics; if nothing else, Roman knows how to play to an audience.
“Not one of his best speeches,” Logan mutters.
Janus shrugs, and finally manages to catch Virgil’s gaze from across the room. He smirks, sardonically saluting him with his glass, and Virgil turns the full force of his glare onto him, mouthing something that is either I’m going to kill you or I’m rowing to mill two; really, Janus can’t tell which.
And then, he realizes that he has a problem.
It’s a toast. Everyone is bringing their drinks to his lips, taking sips, swallowing. Obviously, he can’t do any of this, as he rather likes being alive and unpoisoned. But the ambassador is still watching Logan intently, and Logan is sipping from Janus’ old glass; if the ambassador is expecting something to happen, and nothing does, he will turn his attention to the people around Logan, trying to figure out what went wrong. If that happens, there is a chance that he will notice if Janus doesn’t drink. From there, he will be able to suppose that Janus has caught onto his plans, has caught onto him, and from there, he will become more desperate.
Janus doesn’t want that. A desperate man becomes unpredictable, uncontrollable. A desperate man might act as though he has nothing to lose.
His mind racing, he brings the goblet up to his lips. It shouldn’t be too hard to feign a sip. He’s overthinking this.
He tilts the glass back, stopping just short of letting the wine touch his lips. He swallows a bit of his own saliva for realism. And then, it’s done, and he can relax again.
“Really, he should know better then to put Virgil in the limelight,” he says, keeping the ambassador in the corner of his vision. “He’s going to make him pay for that later.”
“If he would stop being so reckless, he wouldn’t be captured by his enemies so often, and Virgil wouldn’t have to hare off after him at all,” Logan sighs. “I will never understand their intricate courting rituals. Why don’t they just say they have feelings for each other and have done with it?”
The longer Logan goes without succumbing to some kind of terrible sickness, the paler the ambassador’s face grows. Janus is almost enjoying watching him.
“Some people are incapable of saying what they mean,” he says, and Logan looks at him, raising an eyebrow.
“Is that the case?” he says, pointed, and Janus grins.
“Why, my dear master sorcerer, you can’t possibly be implying that I—”
His left arm goes numb. Suddenly, all at once, and he cuts himself off, trying to shake feeling back into it. But it’s not like pins and needles, and as the seconds pass— only a few, surely, but the quick, rabbit-beating of his heart makes it seem otherwise— the sensation spreads, creeping toward his chest.
“Janus?” Logan asks. “Is something wrong?”
He sounds worried, very concerned, and Janus would be flattered, but he’s a bit busy being concerned himself.
“I don’t,” he starts, “I’m not—”
And then, his lungs are set on fire, and the rest of his sentence is lost to a wheezing scream as he doubles over, hands flying up to his chest, the wine glass clattering against the floor, half of it shattering and drawing the attention of everyone in the vicinity, but he can’t care about that because he’s trying to force his lungs to inflate, but he’s burning up from the inside out and he can’t—
“Janus!”
There are arms, around him, steadying him. He looks up to meet Logan’s face, painted with fear and blurry, strangely blurry, and he doesn’t think that he’s crying so why is Logan blurry? But he is blurry, and the rest of Janus’ limbs have gone numb, and standing is becoming increasingly difficult, and the fire is there, growing hotter with each moment, and he opens his mouth to say something but all that escapes is a gasp, and then a strangled squeaking sound, as if the sounds are being wrung from him along with the last of his air.
“Shit, shit, shit—”
It’s almost funny, Logan swearing. He’s usually far too collected for that.
His center of gravity tips. Everything spins, and then, he feels himself being lowered to the ground. The floor is cold against his back, soothing, though it doesn’t help much after the momentary relief.
“What the fuck is wrong with him?”
Virgil, now, hovering over him, frantic.
“I don’t know,” Logan says, and he sounds scared, and that’s wrong. Logan is never scared. “I don’t know, poison, I’d imagine, but I don’t know what—”
“Well can you figure it out?”
Roman’s here too.
“I’m trying,” Logan snaps. “If you’ll give me a bit of room—”
The pain rises to a crescendo, like it’s eating his flesh away, and he lets out a whimper. An honest-to-gods whimper, and no. Absolutely not. He has more dignity than this. He has faced worse than this and come out alive, and he trusts Logan to do all that he can. So he breathes, shuddering breaths, breaths that twist and hurt and seem to move in places that they shouldn’t, and he wrests his mind back under control.
“The wine,” he gasps out, and his voice sounds absolutely wrecked. “I saw— the ambassador from Halledrin— he put it in the wine—”
“So you switched them,” Logan says, and scratch fear. This is fury. “How could you possibly have been so stupid?”
“I didn’t drink it!” he cries, and the exclamation is ripped from him, too harsh, and the exertion sends the pain flaring up, the flames licking at his heart, and he chokes on air. “I didn’t— I faked it, I didn’t drink, I don’t know—”
“Well, how the fuck did you get poisoned, then?” Virgil shrieks, and then, Logan fills his field of vision. He’s chanting something in the Old Tongue, and then slapping his hands on his chest, and just like that, the pain fades as magic rushes through him, warm and sparkling and steady and very, very Logan, and his head clears enough to think properly.
“The Halledrinian ambassador?” Roman snarls, and in that moment, he looks exactly like his brother. “I’ll be back.” And then he’s stalking through the crowd, and Janus wishes he didn’t feel so drained; he’d love to watch Roman make the man sweat, but he can barely muster up the energy to raise his head to look at Logan.
“I was going to keep it until I could get it looked at,” he says. His mouth is dry, painfully so. “I faked a sip, for the toast, but I didn’t take one. I didn’t touch it.”
The magic is still buzzing through him, lending him strength. He’ll ride it for what it’s worth.
Gods above and below, this is embarrassing.
“Are you sure it was the wine?” Logan asks. “It couldn’t have been anything else?”
“I wouldn’t think so,” he says. “I’m sorry, I probably should have—”
“Told me?” Logan cuts in. “I should think so. Honestly, why would you think keeping it from me was a good idea?”
The magic is still buzzing through him. It feels more intense now, almost uncomfortable.
“I didn’t want him to think that I knew anything,” he says. “I didn’t want to risk him trying something else.”
Logan shakes his head. “You’re too clever for your own good, do you know that?” he says, and he sounds completely exasperated, but the anger is fading, and Janus is glad of it. He doesn’t regret what he did, just how it turned out, and he never likes it when Logan is annoyed with him, because somehow, Logan has the ability to make him feel like a child, chastised for trying to sneak dessert out of the kitchen.
“I think I’m just clever enough,” he retorts, and then frowns. “Out of curiosity, what spell did you use?”
“A general cleansing incantation,” Logan tells him, “though at twice the power I would usually put into it. I’m just glad the poison wasn’t more specialized. Some toxins are resistant to magic, you know.”
Janus does know, and under any other circumstance, he would be more than willing to listen to Logan going on about the subject for days. But the buzzing of the magic in his system, Logan’s magic, has graduated from relieving to uncomfortable to something approaching pain, and it’s been a long time since he had to be healed with a spell, but he doesn’t think this is right.
He opens his mouth to tell Logan about it, about the way it feels as though there are ants crawling under his skin, but then—
then—
his body—
seizes—
and rational thought flies out the window as his muscles lock and pain tears through him, biting and sharp and ripping and buzzing, and his limbs jerk and this is a seizure, he’s having a seizure, and his head slams against the ground hard and white lights flash across his vision and he can hear shouting, and something soft is shoved underneath his head to soften the impact as it hits against the floor again and again and again and he can’t speak, can’t breath, and there is blood bubbling in the back of his throat, so much that he fears he’ll choke on it, and all the while there is the buzzing, curling in him and forcing his bones from their sockets, it feels like, scrambling his innards, and it feels like there is something inside of him, something eating him, and perhaps he’s eating himself, has turned into the serpent that consumes its own tail—
He doesn’t know.
There are still voices, panicked and loud, and he should know them, too, but he can’t. Not now.
He just knows that it hurts, in waves, each one worst than the last, and it won’t stop. A strangled scream is ripped from his throat, high and thick, forcing its way past the blood that’s gathered in his mouth, and someone is cursing, swearing up a blue streak, and the people around him sound scared, and he thinks that he is too.
Each wave worse than the last. Once he screams once, he can’t stop.
Unconsciousness, when it comes, is a blessing.
-------------
Awareness comes and goes in flashes.
He wakes, his body thrashing, trying to escape. Pain like red hot pokers pressing up against him and into him. He wheezes, and there is someone holding him, trying to restrain him, and he’s too weak to push them away.
“Please,” he tries to say, but the word comes out garbled and mangled beyond all recognition.
“Remus,” the person growls, and it must be Virgil, but he can’t pry his eyes open to see, “knock him out.”
“On it,” says someone else, and there is a hand on his forehead, blessedly cool, and then nothing.
Then, again: his entire body on fire, but lacking the energy to so much as lift a finger. He gasps for breath, each inhalation a struggle, and past the white noise in his ears, he thinks he hears someone speaking. Muttering. Praying? He wrests his eyes open, and his surroundings are a blur, but it is Patton sitting at his bedside. Holding his hand, too, he thinks, but he can’t feel it.
He didn’t even know Patton had returned to the castle.
He tries to say something, anything, but he doesn’t have the air to spend on speech. So he lies there, panting, and finally, Patton looks up, and Janus can’t make out his face but he hears his gasp.
“Oh, gods,” Patton says, and leans in closer. “Jan, can you hear me?”
He can’t respond. Can’t so much as nod.
“You hold on,” Patton says, and he sounds like he’s fighting tears. “You hear me? You don’t die from this. You hang in there, and everything’s gonna be a-okay. You got it?”
It’s a sweet lie, a pretty lie, and Janus can’t begrudge him for it.
Darkness again.
And then:
“—cking be giving up!”
“Of course I’m not giving up!”
Logan’s voice, sharp and angry and lined with despair, and his heart skips a beat. Or perhaps it’s not the sound of his voice that does it at all, but the poison, wrapping around his heart and squeezing. He still hurts, every inch of him, but it’s distant, far away, and it should worry him, he thinks, because that probably means that he’s far past the point of pain that his body can actually handle. But his mind is too fuzzy, everything indistinct.
“I’m not going to give up. I would rather die. But without knowing what the poison was, or better yet, having a sample of it, I’m left to flounder, and attempting to use magic has done more harm than good.”
Gods. He sounds so broken.
“Roman said he was gonna try and get answers out of the shithead.” That’s Remus, uncharacteristically serious. “No luck so far, apparently.” A bang, like a fist against a table. “He should let me at him. I’d rip it right out of him, reach my hand down his throat and pull out his fucking vocal chords—”
“Okay, I’m gonna need you to shut up right the fuck now—”
“Oh, I’m sorry, is that too much for your delicate sensibilities—”
“Enough, both of you!”
Logan again, desperate and exhausted, and with a labored, stuttering breath, Janus pries his eyes open. A wave of dizziness assaults him, and the light is far too bright, but he holds out, turning his head to the side in a motion that takes more effort than it should.
His vision is swimming, coming in and out of focus. But it’s Virgil, Remus, and Logan, all standing and arguing with each other.
And it hits him, then: Oh. I’m dying.
“The fact remains that we’re all in the dark here. I’m in the dark. Without knowing what the poison was or how he ingested it, I can’t deconstruct it to find a cure. All efforts to use a spell to detect the toxin have failed, and all efforts to use a spell to heal him have only aggravated his condition.” Logan makes a sharp motion; Janus isn’t sure, but he thinks he’s scrubbing his hand down his face. “It makes sense,” he continues, more subdued. “I was the original target. So of course the poison would be undetectable by magic. Of course it would—”
He breaks off, and Virgil reaches out to him.
“This isn’t your fault,” he says lowly. “Janus made his dumb fucking decision himself.”
“He wasn’t trying to get poisoned,” Remus interjects, sharp. “So how about you take your dumb fucking decision and shove it up your—”
His mind is whirling. Something about the description of the poison, the fact that magic cannot be used to combat it, seems familiar, but his mind refuses to dredge up any memory that he might have of a poison that fits those qualities.
He doesn’t know. Or, worse, he might know, but the poison that is killing him is preventing him from coming up with the information that could save him.
But there’s something else. Something just beyond his reach, something that flits from his grasp when he tries to think about it.
“And there was nothing in the wine,” Virgil says. “Nothing at all?”
“Nothing that the chemists could find.”
“And I checked it for good measure!” Remus says. “Nadda. Zip. Fucking nothing. So how we got here is beyond me.”
That’s it.
That’s it.
He didn’t drink the wine. It wouldn’t have mattered if the wine was poisoned. He didn’t have any.
But he remembers swallowing. His own saliva, just to make it realistic.
There’s only one place the poison could have been.
He tries to speak. But his throat feels full of razor wire, and the effort is enough to bring the rest of the pain back into focus. What starts out as something that might, possibly, be a word devolves into a high, keening whimper, and he can’t muster up the energy to be embarrassed about it, because gods. His back arches, and his fists clench into the bedsheets as he tries to ride it out, but there is no riding it out, because it just won’t stop.
“Janus!”
Suddenly, they’re all very close.
“Shit, shit, you’re gonna be okay, just give us a second,” Virgil says. “Remus, you—”
“Right—”
And no, because Remus is going to knock him out again, but he can’t, not before he tells them what he just figured out, because if he goes under again he’s scared that he won’t get another chance.
“No,” he gasps, and his voice is absolutely wrecked, and speaking hurts, but— “No, don’t. I need—”
He breaks off with a ragged gasp, his throat refusing to cooperate with him, and he could scream with frustration, really would scream, if his voice was working. But then, Logan is there, his face close to his and his eyes very blue.
“What do you need, Janus?” he asks, his voice low and urgent, and Janus gathers his breath, and try again.
“Test the rim,” he says. “It wasn’t— wasn’t in the wine, and it wasn’t a spell. But I—” His words strangle themselves, but he can see the light dawning in Logan’s eyes.
“You put your lips to the rim of the glass,” he finished. “It was on the—” He turns to Virgil, the motion whipcord sharp. “Virgil, go find the glass and have it sent to my— no, actually, bring it here. Time is of the essence.”
Virgil is off like a shot almost before Logan is finished speaking.
“And Remus,” he continues, “I’ll need—”
“You’ve got it, specs,” Remus says. “Whatever support I can give.”
Logan nods, and meets Janus’ eyes again. At least, he thinks he does. His vision is growing dark, shadows curling around the edges like fire-blackened paper, eating away everything he can see. The pain is distant again, and even his own heartbeat seems to be slowing. Logan’s voice sounds as if it’s coming to him through deep water.
“You can rest now, Janus,” he says. “You’ve done well. I’m going to cure you, I swear. This will all be over soon.”
One way or another, he agrees, but doesn’t say it out loud. Even if he could, he thinks it would upset Logan to say something like that. Would upset him to remind him of the very real possibility that this will not end well, that it is already too late. Because his vision is blackening and his heartbeat is slowing, and everything feels so very, very far away, and he doesn’t want to die but he might not have a choice in the matter.
Logan’s face is still hovering above his, and he thinks that if this is the last sight he will ever have, it’s the best one he could have asked for.
-----------------
He wakes to a pressure against his side and a bone-deep exhaustion, and he takes a moment to simply breathe, staring at the ceiling and reveling in the ease of it. He is so very tired, but his lungs inflate and deflate without pain, without anything catching and setting him to coughing, without having to fight his own body to get the air he needs.
Then, he turns his head.
Logan is asleep on a chair next to his bed, slumped forward so that his head is resting against his side, effectively trapping one arm. He is pale and drawn, his brows furrowed and hair sticking out in all directions, as if he’s been running his fingers through it repeatedly. His glasses are still on his face, terribly askew, and on instinct, Janus reaches across his body, trying to correct them, perhaps, or to take them off entirely. But at the movement, slight though it is, Logan startles awake, eyes blinking wide open, lips parted as if to call out.
Then, his eyes meet Janus’.
“You’re awake,” he breathes, and it sounds uncomfortably like a revelation, like the answer to every prayer Logan has ever offered— and Logan isn’t religious, Janus knows, has never seen much point in worshiping distant gods. “How are you feeling?”
“Better,” he offers, wincing at the sandpaper-quality of his own voice. It’s the truth, though; he feels drained, mentally and physically, and he aches terribly, but the pain is nothing compared to what it was. “I assume you figured it out.”
Logan pushes his glasses back into position on his face, a little more aggressively than the motion should require. “Barely,” he says. “If you had consumed any more than you did, or if I had been even ten minutes slower, you would have died.”
He hums. “I certainly felt like it,” he murmurs, glancing away. “Thank you for saving me.”
For once, he means exactly what he says, but Logan’s expression darkens. “I shouldn’t have had to,” he says, sharp. “That poison—” He breaks off, sucking in a breath, looking away. He vigorously jabs at his glasses, pushing them even farther up his nose. “That poison was meant to target magic in a person’s system, and because you don’t have magic inherently, it turned to attacking your internal organs instead. Every attempt to heal you only fueled its effects. Do you know how I—”
He breaks off again, but Janus is stuck on something else, is stuck on targeting magic, and he has always been good at reading between the lines, so he knows exactly what Logan isn’t saying. Logan lives off magic, breathes it, practically is magic in every sense of the word. Had Logan taken a poison that destroyed magic, it would have destroyed him.
The Halledrinian ambassador chose his toxin well.
“In that case,” he says, “I suppose that this turned out as well as it could have. Obviously, getting poisoned myself was far from ideal, but better me than you, in this scenario.”
He knows immediately that this is the wrong thing to say; usually, he would have realized that before the words left his mouth at all, but his mind is still sluggish, his mouth looser. Logan’s face twists, becomes something thunderous and angry, and the warm candlelight that fills the room— his room, he notices, though he’s fairly certain he was in Remus’ infirmary before— flickers and dances as the air stirs, a slight wind buffeting the bedsheets.
“I think you might have missed the part where I said that you almost died,” Logan says, and his voice is steady, but his hands are not, trembling where they have balled into fists on his lap.
He blinks, at a loss. Were he in better form, he would know what to say here, how to soothe Logan’s worry and wash the past few— well. He has no idea how long it’s been. But he would be able to turn it all around, put the event behind them, if the words would only come, but they don’t, so here he lies, feeling powerless and a bit stupid.
“I didn’t,” he points out, and knows that the rebuttal is weak, that this won’t help. “Clearly.”
“The point is that you could have!”
It’s a shout, and Logan pauses, seemingly surprised at his own volume. He deflates, then, his shoulders slumping, all the fight flowing from him like water from a sieve. He hunches in on himself just slightly, his expression fading from fury to something much more tired, much more worn.
“I’m sorry,” he says, and Janus can only watch as he scrubs at his eyes, almost viciously, and then stares at his hands. “I just— you nearly died. From poison that was meant for me.”
He sounds wrecked, as if that is the worst possibility he could imagine, and— oh.
“I would have died,” Logan murmurs. “It would have decimated my magic before I could do a thing about it, and me along with it.” He looks up, and his eyes are shining with unshed tears, and Janus wants nothing more than to wipe them away. He would try, he thinks, if he felt as though he could move enough to do so, if he thought Logan would allow him the liberty. “But instead of me, it was you. And I had to watch as you died in my place. If you hadn’t been able to communicate how you’d ingested it, I would have been helpless. I would have—” He breaks off suddenly, closing his eyes. “I would have lost you.”
Oh.
He wrenches himself into a sitting position, ignoring the way his muscles scream in protest, ignoring Logan’s startled exclamation. He pushes himself up, reaches out, and snags Logan’s hands in one of his. Too late, he realizes that somewhere along the line, he was divested of his gloves, and his bare skin makes contact with Logan’s. It’s like a bolt of lightning shooting up his arm, and he struggles not to show his shock on his face; he is no stranger to touch, but not like this, never like this, with his bare hand. And from the way Logan is staring, from the way Logan’s lips have parted, just slightly, he knows it too.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he says, as fierce, as vehement as he can manage. “And call me selfish, but I am infinitely glad that I didn’t have to lose you.”
He meets Logan’s eyes. As difficult as this level of honesty, this level of vulnerability is for him, it needs to be said. He needs Logan to know, needs him to understand, needs him to realize that he cannot possibly regret this, if the alternative was watching Logan choke on his own blood.
Logan makes a sound, soft and wounded, and turns his hand so that he’s grasping at Janus’ just as tightly as Janus is grasping him. And then, he leans in close, bumping their foreheads together and then staying there, and Janus doesn’t dare to move. He can feel Logan’s breath on his skin, ghosting across his lips; an inch or two closer, and they would be kissing.
