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hier--soir · 4 months

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a lover's pinch | seven

joel miller x f!reader

pairing: professor!joel miller x f!reader rating: explicit, 18+ mdni summary: things get a little messy after returning home. a confrontation sparks the beginning of a new stage in your relationship with joel. warnings/tags: au, university professor joel, age gap [20 something years diff], ethically dubious relationship due to inherent power imbalance, angst, miscommunication trope, self-doubt, alcohol consumption/hangover, joel is 50 and he texts like it, les mis spoilers???, phantom of the opera spoilers???, jealous!joel, food/eating, hurt/comfort, professor DAD, professor COWBOY, soft emotional smut, unprotected piv sex, cream pie, oral [f!receiving], joel says dadgum cause i think it's so classic him and so cute. word count: 11.1k jesus series masterlist | main masterlist chapter moodboard a/n: merry christmas to all that celebrate. as always, thank you for your patience and kindness. the love for this series is nothing short of mind blowing, and i appreciate you all endlessly. i hope you enjoy this angst and potentially the most flowery + emotional ALP smut yet [if that's even possible]. also rachel i love you i'm sorry. without further ado, the beginning of our descent into The End Times x follow @hier--soirupdates if you'd like to be notified when i share my writing this is part seven of ALP. you can read the previous parts here: one, two, three, four, five, six.

Tuesday.

It's nine thirty in the morning and you buy a Coke anyways.

It’s raining heavy outside; fat droplets of water that splatter against the windscreen of your car and dribble down, slipping through the crevice at the top of the bonnet, searching for the engine, for the oil gasket, for somewhere undercover to dry out.

You tuck your legs beneath yourself, sit criss-cross in the driver’s seat, and take small sips of fizzing black sugar. Allow it to moisten your lips, coat your tongue and your teeth in that sickening, viscous way soda always does, before it slips down your throat.

There’s something unearthly about the day, unnerving—it’s Tuesday morning and you’re hungover. A dull ache behind your left eye, a kink in your neck. You check your phone.

Thick, rolling clouds loom across the sky. Occasionally, a flash of lightning, a thrum of thunder. You tear open a packet of peanuts and pluck one out, and then another. Eat until your lips are dry and puckered, and then take another drink. More peanuts then. Salty, sweet, salty, sweet.

It’s all you can stomach as your liver pumps and spasms, still working to cleanse your blood of the night before, spent sprawled on the couch with Trin and Nora.

Wearing sweaters and thick socks, gripping full glasses of wine, and watching Les Misérables. Nora, tears on her cheeks, had sung along with Hugh Jackman—'This innocent who bears my face, who goes to judgement in my place, who am I?’—and you, bleary-eyed and tipsy, had discreetly checked your phone.

You didn’t cry during I Dreamed A Dream but you’re crying for this? Trin rolled her eyes.

He sacrifices his freedom to save that man, Nora whimpered.

You woke up starving and the traffic was slow. At every red light and stop sign your fingers itched against the wheel, desperate to press inside your bag and pull out this little packet. And now, safe in the campus parking lot, you feast. Salty, sweet, salty, sweet. You feel a fleeting moment of pity for people with peanut allergies, and then you check your phone.

Still nothing.

Since you left New York on Monday morning there’s been no sign of life from Joel. No get home safe, no see you on Tuesday; no acknowledgement at all.

You stare dejectedly at the messages you’ve sent him.

First from yesterday afternoon:

Home now. Enjoy your last day in the big apple x

And then from late last night, two bottles of wine deep:

It’s raining and miserable here

Wish I was still in new york

With you

Sitting in your car now, glowering at the blank space where his response should be, you reconcile with the thought that perhaps he wants what happened in New York to stay in New York. Stolen glances and all-too-brief touches in a conference hall, his hand on your wrist at the museum, skin against skin in his hotel room, and in yours—perhaps it was supposed to happen there, not here. The lowering of walls came with a change in location, and maybe that was his intention. But those thoughts don’t ease the sharp twist in your chest when you think of him. Doesn’t take away how much you wish he would give you something – a morsel of communication, even a single word of acknowledgement. For as hard as you try to understand, you can’t forget the look in his eyes when he touched you at the cloisters, the way he breathed your name into your mouth. Sewing the seed of JoelJoelJoel into in the soft folds of your brain, impossible to forget.

You don’t think about his dinner with Rachel. Don’t consider that something may have happened that night, something that changed his mind about you. Something that made him rethink the entire weekend as you slipped into the shower and out the door, leaving him alone in your hotel bed while you headed to the airport.

No. You don’t think about that at all.

When you make it inside, clothes wet and cool from the rain, you shake your hair out like a dog. Let droplets fly across the hall as you make your way into the lecture theatre; a drizzled trail left in your wake.

The room is full when you step inside, but there’s no sign of him yet. You collapse into an empty chair in the front row and wait. The final few students filter in through the door, shaking out umbrellas and wiping their feet. And for another ten minutes you, foolishly, still expect Joel to show up.

