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da-birb-writes-sometimes · 8 months

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How You Turn My World; Chapter 1

Your day started with chaos, and my dear, it looks like it will continue to be chaos. But only time will tell. The Underground holds many surprises in store for you.

Characters; Grim, Lilia Vanrouge, Deuce Spade, Ace Trappola

Content; Gender-neutral reader, cat shenanigans, building the plot

Content Warnings; Swearing, illusion to marijuana but there is none

Word Count; 4.6 K

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 |

Don't put my work into AI; I'll make sure you go to the Underground and don't return. Mwah mwah, kisses~

Ah, the joys of cat parenthood. Days spent cuddling your little bundle of furry joy. That’s what your friends preached. That having a feline roommate was easy and rewarding. That you would benefit by having a cute and fuzzy companion that didn’t demand much of anything. That you would love your little kitty friend like a child. Well, either your friends were liars with questionable senses of humour, or you drew the short stick when it came to choosing a furry companion. And there’s always the possibility of it being both, what with having Ace as a friend and all, but you just hoped it was just your shit luck and not that you had shit friends.

Seriously, though, what higher power did you manage to piss off to deserve the royal hobgoblin of a cat you have? He has shit and pissed in your plants on several occasions. Demolished every single curtain he laid eyes on like he had a personal vendetta against them. Stole your breakfast off your plate right as you were about to take a bite. Puked on your last pair of good white shoes, which still had stains on them because they wouldn’t come out. The cherry on top of it all though was that he insists on yowling and crying in the middle of the damn night for no good reason. Rudely awaking you from the dead of sleep because he demanded attention. With how loud he was, you were surprised that you hadn’t gotten a noise complaint from any of your neighbours… yet. But then again, you could hear the upstairs neighbours’ children screaming bloody murder every so often — what were their names, the Clovers? They were probably so used to it that they threw you a bone, or they didn’t want extra grey hairs from filing a complaint to the landlord. So maybe Grim wasn’t all that bad, but he was still a gremlin child.

“MROWWWWWW!!!!!” Ah, so tonight was no different then. Grim had decided that you needed to be woken up before even the birds started to sing, needed to be yanked out of the land of dreams. That whatever had caught the attention of his singular brain cell was more important than you recharging so you don’t accidentally say the wrong thing to your boss. Since last time you had slipped up and called him dad, even though no one in their right mind would leave him alone with a rutabaga unattended, and he went on a two-hour long monologue about how much of a kind and generous person he was for you to see him as a father figure. And your salary wasn’t high enough, nor would it ever be, to deal with his eccentric and maddening behaviour.

Maybe, just maybe, if you ignored him and stared at the ceiling long enough he would stop his caterwauling and go to sleep. “MROWWWW!!!!!” Apparently not.

Just one night, ONE NIGHT, of peace and quiet. PLEASE. But you knew that if you didn’t get up soon, he would get up on the bed and put his fluffy butt in your face… like he did last night and the night before that. Sighing, you begrudgingly got out of your cocoon of warm, fluffy, blankets, and hoped you would soon be back in them after dealing with Grim. Hopefully, he was just complaining about his food bowl not being as full as he would like it.

What was the time anyways? Three-thirty in the morning? Ugh, Grim! What did Ace say about it, ah, yes, “Primetime witching hour. Demons and all sorts of creepies” yada yada yada. But you didn’t pay any mind to him, as his annoying smug look would taunt you in your mind even though he was probably sound asleep, blissfully asleep. Something that you wanted to be doing, but woefully you were not.

Stepping out into the main living space, you shot the grey fuzzball the stink eye. “What the hell do you want? You absolute gremlin!” You hissed through gritted teeth, very much annoyed with your brat of a fur child and wanting nothing more than to crawl back to bed, hell, even the loveseat would suffice.

The offending feline just trilled at you in response, and his tail vibrated, happy that you had come out to see him. How is he so cute but so annoying? He rubbed against your legs before trotting off to one of his hidey holes, which also served as his nest of your stolen socks. He has a weird obsession with socks. But he popped back out, holding something in his mouth. Something small and fuzzy that didn’t look like any of his toys.

“Prowwww,” he dropped it at your feet as if saying that catching whatever it was, was the equivalent to paying his share of rent. Which, it was very much not.

You closed your eyes and pinched your brow. Please be one of his toys. PLEASE be one of his toys. You chanted to yourself in your mind and then opened your eyes. Unfortunately, it was not one of his toys. The small, fuzzy thing in question seemed to be a mouse or some other kind of rodent. It was too late (too early?) for this, and quite frankly you didn’t have the brain power to confirm whatever the hell it was. All you knew was that it looked like a mouse, therefore it was a mouse.

“Is this what you’ve been screaming about this whole time? A mouse,” you sighed. Shaking your head, you went to the bathroom, grabbing some paper towel so you could at least put it outside for something else to eat, or go back to nature in some other way. It was better than just being left to decompose in the communal garbage bin. When you came back out though, it was nowhere to be seen. Now, either Grim decided to eat it like a good kitty cat, or, with your luck, it was still alive and was now running amuck in your apartment.

Grim’s chattering was coming from the kitchen now, and he was up on top of the fridge. It was running amuck in your apartment, how lovely.

“Why, why, are you like this?! Get down from there!” You really didn’t have the energy for this.

Grim just blinked at you before his eyes dilated. He leapt down from his perch on the fridge and was pawing at a corner by the window. Looking down and you couldn’t make out anything on the floor. But you had the oh-so-brilliant idea to look up toward the ceiling. The ‘mouse’ was very much alive, and wasn’t a mouse at all, since it was flying around and banging itself against the corner.

“YOU CAUGHT A FUCKING BAT?!”

He had indeed caught a fucking bat. And bats were normally fine, when they were outside. Not when they’re flying around your apartment at three o’clock in the morning and your cat is losing his goddamn mind trying to catch it. So no, this was very much not fine.

The bat was about as pleased as you were with this whole situation and kept on flinging itself against the glass of the window, desperately trying to get back outside. How the hell did it get inside in the first place? That could be pondered on upon at a later time, as the first priority was getting it back outside.

“Don’t fly towards my head, bat. I’m just trying to get you back outside. You’re a nice bat, right? Nice bat, nice bat,” you whispered in a non-threatening tone. Could the flying mammal understand what you were saying? Mostly likely not. Hopefully it understood that you, unlike your cat, were trying to help and did not want some fresh bat as your late night snack tonight.

After what felt like forever fuddling with the window to open with a broom in hand, just in case the bat decided to dive bomb your head, you finally got the cursed thing open.

Grabbing Grim, who was still trying to catch the bat for a second time tonight, you got back to your bedroom and locked the door shut. You hoped that the bat would take the hint that it now had a path to freedom, but only time, and a bit of sleep, would tell. Slumping against the door frame, you sighed and looked over at Grim. He was playing with the door stop, the boing, boingg, boinggg sounds filling in the quiet. Whether it was to amuse himself, or to annoy you was a fifty-fifty bet.

Just as you were about to crawl back under the covers a string of anxiety connected in your head. Shit, did Grim get bit? DAMMIT GRIM! After leaving a somewhat desperate and tired call to your vet’s voicemail, alongside an apology for the late call (early call?), you peeked outside to see if the bat was still flying around. According to Google, the bat should be tested for rabies. You did not trust your no brain cell having fluff ball to know better than to get bit by a possibly rabid bat. But it was gone, so yet again, you were out of luck.

You had enough with today, even though it had just really begun. Pulling up the covers, you sighed in the dark warmth of your blanket cocoon. Grim was busying himself by trying to pounce on your feet, but you ignored him, falling back to sleep and hoping that the rest of your day wouldn’t bring any more shenanigans, migraines, or small flying mammals.

…

By some miracle, you managed to get Grim to the vet the very same day. Your boss agreed to let you work from home because he is ever so kind and generous… It did help that one of the other higher-ups nearly nagged off his ear upon hearing about the condition of your cat. Even through the phone you could hear it, and could only imagine the spectacle it must have been. Oh well, you had the day off and that is what mattered… but you would be lying if you said that you didn’t cough out a laugh just imagining the scene on the other side of the phone.

You were relieved, Grim on the other hand was not having it. To be fair, you did trick him into his crate with some tuna. He made his disdain known to all though by crying the entire way there. You almost felt bad for him, almost being the key word.

“You have no one to blame for this but yourself, ya know.” You huffed at him, feeling your shit sleep all too well. “Crying about it won’t help you any.”

Grim let out a pathetic little mew. His little, bright, blue eyes being the only visible part of him, which peered out miserably from the crate. Caving to the kitty manipulation, you poked your finger in as a peace offering. Grim booped his nose to your finger and then proceeded to nibble on it; such a vicious beast.

The vet visit went as well as you could hope it could, as Grim only tried to maim the vet a few times. Hey, it was an improvement from last time, as he had actually peed on them. So yes, trying to maim was vastly better than seeing your figurative child pee on the doctor. You’re pretty sure your vet didn’t go through years of schooling and thousands of dollars into debt just to get peed on by your unruly cat. But Grim was won over by the offering of that cat gogurt, his nose and stomach betraying him. Note to self, stock up on some of that stuff.

The rest of the visit went on without a hitch; he had some blood drawn, got his booster shot for rabies, and even managed to squeeze in a bonus nail trim. There was no evidence of any bite or puncture marks, so Grim by some miracle, did indeed have enough brain cells not to get bit.

“Grim will have to be watched for about forty-five days,” the vet hummed, checking Grim’s chart. “Since you don’t have any other animals it shouldn’t be too difficult to keep him in quarantine. If you see any symptoms be sure to bring him back, just in case.” They gave you a tired smile, and then turned that smile towards their cantankerous patient. “And thank you for deciding not to pee on me this time, Grim. I’m not so bad, see?”

Grim swatted at them, which was his answer to the vet’s question. In Grim’s book, the vet was that bad.

Ignoring his attitude, as you would whenever you came across a screaming toddler and exhausted parent while doing your grocery run, you turned back to your vet. “Thank you, and sorry for Grim. If it makes you feel any better, he’s just as much as a gremlin child at home as well.” At least today went better than last time.

The vet chuckled goodheartedly, “Don’t worry about it, I have more unruly patients than little Grim here.”

Damn, they have seen some shit, haven’t they? … Maybe I should, I don’t know, bring them a gift basket next time I’m in? Or maybe a gift card for a spa day or something??? You should really get them something for the amount of dry cleaning they probably needed to do.

With the visit over, and Grim having a clear bill of health, you shoved him back into his carrier with zero decorum, closing the door as fast as possible before he could escape and try to hide behind the counter like he did last time. I know your tricks, cat. Speaking of bills, the one that was waiting for you at the front desk was enough for you to point an icy glare at your unruly ward.

“You’re lucky that I love you, asshole.” And much like the vet you too got a swat as your thank you. Wonder if this is what the Clovers feel about their children? At least their kids didn’t wake them up in the middle of the night with a bat they caught… You shook your head, moving past those thoughts, and hauled your wailing cat back home.

…

...

By the time you got back to your place, it was just a little past noon. The rest of your day was wide open, and you didn’t really have anything else to do, since taking Grim to the vet was the most urgent of your tasks. Your place could benefit from some tidying, since your boss had recently been demanding more as of late and has been even less useful than he usually was… which was saying something. Seriously, how does he have his position? It was baffling. You swore you could hear his monologue playing on loop in your head whenever you thought of the man, which you tried to keep to a minimum for your own sanity… whatever little of it still remained that is.

Shaking your head to rid the annoying voice, you put on your favourite playlist and got to work. You took your time, putting away the dishes, vacuumed the main room, and even got rid of the dust on the high shelves. But your place was small, so it didn’t take very long for you to tidy up, and deep cleaning could wait for another day when you had enough energy to mentally and physically deal with that undertaking.

You knew that your email probably had a few messages, but it could wait. You weren’t on the clock and therefore didn’t have to check it. Only do the stuff you’re required to do when you get paid, it makes your downtime way more enjoyable.

But, you were bored. The cleaning helped with it, but with the majority of it done and the more intense stuff waiting for another day, you had nothing else to do. And while doom scrolling through social media may fill in the time, it too, was boring, predictable.

… There were two people though who were the exact opposite of boring and predictable. And yes, they did give you your fair share of migraines and questioning your life decisions more than you usually do, they were your best friends. And you were in need of having a movie night with them.

Opening up the group chat, you typed in a message.

| The Responsible One | You guys down for a movie night at my place tonight?

And almost immediately, Ace replied.

| Ginger, derogatory | depends | ya got fiid?

Deuce responded shortly after.

|The Responsible One | How does 6 sound?

| Mama’s Boi | 6 works for me

| The Responsible One | I took a screenshot of that btw love you Ace | Thanks Deuce for actually giving me an answer. | What FIID do you guys want?

| Ginger, derogatory | FUCK YOU | … but yeah 6 works 4 me | any is cool with me

| The Responsible One | Yes yes, fuck you too Ace | Bring your own snacks it is then | See you guys at 6!

That gave you about ninety minutes to hide your good snacks, since the last time, Ace had made himself too comfortable and ate all your fancy treats that you paid way too much for. But like they say, you deserve to ‘treat yoself’ … Ace still owed you for those snacks though. They were fucking expensive, prick.

…

Ninety minutes didn’t take very long, but you managed to hide some of the mess that you hadn’t tackled in your bedroom; it could stand to wait. And the first of your dork friends arrived right on time, count on Deuce trying to be punctual… even if he was panting like he had run a marathon to make it.

“You know,” you sighed, “you didn’t have to sprint here.” You grabbed a glass, filled it with some ice water, and handed it over to your flushed and heaving friend. Please don’t pass out on me. “It’s not a race.”

Deuce took the glass and downed it, still catching his breath. He lifted up the tote bag he was carrying, “Mom made brownies.” A series of coughs escaped him, but he gave you a bashful smile and showed off the multiple Tupperware containers filled to the brim with still warm chocolatey divineness. “Didn’t want them to get cold! Oh! She also made extra for you too!”

He is such a sweetheart… but he’s also pretty dense at times, still a sweetie though. You could have just warmed them back up in the microwave — yes, they weren’t the same as fresh from the oven, but still — you didn’t have the heart to tell Deuce that though. He looked so proud that he made it on time and that the brownies were still warm. What did you do to deserve Deuce as a friend?

“Also,” he fished around the tote bag, “I brought extra popcorn, since we ate all of yours last time.” And he pulled out an unopened bag of popcorn, the bashful smile turning bright.

Deuce took a step forward, but stopped and backpedalled, taking off his shoes. After he set them neatly by the door, he made his way to the kitchen, and set all of his assorted belongings on the meagre counter space. Once he unloaded the tasty cargo, he made his way over to your loveseat, which had seen better days, and sat down, getting comfortable.

He was looking at you, and there was a little crease in between his eyebrows. Deuce only wore that look when he was worried. “Are you feeling okay? You seem a bit… off.”

You gave him a tired smile, “Meh. Tired, stressed, not enough money. You know, the usual.” You noticed that his frown was only deepening, so you took a seat next to him and patted his shoulder. “Seriously, Deuce, I’m okay. Plus you got enough on your own plate without worrying about me. I’m going to be fine.”

Deuce pursed his lips, but let out a long sigh, accepting your answer without much fuss. You were capable of dealing with whatever it was, he knew that. You were one of the most capable, and stubborn, people that he knew. You would be fine in the end. “Whose turn is it to pick the movie this time?” He asked, stretching out, trying not to bump into you.

“Hmm, your turn actually,” you hummed. “But–”

Bzz! Bzzz! BZZZ! Someone was buzzing your door, repeatedly pushing at the button. Only one person you know did that. BZZZZZZZZ! And he wouldn’t let up until you answered the door.

Groaning, you got out of your spot and peaked through the peephole. On the other side was none other than Ace, who’s leg was bouncing and he kept on pushing your damn buzzer.

You only opened the door when he decided to lean on it, making him almost fall… almost. Maybe next time would be the day where you would see him eat dirt. “Happy you could join us on this lovely evening,” you drawl, doing a little bow.

Ace rolled his eyes at you, “Seriously? Feeling petty tonight I see.” He too took off his shoes, since the last time he wore them in and tracked in mud from outside, you made him clean it up. He learned his lesson that day, and really didn’t feel like cleaning your floor again.

You smiled at him, “Yeah, yeah I am~” You dropped the smile and went back to your comfy spot beside Deuce. “Also,” you turned around right as Ace was about to plunder your fridge. You glared at him, and he backed off, giving you a sheepish look. “Don’t even think about stealing my food, there’s popcorn and you have food at your home. Unless you want to start paying for my groceries, stick to what’s on the counter.”

Closing the fridge, Ace busied himself by making himself some popcorn, and sneaking a brownie or two in his mouth as he waited for the microwave to finish making his treat. While he was busy in the kitchen, you and Deuce were slowly going through the seemingly endless catalogue of movies.

“What are we even watching tonight? There’s no special occasion,” Ace mused, sitting on the counter, swinging his legs back and forth. “Action? Horror? Sci-fi? Perhaps,” he paused and made a kissy face, “romance?~”

You stared at him, until he dropped the kissy face. “Never do that again,” you deadpanned, turning back to the screen. “Found something?”

Deuce was hovering over a title, Labyrinth. “Can we watch this? Mom said it was one of her favourites when she was a kid.”

Ace plopped into the armchair, and started chowing down on his fresh popcorn. “Dude, your mom probs just had the hots for, uhhh, Jared? Or whatever his name is.”

You threw a pillow at him, but missed unfortunately, and Ace flipped you off. “First off, Ace, his name is Jareth not Jared. And yeah, we can watch it,” you said, stretching back and getting into prime comfortable blob position. Oh yeah, you weren’t getting back up.

Once Deuce got up and brought some snacks back in, you started the movie. And damn, these brownies are divine. You really needed to ask Ms. Spade for her recipe. The popcorn was decent, overall meh, but the brownies! THE BROWNIES!!!

You all settled down after being rationed your snacks, and you pressed play. Ace and Deuce both nearly choked on popcorn when Jareth appeared.

“WHY ARE HIS PANTS SO TIGHT?!” They both choked in unison.

You just rolled your eyes and ignored them, trying to focus on the movie. Other than you nearly having to do the Heimlich manoeuvre on the both of them, the movie continued without incident, until a certain gremlin decided to start crying right as Magic Dance began playing. Seriously Grim, must you choose the most inopportune time to act like Toby does in the movie? But that’s life with a cat.

You paused the movie and looked at Deuce. You were in prime comfortable blob mode, you weren’t getting up. Deuce patted you on the shoulder and went to go see what on Earth Grim was screaming about. Ace just continued to scarf back brownies, thank goodness you hid some away before he got here, or else you wouldn’t have any come tomorrow.

But Deuce came running back out of your room, since that was where Grim was. And you were about to question why he looked like he’d just seen a ghost when something blurred right past him; something small, fuzzy, and flying.