With one hand, Logan continues to hold his. The other curls around the back of his neck, keeping him in place.
“Never,” Logan says, “do that to me again.”
“I assure you,” he replies, “I don’t plan on it.”
For a moment they stay like that, foreheads touching, breathing together, and Janus’ eyes slip closed. Like this, he can almost forget that anything happened, can forget the pain, can forget how weak he feels. He’s here, and Logan’s here, and nothing else matters.
And then, the door slams open. He jerks back, startled, and Logan’s hand slips away from his neck.
Remus is standing there, gaping.
“Holy shit,” he says. “You’re awake.” He turns to call to someone down the hall— “He’s awake!—” and then, he’s rushing into the room, and Janus doesn’t have any time to prepare before he’s jumped onto the bed, wrapping his arms around him like a particularly clingy octopus, and he’s chanting a litany of words under his breath, things like, “You’re okay you’re okay you’re okay holy shit,” and other words that he can’t quite make out, and the hug is a bit too tight to be comfortable, but he accepts it anyway. He’s still holding one of Logan’s hands, and he is loathe to let go, but he wraps his free arm around Remus’ back.
“Everyone’s been very worried about you,” Logan says quietly. “Patton returned from the coast in the middle of it all, and he was quite distraught. And that’s not to mention how… irate Roman has been, and Virgil—”
“Speak for yourself,” Virgil says, leaning in the doorway. He crosses his arms, but the relief on his face is poorly disguised, and he must have truly been in a bad way if Virgil was that concerned. “Roman and Patton are on their way up, I think. They were talking to the asshole. The ambassador,” he adds when Janus tilts his head in a silent question. “Piece of shit admitted to everything. He’s not even the real ambassador; he killed the real one and took his clothes, tried to go after Logan to spark war between us and Halledrin.”
“I’m gonna kill him,” Remus says. “Roman said I could, if I wanted to. He was real mad so I dunno if he meant it, but he said it, so it counts. I’m gonna stick a knife in his guts and pull out his intestines and feed them to him and—”
“That’s more than enough, I think,” Logan interjects, and Janus is glad of it. He’s used to Remus’ gory tangents, can deal with them well, normally, but he’s exhausted, and he thinks that consciousness will slip away from him any moment now. He can feel his eyelids beginning to droop, his body leaning against Remus’ more and more, and he highly doubts that he will make it to see Roman and Patton.
But that’s alright. He’ll wake up again and see them then. For now, he has Virgil here, and Remus, and he is still holding Logan’s hand, and he is tired and he aches, but he’s alright.
He meets Logan’s eyes, squeezes his hand, and smiles. And Logan smiles back.
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Idk if you do nsfw but... Hawks masturbating while thinking of his crush and moaning their name, then their crush walks in on them and they have sexxy timee
NSFW is my middle name~ Especially when it comes to my bird husband. I also made this a non-binary reader and this was my first time doing that, I hope you like it and it’s not horrible!
I’m slowly going through all my requests, I’m sorry it’s taking so long. My job has me working INSANE hours but I'm tryna get back into the swing of things. I have three days off this week so I’m hoping I can get more requests done, also I am working on Something to Somebody part 3. So maybe that will come out too!!
Parings Hawks X Non-Binary! Reader
Rating:Explicit!!! 18+
Permanent tag list: @gr0vndz3ro @katsukikitten @prismaroyal @hawks-senseis @kingtamakimurder
You stood at the door in utter and complete shock. Your boss, Hawks, had his pants open, head resting on the back of the small couch in his office while his wings were stretched out behind him. Cock in his hand, slowly moving his hand up and down the hardened shaft. Small whimpers fell from his lips before he bit them as he moaned your name.
You felt your stomach drop, but in a good way. Just the sight of him, cheeks flushed, lips red from him biting them, eyes closed as he continued to say your name under his breath like a mantra, had you more turned on than you have been in your entire life. You always had a crush on Hawks but never thought that he might reciprocate them.
Gently, you placed the two bags of food you picked up for dinner in your hands on the floor. Tip-toeing towards the back of the couch, you were amazed at how you were able to get this close without his heightened senses detecting you entering the office. Hawks was so lost in him imagining your lips around him bringing him to new heights, that he had never heard you open the door.
Finally, you were behind him, his soft moans and whimpers sounded even more beautiful when you got closer. Taking both your pointer fingers you ran them through his feathers, your lips next to his ear.
“Do you need any help there, birdman?”
Golden eyes snapped open as a soft gasp filled the air. Hawks stopped his movements, he hurried to try and cover himself up.
“Tsk Tsk, no point in trying to hide it. You obviously wanted to get caught, touching yourself like that in the middle of your office.” Reaching over him, you grabbed his hands, moving and pinning them to his sides. You could see his chest moving with each deep breath he took, his breath shaky.
“Are you this hard because you thought of me?” His cock laid against his stomach, hard as a rock. You could see a small amount of pre-cum spill out as it twitched, it made your mouth water.
Hawks could only moan in acknowledgment, afraid that this was just a dream, and if he spoke he’d wake up. “Were you thinking of me touching you, that my hands gripping your dick instead of your own?” You spoke through your teeth as you said that, soft lips brushing against his now red ear, his cheeks just as red.
Keeping your eyes on his cock, you watched as it twitched against him again. “I see someone is getting more excited.” You pushed away from him as you stalked around the couch. Hawks kept his eyes on you, watching as you unbuttoned your pants.
Once in front of the hero, you shimmed out of the clothing on your lower half, pulling your underwear down with it. You’ve never been this exposed in front of Hawks, but the look in his eyes made you feel loved and desired. His eyes were dark with lust but full of so much love, even when he grabbed you by the waist to bring you closer to him, his eyes never left your own.
“You have no idea how much I crave you. How fucking crazy you drive me, each and every day.” Hawks was still sitting on the couch as he ran a hand over your chest, watching as you took in a shuddered breath when he got close to your sex. Guiding you, Hawks dragged you closer to him, your thighs on either side of his own, straddling him. You could feel his hands run all over your body, exploring you. Your own hands found purchase in his blonde locks, gently gripping it when his hands ran over your bare ass.
“As much as I would love to tease you, I don’t think I can hold myself back any longer baby.” He moved his hips against you, making his cock rub against you, showing you just how bad he needed you.
You moaned as he rubbed against your quivering hole, each move made you feral with desire for the man under you. Reaching around your body you took hold of his throbbing cock, a small hiss came from Hawks his eyes rolling in the back of his head. Taking a deep breath you guided him to your awaiting entrance, watching his face as he slowly slid into you.
“Fuck….” Hawks said with a long sigh as every inch of him was being surrounded by your tight walls. His hands on your hips tightened, his nails leaving marks on your delicate skin.
The only word for you to describe what it felt like to have Hawks feeling filling you was divine. One of your hands laid flat against his chest while the other gripped the back of the couch. The sound of your soft moan and Hawks ragged breathing were the only sounds you could hear in the large office. You sat still, eyes closed as your body was adjusting to his size.
You felt a soft hand cup your cheek, a thumb gently swiped across your parted lips. Opening your eyes, you looked down at the man below you, you felt the little air that was in your lungs escape. He looked even more beautiful now than he ever had. Soft blond locks fell in front of those serene golden eyes that were peaking through the fallen fringe to look at you. Cheeks red and a small glimmer of sweat glistened on his forehead. The late summer sunset shone through the windows, silhouetting those stunning vermillion wings that were slightly stretched out.
“Whenever you are ready, love bird.” His voice was soft, nothing but love and affection dripped from the words he spoke.
Slowly you lifted your hips slightly, the feeling of him sliding out of you and then sliding back in caused you to moan only this time a little louder. You did that a couple of times as your body started to get accustomed to the beautiful love you and Hawks were making.
“God you feel so fucking good.” Hawks started to move his hips against you, meeting your thrust which sent a new wave of pleasure to course through your body. “That's right baby, I wanna hear you. I wanna know how good this makes you feel.”
With each thrust your moans became louder and louder, Hawks’ praises and thrusts were becoming too much for you to handle and he knew. Wrapping his arm around your waist Hawks lifted himself from the couch, placing your back against the seat cushions while he remained on top of you, your legs were moved to go over his shoulders, his cock still inside.
Hawks pulled his hips away from you, then snapping them forward. With this new position, Hawks was able to go deeper inside of you, hitting that soft sweet spot that made your toes curl.
“Do that again, please.” Your arms were above your head, trying to find the arm of the couch to hold on to as Hawks brought you to cloud nine.
“Anything for you love bird.” And just like that he had you gasping, gripping the couch with your nails, eyes rolling into the back for your head as he continuously hit that same spot over and over again.
“Fuck Hawks.” The only things that popped up in your head was his name and a whole string of profanities.
“Keigo….call me Keigo.” He had placed a hand around the lower part of your neck, slightly applying pressure.
“Keep going just like that Keigo, you’re gonna make me cum.”
Hawks’ pace picked up as he continued his thrusts. You could feel yourself coming close to that blissful release, and you wanted him to cum with you. To reach that same high. Grabbing him by the back of his neck you brought him down to you, your lips barely touching. His movements never stopped as he looked deeply into your eyes.
You could see just how vulnerable he was at this moment, just how much he cares for you. As if you were the most precious person in the world to him. Licking your lips, you lifted your chin, his slightly chapped lips met yours.
Opening your mouth you let your tongue dance with his. You could melt just from his kisses alone, they were a little on the animalistic side yet full still full of passion. His strokes started to become sloppy, signaling that he too was close.
Pulling away from his lips, you kept your hand on the back of his neck, massaging it lovingly, your forehead pressed against his. His hair falling in your face.
“Cum with me Keigo, please.”
“Fuck baby.” You moaned so loud you were positive the people walking on the street could hear you even if you were on the thirtieth floor. Hawks was moaning and grunting on top of you, God were they beautiful moans.
Watching you saw his wings spread open, showing off their length. “Look at me lovebird.” Your eyes met his and with a few more strokes you came for the man with wings that had flown into your heart and he came in you. His wings shivering as he did, his mouth brushed against yours as he tried to catch his breath.
You felt dizzy and hot as you both rode out your orgasm. Hawks pressed butterfly kisses against your lips as both your heart rates calmed down.
When you both felt your breathing come back to normal, Hawks pulled out of you, not before placing kisses all over your face as he continued to whisper sweet nothings against your hot skin.
“Do I smell food, specifically chicken?” Hawks was laying on top of you, his face pressed against the crook of your neck, where he decided would be a good place to leave a fairly large mark.
“You are so freaking annoying.” You shook your head at the blonde. He smiled down at you, before leaning down pressing his lips against yours. You couldn’t help but smile against him, as annoying as he could be, you still loved him.
#ari answers#bnha hawks#hawks smut#takami keigo#Takami Keigo smut#bnha smut#bnha#mha smut#hawks x reader smut#hawks x reader#keigo x reader
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Post canon sangcheng fic recs for @runespoor7
(wooohoo that’s only 25 fics haha)
Silence by inberin
https://archiveofourown.org/works/17441771
a conversation in the snow.
Wonderfully nuanced characterisation. It hints at whole relationship and dynamic with a lot of delicacy.
Windrose by offlight
https://archiveofourown.org/works/18997546
Nie Huaisang is forced into a coma to stop his qi deviation. Jiang Cheng is tasked with waking him up.
There’s a lot of intriguing dreamscapes in this one, and I love Jiang Cheng (and in the background Wei Wuxian)’s desperation and obstinacy.
All the innocence we give by shamiran
https://archiveofourown.org/works/18864910
Learning to renavigate the ground between them is easier than Nie HuaiSang expects. It's also harder than he could have imagined.
Just a sweet story.
Taste the wine off your lips by ExNihiIo
https://archiveofourown.org/works/20129245
A light pat lands against his back, and a cup of water is pushed in front of his face. ���Not even Zi Shi, and you’re already tipsy?,” asks a teasing voice, while a thin hand puts down the cup.
Jiang Cheng coughs a little more, shaking his head, and sends a dirty look at his host. “I am not tipsy.”
“Hm, and yet your cheeks are all red. What would your disciples think, if they saw you in this state?”
“They’d think about running away while they can. I can break legs more easily than I can drink alcohol.”
A smile curves the edges of Nie Huaisang’s mouth, and he closes his fan with a curt jerk, sitting across the table. He’s wearing lighter clothes, Jiang Cheng notices, compared to the ones he had during the Discussion Conference. Where those had been tight and rigid against his body, these now fall softly on him, the large sleeves sweeping delicately as Nie Huaisang moves to pour himself a cup.
I like the melancholy tone of this one.
The light of autumn: you will not be spared by crooows
https://archiveofourown.org/works/19901467/chapters/47138221
Nie Huaisang arrives a week early for the conference which will be held in Yunmeng to discuss the position of chief cultivator.
[Title is from a poem called "October" by Louise Glück!]
A bit funny, a bit melancholy
You can run but you can’t hide by ThirtySixSaveFiles
https://archiveofourown.org/works/21119297
Nie Huaisang has noticed something about the way Jiang Cheng takes compliments; Nie Huaisang has a theory, and he intends to test it out.
Just Huaisang figuring out Jiang Cheng has a praise kink. Established pairing.
Evening Bloom by dragonofeternal
https://archiveofourown.org/works/20958518
Jiang Cheng is spry and lithe well into his twilight years, living well off Wei Wuxian's stolen youth; Nie Huaisang's golden core, on the other hand, has always been poor- he blacks his hair with ink and dyes, hides the pudge of indolence and the wrinkles of age behind the latest fashions and the finest fans. Perhaps for their peers, finding the space to be vulnerable came easy, but for them it's taken this long to maybe think of letting someone in.
I have a big weakness for stories about old people falling in love and this is one delivers very sweetly.
Four Days in Lanling by Halotolerant
https://archiveofourown.org/works/21722695/chapters/51817036
Nie Huaisang looks at him. ‘You are confusing me, Clan Leader Jiang, perhaps I misunderstand, but…’
‘You didn’t misunderstand. You don’t misunderstand. You understand all of it.’ For six months Jiang Cheng has been mulling this over, and now with Nie Huaisang in front of him he can’t figure out if he most wants to knock him down or kneel at his feet. What he does is try and breathe. Clench his hands at his sides. ‘And now I am going to ask you to do something for me. You have to do something for me. You have to help Jin Ling.’
Ok so perhaps it’s misrepresentating to call this a post canon fic since most of the action is mid-13-years-of-WWX-death but the fairly important framing part is post canon. Also it’s one of the best sangcheng fic out there and a must read.
Shadow eternal by rynleaf
https://archiveofourown.org/works/23162944/chapters/55439032
“You want me to distract the Chief Cultivator from the Annual Cultivation Conference, so you and other sect leaders can… what. Sign contracts without adult supervision?”
“If Jiang-zongzhu is amenable,” Sect Leader Ouyang repeats with a nod.
Jiang Cheng pinches the bridge of his nose. The pressure he felt building behind his eyes all morning is swiftly coalescing into a bitch of a headache. “Just what do you all think I’m capable of?”
Sect Leader Ouyang bows with a cheerful smile. “We have utmost faith in Sandu Shengshou’s abilities.”
-
In which a night hunt ends in disaster, Jiang Cheng catches a glimpse of Nie Huaisang's heart, and feelings are discussed after a certain fashion.
One that’s between sweet and angsty.
The way is shut, and we cannot go back by saltedpin
https://archiveofourown.org/works/23592523
One month since Guanyin Temple, and some people are coping better than others (or not).
This one is a mostly sad and bitter take on Jiang Cheng reacting to Nie Huaisang’s plot (and being very drunk).
Living memory by ghosthouses
https://archiveofourown.org/works/24827980
Once Jin Guangyao has left, he gives himself two indulgences. The first, a day to scream in his rooms made soundproof with a talisman. The second, a physical list written in code, to keep his older self, who will have let the pain dull with time, accountable for what must be done.
It has only two commandments:
He will die.
and
He will know.
Nie Huaisang puts it in his sleeve with the intention of keeping it with him at all times, to be added to but never reduced, a living memory of his task.
This and its prequel which you should also read is quite short but probably one of my favorite depictions of their dynamic (and probably one I find most plausible).
What’s Left of us by cangse-sanren
https://archiveofourown.org/works/24979081
“Well,” Huaisang tries hesitantly, “both of us seem to have a rather fraught relationship with things like older brothers and the concept of betrayal. And regret,” he adds as an afterthought. "Perhaps you just understand me more than most."
Yet another that dwells into Jiang Cheng reacting to Nie Huaisang’s plan. I really like that take although it’s barely shippy (and quite short).
Descending by lightningwaltz
https://archiveofourown.org/works/25296595
“I want to… to not be embarrassed.”
“To not be embarrassed during what?”
“During sex.” There. Jiang Cheng can say it. “In general. Also with you right now.”
“Very good.”
“When did you become so authoritative?” Jiang Cheng wants to sound irked, but can’t quite manage anything beyond nervous curiosity.
Very interesting fic and in many ways unusual. I’d say it’s hypnosis kink, but it’s much more character driven than that. With a context of established FWB arrangement between Jiang Cheng and Nie Huaisang.
Tell him that I miss our little talks by xiaolongbaobei
https://archiveofourown.org/works/25232023
the post-canon fic where Jiang Cheng becomes the Chief Cultivator, realizes that it's not too late to fall in love and learns to ask for what he wants
Longish fic exploring Jiang Cheng as Chief cultivator working with Nie Huaisang and slowly falling in love with him. I adore this one, and not only because I love fics that explore the idea of Jiang Cheng as chief cultivator.
Blind for Love by manamune
https://archiveofourown.org/works/25760272
Jiang Cheng is poisoned with an aphrodisiac and needs to orgasm repeatedly in order to flush it from his system.
The first person he thinks of going to for help is Nie Huaisang, who does what any good friend would do: he shoves his three decades worth of feelings for Jiang Cheng deep into the recesses of his mind, locks them up so he can pretend they don’t exist, and then fucks him so hard that he passes out.
Mostly a long smutty piece, but with a lot of fun character bits along the way.
A Tight-Knit Family by aldalin
https://archiveofourown.org/works/25500481/chapters/61862899
“Jing Ling, we need to talk.”
Jin Ling has too many uncles, and he’s about to get another.
Sect Leader Jiang announces his marriage to Sect Leader Nie.
A fairly different take, more focused on Jin Ling and Wei Wuxian reacting to Jiang Cheng and Nie Huaisang’s relationship.
A trip to Qinghe by Scorpiwriting
https://archiveofourown.org/works/26974741
An unexpected hunt forces Jiang Cheng to leave the Lotus Pier a bit earlier than he had anticipated, so he decides to send Jin Ling to Qinghe, for the sake of not sending him back to Lanling so soon: it turns into a learning experience for the young sect leader, who gets to peek into the life of the Headshaker.
or.
Jin Ling learns that not everything people say is true and that perhaps there is some merit to art. He also learns that loneliness is a dark beast and that his uncle should definitely do something about it.
Another one more focused on Jin Ling’s reaction to it. Honestly more of a gen piece about Jin Ling and Nie Huaisang, but an interesting one.
Silver bracelets on their wrists by mercurious
https://archiveofourown.org/works/25797715
“Can’t I find excuses to visit an old friend?”
Ok so this one is a bit fucked up in interesting ways. It combines Chief Cultivator Jiang Cheng and explicit longing about Wei Wuxian, and BDSM as catharsis. It’s a fascinating piece.
Welcome to love by amphigoric
https://archiveofourown.org/works/22412866/chapters/53549794
Desire, Jiang Cheng learned, flourished even in love’s absence. It surged hot and fast through his veins at the sight of Nie Huaisang’s spread thighs, marks still lingering from the last rendezvous they had. He felt it burning through his chest as Huaisang raked lines down his back, breaths coming in short, desperate gasps: “Jiang Wanyin, Jiang Wanyin, please, please.”
It’s a little bit clumsy at times, but also very passionate and intense in a way I still find compelling. Featuring a lot of self sabotaging Jiang Cheng.
When your stitch comes loose by heyninja
https://archiveofourown.org/works/27868454/chapters/68234434
Sometimes people see you for who you really are. Sometimes because you let them. Sometimes whether you like it or not.
A triptych of collisions between Nie Huaisang and Jiang Cheng.
Only the last part is post canon but it’s the most important part, isn’t it?
Peel your heart like a pomegranate by Izumi_silverleaf
https://archiveofourown.org/works/29458974
"It's an extraordinary feeling when parts of your body are touched for the first time. I'm thinking of the sensations from sex and surgery."
Sometimes you just need to read a very hot guro fic. It’s a weird fic but it’s a cool one.
