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autismserenity · 3 months

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know someone who enjoys horror stories? share this one! it's true!

hahahahahahahahahaha aarrggghhhhhhhhhh 3,000,000 deaths due to COVID-19 last year. Globally. Three million. Case rates higher than 90% of the rest of the pandemic. The reason people are still worried about COVID is because it has a way of quietly fucking up your body. And the risk is cumulative.

I'm going to say that again: the risk is cumulative.

It's not just that a lot of people get bad long-term effects from it. One in seven or so? Enough that it's kind of the Russian Roulette of diseases. It's also that the more times you get it, the higher that risk becomes. Like if each time you survived Russian Roulette, the empty chamber was removed from the gun entirely. The worst part is that, psychologically, we have the absolute opposite reaction. If we survive something with no ill effects, we assume it's pretty safe. It is really, really hard to override that sense of, "Ok, well, I got it and now I probably have a lot of immunity and also it wasn't that bad." It is not a respiratory disease. Airborne, yes. Respiratory disease, no: not a cold, not a flu, not RSV.

Like measles (or maybe chickenpox?), it starts with respiratory symptoms. And then it moves to other parts of your body. It seems to target the lungs, the digestive system, the heart, and the brain the most.

It also hits the immune system really hard - a lot of people are suddenly more susceptible to completely unrelated viruses. People get brain fog, migraines, forget things they used to know.

(I really, really hate that it can cross the blood-brain barrier. NOTHING SHOULD EVER CROSS THE BLOOD-BRAIN BARRIER IT IS THERE FOR A REASON.) Anecdotal examples of this shit are horrifying. I've seen people talk about coworkers who've had COVID five or more times, and now their work... just often doesn't make sense? They send emails that say things like, "Sorry, I didn't mean Los Angeles, I meant Los Angeles."

Or they insist they've never heard of some project that they were actually in charge of a year or two before.

Or their work is just kind of falling apart, and they don't seem to be aware of it.

People talk about how they don't want to get the person in trouble, so their team just works around it. Or they describe neighbors and relatives who had COVID repeatedly, were nearly hospitalized, talked about how incredibly sick they felt at the time... and now swear they've only had it once and it wasn't bad, they barely even noticed it.

(As someone who lived with severe dissociation for most of my life, this is a genuinely terrifying idea to me. I've already spent my whole life being like, "but what if I told them that already? but what if I did do that? what if that did happen to me and I just don't remember?") One of its known effects in the brain is to increase impulsivity and risk-taking, which is real fucking convenient honestly. What a fantastic fucking mutation. So happy for it on that one. Yes, please make it seem less important to wear a mask and get vaccinated. I'm not screaming internally at all now.

I saw a tweet from someone last year whose family hadn't had COVID yet, who were still masking in public, including school.

She said that her son was no kind of an athlete. Solidly bottom middle of the pack in gym.

And suddenly, this year, he was absolutely blowing past all the other kids who had to run the mile. He wasn't running any faster. His times weren't fantastic or anything. It's just that the rest of the kids were worse than him now. For some reason. I think about that a lot. (Like my incredibly active six-year-old getting a cold, and suddenly developing post-viral asthma that looked like pneumonia.

He went back to school the day before yesterday, after being home for a month and using preventative inhalers for almost week.

He told me that it was GREAT - except that he couldn't run as much at recess, because he immediately got really tired. Like how I went outside with him to do some yard work and felt like my body couldn't figure out how to increase breathing and heart rate.

I wasn't physically out of breath, but I felt like I was out of breath. That COVID feeling people describe, of "I'm not getting enough air." Except that I didn't have that problem when I had COVID.) Some people don't observe any long (or medium) term side effects after they have it.

But researchers have found viral reservoirs of COVID-19 in everyone they've studied who had it.

It just seems to hang out, dormant, for... well, longer than we've had an opportunity to observe it, so far.

(I definitely watched that literal horror movie. I think that's an entire genre. The alien dormant under ice in the Arctic.)

(oh hey I don't like that either!!!!!!!!!) All of which is to explain why we should still care about avoiding it, and how it manages to still cause excess deaths. Measuring excess deaths has been a standard tool in public health for a long time.

We know how many people usually die from all different causes, every year. So we can tell if, for example, deaths from heart disease have gone way up in the past three years, and look for reasons. Those are excess deaths: deaths that, four years ago, would not have happened. During the pandemic, excess death rates have been a really important tool. For all sorts of reasons. Like, sometimes people die from COVID without ever getting tested, and the official cause is listed as something else because nobody knows they had COVID. But also, people are dying from cardiovascular illness much younger now.

People are having strokes and heart attacks younger, and more often, than they did before the pandemic started. COVID causes a lot of problems. And some of those problems kill people. And some of them make it easier for other things to kill us. Lung damage from COVID leading to lungs collapsing, or to pneumonia, or to a pulmonary embolism, for example. The Economist built a machine-learning model with a 95% confidence interval that gauges excess death statistics around the world, to tell them what the true toll of the ongoing COVID pandemic has been so far.

Total excess deaths globally in 2023: Three million.

3,000,000.

Official COVID-19 deaths globally so far: Seven million. 7,000,000. Total excess deaths during COVID so far: Thirty-five point two million. 35,200,000.

Five times as many.

That's bad. I don't like that at all. I'm glad last year was less than a tenth of that. I'm not particularly confident about that continuing, though, because last year we started a period of really high COVID transmission. Case rates higher than 90% of the rest of the pandemic. Here's their data, and charts you can play with, and links to detailed information on how they did all of this:

Here's a non-paywalled link to it:

https://archive.vn/2024.01.26-012536/https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-estimates

Oh: here's a link to where you can buy comfy, effective N95 masks in all sizes:

Those ones are about a buck each after shipping - about $30 for a box of 30. They also have sample packs for a dollar, so you can try a couple of different sizes and styles.

You can wear an N95 mask for about 40 total hours before the effectiveness really drops, so that's like a dollar for a week of wear.

They're also family-owned and have cat-shaped masks and I really love them. These ones are cuter and in a much wider range of colors, prints, and styles, but they're also more expensive; they range from $1.80 to $3 for a mask. ($18-$30 for a box of ten.)