The damn bat is back?! Yeah, you definitely felt like you were cursed.

Now, you could either get up and deal with the bat, since Deuce was just trying to shoo it outside the window with a mop and Ace was screaming much like Grim was, or you could stay warm and comfy and hide under the blanket, pretending that this wasn’t your waking reality…

Option B was really tempting right now, to be honest. Sighing, you got up, massaged your temples to collect yourself, before arming yourself with a broom yet again. Grim has his rabies vaccine, you don’t, so you weren’t taking any chances.

“WHY IS THERE A BAT IN YOUR APARTMENT?!” Ace hissed, ducking as the bat swooped near him.

You opened the window right open, almost threatening to take it off its bearings, “Because the universe hates me, that’s why!” Was it dramatic? Yes. Did it contain a seed of truth? Yes. So that’s what you went with. Was it really an exaggeration though? In the past twenty-four hours it really felt like the universe was sending you a personal ‘Fuck You ♡ ' letter with a kiss mark on the envelope.

You and Deuce tried to work together as a team to coax the bat outside. Come on, the window is wide open. Come on bat, get your fuzzy ass out of my place.

All that was happening though, was some scene that belonged in a Three Stooges act. With Ace and Grim screeching — yes they counted as one collective unit — Deuce trying his best, but not getting anywhere, and you feeling like you were about to explode from the stress and noise. Even on an impromptu day off, you didn’t get a break, not really.

Getting whisked away by the Goblin King is looking real appealing right now. The bat swooped down close to you, and your instincts kicked in and you swung at it, making it crash land into your coffee table, right into the popcorn. And alongside the popcorn getting spilled everywhere, there was also a poof of green sparkles.

When the green sparkles subsided, there was a strange person with long black hair and red streaks, wearing something that looked straight out of a Ren Faire, and he was standing on your table. The strange man looked straight at you, and you looked back, blinking fast. Did Ms. Spade give us a different kind of brownie? Or is this actually happening?

He snapped his fingers, and you watched as he slowly disappeared into another poof of green sparkles. You were backing up, since hey there was a stranger in your place out of nowhere, but thanks to your shit luck, you tripped over your own feet, tumbling into them. And as the green poof subsided, both you, and the stranger, were nowhere to be seen. Leaving a very confused Ace, Deuce, and Grim to wonder what the hell happened to you.

And honestly? You were thinking the same. Where the FUCK am I?!

...