If you give a Nie a cushion by LesbianLazerOwl
https://archiveofourown.org/works/29470236
Prompt: Long enough After Canon that everyone's mostly okay these days, Jiang Cheng and Nie Huaisang get drunk and wind up comparing masturbation habits; each is aghast at how the other spends their personal time.
Funny and hot
To Distraction by isozyme
https://archiveofourown.org/works/27763816
It’s the third night of Yunmeng’s kite festival celebrations. Nie Huaisang has come visiting, eager to partake in the food, the arts, and Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng wants to forget. Nie Huaisang has some new lube and wants to see if he can put his whole fist in somebody’s ass.
Established pairing in which Nie Huaisang fists Jiang Cheng. It’s hot.
Safe in Your arms by Dragon_scribe
https://archiveofourown.org/works/30070503/chapters/74058315
In the aftermath of a night hunt gone (very) wrong, Jiang Cheng wakes up to find himself in the Unclean Realm. As he recovers from his injuries, he and Nie Huaisang grow closer and as time passes, their friendship begins to shift to something more.
Very sweet/sappy and hurt/comfort orientated, with a small bit of reconciliation dimension too.
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Past [Part 3] (Obsession)
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6
Tom Riddle's Moodboard
Main Character's Moodboard
~////////////////𓆙////////////////~
1940 - 3rd year
There’s no chance of getting out of this. Our mentor must be out of their mind. No smooth sailing this period, not for me. Nothing at all has prepared me for this point in time.
My heartbeat rises by the second. At the brink of jumping out of my chest. I constantly try to reassure myself as I prepare. Forcing the illusion that I have everything together.
I most definitely don’t have anything, not a crumb, together.
My hands sweat with anticipation, my wand almost slipping off multiple times. The magical stick even wants to run away from this situation. I’ll start running with it soon enough.
The whole room is quiet in expectation. The tension levels in this area are too high for me to even start to comprehend. All I can hear is the sounds of my breathing and the occasional ruffle of robes. The high regard these people hold for me isn’t doing me any favors. I’m about to ruin any confidence anyone holds in my skills.
My friends are holding their thumbs up for encouragement. It does little to calm my panic, but I appreciate the effort anyway. Other acquaintances from the same house nodded their heads in an attempt to console my emotions.
Before the teacher signals to start, he gives us a bit to come up with a plan. Ten seconds at most. Now, this isn’t something possible to win. Not against him, no. My only goal here is to last as long as I can and don’t mess up.
Act smart, seem like you know more than you do.
He looks as easy-going as ever. This may seem like a walk in the gardens to him. No “threat” whatsoever to make him feel uneasy. I’m quite irritated at the thought of being anything but a challenge. He may be a little right, but that doesn’t help my ego.
Easy, I’m nothing easy.
Riddle might be stronger at this, but that doesn’t mean I'm complete garbage. I can hold my own, I will hold my own.
My breathing patterns change into more of a deep inhale and exhale. Focusing on completely dropping my heart rate and keeping my thoughts intact. Madam Rose, the school nurse, hates seeing me walk in there. Frequent visits from dealing with plants has her hair getting pulled out. I don’t think Miss Rose would be too keen on me passing out from the lack of oxygen.
“Only stick with the one basic spell of force. For both offensive and defensive tactics.”
Riddle’s atmosphere surrounding him is focused, deadly. He hasn’t moved his gaze from my lips. Probably on guard for whenever I cast something. I’m slightly unsteady on my feet from nerves. It’s almost suffocating being under all these watchful eyes.
A snake takes their time to strike. They examine all angles where you may be weak. Testing the vulnerability of your actions and thinking process. A few testing snaps of their mouth can tell them how the fight will go. They are well-balanced and focused, masters of intimidation.
Breathing.
Oxygen informs the snake how much you’re able to hold on for. The more you intake, the tighter it gets. Restricting the amount of oxygen the prey respires. Until they are physically unable to anymore, slowly weakening. The fight they were presenting lessens to almost non-distinguishable. The prey’s struggling to get free, dying down. Then it passes away, openly given to the snake without any more thought. A mere temporary meal in its eyes.
“Begin.”
Our eye contact is steady, neither of us moving an inch. Our mouths are closed shut, wands at the ready. I slightly squint my eyes while I focus. If he’s waiting for me to go first he is out of luck. I’m not budging, we will stay in the same position until next period if we have to.
Riddle also slightly squints his eyes. His hand doesn’t shake even if his wand was out in the air for a long time. The arm he holds out is steady and unmoving. Nothing triggers my attention since his movements are of little importance. I search his eyes for any life, no emotion is found swirling in those charcoal black eyes. Absolutely brilliant and fierce when focused or aggravated. The class starts getting rowdy, finally allowed to talk since Riddle just made the first move.
There’s only one spell I need to remember, that makes it a little easier to think of ways to find my opening. I quickly revert the spell away from me and send it right back. A tennis match is played between that one spell. Tom huffs and sends his enchantment straight towards the ground. It bursts into tiny magical specks of green. During that time I sent a spell his way.
After a while, I start to notice right before he casts a spell he moves his mouth like he inhales to take a breath. I’ve noticed him do it quite often. Since he casts fairly quickly there wasn’t much to go off of. Not much to use to my advantage. When he “inhales” he’s most of the time not actually breathing in air. It’s just a simple movement he does. It might be because of his accent, the way he learned to talk. Quite a small little quirk of the lips.
To start testing out this theory I centered most of my attention on his mouth. Waiting to see if my theory was reliable enough to depend on. He’s starting to gain more offensive attacks on me. Most of my spells undecidedly move more defensive by the minute.
Right before he mutters the words, I send a spell of my own. The magic aiming for his knees. Before he could defend himself from that one I prepared another offensive conjuration to his wand. He forwarded an incantation my way and I hurriedly obviated the sorcery as it was also heading to my stifle joint. Some of the force still slightly makes contact with my left knee. My balance is suddenly thrown off.
As I scramble to catch my footing, Riddle with point accuracy parries my wand attack. Then diverts my knee attack towards my right knee. Since I was focused on stabilizing my posture I didn’t notice the spell approaching my other knee
Forthcoming my inevitable demise.
I end up planting both hands on the ground. My knees falling one after the other from the pressure.
Our audience starts yelling complaints and praise. Calls for a rematch and cheats. My loss was bound to happen, but I did get to do that three combo. Two offensive and one defensive, all in the span of 5 seconds. Not too bad if I say so myself.
“Mr. Riddle wins this duel. Excellent job to the both of you. A very good strategy was well thought out for each side.”
I make my way down the steps on my platform’s side. Immediately being greeted by hugs and pats on the back.
At least my feet didn’t get tied together from restlessness causing me to fall and he wins the duel immediately. I would have dropped out right then and there from embarrassment.
There’s barely any feedback for Riddle, his little posse praising him like a king. People either saw no fault in him or were too frightened to actually comment on it publicly.
For me, that’s another case. Quite a bit of suggestions are offered, keep my form ready and my attention on more than one thing. Any and all advice is welcomed. Who knows how it can help me one day.
Amelia hugs my side with the biggest grin on her face, “You did so well! I think he actually had to work a little for that win.”
Everyone is dismissed and we head our way to Herbology. Tom’s face looks as if he’s already forgotten about the duel. His body language remains tranquil as ever.
~////////////////𓆙////////////////~
Bubotuber pus, one of the grossest things I’ve had the misfortune of learning at home. Now I have to live through it again? How can one endure harvesting the essence?
“All of you are required to wear gloves for today’s class. Does anyone know what effects you would have when touching this substance with your bare skin?”
Quite a number of students raise their hands. I’m guessing they did research on why they needed to buy these gloves when handed the school procurement catalog.
Exactly what I did, curiosity might actually kill the cat.
“Yes, you sweet girl,” she picks, “What’s your name?”
“Merlene,” the student answers, “If you touch this without protection then extremely painful boils will appear in its stead.”
“Correct! 5 points to Hufflepuff,” she claps.
My fingers already lay inside the dragon-hide gloves. Its rough texture rubs against the calluses from dealing with the harsh stems of different plants.
This substance is usually processed to be used for acne treatments. Only touched in its weakened state. Oddly satisfying to some, I am not a part of that group of people
“This is disgusting,” I say as I harvest the pus. My gagging reflexes acting up every time the plant gets squeezed.
A few students chuckle at my remark. They seem to be having a good time, weirdly focused on this substance. It smells of petrol, not a big fan of the scent. Reminds me of the sketchy gas stations my parents and I would take on family road trips.
Its thick goo is finally contained in bottles. Relief washes over me from finishing the collecting process. My gloves are removed and I do a quick spell to clean my area. Nothing really fell on it so it didn’t need scrubbing beforehand.
Amelia seems to just be finishing her plant. A lot of goo splashed all over her table. Luckily it doesn’t seem like any of that touched anyone’s face or uncovered arms.
“I’m just about done, can you help with cleaning please?” Amelia starts collecting all of her bottles into her arms. None of the glass vials touched in green gunk.
“Yeah, I got you, turn those in to the professor.” I immediately started helping her out. In that process, I also cleaned other’s messes too. Why not, there is still time to waste until we can all leave. Cleaning products smell better than whatever chemicals intoxicate the air.
“Pop quiz, shout out the answers. Why not use spells instead of treated bubotuber pus for treatments?”
Easy question, I whisper the answer in Amelia’s ear when she comes back from turning in the assignment so she can shout it.
“Using spells proves to be too risky, like the Eloise Midgen incident,” she answers.
Good, she remembers Eloise's event.
“Yeah, she cursed her nose off, poofed from existence,” a girl from Hufflepuff adds.
“Precisely, everyone has permission to leave now,” the professor exclaims, “don’t head out without cleaning or I’ll reduct points. Last time a student got boils all over their hand from an improperly cleaned station.”
~////////////////𓆙////////////////~
“It actually went decently. Nothing blew up, surprisingly.”
At lunch, we are all talking about our first three classes. Potions being our first topic.
“Thought as much, I saw your stupid grin. You looked like you just won the wizarding lottery,” I say with my mouth stuffed with food. Hoping they could understand me between my chews.
“Both of you, slow down. The food ain’t going anywhere damn,” Devyn laughs.
Amelia and I pause, we look at each other, then at Devyn, then back to us. After a silent halt in our actions, we continue to shove down a bunch of food.
“I noticed you kept gagging at the pus. You looked queasy, your face was so pale.”
I audibly shiver at the recollection of said class. My eyes were watering so bad there. That stuff would never stop coming.
“I’m eating, stop mentioning that nasty stuff,” Amelia starts shaking her head. If only I could see the thoughts forcefully being shaken out of her head.
“You should have seen her station. That stuff was everywhere. How bad is your aim, the opening to the bottle wasn’t that small?”
“It wasn’t even that!” she drops her fork, “I squeezed that bloody plant too hard and it squirted everywhere!”
“Poor choice of words,” Devyn snickers. All she gets is a shove from me.
“Get your mind out of the gutter, she’s clearly traumatized.”
Devyn shoves me back, “You’re clearly traumatized from the duel. The one you failed at, the one-”
“I’m aware of the duel you’re talking about,” I interrupt, “I bet you wouldn’t have lasted as long as I did.”
“Oh please, you’re just salty about losing.”
I roll my eyes and subconsciously scan the room for him. There he is, mysteriously talking to his group of buddies. After a little bit, he catches onto my staring. He briefly looked around him to see if I was looking at something else. Finally, he comes to the realization it was in fact him I was blessing with my attention.
During this, he was talking to his friend next to him. He stopped his conversation to completely give me his attention. The guy he was just talking to engaged in another conversation quickly.
The moment was interrupted with hands waving in front of my face, “You gonna eat that?”
“Nah I’m full, go ahead.”
Riddle continued on with his food. Never looking my way again.
~////////////////𓆙////////////////~
“Hey, uh, Riddle you have a second?”
I stop him by tapping his shoulder a couple of times. His height already makes mountains seem molecular.
He furrowed his eyebrows and glances at the shoulder I just touched. Making it a scene to dust that part off, what an ass.
“No, I really don’t have a second,” he responds.
“Well that, really, sucks for you huh. Can you teach me techniques for dueling?”
“No,” he starts to turn away.
“Please, you will get one favor from me. Whatever you need.”
Tom turns back around, “Anything? Does that favor expire?”
I shake my head no. If he plans to wait a long time he’ll probably forget about it. He seems to be deep in thought for a bit. No rush really since we're on our break. If he agrees I could get ahead of so many competitors.
“Fine, every Friday afternoon starting tomorrow in the Room of Requirement.”
He immediately strides away while I stare back in shock. My brain didn’t expect him to actually accept. Getting this far wasn’t a very possible outcome.
Now I just have to find out where the Room of Requirement is located.
~////////////////𓆙////////////////~
Taglist:
@empath-bunny
@jinxqsu
#tom riddle x oc#tom riddle imagine#tom riddle#tom marvolo riddle#tom riddle x reader#tom riddle x you#tom riddle x y/n#lord voldemort#voldemort#gryffindor#ravenclaw#hufflepuff#slytherin#hogwarts#wizard#post wizarding war#enemies to allies#enemies to friends to lovers#enemies to lovers#angst#oc#poc#Oc is any race#horcrux#moldy voldy
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Any alive! Skulduggery hcs that you haven't shared? I live by your version of him tbh
Hi anon! I think I covered skug's backstory up to when he signs up to fight and then skipped ahead to when he meets his wife, so you can have the Early War Years
- so when we left skug, he'd been on the pirate adventure and essentially moved in with ghastly's family at age 16, and that's where he stays for the next three years. Ghastly's father introduces him to taking pride in his appearance, Ghastly introduces him to Hopeless, and Ghastly's mother Saoirse introduces him to three things: motherly love, household chores, and the back of her hand for swearing in the house. He settles into the family, flirts with the prettiest local girls, develops an allergy to manual labour, and starts Experimenting™ with Ghastly, who's absolutely besotted with him.
- at 19, he has his surge, and it's bad. Ghastly has his a few months earlier, and it wasn't pleasant, but Ghastly was always going to be an elemental. He was sick and achy for a few days and howling in pain for just one or two. Skug expects much the same: he hasn't used necromancy in years, and he's had the best elemental tutors his parents could find.
- But he's inherited an insanely strong necromancy gene from his biological father, and an insanely strong elemental gene from his mother, and his surge ultimately comes down to two branches of magic trying to destroy each other to be the last gene standing. His temperature skyrockets as the elemental gene tries to burn the necromancy out of him. What looks like black blood seeps from his eyes and his nose and the corner of his mouth. His veins go black as the shadows retaliate. It goes on for days. Ghastly's mother is beside herself trying to get water into him so he doesn't die of thirst.
- If he hadn't also inherited the extremely rare genetic abnormality responsible for magical ambidexterity, his surge would've killed him. But he did, so it doesn't, and eventually he comes out of it and spends the next six months or so just recovering.
- at this point, the sanctuary is pushing recruitment. Ghastly doesn't look twice at the posters, but skug does. Ghastly's whole world is his family, their farm, and his father's tailoring business. But skug's father is a diplomat, he's got extended family involved in the war, he was supposed to go to a fancy French university that ended up being burned down during an attack by some pro-Mevolent riots, he's had to field questions from smaller siblings about when - and if - their dad would be coming home. He's highly educated, politically savvy, and emotionally involved. He decides he wants to sign up to fight.
- Saoirse does her best to talk him out of it, but skug is skug, and he digs his heels in and insists this is what he wants to do. He's going to join the war effort.
- Ghastly and Hopeless think it over and decide to join up with him. Hopeless, because he's an idealistic young man looking for glory, and Ghastly because someone has to watch skulduggery's back and keep him out of trouble, or he'll get himself shot long before he gets to set foot on a battlefield.
- honestly, ghastly isn't expecting skug to last long in the army. Skug is a pampered spoiled rich brat, and he's about to be surrounded by people who will scream in his face and make him do drills and expect him to obey orders, and he thinks it will take a few weeks tops before skug wants to desert
- that is. Not what happens
- like. none of them like it very much to begin with. hopeless has never had to do this much exercise in his life, and he hates it. ghastly is lonely and homesick and just wants to go back to dublin. and their first CO decides he hates skug on like, their first day of training, because he's a smart-mouthed arrogant asshole who's never had to be afraid of anything but his own father, and he does not react well to being ridiculed during drills. skug's ego takes a good solid battering because the other enlistees don't appreciate being given extra chores as punishment for him mouthing off, ghastly has to crack some skulls to make sure he won't be bullied for his scars, hopeless doesn't quite fit in and gets some nasty ribbing over it
- but also? they've got untapped talent, all three of them. they end up black ops fighters for a reason. hopeless tops the class for intelligence and undercover operations, because he can become anyone. ghastly is strong and level-headed and does well under pressure. and skulduggery is a natural leader, a ruthless tactician, and has a tendency to pull off insane plans that would go horribly for anyone else.
- they survive basic training. they get sent into the field. and ghastly and hopeless find that they're actually pretty good at this. they earn the respect of the rest of their platoon. and skulduggery? he starts to thrive
- this is the era of wealthy aristocrats buying their way into leadership positions they don't have the experience or common sense to do well in. almost none of the lower-class soldiers have any patience for it, but as a fellow aristo Skug has the social standing to call them out on it, so he still has a habit of making enemies of his commanding officers. he resents being handed orders by men who are less than he is, less clever, less observant, less capable. he goes out of his way to prove that his way of doing things is better.
- and? it works for him, sort of. he gets promoted several times - first he's pulled out of the enlisted ranks to be trained up as an officer, then he makes lieutenant, then captain - partly because he's Challenging to deal with and partly because he's becoming incredibly competent. it's fairly common for skug to get a flogging (for disobeying orders) and a promotion (because it worked out well for him) simultaneously. he has quite a few stripes by the time he meets wifey. when he starts being given command of a squad of his own, he takes ghastly with him as his number two, and hopeless comes along for the ride.
- at some point, skug gets palmed off on then-colonel corrival deuce. it's phrased as "oh here i'll give you some of my best men", but corrival is experienced enough to recognise "god please take this one off my hands im begging you" when he sees it, and sure enough, he butts heads with skug almost as soon as they're introduced.
- by this point skulduggery's men have developed a reputation for being a bit wild, and they're very loyal to him, so corrival has his work cut out. but? he's got a bit of a different approach to a lot of his fellow officers, because he came up through the ranks himself. so instead of locking horns with skug and trying to flog him into compliance, he turns skug into his pet project, his protégé. he gives him a loose rein, defends his decisions to the higher-ups, and doesn't interfere too much with how skug runs his team, but he also doesn't tolerate backtalk, bullshit or cheek. he's the stern-but-fair mentor figure - the Captain Holt/Captain Pellew/Lord Wellington to skug's Peralta/Hornblower/Sharpe. and skug's never had a very involved father figure, because ghastly's father is massively introverted and his own was short-tempered and perpetually disappointed in him, so corrival trips his "kids want boundaries" switch and actually wins him over.
- corrival hangs onto him after that. as he gets promoted and moved around, skug goes with him, and by extension so do his team. corrival learns to use the sensible members of the group - ghastly and hopeless, then erskine - to triangulate skug and stop his temper getting the better of him. he's incredibly proud of his chosen men, and all three of them really come into their own under his guidance. skug turns down promotion a couple times because it would mean a change of CO, and he knows there aren't many people he'd take orders from anymore.
- and then skug meets wifey.
- when skug gets married, neither his mother or father attend. they don't approve of wifey or her pitiful dowry. they assume, as does kenspeckle, that he's marrying her to Do The Decent Thing because he's knocked her up, and his father reassures him that he doesn't have to marry the girl, just send her somewhere far away and send her money to support her brat, and this whole sorry indiscretion can be put behind him. skug is. furious. he was smart enough not to take wifey with him to announce the engagement, and he ends up having a screaming match with his father that ends with him a) walking out and b) getting disinherited. he marries her anyway, and despite mr and mrs pleasant senior snubbing the whole event, he's got a full complement of parents there all the same - ghastly's parents turn up, and so does corrival.
- it's a military thing - skug's in his military dress uniform, they cut the cake with his sword - the parade sword, at least, the one he's never actually used, they walk out of the venue through the sword arch and skug's team do the rifle salute. ghastly's mother drags him to one side, pulls him down by the shirtfront to fuss over his hair and try to make it lay flat, licks her thumb and wipes a smudge off his cheek, embarrasses him in front of all his friends. then corrival snags him while they're waiting for the bride, tells him off for not having perfectly shiny buttons, redoes his collar for him, and tells him, "You'll do" like he isn't about to cry a lil. he offers skug some whiskey from his flask "for courage" and without really thinking skug says he doesn't need it because he's never been so sure about anything in his life and corrival is just. he's fine. he's not choked up at all. stand up straight, boy, for god's sake.