#covid isn't over #covid 19 #disability rights #disability advocacy #wear a mask #covid conscious #covid cautious #mask up #wall of words #public health #health care

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murobrown · 8 months

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#I'm fucking freaking out and crying and I need to went #I don't know what the fuck am i doing wrong but I gained one kg in three days #i haven't changed anything about my lifestyle #i don't want to have more than 48kg #i work out nealry two hours daily and try my best to consume less than 1000 calories a day #I don't know if I should start skipping meals and invest that time into more workout or what #i have never before gained so much weight so rapidly #and I know it's not my cycle this time #i fucking hate this stupid ugly disgusting body i have and my dysfunctional digestive system and dumb stomach and idiotic brain #all the fucking progress i made in one year is going to be gone #and it's hard to eat less when food is pretty much the only thing I look forward to during my day #I'm so fucking tired of me just fucking up constantly #few months ago i used to have stable weight of 46 and now I can't even keep up with that #I'm done I'm so fucking done with treating myself kindly #i don't fucking deserve that because I give myself a helping hand and I take it and destroy everything #fuck you fuck you fuck you #I'm so angry and so sad and so frustrated and I don't know what to do with myself #i want to beat myself up #i can never keep anything good with me #i don't know how to live with myself anymore I'm just so tired #okay that's all #bye

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aplpaca · 1 year

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I know I put this on the tags of that "horses will eat meat and eggs" post but like if that's all it takes for people to get freaked out and think horses are deranged then they should also be aware that almost all other herbivores do the exact same thing. It's actually seems to be way less common for herbivores to eat 100% only plants than it is for them to eat meat occasionally (koalas are one of the suspected few strict herbivores bc their diet and digestive system is so specialized). They don't go out searching/hunting for it like carnivores and omnivores, but if they stumble across some carrion or some eggs (or some particularly easy live meat), that's fair game, even moreso if other food is scarce.

Like,,,,Deer will eat dead fish and rabbits, and have been recorded eating dead deer also. They've also been recorded eating live hatchlings from bird nests. Rabbits will scavenge birds a lot, and also do scavenging cannibalism. Snowshoe hares have been recorded scavenging a lynx, which is ironically their main predator when alive. Elephants will eat fish. Cows will eat live birds just right of the ground, along with eggs they may find.

Horses aren't deranged bc they'll eat meat, they're deranged bc theyre like if you put the ghost of a psychically-sensitive victorian child into the body of a 1500 pound mammal.

#i respect horses but you gotta admit their vibes are kinda wonky sometimes #horses #animals

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rebeccathenaturalist · 5 months

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Welcome to my Tuesday morning PSA about plastics!

So--I was walking along the Bolstadt beach approach sidewalk here in Long Beach, WA yesterday afternoon, and I started seeing these little orange pellets on the ground that looked a little bit like salmon roe (but probably weren't). So I picked one up, and it was most definitely rubber. I went around picking up every one I could find, and while I didn't keep exact count I probably amassed 50-60 of them. I took this picture before depositing them in the nearest trash can.

These are airsoft gun pellets, and you can buy them in big jars containing thousands of them. That means that someone who decided that the beach was a great place to shoot their airsoft guns could easily litter the place with countless little bits of plastic rubber in less than an hour. We already have a huge problem here with people leaving trash, including tiny bits of plastic, all over the beach (you should see the gigantic mess after 4th of July fireworks when thousands of people come in from out of town, blow things up, and then leave again without picking up after themselves.)

But these airsoft pellets have a particularly nasty side effect. You know how my first thought was "wow, those look kind of like salmon roe?" Well, we have a number of opportunistic omnivore birds like crows, ravens, and several species of gull that commonly scavenge on the beach, especially along the approaches because people often feed them there. If I can catch the resemblance of an orange airsoft pellet to a fish egg, then chances are there are wildlife that will assume they're edible.

Since birds don't chew their food, they probably won't notice that the taste or texture is wrong--it'll just go down the hatch. And since they can't digest the pellets, there's a good chance they might just build up in the bird's digestive system, especially if the bird eats a large number of them--say, fifty or sixty of them dropped on the ground along the same fifty foot stretch of sidewalk. The bird might die of starvation if there's not enough capacity for food in their stomach--or they might just die painfully of an impacted gut, and no way to get help for it. If the pellets end up washed into the ocean, you get the same issue with fish and other marine wildlife eating them, and then of course the pellets eventually breaking up into microplastic particles.

You can get biodegradable airsoft pellets; they appear to mainly be gray or white in color rather than bright screaming orange and green. But "biodegradable" doesn't mean "instantly dissolves the next time it rains." An Amazon listing for Aim Green biodegradable airsoft pellets advertise them as "Our biodegradable BBs are engineered to degrade only with long-term exposure to water and sun and will degrade 180 days after being used." That's half a year for them to be eaten by wildlife.

I don't know, y'all. That handful of carelessly dropped rubber pellets just encapsulates how much people don't factor in the rest of nature when making decisions, even on something that is purely for entertainment like an airsoft gun. We could have had a lot of the same technological advances we have today, but with much less environmental impact, if we had considered the long-term effects on both other people and other living beings, as well as our habitats. We could have found ways from the beginning to make these things in ways that benefited us but also mitigated any harm as much as possible. Instead we're now having to reverse-engineer things we've been using for decades, and sometimes--like the "biodegradable" airsoft pellets--they still have a significant negative impact.

But--at least there are people trying to do things better, thinking ahead instead of just on immediate profit. We're stuck in a heck of a mess here, figuratively and literally, and changing an entire system can't be done in a day. Maybe we can at least keep pushing for a cultural shift that emphasizes planning far into the future--if not the often-cited "seven generations ahead", then at least throughout the potential lifespan of a given product.

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violetrainbow412-blog · 1 year

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Bolinus brandaris [S. R]

Spencer Reid x fem!reader

word count: 1.6k

and by public demand, part. 2

summary: Reid loves the gift you just gave him and the whole team can notice.

"Everyone ready to go back?" Gideon asked, taking a quick look at the jet to make sure all of you were there. You had an extortion case quite far from home, Miami to be exact, and you had a long flight back to Quantico, so the last thing he wanted was to forget someone.

Miami was a beautiful place that you would have liked to visit in other circumstances, that had nothing to do with crimes at all, since you had always felt a certain weakness for the warm climate, the sticky breeze, and the sound of the waves that were on the beach.

You had only had the chance to go to a mall to buy a new outfit, because yours had been completely ruined, while Morgan took advantage of the wait to buy an ice cream popsicle. It hadn't been a dream ride, but it was something at least.

“I feel like I could sleep for 90 hours straight,” you sighed, closing your eyes and falling into Spencer's side as usual. You two were the youngest, he was younger than you of course, so it was easier to connect with him than the other members of the team. You seemed to have similar interests and he was strangely comfortable with you.

“You would actually need to wake up periodically to expel fluids or you would risk bursting your bladder or even your bowels, because even though your digestive system shuts down when you sleep it only does so for a certain number of hours. Maybe you could sleep for 14 or 17 hours, which is what a baby sleeps, but 90 seems excessive to me even if you do not consume drinks or food before doing so”

"It's an expression, Reid" you laughed, but without the intention of making him feel bad for having answered you that way. Sometimes it was necessary to explain to him that you weren't being serious, as obvious as this seemed.

"You can sleep through the whole trip" he argued and although you still had your eyes closed you assumed that he had shrugged "I'll wake you up if you start snoring"

"I don't snore!" you defended yourself, playfully smacking him on the arm and hearing him laugh. Somehow watching him led you to remember a chain of events ending in the package you had carefully stowed in your bag and you almost jumped out of your seat the next second: "Wait, I just remembered something" you reported and went to the baggage area to rummage through your suitcase, taking just a few minutes to be back in your seat “I bought you this”

"Me?" he asked in disbelief. The others were on their own business enough to notice your conversation, making the moment a bit more private.