Tags; @busycloudy, @eynnwwyjth, @identity-theft-101, @ithseem, @krenenbaker, @ryker-writes, @twistwonderlanddevotee, @xxoomiii

~~~~~~~

Author's Note; And I'm finally showing this to the world, after months of collecting dust in my Google Docs. I have no idea how long this fic will go on for, and the length may be dictated by how much feedback and interaction this gets, so yeah. General rating for this is Teen but might change in the future; I won't tag people if that happens though, cuz, yeah.

If you enjoyed this story, and want to read more of my stuff while I slowly work on more installments to this fic, check out my masterlist! Please ignore any spelling mistakes, I write and die with no beta.

#twst #twst x gn reader #twst x reader #twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland x reader #twisted wonderland x gn reader #twst grim #lilia vanrouge #deuce spade #ace trappola #there will be more x reader stuff in future chapters #soooo #lilia vanrouge x reader #lilia vanrouge x gn reader #loosely inspired off of labyrinth and some other fae media; but very loosely #majority of this should be original with some tie ins from the movie #i wrote like 9 K in may for this idea and haven't touched it since; it took me like a week to rewrite this 4.6 K and i deleted some stuff #don't be precious; delete your art (from drawfee)#the length of this may be dictated from how much traction and interaction it gets #gilf enjoyers rejoice #twst labyrinth au #<- kinda but not really; we shall see #to clarrify; there is nothing in the brownies; the brownies are just run of the mill brownies #will be making a masterlist for this series; just so i don't break diasomnia's sooner than the others #there's also going to be a break in fic updates in october; but more on that later #btw everything grim did; my cats have done; the 'bat' was a mouse though and not lilia vanrouge from twisted wonderland #also labyrinth gave me nightmares as a child cuz i was terrified of puppets; and i had the same reaction as adeuce at his pants #first time posting a multi-chapter fic; let's see how this goes

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hamsterclaw · 1 month

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Yoongi’s a murder detective fighting burnout when he’s assigned the case that you and your former partner fucked up.

Paring: Yoongi x f! Reader

Genre: Detectives!Yoongi and reader

Rating: 18+

Word count: 6.6k

Warnings: Swearing, descriptions of murder, bloodshed and assault, sex, depression and burnout, mentions of guns

The flashing blue lights in Yoongi’s window are followed by the wail of sirens cutting through the early evening bustle.

Yoongi looks out the window. He’s three floors up from street level, there’s raindrops tracking along the dirty glass, the faint smell of mildew that accompanies any rainfall in this filthy city.

Under the table, his good leather shoes, the ones he saves for weddings and funerals, have rubbed a hole in the skin over his achilles. Yoongi had worn them for his disciplinary hearing today, the part of him that still wants to be a cop temporarily winning over the part of him that doesn’t.

He wonders if this is what burnout feels like.

His superior, Kim Namjoon, had called him into his office after the hearing to tell him he was on probation, to clean up his act because he wouldn’t be so lucky as to get off next time.

The truth is, Yoongi had known while he was pressing the suspect’s face into gravel with his booted foot that it would come back to bite him on the ass.

He’d done it anyway.

Yoongi’s never been kind to scum who exploit children, but his partner, Jung Hoseok, had seen something in Yoongi’s face that day that had made him report Yoongi.

Yoongi doesn’t blame him. Hoseok has been his partner on and off for five years and he’s as sterling as they come. His moral compass is as strong as it was the day they graduated from the academy, despite all the fucked up shit they’ve seen.

Unlike Yoongi.

Yoongi was never black and white to begin with and now he’s so far into the grey he scares himself sometimes. It’s never been his goal to be the kind of cop who metes out his own justice.

Only madness lies that way.

Anyway now Hoseok’s been reassigned temporarily to narcotics, supposedly a break from homicide, and Yoongi’s partnerless.

Probably not for long, there’s always some hungry rookie wanting the credibility of working homicide.

Yoongi sighs, closes the file he’d been skimming. It’s well past seven, there aren’t any open cases that need his immediate attention and he figures he might as well go home to his apartment and his cat, Kenzo.

The pavement’s slippery under the smooth soles of his good shoes, Yoongi pulls his coat tighter against the early autumn chill as he walks the five blocks to his apartment.

The smell of fried wontons fills his nostrils as he passes a conduit street in the back end of Little China, Yoongi’s tempted to stop and pick up dinner.

He’s tempted every time and succumbed yesterday so he soldiers on, not without a pang of regret. He regrets food choices because he’d rather that, than think about his actual regrets.

The bang of a gunshot when he’d been two minutes too late to what then became a crime scene.

Fucking some girl with a cute face because he hadn’t been man enough to treat Mara the way she deserved.

Choosing to stay in homicide even after it had become clear to him that he had plumbed the depths of human depravity. Scarring his psyche repeatedly because it’s easier than making the active choice to request a transfer.

Yoongi unlocks his door, toes his shoes off, hangs up his coat.

There’s a flicker of movement in the corner of his eye, a flash of grey fur as Kenzo skitters across the entryway, close but not touching him.

It’s the kind of greeting Yoongi can get behind.

He pours out a serving of dry food into Kenzo’s dish, heads to the fridge to reheat yesterday’s wontons.

Eats standing at the tiny kitchen island, cracks open a beer to wash it all down.

He catches sight of his face, pinched in the scowl it seems to fall into more often than not these days.

Jesus, is he getting old?

Yoongi avoids looking at his reflection again as he showers. Changes into the same t-shirt he’s been wearing for weeks, contemplates watching porn just to take the edge off, but decides he can’t be bothered.

He falls into sleep, deep and dreamless, wakes up with an almighty crick in his neck just before dawn from the way he’d been huddled in a tight ball under the covers.

He knows he’s not right, but he’s been not right for so long Yoongi wouldn’t even know where to start putting himself together again.

***

Redemption comes in odd packages, Yoongi thinks, as he looks up a case he worked on six months ago, a shady businessman on the fringe of organised crime who’d got high as a kite and beat a sex worker to death.

He’d been killed on the way to serving out his sentence in the cushy prison in Busan his fancy lawyer had managed to negotiate, crushed in the back of the transport vehicle when it had been t-boned by a lorry.

Apparently a freak accident, Yoongi doubts it but he’s also not going to look too closely, it’s out of his jurisdiction and he’s too jaded to mourn the loss of another brutal asshole. They’d had to identify the sex worker by her dental records and DNA, her face had been unrecognisable.

There’s a knock on the frosted glass panel on his office door, Yoongi looks up as Kim Namjoon walks in, followed by the latest hungry rookie angling for a stint in homicide.

‘Min Yoongi, this is Y/N L/N,’ Namjoon says. ‘She’s a new transfer in from the Seoul branch.’

Yoongi doesn’t have to fake his disinterest as he nods politely at you.

‘What’s the case?’ he asks.

Namjoon looks pointedly at the crime scene photo blown up on Yoongi’s screen.

Yoongi waits.

He can feel your gaze on him, but he’ll get to that later.

The anticipation of a new case never gets old, he’s been in homicide since he graduated off the beat ten years ago and he no longer thinks it’s sick of him to get excited about another murder.

It’s the thrill of the hunt that he lives for, the translation of nebulous facts and witness statements into a puzzle that he can solve.

Yoongi’s damn good at his job. It almost makes the sacrifices in the rest of his so-called life worth it.

Namjoon hands Yoongi a case file, crisp, sharp edges waiting to razor his fingertips open. Flat.

Inside, the standard cover page, then a note that makes Yoongi sit up straight out of his slouch.

He looks at Namjoon to find Namjoon’s already looking at him.

‘The reaper of Seoul?’

Yoongi realises as he says the words out loud how it sounds.

The capture and subsequent conviction of the serial killer who’d terrorised the citizens of Seoul for three years had made headlines nationwide.

Last year.

‘Yeah,’ Namjoon says, the tension in his jaw evident now that Yoongi’s looking at him properly.

Namjoon glances at you. ‘It would seem he never left.’

You shift your weight and your eyes meet Yoongi’s.

‘My partner and I broke the case,’ you say. There’s a brittle smoothness to your voice that Yoongi recognises as a paper thin facade over the hauntedness underneath. ‘Turns out we didn’t.’

***

The note in the case file is a single sheet of letter paper, lined in blue.

The handwriting is precise, neat between the lines.

Oh dear.

Better luck this time?

Best regards from your neighbourhood Reaper.

Yoongi looks at you, sitting across the room at the desk Hoseok’s temporarily vacated.

You’re staring at your screen, face backlit in blue, expression unreadable. You’re in black, nondescript knitwear, your hair pushed back from your face, eyes narrowed.

He clears his throat. ‘You worked the case with your partner.’

It’s a statement you answer to like a question.

‘It was the first case I picked up when I joined homicide,’ you say, turning to Yoongi. ‘It started with -‘

‘Kim Seulgi,’ Yoongi says.

You nod, almost grimacing at the name of the Seoul Reaper’s first high profile victim.

‘Her family wanted answers.’

Kim Seulgi had been born of Seoul’s elite, an architect with her grandfather’s firm who had picked up a number of accolades for her work on the National Opera House.

She’d been engaged to an equally accomplished classical pianist, Jeong Minho, and had been the only offspring of her wealthy parents.

She’d disappeared three days before her wedding, only to turn up on her wedding day, floating in the Hangang, dressed in the clothes she’d disappeared in.

You say, ‘She was an ambitious first target.’

‘Was she the first?’ Yoongi asks.

The flicker in your eyes tells him this isn’t the first time you’ve considered this.

‘My partner Kiho.’ There’s strain in your voice. You start again. ‘My partner, Kiho, and I thought he’d killed before.’

You shrug. ‘The captain felt we were wasting time looking back into his early years.’

Yoongi says, neutral, ‘Budgets are limited, your case must have passed the thresholds for plausible deniability.’

‘It seemed to fit,’ you agree.

Your eyes meet again. ‘Not all of it, though.’

Yoongi knows, intimately, what it’s like to not be certain. Sometimes all you have is your instinct. It’s one thing to build a case no reasonable person would doubt, but you’re also betting on your gut. You’re betting on being a good enough detective to know that the pieces fit, without forcing them to fit.

You’re betting on being honest with yourself, and Yoongi knows more than anyone how tempting the lies can be.

Now you’re the one watching him, taking the measure of him.

His email pings.

‘That’s the link to the full case file,’ you say.

You get up, carry a stack of notebooks to his desk.

‘Our notebooks,’ you say.

Yoongi looks at the stack.

Every cop’s got their own collection of notebooks, raw data and impressions that don’t always make it into official reports.

The equivalent of dirty underwear when you’re not expecting company versus lingerie when you’re down to fuck.

This close, he can smell your shampoo, bright and faintly floral.

You blink at him.

‘I need to sort something with human resources,’ you say. ‘I’ll see you later.’

In actual fact it’s 36 hours later when he next sees you, at 4am, at a crime scene.

***

The rain falling is more than a drizzle, enough that the tent around the victim is the first priority.

There’s an imprint of violence in the air, Yoongi knows you feel it too by the way your lips tighten as you duck under the yellow tape to join him.

You nod at him in greeting, then there’s silence as you enter the tent.

The victim’s on her front, face turned to the right, hand tucked under her cheek.

She hasn’t been dead long enough for livedo to set in, she would almost look asleep if it weren’t for the purple of her lips, the greyness to her complexion.

The bath of blood she’s lying in.

Yoongi can just see the edge of the gaping wound on her neck.

You wait until forensics turns her body over.

The top three buttons of her silk blouse are undone, her chest slick with blood.

Yoongi’s reading the crime scene like he’s reading you, and he knows what you’re going to say before you say it.

‘It’s him,’ you breathe. The devastation in your eyes makes it difficult for him to look at you. ‘Fuck, it’s him.’

***

You’re shivering visibly despite the hot coffee Yoongi’s poured you, despite the fact that he’s turned the heating in his ancient Hyundai up as far as it’ll go.

There are droplets of water in your hair, sparkling incongruously in the gloom.

You’re waiting till first light to knock on neighbourhood doors, the victim was found in a quiet cul-de-sac.

Two minutes from her own front door.

Not much chills Yoongi these days but that fact does make him pause.

The audacity of it.

He says, ‘I have a blanket in the trunk.’

You’re protesting but Yoongi gets back out in the rain anyway, grabs the blanket and gets back in.

Hands it to you, takes your cup as you drape the blanket around yourself.

‘It gets colder here than Seoul,’ Yoongi offers, handing you your coffee back.

‘We fucked it up,’ you say, and Yoongi knows that’s what you’ve been thinking since you saw the body.

He’s just been waiting for you to be ready to say it.

‘So make it right,’ he says, simple.

‘An innocent man’s in prison because Kiho and I fucked up,’ you say.

Yoongi doesn’t want to minimise it but he doubts the man you put away was completely innocent.

‘I read your notebooks,’ he says. ‘Who’s Jeon Bogyeol?’

There had been twelve murders before the arrest. All women in their late twenties to mid thirties, all living alone.

They’d all lived in the same part of Seoul, but apart from that there was nothing to link them that he could find.

You look at him warily. ‘He was a night watchman at the apartments of seven of the women.’

Yoongi waits.

‘We cross-referenced staff at all the addresses, and his name kept coming up. Like Jang Daeseong.’

You flinch at the name of the man convicted of the murders, as though it didn’t fall from your own lips.

You keep talking, though, your voice never faltering. ‘We never found any links between Jeon Bogyeol and the other five women.’

‘Did he have a history?’ Yoongi asks. He’s looking out the window at the first rays of sunrise, muted orange through the rain. His shoulder aches, an old injury he doesn’t think about except when he’s tired, and cold.

‘There was a neighbour,’ you say. You’re chewing on your bottom lip, a tell Yoongi’s noticed for the first time tonight.

‘She called the police once saying she’d seen Bogyeol taking a woman into his apartment against her will.’

You’re frowning. ‘The beat cops who responded to the call out said there was no sign of anyone else in his apartment. The neighbour moved away.’

‘Moved away?’ Yoongi asks, and you glance at him, understanding the sharpness in his tone.

‘I was going to look into it when the Chief shut us down,’ you say. It’s stated simply, like a fact, no sign of defensiveness.

Yoongi offers you more coffee from his flask.

‘Where’s Bogyeol now?’

‘When the new letter came in I looked him up,’ you say. The steam rising from your cup obscures part of your expression for a moment, but Yoongi can hear the tremor in your voice.

‘He’s less than fifty miles east of here.’

Dawn’s breaking, the rain’s finally starting to peter out, but Yoongi’s chilled anyway.

***

The morning sun is high in the sky by the time Yoongi and you finish interviewing the neighbours and the new victim’s friends and family.

Yoongi’s phone rings. It’s Namjoon.

‘Can you talk?’ Namjoon asks.

Yoongi mouths ‘Namjoon’ in response to your inquiring expression, puts some distance between you and him.

‘Yeah,’ he answers.

‘The post-mortem results are back, and the preliminary tox screen is negative. The ME’s put the cause of death as exsanguination.’

Yoongi processes this. ‘It’s the same MO as the previous Seoul reaper victims,’ he says.

Namjoon sighs. ‘Has anything new come out of your interviews?’

‘No,’ Yoongi says. The victim had been well-liked, none of the neighbours had seen or heard anything, and on the surface of it there were no conflicts he could see. Her boyfriend of two years had been away on a work trip, his location confirmed around the window of the crime.

Yoongi’s looking at you as you wait against the car, and when your name comes out of Namjoon’s mouth he’s already got an inkling of what Namjoon wants to know.

‘I reviewed the case,’ Namjoon says. ‘There are no obvious flaws or errors in their investigation.’

Yoongi grunts. ‘There was a lead that they didn’t follow up on.’

He fills Namjoon in.

‘I’ll follow it up.’

Namjoon says, thoughtfully, ‘I wonder where her partner’s working now.’

Yoongi’s surprised Namjoon doesn’t already know, to be honest, he’s always two steps ahead of Yoongi.

He flicks his gaze to you again. You’re still waiting against the car, and there’s a loneliness to your posture, a fatigued downturn to your mouth that makes him say, ‘Hey Joon, I’ll call you back, ok?’

He ends the call, unlocks the car.

‘We should get back and compare notes,’ Yoongi says. His voice has dropped the way it does when he’s tired, and shit, he is tired. He hasn’t slept well for a while.

‘Let me drive,’ you offer. You take his keys, and your fingers brush his for an instant.

The contact, brief though it is, makes Yoongi’s skin tingle.

He wonders if you notice his reaction, but you’re already sliding in, adjusting the seat, starting up the car.

***

Yoongi wakes when you’re parking the car, sits up, a little embarrassed.

‘I’m sorry,’ he says, looking to gauge your reaction.

‘Don’t be,’ you reply. ‘I would have done the same if you’d driven.’

There’s a hint of mischief in the curve of your half-smile.

‘You mumble in your sleep.’

Yoongi rubs a hand over his face. ‘What’d I say?’

‘I couldn’t make out any words,’ you tell him, but there’s a twinkle in your eye that makes him wonder if that’s really true.

Mara is the only person who’s shared his bed in recent years, and she’d never mentioned anything.

You swipe your ID to get into the station, hit the lifts.

In the dire grey lighting you look almost as tired as he does.

‘Coffee?’ Yoongi offers, when you pass the vending machine on the way to the office.

‘Yeah,’ you say. You’re on your phone, frowning over a text.

Yoongi passes you a cup.

‘Problem?’ he asks.

‘Kiho,’ you say. You look at him. ‘My old partner. He wants to meet up.’

‘It’d be useful to talk through the case with him,’ Yoongi agrees.

Your expression is difficult to read. ‘He’s in a retreat a couple hours drive from here. He took time off after we closed the case.’

Yoongi gulps his coffee. ‘There isn’t anything else we can do here anyway, we’re waiting on leads.’

He reaches out his hand for the car keys. ‘I can drive.’

***

The retreat Kiho is staying in is set amongst the foothills of a mountain, rolling grounds all around, a view of the cliffs overlooking the sea.

It seems to Yoongi like a place only the very rich or the very damaged would live.

Unless you get better pay packets in Seoul he’s apprehensive about meeting Kiho.

You sign in at the front desk, the receptionist greets you warmly, like she’s met you a few times before.

You lead Yoongi through a huge lounge, through open patio doors and into a green. Yoongi’s looking around at the residents, scanning the area the way he does automatically whenever he’s in an unfamiliar place.

You’re waving a hand, and then you’re embracing a tall man tightly. Neither of you say anything but Yoongi can see the way your shoulders slump, like the tension’s draining out of you.

It’s only when the tall man looks up at Yoongi inquiringly that Yoongi notices the long scar running along his neck. Tracing the path of his jugular, vertical rather than horizontal.

Kiho extends a hand.

‘So you’re going to get our guy,’ he says.

Yoongi doesn’t know what to say to that.

‘We’re going to get him,’ he says, finally.

Kiho turns to you. ‘You haven’t told him,’ he says to you.

You’re looking at Yoongi.

‘We can tell him now.’

***

‘I started getting notes after Jang Daeseong was convicted,’ you say. You’re sitting in a gazebo with Yoongi and Kiho, mugs of coffee in front of you.

Yoongi raises an eyebrow.

You flick your eyes to his, then look away, unlock your phone.

Yoongi takes your phone, scrolls through a gallery of pictures.

Lined paper, handwriting he’s seen before.

Yoongi reads through the content, then returns your phone to you.

‘The originals are with forensics,’ you tell him. ‘The paper and ink are generic, impossible to trace. There’s no trace of DNA, not so much as a partial print.’

‘The notes stopped coming last month,’ you say. ‘Right around the time I moved.’

Kiho’s scratching his neck absently, Yoongi catches how your gaze drops to his scar.

The length of it’s longer than a stab wound, he thinks the surgeons might have had to extend the scar to repair the vessels beneath.

You turn to Yoongi.

‘We have to stop him,’ you say. ‘Use me to lure him out.’

‘He nearly killed me,’ Kiho says. His expression is sober, his tone flat.

He stops there, but Yoongi can hear his next words, loud and clear.

What’s he going to do to you?

‘We can’t let him keep going like this,’ you say, very gently.

Kiho meets Yoongi’s gaze.

Yoongi doesn’t falter.

‘He has to be stopped,’ he agrees.

***

The drive back to the police station goes quicker - there’s something about seeing your old partner that’s given you a bump of energy.

Yoongi can practically feel the adrenaline fizzing in your blood, coming off you in waves.

He’s worried about the crash when the adrenaline ebbs.

He sure as fuck hopes you can cope with the lows better than he can.

He’d put in a call before you left the retreat, Namjoon’s fast tracking a last known address on the neighbour of Jeon Bogyeol who’d moved away.

You’re typing an address into the satnav yourself, face drawn, eyes serious.

Yoongi doesn’t have to ask whose address it is.

‘Are you sure you’re up to this?’ he asks.

His voice is as neutral as he can make it but he already knows that you’ve made your decision.

It’s written all over you, in the way your shoulders are squared, in the tilt of your chin, in the way your hands are tensed into fists in your lap.

‘I need to see this through, Yoongi,’ you say.

Yoongi takes a moment.

‘What happened to Kiho?’ he asks.

‘He didn’t see who it was,’ you answer. Your eyes are fixed in front of you, jaw tensed.

‘He was heading home in between shifts and he got jumped in the car park under his apartment. If he hadn’t been found by the car park attendant —‘ you voice trails off, and you shiver.

‘He was lucky the car park attendant called for help right away. That his next door neighbour, fresh off a shift in the trauma department, arrived home when she did and was there to take over. That he lives five minutes on blue lights away from the best trauma centre in Seoul.’

You look at Yoongi. ‘Kiho’s damned lucky to be alive.’

‘It’s a different injury from the reaper’s usual MO,’ Yoongi says slowly.

You nod. ‘He was toying with us.’

‘You said you received notes from the Reaper,’ Yoongi says. He’s watching you carefully in the rearview. ‘What did they say?’

Your lips press together in a line, but your voice is steady when you answer.

‘He said he’d been watching me, and that he was coming for me. That I’d be his final kill.’

***

The address you’ve put in for Jeon Bogyeol is a house in a run down suburban neighbourhood, the type of place Yoongi grew up.

The houses are haphazardly arranged, like a careless scatter on a Monopoly board, connected by a warren of roads too narrow for more than one car to pass.

Yoongi can see you tensing up the closer you get to your destination, and after he parks and switches off the engine, he places his hand on your arm.

Your eyes are expressive, more so than your voice.

‘We haven’t got grounds yet for an arrest warrant,’ you say, flat.

‘We’re working the case,’ Yoongi replies. ‘And if it’s right, we’ll work it until it’s airtight.’

Your response is to stare at him a moment, then to push open the car door.

Yoongi notices that you’ve unzipped your jacket, making your holstered gun more visible.

His own gun presses against his hip, the weight of it reminding him that although he’s only drawn it a handful of times, each time has been with intent.

He sure as fuck hopes neither of you will have reason to draw your gun today.

***

The address is little more than a shack, a rickety door that looks like it’ll give under a strong kick, a boarded up window that’s visibly cracked.