- he also makes a speech ghastly still brings up hundreds of years later, because it's the soppiest the old man ever got with any of them. along the lines of "i never had a son, and if i had, i like to think he would've turned out absolutely nothing like you, because you are single-handedly the reason i am going grey several hundred years ahead of schedule. that being said, i couldn't be prouder of the man you've become; you are at least half as stubborn and annoying now as you were when i met you, and i think i can claim at least some of the credit." and then, to wifey, "as to you, my dear, you have freed me, this monster is yours now. to your health, and my heartiest hopes that your future children turn out like you, because one of him is plenty."
- wifey laughs until her sides hurt and she's wheezing. skug pretends he's offended. ghastly wolf-whistles noisily and gets clipped round the ear by his mama. corrival tears up a little in the middle of his speech and clears his throat to hide it. and when it's all over and they're about to leave, wifey thanks him for coming because she knows it meant a lot to skug, and he promises her he'll do his best to bring skug home safe and sound until this damnable war is over.
(he wishes he'd been able to keep that promise until the day he dies)
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Freefall
Ship: Jamil/Yuu, female MC
Words: 1,502
Fic under the cut
“Hmm? You wanna try riding a broomstick?” Kalim asked light-heartedly. “Jamil’s one of the best in class, maybe you should ask him instead! Hey Jamil!”
Well, all it took was one off-hand remark about wishing to be able to fly like the others on a broomstick and Kalim was already off, dragging a confused Jamil to where Yuu stood in her gym “uniform”- a simple sweatshirt and sweatpants combo. Yuu’s gym sessions consisted of running laps around the grounds and wistfully looking at the students flying. And teasing the Octatrio.
Now Jamil’s in front of her, eyes carefully assessing...what? He is looking at her but she can’t tell what he’s thinking. With a sigh that hopefully wasn’t out of exasperation, Jamil got his broomstick floating and hopped on, sitting more towards the tail-end of it. He looked enquiringly at Yuu-
“Aren’t you getting on?” he asked simply, pointing down in front of him.
Oh. Oh. Yuu’ll be sitting in front of Jamil. The thought made her heart skip a beat. Not wanting to keep him waiting, she shoved aside any budding ideas and tentatively sat in the indicated space, gripping the broom tightly.
Immediately Jamil scooted forward, his chest enveloping Yuu’s smaller back and placed his hands right over hers. “Don’t worry, I’ll be gentle” he whispered into her ear.
Yuu felt like this was some kind of cruel dream. There’s no way he chose those words to speak, right? This must be some kind of fantasy her mind conjured up in a last-ditch effort to stay awake in Trein’s class. Thinking about Jamil does make her stay VERY awake.
However the moment the broom started to fly, Yuu felt her stomach drop at the sudden increase in altitude, jolting her back to the present. “Sorry, was that too fast? Let me know if I should take it slow.” Jamil’s silky voice once again serenaded her ear. “A-a little slower please? I am not used to this.” Jamil chuckled as a response. At this point Yuu was hyper-aware of the proximity of his face to hers, his chest to her back and his arms enclosing hers and his legs- oh- his legs were flush against hers, his sneakered feet tucked under hers and holding them up. Feeling the shared heat of their intertwined legs almost made Yuu gasp out loud. Forcing her eyes shut, she tried to rewire her thoughts to their alchemy homework and just focus on the sensation of the wind whipping through her hair instead of-
“Hey are you alright? Should I stop? Do you wanna get down?” Jamil’s hushed voice sounded genuinely concerned.
“Sorry! Sorry, I just got a little overwhelmed.”
“Does this make you feel better?” Yuu felt Jamil’s arm snake around her waist, holding her even closer to his body.
“Yes. Much better” she managed to squeak out, as her face and body seemed to be aflame.
The rest of the flight was fairly uneventful. Yuu felt comfortable with the gentle pressure of Jamil’s body and turned her head a little to catch a glimpse of his face. He had his usual stoic face on but Yuu thought she might have caught a bit of red there. Soon, Jamil made quips about each student they passed over causing Yuu to giggle over his deadpan delivery of said jabs. They flew at a leisurely pace, mostly quiet save for a few Oohs from Yuu’s side when she had a new view of something she saw everyday.
Little did she know, every word and sound she let out made the boy behind her blush and feel incredibly proud to be the only one to witness it and (indirectly) be the reason for her reactions.
***
Jamil did not know why and how he was suddenly seated behind Yuu, if you gave someone a lift on the broomstick, they were the one who sat behind. But here he is, body lined up closely against her. As if his body moved on instinct without his brain directing it and only now waking up to the fact that they were in extremely close physical contact. Jamil wondered if he was being inappropriate for a moment before he felt Yuu sigh and lean into him more and glance back at him, with a shy smile. Jamil felt like his heart would burst out of his chest any moment. Looking for a way to calm his mind, he spotted Azul down below and immediately came up with a snarky comment. That made her laugh and Jamil’s heart soared once more. They fell into a comfortable banter, Jamil hanging on to every word she said.
He found it easy to talk to her, especially after the whole Overblot debacle. And he caught himself wishing to talk more and more to her and make her smile, laugh, just react to his words in general (positively of course). He staunchly refused to ponder over his desire for her attention and simply dismissed his tumultuous feelings and convinced himself he cared for her as a friend and all his feelings were platonic. Nevermind the fact that he has NEVER taken anyone for a ride on his broomstick, not even Kalim. And yet…
Kalim MUST have known this would happen. No wonder he asked him to help Yuu despite being a competent flier himself. Jamil felt a twinge of annoyance. But it was quickly quelled as he heard Yuu say his name. Deciding to deal with these troublesome thoughts later, Jamil fell back into conversation, keeping his voice neutral with practiced ease even if his heart was thumping frantically in excitement.
The day was sunny and breezy and they were flying for well over 20 minutes. They had already crossed the grounds a few times. Jamil sighed. They should probably land. His body was getting a little stiff from not moving much from this position. And it was Yuu’s first time flying.
“I think we should descend soon…” he said, reluctantly.
“Oh. Hmm..” Yuu said. “A little more? Please?” To emphasize her point, she leaned back into Jamil and looked at him again. ‘Unfair!’ Jamil thought. ‘There’s no way I’d say no now.’ he sighed, but smiled at her.
***
“Hey Jamil, why don’t we go a bit faster? Can you do a roll? Wait, is it possible to do it with 2 people?”
The prospect of their ride coming to an end made Yuu curious about all the things she wanted to try.
“It could be done…”
“PLEASE CAN WE DO IT THEN?”
“...
Alright, please hold on tight. Do let me know if I should stop.”
Saying so, Jamil tightened his grip on Yuu and leaned further in, almost pinning her to the broom. With his other hand, he gently tugged hers and repositioned them closer to their bodies and once again placed his over hers, his thumb idly stroking her skin. The gesture was barely noticed by Yuu because immediately then Jamil maneuvered the broom to tilt sharply sideways and quickly roll once, twice and then after a moment’s pause, speed up. With a tug of his hand the broom flew upwards, performing a loop and then slowly decelerated before hovering to a stop.
Yuu felt the rush of adrenaline coursing through her, her hair was all over the place but she could only breathlessly laugh as Jamil hummed casually against her.
“That was so fucking amazing!! Ahh thank you Jamil for obliging me.”
Below them, Kalim whooped while Jack asked (yelled) if Yuu’s okay. Yuu yelled back she is, causing Jamil to pull his face back a little involuntarily as her voice was too loud.
“Ahh sorry sorry. I am done yelling, you can come back now.” Yuu said lightly before realizing what she meant. She felt herself blush and thankfully Jamil didn’t comment, quietly leaning back in, his lips close to her ear once again. She could hear his steady breathing if she concentrated (not like she was actively trying to!!).
“Yuu…” he spoke, his words barely a whisper. Yuu could have sworn his lips made contact with her skin. He seemed to drawl out her name and it gave her butterflies.
“J-Jamil?” she asked back, her spirits dampened slightly, knowing full well what he wanted to say.
He sighed, the action causing all sorts of feelings to bloom inside Yuu.
“We should get off. I am sorry, it’s getting a little late. BUT- we can maybe do this again later-”
“Definitely!!!”
Jamil smiled. Yuu felt like her heart would burst out of happiness.
As they got off, Yuu immediately felt her back go cold, missing Jamil’s warmth. As their friends jogged towards them, Jamil ducked close and said in a low voice- “Went a little hard at the end because you asked for it. I hope you can walk straight until our next ride.” then proceeded to saunter off towards Kalim, broom in hand.
Yuu felt her knees grow weak and it was hard to answer if it was because of the flying or Jamil.
#jamil viper#twisted wonderland#jamil x yuu#twst#twst jamil#i am sorry this is so thirsty#i love him so much#very self-indulgent#as usual#my fic#my writing#god i love mr jamil viper so fking much#help me
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Ok hot take: The Eggpire should’ve won at the banquet.
Gonna be honest I really want the Eggpire to win in a major stream. It’s just... I guess I’ve always had trouble taking them seriously and antagonistic force? Let me explain why.
One of the things I love about The Dream SMP is the fact that the antagonists have a long history of winning. When it’s a battle between 2 conflicting sides it feels like battle, and (in the older streams especially) because of the improvised status people didn’t hold back, and it felt like if someone managed to win organically there would be no chance of retcons. Anything can happen. That’s the best part of it being streams, there’s no “oh there’s a bunch of episodes left with ‘insert thing here’ in the title, so they to win”. There are real, unpredictable stakes. Not to mention, every major antagonist has done something tangible, and had something that makes them a real threat. Let’s look at the antagonists thus far:
Dream (l’mansburg independence war):
Actively prevented L’mansburg from becoming a thing. He was the admin, it was his say.
Had stolen the Discs back in the disc war
Got Eret to betray everyone, causing all of the members to die
Blew up the nation itself
Killed Tommy in a duel
Got power over Tommy via the discs
Basically won the war
Final Explanation: Though this was back when there was less roleplay there was still tangible acts and reasons to take him seriously. Not only did he have a past with conflict with the current “protagonist”, he basically won at every step of the way. He was bad, because he stood in the way of the “protagonists” getting what they want, and he had real power to do that.
Jschlatt:
Had the presidency, and by the viewer vote rather than a simple power seize (legitimacy as a threat)
Had the charisma/intimidation to get the citizens of L’mansburg to enforce an exile of Tommy and Wilbur
The speech. You know the one.
 Was abusive to Quackity
Killed cats
Taxed Niki (and got her to pay said taxes)
Caused Wilbur’s downward spiral
Manipulated Tubbo, and purposefully kept him from Tommy
Had the intimidation/charisma/perceived power to get Techno to kill Tubbo (his ally) at the festival.
Was directly responsible for Tubbo loosing his cannon lives, this would later be one of the reasons he was so vulnerable to Dream
Warped the nation into something that felt wrong
Got Dream to betray Pogtopia
Final Explanation: While Jschlatt didn’t have a lot of power tangibly, he had a ton of power in convincing others to do things, and was very good at seeming powerful. That being said the effects of this persuasion had the tangible consequences of lives lost, and lost allies. Not to mention he wasn’t even the main antagonist on Doomsday, I’d argue that goes to...
Wilbur Soot:
Blew up L’mansburg
Lied to Tommy, and betrayed him on Doomsday
Was someone the audience saw as a good person before Wilbur’s downward spiral (legitimacy)
His speeches were some of the most iconic in the series
Was someone Tommy looked up to
Worked with Dream, a known antagonist
Actively egged on Tommy’s anger in the pit
Kept trying to pressure Tommy to do things he repeatedly said he didn’t want to do
Actively staged the blowing up if L’mansburg so that Tommy would be onstage when it blew up. Tommy who also only had one cannon life. Even if it didn’t succeed, attempted murder to prove a point is not okay.
Didn’t care when Tubbo died in the festival
Didn’t care that Tubbo was onstage
Didn’t care that Tubbo was onstage when he blew up L’mansburg
Final Explanation: Even if you don’t view Wilbur as a bad person, he has done some bad things, and was most certainly an antagonist. He destroyed the nation we worked to build, and his paranoia caused him to do actions that could be described charitably as questionable.
.
Dream (exile conflict and beyond):
(Oh boy, this is gonna be a long list...)
Did everything himself (legitimacy x10, especially after Jschlatt’s power and downfall being reliant on others)
Previous history as an antagonist
Super skilled and powerful. One of the best fighters on the server. Extremely powerful. (legitimacy)
Took 2 of Tommy’s cannon lives. Eventually took all 3.
Used the threat of Tommy’s death to get him to go what he wanted. A threat caused by said taking of 2 cannon lives.
Built walls around L’mansburg, and forced Tubbo to exile Tommy for him to stop
Blew up Tommy’s armor (and other stuff) every day in Exile
Manipulate Tubbo into thinking he was his friend.
Told ghostbur to go into the forest and leave Tommy so he would be alone at the party
Kicked George off the thrown
Payed Sam to make Pandora’s Vault to imprison all his enemies. Actively helped with the construction.
Telling Tommy his friends hated him
Telling Tommy that Tubbo never actually visited to make him question his sanity
Just, his entire abuse and manipulation of Tommy
Overall, just exile (I’m not going to list everything, there’s too much)
Seemingly having no points of attack against him (legitimacy)
The scenes of Techno to get Techno to hand over Tommy (legitimacy)
Getting Techno to team with him to blow up L’mansburg (legitimacy)
Blowing up L’mansburg for a final time
The fact that him, Techno, and Phil won against the entire rest of the server (legitimacy)
His manipulation and control of Ranboo
The Vault, and him getting Tubbo and Tommy into a vulnerable position despite their preparations
The fact he was going to force Tommy to be completely isolated in a prison with the only think he could do is think about how it’s kind of his fault his friend died
The fact he was going to kill Tubbo
The fact he was going to keep Skeppy in a 1 by 1 cage to blackmail BBH
The fact he was going to steal all the server’s most valuable possessions to control them
Manipulating Sapnap during his prison visit, so he could facilitate further manipulation of Ranboo
Killing Tommy in the prison
Laughing after her killed Tommy in prison
Saying he was going to kill him again as an experiment
Saying he was going to brung back Wilbur, specifically after Tommy begged him not too
His reaction to people finding out about Tommy’s death and revival was “do they think it’s cool”
You get the point, Dream was done a lot. Its a very long list.
Final Explanation: Dream is powerful because he physically does everything himself. He has no apparent weakness. He’s manipulative, seemingly obsessed with hurting Tommy, physically powerful, and is the primary antagonist to the server. He wins the majority of the time, and when he wins it doesn’t feel like anything could be done to prevent it. He also relies on himself for basically everything. Overall, Dream does an amazing job of being an effective threat.
While I could go into the other characters that are more controversial as being classified as “antagonists”, I think you get the point. What makes antagonists on the sever intimidating is the tangible things they do. Every good antagonist on the server has a list of mostly irreversible tangible effects of the plot. Jschlatt got Tubbo executed, Wilbur blew up L’mansburg, Dream did... a lot of things. Every major antagonist has succeeded in some way at successfully irreversibly hurting or destroying something the audience had an active attachment to. However in my eyes the egg has not done this as well as the other antagonists.
What makes the egg different from any other antagonist as its fundamentally a bunch of blocks, rather than an actual person. Not to say the egg can’t work because of it, but in general selling the audience of the idea that it’s am actual dangerous force is extremely important. Unfortunately, it doesn’t really succeed in doing so.
Let’s attempt what we did for all the other antagonists, but this time apply it to the Eggpire. Let’s see what they have they done:
The Eggpire (feel free to add anything I miss):
The egg warps the mind of those on the server. It can generally influence people into either loving or seemingly into hating it.
It twisted Bad (an previously wholesome character, but with hints of a darker side) into someone willing to do some pretty bad things, including murder (legitimacy)
It brainwashes its members into working for it
The Egg took Skeppy, this is likely why Bad is willing to work for it
They tried to kill Tommy multiple times simply for the fact he’s immune to the egg
They celebrated Tommy’s death due to his connection with the egg
They tried to feed Puffy (someone originally a part of the Eggpire) to the egg. They eventually send a mercenary after her as well.
They put Sam in a hole with The Egg overnight. Though he did not join, he ate his own skin, however this has not been mentioned as a persisting injury, or even been mentioned again to my knowledge.
They stuck Ranboo in the hole near the Egg. This caused him to freak out and later try to destroy it.
They stuck Hannah in a box near The Egg despite her allergy to it.
The egg blew up a statue in the Foolish confrontation.
They trick and trap everyone at the Red Banquet
They planned to execute a room full of people
They Killed Foolish
So on the surface, it looks like they’ve done a lot of bad things on par with the others. However upon a closer look you will realize something: almost everything on this list either failed, or was something that had no importance established before The Egg plot started. Let me explain why with all the corresponding bullets:
The egg warps the mind of those on the server. Yes, it technically does, but when you think about it no one who actively was against the egg has been forced to join it. The only person was Bad and it wasn’t The Egg’s control, it was Skeppy. Even those left overnight with it haven’t joined. We can only conclude it’s abilities are fairly weak.
It twisted Bad. Actually this is a fair one, though it should be noted Bad had basically no plot relevance before this arc. However, though this one is a legitimate source of legitimacy for The Egg, it’s a bit counteracted by all the other points.
It brainwashes its members into working for it. Does it really though? Basically everyone but Bad was influenced by it offering power. No one who actively hated the idea of joining the Egg has joined it, despite Bad’s claims. They mostly all joined for power, power they seemingly have no gotten. But still not much has changed as The Badlands was already power hungry before The Egg. It can be argued that thats the point, but it still fails in relation to all the other Eggpire failures.
The Egg took Skeppy, this is likely why Bad is willing to work for it. This is another good one... except it happened 4 months ago...
They tried to kill Tommy multiple times. Yes they tried. And failed. Multiple times.
They celebrated Tommy’s death due to his connection with the egg. While this is bad as an action, it’s more of a “look how x has effected these characters” than an actual tangible bad act. It’s more of a dick move than evil.
They tried to feed Puffy to The Egg. They eventually send a mercenary after her as well. Yes they tried. And failed. And yes they did try to send a mercenary. A mercenary who not only failed, but betrayed them.
They put Sam in a hole with The Egg overnight. You know this could be good if it left a scar, or became a big thing in Sam’s character. However it was never mentioned again.
They stuck Ranboo in the hole near the Egg. He got out after immediately, they didn’t even close the hole. Also I don’t see “one of the most rich people on the server now wants to destroy you” as a win. They seemingly gained nothing from this.
They stuck Hannah in a box near The Egg despite her allergy to it. Okay finally they turned someone. Someone completely new to the server. Someone who was not involved in any events before this. You know, like every other Eggpire member.
The egg blew up a statue in the Foolish confrontation. This is the only display of power we have ever gotten from The Egg, and Foolish out completed them with the “Totem of Death” thing. It wasn’t even an important statue.
They trick and trap everyone at the Red Banquet. They do that. Then they loose and get The Egg itself captured by all of their enemies directly after pissing them off.
They planned to execute a room full of people. They did plan to do that. Then they failed. They failed partially to do with the act of poking Techno with a stick that was his visit with Ranboo.
They Killed Foolish. This would be a lot more impressive if Foolish didn’t have all 3 cannon lives left, and if it wasn’t followed by them failing to kill an entire room of unarmed people, and having one of their own members loosing a cannon life. And they lost the godamn egg itself
Basically everything done was either to something newly introduced to the roleplay, or it failed. The Eggpire keeps repeatedly failing every step of the way, and has yet to have a major success. What makes it not work it though it may win some battles, it’s never at a state of winning the war. It makes it so hard to take them seriously when they make a threat. They have the success rate of Team Rocket from Pokemon, and seemingly every stream has them blasting off again. There are plenty of things that could be done to remedy this: they could get someone with heavy plot armor previous establishment to the lore under their control, they could make a plan that actually succeeds, they could successfully pull of an execution like the one at the banquet, or anything that physically effects the characters on the server. However they need to succeed in something. The problem with the failure at the banquet was that it further proved that the Eggpire will never succeed. It could’ve been a killing on par with Doomsday, yet instead we got deus ex Techno and Quackity.
I rest my case. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.
(But anyway that’s just my view of why I never could really be intimidated by the egg, I’m open to counter arguments and suggestions. Lol I really just want the egg to successfully do something)
#the red banquet#the egg#the eggpire#eggpire#badboyhalo#bbh#dsmp badboyhalo#dream smp#mcyt#I swear#just do something#anything#that’s all it takes to fix this#I’m tired of how they keep failing yet are meant to be intimidating#I can’t take them seriously lol
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Queen live at Bingley Hall in Stafford, UK - May 6, 1978 (Part -2)
Photos were taken by Anthony Mallan.