“I looked at it and just thought of you. Although I don't know if you're going to like it” you said shyly, handing him something wrapped in a paper bag with a store sticker on it. You had found the gift when you went shopping for your clean outfit and a part of you had been anxious all day to be able to give it to him to watch his reaction.

Reid looked at it curiously and handled it carefully, as if he were afraid it would fall apart in his fingers, until he managed to open it and took a piece of cloth from it.

"A scarf?"

“I saw you in one the other day and I thought you might like them. You know, you always wear your vests under your coats and your ties and you're always overdressed, but in a cute way” you laughed, while you pointed your hands at your body pretending to touch the pieces of his outfit "But it's okay if you don't want to wear it"

"No! I mean yes. I want to use it” he reassured you. Spencer held it out to look at it more carefully: it was purple, a stripe in the middle of patterned colored rhombuses intertwined with some embroidery of branches with leaves in black. "Did you know that the color purple is related to royalty because of how difficult it was to obtain the pigment before the Christian era? It is obvious that artificial dyes didn’t exist at that time, so everything they dyed the fabrics with had to be obtained from nature and that particular tone was quite difficult to obtain because it came from Bolinus brandaris, an extremely rare species of sea snail. To obtain 1 gram of this substance it is necessary to have 10,000 snails. And that gram was barely enough to dye a small piece. Its value and the difficulty in mass-producing it is due to the fact that the substance obtained had to be left to dry in the sun for a very precise time to be used later. Half a kilo of wool dyed in that color cost what would now be equivalent to around 300,000 euros,” he said, still holding the scarf as he rambled on. "It is also related to liturgical attire, it symbolizes power, wisdom, and is the perfect combination between the energy of red and the calm of blue”

“Oh yeah, I… I knew all that before I bought it, I didn't choose it just because I think purple brings out your eyes” you blatantly lied, making your friend laugh tenderly.

“What I meant to say is that I like it” he added, a little embarrassed by the smile and attention with which you had been observing him. You always did that when he wandered off, leaving him helpless and not knowing how to react.

"You said it has to do with wisdom, right?" you exclaimed and he nodded gently "Do you think there's some weird psychological reason why my brain knew that and linked it to you or was it just a coincidence?"

"Well, it's hard to explain..." he began to say, turning a little in his seat to be closer to you and begin a long explanation about the connections that our brain creates with things and people.

You were completely exhausted but you didn't have the heart to stop him from saying anything he had to say and you listened intently as much as your body would allow, until eventually you were lulled to sleep by the sound of Spencer's soft voice. When he stopped hearing your hums he realized that you had already fallen asleep and he moved your body carefully until you were completely reclining on the chair, so that when you woke up the physical pain of sleeping on the plane would be less. He, for his part, stayed in the seat next to you sheltered your rest, and at some point ended up asleep too.

The day after she came back from Miami, Spencer was already wearing the scarf you gave him. He had matched it with a brown coat, a vest in a darker shade of purple than the scarf, and a white shirt that together made him look perfect. Also, his well-brushed straight hair fell to the side and his tanned skin looked particularly clean.

You didn’t need to tell him anything because the smile you gave him when you looked him up and down was reason enough for him to be flattered and also proud to receive your approval. All day you watched him, a bit for the garment and a bit for the very pleasure of admiring him, and you noticed that he frequently checked that everything about him looked good, as if he was trying to impress you. Every time he spoke he avoided looking at you, only at you, but you couldn't take your eyes off him.

The day after that he used it too and the next day and the next, to the point where it was strange to see him go anywhere without it, as if it had become a part of him. After a week, while they waited in the boardroom, Elle finally had the courage to face the situation and ask Spencer why the particular choice for something for everyday use.

"It's that his girlfriend gave it to him" answered Morgan, before the brunette could say anything.

"What? No! Y/N is not my girlfriend” he said, completely embarrassed and making sure with his eyes that you weren't around to hear that.

"Oh, now I understand" JJ joined the conversation.

"You understand what?"

“You are always taking care that it doesn’t get dirty or stained”

"Yes, I don't like my clothes to get ruined"

"But more so if it's something his girlfriend gave him" insisted Morgan and in a fit that no one expected Spencer took a ball of paper and threw it at his face. That just got a collective laugh.

"I just like it. That's all”

"We all know you like her, Reid," added Hotch, who had kept quiet thus far and didn't even look up from the files. He flushed red to the ears as the rest of the team shared another laugh, and just seconds later you and Gideon walked through the door.

"Good morning"

"Good morning" answered the others, like school children before the arrival of a teacher. There was one seat left next to Morgan that Gideon took and that forced you into the only remaining chair between Elle and Spencer.

“Did I miss something interesting?” you murmured, leaning into him and smiling close to his face.

"No" he replied kindly, feeling your gaze drop from his eyes.

"Your scarf," you said, reaching out your hands to move it a little around his neck "It was out of place"

Everyone else, except for Gideon, shared knowing glances and stifled giggles as they watched the nervous way he thanked you. It didn't help too much that for the entire meeting you were completely distracted looking at your partner next to you, making the whole team wonder when the two of you were finally going to end up kissing.

#spencer reid #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid x reader #criminal minds #criminal minds fanfic #dr spencer reid #matthew gray gubler #aaron hotchner #derek morgan #jason gideon #JJ #penelope garcía

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caesium-55 · 2 months

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—seven days. [ iii ]

pairing: max verstappen x manager! reader.

summary: as the third time world champion, max verstappen's manager, you function on the belief that whatever max verstappen wanted, max verstappen shall get. but this time, after four years of working as his manager, you can't give him what he wants anymore and that was to stay.

author's note: hi hello welcome to part three. i flunked the quiz. lemme know what you think. NOT BETA READ. NOT EDITED. this chapter kinda sux. can't believe i went through a breakup just last week and i still cant write decent post-breakup scenes.

tags: @whatamidoingwithmylife-ramdom @eugene-emt-roe @bellezaycafe @barnestatic @theseerbetweenus @wcnorris @notyouraveragemochii @lpab hope i didn't forget anyone.

masterlist.

you: *sent a link*

him: ?

him: what's this

you: benefits of crying

you: read it it's enlightening

him: some people do not cry over a breakup you know and that is totally okay

you: why crying helps.

you: 1. tears release toxins, stress hormones to be specific. it is good to let all the bad energy out.

you: 2. it aids sleep. no need for further explanation.

you: 3. crying releases oxytocin and endorphins. i know you don't know what an oxytocin or an endorphin is but they're happy chemicals.

you: 4. crying helps you receive the support you need from the people around you. EMOTIONAL VULNERABILITY is okay, max. stop treating it like an STD.

him: it feels like an std

you: pussy

you: emotional vulnerability is a thing and it's normal so stop trying to be a big strong man when you're barely holding it together.

you: you may look fine now but i know you

him: please stop

you: no

you: 5. crying has a self soothing effect. very nice actually. it activates the rest and digest system.

him: what even is that

you: the parasympathetic nervous system

him: ??

you: this is why you shouldn't have dropped out of high school

you: education is important yknow

you: youre already lacking in three forms of intelligence, academic, emotional n social intelligence

him: fuck you im smart

you: fuck you 2 and yeah you're smart but only in geography

you: you probably can't do your taxes

him: im dutch so the company's account department do it for me by default

him: the american system is just weird

you: cant argue w/ u there

you: also, 6. crying helps restore emotional balance

you: see? you need that

you: yknow now that i think abt it you should consider seeking therapy

him: what makes you think i’m not in therapy right now

you: well have you considered getting MORE therapy?