Yoongi knocks, identifies you both.

Follows procedure because he’s determined to get it all right this time.

Get the monster locked up where he belongs.

You don’t have grounds to break down the door, at least not until you go round to the back and see the pink tricycle upended in the dirt, streamers splayed tendrils of pink and white.

There isn’t much that sends Yoongi into the grey as much as the suggestion that a child might be involved.

He doesn’t really recall looking at you to confirm, just knows that one minute he’s outside in the chill and the next he’s inside the shack, gun drawn, the metallic tang of blood in the back of his throat.

There’s nowhere to hide in the empty shack, Jeon Bogyeol is gone.

You do a cursory search but both of you know you aren’t going to find your answers here.

Then Yoongi must blank out, because the next thing he hears is your voice, firm, saying his name.

He’s panting, covered in sweat, back against a wall, your hands grabbing fistfuls of his jacket to keep him upright.

He blinks, and you snap into focus. There’s ringing in his ears.

Your mouth opens, and the ringing stops. He hears your voice.

‘Let’s go, Yoongi.’

He lets you lead him out, folds himself into the passenger seat of your car, notes distantly how you put your hand on the top of the doorframe like you’re worried he’s going to bang his head.

You start the engine and then you drive, and Yoongi’s grateful that you don’t say anything at all, don’t ask for an explanation of why a fucking tricycle sent him into a tailspin.

Yoongi looks down in his lap because he’s not ready to see if you’re looking at him differently now that you’ve seen him wig out.

You put the radio on after a few minutes, stop at a drive thru after an hour.

It’s only when you hand him a coffee, silently, that he’s moved to speak.

He clears his throat, and you’re the one who speaks, still looking straight ahead, out the windscreen.

‘You don’t have to tell me. I mean, I’ll listen if you do, but you don’t have to.’

Yoongi chews on that a moment.

‘Three years ago I worked what we thought was a murder in Busan. It turned out to be an abduction.’

Yoongi laughs. There’s no humour in it.

‘We found her. She was still warm. If we’d been ten minutes quicker at figuring it out, if her fucking dad had told us about the business deal he had that had gone sour sooner, if I’d even just tried harder��’

His voice trails off.

He risks a glance at you.

You’re still not looking at him.

‘I can’t speak to whether you could have prevented it, Yoongi. All I know is that none of us come to work to do a bad job.’

Your hand lands on his forearm briefly.

‘Some days are just bad days at the office.’

It’s not the first time Yoongi’s heard it, but it’s the first time it’s been said to him with no judgement that he can hear.

***

When you get back to the precinct, Namjoon’s waiting.

He hands Yoongi another case file.

‘I got Jimin to follow up on those leads we talked about,’ Namjoon says, no preamble.

‘We visited Jeon Bogyeol’s last known address,’ you say. ‘There’s no one there now, but it hasn’t been long since he moved out.’

Namjoon says, ‘Keep me informed.’

He nods to the case file. ‘There’s some interesting information in there.’

As Namjoon walks off, you turn to Yoongi.

‘I’m going down to visit someone I know in forensics, see if they can check the house.’

Yoongi heads for your joint office.

There’s a cleaning cart parked just outside the door, which opens just as Yoongi reaches for the doorknob.

The cleaner apologises and bows politely.

Yoongi steps aside to let her pass.

‘You forgot this,’ he says, spotting the dusting cloth left on your desk.

He hands it to her and places the file on his desk.

Outside, it’s raining again.

***

Yoongi wakes with a jolt.

You’re perched on the edge of his desk.

‘You should go home, get some sleep.’

‘In the middle of an active murder investigation?’ Yoongi mumbles.

‘I’m one of the potential targets, remember?’ you say, grimacing. ‘He might come to us.’

At Yoongi’s expression, you say, ‘We’ve been doing nothing but following up leads since the last murder. The last investigation took months, almost a year. What are you going to do, not sleep until he’s caught?’

‘I don’t sleep much anyway,’ Yoongi says, but he knows you’re right.

‘I know you don’t,’ you reply. There’s an empathy in your tone that reminds him you’re a homicide detective too.

You exchange a look, and then you both speak at the same time.

‘I should go —‘

‘Do you like wontons?’ Yoongi blurts out.

You raise an eyebrow. ‘Is this like inviting me in for ramen?’

‘What?’ Yoongi splutters. ‘No, not like that. There’s this place I go. They have—-‘

‘Wontons, I get it,’ you say. You get up. ‘Yeah. Let’s go.’

***

It’s been a while since Yoongi shared a meal with someone else, the last person was Hoseok, who could go straight from a crime scene to a steakhouse without turning a hair.

You’re chasing a wonton around your plate, fatigue lining the corners of your mouth.

Yoongi asks, ‘Where do you live?’

‘The other side of town,’ you tell him. ‘Near the financial district.’

‘Fancy,’ Yoongi muses.

‘More than I can afford,’ you say darkly. ‘If this case goes on for a while I’m going to need to move.’

You look up at him. ‘Where do you live?’

‘Close to here,’ Yoongi says.

‘Yeah?’

You put your chopsticks down. ‘I should —-‘

This time, Yoongi interrupts.

‘Do you want to come round for ramen?’

Your eyes meet, and there’s a beat of silence. Then a pulse of connection that sends heat through Yoongi’s veins.

Your knee brushes his under the table.

‘Yeah,’ you answer, deliberate. ‘Fuck, yeah.’

***

Yoongi’s always hated the preamble to a hookup, in his line of work uncertainty is a thing to be avoided.

You work the case until you get an explanation no reasonable person would doubt.

He finds himself waiting, though, now that you’re standing in his apartment.

You’re looking around, and he wonders if his existence seems as lonely on the outside as it feels on the inside.

He’s wondering if you’ve changed your mind, if you really did think he meant ramen, when you reach out and grasp the front of his shirt.

Slip the tips of your fingers just under, hold the placket as you use your other hand to unbutton. Start at his throat, work your way down, slowly.

His skin prickles under the warmth of your fingers.

You lean forward and press a kiss to the base of his neck.

Yoongi reaches up, slides a hand around the nape of your neck, and you tilt your face to his.

Close up, you’re soft.

Yoongi traces your bottom lip with his thumb, and your lips part.

You don’t say anything, though, and that’s ok, because Yoongi thinks you’re as talked out as he is.

It’s been a hell of a fucking day.

You’re kissing his neck again, instead of his mouth, and that’s ok, because this isn’t love, it’s comfort.

A human connection in a day filled with monsters.

Yoongi sighs as your hands slip over his bare chest, round to his back.

He helps you lift your top over your head, admires your breasts, nipples pressing against the fabric of your bra.

He cups the weight of them in his hands, and you moan.

Yoongi’s cock is filling out, and you’re undoing his belt like you want to see for yourself.

You drop to your knees in front of him, press your mouth onto the length of him over his boxer briefs, sigh with pleasure.

‘Not too much,’ Yoongi warns, ‘not if you want me to fuck you.’

You look up at him, hair mussed, a smile curving your lips.

You tug his boxer briefs down, and Yoongi curls a hand around himself so as not to hit you in the face.

‘Just let me —‘

You open your mouth to take him in, and Yoongi groans at the feel of your warmth.

When did he last —

His crown nudges the back of your throat, and you swallow, and he loses his train of thought.

He grabs your shoulder, tugs you up, kisses the smear of his own stickiness at the corner of your mouth.

The light slanting in through the window is hues of gold and orange, filling in the hollows of your face, outlining the curves of your body.

Yoongi has to stop looking at you because he doesn’t want to cry at how much he’s missed being close to someone like this.

‘Where do you want me?’ he asks, voice taut.

‘Anywhere,’ you say. ‘Just turn these fucking lights out.’

***

In the dark, Yoongi’s most enraptured by the warmth of you.

Your skin is smooth, so soft under his hands as he wraps his fingers around the curve of your hips.

His cock glides in and out of the heat between your legs, and your moans are beautiful but what really gets him are the hitches in your breathing as he moves.

He turns you over, onto your back, and you pull him to you. Your mouth opens on his shoulder in what would be a kiss if you weren’t biting down. Your tongue flicks over his bruised skin, an apology.

You haven’t spoken to each other in words in a while but Yoongi doesn’t think either of you need words right now.

At least he doesn’t.

You’re tightening around his cock now, your cries quickening until you gasp his name in a tone that makes him grunt and his hips jerk, taking him deep as he can go.

Even in his pleasure he makes sure not to crush you as he collapses next to you.

Then you’re up, walking over to the window, pulling up the sash, lighting a cigarette without asking if he’s ok with it.

Yoongi admires the outline of your profile against the glass.

‘I needed that,’ you say, taking a drag, hunching a little to blow smoke out of his window.

‘Me too,’ Yoongi says, honestly.

He ties off the condom, gets up to toss it in the trash on top of yesterday’s takeout.

Pours you a glass of water on his way back to bed.

He half expects you to be dressed, and you are, but in his clothes, not your own, an old t-shirt he’d tossed on the chair by the bed yesterday morning before he left for work.

He can’t see your face clearly in the dark. It makes it easy to find his voice.

‘You should stay,’ he says. ‘We can get coffee in the morning.’

You’re quiet. ‘I want to.’

Yoongi climbs into bed, and after a moment you slide in next to him.

Your bodies aren’t touching at all, but somehow having you there with him is enough.

Yoongi means to check on you, but he’s asleep so quickly he doesn’t get a chance to.

***

There’s a basketball hoop set into the wall in the back end of the station, a concrete square with a chain-link fence.

The building opposite is a block of offices, as is the building next to it.

Yoongi makes the shot, and you grab the ball on its first bounce.

You say, ‘Forensics got nothing from Jeon Bogyeol’s shack. He bleached the shit out of the place before he left.’

Yoongi grunts, watches you point and shoot.

He’d read through the file Namjoon gave him on the neighbour - it’s incomplete but she was last seen alive twelve weeks ago in a coastal town.

There’s something niggling at the back of his brain, he’d suggested shooting hoops in the hopes that the activity might shake the thought loose so his conscious mind can make the connection.

His phone vibrates in his pocket.

Namjoon.

‘I’m going up to see Namjoon,’ he says. ‘You coming?’

‘I’ll stay here for a bit,’ you say. ‘I’ll be up in a sec.’

Yoongi shrugs, lets himself back in.

Takes the stairs up to Namjoon’s office on the third floor.

There’s a cleaning cart parked next to the staff kitchen as he rounds the corner.

Yoongi’s about to knock on Namjoon’s door when his scattered thoughts crystallise.

The case file Namjoon had given him had a grainy photo of Jeon Bogyeol’s neighbour, the one who’d reported him and then disappeared.

He’s seen her face before, and recently.

Coming out of your office.

‘Fuck,’ he swears.

He grabs his phone out of his pocket, dials your number.

Your phone rings, and rings.

Yoongi takes off, down the stairs, back the way he came.

By the time he bursts out of the back door of the station, gun drawn, his heart’s thumping triple speed, but his hand is steady as he aims it at the man with a knife standing over you.

His finger goes from trigger guard to trigger.

‘Fucking drop it,’ Yoongi warns.

He doesn’t, so Yoongi shoots.

***

Jeon Bogyeol’s neighbour who had reported him was called Seo Hyerin.

She was in her early forties, an ex-teacher who he’d coerced into helping him by turning up at her new place even after she’d moved to get away from him.

She’d been too scared to disobey him, but in forcing her to help him, Jeon Bogyeol had given her access to enough information to clinch the case against him.

Once she’d found out he’d been shot and was likely to go straight from hospital to prison, she’d shared all that information with Yoongi and you.

The pieces fell into place so easily there was no need to make any of it fit.

And now Yoongi’s sitting in the kitchen of your apartment, watching as you pack things up.

He’d been right. Your place was fancy.

You were being transferred back to Seoul to finish up, see things through with the case.

He realises you’re looking at him.

‘My new place is a couple hours drive from here,’ you say.

‘Yeah?’ Yoongi says, like he hadn’t already looked it up.

He’d also looked up timed automated cat food dispensers, just because it was one thing to have a neighbour drop in and feed Kenzo if he’s stuck with a case occasionally, but it’s another thing if he’s regularly going to be driving down to see you.

If he’s regularly going to be spending the night away.

It’s uncharacteristic, for him, but he’s hopeful.

‘I slept pretty well that time,’ you say, looking down into your box.

You look up at him, and the curve of your lips makes Yoongi think to himself that he’d like to kiss you, sometime.

‘In your apartment,’ you clarify, like he wouldn’t already know.

‘I make good ramen,’ Yoongi says. ‘I can make it again for you, you know.’

You laugh, and the sound makes Yoongi feel warm.

He realises that he’s smiling.

Fuck, it’s been a while.

#bts fanfiction #bts smut #yoongi x reader #bts fanfic #yoongi fic #yoongi smut

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im-totally-not-an-alien-2 · 11 months

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"Hello." A dull thwack sound reverberated across the rooftop, leaving the boy who snuck up on Red Robin clutching his head. The boy, a meta if the large animal ears and tail were anything to go by, shook off the pain and pouted up at him, "What was that for?!"

The vigilante was unrepentant, holding his bo staff in a ready position, "You snuck up behind a vigilante at night. In Gotham."

"Okay," the meta conceded, still pouting. "You have a point there. Robin threw ninja stars at me when I tried to approach Batman."

That got Tims attention, "You tried to approach Batman? Was there something you needed?"

The kid suddenly got serious, "My mom went missing. I haven't been able to contact her for almost two weeks now."

Red pulled his arm closer to his face before he began typing on his wrist computer, "Can you tell me her name and date of birth?"

"Um." The other teen fidgetted with his tail a bit, "Okay, so...she's kinda Cheetah."

"...come again?"

"She's Cheetah. The...the supervillian."

Red Robin stared at him, and honestly who could blame him? The bats hadn't even known Cheetah had a son. "So why are you in Gotham? Why not ask Wonder Woman for help? Cheetahs one of her rogues not ours."

The teen shook his head, "She went to meet someone in Gotham before she disappeared. She seemed really agitated before she left, almost scared. I've never seen her like that before." He paused, giving the vigilante time to type before continuing, "I didn't go Wonder Woman since I figured I would wind up needing to talk to a bat anyway since its your turf and all." He said, waving a hand as if gesturing to the city around them.

"I wasn't aware Cheetah had a kid."

The meta grimaced, "she didn't until a year ago."

Red gave him a look, as if urging him to go on.

The meta chuffed, sounding a lot like whatever big cat he was supposed to be, "I'll only tell you my tragic backstory if you promise to help me find my mom."

"I'll find your mom." The bird said without an ounce of hesitation. Tim was a little offended. Did this guy think he was going to leave his mom in danger just because she was a criminal? Appearently so, seeing as the teen looked so relieved at his words.

"Okay, so my bio parents were evil mad scientists. Always a bad start, anyway they were obsessed with the occult and one day they suddenly took me and my sister to Brazil to hunt for some artifact of another. That alone was strange but weirder still was the fact my creepy godfather was paying for it all. He usually only does something like that when he's plotting "

"Plotting?" The detective interjected, "you make it sound like he does that often."

"Yeah. Hes a supervillian." The meta said casually, as if he didn't just leave Tim reeling, but the kid wasn't done yet, "He's had a massive crush on my bio mom since collage and never let it go no matter how many times she rejected him. She even married my dad, his best friend, and this dude just kept simping for 20 years." The teen rolled his eyes, "Hes convinced himself that if he murders my bio dad then my bio mom will fall in love with him and me and jazz will be "his"." He said that last part with fingerqoutes and a disgusted expression.

Tim filed that away for later, "Can I have his name, if nothing else?"

The teen seemed reluctant for a moment, "You're the worlds greatest detectives. You'll find out even if i try to hide it. Besides, I'd probably be better off if you and the Justice League know everything anyway."

Tim was...surprised by that. Most people usually weren't this open with them.

"His name is Vlad Masters, he also goes by Plasmius when he's dressed like a wannabe vampire. He's a ghost who's repossessed his corpse. My parents are Jack and Maddie Fenton, who are obsessed with ghosts and have convinced themselves that all ghosts are evil and must be destroyed, regardless of how much evidence points to them being wrong."

"And your name?"

The meta grinned at him, showing off four very sharp fangs, reminiscent of the large cat he takes after, "You can call me Jaguar. We were exploring a bit when I broke off from my family and got jumped by one of them. Suddenly I was struck by a claw and turned into furry bait. Fluffy stopped trying to make me his lunch and just stared at me before walking away, which was wierd. Then my parents found me, accused me of being a ghost, because thats naturally what someone would assume when thier son sprouts cat ears," he said while rolling his eyes.

"Naturally." Red joked, which had the benefit of making Jaguar smile.

"So my parents chased me through the jungle, shooting all the while, then suddenly a portal opened up in front of me. I'm not stupid, I know there was no way this wasn't a trap. I mean, a portal opening up right after that bizarre series of events and its the same shade of glowing green as the wierd death go my parents are obsessed with? There's no way they weren't related somhow, but I was desperate and jumped through anyway."

"I landed in another jungle, or the same one in a different location, I'm not sure. I tried hunting and foraging but wasn't very successful at either." Danny still remembered the throbbed in his head when he had headbutt that tree after missing his pounce on that pig he had been stalking. "Thats when Cheetah found me. She took me in and taught me to hunt and fight."

-----

Possible plot twists:

1. Danny isnt Phantom in this au

2. Danny is Phantom in this au but is trying to leave that life behind

3. My favorite. Danny has the ability to manipulate and control animals into doing his bidding with the effect of jaguars and other big cats being the most prevalent and he just doesn't realize it.

One of Cheetahs friends/allies realizes cheetah has changed and suspected something and convinced her to leave for a while to see if her care for this kid faded after a while away from his presence. It works and Danny loses another parental figure/possibly attacked by them too.

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ellieluvr420 · 3 months

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wife Abby headcanons xoxo

-You met at a bar when your friend cancelled on you last minute, she offered to buy you a drink and you chatted at the bar until she invited you back to hers, this was back when you were 22 and she was 25 so her flat was more modest but still well decorated and clean. You both shared a bottle of wine and sat and spoke more for hours until you were both so drunk you started doing karaoke together by watching youtube videos on her TV, she invited you out to an actual karaoke bar as your second date and she only fell even more in love with you the more she saw you.

-I think she would work in corporate like a lawyer or investment banker or something so I think she would try and work from home as much as they would let her.

-She looks so funny when she works from home too because she wears work clothes on her top half for her zoom calls but then she would be wearing pj bottoms and her slippers on her bottom half.

-Such a victim of Apple's marketing, always insists she needs the newest phone or whatever they had brought out, she has the watch, the phone, an ipad, an imac, macbook pro, airpod pros and airpod max's. Literally everything they sell because she's actually a tech geek at heart.

"I totally need it."

"Give me one reason you need an iPad Abigail."

"...I don't know, it's just cool."

You roll your eyes at her but chuckle at her insistence as you press a small kiss to her pouty lips. She smiles at you and looks like a child on Christmas day as she orders her new toy.

-She would so wear the airpod max's while working out and i think she'd always have one of those gallon water bottles that she'd take everywhere with her.

"Babe please just let me buy you one, trust me it will make you drink so much more water."

"No it won't, do not waste your money seriously." She'd huff at your stubbornness and go and buy you one anyway.

-I think she would workout at night or during the day if she can fit it in which rarely happens because she enjoys her mornings with you where you guys cuddle and chat and have breakfast together before she goes to work or gets started in the home office

-Does majority of the cooking because she really enjoys it and is also a chef, like she whips up three course meals so regularly like its nothing.

-You try and make dinner together on the weekends which equates to her micromanaging you until she gets too stressed watching you mess up and does it herself while you sit on the counter entertaining her.

-She always goes to sleep as big spoon and always wakes up as little spoon, every night, without failure. Also loves to lay on your stomach with her arms around your waist, one of her fav cuddling positions.

-She's the kind of person to ignore and persevere through a cold until she literally passes out and will get mad at you when you have to force her to rest but once she's comfy and has accepted she's ill she's such a baby.

-She would be so good with kids and they would all love her too like when you would go to family gatherings together all the kids would always be glued to her pulling her every which way

-loves dogs and cats and wants two of each

-loves home date nights where you cook together and watch films or play games whether its board, video or card games. Once you bought a fake police file and tried to figure out who the murderer was, it ended in a huge argument because you couldn't agree on who it was, you were so annoyed you made her sleep on the sofa but in the middle of night she sauntered back into your room and climbs into bed cuddling into you.

"Sorry babe, you were right." She kisses your forehead and you smile as you both go to sleep happily, Abby had managed to find the answer online but she didn't tell you that you were in fact wrong, she would rather be in bed cuddling you than prove she was right.

-I think she would want 3 kids, preferably boy, girl, boy or vice versa but she would be happy with any kids.

-If/when kids come along she starts working from home primarily and you watch them grow together.

-She would eventually want to move away from the city where she lived for an easy commute to work to a beautiful house in the country with large fields behind a huge back garden where the dogs and cats, and ducks all play with the kids.

-She would love reading crime thriller books but she also has a guilty pleasure for romance and sometimes she'll sit in bed with you and read you parts of the books. Can imagine older Abby refusing to get reading glasses because that makes her officially old but she’s literally holding the book as far as it will go and squinting so hard and she still can’t read it, you eventually give in and read it to her which only motivates her to not get glasses more because this was a way better option.

-Loves Family Guy, American Dad, South Park, all those kind of shows but if you put on a drama she'll grumble and then be hooked.

"Oh my god, oh my god, are you fucking kidding me? Noooooooo." Abby yells at the screen as she watches the season 1 finale of vampire diaries with you, you had started rewatching it as it was nostalgic and she made fun of you so much until you forced her to watch the episode you were watching.

Like I could so see her watching greys anatomy and sobbing when there's a major character death