Fan Stories
“As I write this I can't believe it is over 24 years since my first ever Queen gig. I was 15 years old and had looked forward to this day ever since I had first heard Bohemian Rhapsody 3 years earlier. Before that song Queen had just been another pop/rock group but BoRhap was the song which for me would set them apart from all others, the song that began my addiction for this band's music - an addiction which continues to this day.
I had an hour long bus ride to Stafford and then had to walk to the Bingley Hall which was about 2 miles out of town. I remember while walking a couple of stretched limos passed I couldn't see inside because the windows were blacked out but I knew that it was the members of Queen in those cars and that added to the excitement. I arrived at the venue and joined the queue to get in. I was quite early but there were still a few hundred people in front of me. I bought a Black T shirt with the News of The World robot on the front and the words Spring Tour '78 and a program, both of which I still have although the T shirt is well worn. I was also treated to a young lady a bit drunk I think, taking her T Shirt off and running around half naked, quite sensational for a 15 year old lad.
We were let into the hall at about 7pm and I found myself fairly near the front it was all standing and I was quite small so I was pleased to see the stage was set quite high which meant I would have an excellent view. The stage set for this tour was the famous crown and as I looked in awe at its size. I can remember wondering how they would get it to lift off the stage?
I can't remember the time but probably an hour or so after I had got into the hall the lights went out and a mechanical whining noise started this was followed very quickly by white lights from the stage, smoke and then the drum beat of We Will Rock You with the song breaking straight into the chorus. Suddenly on a platform in the middle of the front row of the crowd Brian May appeared playing the "Rock You" guitar riff. I remember the feeling of joy and awe, I am sure I must have pinched myself to make sure this was really happening. After an explosion they burst into the fast version of "Rock You" and I saw Freddie for the first time. He was wearing shiney leather trousers, jacket & cap and running around the stage like a madman.
It's far too long ago for me to remember every detail of the show but I do remember Freddie toasting us with champagne and at the end of '39 Roger threw his tamborine into the crowd and I had it for a split second before dropping it, I stood no chance really. The songs which I remember most from this gig were the ones which after this tour they were never to play live again: "White Man" & "Prophets Song" both were played either side of Brian's guitar solo and I can clearly remember Freddie performing vocal gymnastics during the middle section of "Prophets Song". The concert ended with a Rock n Roll medley. I remember right at the end of God Save The Queen we all started singing "You'll Never Walk Alone", then the lights were on and it was over. In a lot of respects it seems so long ago but as I am thinking of it now, parts of it are as clear as yesterday.” - Kevin Ruscoe
“It was fun reading Kevin's story about going to see Queen at Stafford Bingley Hall in 1978. This was the first concert I had ever been to (talk about starting at the top). When the lights went down and Brian started with the dynamic We Will Rock You strumming, I was captured. A couple of years ealier I had purchased Night At The Opera for a girl I fancied at work. I took it to give her and before I could present her with it she showed me that she had just brought the album herself. So much for my Night At The Opera with her! So, I had to go home, take a cold shower, and listen to music. Because it was the only album I had, I played it and played it and I discovered a world I never knew existed. Music up to that point was something that was on the radio. That night seemed to open a new and exciting world me. Not as exciting as I had been planning with her but exciting none the less.
My biggest memory of the Stafford concert was when Freddie gets us to sing along with him. Whenever I heard the Live Killers album, it would take me back to that moment at Stafford when I found out what I wanted to do with my life. I write now, plays and musicals, some successful, some not. Thanks Queen for my reason to live.” - Robert
“Memory's a funny thing... and I wish to heck that I had a better one. How come I can remember useless things I don't want to know, like the winner of the first Big Brother programme, but can't remember stuff which would be far more useful... like how to order beer in any language, my bank account number... or the exact setlist of my first ever rock concert, Queen at Stafford's Bingley Hall in May 1978?
Sitting down to type up this review I did a quick search on the net but only came up with a partial setlist which ends about two thirds of the way through. Very frustrating. So really this isn't a review, it can't be, but it's more a hazy recollection of just what it felt like to be a 15-year-old boy at his very first rock show.
First off I remember getting the ticket. "Harvey Goldsmith presents A Night With Queen" printed in green (tickets for the Sunday night gig were printed in blue) and the price, L3.50 - laughably cheap now. I can't remember how long it was before the gig that I got the ticket but I do know that the waiting for the day of the gig was unbearable. But eventually that day arrived.
Another reason it sticks in my mind is that it was the day of the FA Cup final (Arsenal beat Ipswich Town) and it was the first time I'd not sat glued to the TV from 12pm for all the build-up and the big match itself. If it had been my team, Manchester City, it might have been a different story, but I went up to Bingley Hall mid-afternoon, with a friend called Mark Butters, to join the queue and get as good a standing spot as possible.
For those of you who don't know, Bingley Hall is a 10,000-plus capacity shed (a giant cowshed, really), at the County Showground just outside Stafford, and owned by the Staffordshire Agricultural Society. Before the NEC and other purpose-built venues came along, gigs at this venue (which on other occasions were filled with agricultural displays or animal pens) were a big deal, on a par with Wembley Arena and the like. Others to have played there include Abba, Black Sabbath, Genesis, Thin Lizzy, Saxon, Yes and Rush.
I remember my Mum being worried sick about me going to the gig. Worried about the size of the crowd. Worried about the music volume. Worried about drugs. She was particularly worried that I was wearing a Thin Lizzy badge on my denim jacket and might get beaten up by some aggressive Queen fan who took exception to any other band. I had to persuade her that rock fans were not quite so tribal as football fans.
I also remember standing fairly close to the glass-fronted doors in the queue and the physical, painful ache of anticipation. What came next is a blur - the doors finally being opened, the crush as we made our way through and our tickets were examined, the further crush by the merchandise stall (I got myself a big, square programme, which I've still got).
Then I made my way into the crowd, jockeying for a position as near to the front as possible. The gig was all-standing and as showtime got closer the build-up of pressure was astonishing. I was pretty central, but there was constant swaying from left to right, if you lifted your legs you wouldn't fall, just be carried along with this sea of rock fans.
Finally the wait is over (yes, I know I've changed tense, it just suits my recollections better). The lights go down. The roar of the crowd is unbelievably loud. But what comes next is even louder. As we strain to see what's going on the air is filled with a mechanical sound, the giant lighting rig (Queen's famed crown set-up) is lifting into the air in a sea of smoke. We Will Rock You explodes into the air. It's all light and smoke and noise... and suddenly there's Brian May, playing that guitar, just feet away from me. The spotlights fall on John Deacon and Roger Taylor behind his gigantic drumkit.
Just one thing left now. Freddie. And he appears out of nowhere, Freddie Mercury, prancing and preening around the stage, soaking up the adulation, singing his guts out, clad in shiny black PVC. Call me innocent or naive, but back then I didn't really know about the whole gay/camp fetish thing... he just looked like the superstar he was.
For the next two hours or so I am transported to a whole new place. We get the rockers (Brighton Rock, We Are The Champions, Now I'm Here, a pre-release It's Late, I'm In Love With My Car), the pop-orientated stuff (Killer Queen, Spread Your Wings, Somebody To Love, You're My Best Friend) and a superb acoustic section, featuring Love Of My Life and its amazing crowd singalong and '39, during which a string breaks on Brian May's guitar but he carries on regardless, note perfect to my ears.
Oh, and we get Bohemian Rhapsody too. It's still only a couple of years old at this point, and although obviously something incredibly special is still making it's way up the ladder to immortality to stand alongside the likes of Stairway To Heaven. Anyway, it's bloody brilliant. Queen leave the stage for the opera section, enabling them to make another grand entrance in lights, smoke and pyrotechnics for the rock-out - a masterstroke!
According to Kevin Ruscoe's review of this gig at the superb www.queenconcerts.com site we also got White Man and The Prophet's Song, but I have no recollection of that at all. Nonetheless it still sticks in my mind as one of the greatest gigs I have even seen over the past 28 years, and as one of the greatest events of my life. Like Kevin, I remember singing You'll Never Walk Alone at the end of God Save The Queen, a football terrace salute to a rock phenomenon. What a night!” - Ian Harvey (April 28, 2006)
Part-1
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Personal Review (12/12/21)
Cast in Firelight by Dana Swift
Why am I reviewing this book?
I actually meant to review this one a few weeks ago—I can't believe I forgot, especially when I enjoyed it so much! I've had some time to think about this one, so my opinion has changed in some places.
Plot 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Adraa and Jatin are two royal heirs betrothed to one another that also find each other incredibly annoying. They haven't seen each other since childhood, but their rivalry is kept alive through letters. However, recently, Adraa has discovered corruption in her country, and a case of mistaken identity leads to her and Jatin teaming up to uncover a conspiracy.
The plot was a little typical for YA, but there were certain things that made it stand out. For example, the combined underground conspiracy, Adraa's upcoming test, and the emotional turmoil combined kept the plot moving. Also, the worldbuilding was done pretty well, and the magic system intrigued me. The addition of Adraa's firelight also added some personal investment for the characters. I do wish the plotlines of "Adraa" and "Jaya" had interacted more.
Despite it being similar to other YA books, I did not know what was being led up to until the very end. I had a general idea, but the plot twist did ultimately take me by surprise. I think it was a good case of keeping the reader in the dark without having revelations pop out of nowhere.
Characters 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
I liked Adraa and Jatin. They were both fairly well-constructed characters, and I was always rooting for them. Neither were annoying, which, in first-person YA novels, is always the hardest to overcome. They were both way more similar than either of them thought, which I think made their romance believable. They both deal with an immense amount of pressure from their position, and it's clear their investigation alleviates some of that for them since they are both action-oriented people. They are both a bit awkward, as is expected for teenagers.
As for the romance, I found it very sweet. The only issue I had with it was it did come dangerously close to insta-love in some places. Luckily, it managed to avoid that for the most part, and I got some lovely pining to read about. The eventual reveal of their identities was handled well, particularly in the fact that they didn't cause a lot of drama because of it, which would've irked me. They handle it very maturely, thank goodness.
I do wish the side characters had gotten more development. I liked the side characters, especially the family members of both Adraa and Jatin, but they got very little time and attention. Maybe that's something for book two.
Writing Style 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
The writing style threw me off a little bit because of how modern it sounded. Cast in Firelight is set in a high fantasy world, so the very modern tone most people had was a bit weird. There's nothing terribly egregious, like pop culture references or modern slang, but, especially the way Adraa and Jatin think, it felt more like teenagers from today than heirs to fantastical kingdoms.
Overall 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
I did really like this book, and I am eagerly awaiting the sequel. However, while I initially rated it a 9, as I think more about it I'm bringing it down to an 8. This is mostly because the impact it had on me faded after a little while. I still like the characters and find the plot very engaging, it just doesn't seem amazing like before. Still, I cannot wait to read Bound by Firelight! Check this book out for a fun, YA fantasy set in a unique magical world.
The Author
Dana Swift: American, this is her debut novel (congratulations!)
The Reviewer
My name is Wonderose; I try to post a review every two weeks, sometimes once a week, usually over vacations. I take recommendations! Check out my about me post for more!
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feels like we're dreaming, we're tripping and reeling
summary: requested: andy barber being obsessed with the thought of reader being pregnant and wanting nothing more than to be a dad. being the most doting, caring man throughout the whole pregnancy, rubbing reader's feet and going out to get all her cravings and rubbing her stomach constantly. crying when he feels the baby kick. painting the whole nursery himself and spoiling the hell out of their little bundle when it arrives. andy barber being domestic and soft as hell in general gets me so weak.
warnings: some smut. pool smut. not the same pool bc that was a public pool but it needed to happen so. andy being cute, as cute as i’m sure he was when his wife was pregnant. (my proof: that smile every time someone asks him if he’s jacob’s dad)
word count: almost 10,000. honestly, i was going to keep going but jesus 10,000?!
pairing: andy barber x reader
How many brands of pregnancy tests existed in this world?
Honestly, beyond 5, what the fuck was the point? They measured the same shit, did they not? You didn’t care enough to find out, but during the period of painful silence, you thought about googling the answer.
You were in the tub, wrapped up in one of Andy’s hoodies, just watching him. He was at the counter, looking at the timer. He’d gone out to pick up the tests for what you guys had decided would be your new routine.
You’d always had sex a lot, but lately, Andy didn’t want to go a night without. Not because he was under the impression that would be a more effective method, he just literally could not keep his hands off you anymore. He asked you that morning if you wanted to make Friday night the test night. It made sense, he had his weekends off and that meant he could skulk around the house if it didn’t happen.
Most tests took 2 to 3 minutes. Some took 15 for whatever fucking reason. He wanted to wait for all of them, so for a quarter of an hour, you were just stuck there. Waiting. With him. Which shouldn’t have been so stressful, but it was.
The day you told him you wanted to try for a baby, he didn’t let you out of bed. Even though he knew it wasn’t going to happen for a while since you needed to finish your last week and a half of birth control. He had just been so happy, any attempts made to hide his obsession with you getting pregnant were tossed out the window immediately.
He’d thought about it before you, he’d wanted it before you, but hearing that you finally wanted it too just triggered something. He bought parenting books because he figured during your pregnancy, he wouldn’t have that much time to read. He bought this huge ass book of names and after he fucked you, he liked to bring it out and try to talk you into names he wanted while you were in such a blissful state.
Every second of trying had made you fall in love with him more. Yes, you wanted kids, but honestly, babies didn’t much appeal to you. You understood that to get to kids, you had to deal with the babies and you were okay with that, but mainly, you wanted to make Andy a father. You knew he would be good at it, possibly the best in the world.
And even with all the wanting, he never put pressure on you. The morning you told him you were done with the birth control, he sat you down and had the longest talk with you just to make sure that he hadn’t done anything to make you think he was losing patience with you. He wanted a baby, but he needed a happy wife. He didn’t want any part of something that you weren’t completely on board with.
But with wanting to try, you needed to make some changes. You were always fairly active since Andy had his busy days and you didn’t like just sitting and doing nothing while you waited for him to get home. With trying to conceive, your workouts had to be a little more basic. Longer, but less intense runs, some yoga. Andy had read that cardio was important, you thought up swimming. The very next day, he was already making plans to expand the house and add an indoor swimming pool. When you gave him a look, he pointed out that the kids would love it when they were old enough to swim. How could you possibly say no?
Caffeine was next on the chopping block. Andy, the sweetheart that he was, knew how much you loved coffee and tried his hardest to cut it out as well. He wanted to show you that you weren’t in this alone. It was your body, yes, but he would make sacrifices, too. The first time you caught him falling asleep at the dinner table, you had to tell him to end his noble support. With a job like his, he needed his coffee. The compromise was that he wouldn’t drink it in your presence.
He also did insane amounts of research. Even after you stopped the pill, he insisted on using condoms for a month after so you could start getting some folic acid before ending up pregnant. That was quite the sacrifice. One of your favorite things on this planet was when he finished inside you. Not a fucking condom. But you were trying this thing where you didn’t express negativity because with Andy as your husband, there was no way not to feel like a brat. How was someone so perfect?
Your period hadn’t returned yet but that didn’t mean you were incapable of getting pregnant. Hence the random, shot-in-the-dark pregnancy test Friday plan. You didn’t feel pregnant and you knew that was stupid. Some didn’t know they were pregnant until they were giving birth. And you’d never been pregnant before, so how would you know what to look for? You just couldn’t stop thinking about how you didn’t feel it. You also didn’t want to tell Andy because you hoped you were wrong.
It had been a week short of two months without the pill and three weeks since he stopped wearing condoms. The chances of it just falling into place were slim—you didn’t have research to back that up, just some deeply-rooted cynicism. Maybe it was your defense mechanism, act like you saw it coming and you wouldn’t be disappointed. Right?
Wrong, which you discovered when you saw Andy’s face after he turned over one of the tests. You wouldn’t cry because it had been a total of 5 seconds and some people had to try much longer, and you didn’t want him to have to put aside his feelings to then console you. You did, however, want to cry.
“We should see a doctor,” you said.
He scoffed. “We haven’t really been trying that long.”
“But we can, why not?”
He finally turned to you, forcing his expression into something that didn’t break your heart just to see. “It’s fine.”
“It’s not. Andy, I told you that I’m ready.”
“I know, and trust me, there’s nothing that I want more. I just also think there’s still some romance in being old fashioned and just letting it happen.”
“Google is your new best friend, Andy. Why not consult an actual professional?”
“We can, if you want, but like I said, it hasn’t been that long. Besides, until you start your period again, it’s probably just a waiting game. Not always, but it can be. We should be realistic about this. I don’t want to waste a visit down to the doctor just so they can tell us what my new best friend already has.”
“Okay,” you shrugged, “if that’s what you want—”
“None of that. What do you want?”
“I want to be the mother of your children.”
He sighed, crouching down to your side. “You will be.”
“You don’t know that—”
“No, I do,” he insisted. “Because I’m not going to stop fucking you. And if that doesn’t work, we’ll go see a doctor. If there’s a problem, we will fix it. If we can’t, we will adopt. Are we clear? There is no way, Mrs. Barber, that you will not be the mother of my children one day. And because I damn well know that I deserve it, I will have the great honor of being the father of your children.”
You sighed and melted, but you hoped that much wasn’t apparent. “You’re so lame.”
He smirked. “Wanna get out of that tub so we can have sex?”
“Why can’t we have sex in the tub?”
“Do you want to?”
“Maybe, but no water.”
“Okay, that’s weird.”
You shrugged. “Fine, I’ll get out of the tub.”
“Sounds like a plan.” He went to stand up but you caught his arm before he could. He took one look at you and was already shaking his head. “Don’t even say it—”
“I am, though.”
“I don’t want to hear it. Ever.”
“I feel bad.”
“You shouldn’t. It could be me. It could be nothing. Baby, it is too soon to start worrying about anything. Avoid stress, that is what you need to be doing.”
He could say it a million different ways, you were still sorry.
It was troubling how excited you were to get your period back. Honestly, when the birth control had finally taken it away, you cried. Tears of joy. To have the same reaction over getting it back felt weird.
Andy also seemed excited until you outlined just how inconvenient the whole thing was. Okay, that was being negative, but you were kind of in a bad mood. Something he was not at all bothered by. Because of course. He hadn’t been bothered by a single thing since you told him you wanted to start trying.
Officially, four months into wanting a baby and the only thing keeping you holding on was your beautiful, loving husband. He always knew when you were feeling down, so he would talk about the future and how nice it would be when you could finally take the kids out on family trips. How great taking them to school would be. All the fun things you would get them into, dance, sports, anything that you both could go and support. You were completely lost on how he was so positive all the time.
You needed to keep going, though. Like he said, you guys had options. It was better to know sooner rather than later, so you pushed forward. Sadly, your periods were irregular so you would probably ovulate irregularly. And you weren’t even aware of when you were ovulating because Andy still wanted this to be “natural”.
The second Friday with negative results was clearly taxing on both of you. He decided to end it immediately. That was why you had taken to sneaking pregnancy tests any chance you got. You didn’t like not telling him but you always felt like a failure every time it came back negative. But life went on, that much he made sure of.
The pool was finished and he seemed to like it more than you did. In fact, your liking it extended only as far as getting to see him wet and shirtless. But you were still in there 4 to 5 times a week for 30 minutes after you got home from work on weekdays and early on weekends. Because you did everything you were supposed to do. Because you didn’t want to feel like this was your fault, like there was something you were doing that would prevent this.
He came in one Saturday morning just as you were getting out. “Done?”
“Yeah, I served my time,” you joked. “I should get started on lunch. Any requests?”
“No, whatever sounds good to you.”
You went inside, fully intending to make lunch. But something that just didn’t make sense was how much you craved sex with Andy. It seemed like the more you had, the more you wanted. You guys were always sexual. At the start, after a month or so, every date ended with sex. When you moved in with him, it was more nights than not, even after you got married. But this was every day, numerous times a day.
He was turned on by the idea of getting you pregnant. He was insatiable for that reason. Sex this often wasn’t normal and it probably wasn’t raising your chances of conceiving since you weren’t being too methodical about it, but you were thrilled with this change. You worried about how much sex you would have once you were pregnant anyway, you figured you should start preparing for the long months ahead.
You were only in the kitchen for three minutes, trying to find food that would interest you more than what was currently on your mind. It didn’t work.
You returned to Andy. He was swimming his laps, completely oblivious. You stripped out of your bathing suit where you stood at the edge of the pool. He only made it three more times back and forth before he must have sensed you there.
He turned up, brushing his wet hair out of his face. When he saw you naked, his eyes widened. “Here? Now?”