You stand in front of the body mirror, holding the Red Bull polo shirt against your body to see how it looks on you for one last time. On your right sleeve, the word MANAGER is written in bold, white text. Because that was what you were. Just a manager.

In another universe this is not the shirt that you’d be wearing. The MANAGER would have been ENGINEER. In another another universe where your family has been well-off enough to continuously send you to karting school and you would have been the one driving the fucking car by now.

You know, if Max has even tried talking to Horner and suggested that you should be moved into the engineering team, then you wouldn't be stuck wearing this god-awful polo that burned your skin every time you wore it for work. Everybody reduced you as Max’s American manager and because you are American, most of them kind of just assumed that you're dumb, you know?

Does the world even know how smart you are? That you graduated top of your class, got the best thesis award, and that you had finished your masters just this year? Did they even know that a Japanese car company wanted you on their research team? That a NASCAR team wanted you on board as one of their engineers? Does Max even know?

Fuck no. He only knows that you're the best at ironing clothes and organizing his Google calendar and memorizing his entire coffee order by heart. He knew you're good at extinguishing kitchen fires and kicking ass in YSL Opyum heels. You doubt he knows that you can do Calculus in your sleep.

You can take it if the world puts you down for your appearance. But if the world puts you down because of your intellect? That's a different story. You'll take any insult to the face but not to your intelligence.

You have four days left in Monaco so you have begun packing already. You're right, everything did fit into three suitcases. Also, you haven't told Max yet. For some reason, you’re too anxious. Which is shocking to say the least because you never ever gets anxious when it came to Max Verstappen. You wouldn't have lasted this long working alongside Max if you were a pussy.

Max Max Max Super Max Max—

“[Name] here. Need anythin’, champ?”

Hearing a sob on the other end of the line immediately activates your fight or flight response. Your eyes widen and you toss the Red Bull shirt aside. Your legs leads you to the nearly empty shoe rack stationed beside the front door, grabbing the pair of shoes at the very top of the tiny shelf and throwing them on.

“I’m comin’ there. Hang on, Max. You wait for me, okay?”

He doesn't answer, just continuing to sob and the sound absolutely breaks your heart.

You run to his penthouse at a speed that will even put the RB19 to shame. Not even bothering to knock, you barge in and yell his name in the empty halls of his penthouse. You search in the kitchen. He's not there. The living room. Not there either. The room where his simulations are. Not there. You run to his bedroom upstairs.

The door is locked. Dammit. Panic overflooded your system.

“Max, sweetheart, you there?”

No answer, but you can hear a faint sound behind the door if you press your ear against the wood. Firefighter training covered how to open a fucking door when it was locked so this once again becomes a situation where you're grateful that you did that tiring and borderline suicidal volunteer work.

Max keeps a fire extinguisher inside his penthouse as per your advice. There is one stationed in almost every room inside his house. You knew there is one inside his room and another one just at the end of the hallway. You make a quick run for it and once you have the extinguisher in your hands, you run back to his door.

“Step away from the door!” you instructed while your mind mentally calculates your payment plan as you hit the door knob with so much force, the walls tremble at your strength. You're functioning on pure adrenaline. Your instincts only yell one thing and that is: go to Max. No one and nothing in this world will keep you from him. It isn't long until his bedroom door broke down. With one last final kick, it crumbles down from its hinges and you forcefully pry it open and sprint inside.

Max tucks himself in the tiny space in the corner of his huge bedroom, his knees shoved up to his chest. A 181-cm tall man trying to make himself as small as possible.

This is it. This is the bottled-up emotions he's been storing since Abu Dhabi. You cannot say you have not anticipated this. Max is bound to explode sooner or later.

Panic attacks have made a home in Max’s body since he was a child. That's what one gets when they’re parented by someone like Jos Verstappen. He killed Max’s soul and made the boy a machine and for what? To shape a child into a man, a racer that he wanted to be but failed to become at the cost of Max's mental health and childhood.

When Max looks up with that heartbreaking look on his face, you almost crumble. Almost, because you cannot crumble. Not when Max needs you.

Sometimes, you forget what it took for Max to become the champion that he is today. A childhood sacrificed for his dominance on the tracks. A whole lot of hatred from the people to become a WDC. And now, a love lost for his third consecutive championship.

“You came,” his voice cracks towards the end.

Your eyes soften, “You called, Max. Course I’ll come.”

You barely brace yourself for the impact that is Max’s body wrapping around yours in a tight hug. The man have literally launch himself from the floor to you at sixth gear speed. You stumble backwards slightly, holding his bed for support so the both of you won't fall down.

“Max—”

“No,” he whispers and his grip on your tightens as if he's afraid that you’ll slip away if he even tried to give your lungs space to breathe. “Don't speak. Stay.”

What Max wanted, what Max would get. So you shut your mouth, shuffle slightly so he'll be in a more comfortable position and allow him take whatever he wants from you. This will be the last chance he’ll ever do it anyway because in four days time, you’re flying to Texas.

You stay for what is probably hours in that position. Crumbled together on the floor, leaning against the side of Max’s king-sized bed. Your shirt is completely damp from his tears but you cannot even bring yourself to care about it.

“Your shoes…” It's the first time Max has spoken since the start of his meltdown.

“Hm?” you turn your head and your nose nuzzles against his hair, making you scrunch it up a little. His hair is tickling your nostrils. If you lean a little forward, your lips will meet the skin of his temple.

“They’re mismatched.”

Brows furrowed, your eyes move to your feet and see that Max is right. Your shoes are indeed mismatched. On your left is one of your Adidas slides and the other is your slip-on Skechers. You ran from one building to another in mismatched shoes. Fucking embarassing.

“Ignore them.”

Silence.

“You good now?”

“No.”

“Okay,” you say. “If you want to talk, I’ll listen.”

You hear Max let out a shaky breath, “Just stay for a while. Don't leave me alone.”

“Okay.”