-Goes to get mani pedis with you and she'll always get her nails painted to match the colour of yours even when you'd pick super bright to mess with her she'd get it without batting an eye.

-Of course she gets along super well with all your friends and family, sometimes you think they love her more than you 😀

okay that's all I got for now but I will probs do way more once the series is finished :))

#abby anderson x female reader #abby anderson x reader #abby the last of us #abby x reader #abby anderson #abby anderson tlou2 #abby anderson x fem!reader #abby tlou #tlou abby #abby anderson tlou #abby x fem!reader

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yanderes-galore · 2 months

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I was going to do this at some point but others also wanted it... so! CatNap time! This is my version like with DogDay, so maybe read that one first to understand my AU? Pure brainrot, barely proofread, there may be mistakes.

🌙Yandere! CatNap Concept🌙

🐱(My Version)🐱

Pairing: Platonic

Possible Trigger Warnings: Gender-Neutral Darling, Obsession, Stalking, Possessive behavior, Violence, Overprotective behavior, Drugging/Gassing, CatNap watches you sleep, Manipulation, Slight sadism, Blood, Implied murder, Slight gore, Forced companionship.

I'm just going to say this, the first thing I read about CatNap is he likes watching his friends sleep.

So that's how this starts.

As usual, CatNap has a cartoon/plush form and a monster form in my AU.

I talk a bit more about this in the DogDay concept.

CatNap, in his more innocent plush form, is docile, gentle, bashful, and highly impressionable according to the wiki.

CatNap can have an eerie presence but he is usually very calming.

He prioritizes proper rest, especially towards you.

When left all alone in Playcare, he becomes a hunting beast who worships The Prototype.

He's not Theo in this version, he's his own thing.

He's sadistic and enjoys the hunt in his more beastly form.

However... he isn't heartless... as in this concept he cares for you a lot.

Let's use this concept just to discuss his overall behavior like I did in the last one.

CatNap's plush/cartoon form still manages to get up to just about the waist of an adult on two legs.

Although the cat also likes to roam on four legs.

CatNap has a lavender smell in his fur, a scent known to calm and put others to sleep.

Although... that isn't exactly what he uses to put you to sleep.

Like in canon, CatNap has the ability to release Poppy Gas from his lungs.

Said gas creates hallucinations and even puts the target asleep.

CatNap likes it when his best friend sleeps....

So, the purple cat often likes to crawl on your lap, release some of the gas, and puts you to sleep as he nuzzles into you with a purr.

Yes, I feel I want to make CatNap purr in my version.

CatNap likes to wrap his long tail around you and follows you around loyally.

He wants to make you happy, healthy, and full of energy!

The only way to do that is a good night's sleep, right?

So let him help you.

CatNap definitely also uses his lavender scent to calm you, too.

He just wants his friend to hold him and sleep...

He'll watch over you like a good friend should.

Then there's the monster form.

He's still very dedicated to you, even when he roams the area like a stalking cat.

CatNap watches over you like a hawk, a caretaker at heart.

In his larger form he looks more unnerving, crawling on all fours like huge hunting cat.

He carefully stalks prey (and you) in the shadows, disorienting them with Poppy Gas before striking.

Unlike DogDay he doesn't bother hiding his predatory nature.

He doesn't care if blood or bits of flesh stain his purple fur when he eats.

His lavender scent still lingers despite the dirty blood smell when he's near you.

The large cat often tries to curl around you in his larger form, purring softly as he encourages you to sleep.

If you try to leave his long tail prevents it... he'll even give you Poppy Gas if you still struggle.

If you think about it... CatNap would be very similar to Moon from FNAF... except CatNap is more... religious?

Speaking of that, CatNap may view you as a gift from The Prototype.

His god has rewarded him for his loyalty!

He'll cherish you as his Best Friend....

CatNap would not hurt you as he views you as his gift and Best Friend.

He often swaps between his smaller cartoon/plush form and his monster form.

If he isn't on a hunt and doesn't want to scare you... he'll swap to his more docile form and encourage you to hold him.

Admittedly... his purr and lavender scent is enough to make you want to sleep anyways.

CatNap is mostly sadistic towards others, like DogDay and the other Critters if they were still alive somehow.

CatNap is possessive of his newfound pal.

He growls and hisses when you try to leave or if you mention any other Toy Mascot.

Even if you did escape, CatNap is hot on your tail, stalking you from the shadows.

Next thing you know the room you're in fills with red mist... you start to hallucinate... the last thing you see before you collapse is the monstrous form of a predatory cat.

Then you wake up back where you once were... with a purple plush cat wrapped in your arms purring away.

It looks like you aren't leaving the claws of CatNap after all....

#yandere poppy playtime #yandere smiling critters #yandere catnap

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olsenmyolsen · 5 months

Text

Ever Since Natasha Saw You (18+)

master list

dark master list

Post Black Widow Dark!Natasha Romanoff (Female Reader X Natasha Romanoff)

Summary: She was a hero. But to her, YOU were so much more.

Word Count: 6.1K

Content: Dub-Con, Obsession, Kidnapping, Stalking, Blood, Knife, Knifeplay, Mommy Kink, Feelings, Trauma, Death,

The Black Widow hid a secret.

She was in love with you. Sounds pretty innocent... right?

"Night Y/N!" Your coworker Daisy called out as you were still typing at your computer. It was Friday night, and everyone but you was already leaving. Leaving to be free of the thoughts of work for at least the weekend.

You had a marketing job in downtown Manhattan. Skyscraper. Cubicle. Long nights. That kind of job.

You liked it, honestly.

Sure, New York and the surrounding areas were dangerous. Hell, at times. But you had heroes and vigilantes to save you. You had first-hand experience in 2012 when you and your Dad were saved while out at your "I made it through University without killing myself" lunch.

Now, here you were 4 years later. Still in the city while your Dad left. But that was fine. Being on your own has been exemplary. Sure, you have some friends... coworkers, really. You went on dates! I mean, they didn't lead to much more. But you were going through life.

A cat! You have a cat. An orange tabby who only loves you for food...

Anyways! You were fine and finishing up work on your computer when a pop-up of World News showed up in the top right-hand corner of your screen.

What's New 3 Weeks After The Fall Of A Secret Organization Hiding In The Sky? Russia and the U.S. Remain Quiet.

You heard about the debris and strange things found over on that side of the world earlier this month. With that came the theories.

You rolled your eyes at most. But some were fun. Like aliens was a popular one. People online said it was a crashed group of green-shape-shifting aliens. Your coworker Lindsey swore by another that claimed it was a giant purple guy who crashed on Earth.

Yeah, that'll be the day.

You even had a friend of a friend named Darcy who said an Avenger was present to what happened, leaving you curious.

The Avengers, as far as you were concerned, were in trouble. Rumblings, sightings, and videos of two sides of the superhero group fighting at a German airport left many to speculate that this was the end. Plus, this coming weeks after what happened in Lagos and the murder of King T'Chaka made it all the more plausible.

So, if the rumor was confirmed that an Avenger was at the collapse of what many were confused about, it was... interesting.

But you couldn't dwell on that. You shook your head and closed out of the news to finish up your projected cost for the next wave of Roxxon Marketing.

As you walked out of your office building, you were unaware you were being followed.

It wasn't the first time you had been followed. Fuck it wasn't even the fiftieth time it had happened, but still you remained clueless. She thought it was cute at first how unaware of your surroundings you were. It always made her smile.

Because in one second, an innocent and pretty thing like you could be gone.

But she wouldn't let that happen.

Not by anyone else, at least.

You have to understand. She was your protector. Yeah.. Yeah, that's right! The one to make sure you got home safe. The one to take care of threats no matter how minuscule they might be. She also made sure no one got too close or even dared to ask you out.

You couldn't date. That would be unfair and very hurtful to the one who... watched over you...

I mean, you never wondered why suddenly Dennis never showed back up to work after asking you out to lunch, now did you?

Rumor was his family got sick, and he had to skip town. But we know about rumors now, don't we? I.E., purple aliens. Green shapeshifting ones. You get it.

Oh. Also. What happened to Dennis, you may ask?

I'll let you know when his body turns up.

However, all of this is to say that you were lucky Natasha Romanoff picked you.

She was back after being gone, having to deal with some family business. But she was back! For you! Natasha thought you should be grateful. She could be- SHOULD BE on the run right now, but here she was twenty feet behind you.

After tonight, you were going to know precisely who she was.

Natasha smiled as she followed you. She laughed as she saw how cautious you were of people even when you're on your phone like you are right now.

However, as cautious as you may be, it leaves you vulnerable. Sweet. Easy.

Natasha thinks you're too nice for your own good sometimes. Like you always see the best in people. It drives Natasha crazy the amount times she has had to stop because you stopped to help someone. A drunk. A homeless man. A- you get it.

As you and Natasha head down into the subway, she appreciates how your route hasn't changed at all since your first day of work many years ago. Yet she can't help but snicker at how you've never noticed her taking that walk with you. But then again, even with how cautious you are, you don't notice things.

You still haven't noticed the tiny cameras Natasha installed in your place. Or the amount of panties she's stolen. Or even the amount of times you've slept with her arms around your body. In addition to the hushed whispers and stolen kisses, she's left on your lips.

On top of that, you haven't noticed her feelings for you.

Natasha moves closer to you as you both are nearing your stop. With a plan in motion, The Black Widow can't help but smile.

Natasha takes another step forward and grabs onto the metal pole in front of herself to stop her movement when you look up and around the car. You stop when your eyes reach Natasha's green ones in a hoodie and jeans. You smile quickly before putting your head down, focusing back on your phone.

What you did just now was polite. You looked from your phone to stretch your neck and smiled at a cute blonde who just so happened to be looking your way.

That's what you thought.

To Natasha, you signaled her out.

With your eyes, you noticed her. After all this time, you did it! On tonight of all nights. It was a sign. It was meant to be!

Natasha smiled and stared at you, unaware.

When you finally got up to get off at your stop, you felt your arm being yanked back. When you stumbled back and turned your head to find a bald man older than your father looking at you like he won a prize, you pulled as hard as possible. But his grip was tight. "Where are you going, sweetheart?" He looked over your body, making you pull again.

How was no one stopping this man? Was no one seeing it? Did no one care?

The train car beeped, signaling the doors were going to be closing, and the man had yet to remove you from his grip. You were about to scream when the blonde woman from before grabbed your other arm, making you shriek in surprise. The woman acted fast and kicked the man in the knee hard enough to break it before rushing the two of you out of the train car just as the doors closed on three other men hitting their first against the door.

You wanted to wave them bye and flick them off, but your arm hurt. Not the one the man held.. But... but your other one. The one the woman held as she saved you.

"You, alright?" The blonde had a raspy voice as she spoke. It sounded familiar, but as you quickly scanned her face, you declared she must have that kind of face. (as if) But her eyes. Her eyes were one of a kind. Beautiful and a shimmering green you wanted to get lost in.

So lost that you almost forgot about the arm pain and the dizziness you were starting to feel...

"Yeah." You nodded to the blonde who had yet to release your arm. "I'm fine."

This was a lie, and Natasha, of course, knew that. I mean, she was the one wearing the ring that, with one turn of the gemstone, revealed a tiny needle. One that the blonde used to inject your arm with a sleeping agent.

"Are you sure?" The woman smiled as she asked you. Why was she smiling? You went to nod that you were indeed fine but found yourself more tired. Weaker even. "Oh, honey, you don't look so good."

Natasha smiled as she felt your body losing the fight. Natasha quickly looked around before wrapping your arm around her shoulder to make it appear as if you were a drunk friend who needed help getting home.

"Oh, Y/N, it looks like that guy must have really done something, huh?"

The guy in the group of men that she paid off.

Your mind was becoming black as your body went limp, and before you could ask her how she knew your name or who the hell she was, you took one last look at the blonde.

This time, you recognized who she was.

You went to speak but slurred your words as you closed your eyes, passing out in Natasha Romanoff's arms.

Getting you home was easy.

As Natasha unlocked your front door, she smiled, pulling you closer as you entered through the threshold between the hallway and your apartment. Natasha smiled wider as she looked around at what would become her place with you before looking at your limp, unconscious body. "We're home!"

Home was with you.

With a kick to the door, it closed behind you two as she hurried you to your room.

Once inside, Natasha was happy to find that not much, if anything, had changed since she last visited. She said hi to your cat, who purred at the sight of the blonde.

Natasha loved your cat and couldn't wait to be a good cat mom.

Natasha took you and gently placed you on the bed before looking around the room. She was looking for something. Natasha closed the bedroom door and went back, kicking the floorboard to the right of your end table, and up it flipped. She bent down and pulled out a small black backpack she stored two years ago.

Opening it up to make sure everything was still there. She knew you probably didn't even know that it existed. (You hadn't.) But Natasha had to be sure.

Dumping out the bag's contents, she was happy to see that nothing was missing. But she still took inventory. 5 Widow Bites. 1 Pistol. 12 Bullets. 1 Set of Handcuffs. 1 Knife. 3 Needles of the Sleeping Agent. 1 Burner Phone.

Finally, 2 very dry Nutri-Grain Bar.

Natasha kept the loaded gun, knife, and handcuffs out of the bag and placed it on the desk in the corner of your room. The bag moved to the edge of the bed—no point in hiding it now.

"Oh, Y/N!" Natasha sat next to your upper body, passed out on the bed. She spoke as her soft hand ran through your hair. It calmed Natasha. "You're so pretty, Y/N."

Natasha looked over your still-covered body before moving her hand down your back. "Here. Come on." She flipped you over onto your back and pulled you more onto the bed.

Natasha's eyes found your face. "Baby, I can't wait for the rest of our lives." Natasha bit her lip as she spoke to you. Hopefully, and giddy for the future. "We're going to be so happy." Natasha leaned down and planted a kiss at the top of your head. "You still smell like coconut. I still don't really like that shampoo, but I know how much you do." Natasha smiled as if this was a normal conversation before giving you another kiss. Just as one of her hands began to snake its way across your stomach before landing at your hip.

"I love you."

Natasha couldn't help herself. She smiled brightly as she said those words out loud to you for the first time.

Natasha's lips found the side of your face again and again. She always loved how soft you felt against her. Delicate. Like something Natasha wanted to cherish. Keep perfect. Forever.

But there was also that part inside of her. The side of Natasha that wanted to own you. Take that softness and fuck it out of you. Damage you. Hurt you.

Both were fighting for control.

Regardless, Natasha slid down the zipper of your unbuttoned jeans and slipped her hand over your black cotton panties. Moaning as her stomach flipped in the joys of touching you, feeling your heat on her fingers. Letting excitement wave over her, she cupped your pussy before dragging her index finger up over your growing wet-covered folds. "Oh fuck, baby!" Natasha moaned before looking at the side of your face.

Natasha smiles to herself. She leans over and kisses your cheek, and quickly removes her hand from your recently shaved pussy.

Natasha licks the little slick on her fingers off.

Natasha savored the taste before she laid flat on her back. Lifting her ass as she tore off the black jeans she was wearing along with her red panties. Choosing to keep her slightly raised pullover hoodie on, Natasha grabbed your left wrist. "I want you to feel me..." Natasha looked over and spoke to you. "I want you to feel how wet you make me, Y/N! How tight I am for you. I've been waiting."

With that, Natasha kept her eyes on your left hand as she moved it down her toned stomach. The tips of your fingers brushing over her skin, making her squirm in anticipation for what's to come.

Moving them further down, Natasha gasps as your hand gets pushed down onto the top of Natasha's bare pussy. "This is for you." She moans as she pushed your hand further down. Directing your middle and ring finger to her clit. "Oh fuck!" She moans and grows wetter at your unconscious touch.

"Keep going. Keep going!" Natasha directs your fingers to move in a circular motion. Before her mouth drops as your fingers get pushed over The Black Widows dripping pussy. She moans and grips your hand. "Right there." Natasha moves your fingers around her opening for you.

"It's for you, baby. Come on. I want you to fuck me!" She gives your hand one more push and bucks when your fingers easily slide into her. Natasha loudly moans while her left hand grips the comforter of the bed.

Your fingers feel perfect inside of her.

Natasha can't get over that.

She thinks you were made for her.

Slowly, Natasha starts to move herself against your fingers. Her hips working overtime. Only using her right hand to position your hand better. "Oh my God!" Natasha smiles as a shaky breath comes out. You're doing this to her. You're making her feel this good. You're fucking her right.

Natasha is rocking her hips up and down your slick fingers. You're pushing her closer and closer. "Oh god!" She grunts as she slams the back of your hand to feel you deeper, indirectly slapping her pussy and clit that, sends a wave of pain that morphs into pleasure. "Oh yes!"

Natasha does it repeatedly while her left-hand works on her clit. Her middle fingers pushes the bud of it up as she continues her circular motion. "That's it, baby! Make me cum! Make me fucking cum!" She turns her head to you and stares at your unconscious body. "You're doing so well, baby."

If you were awake right now, you'd feel Natasha's wetness run down your fingers. Into your palms. And down your wrist. You'd hear her moans and screams of pleasure as she makes herself cum with your fingers. "Oh my God!" Natasha Romanoff jolts up. "Y/N, I'm cumming! I'm cumming! Oh fuck! Oh, fuck, baby.."

Natasha rides her orgasm out and smiles when she falls back onto the bed. She turns and looks at your body. "You made me feel so good."

You're perfect.

As she catches her breath, Natasha gently pulls your fingers out and brings them up to her mouth. She marvels at the sight of you now covered in her before she takes her tongue and runs it over your fingers. Enjoying the taste of herself. "I can't wait to taste you." Now that we're together, she forgot to add.

Natasha insets your finger back into her mouth. Loudly sucking on them and moaning before shoving your fingers to the back of her throat, making herself gag on them. She repeats the action.

"Will you let me do that to you?" Natasha says after she's pulled them out and caught her breath. "Hmm?" She licks them again. "Will you gag for me?" She kisses your ring finger and twirls it around. "I wonder..."

Natasha kisses you one more time as she gently places your hand down and moves her body to lay half of it on you. "I wonder what you won't do now that you're mine." She takes your chin in her hand and moves it in her direction. "I can't wait for you to be awake. For us." Natasha deeply kisses your lips as her hand quickly pushes your boobs up. "But first." Natasha releases you and gets up from the bed. She takes off the rest of her clothes and tosses them into your now-shared laundry basket before moving to the desk where her belongings are located.

"I need to take care of a few things."

Slowly, your body starts to stir awake.

You go to move to your side but wince when you land on your arm. You are unsure why it hurts, but you are too stiff and tired to worry about that right now. But for some reason, since you're awakening, your body isn't going back to sleep.

Silent bells are ringing in your head, but you don't know they're there.

You groan and manage to flip your body onto its stomach. This position feels terrific, especially since you feel the coolness of the bedsheet against your body. You snuggle your face into your pillow- your eyes shoot open.

You don't remember coming home...

You open your eyes wider and take a look around the room. It's your room. You're relieved to see that but grow more worried at your nonexistent memory of getting home.

Plus, it looks like things around the room are off... you turn your tired back against the mattress and find yourself surprised to have another person in the room.

A blonde-haired woman wearing one of your college sweatshirts looking through one of your old journals... Once again, the alarm in your head is not alerting you. It's distant and faded.

"That's my shirt..?" Your groggy voice makes the woman look up with a smile.

To you, the woman's smile looks like a kid on Christmas morning.

To Natasha, she's testing out how you're gonna act.

"Hi!" The woman gets up with a glass of water from the chair at your desk. The action reveals to you that it looks like she's not wearing any bottoms, but you can't tell because of the length of her- your sweatshirt. The blonde rounds the bed and carefully gets on her knees before you on the floor. She looks kindly at you as your eyes quickly scan her face and exposed legs. "Nice to see you up." She says to you. Innocently enough. "How are you feeling?" She sweetly asks as she hands you the glass of water.

"I don't- I don't remember..." You say, making the blonde smile wider. "I was walking..." You struggle to come up with anything after that. It's like your mind went blank.

Why couldn't you remember?

You shake your head and take a few sips from the glass before the blonde takes it from you to place on your bedside table—a kind gesture on the outside. But the less you know about the pheromonal powder agent you just ingested, the better.

"Oh, honey..." The blonde lifts and places her hand on yours. The soft contact makes you feel warmer. However, the feeling of this being wrong is still unreachable to you. Natasha smiles when you don't pull away. The drugs from before and now are working. "Those men really did a number on you, huh?"

Men? You think as Natasha watches your face.

"You know you're lucky I was there," Natasha says as she rises from her kneeling position to stand in front of you. Now she towers you, and you feel her legs brush past your own. You don't stop her as she moves closer to you. She raises a hand and pushes some of your hair back. "A man grabbed you and wanted to hurt you, but I was there to stop them. But honey, I think they drugged you..."

Her touch and voice were soothing. She felt and smelled wonderful. You even did your best to not react to the pet name she gave you. "Dru-drugged me?" Once again, the bells should be going off, but Natasha knows exactly what she's doing. "Yeah, I got you off the train, but as we were walking, you started to walk funny. Your face got sleepy." She says this while looking into your eyes. She has her gaze fixated on you, and it pulls you in. "But you were smart." The blonde smiles down at you. "You made sure to tell me where you lived so I could get you home safe." Her raspy voice makes you smile, but her words are making you question if that happened... but you don't remember...