“Well, unless you want me to wait for you to finish. I could just sit and watch, take care of myself until you can.”
“Here,” he decided. “Now.”
You smirked, sauntering off to the right where the stairs were. He made his way to you just before you descended the last step. He wrapped his arms around your waist and you took your cue to jump up and wrap yourself around him.
He carried you further into the water, lips moving against yours. You clung to his shoulders and your legs locked around his hips. “You are wild and demanding,” he accused.
You scoffed. “Me?”
He pretended to think about it. “Well, I guess it was me who stopped dinner last night, me who couldn’t wait until we left the grocery store, me who had you pull over while we were driving a few days ago, and me who came in here naked—oh, wait—“
You laughed. “Well, I’m just trying to prepare myself for when we’re hardly doing this anymore.”
“When we retire?”
You snorted. “No. You know, when I’m pregnant.”
He scoffed, pressing you against the side of the pool. You felt a hand moving between you, working his shorts out of the way. “You think I’m not going to fuck you when you’re pregnant?”
“Well...I assumed, yeah.”
He nudged your chin with his nose until you tilted your head back, offering him your neck. He kissed you softly as he indelicately pushed into you.
You clutched at his shoulders harder, whining his name.
“You’re insane if you think I’m going to be able to refrain from touching you. Especially while you’re pregnant.”
You angled your head so you could see his face. He looked downright amused at what you were saying.
The pace and pressure of his hips immediately became punishing. He held you tight, hands on your hips as he fucked you. “You don’t even know how hard I get thinking about you carrying my child.”
Maybe it was what he was saying, maybe it was that you had wanted him inside you since you woke up, but it wasn’t taking long to get you there. You brought one hand up to the edge of the pool for a little more support.
Andy began kissing your neck and nipping at your chest. “I think about how beautiful you’re going to look, I think about how I’m going to have you riding me every day.”
You could picture that. Fuck. You were rarely on top now because you loved being underneath him and he loved pinning you down to the mattress, but when you got bigger, you would have to adapt. It didn’t sound as boring as you’d had yourself convinced it was when he said it.
“Every morning before I go to work, I’ll wake you up with my mouth between your legs.”
You let out a shaky breath. “What’s stopping you from doing that now?”
“You,” he promised. “I can barely open my eyes before you’re telling me to get inside you. You’ll be slower when you’re pregnant, less of a predator, more of a prey.”
You scoffed but it became a moan. If he kept talking like this, you were going to come soon.
“Some women are more sensitive when they’re pregnant,” he asserted. “I bet you will be. You’re already so sensitive. I’m going to spend every weekend fucking you until you’re begging me to stop.”
“Andy.” You turned your head toward him and he kissed you. You whimpered when you felt his hand at your cunt, fingers pressing against your clit so gently.
You finished first but he was close behind, turning his head down to groan into your shoulder.
He rode out his high slowly, kissing any part of your skin that was in his reach. He lifted you out of the water, onto the tiled floor surrounding the pool. He kissed both of your knees, then your calves, all while keeping his eyes on you. “Sound like a plan?”
You smiled, rolling your eyes. “Really, I should make lunch.”
“I love you.”
“I love you, too.” You headed out, back to the kitchen.
“You’re not getting dressed?”
“Nope.”
Four months, one week, and six days later, you were pregnant. You’d felt weird, it was 3 in the morning, Andy was asleep, and you knew you weren’t going to be able to rest until you found out.
Technically, you hadn’t missed your period yet. Sometimes you started on the 17th, others the 22nd through the 24th. Oh, but there was also the wonderful time you had started on the 5th. That time, you did cry. He might have too, but never in front of you because he was trying to be the most positive man on earth.
You only took two tests, the ones with the least amount of wait time. The results came back positive and for a moment, you just sat there. You had been terrified that it wasn’t going to happen. You worried about how much that would hurt Andy. You also stupidly worried about the possibility that he would leave you over it.
But that didn’t matter anymore. You were pregnant and he was going to be thrilled. After being a little annoyed that you took the test without him, you assumed.
You weren’t sure how to tell him. When to tell him. It was 3 in the morning and he had to work. Maybe after he got home. If you told him when he woke up, he was just going to want to stay home.
Logically, you knew false positives were not the same as false negatives. But it was just like when you were in junior high and you didn’t get your period so you were convinced you were pregnant even though you were very much not having sex. Yes, you were paranoid but you just wanted to be sure. The only thing worse than not getting pregnant would be getting Andy’s hopes up.
You waited until he was at work and then made an appointment. This would also annoy him because he wanted to do extensive research when selecting a doctor. You weren’t robbing him of that, you just wanted to have confirmation. The second you did, you would tell him and start looking at doctors.
You had it scheduled four days out, Thursday. You could get in on your lunch hour. It was odd going and explaining to the nurse your thought process and why you couldn’t schedule a follow-up appointment after the confirmation. She must have thought you were an idiot, you possibly were, but you were a happy idiot.
That night, when Andy arrived home, you were waiting on the couch for him. Once again, unclothed. You’d gotten quite used to being nude, having him undress you every time either of you wanted sex was just ridiculous. There wasn’t a word said as he laid over you on the couch, not bothering to get undressed. He just moved his pants and then he was inside you.
He didn’t move at first, instead, he rubbed your clit until you finished around him.
You draped a leg over his ass. “Andy, fuck me.”
“Not yet, baby.” His fingers circled over your clit again, his eyes fixed on yours and wanting to see pleasure on your face. He was in a mood and that meant the sex was going to be exhausting. Worth it, but very unlike the easy and quick routines you’d gotten used to in all of the chaos of trying to get pregnant.
When he would join you in the shower because usually, you woke up earlier than him even though you went to work later, he would wrap his arms around you all sweet then shove you against the wall and make you come with him. When he would find you making dinner and fuck you over the counter. When you were up later than he wanted so he would just fuck you wherever you were until you were so exhausted that he had to carry you upstairs. No other married people had as much sex as you guys, you were almost certain.
You’d made a complete mess of his pants but he didn’t seem concerned about them. He sat up and set you on his lap, holding you in place as he thrust his hips up. There was always something amazing about sex with him still in his suit. It wasn’t like his clothing left much to the imagination anyway, you could see and feel the muscles in his arms and chest.
He continued fucking you until he was close, then he settled you flat against him and used his fingers to make you come again and again. Until he was sure he had come down enough from his almost-finish. Feeling your pussy move around him, the way you would tighten when you orgasmed, the way you continued to get wetter and wetter, he was addicted.
You grabbed his free hand and placed it on one of your breasts and he closed his mouth around the opposite. Again, he held you up so he had enough room to drive his cock into you, hard and deep, and so painfully slow. It must not have been the best day. He loved being in absolute control of you when he couldn’t be at work.
Once more, just as he was about to finish, and you could tell because his hands would tighten and his hips would start to stutter, he sat you on his lap.
You curled your hand under his jaw, pulling him from your breast up to your mouth. The kiss was sloppy, all tongue and desperate moans from both of you.
“Touch yourself, baby,” he directed as he pulled away.
Your fingers instantly dropped to your clit and you began drawing yourself toward another end. He wouldn’t let you stop, not after the first, the second, the third. Your hand was shaking, you were shaking, he had to hold you by the shoulders otherwise you would have fallen back. The entire time, he remained buried in your cunt, hard and not doing a damn thing about it. He was using you to edge himself and that made you impossibly wet.
He repeated this, more times than you could count. He didn’t say a word either, just led your hand down to your clit or used his own when he knew you couldn’t. Sometimes the sex was like this, he was working through something and he didn’t want to talk at first. It was about proving to himself that he had enviable control, and he definitely did because it wasn’t like you made it easy for him.
When he laid you down on the coffee table, he began pounding into you. You could tell when he was almost there because he was getting louder, grunting into your skin, or groaning as he bit down on your shoulder, your breast, your neck.
He pulled out before then and you felt inclined to put a stop to this madness.
“Andy.”
His hand made its way back to your pussy as he stroked his cock with his opposite. Moments later, he was spilling out onto your skin. As he continued fucking you with his fingers, you ran your hands over your stomach, spreading his cum along your body until you reached your breasts. You loved having his cum on you and he loved seeing it on you.
After your orgasm, he sat back on the couch as he worked to catch his breath. “Sorry, that was kind of a waste.”
“Not really.” You continued teasing him with your hands on your breasts and these small mewls that you knew he was already getting worked up over again.
He probably didn’t even realize what you’d said, too focused on watching you pinch and pull on your nipples.
You turned down a few minutes later, meeting his eye.
He kept his eyes on your hands as he spoke. “Wanna get in the shower while I make dinner?”
You moved off the table, legs shaky as you made your way to him. You caught his hand before he could sit you on his lap and sat down on the couch at his side. Leaning over, you took him in your mouth.
“Jesus,” he hissed.
After swallowing as much of him as you could, you set one of his hands on the back of your head. He knew what you wanted.
Holding you in place, he began rolling his hips. It wasn’t too forceful but you could feel him in the back of your throat. He was hard again in a matter of a few moments.
“God, your mouth is fucking perfect, baby.” He was losing his steady pace, his hips jerkier, slower sometimes. “All I could think about today was you. Your beautiful cunt, your fucking mouth. I’ve wanted to see you covered in my cum for so long, but...” he didn’t finish his sentence, you knew why he hadn’t.
You weren’t satisfied until you’d swallowed every drop of him. As you pulled off, he grabbed your hips and brought you onto one of his thighs. He kissed your forehead and began running his fingers through your hair.
“How was work?”
He shrugged. “You know.”
“Rough day?”
“It usually is,” he attempted to dismiss.
“Sounds like you could use good news.”
He arched an eyebrow. “You have good news?”
“Well, I’m pregnant.”
He blinked slowly, then abruptly sat up straight as his hands dropped to your hips. “What?”
“I’m pregnant.”
“Oh, okay,” he blurted out. He moved you onto the couch, standing and tucking himself back into his pants. “Do you want to take a test?”
“I already took the test.”
“Without me?” he demanded. “How many?”
“I took two, but I went to the doctor to get it confirmed.”
“Without me?!” he repeated.
“Don’t be mad, I just wanted to make sure.”
“I am mad.” But then he leaned down and started kissing you so you figured he was going to get over it fairly quickly. He pulled away, both hands coming up to your face. “I can’t believe you. How long have you known?”
“I took the test 4 days ago. Went to the doctor today.”
“4 days?!”
“Andy, I didn’t want to get you excited if I wasn’t actually pregnant.”
“Well, can you take another test so I can see it? We have a billion upstairs.”
You scoffed. “Do you want me to? I will.”
“Yeah, kind of. I know it’s stupid—“
You shook your head. “It’s not, I can do it.”
He got on his knees on the floor, gently pressing you back to the couch. “I knew it would happen, I just didn’t think it was going to happen this soon.”
“Yeah.”
“And you’re still okay? You still want this?”
“Of course.”
He leaned forward, kissing your throat all the way down to your stomach. You shivered at the sensation of his beard prickling against your skin. He continued kissing you and you ran your fingers through his hair.
He turned up to you, lips still pressed just below your navel. “It’ll be a girl.”
You scoffed. “Andy, you don’t know that.”
“I do,” he insisted.
“You never said you wanted a girl.”
“I want any baby you can give me.”
“Even if it was a demon baby that turned out to be a cannibal?”
“As long as it had your smile, yes.”
You snorted. “And your eyelashes!”
“And your cheekbones.”
You ran your finger along the bridge of his nose. “Your nose.”
“Is it red like all the other demon babies?”
“You’re in too good of a mood.”
“Impossible, no mood is too good considering you’re carrying my daughter.”
“Stop,” you scolded half-heartedly. “Look, you have a total of at least 15 weeks before you find out whether it’s a boy or a girl.”
“You have 15 weeks.”
“Andrew Barber,” you scoffed, “stop.”
“Let’s bet.”
“No!” You laughed.
“Scared?”
“Don’t even try that with me.”
He shrugged. “You sound scared. I never knew that the woman who gave me a hand job in a movie theatre would be such a baby—“
“Andy, if you don’t stop talking, all of this pregnant sex you’ve been fantasizing about is not going to happen.”
With a small smile, he shut his mouth.
“Upstairs? You want me to take the test?”
He scooped you up off the couch and headed toward your bedroom.
The next day, Andy was already working on all those grand promises he’d made. You woke with your calves draped over his shoulders, his lips wrapped around your clit, his hands folded over your hips to hold you down, and his beautiful blue eyes looking up at you.
Then he wanted to go shopping. He’d already called into work, not even bothering to lie about being sick. He was thrilled to let Lynn know that you were pregnant and apparently, she knew how big of a deal that was so she let him off the hook after making him promise to take pictures of what he was intending to do to the nursery.
He wanted to paint. You had wanted to leave it white. Gendered colors were stupid anyway. He’d said the same at the start, but he was currently waving pink swatches in your face.
“Andy, what if it’s a boy?”
He shrugged. “Then he’s going to have a pink nursery. Pink sky or pink pearl?”
You spared the colors a glance. “Pink pearl. Why can’t we just do one of those gender-neutral colors?”
“Because yellow is ugly and purple is loud.”
“Green.”
“Reminds me of spring.”
“Orange.”
“Pumpkins.”
“Red.”
“Blood.”
You rolled your eyes. “Well, why not dark blue? I was kind of hoping we could do, like, a constellation theme.”
He thought for a moment. “Let’s do both. But instead of blue, we’ll use pink.”
“Okay,” and you were excited again. “You are insane, though. Just so you know.”
“Hardly. Do you know how behind I am? I wasn’t expecting this to happen so soon. I haven’t found the doctor yet, I’m just barely starting on the nursery. We don’t have a name, we don’t have a crib. Essentially, we have nothing.”
Was he seriously already stressing about this? And that probably wasn’t even a fourth of what was going through his mind.
You reached over, finger tapping on the only pink color you’d seen that you liked enough to put on the walls. “We have a paint color. If you like it.”
He glanced between you and the color twice before nodding. “Okay.”
Walking through the aisles, you decided to take over. You threw all the tools he could possibly need in the cart and didn’t stop until you spotted the glitter. You stared straight at it until he got curious enough about what you were so focused on that he made his way to you. Adding glitter to paint was difficult, you knew because you had attempted before. Your friend’s sister’s kid was turning 7 and wanted to redesign her bedroom and you tagged along because glitter. It ended in tears and Andy buying you ice cream to make you feel better.
He sighed. “You want the glitter?”
“I simply cannot live without it.”
With another sigh, a much more resigned one, he started tossing in bags of the glitter additive. “You know you’re not helping, right?”
“What? Because of last time—?“
“No, because you’re pregnant.”
“Andy, it’s not even a baby yet. It’s a fetus. Can’t I just do what I would have always done up until the point that I can’t get an abortion?”
“That is not funny.”
You snorted. “It kind of is. Stop worrying.” You rolled onto your toes and kissed the tip of his nose. “Otherwise, you’re going to look like a grandfather instead of a father. And hey, I’d still be pretty attracted to you but we have more kids to make, so calm down.”
He banned you from the house. Yep, you had a total of one friend who was currently married and interested in children. That was the friend he wanted you to focus on, not the others, he said, that they meant well, but couldn’t possibly be supportive at a time like this. In reality, he never liked most of your friends. You kept them out of college and he always thought they liked to go out and drink too much.
Your friend was excited when you asked if you could stay with her for a bit. Andy wanted to paint immediately and then make sure all lingering traces of the paint were adequately gone from the house before you returned.
Painting took two days. He called you both mornings, brought you lunch at work, took you out to dinner, and made sure to call you before you went to bed.
Then he checked you both into a hotel for 3 days. You had to force him to go to work on Monday, pointing out that he really needed to be making money. You loved your job but it wasn’t as if the salary was sufficient to raise a baby on.
Andy let you revel in the beauty of the nursery up until the weekend. The constellations were a soft champagne color and the glitter was mixed in perfectly, evenly. It looked professionally done, but you weren’t surprised. He was perfect and everything he did for you and his child would be perfect as well.
Next, his mission was to find a crib and pick the doctor. Something that kept him on his laptop most of Saturday while you slept soundly next to him. You were already beginning to feel tired and you weren’t sure if that was because of him or your baby.
Time went by in a blur. He’d fallen into a routine effortlessly. He would wake you up as he told you he would, eating you out, then he would get you in the shower with him, and make sure you ate a good breakfast before he headed off to work. He would call at lunch, just to make sure you weren’t too exhausted to be at work. You always felt inclined to tell him stories about working pregnant women every time. He would come home and fix dinner and wouldn’t let you lift a finger to help. At night, after he thoroughly fucked you, which honestly didn’t take much, you would fall asleep together. It was a great first two months.
At the start of your 3rd month, you were already showing. It seemed like it was the best day of Andy’s life. In fact, he wanted to start a scrapbook. He wanted to document everything and you didn’t have the heart to tell him he was absolutely crazy. Besides, it was pretty cute.
It was around this time that you had the most absurd craving for almond butter. He loved almond butter so it was always in the house and you never once wanted any part of it. Randomly, you thought apples and almond butter sounded great and you finished the entire jar before he got home. Something that amused him greatly, he promised he would get more on his way home the next day. That new obsession lasted for a week and a half, and you had yourself convinced that it was going to be the worst of it.
No. Swap out apples for Cheetos. Seriously, you wanted to eat Cheetos and almond butter. You were downright ashamed so you didn’t even ask him to get you anything, you just snuck out to the store before he got home one night and bought yourself a sufficient stash that you kept hidden in the very back of the pantry. This wouldn’t work for the entire pregnancy but until you were further along, you intended to hide these horrible cravings.
Well, as well as you could. He was anticipating more after the almond butter so he always texted and asked if you wanted him to bring something home. So far, your genius combinations had been tacos and chocolate, macaroni and cheese and sour patch kids, cashews and Doritos, French fries and hot chocolate, and orange chicken and lemonade. Andy drove everywhere at any given hour. If there was a store open, he would go. If it was closed and you couldn’t wait that long, he would go to a 24-hour fast food place. He’d started stocking your favorites as well, and hiding them until you really needed them.
The day before you were set to find out the sex of the baby, he went shopping. You were far too tired to try to leave the house, especially since Andy could shop. You thought he would come home with more for the nursery. Since he’d found the crib, he’d started looking at bedding and the other matching furniture. You knew it would be extreme since you weren’t there to stop him. What you did not expect was that he would sneak in and take full advantage of your unconsciousness. If he hadn’t dropped something, you never would have caught him.
When you found him in the nursery, he was in the closet. Hanging up clothing. Pink clothing. For a girl. “Andy.”
“We are having a girl,” he stated simply.
“Oh, my god,” you muttered to yourself.
“Sorry I woke you.”
“Don’t be, I’m glad I’m witnessing this insanity.”
He gave you a flat look, fully turning to you with a tiny black bodysuit with white hearts printed on it. “This could be for a boy, I don’t know what you’re so upset about it.”
You smirked. “Anything can be for a boy if you try hard enough. Look, if you wanted a girl so bad—“
“I wanted a baby.”
“Andy, you bought girl clothes!”
“Because we are having a girl.”
“You’re going to have this child alone if it doesn’t stop making me crave the most ridiculous things.”
He hummed. “Is that why you’re up here?” Smirking, he made his way to you. As usual, his hands went straight to your stomach, he had to feel any movement and it was driving him crazy that he hadn’t. “What do you want?”
You scoffed tiredly. “A lot of things. Yogurt, peach and blueberry. Something lemon, lemon squares, lemon cake. A lot of pasta, I really want spaghetti. And despite your incorrigible behavior, I want you.”
“You do mean sexually, right? Because I read sometimes pregnant women want to eat things that aren’t food—“
You placed your hand flat over his mouth. “I take it back, I just want the food.” You turned away to escape from the room but he was right on your tail. “Andy, I’m hungry.”
“I’ll get you the food,” he promised. “Let’s just make a quick stop to the bedroom first.”
You didn’t put up much resistance as he began leading you that way. He had been correct about one thing, you were so sensitive. You’d given up on wearing bras or underwear, and your clothes had to be loose. Especially given the dreams you were having. Much to his simultaneous joy and dismay, you would send him pictures and videos of certain sexual situations at least twice a week just a couple of hours before he got home.
That cocky bastard was correct. A fact that had him beaming the remainder of the appointment, all the way home, and even in his sleep. You weren’t upset that you were having a girl. It wasn’t that you thought you had a right to be picky, but very simply, you wanted a girl more than you wanted a boy. You weren’t even sure why. Gender wasn’t real and it wouldn’t upset you if someday in the future that little girl told you that she wasn’t a girl at all. Logically, you knew there was no point. But you didn’t have to be logical, not while you were carrying a baby.