It’s only when the door creaks open and an old man walks through, that you let the hopeful feeling rest.

He lays a worn old satchel against the desk and turns to smile at the room.

“Hello,” the stranger smiles, and his jowls quiver as he speaks. “I’m Jerry Dorfman, a Professor from the literature department, and…”

You zone out for a second, eyes darting down to your phone screen. Nothing.

“Oh, and Professor Miller,” Dorfman says, as if he’s just remembered that he shouldn’t be here. Shouldn’t be standing up there, in his spot. “Is tied up with a family matter. I trust he’ll be back with us later in the week.”

A family matter?

Slick with rain, staring at this stranger stood in Joel’s place, you feel like a kind of newborn. Some fresh lamb, soaked in the blood and amniotic fluids of her mother’s womb, staring through unseeing eyes, hoping to glean some understanding of this moment. This sudden burst of light, this shocking cold after so many weeks of warmth, of sweat and strong hands on your skin, holding you close. But this is Eros; the blacksmith, the limb-loosener, the crusher. A deviation from stoking the flame to the suddenly desperate, grasping loneliness of feeling as though you are standing by a lover’s window, staring helplessly through the glass, and watching them from the outside. Alone.

Dorfman tries and fails to connect his laptop to the projector.

Numb fingers type;

Are you okay? Where are you?

But no response comes.

No, not until later that night, not until you’re tucked beneath the covers of your bed, showered and sleepy, does he finally reach out.

The clock has just ticked past midnight when your phone vibrates.

Hey, I had to stay in the city another day. Just landed at PWM. See you on Thursday.

A hot, jagged feeling swims in your gut as you read the message, and then reread it. Twice, three more times, searching for some hint of familiarity. Some indication that he has been thinking about you as much as you’ve been thinking about him. That the past weekend meant something to him, like it meant to you.

Minutes pass, and when you don’t find what you’re looking for, you fall asleep without responding.

Thursday.

Nora wakes up with a stuffy nose.

This always happens to me, she sniffs. I hate being sick.

The tiles in the kitchen are cold beneath your bare toes and rain smears heavily against the windowpane. You can hear fat blooms of thunder bellowing outside. Nora’s sullen, husky voice paired with the steam rising from your mug are all it takes to convince you to stay home with her.

The two of you spend the day curled on the sofa beneath blankets. You stare at your laptop, a document open on your screen with the title of an essay sitting pretty at the top. The cursor blinks and blinks at you, taunting you, daring you to write something, anything. But Sex and The City is playing on the tv, and Nora is snoring at the other end of the sofa, and you can’t help but watch the minutes tick by on the clock. Listen to Carrie and Miranda argue about Big, and wonder if Joel has even noticed your absence.

Trin gets home from class, and you follow her into the kitchen. Peel and slice oranges and apples and lemons while she tells you about her day. Boil them in sugar with cinnamon and star anise while she complains about an argument she had with her boyfriend. Add red wine and brandy while she tells you that her Dad sent her some money, and she’ll order take out for the three of you.

So together you huddle in the lounge and eat hot Indian food with your hands. Soak pieces of naan in tarka dal and saag paneer and top if off with mulled wine, unphased by the clashing of flavours in your mouths.

And you don’t check your phone, or look at the time, and you don’t complain when Nora asks, with glassy-eyes and spinach in her teeth, if she can put on another musical.

He’s a freak, Trin frowns at the TV.

He loves her, Nora implores, staring doe-eyed at a masked Gerard Butler.

Nor, Trin scoffs, he put a wedding dress on a mannequin that looks just like her. In his fucking lair, no less. That’s freak behaviour.

He has amazing sideburns though, Nora grins. So he gets a pass.

Your phone vibrates as Erik strokes a passed-out Christine’s face, singing help me make the music of the night.

Careful that Nora won’t notice, you pull it from beneath your thigh.

Where were you today?

You stare at the words for a moment and feel your lips curl into an disbelieving sneer.

“Oh, fuck off,” you mutter, and shove your phone into the crevice between the sofa cushions.

Wednesday.

A week goes by with no word from Joel.

No word from you either.

You stay home every day. Write and read and catch up on work and take Benadryl and sip soup and then you wake one morning, relieved to find that Nora’s cold has finally left your system.

So you tug on jeans, a sweater, and share a pot of coffee in the kitchen. Share quiet conversation with Pete in his shitty old Beamer as he gives you a ride to campus, and walk into Rachel’s lecture with zero expectation that today will be the day you finally see Joel again.

“We understand that Antigone is a victim of her father’s sins,” Rachel explains. “In the wake of patricide, of incest, every one of her actions is seen as a direct consequence.”