"Are you okay?" She asks as you're thinking. You look back up at her concerned face. "Yeah.. I- I was just trying to remember..." Natasha nods and moves her body in between your legs. Spreading them further apart. "What did you say your name was again?" You ask, making Natasha laugh. "I didn't. Good try, though." She places her hands on your shoulders. She's bold. "What's the matter? You don't trust me?" Something about the way she says it makes you feel sick and guilty for even thinking that you didn't trust her.

Natasha, of course, knows this.

"No- no, I trust you! I'm sorry!" You reach your hands out and place them on Natasha's covered hips. Natasha smiles at your action while faking a sad sniffle. "My name is Natasha." You look over the blonde and smile.

That's when it clicks.

"Natasha Romanoff." Natasha's frown turns into a smile. "Wow, you know who I am?" She fakes surprise and turns on the innocence. You nod with your mind, unable to think about anything else but her. "Wow! I got saved by The Black Widow."

Natasha watches as you process this faux information. Gosh, you look so cute. "I guess I was lucky, huh?" You look at her, earning a chuckle. "I just didn't want anything to happen to you," Natasha says, warming your heart. "You're too perfect." She adds in a low whisper. Something you catch that makes your brain fuzzy.

However, before you can do or say anything else, Natasha pushes her body closer to you. Carefully, she watches your eyes as she lifts one leg over yours. Placing one knee on the bed next to your hips before doing the same with the other. She smiles down at you as her bare ass finds itself sitting in your lap.

You feel her wet pussy on your tight black bike shorts.

"Is this okay?" She whispers as she brings her face close enough to yours to feel her breath on your ear. You inhale her scent and feel the butterflies in your stomach.

"More than okay, Natasha..." You find yourself saying. The alarms in your head have officially been silenced. You should be asking why she's doing this, why she's still here. You shouldn't be accepting her advances. But yet you aren't questioning her. You accept her actions with a smile.

She smiles back.

"You know..." Natasha leans down and kisses your cheek. "I'll always protect you." You feel a blush on your face when her soft lips touch your skin again. "I've loved you for so long, and now I get to show you." Natasha lifts her face away from you to look at your eyes flutter.

Natasha sees how defenseless you are now.

The drugs have all worked.

"You love me?" You question as you move your hands down from Natasha's hips to her thighs. The touch of her feels cool to your warm hands. You peer into her green eyes and see them sparkle. "For years, I've loved you." She unwraps her arms from around you and places them on your hands. She moves them up from her thighs to under what used to be your shirt. You feel the bend of her hips and the softness of the sides of her body as your fingertips brush past their way to her nipples.

She pushes your hand to grope her boobs.

"For years, I've wanted you, and now I have you. Don't I?"

Natasha slowly moves her hips back and forth, sending a wave of pleasure through her body as her wet clit brushes up and down the end seam of your bike shorts. She moans and whimpers while looking at you, waiting for an answer. "Don't I, Y/N?!" You push and pull her boobs as you look at Natasha Romanoff acting like a slut for you. "Yes. Yes, Natasha! You have me!"

"I'm yours!" You wanted to scream.

"Good girl." She whispers as she leans down and kisses you again and again. Her tongue pushing its way into your mouth. The taste of her is salvia is electrifying. The pleasure you feel makes you moan into her mouth. Natasha smirks as you push yourself deeper and closer to The Black Widow.

Natasha reaches down as you two fall onto the bed to places her hand in the middle of your bike shorts. She begins rubbing your core up and down as her hand pushes your legs open. "Come on, baby. Open up for me."

You nod with your eyes closed and feel Natasha's fingers slow down in speed as she now gently brushes her fingers past your wet clit seeping through the shorts.

Each time she touches it, you jump.

And then. Natasha pulls her hands away from you: nothing but the cool air touching the wet spot on your shorts. You feel needy and frustrated. You open your eyes to see Natasha on her knees, lifting her shirt off her body. Her blonde hair falls back into place right above her shoulder.

She smiles at you and watches as you take her in.

You feel your mouth become dry as you look up at Natasha's toned stomach. A set of abs staring at you. You move from her perfect breast and hard pink nipples to her shoulders and biceps. The definition in her arms makes you close your mouth to hold in a noise that would've been embarrassing.

You look up at her neck—a smile when you see a cute mole that was previously hidden. Finally, you bring your eyes to her face and the smirk on her lips.

"Can I take these off?" Natasha points down to your bike shorts. You nod, making Natasha internally laugh. The shorts were coming off no matter what your answer was.

You pull your head from Natasaba's gaze and watch as Natasha's left hand goes to the bottom seam of your shorts and lifts them up from your body.

Once again, her touch makes your skin flush with pleasure. It's as if you're addicted to her and her touch.

Natasha pulls her right arm from behind herself, and that's when you drop your mouth. "Na-natasha, what's that?"

"Did I say you can speak?"

You sit stunned as the knife in her hand comes closer to your body. You weren't aware that you couldn't speak unless spoken to, but... di- did Natasha expect that of you? Did she tell you, and you just forgot?

"Look at me." She sternly asks of you. "Not at the knife but at me." The movement of the knife doesn't stop when you pull your eyes to Natasha and her beautiful green ones. "What did I say earlier?" She asks. "Think real hard and then answer me, okay." Her eyes leave you as she focuses on the blade, meeting the bottom seam of your shorts. You keep your eyes on Natasha's face and hear the ripping sound of your shorts as she goes further and further up.

She stops at your hip close to the top seam when you decide to speak up.

"That you'll always protect me." Natasha smiles wide. You listened and answered her perfectly. Natasha smiles and can't help herself when she leans in and kisses you. "Good job." She says with care dripping from her lips. "What else did I say?"

"That you love me."

Natasha nods. "I do love you." She leans in and, with the knife still in her left hand, drags up the rest of the way. Her lips touch yours at the same time the blade cuts through your shorts.

Immediately, Natasha tosses the knife off the bed. It clatters on the floor, making you jump into Natasha's lips again. "Sorry." You say when she backs away. "It's okay." The blonde tells you. "As long as you know that I would never hurt you, right?"

"Right." You agree easily.

Natasha smiles as she pulls at the fabric resting on your pussy. The coating sticks to you as she pulls it further away until the string of wetness breaks mid-air. Falling back onto your thigh. "Did Mommy make you feel this way?"

She knows that she did.

But she wants to hear you say it.

"Yes." Natasha brings her fingers back to where they belong. "Yes, what?" She glides her middle finger over your pink mound. You moan and shudder.

"Yes, Mommy."

Natasha should've left soon after that night. But she couldn't bring herself to do it.

She knew her friends needed her help, but she couldn't leave you. She finally had you, and you had her. Why would she want to jeopardize that?

So as, the days turned into weeks to months to years. Natasha felt the pressure to run continue to build.

In contrast, as the days turned into weeks to months to years. You felt yourself falling deeper and deeper in love with the one who saved you. The Black Widow. The cute blonde hero who made you breakfast in bed. The woman who stayed with you. The one who whispered sweet nothings into your ear every night as you drifted asleep. The woman who saved the world repeatedly could now be there for you.

Natasha even let it be known that you didn't have to work anymore. She had an array of offshore accounts and wanted to spoil you, and you, in turn, let her.

You blushed when she looked your way and never got tired of seeing her smile. A goddess herself sculpted her body, and Natasha happily made sure you came for her. Only her.

"Hey, what's going on?"

You walked out of your and Natasha's bedroom after finding the bed empty to see her in the living room going over her weaponry. Something you didn't like, but you trusted Natasha with them. Knowing she would never harm you.

It was early afternoon, and after your morning trip to the farmers market, followed by some light grocery shopping, you came home to Natasha, waiting with some brunch and a board game.

You took a nap after that, and while you slept, Natasha made her decision.

"They need me."

You knew who Natasha was talking about. It wasn't a secret that you were dating Natasha Romanoff. Well, it was a secret to everyone else. But you get my point. You were dating a fugitive labeled that by the United Nations on account of the Sokovian Accords—an ex-Avenger who still wanted to help.

"What if I don't want you to go." You asked with hurt in your voice. You finally had the love of your life. Someone you weren't even looking for, and now she wanted to go?

"Baby..." She put her gun on the coffee table and made her way to you. Wrapping her arms around you as you wrapped around her body. "I don't want to go..." A white lie, considering her little weekend-avenging trips from time to time weren't enough. "But I have to. To protect us. To protect you." The truth.

"Rogers needs me. Plus, with Vision and Wanda running around trying to be a normal couple again. He really needs the help."

You nodded into Natasha's shoulder. You hated that she was right. "How long?" Natasha sighed. She really didn't know how long it would be.

"Give me two weeks, and I'll be back."

You deflated, and your heart formed cracks. You didn't want her to leave, and you didn't want her to go for that long!

Natasha started kissing your head and rubbing your back, and you didn't understand why until you felt the tears leaving your eyes. You were crying.

Natasha hated it. She hated hearing how heartbroken you were. But at the same time, she loved it. You were hers. And she was yours.

"I love you Y/N. I'll be back before you know it."

"I love you, Natty. Please be careful."

Natasha wasn't even gone for two weeks. In fact, her time with Captain and Birdboy lasted a mere pair of days.

On day 3, Vision turned off his transponder.

Within 48 hours, half of everything was dust.

When Natasha found the others at the corpse of the synthezoid. Two people ran through Natasha's mind.

Yelena.

And you.

"Y/N!"

Natasha screamed as she busted open the door to your shared space. She threw her useless phone onto the counter as she ran through the living room, still in her uniform. Passing by the TV that sat on the emergency broadcast. "Y/N!" She called out again as she stopped at the bedroom door. "Please be here. Please be alive.."

Natasha had tears in her eyes as she slowly opened the bedroom door. Her breath left her lips in a gasp before she blinked away tears that were escaping. She carefully made her way to the bed and sat down.

You turned over as you felt the bed shift. Then you opened your eyes when you felt Natasha's presence. "Natasha? Natasha!" You sprung up from the bed and collided into her body.

You both wept as the relief flooded your combined emotions. "You're alive..." Natasha whispered into your head before inhaling.

She grew to love your shampoo.

"I miss you." You said. "Don't worry, Detka. I'm here. I'm here." Natasha kissed the side of your head before leaning back and kissing your mouth.

God, she missed your lips and the softness of your cheeks as you tried to hide your blush.

"I miss you." You repeated, confusing Natasha.

"Babe?" She pulled back and held your head in her hands. Her green eyes scanned your beautiful face and saw nothing wrong until a speck of dust flew off your nose. "No.." Natasha whispered with pain. "Y/N." She kept your face in her hands as little by little. You ceased to exist. "Y/N!" Her hands started to be covered.

"I miss you."

"Y/N, please no! No! Please!"

"I miss-" "Stop it!" "Nata-"

"No!" She screamed and screamed as you vanished until she woke up thrashing in her bed at the compound. Alone. Gun drawn and ready...

"Whatever it takes..." Whispered by you... Is this the last thing Natasha always heard when she woke up from her nightmares..

Natasha looks around the room with bags under her red, dried eyes and chapped lips. She struggles every day to live. She hates herself for leaving.

She hates that the last thing you told her was, "be careful."

She is hurt. Alone. Scared.

She misses you.

Every day, she tries and uses her resources to find a way to bring everyone back. But so far, she's always coming up empty-handed.

The worst part is, is that even after three years of you being gone. Natasha never told anyone. You were a secret to everyone else.

But to Natasha, you were everything.

dividers by @/benkeibear & @/firefly-graphics

434 notes · View notes

husbandhoshi · 3 months

Text

TO GROW LOVE (AND EAT IT TO THE CORE)

pairing: mingyu x gn!reader wc: 8.1k summary: your whole life, you've only wanted one thing. then you meet mingyu. suddenly you want too much, and you wish the summer never ended. notes: farmer!au, established relationship, angst/hurt/a little comfort

this is a birthday fic for my one and only cat @wuahae ! yes this is about half a year late but what can i say. all good things come with time. thank you for being so kind, funny, and thoughtful (and patient)! not a day goes by where i’m not thankful for our friendship :)

and a million thanks to hana @wqnwoos and jackie @97-liners for helping me with edits. literally you guys are insane writers and i will never stop looking up to you.

i. strawberries (the summer we were young)

When a strawberry is ripe, the seeds push out from the heart of the fruit, as if it's bursting from the inside out.

This is one of the few and only things you've learned by living in Seogwipo, where strawberry season comes like a supernova. The May sun, full and heavy, peels into summer, and the roadside farms open their doors, trying to catch stray vacationers from Jeju City on the other side of the island.

That being said, there are approximately two things to do here. One of them is farm. The other is pretend like you have a life, which is your childhood friend Yizhuo's favorite thing to do when she's back from university on summer break.

Today, this involved convincing her ritzy, too-good Seoul friends that they're missing out on this side of Jeju. (Missing out on what? You're not sure. Perhaps the chipped paint of the mural walls, or the endless flat-topped stretches of seagrass. Yizhuo isn't fooling anyone, but you've always liked stretching your legs out in the bed of her pick-up, even on the long drive to nowhere.)

Unsurprisingly, her friends quickly came to the same conclusion. Just one look at your local strawberry patch, with none of the glamour of the bloated tourist traps in the city, and they decided they'd rather spend the afternoon at the beach.

It was then, between the fragaria blooms, when you met Mingyu. He asked for your name, and the rest was history. Yizhuo and co. scattered like the grasping hands of an overripe dandelion and you learned that he was, one, the newly-graduated son of a pair of local farmers, and two, very, very attractive. Almost too much so, especially for a place like this.

Now he holds up a berry, a bright red murder between his fingers, and tells you to try it.

"You must be delusional if you think i'm taking food from a stranger," you laugh, perched on the fence bordering the field. It sprawls before you, melon stripes on the sunbaked ground.

"No, my name is Mingyu," he replies. "No idea who delusional is." His smile, all bright lip and snaggletooth, tears into the scarlet belly of a newly picked strawberry.

"We all know what happened to Persephone."

"Well, if the underworld was a strawberry patch, I wouldn't mind being stuck there for all of eternity."

"What're you picking all these for, anyway?" you ask, watching Mingyu struggle with his too-big straw hat between the vines. His woven basket bleeds over with little berries.

"Jam. I make it on the very first day of every summer."

"Why?"

"You ask a lot of questions for someone who trespassed on my farm. You're cute, but I won't let you off easy."

He laughs at how you balk, clearly red-handed. You're not sure how to tell him you don't think you were supposed to be here either. You don't do things like sit in the back of trucks, trespass, or talk to pretty farmer boys who take a fancy to you, but it's the summer before you graduate and you're not even sure how long you'll have to continue making bad decisions.

"Are you gonna take my first-born now?" you joke instead. The daylight runs down the rim of Mingyu's hat, trickles down his brow, and you wish you could pour the image of him into a jar and keep it forever.

"No, but I will invite you in for some fresh jam on toast. I baked a loaf this morning." and when you say nothing, he continues. "The strawberries are only good once a year. It's the best you'll ever have. Promise."

It's a whine and a half, and somehow you convince yourself this will be the last bad decision you'll make. You've been here long enough to know that good things don't come twice in Seogwipo, and he is unlikely to be an exception.

Yizhuo blows up your phone, you tie the gingham apron around Mingyu's tiny waist, and the basket turns to blood in the saucepan.

Mingyu is right. Love comes to you in that kitchen, high and red like the sun, and the jam never tastes as good as it does that summer.

ii. watermelon (hollowed out, like a magic trick)

"A good watermelon sounds like a heartbeat."

You watch Mingyu heave the fruit, small and striped, out of his grocery bag. It joins the array of egg sandwiches and banana milks you picked up from the store together earlier. (There should have been chocolate Pepero too, but you split the box on the walk).

You're on a picnic, sprawled out on the outcropping overlooking the water. The path up is basically right behind your house, but you had never cared to visit. It had always been the local makeout spot, a schlocky teen crawl for those with nothing better to do, and yet, with Mingyu stretched out beside you, it seems newer. More exciting.

You're still just friends, or at least that's what you told Yizhuo. But ever since you sat on Mingyu's kitchen counter and ate from his jam-covered spatula, you don't think you've gone a week without seeing him. It's been almost two months, which seems so long and yet not long enough—he makes it easy to be greedy.

"See?" He thumps the watermelon with the heel of his palm. "Try it."

You already went through this entire charade at the grocery store, right in front of all the local aunties, but you indulge him. There's little point to triple checking if it's still ripe, but you think he just likes hitting it.

"It sounds good," you say. "But how are we even gonna eat it? We don't have a knife."

"Watch this." Mingyu procures a coin from his pocket. "You didn't learn this in elementary school? I feel like everyone was doing it."

"Here?" you ask, incredulous.

"Yeah, here. I grew up here too, you know."

He holds the edge of the coin to the skin and slams his palm into it once more, so that it lodges itself into the rind, and begins dragging it around the fruit. You start to wonder if he bought the watermelon just to show you a party trick—not that you mind, though. The strain of his biceps peeks through his rolled up white tee, and you remember why he was able to stop you with just one look back when you first met.

"No way." The watermelon is so ripe, it bleeds around the incision. "I feel like I know everyone here. And I definitely would have remembered you."

"I was probably, like, two grades above you," he replies. "And my parents shipped me off to live with my cousins after elementary school. They said I should get out of Seogwipo and experience the real world."

"Good call. There's nothing here." You watch Mingyu spin the melon over to cut through the other side. The coin catches the sunlight, and it looks like gold. "I wish I left for university. The one here is so small."

"Really?" He pauses to show you his handiwork. The two melon halves roll over on their backs, their cut edge cruel and jagged. "Cool, huh?"

"Impressive," you say. "Honestly. I really didn't think that would work."

"I didn't either when I first saw someone do it. But I’ll try anything once," he replies, ripping open the packaging of the plastic spoon from the bag. "I can't believe you don't like it here."

"You do?"

"Yeah. A lot." He shoves the spoon in his mouth, and you watch the watermelon juice pool around his lips. "I missed home. The trees and the tall grass and the ocean. All the fruits. Everything. I learned to ride a bike, right down there by the water."

"Hm." He passes you the spoon. You don't want to hog it, so you carve out a piece bigger than you need. "Are you gonna work at the farm?"

"Maybe. Haven't decided yet," he says. "I think I want to be here, though. Maybe do something with food, but I want to be home."

"That's funny, because I think I’ve always wanted to live a different life. Or at least one somewhere else."

"You want to go to law school, right?"

"Yeah." Mingyu is right. The watermelon is all sugar, and you would almost feel guilty for eating it if it wasn't technically good for you. "I’ve always wanted to be a lawyer. It's something about the people watching, I think."

"That’s really cool," Mingyu says, mouth full but no less sincere. It's then that you notice your shoulders are almost touching, and your heart crawls back up to your mouth. "You know what you want. I admire that."

He makes it sound like a compliment, but you're sure it's a curse.

You think of your parents. There's a permanent wrinkle ironed into their foreheads, the paper crease of expectations and high standards. It's not that they didn't care, but their kind of care was a humbled sort, made heavy by a hard life. It didn't help that your big sister Seohyun went straight from Yonsei to work a big tech job in San Francisco and never once looked back.

But you can't blame any of them—wanting has always been a hereditary failing. Sometimes Yizhuo will catch you frowning at nothing, and then you remember that life isn't a performance and every day ends at the same time no matter how hard you work. But you don't know how to tell her that the only thing you can do sometimes is want, because otherwise you wouldn't really have much at all.

It seems like the exact opposite of how Mingyu lives—everything about him seems to pass like the seasons. Maybe that's why you can't seem to get enough of each other.

"Thank you. Really." You dig the spoon into your half of the melon. There isn't much left. "You're way too nice to me."

"It’s not hard to be," he laughs. "Maybe you're just too hard on yourself."

You're losing track of the distance between the two of you. You can almost feel the heat playing off his skin.

"Maybe."

It's then, under the veil of summer, where you meet Mingyu's gaze and, finally, things seem close to simple.

All you know are his eyes, heavy with sun, and then the slow, slow move of his lips against yours. He tastes like August, long and sweet, and for once you know what it's like to not only want, but to have, and to have again.

The ocean sings on the horizon, and the watermelon bellies weep.

iii. adzuki beans (or, the blood of a headless taiyaki)

Mingyu eats taiyaki headfirst because he says it hurts less.

"That makes no sense," you tell him, your pinkies linked. You never really liked holding hands, but yours fits so perfectly in Mingyu's and there's some girlish, childlike shine to it when you watch his finger search for yours after just a moment separated.

"What do you mean."

He breaks your gaze to eye a red bean taiyaki, like an unwilling predator sizing up their prey. It's the lamest, most embarrassing iteration of National Geographic you've ever seen, and yet you cannot find any fiber within yourself not deeply in love with the lion.

Fall is a forgiving place for your relationship to settle. You're now a senior at university and he's started his gap year. Gap implies he's in the middle of something, but in true Mingyu fashion, he leaves it up to fate, or chance, or something not nearly as kind (whim).

"Taiyaki isn't alive. And why would you want to pretend it is? Eating gummy bears would become an extinction event."

"It kind of is." He holds out the tail end of the taiyaki, the pastry almost explicitly flayed open, in front of you to eat. "Why does the Haribo bear have a face? Why do the gummy bears live in a gummy forest?"

"Great, so now I can’t even enjoy gummy bears without feeling like a serial killer?"