Even though Andy was annoyingly smug about the whole thing, you were excited. You finally got to take a look at the closet and discovered yesterday was not his first time buying clothing. You wanted to be mad at him but he had the softest look on his face. This was everything he wanted and you liked that you were able to provide it for him.
At 5 months, he absolutely needed to feel her kick. If he wasn’t fucking you or feeding you, or shopping, or at work, his hands were on your stomach. One of his favorite things, when you got out of the shower, was covering you in lotion, something you were supposed to do to prevent stretch marks, not that either of you much cared. During that time, he would speak to her, try to get her to give him any kind of movement. Or sometimes, you would wake up and he was just level with your stomach, whispering things to her.
You didn’t have the heart to tell him that you’d felt what you presumed were “flutters” and maybe one good kick a couple of nights ago, but you weren’t certain. You sort of enjoyed that she didn’t just give in to his murmurings of “come on, baby, give daddy a kick”, or “if you kick, I’ll never tell you no”. That line was dropped from rotation after you pointed out you would be holding him to that when she wanted to start dating.
She seemed to like his voice, you could admit. Sometimes it wasn’t him that woke you up, it was her responding to him. They weren’t fast movements, they weren’t particularly forceful either, but they were there. You didn’t understand how he’d yet to feel anything. And since you were still telling him you hadn’t really felt anything, he brought it up at the next appointment. The look of pure horror on his face when the doctor told him the likelihood of fathers never feeling any movement was sad, in a funny way. Kind of. Being pregnant had made you a little meaner.
He was pouting about it all night but you told him you were sure he would feel something. You told him you wouldn’t have her until she kicked for him. He knew you couldn’t control that, obviously, but it made him feel better.
At 5 months and 2 weeks, it happened. You were failing at staying awake and trying to read a book when you felt an abrupt tap. You startled awake, discovering the book on the floor. That had to be it, you just dropped it on yourself. But then it happened again, a bit harder and a tad painful.
“Andy!”
He bolted to your side in a matter of seconds. Seriously, he had to have broken world records with that trick. “What? What’s wrong?”
You grabbed his hands, pulling his arms over the back of the couch, and placed them over your stomach.
“Are you okay? Do we need to go—?”
“Shut up,” you ordered.
After a couple of minutes, he sighed. “You felt an actual kick?”
“Sorry, she tends to move more when I’m so still.”
He moved around the couch and sat on the floor. “It’s going to happen. I’m not going to feel her.”
“No,” you argued. “Are you working?”
“No, just scaring myself with more books.”
You held your hand out to him and he helped you up. You crouched down to pick up your dropped book and handed it off to him. “Read it, she seems to like your voice... I’ll fall asleep, see if that works.”
You were settled in bed next to Andy, his one hand pressed to the side of your belly as he read the book aloud. You were trying to keep still but also trying to stay awake, you wanted to see his face when he felt it. That was out of the question, Andy’s voice was like honey, or a fall morning, or the feeling of being home after a long day. You were out after a few paragraphs.
When you woke up, you weren’t sure why. You saw Andy hovering over you fully with wet eyes and the softest smile you had ever seen. “Baby?”
“I felt her.”
You scoffed. “I told you that you would.”
He kissed all over your stomach, lingering each time. “Maybe she finally knows I’m her daddy.”
“She always knew.”
“You’re just saying that to make me feel better.”
“Truth?” He glanced up at you and you explained, “I’ve been feeling her for a while now. That’s why I knew she liked your voice... I have some bad news, Andy. It seems like she already knows you’re wrapped around her finger and she is going to enjoy making you jump through hoops.”
“Just like her mom.”
You smirked. “Guess so.” You reached out to touch his face. “What are you thinking?”
He shrugged. “Every morning, I wake up and I’m so sure that my life couldn’t get any better but every day, it does. I didn’t know it was possible to love as much as I love you and as much as I love her.”
You turned to mush instantly.
“I didn’t have this growing up, you know. I didn’t have a dad but I’m going to do it right. I’m not going to be like him. I don’t understand how he could just walk away from his child, I would never do that. I could never do that. Or from you, my beautiful wife. For a long time, while we were trying, I just hated him so much. More than usual. I hated that we had to try so hard and that he was given a family that he just tossed away.”
“Well, he was an idiot. You are truly the best man I will ever know, possibly the best man that there is. And you’re going to be the best father, too... Okay, maybe second best after Ryan Reynolds, but still pretty high up there.”
He scoffed.
Feeling her kick was another addition to his day. Lips and fingers brought you to orgasm before taking you to the shower where he carefully wrapped his arms around your shoulders and fucked you from behind. He would dry you off, lay you out on the bed, and cover you in lotion and pay a lot of attention to your feet. His hands all over your body never failed to make you want him, but he had to go to work. You both knew if you started, he was going to end up being late. After breakfast, he would say goodbye to you, then he would lean down and ask his little girl for any kind of movement. She’d began to indulge him at least twice a day, when he was leaving and when he would say goodnight.
He’d always let you sleep in on Saturdays and even stayed with you for a great deal of it. Mostly because he knew you could sense when he wasn’t in bed and that would wake you. But with time, you were becoming less tired. Not entirely, you still were out like the dead at 9 every night, but sometimes you woke up actually feeling rested.
Saturdays were what he intended them to be. This particular Saturday had him wrapped around you, hands flat to your stomach, chin atop your head. You had another fantastic dream, one where you weren’t pregnant.
You loved your baby and you loved that you were able to carry her but you missed how hard he fucked you sometimes. You just couldn’t wait until he could pull your hair, choke you, spank you, tie you up, all of the things he loved to do to you. More importantly, you couldn’t wait until he was on top of you, pinning you down and leaving bruises.
Those dreams were why you woke up wet more often than not. Why you never hesitated to take his hand and slide it lower but you didn’t need that today, you just needed him. For you, he’d adapted to sleeping without clothes. It was easier that way and he’d never complain about you doing the same. Besides, the heat was getting the best of you the bigger you got.
You reached back with your heel, tapping his shin several times. “Andy?”
He hummed.
“It’s Saturday. Wake up.”
He scoffed, eyes still closed. “Yeah, it’s Saturday. Sleep in.”
“Fuck me,” you whined.
“I wish I could say that wasn’t enough to get me hard.”
“You were already hard,” you assured. You could feel him against your hip.
He grabbed your thigh and draped it over him. “You know, my love, when you’re not carrying our baby, I am going to have a lot of fun making you wait for it. I am indulging you now simply because you are giving me the greatest gift anyone could. But when I can tie you up, when I can fuck you, that is what I’m looking forward to.”
You moaned as he unhurriedly slipped inside you. “I miss your hands around my neck, that’s what I’m looking forward to.”
“So, I suspect you’ll continue being a brat long past your due date.”
“Yes, and there’s nothing you can do about it,” you taunted.
“Not right now, just you wait. You’ve been bad ever since you told me you were pregnant. Laying on the couch, naked. I know you had been touching yourself. I’ve been keeping track and your ass is probably going to be getting spanked up until you’re pregnant again.”
You snorted, turning your head back slightly. “Oh, and is that going to be immediately after?”
He kissed along your jaw. “Up to you.”
“You want another girl?”
“Yeah,” he admitted somewhat sheepishly.
You scoffed.
“But I wouldn’t be let down by a boy,” he promised. He started delicately rolling his hips, one hand coming to your center to rub your clit.
Watching you fall apart like this was something else. Andy found you utterly beautiful, your cheeks would flush, your eyes would fill with such desperation for him that made him feel wanted. The moans that spilled from your mouth were sometimes animalistic, inspired only by how much you needed him to give you what only he could.
Now that you were pregnant, he could cover you in his cum. He always loved doing that, an interesting discovery he’d made very early in your relationship. After you decided you wanted to try for a baby, he would often come inside you and tell you to leave it there, which was pleasing as well. But this. This was simplistic, classic beauty.
He pulled out, fingers filling you instead. Your hips moved frantically, seeking the pressure of his palm against your clit. Angling your head back, his lips hungrily met yours. You reached down and took him in your hand, he turned his head slightly to hiss a curse.
Once he looked at you again, you pretended all you wanted was an innocent kiss. Something you kept up until he was just about to come, and then you bit down hard on his bottom lip. He had no idea how to retaliate and seeing the frustration play out on his face was almost as satisfying as your finish.
You laid next to him patiently as he came down, anticipating his reaction. It was always funnier when he had time to dwell on the situation. For several more weeks, you had complete permission to be as bratty as you wanted. You couldn’t believe you hadn’t been taking advantage of that more.
He turned his head to you and you smirked. “That’s going on top of the list. You will regret that.”
“The look on your face was so worth it.”
“Teasing is also going on the list,” he warned.
The day your water broke was just a normal day. Of course, not your due date. No, this baby had been torturing you since the very start, why stop now? You expected it was just something in the Barber blood. Strong-willed, complicated, and the tendency to be a complete pain in the ass.
Regardless, your husband was at work. If everything went well for him today, there was one last case that he was going to tie up, and then he was yours and hers until he was ready to go back. You figured that wouldn’t be for a long while and that was exciting.
You would think that this would have been too much by now. You guys didn’t really have your friends, or regular company that you kept. No one had been in your home, save for Lynn who you insisted he invite over so she could see the nursery in person.
She’d also given you a gift and you wanted to receive it from her in person. You knew there was a special friendship she had with Andy. A woman in a position of power, you figured she didn’t have time for many. And Andy wasn’t a typical friend, a low-maintenance guy who was kind and smart. They just went together well, and you wanted to encourage him to let her in at least a little.
He answered your call on the first ring because he’d been glued to his phone for these past three months every time that he had to leave the house. “Hey, everything okay?”
“Are you busy?” you worked to keep your voice level. No need to rile him up before he could get home.
“No, not really. I just stepped out of a meeting with Lynn. We were talking about the last case she thought of giving me. She’s wondering if three days is—”
“She should give it to someone else.” You had taken to rubbing your stomach, mentally pleading with your baby. Please, baby, just wait for your daddy. I’ll never hear the end of this if he doesn’t see it.
“Are you okay?”
“Well, I’m fine…but my water broke—”
“What?!” he yelled. You distantly heard him yelling then, “Lynn, I gotta go! My baby is on the way and she was a bit of a jerk at the start, wouldn’t kick for me. I think she’s missing all those times she killed my soul and I’m terrified she’s going to show up before I make it.”
You could only imagine the look on Lynn’s face. Or the look on his face. A cross between terrified and thrilled, he probably looked like a serial killer.
“Can you wait for me to get home?”
“Did you just call our daughter a jerk?”
He huffed. “Baby.”
“I think so. I haven’t started having any contra—nope! No, there it is.”
He talked you to through breathing until it subsided. “Okay, listen, this is very important. I’m across town right now and there’s going to be some traffic at this hour—”
“Please don’t drive crazy.”
“I won’t, I promise. But first, I need you to get the timer…where are you?”
“On the couch.”
“Great, get the timer under the table.”
“There isn’t a timer under the table.”
“There is, I taped it there.”
“For what?” you pressed.
“This, obviously.”
“But why would you tape it?”
“There are about twenty timers all over the house, hidden so you couldn’t find them and move then.”
With a deep sigh, you leaned forward slowly to search under the top of the table for the timer. Yup, he was being serious.
“Okay, just keep track of them. And now, the second thing, I need you to promise me something. The neighbors, if you need them to drive you, they will.”
“What?”
“I’ve been creating these backup plans ever since you told me you were pregnant.”
“Oh, come on,” you complained. “I thought you were being nice to them because you liked them.”
“I mean, it’s not as if anyone in our neighborhood would ever say no to taking you. I just had to make sure that they were good drivers.”
You didn’t know how to respond. You had hoped that having a child was making him see the importance of social ties. These people lived by you, they were all having kids, most of them would probably end up in the same school.
“Honey?”
“I thought you wanted them to be our married friends. She just had her baby 8 months ago—”
He snorted. “Yeah, in addition to that other one.”
“Are you talking about Charles?”
“I know he’s 5, but he’s evil—”
“Andy!”
“Baby, listen. I’m getting in the car now. If you need to get to the hospital before I make it there, go left first. If they are not home, then go to the right. Left then right. Left first, right is the second resort.”
“You dragged the Johnsons into this, too?”
“Dragged ‘em all in, baby. Gotta go, stay calm and don’t move unless you need to. I love you.”
“I love you, too.” You hung up and laid back against the couch. It felt like all there was to do was wait for your next contraction, something you did not enjoy the first time. They were just going to get worse, you needed your husband here.
You heard Andy pull up a little over half an hour later. He charged into the house like a maniac, showing up at your side, hands immediately going to your stomach. “Are you okay?”
“I’ve had a couple of contractions,” you reported. “They don’t last long and they’re pretty far apart.”
“Okay, let’s go.” He helped you off the couch, bringing the timer along with him. He let you control the pace to the car. You’d gotten bigger than you thought you would and walking three steps was nearly a minute-long ordeal.
Halfway there, you noticed the bag over his shoulder. “Don’t you have a bag in the car?”
“I packed the car bags sometime last week. Who knows what state of mind I was in? I can’t trust my competence.”
“Are you implying that there has been a moment during these 40 weeks that you haven’t been out of your mind?”
“I’m going to pay for this neighbors bit, aren’t I?”
“Yes,” you promised.
Labor wasn’t a long process. Painless as many women had told you it was? Fuck no. It hurt, a lot. But Andy was there and he was all you needed. He talked you through the breathing, he never stopped touching you, your arms, your face, your stomach. He liked to make plans when neither of those things worked. He reminded you about all the great things you guys would get to do with children, and it was enough to get you through it.
You thought you knew what love looked like, because you loved Andy so much. But when he saw your baby for the first time after she’d been set in his arms, he looked at her in such an intense, breath-taking way.
Any uncertainty you might have been playing with in your mind was gone in that second. You’d gotten a bit paranoid over time. Wondering if you guys were just going to have the same marriage as everyone else. Like, you started in love and ended with affairs and really hurtful words. But you knew then that this was not a normal family. This was true, unconditional love.
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french vanilla 01 | gilbert lafayette
title: french vanilla 01
pairing: lafayette x reader
words: 5.7k; this is probably going to shake out to be a trilogy :)
warnings: abundant sexual innuendos, hand fetish lowkey, maria reynolds’s abs, hugh grant mentions, painfully thick sexual tension
desc: you can’t quite place it – maybe it’s his unchecked confidence, or maybe it’s just his arms – but there’s something about your new dance instructor that makes your palms sweat and your head spin – which is, unfortunately for you, not the best combination while suspended two yards above the floor.
tags: @stargazelaurens @ivory-haired-queens @exoticxchicken8 @assbuttstyles777 @superbarriobrothers @distinguishedpotsticker @fukaaaaaaaa @hereforthepsyche-assessment @ivetoldamillionlies @fangirl570 @thealaddinkid @lasciviouspeach @shy-and-awkward-daveed @rachelhermionerose @soft-weeb-s @gryffinclxw @anamrnk @daveeddiggsit @ayayayayana @marinovakovich @cryinghazelnutt @thefandomgirl03 @a-hopeless-fan @cloudywlw @tinywhim @lolidunnoaboutnow @siriusorionblackiii— lmk if you want to be added
You took a deep breath as you examined the door in front of you, the sign on it confirming that you were in the right place, despite the fact that you -- though you'd never admit it -- desperately hoped you weren't. You'd signed up for pole dancing classes on something of a dare, when you joking about it with your friends lead to you being challenged to really try it. And you never backed down from a challenge.
So there you stood, only feet from the door that determined the next two hours (and two hours every Tuesday and Thursday for the next six weeks) of your fate, ponytail tied tight at the back of your head, still just a bit sore from spending the past few weeks since you'd signed up trying to improve your upper body strength. (You'd quickly found out that you despised lifting, as well as that you were not in nearly good enough shape to continue doing it without every one of your joints aching for the following week.)
Your eyes darted to the clock that hung from the wall to your left, swallowing hard when you saw that if you didn't move soon, you'd be late. As much as you didn't particularly want to pole dance, you wanted even less to be late to pole dancing classes.
You reluctantly entered, less than thrilled to find the class both relatively small (you wouldn't be able to hide at the back just to tell your friends you'd gone) and filled mostly with fairly attractive women in their twenties and thirties. And just like that, you remembered why you preferred not to leave the house.
You dropped your gym bag off to the side near the door, bringing only your water bottle with you, and made your way toward the mass of people in the middle of the room, all stretching and chatting. All right, this wasn't so bad. You could work with chatty women.
"Hey." You approached one on the edge nearest to you, seemingly zeroed in on what she was doing, long, dark hair pulled back into a ponytail, only having donned leggings and a matching sports bra. "Mind if I sit?" She looked up at your hopeful, if not slightly anxious, smile, and her expression brightened.
"Of course!" Her reply came slightly breathlessly, seeming surprised at your presence, but welcoming nonetheless. She nodded her head toward the space next to her, scooting over just a few inches, but the gesture wasn't lost on you. You gave her a warm smile as you took a seat on the polished hardwood floor, reaching out to stretch one leg. "First time?"
You turned your head to her with wide eyes. Was it that obvious? "Oh! Um, yeah. I'm kind of here on a dare, so we'll see how this turns out," you said with a nervous laugh, "What gave it away?"
She just smiled at you, eyes crinkling at the corners. "Might just take one to know one," she confessed, "I took a one-session beginners' class a few weeks ago with some friends, but I'm the only one who stuck around, so I think we're in the same boat right now."
You grinned at her. "Y'know what they say; two shipmates are better than one."
"Do they?"
You shared a slight laugh as you held your knee up toward your chest, extending your free hand toward her in greeting. "Y/N."
"Maria." She gladly took your hand, meeting your eyes with a friendly gaze, and you decided then and there that you liked Maria. Besides, you felt safer knowing that you had an ally going into this.
A loud clap and the shuffling of hands came from the front of the room, attracting all your attention. "Alright, ladies!" You lifted your head, breaking her gaze, to look curiously up at the source of the deep French accent, who was also presumably your instructor. Your eyes widened.
You'd been surprised enough that your instructor was a man. Registration had only given you a last name, and while you supposed the class hadn't specified that it was just for women, the lack of men attending the class made it feel strange that it was being taught by one. That wasn't the main source of your surprise, though. The man standing in front of you all as you sat up was, to be quite blunt, gorgeous. He had dark skin and a gorgeous smile, curls pulled back in an unruly bun, arms bulging through the sleeves of his less-than-loose t-shirt. If you'd been nervous before, it was nothing compared to how you felt then.
"It is good to see all of you eager and ready to get right into things. I am your instructor, Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch, Gilbert du Motier de Lafayette, but I am not expecting any of you to remember all of zat, so please, call me Lafayette," he greeted you all warmly, and you thanked whatever god was up there that he was the instructor, letting out a soft sigh. Otherwise, you thought, your gaze drifting down to the outline of his abs, the staring would probably have weirded him out by now. Though, you realized only moments later that you still weren't quite safe of that as you looked back up to his face, only to find him watching you as he spoke, an eyebrow cocked. You swallowed hard. From that point, though, while he continued talking, his smile didn't revert back from the smirk it'd become.
"I 'ave been a trained pole dancer for nearly seven years now, and 'ave been giving classes for more than three, so I can assure you zat you are in good 'ands with me." You had no doubt about that as he folded his arms across his chest, and you eyed the bulging veins in his forearms, his large hands -- perhaps being attracted to his hands bordered on skeevy, but your moral compass wasn't at the forefront of your mind just then. You couldn't help but admire his physique. "I will be spending ze next several weeks with you building your skills up from ze fundamentals into full pieces of choreography, 'elping you every step of ze way. You will become skilled pole dancers in zis class, although 'ow you choose to use zat skill is entirely up to you."
He gave a playful grin at that, eliciting a laugh from most of the women in the class, though Maria and you shared a weary glance.
"But no matter your choice," he finished, "I look forward to getting to know and to work with each and every one of you." He met your eyes as he said that, and while you couldn't imagine the words could've been directed at you, the intensity of his gaze had you tugging your bottom lip in between your teeth.
You could be in for a long six weeks.
Beyond that, though, you quickly learned that pole dancing was not nearly as easy as you hoped it would be, nor as easy as Lafayette (and surprisingly, Maria, though you should've seen it coming based on the size of her arms and her very prominent abs) made it look.
"Back straight, Y/N," Lafayette commented as he passed you. He'd learned your name about fifteen minutes earlier and had since used it on every opportunity he'd had to visit your side of the room. "Keep your hips out; it will make it easier to 'old ze structure of ze position." You huffed, pushing your chest forward and your hips back, your arms shaking as you struggled to hold yourself up, let alone maintain proper form. "Perfect. Now loosen your grip a little bit; swing your legs slowly around ze pole."