Eventually, you manage to talk Max out of the hug. You're beginning to feel claustrophobic but you do not want to say it out right so you try to negotiate instead. That's how you and Max found yourselves inside his kitchen again. You're trying to replicate your Abuela's cheesecake, which she was known for back in Austin, and Max is…well, he's Max and he’s trying to be helpful in any way he can. If it's some other day, you'd have shoved him out of the way because you prefer working alone in the kitchen. Having eyes on you gives you anxiety. But given today’s circumstances, you do not have the heart to make Max leave so you task him with doing the little stuff like mixing things and throwing shit to the trash can nearby. And he does so splendidly.

“Thank you, by the way.”

“For what, baby?” You internally wince at your own slip of the tongue. Damn that habit of yours of calling people with affectionate call signs. Thankfully, Max seems to have not noticed it.

“For coming here.”

You shrug.

“I only did what you did for me in 2021.”

Again, your breakup with Leo was bad bad. You spent a month crying for a love lost and Max was there for you. For the most part, at least. You want him to focus on winning and winning alone that you pushed him away a lot of times but you appreciated how he was more obedient to your commands, that he held his tongue so he wouldn't piss you off even though he was not liking your words, and that he was considerate of you.

“I hope you won't go into fights though,” you chuckle. “Like I did after my breakup.”

He smiles, shaking his head lightly and you know he's recalling the memory. 2021 is a hilarious year for you, the Red Bull manager. You went viral after getting into a cat fight with a girl and a whole fist fight with her boyfriend.

You and Leo called it quits a week before Monaco and even though it had been four races since then, your heart was still in a quite fragile state at that specific race weekend. One minor inconvenience was enough to ignite a wild blaze of fire within you and nobody could extinguish the flames.

After Silverstone FP1, you were leading Max to the cool down room to brief him with Horner’s relayed instructions and someone had thrown a glass bottle towards the both of you while walking. Originally, Max was the main target of the bottle but you happened to have moved towards the line of trajectory and the bottle landed on your temple, hard enough that you stumbled upon impact.

You barely heard Max’s shocked gasp and shout of panic over the sound of glass shattering on your foot because the only thing you could register was the terrifying feeling of a thick liquid trickling down the side of your face and you didn't even need to see it to know it was blood.

The only thing you saw was red and it was on fucking sight.

Fucking Hamilton fan. Fucking Hamilton. He’s in Max’s way. He’s in your way. He’s the wall that was dividing you from your dream position in the engineering team.

You shoved the iPad you were holding to Max’s hands and marched down to the woman wearing the Merc #44 merch, swiftly jumping over the barricade and grabbing her by the collar of her pristine white Versace top.

The events that followed were too fast. You grabbed her collar. She pulled your hair. You also pulled her hair. Someone pulled her away from you. You tried to grab her, clawing her bare arms with your manicured nails. She screamed. You screamed back. You pulled out some curse words in Spanish as well because cursing her in one language alone is not enough. Her boyfriend appeared. A quick punch to your cheek. You fell to the ground.

The world stood still. There was a sting on your palm because your skin got torn from the hard surface of the concrete ground. You let a bloodcurdling war cry and your Dad would definitely be disappointed at you for using the boxing techniques he taught you for self defense purposes only to fight a guy two times your size.

Everything was a bigger blur from there. But you did remember the sensation of Max’s strong arms around you, stopping you from lunging forward again. He was saying sweet words to your ear to calm you down but your brain failed to intercept them so you could hear the words, could hear his voice, but not understand any of it. You remember Christian Horner's disappointed face that haunted you even two years later. You remembered feeling so terrified as you sat outside Christian Horner’s office waiting for the final verdict while he and Max and a few of the Red Bull higher-ups argued about your future with the team. You remembered hearing Max’s loud snarl on the other side of the mahogany door: “Did you see her face?! There was blood everywhere! On her nose, on her mouth, on the fucking side of her head!” You remembered the girl taking the case to court. You remembered fearing that you’d be sent to jail. You remembered that she lost the case because it was ruled as self defense and your injuries were grave. You remembered discovering that it was Max who used all his power and got the best lawyer to fight your case. You remembered the atmosphere in the Red Bull garage shifting when you entered it a few weeks later and everyone stared the bandages and bruises. Everyone thought one thing: of course, it would also take a monster to manage a monster like Max Verstappen. You remembered Lewis Hamilton, seven-time world champion, apologizing personally for the fight caused by his own fan. He didn't need to but he was so sincere with it that you cried when he handed you the apology flowers. God, how could you even hate this man? Your anger towards him was misplaced.

You’d been living with the guilt ever since, that you were horrifyingly violent for a day, that you were capable of killing for a day. And it could happen again. One day. God, you hoped you wouldn't have to see that day. You knew all your coworkers have been careful with angering you ever since. They're terrified of you even. Max should be, too. But then again, why would he when he already saw the horrors done by his father’s hands ever since he was a child? He was used to it.

“I won't,” he says, smiling at you. “I wouldn't want to add anymore problems for you to clean up.”

But you will not be the one cleaning it up because you resigned. You didn’t tell that to him though. Not right now. He just had a meltdown over Kelly leaving him and the news of his manager leaving him too will destroy him.

The cheesecake is a little burnt when you take it out of the oven but it actually adds more flavor to it so yeah, that's a win.

“We should drink,” you suggest.

“It’s mid-afternoon.”

“We drank at mid-afternoon yesterday,” you give him a blank stare. “With Alex and Charles, remember?”

He doesn't say anything as you make your way to his fridge and pull out two bottles of beer. Max has champagne stored somewhere but you have enough of those expensive champagnes. You need beer. Beer is good. Beer is nice. You're a beer type of person and it is time Max becomes one, too.

“I’m no scientist,” you begin, biting off the beer’s bottle cap. “But according to chemistry, alcohol is solution.”

Well, technically, edible alcohol or ethanol is not a mixture. Rather, it's a pure substance that happens to be a liquid at room temperature and typical atmospheric pressure. Pure ethanol is not a solution. Hard spirits though? That's a solution.

Beer is not a hard spirit. It's more of a fermented drink. But Max doesn't know that, though, so you don't bother explaining the science behind it.

Somewhere down the road, the two of you move to his living room. You use the Youtube app in his TV to search karaoke video and have the bestest time of your lives. You're screaming along some Daddy Yankee and El Alfa songs and Max doesn't know how to speak Spanish so he’s just vibing to it.

At 5 PM, you pull out Max’s expensive vodka bottle. Now this is the real shit. The ten bottles of beer? Those are just pregame. Max is already drunk with just those because he’s a pussy but you’re no pussy, so the only right answer is vodka! Viva la vodka or whatever.

Your throat gets tired of singing and Max gets tired from dancing, too, so you both decide to just go entertain yourselves in other ways. First, you introduced Max to beer-pong. He loses, of course. He sucks at everything not racing. Then, the two of you move onto chess. Max gives up mid-game. He cannot understand the rules. Then, lastly, you move to the billiard table Max owned. He only used it when the other guys are over and you do not even know why he bought it when he sucked at playing billiards.