You dig your pointer into his shoulders, broad from all the time he spends on the farm. To think that his hands, big and weathered, were made to pick berries (and now wrap around your pinky finger) is bruising, if not ridiculously funny.

"It's a crime of passion. Gummy passion. Prosecute that."

He kisses your cheek and your heart almost squeezes into two.

The terrible thing about being with Mingyu is how seemingly endless his affection is. Now he's feeding you in public and buying the two of you matching socks (cat and dog, to be exact), although you'll admit it's a little charming, even if the neighbors do gossip.

He's sweet, too sweet, and his kisses stick to the back of your throat.

But you can't be fooled. There's an unsaid violence to the way Mingyu loves. (The meticulous spiral of the peel he carves when you ask for him to cut you an apple. The grind, decisive and cruel, of a knife against a cutting board. A pair of canines against your neck, your jaw.)

Even now, he bites the head off another unwitting taiyaki before stuffing it back in the bag.

"We're still splitsing, right?" he says, with perhaps 1% of his mouth available for speaking and the other 99% murder machine.

Splits, he always says before you share food. You never had the heart to tell him that it's in the same family as mines or sharesies or takebacks—silly childhood relics, ones that no one uses anymore because they don't mean anything.

This time, you don't hear him because you're thinking about the law school fair you went to before Mingyu picked you up. The future is so close, it scares you. A year from now, what ground would you be standing on? Would it smell like this—the peat, the thread-spool fields, the balm of the ocean? Would you still have Mingyu's finger wrapped round yours?

"Have you decided if you're staying at the farm?" you ask.

"Not really." He uses the back of his hand to wipe off his chin. "If my sister decides to take over, I’m actually kinda thinking of going to pastry school instead of getting a masters."

Mingyu had been toying with the idea for some time after you had talked about it on the outlook. It started off as a joke (September; a galette), then a what if (October; green tea mochi), and now it sits at a kinda.

"Kinda?"

The word gathers speed in the pachinko machine of your mind. You never liked being a kinda person. For Mingyu, it seems like a luxury of a word, but for you, it's really just another thing to hide behind. Kinda talented, kinda ambitious, kinda just there. You're always one foot in, one foot out of something better.

"Yeah, kinda. Why?"

"I dunno. What if we both end up leaving?"

"Maybe. You still want to, right?"

You would be lying if you said you didn't—it's what you always wanted. Seogwipo has been a sun-rot, too-small crutch for you, but you would also be lying if you said you weren't terrified that you'd eventually come back, limping like some doomed Icarus, unable to truly make it in the real world.

Then you think of the pockmarked farmland beside your home, lacy with the fall harvest. Even now, you can trace the endless blue of the coastline all the way there, cut through all the maybes and just let the sound of the ocean fold you into sleep like you were a child again. You wonder if Seohyun, all the way on the other side of the world, ever misses it.

"I’m not sure," you say, because, as much as you don't like it, it's the only answer you have.

"It's ok. You'll figure it out. You always do." He squeezes your cheeks together between his thumb and index, laughing at how they pillow out underneath his fingers. "Screw pastry school. I could come with you. Who else would keep you fed?"

Mingyu's complete and unfounded belief in you makes you feel something close to betrayal. How could he say any of that? With what proof? Only someone like Mingyu would be able to hold the wrinkled fruit of your unremarkable life between his palms and see something better than that. Maybe it's because he grew up on a farm. Either that, or he already cares for you too much, too painfully.

Secrets are easy to keep when they look like yours. At least here, in the pit of your stomach, you can keep count, take attendance of them, all your tittering, small anxieties. Some days it feels like your ribs are pressing out, but it's better than cutting everything loose to spill out over what little you do have control over.

You can handle a little pressure. You have to.

What concerns you is the hand Mingyu's got across your chest. With one look, he just might gut you. A twist of the heart-knife, and all those carefully wound insides carved out in an instant—maybe he'd pity you, but worse than that, he'd likely be disappointed.

For you, expectation has always stood taller than shame, and the idea that he sees something past you makes you want to run away.

"I could be a house husband," he says as easily as ever. "You'll be off saving the world, arguing with whoever, and I'll be there to run you a bath afterwards."

"Let's not get too ahead of ourselves," you reply, binding up the strange, hollow feeling in your stomach with a laugh.

There's a scared little girl hiding inside you, and whether Mingyu sees her or not hurts the same. A spade is a spade. You can only pretend so long.

You look at the taiyaki floating in their wax paper bag, blinded and wrought open by the same grin that now peels you down, and you're not hungry anymore.

iv. winter pears (rotten, outside your parents' house)

Mingyu's family loves Christmas.

You think it's because of the pear trees they have in the front yard. They stand bravely before the house, all emerald ash and wisdom in the December freeze. Run your palms over the knobs and it's like you can see into a sleepy visage of simpler days past. (Below its heart, carved: 1982, the year the farm was bought. Along the tangle of the roots: gyu waz here, in an unsure, childish scrawl.)

Winter comes to the countryside crawling on its hands and knees. On days it doesn't snow, there's a mist, boggy and clingy. You've come to realize the cold is more of a threat than a promise, and so the pear trees still bear fruit; the silvery branches hang heavy, faithful.

The first day of December, Mingyu's parents had tasked the two of you with decorating the farmhouse, a duty you took very seriously. You wrapped Mingyu up in string lights and watched him blink in and out like your own personal firefly.

It wasn't until you watched the rafters, the barn doors, the joyous vault of the ceiling all glow, like a spectacular firework, that you finally started to understand why Mingyu was so into the holidays.

It was in the yellow blush of the string lights that you had your first pear from the tree, which Mingyu insisted was a holiday tradition. We make poached pears, he said, mid-bite. You simmer the pear in syrup until it gets so soft, you can cut into it with a fork. Just like butter.

That same night, he kissed you, mouth hot and trembling and tasting of honey, and pressed you against the bark so hard, you could feel the grit of its veins against your skin.

You think December became your favorite month, and pears your favorite fruit.

So much so, that for the entire month, you try to put away your worries about law school applications to celebrate with Mingyu and his family.

You learn his mom makes the best hot chocolate (a cinnamon stick and a dogged devotion to the whisk), and that Mingyu has no clue on God's green earth how to ice skate. (He careens right into your chest the first time. You spend the next hour with him attached to you like a backpack—he manages to find the most impractical ways to do anything, which you somehow admire the most). On Sundays, Yizhuo ditches her Seoul friends and instead accompanies you to the mall two towns over, where she watches you compare different ties and watches and collagen creams as you decide on gifts for his family. (Lilac is so last year, she'd say, stirring the straw of a watered-down milk tea.)

It's not until the weekend before Christmas when you realize just how serious things have gotten. Your feet understand the meander of the dirt path to the farmhouse, your bones the scent of the yellow-skinned apple, the faded wildflowers. Your palms crave the plush of the rug they have in front of the fireplace. Hell, you can't even eat soondubu without thinking of the kind Mingyu's dad makes, with extra anchovies and green onion.

You don't think about what this means. There are ten days left in December and love poured from a full cup never seems to run out.

"Please let me carry some of those," Mingyu wheedles. "Oh my god. I'm like the worst boyfriend in the world."

"No, you are not." you make your way up to his doorstep, taking care to one-two step over the stray roots of one of the pear trees. It's second nature to you by now. "The moment I hand you a box, you are gonna start trying to figure out what it is."

He harumphs and plucks the big one off the top anyway, the one he knows you can't reach. "I didn't even know you were getting us gifts. You didn't have to."

"It's the least I could do. Who shows up to a holiday dinner emptyhanded?" You stop at the front door. "And stop shaking it," you laugh, using the tip of your boot to nudge his shin.

"Okay. Okay," he says, saccharine, adoring, before grabbing the doorknob. "Ready? Are you nervous? You shouldn't be nervous, right? It's not fancy or anything, if you were worried about that."

And that's the thing that wedges itself between your ribs. Mingyu and his whole family are like this. They love and worry and love again; it presses deep into you, fills you, and overflows.

So here you are, standing in your nicest dress and balancing a stack of gifts you hope will amount to something, never enough but something, to repay the people who you feel have loved you more than you deserve. It's all you really have. You do your best, and yet you know when that door opens, it'll all be washed away in a high-tide flurry of hugs and laughter and the familiar press of Bobpul's wet nose against your leg. They're just those kinds of people—they would be just as happy if you didn't bring anything at all, and somehow that makes you feel even more guilty.

"No, no," you wave him off. "I’m fine. Excited."

When Mingyu opens the door, everything goes just as you expected. His sister takes your coat, your gifts are whisked away to the tree (Aji has already figured out which one is his), and his parents descend upon you in a choking swell of warmth and charity.

We baked some fresh bread for your parents (—Thank you so much, but you really shouldn't have.). You look so beautiful in that color (—No, no, you flatter me too much.). Mingyu better be taking good care of you (—He is. He really, really is.).

The kitchen is gauzy with cinnamon, anise. They must be making their famous poached pears, which Mingyu remarks on, just like clockwork.

Dinner passes the same way. It bubbles over with affection, and you feel swallowed by an impossible yearning. This—a full table and a hand to hold underneath it—did you deserve this? And could you keep it?

For an instant, you picture yourself, years later, at this same seat. Mingyu would be fussing over the rice cakes, his apron still gingham because it reminds him of the day you two met. His parents, grayer but no less happy, bickering over the shade of tinsel on the tree. And the dogs, coiled at your feet like they are now. The vision laps at your bones like you're a raft in a storm.

You're pulled back into the moment when Mingyu squeezes your hand, grounding and insistent. "Mom asked how school was going. I told her I think you're basically the smartest person I know, and I’m pretty sure you're getting into whatever law school you want."

Mingyu's parents laugh, and they cut through their pears.

"Oh, sorry," you say. "Um."

Clink. Knife meets flesh, meets porcelain. Your cheeks are hot. You wanted to talk about anything other than yourself tonight. Clink.

"The top programs are a reach, but it'd be nice." clink. "I just want to get in somewhere."

"They’re all so far away," Mingyu's mom remarks. "So grown up. Any school will be lucky to have you. You'll get into all of them."

Clink.

"Or maybe you can stay here." You watch the prongs of Mingyu's father's fork disappear into the pear. "Keep us old folk company."

"No, no, I think Mingyu should take notes and get off his lazy ass," his sister says, teasing. "Going back to the city will be good for him."

"So you can, what, burn down the kitchen again?" Mingyu grumbles, and the whole table seems to boil over with laughter.

"We’re kidding," his mom tells you. "No matter where you go, I’m sure you'll do great. We can even throw you a party at the end of the year. For graduating."

Clink. Clink.

There's a horrible uneasiness writhing around in your stomach. It's pear and syrup and clove and a blackness, an anxious, selfish one that sucks up all the generosity of the evening and turns it into shame.

Mingyu's mom is talking about throwing you a graduation party, something you didn't even think to do for yourself, and here you are, thinking about the shaking moment you open your rejection letters and the lonely path you'll draw on your way back home.

It's ok. They missed out, Mingyu would say, pouring you a consolation drink, and then it would be over. You'd go home and sit on your bed and the trifold piece of paper would go round and round your head like it was in a washing machine.

Your heart, an inventory of tasks and goals and tally marks. Things you've taken and things you've owed. It's a soft, boneless excuse. Be grateful. Give them that, at least.

Clink.

Dessert ends before you can tell his family not to get their hopes up. Mingyu's mom sends you off with your loaf of bread and a kiss on the cheek, and the moment is gone.

"Gyu," you call out on the steps in front of the house.

There are words at the seam of your lips. You want to tell him you're sorry for worrying so much. For making the whole dinner about you and then very possibly having nothing to show for it when it matters. For the heaviness in your chest. Your cowardice. But none of it comes out.

Instead you watch Mingyu pull at the leaves of a pear tree, watching the frost-filigree they get at the end of the season. He looks over his shoulder and smiles at you, as if he's on the hazy cover of a magazine. His eyes bend so wonderfully at the corners when he looks at you, and it breaks your heart.

"You had fun, right?" he asks. "My parents like you a lot, you know. I think they really do."

But that's the problem, you want to say. You all do, and I have no idea why.

Some of the pears are beginning to rot now. You watch one drop off the vine, and it caves to the pavement like it was made of nothing at all.

v. wild barley (grows like weeds)

In March, you play house.

Your parents leave on a two week trip to see relatives, and Mingyu takes it upon himself to make sure you survive.

It's a kind, blinding charade.

(7 am, breakfast. You usually don't even eat breakfast, but you wake up to doenjang and a smile, one that presses itself to yours until you're wearing it on the long walk to school.)

(4 pm, the stretch between lunch and dinner. You're muddling through another useless club meeting when Mingyu sends you a picture of him in your mom's apron, making kimchi. Kiss the chef, he texts you. You promise to, over and over and over.)

It's good until it isn't.

That isn't to say that it's Mingyu's fault. In fact, it's never really Mingyu's fault, and that's the worst thing about your relationship. Sometimes you wish he was worse just so there was someone else to blame.

(1 am, a fridge-cold glass of water and a hand on the column of your spine. Can't sleep? He asks. Just had a weird dream, you say.

It's a lie. You're a liar.

You miss your parents and the first wave of acceptance letters comes out in two days. You're not like him. Sleep has never been a cure for the exhaustion you're feeling, and you have no way of telling him that however warm the bed is won't fix that.)

It's on a Thursday afternoon when you open your mailbox and see the tiny, thin envelope that you've been expecting for the past week. You don't need to open it to know what it says, and yet you do it anyway.

The sun is white, a ghost in the spring sky. The ocean bleeds into the overcast, the curly barley stands tall around your feet, and you let the worst letter you've gotten in your life fall upon your shoulders, word by terrible word.

Then you close it, pinching the seam shut, and draw up your brave face. Nothing left to do but be brave. You're convinced you've used up all the sadness in your relationship—spend in pennies and the well still runs dry. Mingyu will cup your cheek and call you darling, pouring into your emptying basin, holey and broken.

You see him now through the kitchen window, Venus in his clamshell of a kitchen. Galbijjim day, he had said this morning. Now, he waves at you, glittery with recognition.

Your throat feels like crumpled paper.

Mingyu smiles at you, hazy through the glass. Your cheeks hurt and your mouth is paper mache, but you smile back anyway.

///

The letters come one after another.

You know what the envelopes hold and yet you keep opening them. The little folder you keep stashed in your bottom drawer gets fatter every passing day because you can't help but revisit your misery, almost as if you need to remind yourself it exists.

Mingyu is none the wiser. Today he decides he'll put off pastry school for one more year. "It doesn't feel like the right time," he says, rolling a log of burdock kimbap up. "You know what I mean?"

No, you don't. You never really do.

You do know, however, that it would feel really fucking bad that, come the end of the year, to have nothing. All your friends would be going somewhere—even Yizhuo opened her acceptance to an MFA program in Shanghai yesterday—and you would be here, still, feet firmly planted in the muddy Jeju dirt like they always had been.

"Hey, don't look so disappointed." he jokes. "Don't tell me you're already trying to get rid of me."

You're not, you really aren't. But part of you wonders if it's just a race to the bottom. If you got rid of him before he decided he wanted to get rid of you, maybe it would hurt a lot less. One less letter for the folder.

"Never. But imagine if you picked up a French accent at pastry school. Then I’d consider it. Maybe."

You watch his knife rock back and forth on the cutting board as he cuts the kimbap.

"Some for you. And more for me," he says, in what you can only describe as someone attempting to speak French when they've never heard it before. "Unless you want more, mon cherie."

He brings the plates to the table, his grin nothing short of dizzying.

"I’m irresistible, huh? Still wanna leave me now?"

"You're gonna have to try a little harder than that, I think."

The words roll off your tongue, easily, traitorously.

You watch the kimbap disappear off of Mingyu's plate.

Going, going, gone.

///

Seogwipo is always dark at night, only kept alive by the glow of the moonlit sea.

You can't sleep. Again. And so you sit out on the steps in front of your house, letting the twilight wrap around you like a blanket.

You got your last letter back earlier today. You held your breath and tore it open like you would a birthday card with money in it.

Waitlisted.

It was surely better than a rejection, but some naive, child-eyed part of you thought that if you had just closed your eyes and hoped hard enough, things would work out the way you had planned. Tragically, it wasn't enough this time. You wanted and wanted and you thought maybe that would mean you'd come close to deserving it.

Your parents called today. After managing to sideline the issue of basically the rest of your entire life, they had finally cut through your sad little charade. No good news yet, huh?

No, but—

It was always like that with you. No, but it's not as bad as you think. No, but give me a chance. No, but I’m trying. I've been trying.

You wish things didn't come out of you so complicated. That you could be like Seohyun, who could go through school with her eyes closed and still graduate at the top of her class. Instead, you parade around your little failures, trying to convince people it all could mean something only if they squinted. See? It isn't so bad.

You think you're past the point of crying about it. Your stomach hurts, you're cold, and most of all, you just want to go back to bed. Plus, although Mingyu sleeps like a log, you think he's developed a sixth sense for whenever you get up too early.

Time to be brave, you've been telling yourself, although you don't know who you're pretending for anymore.

So you nudge the front door open—it's so old, it wails if you come at it with any more force—and, to your surprise, see the light above the kitchen sink turned on.

It's not very bright, but it's enough to make out Mingyu's broad silhouette, back turned to you as he makes a cup of tea. He's humming one of his made-up songs.

"Mingyu?"

"There you are," he says, turning around. "Just came out to check on you. And make you some tea."

The kettle whizzes. Your gut twists.

You still haven't said anything to Mingyu. To manage your own disappointment was one thing—you don't think you could handle another person's. And yet when he stands there, Pororo mug between his huge hands, you feel as if you are holding a knife, big and guilty and bloody.

"I-I'm fine, Gyu. Honest." you watch his expression flicker, unreadable in the persimmon lamplight. "Sorry you had to come out. It's chilly out here."

"You know, you can tell me what's going on. I won't judge."

No, no, no. This is the last conversation you wanted to have, with the last person you wanted to have it with.

You feel feverish. You think your hands are shaking.

"Mingyu, I swear—"

"Whatever it is, we can fix it. I know we can."

That almost makes you want to laugh if you didn't want to cry so bad. Of fucking course he would say that. Mingyu, who treats life like it's the watermelon trick he showed you on the outlook, wants to put a bandaid on this whole thing, as if that could come close to fixing it.

He'd tell you to curl up on the couch with a bad movie while he orders takeout. Kiss you on the top of the head. It's ok, baby. Just another bad day for the person who has the worst luck in the world. Another lump of problems for him to try and make better. If he isn't sick of you now, he sure would be soon enough.

"It’s okay," you say, steeling your voice. "It really isn't a big deal. Let's just go back to sleep."

You try to walk away, but the hardness in Mingyu's eyes roots you down to the tile.

"Stop doing that."

"Doing what?"

"Pushing me away," he swallows. "Like you always do. I know something's going on."

"I’m not, i just—"

"You just what? You can't help it?"

"No, I—"

"Because you like to know that you can? That you can say whatever and then watch me come back?" A fragmented, heavy silence thrums between you. He's looking at you like he's daring you to say something, anything. His gaze is black. "What am I good for if you can't tell me anything?"

There's that familiar, stinging pressure behind your eyes. You think you're crying, but you're not sure. Maybe you've been crying this whole time.

"Fine," you bite. Your blood feels like hot metal. "You really wanna know? I didn't get into law school. There. Happy now?"

Mingyu looks stung.

"W-why didn't you tell me?"

Because I thought you would stop loving me. I thought you would have finally had enough.

"Because it's not all about you, Mingyu."

The words, selfish and damning, burn your tongue. Mingyu is right. This is what you always do. You fuck up and then make everyone else hurt for it.

"I'm sorry," Mingyu says. His voice doesn't sound like his. Instead, the words seem to hang in the air, trembling and holding their breath, waiting for an apology you can't give yet. "I shouldn't have—"

"It's ok." You swallow hard, and it hurts. "Let's just go back to bed."

It's getting colder and colder. You think there's a little hole in your sock, right above the cat's whiskers.

Mingyu doesn't reach for you as he passes to get to the hallway. Maybe he doesn't know how to anymore.

The Pororo cup is left abandoned on the counter. You walk over and read the label on the tea bag—barley, because you have class tomorrow morning.

You pick it up, let the ceramic buzz between your hands with whatever warmth it has left, and hold it to your lips.

It's cold now, but all you can think to do is drink it. Erase all the evidence that tonight ever happened, and maybe it'll be nothing more than a bad dream in the morning.

There's honey at the bottom of the cup. It sears the back of your throat, but you drink until there's nothing left.

vi. the peach blossoms (without fail, bloom every August. I miss you.)

You broke up the next day.

Even now, you remember what happened. You had woken up early that morning to make your own breakfast because you couldn't allow Mingyu to give you any more of himself. Your hands could only hold, shatter, so much.

"Mingyu, I think we should...." You looked at the zigzags of jam on your toast, angry and uneven. "I think we should stop seeing each other. For now," you had added, as if that made anything better at all.

Somehow that seemed more merciful at the time. Really, you think it just showed your cowardice. If you were going to break his heart, you might as well have gone all the way the first time.

Maybe it was a good thing that Mingyu saw right through you. He always did.