"I'm gonna fall if I do," you whined breathlessly, focused on your own conquest to not bruise your tailbone too much to glance up and take notice of how he was watching you. He laughed.
"Just try it. Do not worry so much." While you scowled, trying to pull yourself up a bit so as to have more room to slide down as you tried to swing around the pole, you heard heavy footsteps approaching you from behind. "'ere. Let me 'elp you."
You inhaled sharply as you felt Lafayette rest his hands on your hips. You glanced back nervously over your shoulder, found his face only inches from yours, a small smile resting on his lips, and you gulped, turning back.
"Go ahead; I will not let you fall. You can trust me." While you could feel your heart rate increase in the close proximity, your face heating up, you let out a shaky breath and nodded. You could feel his warm breath dancing over the skin of your neck as you loosened your grip on the pole, sliding down a few uneven inches, and began swinging your legs off to the side, little by little.
"Careful, chérie," his voice came from behind you, hardly a breath over your shoulder as his grip tightened on your hips, pads of his fingers pressing ever so slightly into your skin. He pushed you slightly forward as you slowly went through the motions. "Ah! Back straight."
You could still hear his grin in his voice but could do little more than scowl in your struggle. You pursed your lips, arched your back, and the pressure from his fingertips began to ease as you reached a suspended sitting position next to the pole, using your momentum to swing yourself around.
"Bon travail, Y/N," he said softly, his lips only a breath from your ear as he pulled back. Your heart pounded, grip still shaking, though you weren't sure anymore that it was only from struggling to stay up.
He went back to wandering through the rows of women, shouting tips and encouragement over the music with a wide smile, and it took all of your willpower to not stare at his retreating form. You repeated the move a few times, making sure you could get it on your own, watched the ease with which Maria seemed to go through it. Eventually, your face stopped burning (you didn't like having to admit to yourself why it'd started), and you went on with the choreography, Lafayette demonstrating the next moves. Your eyes widened as you realized how little you had of the skill the rest of the dance needed.
"Now do not worry, everyone," he called out, as everyone sat on the floor in front of him, drinking some water and resting. "I know 'ow intimidating zis looks right now, but none of you are expected to get it on ze first try." His words did little to comfort you as you glanced around the room, knew most of these women would probably be able to pull it off better than you would.
"And if you cannot seem to get it after a while, remember: I am 'ere to be your teacher. You can always," --he caught your eye at those words, the corners of his lips quirking up in a mischievous smile-- "Always, ask for 'elp." He shot you a wink at the end of his sentence, and while most of the women had already begun chattering to those around them (you caught snippets about not minding him helping them out, if you knew what they meant), you couldn't break his gaze, a chill running down your spine.
You couldn't quite place it just yet -- maybe it was his unchecked confidence, the tempter integral to his person, or maybe it was just his arms -- but there was something about your new dance instructor that made your palms sweat and your head spin -- which was, unfortunately for you, not the ideal combination while trying not to fall on your ass, suspended two yards above the floor.
_______________
"You were looking pretty good today, Y/N." Maria winked at you as you packed up your bag. You'd known her for only about a week, now, but had grown quickly attached to her, enjoyed getting to know her. The pair of you had become fast friends. You'd expressed offhandedly your insecurity being in that class alone -- albeit a pole-dancing class -- and she'd subsequently taken it upon herself to tell you how great you were doing about twice a minute.
You rolled your eyes at her with a laugh, taking a drink of water. "Not so bad yourself, Lewis." You wiggled your eyebrows at her flirtatiously, and she scoffed.
"Don't lead me on like this," she teased, "I just might get the wrong idea."
You only grinned, tucking your water bottle into your bag along with the rest of your things. "And if I want you to?"
She laughed, shooting you a wink as she turned to leave. "If you're interested, L/N, you know how to find me," she sang as she walked over to the door, flashing a smile over her shoulder as she shut it behind her. You laughed to yourself as she left, fixing your ponytail before zipping your bag. The rapport was all playful, of course, neither of you expecting the other to take your words as being in earnest, but candidly, you were struggling to figure out whether you'd rather screw Maria or be her. Either way, she was undeniably adding excitement to your life.
As you tightened your ponytail, you swung your bag onto your shoulder, phone in hand as you checked the time. You walked up to the front of the room as everyone began to slowly filter out, needing to talk to Lafayette before you left about your plans for the next class, and feeling astoundingly anxious to do so.
You found him off to the side chatting with someone you didn't recognize, another woman from your class, and his eyes met yours as you neared him. His expression lit up, brows raising and smile broadening as his eyes met yours, and while he nodded along halfheartedly to what it was he was being told, for the time being, it took him about half a sentence after that to wave her off with an "au revoir" that left her giggling. (You couldn't judge her; you'd heard his accent, seen his blinding smile. You'd be no different in her position, and you very well knew it.)
"Y/N, what can I do for you?" he asked, folding his arms with an easy smile as you approached him. You returned the smile, pulling your bag higher up on your shoulder as you reached him.
"Hey, Lafayette," you breathed, tucking a loose strand of hair behind your ear. "I just wanted to talk to you about next class." He arched a brow. "So, I'm not going to be able to make it here this Thursday; I have a board meeting for my job in the evening. I was just thinking, since I know we're working on like a full piece of choreography and everything, is there any way I can keep up with it outside of class?"
He raised his eyebrows, considered you for a moment. "Are your Wednesday nights free?" You pursed your lips, shook your head, and he let out a hum of discontent. "Alright. Zere is a video and walkthrough I can send you of ze next part of ze choreography, so zat you can learn it on your own time. Would zat 'elp?"
You smiled. "Yeah, that'd be great. Is the video of the whole dance, or...?" You trailed off, the question left unsaid, and he nodded as he began to dig through the bag he had left near the front of the room, slinging it over his shoulder as he did so.
"Oui. I can tell you which part of it we will be learning zis Thursday, so zat you can just follow along." He finally emerged from the bag, holding his phone with an easy smile. "Can I 'ave your number, chérie?"
Your eyebrows shot up. What had he just asked? "I'm sorry?"
"Your number?" he repeated, slowly that time, his smile widening, "So zat I can send you ze choreography for Thursday?"
Your eyes widened at your own foolishness, and you let out an anxious breath. Heat was creeping up the back of your neck. "Oh! Right, yeah--"
"Now why did you think I was asking you, hm?" He cocked a challenging brow, seemingly enjoying your reaction. "Did you think I 'ad some ulterior motive? Zat would be entirely inappropriate, chérie." Despite his words, his expression, his teasing grin told you he was amused by the idea, if not intrigued by it. However, you were winded.
"You just caught me off guard," you said, breathless, and he let out a light laugh.
"Of course." He glanced back down at his phone and up at you with an expectant gaze, and your eyes widened. He was still waiting on your number.
"Oh! Right." You gave him the string of numbers as he made you a contact in his phone. Finally, he nodded, looking up at you with a small smile.
"Thank you," he said, eyes shining as he regarded you, though, now, his mischievous gaze had begun to turn wolfish. "I'll be texting you, chérie."
____________
As promised, Lafayette did send you the choreography; the videos were more helpful than you'd expected them to be, considering the only place you had to practice was the bar that divided your doorway in two. (How foolish you felt doing it was extraneous to your ultimate goal.) Thankfully, the next Tuesday passed without a hitch. As did the next Thursday. You were getting noticeably stronger, or otherwise less helpless in your ability to stay upright; you were getting closer and closer with Maria, and more and more intrigued by Lafayette. He was abundantly friendly, and his ability to command a room was enviable, but your unfortunate sticking place was how it seemed he'd already become more than familiar with every woman in the class. He was chatty, obviously, but it was impossible to determine whether his flirty demeanor was unconscious, or whether he knew exactly what he was doing to you. You didn't know quite what to make of him, but you certainly enjoyed eyeing him from the back of the room as you pondered it.
However, his earlier words were stuck firmly in the back of your mind, regardless of whether they'd been sincere. He's your teacher, you reminded yourself, every time you caught yourself staring at his straining biceps when he demonstrated the choreography. It would be entirely inappropriate.
And while your rational mind was right there with you, more than ready to jump ship on the fruitless ordeal of pining after your gorgeous dance instructor with the even more gorgeous accent, neither your hormones nor your heart seemed to agree. While, yes, they understood very well how inappropriate the scenario was, their mantra was something more along the lines of, I'm so fucked.
To say the least, you were in deep.
You wiped sweat from your brow with the hem of your tank top as you retreated to your bag, Lafayette still shouting to everyone from the front of the class as they began to disperse, and you all but entirely tuned out his naive encouragement, reminding you all to keep up the good work. Instead, you grabbed a drink of your water as you walked over to find Maria.
"Hey." You grinned, taking a drink of your water, and she looked over at you with an easy smile, brow raised.
"Hey." She swung her bag onto her shoulder. "You find that any easier than I did?"
You had to scoff at the question, reminiscence painful despite her teasing tone. "Are you really asking me that, now? You're supposed to be the in-shape one in this relationship."
She grinned. "I can't pick up all your slack, L/N. A relationship is supposed to be a two-way street."
"Guess I'll have to step up my game, then." You had to remind yourself exactly why you'd approached her as she dug through her bag, pulling out a sweat towel, her abs flexing as she strained to support the bag in front of her. (You were getting progressively less sure you wouldn't be sliding into her DMs at any point.) She raised her eyebrows at you as she took a drink of water, waiting for you to continue.
You cleared your throat. "So, I was thinking, me and a few of my friends are planning on going to grab dinner after work this Friday, just to go hang out. Would you wanna join us? I think you'd like them."
She pursed her lips, and despite her nonchalance, her smiling eyes gave away how she'd softened at the invitation. "Yeah, I'm down. Where are you all going?"
"Dunno yet." You shrugged, but couldn't help your grin. You were just a bit too excited for Maria to meet your friends. "Probably just someplace downtown?"
She held your endeared gaze another moment before she spoke. "Yeah, sure, can you text m--"
"Y/N!" Both your heads turned as Lafayette approached with a wide smile, cutting off both your invitation and your eagerness to tell Maria everything there was to know about your friends. You hoped desperately that they'd hit it off. (You noticed in the corner of your vision Maria rolling her eyes as he approached.)
It seemed everyone else in the class had cleared out at that point, so he'd apparently decided that interrupting your conversation was appropriate. "Was ze video 'elpful?"
You let out a light sigh, nodded with a smile. "For sure. Thanks for sending it."
"Of course, chérie."
You pulled your bag further up on your shoulder as you glanced away from him, again meeting Maria's eyes. "So are we on for Friday?"
"Wouldn't miss it for the world." She grinned, threw you a playful wink. "I'll be sure to wear something tight."
"What is Friday?" Lafayette interjected as you laughed, and you turned to see his raised brow. Maria had at that point begun to leave, checking her missed texts; apparently, she didn't have much interest in sticking around to chat with Lafayette. You shrugged.
"Not much. Just bringing Maria out with some of my friends. No special occasion."
"And you did not bother to invite me?" He raised his eyebrows, letting out a mocking gasp, and despite being unable to stifle your smile, you rolled your eyes. "I am not sure whether to be offended."
"Sorry, Lafayette; this one's girls only." His facade of a pout grew. "Can't just violate the sanctity of ladies' night like that. Wouldn't be fair."
"So when do I get to meet the rest of your friends?"
"You've met Maria, haven't you?" He huffed, and your grin grew at his adverse reaction. You knew, by then, not to take Lafayette's quips as being in earnest, but you didn't have to avoid being entertained by them.
"Ah, Y/N, I see 'ow it is. Do not worry, I take no offense."
"Wasn't worried," you reassured him, digging through the side of your bag to retrieve your sweatshirt.
He let out a snort of laughter. "Now I take some offense."
"Why would you?"
He ignored that, continuing, "Perhaps I will 'ave to get Maria to invite me to her 'ladies' nights' instead. You would not be invited, of course, since I am apparently not good enough to penetrate your inner circle."
You didn't bother even to humor him, fishing your phone out of your pocket. "Buy me dinner first," you teased, tone dry, and he grinned.
"Per'aps I will."
____________________
You didn't think about that interaction even once before Friday. Though Lafayette and Maria both maintained a place in your subconscious, your dance lessons, your Friday plans, all slid to the back burner as you spent your time working day and night, redrafting and finishing a long-term report for your job. It happened to be due Friday, so that ultimately became your priority leading up to the end of the workweek.
Thankfully, after the exhaustion the past few days had put you through, no one had been all that invested in the idea of going out on the town, so your night out became a night in, watching tacky romcoms at low volumes on Eliza's couch and arguing over which Hugh Grant film was the best of his phases. (The answer was obviously Notting Hill, but to each their own.)
Maria was meshing well with your small girl group, much to your delight, but seeing the way she and Angelica had been making eyes at each other all night made you groan internally. (Angelica still had a boyfriend, mind you, but she seemed to have conveniently forgotten that detail.)
You were just reaching the first confession scene in Bridget Jones's Diary when your phone first pinged. Your instinct was just to turn it over, hide the glow of the screen in the couch cushions, but whoever had messaged you apparently had plans other than letting you all pine for Colin Firth's Mark Darcy. Your notification sound went off once more before you decided you had to turn it on silent -- that, and Eliza's glare when it kept going off had scared you into submission. (Did whoever was texting her not know that double-texting was a bother, or did they just not care?)
When you finally turned your phone over to turn the ringer off, your pulse jumped, and your stomach turned.
lafayette sent: hey
lafayette sent: u up?
However, after you processed the initial shock of seeing his name show up in your notifications, you couldn't help but roll your eyes at the content of the texts.
Y/N sent: are you deliberately interrupting my girls' night out of spite, or did you need something?
lafayette sent: your assumption hurts me
lafayette sent: i could never be so spiteful
Y/N sent: i'm sure
Y/N sent: other than the alternate girls' night you've decided to set up just to exclude me from it, of course
lafayette sent: extenuating circumstances :(
Y/N sent: how??
lafayette sent: you excluded me first :((
Y/N sent: isn't that like, the definition of spite???
lafayette sent: depends on your perspective
Y/N sent: don't think that's how that works
"Y/N," Eliza hissed, yanking your attention from the text string. You were sure you looked like a deer in headlights when you met her eyes, instinctively pulling your phone closer to hide the screen. "Either put that away or go to the kitchen; I'm trying to appreciate corporate Hugh Grant."
"Sorry for distracting you from your very important engagement," you grumbled as you picked yourself up from the couch, sliding your legs out from under where Maria and Angelica were all but in one another's laps. You eyed them with an amused smile before retreating from where your friends lay.
Y/N sent: anyway, why'd you text me?
lafayette sent: turns out working late on a friday isn't the party it's made out to be
lafayette sent: can you blame me for looking for a bit of entertainment?
Y/N sent: what happened to texting me being "entirely inappropriate"?
lafayette sent: didn't i just mention how bored i am???
lafayette sent: desperate times, desperate measures
You rolled your eyes.
Y/N sent: calling talking to me a 'desperate measure' isn't the way to stop me from blocking you
lafayette sent: my apologies
lafayette sent: but what's more entertaining than doing something "entirely inappropriate" on a friday night?
Y/N sent: the girls night that you weren't invited to
lafayette sent: hurtful
lafayette sent: i had to work anyway, so you would not have been graced with my presence
Y/N sent: why are you still at work??
Y/N sent: who the hell is taking dance lessons at 11 pm on a friday
lafayette sent: teaching dance isn't my only job
lafayette sent: i have to pay the bills somehow
Y/N sent: what else do you do?
lafayette sent: unimportant
Y/N sent: ah yes because that makes it seem less suspicious
lafayette sent: i am glad
Y/N sent: seriously tho, are you a bartender? secretly a cook at some fancy dinner place?
Y/N sent: a spy sent to infiltrate city hall by night??
lafayette sent: you are a poor guesser
Y/N sent: i don't have much info to work with
Y/N sent: that'd be like me telling you to guess what i'm wearing while i was dressed in drag
Y/N sent: you aren't exactly making it obvious
lafayette sent: what ARE you wearing? 👀
You inhaled sharply, heat creeping up the back of your neck as you leaned back against the kitchen counter.
Y/N sent: go back to work
lafayette sent: am i not exciting enough for you?
Y/N sent: i think you can find a different 'entirely inappropriate' way to spend your friday
lafayette sent: perhaps you're right
lafayette sent: i suppose my job fills the same purpose
Y/N sent: ?????
Y/N sent: you do know you're just making yourself sound more and more like some kind of criminal, right??
lafayette sent: goodnight, cherie
lafayette sent: i am sorry to leave you with your boring evening
Y/N sent: ur loss
lafayette sent: i cannot disagree
lafayette sent: dream of me ;)
Despite how clichéd the line was, you could, by then, feel your cheeks burning as you rolled your bottom lip between your teeth. You should've turned off the phone right then; he was done texting you, and it'd saved you a world of trouble, but your fixation on reading and re-reading the messages was your downfall.
"Who have you been texting?"
You jumped at the voice from the entrance to the kitchen, pulse spiking. There stood Maria, a skeptical eyebrow raised with an empty wine glass. You forced a smile, shrugged as she neared you, holding the phone up to your chest.
"No one. Just a friend."
She hummed in understanding as she walked around to your other side, reaching for the bag of Takis you could only assume Eliza had sent her to grab. "Seemed like you were having quite a reaction to texting 'just a friend.'"
She gave you a knowing smile that you couldn't help but return, despite rolling your eyes when she wiggled her eyebrows at you. "Don't worry about it. It's no one."
However, with how self-conscious and consumed in your own thoughts you were, you didn't notice her peering over your shoulder when you went to turn off your phone screen.
"Lafayette?!" Her whisper-shout directly in your ear had you flinching away, taking a step back when she reached for your phone. "You've been texting Lafayette all evening?"
If you'd felt embarrassed just reading his texts, by then, your skin was burning. Maria looked well-beyond intrigued, and you pursed your lips to hide your smile. "It's not like that. Let's go finish the movie."
You tucked your phone into your back pocket, turning to go with her back to your living room, but as deftly as you should've expected from her, she swiped your phone from your jeans, turning away to snoop through your messages before you could even begin to react.
"Maria!" you scowled, whirling around to find her wearing a mischievous grin.
"Now, what exactly is on here that you don't want me looking through?" She glanced back over her shoulder at you, her gaze teasing as she went and unlocked your phone. You would never have imagined this would be why you came to regret giving her your passcode.
"Give me my phone," you groaned, following her back toward the counter, your anxiety spiking alongside your fatigue. You were too tired to earnestly give chase. "It's just logistical stuff for class. It's not what you're thinking."
"Mhm." Her skeptical tone told you all you needed to know.
You buried your face in your hands when she turned back to you with wide eyes. "Y/N. Are you fucking serious?"
"What?"
"Why haven't you fucked Lafayette yet?"
"What?" You looked at her in shocked disbelief, brow furrowed. She only looked at you expectantly, apparently still looking for an answer, and you scowled. "Give me my phone back. C'mon."
"Listen, I'm the one who's had to listen to you two flirting every day after class; I think I'm allowed to have an opinion in this by now." Apparently, she was ignoring your pleas for her to leave your sex life alone for the evening.
"We have not been flirting. Don't be dramatic."
"He started a conversation with, 'you up?' That's how people start booty calls, okay? There is nothing platonic about this."
You rolled your eyes, reaching over to snatch your phone from her hands, and this time, she put up little resistance, if any. "That's just how he is. It's not personal. Have you seen the way he talks to every other woman in our class?"
She folded her arms, pinning you with a skeptical stare. "I can promise you he isn't texting the rest of the women in our class at 11 PM on a Friday looking for an invite to their place."
"That's out of context!" you argued, but she didn't seem convinced. "Can we just go back to the movie? Please?"
For a moment, neither of you said anything, and she pursed her lips. "Fine." She brushed past you as she unrolled the bag of Takis, throwing you one last sly grin over her shoulder. "But don't think you're off the hook, L/N. This is far from over."
"Duly noted." Your dead stare didn't discourage how smug she looked as you walked together back into your living room. You couldn't help but think that her snooping into your sex life was mildly hypocritical as you eyed how touchy she and Angelica had become in just a few short hours, but you decided to put it out of your mind. The movie only had about an hour left, anyway.
You pulled out your phone to check the time as Eliza leaned over to you on the couch. "What was all that about? We could hear you and Maria from here."
"Don't worry about it," you murmured, glancing down at your phone screen. The time read 11:24 PM, but when you went to power it off, a notification caught your eye.
lafayette sent: i know i'll be dreaming of you
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