“You know what Kelly said the morning before the race?” Max suddenly says and you look up at him, brow raising slightly. He’s drunk; his skin is flushed and he is all giggly and smile-y as he sits on the billiard table’s side rail and using the billiard stick as some sort of support stand to keep him from falling. You hope he won't accidentally poke himself. You're no better, too. Ten beer bottles and a few glasses of vodka. But you’re not as drunk as Max, and you still have a straight vision and you can still sink the colored balls into the pockets of the billiard table.

“Hm?”

“That it was unfair for her.”

You raise a questioning brow, “Why?”

“I bought shoes and they don't fit her.”

You blink. He laughs at himself as if he has uttered the funniest joke in the world.

“Three years of relationship gone because of a single pair of shoes,” he continues. “She wanted those shoes, too.”

Kelly….what the fuck?

“But that's okay. She….She made me open my eyes, you know? She made me realize what I truly love.”

“Racing.” It's not even a question. It's the truth.

Max stares at you, long and hard, and you look away first because you fear that if you allow yourself to stare too long, you’ll drown in those beautiful blues. This is enough heartache for the day. No need to add more.

“Hey [Name],” he begins. “If I asked you to kiss me, would you do it?”

#manager!reader #max verstappen x you #max verstappen x reader #max verstappen #f1 x reader #f1 imagines #formula one #fanfic #angst #mv1 #mv33 x reader #mv33

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briarpatch-kids · 4 months

Text

I think something that people with fully Invisible disabilities don't quite understand is that not ALL of disability is visible. What you're seeing is the tip of the iceberg.

You see my ventilator, what you don't see is hallucinating and living in the Fear Dimension because of carbon dioxide buildup. You don't see how painful not breathing enough is. You don't see that the muscle weakness in my trunk isn't JUST breathing, it's also my digestive system and reproductive system and swallowing ability.

You see my powerchair and get jealous of how I don't have to Struggle Like You Do, what you don't see is the fact that I haven't sat anywhere that isn't my wheelchair since I had to start using it. No lounging on the couch, no sitting on the grass. You don't see that I'm limited to places my wheelchair can fit into, which means no friend's houses and no small local shops. Even getting a haircut becomes Complicated when you can't sit in the barber chair. My reach is also limited so I can't get my own groceries off the shelf or pick up things that are dropped.

You don't see that I'm in 8/10 pain on a regular day and the only thing doctors have been able to do for it is teach me to be less distressed by it.

You don't see that day by day, year by year I can do less and less on my own. This year I lost toileting independently and breathing independently. Next year I might lose the ability to eat food without a machine, or maybe I'll lose the ability to sleep next to my spouse.

This is what you're jealous of. Because what you see is us getting help that you believe is adequate. It doesn't even scratch the surface of adequate. Any quality of life I have has been hard won after years of fighting and it's still not even close to enough.

#visible disability

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chuulyssa · 3 months

Text

drunk and driven. (light yagami)

↷ A/N ─ happy belated birthday to light and me !! i hope you enjoy this :) again, this is NOT rape/non-con. the reader is as sober as light here. written by a zombie-me at 4am. also im sorry if the camera topic is overused, i just couldnt help myself fantasizing about this

★ COUNT ─ 2.5k

!! TAGS ─ f!reader, dom!light, drinking, smut, fingering, spanking, unprotected sex, p in v, nicknames (good girl, pretty girl, etc.), edging, begging kink, voyeurism

★ PROLOGUE ─ your boyfriend punishes you for almost letting slip his real identity

SMUT, 18+, MDNI

The dim glow of the television cast shadows around the room. You had been at your high school's farewell party, and had too many drinks there to stumble back home in one piece. It was almost midnight, so there was also no way your boyfriend, Light Yagami, would have let you out of his sight, especially with how tipsy you were. He was quite protective of you, but he was right. You let out a drunk sigh and looked away, silently accepting the fact that you'd have to meet his parents in the morning and share a few awkward exchanges.

Light had had more drinks than you at the party, but he looked far from as drunk as you currently were. He was quietly watching a movie on the TV, stroking your hair lightly. Your gaze went up from Light to the flickering screen. A sudden surge of courage rushed through you.

"Light," you whispered, breaking the silence with your hoarse voice.

"No, you're not going home tonight," Light replied without looking at you.

"No, it's not that," you said frustratedly.

Light raised his eyebrows, hearing you slur your words due to the effects of the alcohol. Still, he did not look at you.

"How much did you drink?"

"Less than what you drank," your throat burned, your eyes drooping slightly.

He ignored you, seemingly engrossed in the movie, but you knew it was all just an act for the cameras L had set up.

You continued, "And it doesn't matter how much I drank, because either way, you refuse to give me attention."

Ryuk snickered in the corner.

Light frowned, finally turning his attention towards you as his eyes trailed down your body. He noticed the dark circles under your eyes, the redness of your cheeks, and the slight swaying of your body.

He looked at you for a few more seconds with a calculating look before sighing and setting the remote on his table. He stood up, "You should really get some sleep."

"No," you repeated.

"I-" Light was starting to get annoyed. "Are you crazy? Don't you want to go home tomorrow?"

"I just- I-" You sighed again, leaning back against your chair and almost falling off.

"Idiot," Light muttered, catching you before you fell. He carried you to his bed and lay you down gently before covering you with his blanket. "Are you comfortable? Do you want me to sleep on the floor?"

"No, no, I need cuddles," you smiled drunkenly, completely forgetting what you were going to say back when you had gotten some "courage".

"Of course, you do," Light said proudly. "You need my cuddles to sleep."

You hummed in response. As he snottily took his shirt off before lying down next to you, you closed your eyes slightly. They were burning, as if trying to stop you from both closing them and keeping them open.

His hands made their way to your back, gently pushing your neck to his bare chest. You finally shut your heavy eyelids and snuggled closer to him. This was what you always wanted. Just you and Light. Alone.

You furrowed your eyebrows, your eyes still tightly shut, your face pressed against him. Alone? It was laughable that you thought even for a moment that you two were alone right now. Well, for one, there was a God of Death in the same room as you, trying not to pass out from the lack of apples in his digestive system. Second, a great detective was watching the two of you, possibly along with your boyfriend's own father.

Light pulled you even closer to him, inhaling your scent deeply. Soon, the two of you drifted off to dreamland, and L was left questioning whether the seventeen-year-old star student really was a murderer.

You woke up, limbs tangled with Light's. You checked your wristwatch. About four hours had passed, and as you tried to sit up, your head felt heavy from an early hangover. Light's eyes jerked open. He had always been a light sleeper.

"Hm?" he mumbled in his sleep, no longer feeling the presence of your head in the crook of his neck. "What's the matter, honey?"

"I... had a dream," you said slowly.

"Nightmare?"

"Kinda."

Light sat up slowly and reached out for a glass of water to hand to you.

You peeked into the glass, rubbing your left eye until you saw stars.

"Vodka?" you said hopefully.

"Water," he replied calmly.