"So that's it, huh? You're just gonna give up on us?"

"No, I just...need some time."

"How long?" he asked. "Be honest with me. Because you know I’ll wait."

"I don't know." You couldn't meet his gaze. His eyes reached and reached over that kitchen table and you denied him even that.

"Don't you always know?" he asked, pitifully, desperately. "Don't you want this to work?"

And you did. In fact, you don't think you had ever wanted anything more, and it was that that scared you. You had already lost law school—you couldn't let the only other thing in your life let you go. So you pulled the trigger first.

"We should just end things. I'm sorry. I can't give you what you need."

He packed his bag within the hour, and you think everything, from then on, froze inside you. You didn't move from your seat until your parents came home from the airport later that day and asked why there were two plates of toast still on the table.

You think you knew, someplace, inevitably, this would happen. You, who only knew hunger, had reached deep inside Mingyu and rooted out a love you didn't think you were worthy of having. And yet you still ate from the vine, bite after guilty bite, until you couldn't take any more. The only time he asked you for anything at all, you couldn't give it to him—such was the irony of your relationship.

Maybe you were doomed the moment the first strawberry hit your tongue, just like you had said, all that time ago.

About a month later, you got another letter in the mail. Chungnam National University Law School, it read. This one was fat, in one of those brown envelopes lined with bubble wrap. Somehow, miraculously, that position on the waitlist had turned into an acceptance. You held the package to your chest and cried, loud and with abandon, as if taking a deep breath after almost drowning.

Ironically, the first person you wanted to tell was Mingyu. But the good news you needed to save your relationship came too little, too late. Perhaps that meant it had no legs to stand on in the first place, but that didn't stop you from missing it. Instead, you told Yizhuo, and she drove you to Jeju City and treated you to dinner. "You should just call him," she had said. "Hey, don't look at me like that. He'd probably pick up on the first ring."

The city is swathed in August's crimson summer—peach season. The narrow streets are lined with peach trees, the fruits glowing like fat drops of sunlight. All you do these days is plan for your eventual move to Daejeon and the start of a life that seems newer and shinier than your own. But surrounded by the cicada song, the velvet treeline, the rain-soaked asphalt, somehow you think you're going to miss Seogwipo more than you think.

(Fickle, fickle heart. You always needed things to be taken away to really be able to appreciate them. Somehow, all that wanting had boiled down to something more satisfying, more filling.)

You wonder how Mingyu is. Now that you think about it, he seems just as much a part of Seogwipo as the farm he lives on. It was only last summer when you had first met him in the field, set on fire by the strawberry harvest. You think about him now, peddling around that ridiculous wicker basket to make jam. Maybe talking to another pretty girl, someone as naive, cruel as you had been.

Not long ago, you considered calling him to apologize, but that'd just be another thing to be selfish about. A little time and some warm weather, and I’m calling to finally wash my hands of you. That's what it would sound like, no matter what you said. Still, it didn't stop you from thinking of him, every flower, every season.

"You know, I always wanted to grow peach trees. But I think we've always been a pear kind of family."

Mingyu. If a voice could cut through air, it'd be his.

You whip around, half-believing you're hearing things. Certainly that would be easier, but you're learning that there are some things you can't run from.

And like a picture, Mingyu stands tall, golden, framed by the peach blossoms. Not a thing about him has changed. Not even the way he looks at you.

"Mingyu," you breathe. Unfortunately, none of the times you replayed your last conversation with him help you come up with something to say, because in none of them did you anticipate him coming back. "W-what are you doing here?"

"I live here, silly."

"No way," you reply, scrambling. "Crazy, because I live here too."

You both laugh nervously, a silly, bubbly thing, but you feel like you're going to throw up. It's only now that you realize you're kind of on the walk to his place. Seogwipo has never had places to hide.

"I...um." You try and disentangle the guilt from the nostalgia from the scent of the peaches and the warmth on his face. They all look the same. You missed him. "I got into law school. In Daejeon."

"I heard," he says. "Not surprised at all. I always knew you would."

"Thank you. I mean it." The cicadas buzz around you, as if they know they have an important silence to fill. "You're staying in town, right?"

"Actually, I decided to apply to culinary school. It finally felt right, you know? I'm leaving at the end of the summer, but it's just in Jeju City. I couldn't leave the island."

"Thank goodness. I don't know if you could tell, but I kind of always hoped you would. I don't think I’ve ever eaten better food." Your voice wobbles, but it gets there. "You'll do amazing."

Then time stretches and forces you to recognize, reckon with, the moment you're in. You wonder if he feels the same way you do—bruised, overripe. If there's still a space in his heart for you.

Deep breath. Life only gives you so many chances.

"Mingyu, I’m sorry. I'm sorry I couldn't make us work. You deserved better." Saying it feels like peeling the skin of your heart back. There's still a palpable distance between the two of you—you think that had always been there—but it feels more comfortable in a way it never did before.

"Don’t apologize," he says, easily, as he always does. Everything seems to flow off him like water, and you think that's the part of him you loved the most because it was the one thing you couldn't touch. "We loved each other. I think that much was true."

A jasmine breeze curls through the trees, sending the blossoms fluttering around you like ink in water. The very first time you met Mingyu, you thought the image of him, haloed with the sunset, was the one you wanted to keep forever. And yet, somehow, you don't think you'll ever forget the way he looks right now.

"Will you ever come back to Seogwipo?" you ask.

"I was gonna ask you the same thing—you were always the one who wanted to get out of here." He grins, ear to ear. "Of course I'm coming back. There's nowhere I'd rather be."

"Yeah. I think I know what you mean."

The sea, the clay dirt, Mingyu. Even yourself, clumsy and care-worn. You think, somewhere along the line, you forgot how to love. But you're learning—one step at a time.

"Friends," you say. "Let's be friends. If you'll let me."

"Thought you would never ask. Gladly. Always." The space between you seizes, like it's holding in a breath. Maybe one day, you'll think of closing it once more, but you like where you stand now. You can admire him better from a distance, without your fingerprints all over him. He stuffs his hands in his pockets, something he does before he gets ready to leave. But before he does—"I'll see you soon, okay? You better come back. Promise me."

For the first time, you see the honesty in his eyes and you really, truly believe him.

"Promise."

The Seogwipo sun is high and red in the sky when you wave Mingyu goodbye. It feels like you're coming to an end of a long summer, but you're not afraid. You watch the wind dance through the peach blossoms, their branches never searching, never wanting, and you finally feel as if you've arrived home.

#literally on my hands and knees begging for the tags to work #mine #mingyu #mingyu x reader #mingyu x you #mingyu angst #seventeen angst #mingyu imagines

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fshigur0 · 6 months

Text

heartburn — suguru geto x fem!reader

synopsis: suguru geto has left, that happened many years ago. but when all of a sudden he texts you back, hinting to an urgent matter you have to discuss, you accept out of curiosity. but we all know the story of how curiosity killed the cat.

warnings: MDNI! basically smut with a bit of plot, angst in the beginning, mentions of death, suguru is sadistic, praise kink, begging kink, use of pet names (such as love, dove, sweetheart, princess, etc.), manipulation, unprotected sex, teasing, vaginal penetration, slapping, creampie, dirty talk, suguru is just cruel, angst at the end. it might have left space for a part two? who knows

a/n: this is a repost! hope u like it hehe <3<3

The sheer lightness of being was something extremely unfamiliar for a sorcerer. Your existence was inexorably intertwined with a fate that was, to say the least, cruel, and at the mere age of sixteen — in the very spring of one’s life, it all felt excessively tragic.

You couldn’t really retrace the rapidity of how it happened, but although death should have been a gradual concept to learn for a group of teenagers, it loomed over you; watching from afar like a predator does with its prey, and when you least expected it, it would engulf you like a cruel serpent, completely stealing your breath away.

As soon as the spring of your youth was abruptly shattered – reduced to ashes by an uncontrollable fire – you realized you had lost Suguru as well.

Perhaps out of denial or maybe as a form of protection, you had always told yourself that noticing the pain Suguru was going through had been impossible: after all, you were suffering too. In fact, everyone was suffering, but none of you shared the experience of pain with each other.

You suffered in silence in the darkness of your rooms, in the emptiness of a classroom, but you couldn’t show weakness for fear of weakening each other as a result. Yet, you realized – now almost ten years since the events that had mercilessly changed your life – that all that “care” would amount to nothing. You and Suguru had already lost from the start. When he had decided to leave your life completely, he himself had said that ’it was going to happen anyway, eventually’.

It was at that particular moment that you focused on the details of his face: purplish dark circles dominated the lower part of his eyes, which you had always admired before as they were brimming with love, now devoid of any emotion.

You loved him and, truly, you had loved him ever since you sat next to him in class. His stature and expression might have seemed intimidating to everyone, but having him beside you conveyed a sense of… safety; the first time he cracked a small, soft smile at you, your cheeks ignited and your heart drummed in your chest so hard you feared it might burst from your ribcage. Suguru was kind, and always addressed you in a low but delicate tone, as if he feared that raising it even a little would shatter you.

Sure, you had fallen in love, but Suguru had fallen harder. He loved the way your eyes would slowly trace the pages of your favourite book, their intense colour lit by a ray of nomadic sunshine. He loved the tenderness of your fingertips on his scalp and the way you could send shivers down his spine just by running your hand through his hair. He loved the way your voice syllabled his name, it was pure music to his ears. Suguru loved you, but you both knew it wasn’t enough. It would never be enough, because the world he so yearned to create was much more valuable than you.

The stabs that his words had inflicted soon gave way to a disturbing sense of guilt: if you had realised this earlier, could you have changed the course of the story? Could you have prevented his transformation into a mass murderer? Could you have saved the Suguru Geto you knew? The questions plagued your mind, never to be answered.

And just as the first love of your youth walked out of your life, his silhouette growing smaller, that sense of guilt which tormented you morphed into disgust. Spring had come to an end, making way for a long winter.

〔From Suguru Geto〕 : there are some urgent matters we have to discuss. i’ll come to your place.

He’s sitting on your couch, manspreading. His arms crossed over his chest and his head slightly tilted back, eyes firmly glued on you; his gaze is unbearable, and that mocking grin on his face does not help your cause.

You want to punch him so badly, to scream and yell at him, to ask him why on earth he has decided walk back into your life after so long: but it was you who had allowed him to do it, who had opened the front door for him despite your hands shaking — your mind trying in vain to stop you, to warn you that what you were about to do was morally wrong.

Surely, you won’t be able to look the others in the face any more, not after you have welcomed a criminal into your home, a murderer whom everyone wants dead.

“So, cat’s got ya tongue?”

You take in the last drag of your cigarette, now consumed, savoring the remnants of nicotine tingling your brain. You want to snap back at him for asking such a dumb question, what are you supposed to say? Welcome him back like nothing happened? Throw a party?

“I have nothing to tell you, Suguru. Rather, it was you who texted me out of nowhere,” You acknowledge that you have raised your voice slightly, as if just hearing him speak irritates you to your core, “So speak.”

“Mhmh, you really haven’t changed much, have ya?” His smirk only grows bigger, like he is getting amused at that sight of you. “You still get heated up pretty quickly, I see.”

You scoff, an expression of sheer disbelief on your face. “Seriously, Suguru?” It hadn’t even been ten minutes and he was already taunting you; you hated him, hated that he was treating you like that after breaking your heart, hated that he was breaking it once more right after you had managed to glue the pieces back together. “Listen here, Geto,” and he raises an eyebrow, the smirk slowly vanishing, as if your use of his surname had wounded his pride, “What on earth do you want from me? You don’t show up for years and now you’re here, acting like nothing’s wrong and, and…”

“… And that hurts your feelings, love?”

A stab in the chest would have hurt less, you think. But right now all the suffering you’ve gone through erupts into an anger that blinds you. “You better not fuck with me or I’ll make you regret coming here.”

Silence suddenly drops in your living room, and for a moment the black-haired man remains stunned, blinking. Then, much to your surprise, he starts laughing: it’s that kind of laugh that pierces right through you and rumbles in your chest. However, you don’t understand why a part of you doesn’t mind.

You sit still, unable to utter a single word, an overwhelming feeling of shame washing over you.

You are currently sitting on two different sides of the room, however you now realise that you are actually extremely close. He shakes his head and leans forward slightly until one of his hands rests on your knee. The cool skin of his palm makes direct contact with yours. You quiver. Dammit, you think, did I really have to wear shorts today?

“Oh my, who thought you threatening me would be so cute?”

“Cut it out, Suguru, or else-”

“Or what, sweetheart? Will you snap my neck?” Suguru grabs your wrist, completely disregarding the strenght he does that with, and brings your hand to his neck, wrapping your palm around it. He applies some pressure, and it looks like he’s enjoying that.

“Or will you pierce my chest?” He then leads your hand to his chest, pushing it right over his heart, so hard that you feel his heartbeat vibrate on your skin. “Scream at me that I’m a jerk, that you have every reason to hate me — because you fucking do, Y/N.”

He pulls you in, so close the points of your noses are almost touching, and you feel his minty breath on your face. You should push him away, you really should, but you don’t want to.

“I really do.” You’re barely able to breathe out, lips chapped up.

You are essentially sitting on his lap, Suguru’s hand finding a way to the back of your thigh, squeezing your flesh. You let out a surprised squeal, and he knows he has you wrapped around his finger.

“I can see that” He responds, deep-brown eyes locked on you. “My sweet, sweet, little dove.”

Before you know it, Suguru closes the gap between the two of you, mouths clasping together. The kiss you share isn’t in any way chaste, and it doesn’t take long for you to start feeling breathless.

His hand caresses the abused spot he has just grasped, before cupping the curve of your ass, boldly ignoring the pink fabric of your shorts. The action makes your cunt throb, and you feel ashamed that not wearing a bra underneath your shirt had caused your hardened nipples to be so exposed.

“Suguru, please…” You beg, yet at this point you’re not sure what you’re begging for.

“Mhmh, I didn’t quite catch that, sweetheart. Can you repeat that for me?”

You know this has to stop, you are perfectly aware of that and the situation on its own is seriously unbelievable. Have you lost your mind? You have to tell him before it’s too late, you have to…

Smack.

The impact of his palm on your butt is sudden, but it takes your breath away for a second. Your mouth slightly parts, yet there is no sound coming out of it. You’re taken aback.

“I think I asked you to repeat yourself, haven’t I?”

He sticks his tongue out, tracing a vertical line along your neck, viciously nibbling on your sensitive skin as his hand rubs circles on your aching butt. His teeth then reach your earlobe, sending inebriating vibrations throughout your core.

You hesitate, and he slaps you again, this time it stings so much you bury your face into the crook of his neck. You bite the bottom of your lip, exhaling.

“P-Please, Suguru…” Stop it, let go of me, “Please, fuck me.”

He chuckles, and gently grabs you by the back of your neck, only to connect your mouths again. “You’re such a good girl,” he murmurs in a husky voice before sucking on your lower lip, releasing it with a light pop, “I missed you so fuckin’ much.”

As he pulls away, a thin thread of saliva separates you. Suguru’s hands grab the hems of your Kuromi shirt, uncovering your breasts, and he wastes no time as he starts sucking on the hardened buds.

“S-Suguru, mhhh…”

Your hands firmly grip his shoulders, head tilted back in pure bliss. You are drenched, and Suguru is quick to notice that: with a swift movement - which produces yet another squeal from you - he has you laying down, back against the soft cushions of the sofa.

You feel extremely defenseless as he positions himself above you, arms secured at the sides of your waist. You take a moment to admire how his long hair gracefully drops down, perfectly framing his face.

“I forgot how pretty you looked underneath me.”

He hums, and this has you clench your thighs together, yearning for some so much needed friction. Suguru then leans forward and places a soft kiss to your temple, and at the same time, his hands roughly grasp your legs to separate them exposing your drenched shorts.

“Would you look at that, already so wet for me, aren’t ya.”

You glance away for a mere second, your eyes scanning your surroundings just not to look at him. However, before you can tilt your head back in place, his mouth is on your clothed pussy: the warmth of his breath makes you throb in anticipation, as he taunts you, sucking on the fabric of your pyjamas.

Suguru adores the way you whimper, hips moving relentlessly as you attempt to grind against his mouth — needing more than what he is giving you. Yet, seeing you struggle for his attention makes his cock twitch. He pulls down your shorts, playing a little with your lace panties before leaving you completely naked.

“You’re so wet, princess, so fucking needy. You want my cock so bad?”

You let out a loud moan as he slides his fingers through your slick, coating them in your sweet juices. You don’t respond, and that seems to displease him, because he suddenly stops.

You’re about to protest when a stinging pain vibrates throughout your cunt, tears pricking at the corners of your eyes, your first instinct is to close your legs. But Suguru slaps you across your pussy again, a stern look on his face, eyes entirely darkened.

“I asked you a question, sweetheart.”

“Y-Yes!” You whimper, the pain fading away all too quickly.

“Yes, what, mh?”

“Yes, yes I want your cock- please…”

“What do you want, again?”

He was tormenting you, knowing to be the only one in control of the situation. But you were a mess already, and you really wanted him, no, you needed him.

You stretched out your arm, hand groping his bulge making Suguru inhale through gritted teeth.

“I-I want your cock to fill me up, Suguru.”

Normally, you would wish you could wipe off the grin that had formed on his face. Yet, as he starts rubbing his tip against your folds, you forget about all that. Your ankles are positioned on his shoulders and his hands grasp your waist tightly, probably leaving marks as a result. He then pushes you into him without any warning, leaving you breathless, and speechless once more.

“F-Fuck, Y/N, you feel so fucking amazing, princess.” He grunts, taking a moment to feel your plush walls embrace his cock perfectly. “Haven’t felt this perfect pussy in a while.”

“S-Sugu…-”

His thrusts are rough, hips relentless as he fucks deep into you, your walls clenching at his words. It feels so fucking good, and it doesn’t take long before you’re a babbling mess, moaning his name and earning even more mean thrusts from him.

It makes no sense, you should hate him. You should hate the man who abandoned you, who turned his back on you when…

Suguru squeezes your cheeks together, forcing you to look directly at him, eyes locked with his. “Don’t think, you always think too much, pretty,” He then bends your knees with both his arms, literally squeezing you against the couch and his body, angling his cock so deeply that your eyes roll back.

“Look at that, I’m fucking you dumb. You’re such a good girl letting me fuck you dumb like this, huh? I bet you touched yourself thinkin’ about- mmh, fuck!- about me all these years.”

You try your best to nod, incoherent words leaving your lips as your eyes start getting glossy. The lewd squelching sounds his cock makes as he goes in and out of your pussy combined with your sweet mewls are driving Suguru crazy.

He slows down watching the creamy ring formed around his cock, a mixture of his pre-cum and your delicious juices. Then he lifts his gaze to look at you: tongue slightly stuck out, saliva on your chin, tears of pleasure streaming down your face.

“Aren’t you precious? Mhh- fuck, baby, I think I’m close.”

Your walls clench once again as he begins stretching you out once more, steady thrusts slapping against your cunt. The stimulation the friction gives you, and his cock constantly hitting the spot you love most is enough to make you arch your back, shock waves of pure bliss and pleasure making you scream his name.

“Sugu- Suguru… mhhh'love this, love you so much-”

Suguru can’t take it anymore, the sight of you being subdued by him, your body melting into his own as his pace slows down, but the thrusts get harder. Only you can look so heavenly underneath him, and only he can manipulate you however he wants.

He finally reaches his high, throwing his head back as he fills you up with his warm seed, making you reach your second orgasm. His breath is hitched as he pulls out of you, his cum leaking out of your over-stimulated pussy. Your forehead is sweaty, and some strands of hair are attached to it, yet you don’t seem to care.

There are no other words exchanged between the two of you, and the silence yet again fills up the room. Your eyes are fixated on the ceiling, and although you can’t see him, you hear him standing up.

“You leaving?”

“Yeah,” he responds without a hint of hesitation in his voice, the tiniest inclination of sympathy, “I have to.”

“So you got what you wanted.” You try your best not to sound hurt, but you can’t hide the piercing pain in your chest. “Is this why you came here, just because you wanted someone to fuck? Was that the urgent matter to discuss?”

A low chuckle, that’s when you sit up on the couch. He’s looking directly at you, the glimpse of a smile you once loved depicted on his lips.

“Not just someone, Y/N.” He corrects you, but it doesn’t make it any better. No, in fact, it hurts even more.

“I didn’t mean it,” you utter, voice only a whisper as you ponder whether it’s worth it or not, to hurt him like he hurts you. “I didn’t mean it when I said that I love you.”

Checkmate, you think. Only, it is not pain that you see morphing on Suguru’s face once your gaze focuses on him again. In return, you receive nothing: his gaze seems to be devoid of all emotion, and that only magnifies the void formed in your chest.

“I can see that.” You look down, fully aware that you have just made a very dangerous mistake. You swallow the knot that has formed in your throat.

“But you see, Y/N, the big difference between you and me…” Suguru crouches down, lifting your chin with his index finger, lips a breath away from yours. “It’s that I don’t care.”

And with that he is gone, once again casting the enormous weight of his absence on your shoulders.

©fshigur0

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