You pouted pleadingly; more alcohol was what you needed right now, but you eventually had to resign to your boyfriend. You drank the water, and instantly felt much more sober than you were before. Your sleepy eyes fell on Ryuk, his legs and hands in a rather uncomfortable position, perhaps due to not having apples for such a long time.

For a moment, you, for the second time that night, completely forgot about the existence of the cameras.

You turned to Light. "How long is he going to go without apples?"

"Who, honey?" Light's eyes flashed warningly, but you were far too sleepy to notice.

"Ryuk, your Shini-"

Your words were cut off by a sharp kiss. Light had completely thrown himself at you, and you fell back down on the bed due to the sheer force of his abrupt kiss. The empty glass landed on the floor with a loud clink, but he ignored it. His hands reached under your shirt, his nails digging into the skin of your hips as if daring you to talk further.

You attempted to prop yourself up on your elbows, to gain some kind of control over what was happening. But Light pushed you back down, pulling you by your hips and roughly throwing your head down on the pillow.

He pulled away eventually, the pupils of his eyes completely red, and you cursed yourself mentally. This was not your Light. This was Kira.

He leaned away from you, got up to pick up the thrown glass and filled it with water again, but as he offered it to you, you rejected it. "I'm sober enough for this, Light."

"Very well then," Light whispered and leaned in closer to your ear. "I hope you remember you're being watched. Make sure you put on a show."

You nodded slowly, letting his hands roam around and make their way to the hem of your skirt, twirling the fabric around his fingers. He brought another hand to your top and slid it under the cloth, feeling the material of your satin bra.

"The one I gifted to you?" he raised his eyebrows, a little smirk on his face.

"Yes," you whispered, pulling his bare chest against your clothed one. "Strip me, Light."

"What's the magic word?" he teased, hand slipping under your bra and cupping your breast.

"Please," you whimpered when he pinched your nipple.

Ryuk snapped his eyes open and tumbled out of the room clumsily, perhaps to give you some privacy.

"Good girl," he didn't hide his smirk this time as he pulled your top off completely, throwing it to the side where it landed on his chair next to his own shirt. He ran his hands down your back, grabbing the zipper of your skirt and slowly pulling it down. Light slid the skirt down your legs, leaving you in a matching set of satin underwear and bra.

"Pretty," he murmured, his hand grasping his growing bulge tightly.

"Let me help you with that," you sat up on all fours and leaned in closer, a hand stretched out to touch his crotch.

You rubbed him lightly, slowly increasing your pace before unbuckling his belt and slipping your hand under his boxers. Your constant touching of his tip made him groan, hand reaching out to yank you by your hair and push you back down to the bed. You grabbed his hands and brought them to your breasts, pressing them against your chest.

"Take my bra off."

"I'm not a man to be told what to do," he said, bringing his lips down to your neck. "But I will allow it this time."

Light freed his hands from your grip and brought them to your back, unclasping the hook of your bra and letting it fall to the floor. He cupped your breasts in his hands, lowering himself so that his mouth sucked on one nipple while his hand squeezed the other.

"Fuck," you moaned, pushing his head against your chest.

He grabbed your hand and brought it once more to his crotch, letting you feel the bulge in his pants again.

"You're not the only one who's needy right now."

"You're so- god, I can't wait to feel you inside me," you said, rubbing his dick through the fabric.

"Patient girls are rewarded," he said, dragging his lips from your neck to your collarbone, his free hand ripping your panties off.

"Hey!" you whisper-screamed.

"I'll buy you another set," he said calmly, sliding two fingers inside you, curling them up and hitting your g-spot.

"Yes," you moaned, pushing his hand against your pussy. "Faster."

He brought his other hand from your nipple to your clit and started rubbing it in circles, simultaneously fucking you with his fingers.

"Fuck, I'm going to come," you whimpered after a few minutes, feeling your orgasm build.

"Mhm, do it, what a good girl," he said, rubbing your clit faster, aiding your release. You came hard on his fingers, arching your back, bucking against his hand and moaning loudly. Your legs shook, while he pulled his fingers out of your pussy and brought them to your mouth. "Clean them."

You nodded, sucking on his fingers, your teeth digging into his skin. Light smirked.

"Don't you think you should be punished?"

"Huh-? For what, Li-?"

Your words were cut off once again when he pulled you onto his lap so that your ass faced him and you lay on your stomach, pussy pressed against his crotch.

_ _ _ _

"L, I don't think we should be watching this," Soichiro Yagami kept his eyes away from the screen, where his son, his perfect little son, was busy fingering his girlfriend. He hadn't even known he had a girlfriend, let alone the fact that they were so... intimate with each other.

"There has to be some meaning in what the girl said," L racked his brains, eyes scanning the scene, now showing you in Light's lap and his hand rubbing your ass. "Apples?"

"For god's sake, it may be some sort of safeword for when they- for when they do- this," Soichiro yelled, his eyes on the floor.

"It's not a mere coincidence, Mr Yagami," L said thoughtfully. "Apples? Kira told me 'Shinigamis' loved apples earlier. This is not a coincidence, Mr Yagami."

_ _ _ _

"You're going to be punished for fucking everything up," he whispered in your ear before smacking your ass hard. "Count."

"One!" you yelped, feeling the sting of his hand on your ass. "Two!" "Three!" "Four!" "Five!"

He kept spanking you, alternating between your ass cheeks. You could feel his dick hard against your stomach, and ignoring the pain in your ass, you started to grind against it.

"Six!" "Seven!" "Eight!"

He spanked you harder, and you could feel your ass getting red. You were breathing heavily, and your pussy was so wet that it was dripping onto his lap.

"Nine! Ten!"

_ _ _ _

"Can we stop watching this now?" Soichiro groaned.

"There has to be some hint," L traced the screen with his fingers which showed you getting spanked hard by Light now.

Soichiro let out an uncomfortable sigh.

"Mr Yagami, you can close your ears and eyes," L said without looking away from the screen.

_ _ _ _

"Good girl," Light said, rubbing your ass. "Now, a reward."

He slid his pants and boxers down to his legs and wiggled out of them. He brought his dick to your pussy, rubbing its head against your clit and earning a moan from your pursed lips. He flipped you over, pinning you under him on the bed again as he continued to tease you.

"Please, Light," you begged, trying to reach out for his dick so you could push it in.

"Please what?" he said sweetly and you groaned in annoyance.

"Please fuck me."

He smiled and pushed his dick inside you slowly, savouring every inch of your tight pussy.

"Oh!" you wailed, feeling his cock stretch your pussy.

He started bucking his hips in and out, fucking you harder as his balls slapped against your clit, doubling the pleasure. He was careful not to make a sound, but he didn't stop you from letting your strangled moans out. This would be your punishment, facing his mother in the morning after getting fucked so hard by him at night.

You tried very hard to suppress your lustful sounds, eyes welling up at the thought of facing his family in a few hours, but you couldn't. He was too good. He knew just how to get under your skin. Slowly, you felt your second orgasm approaching.

"Ah, ah! I want to come," you clasped your hand against your mouth to stop yourself from screaming. He was going so hard on you, of course, his mother and his sister would wake up if he continued.

"No, you're not. Hold it in," Light commanded. "You're going to come when I say so."

He kept fucking you harder, and you could feel your orgasm building. This was torture. There was no way you could hold yourself in when he was going so hard on you.

"Please, Light," you begged, feeling your pussy clench around his dick. "I can't hold it in anymore."

"Hold it in, I said," he said, flipping you over again and spanking your ass hard. He increased his speed, and you buried your head in a pillow to muffle your screams. "I'm going to come inside you now. Understood?"

You could feel his cock twitching inside you, and you knew he wasn't lying about his orgasm. You nodded slowly, voice still distant because of the pillow.

He let out a long, satisfied groan as he released his juices inside you, pushing his dick deep inside you. You could feel his cum filling your pussy, and it sent you over the edge.

"Now, come for me, pretty girl," Light said in a hoarse voice.

"Yes!" you screamed, feeling your orgasm wash over you. His cum was dripping out of your pussy, and you could feel his cock softening inside you.

"Good," he said, pulling his cock out of you. It was scary how calm and composed he was when a minute ago, he had spanked you so hard. He grabbed a towel and wiped your pussy clean.

_ _ _ _

Soichiro blinked at the abrupt ending of the sounds. Still refusing to look up at the screen, he asked, "Is it over now?"

"They're both still naked," L said, analyzing the place, feeling his own dick harden at your bare figure, panting and sweating as Light got off you and laid next to you, throwing the towel somewhere insignificant.

"Well then?" Soichiro said.

"Well what?"

"You made me watch my son... doing- doing stuff with his girlfriend," Soichiro said in a shaky voice, his hands behind his back to avoid pulling his hair out in frustration. "What have you understood from this?"

"What I've understood?" L said thoughtfully, his gaze unconsciously reaching his growing bulge. "Your son is quite romantic, I suppose."

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chenfleur · 3 months

Text

where the heart leads, the eyes follow

summary. suddenly, jungwon is everywhere you look and part of every thought you think.

pairing. jungwon x y/n

genre. fluff, classmates to lovers, y/n inner turmoil 👍

word count. 0.9k

released. 03.05.2024

author's note. feedback is appreciated! i need to know how long it takes u guys to write drabbles i feel like i'm doing something wrong 😭😭😭 like why do they take me FOREVER

masterlist

For some godforsaken reason, Yang Jungwon has always been there.

There. Right in your field of vision. Running the school festival's concession stand when you were craving funnel cake. Next to Nishimura Riki on the soccer field when your eyes dart to him, yet also next to Sim Jaeyun when they land on him next. Conveniently seated two columns to your left in your economics class, so when you turn to speak to your friends, you're forced to see a head of midnight hair.

It's irritating. A nuisance.

You hate how Jungwon is somehow always there, because when he is, he's the only one in the room you ever see.

His presence is permanent and permeating; it causes unfilled lesson notes and empty documents to stare up at you every class, begging for your attention while you beg for your attention to stray for once. To not leave a question set half-finished because he just carded a hand through his hair—to not feel your chest weakly twinge whenever he laughs at something his pretty desk mate said.

At some point, you begin to see Jungwon even on the days he isn't there. Even without a stimulus, you can see the lines of his figure that carve out the definition of his shoulders and the sharp inner corners of his cat-like eyes. Your brain is more familiar with the sight and thought of Jungwon than not, including him in an infinite number of mental paintings and films, as if he was as customary in your life as the changing seasons.

Life was better before this bullshit, you think in exasperation.

You hate how the subject at the forefront of your thoughts was just some boy—how he manages to seemingly go about his life so effortlessly while confusion, turmoil, fear settles in your gut.

What's going on? Is this some twisted joke? Why is he always there—

"Y/N?"

His voice comes from behind your open locker door.

You've never heard his voice this close before.

Your name sounds like honey dripping off his tongue, and yet you don't know what to think of it. The rapid beating in your chest and the uncomfortable churn of your stomach are giving you mixed signals.

Cautiously, you close the locker shut. Your voice comes out in a weak exhale.

"Jungwon."

A serene smile appears on his lips. "I wanted to say congratulations. If anyone deserved to speak at the district gala, it's you."

You blink slowly. "District gala?"

"Yeah! You got it, didn't you?"

That doesn't make any logical sense.

Sure, you'd wanted to represent your school and speak in front of the district's administration—but that opportunity has only ever rightfully belonged to one person, and he's standing right in front of you.

"I-I thought you were speaking at the gala."

Jungwon tilts his head at you in a way that makes you feel like your knees could give out. "Pretty sure the name the principal just said over the PA system sounded a lot like yours and nothing like mine," he teases, leaning against the locker next to yours.

Silence falls over the two of you while your gaze is trained on a floor tile, the process of digesting the fact that you'd be giving a speech at the district gala significantly slowed down by Jungwon's looming presence. He looks down at you, a fond speckle in his eye, before he speaks again.

"You can say no, but I have a favour to ask," he says softly. "I have a few parts of my original speech that I really want to make heard. I was wondering if you'd be willing to include them on my behalf?"

He's clutching a small piece of folded paper in between his slender fingers, holding it out for you to take.

You're sure you take way too long to react, shakily reaching out to take the paper from him. Your skin is set aflame when your fingers brush against his.

Trying to pinpoint the emotion Yang Jungwon evokes in you has led you to feel a billion different ones in the process, each one more conflicting than the last—

—and yet, in this moment, you let down your defences.

Letting yourself fall into the sea of stars behind his irises.

Four months later, you're walking up to the stage's wooden podium, over the top of which you're greeted by an auditorium of three hundred different faces.

There's amazement, and then there's anxiety. It manifests in the dry gulp you take and the tightened grip of your hands on the sides of the podium. Your eyes frantically dart around for something to focus on, searching, searching—

Jungwon.

He's there, leaning against a far pillar with one hand in the pocket of his dress pants, and the other holding a glass of sparkling juice. There's a delicate, sterling silver charm bracelet wrapped around his wrist, a singular charm of your initial attached to it.

Your eyes flicker down to the near identical one on your own wrist, the charm with his initial glimmering under the chandelier lights.

With a clear of your throat, you redirect your gaze to the audience. Instinctively, it falls again on the boy against the far pillar.

The one with his phone camera pointed at the stage and the prettiest smile on his face.

Jungwon always seems to be there, waiting for your eyes to land on him.

Or maybe, in a room filled with people, he's the only one you've ever looked for.

#enhypen #enhypen x reader #enhypen imagines #enhypen scenarios #enhypen fluff #enhypen oneshots #enhypen drabbles #jungwon #yang jungwon #jungwon x reader #yang jungwon x reader #jungwon fluff #jungwon imagines #jungwon scenarios #enhypen fic

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