“Even her fate to be buried alive was sewn by her father’s unwitting actions,” she pauses, eyes searching the faces across the room, gauging reactions. “And, of course, this concept isn’t unique to Greek mythology. We see it plainly in the Bible, in Exodus; the sins of your father are to be laid upon the children… these themes of ancestral curses, of the inevitability of fate – they are integral to understand when looking at our tragic heroines. We saw it with Medea, we see it with Antigone, with Iphigenia, with Electra. Electra herself said, we are bound to acquiesce—”

An interrupting knock sounds against the door. Rachel’s head swivels around, eyebrows knitted in frustration as she calls for whoever it is to come in.

The door creaks open and her expression lifts. A saccharine smile spreads across her face, shoulders loosening.

“Joel,” she says warmly. “What can I do for you?”

A shiver wracks down your spine, toes curling in your sneakers.

The broad mass of him rests in the doorway. His head peeks past the wood, just a glimpse of his curls, his glasses, visible from where you sit. Your heart thunders in your chest, palms going damp at the prospect of this being the moment you finally see him again.

He speaks a few words in her direction, too quiet to catch, and then he’s taking a step into the room. His hand grips the edge of the door, keeping it open, and he casts a glance out towards the audience. Dark brown and searching, those eyes filter through countless faces until they finally land on yours.

And for a second, he doesn’t say a word. Just gazes out at you, eyebrows pulled together in the middle of his forehead, and then—and then he fucking looks back at Rachel. Your stomach goes hollow when you see the smile on her face. She lazes against the corner of her desk, and it feels like minutes go by as the two of you stare at him. And there’s something about waiting, you think, that feels like torture. That slow, painful build-up of pressure as you sit and stare and prepare yourself to discover who he’s here for. You or her.

You’re reminded painfully of a Graham Greene quote. A passage from The End of the Affair – one you’d, perhaps foolishly, found romantic when you read it that first time. Chosen words that had warmed your chest and made you feel light, lighter than air; the way only words could do sometimes.

‘Yes, Henry?’ and then ‘You?’ She had always called me ‘you’. ‘Is that you?’ on the telephone, ‘Can you? Will you? Do you?’ so that I imagined, like a fool, for a few minutes at a time, there was only one ‘you’ in the world and that was me.

Now, as you stare at Joel in the mouth of the doorway and memory of that passage sinks its hooks in, you feel only contempt for Greene.

For you had always read that passage imagining yourself as Sarah. And someone else, some misfortunate Maurice Bendrix, had fallen into your lap, and he was the ‘you’. But not you, never you. And it’s that pride which deceives. That pride which lulls us into false senses of security.

Joel says your name then.

Says, “Can I speak with you?” You, you, you.

And it should feel like relief, to hear your name on his lips again. But you catch the way he spares another glance, soft and sympathetic, in Rachel’s direction, and that sickly hurt isn’t abated.

Her face falls, but she smiles at you. Nods her permission for you to leave the room, and only when you’re halfway across the lecture theatre, bag swung over your shoulder, does she continue speaking to the class.

Palm flat against the door, he holds it open for you, making you press against him as you slip out of the room. It clicks shut behind you and he begins to move down the hall, leaving you to follow behind with no explanation. You assume that he’s going to lead you to his office, or anywhere more private than this, but a metre from the door Joel pauses abruptly, turns, and you slam into his chest with a huff.

“Jesus,” you mutter, stumbling a few steps back.

“Where have you been?” he glowers, brows drawn tight and angry over his eyes.

“What?”

“I’ve been busy,” you grit, glaring back. “Where have you been?”

“Busy?” he scoffs, shaking his head. “Yeah, I’ve been busy too. Busy teachin’ the classes that you don’t even show up for.”

“I’ve been sick,” you roll your eyes, unable—or perhaps just unwilling—to stray from nastiness, from spite. “My apologies, Professor.”

“Don’t—” Joel snaps, and flinches as quickly as the word comes out of his mouth, surprised by how harsh it sounds in the air between the two of you. He takes a step closer, voice low now—“Don’t call me that.”

“Fuck, what is your problem?” you huff, eyes widening, exasperated. “I missed two classes, it’s not a big deal.”

“And the silence?” Joel takes a step forward as he says it. Close enough now to see the smudges on the lens of his glasses. Close enough to see the muscle in his jaw twitch. Too close for public; too close for here. “Can’t even text me back, huh? What the hell is goin’ on with you?”

Your body pulls taut at that, hands balling into fists at your sides.

“Oh, you don’t like silence?” you hiss, matching his volume. “You can’t be serious. Joel, I didn’t hear from you for days after New York. Why would I waste my breath when it’s obvious you don’t want to fucking hear from me?”

“It was barely two days,” he shakes his head, shakes off the insinuation, shakes off whatever blame you’re trying to put on him.

“Two days,” you nod, smirking angrily. “Two days after we spent an entire weekend together. Two days after we kissed and fucked and practically went on a date.”

And the word date must elicit something in him. Some minute, man-brain trigger that snaps him to attention and helps him understand the hurt on your face, the tremble in your hands. Because he says your name, voice softening, posture loosening, every bit of his body language screaming out that he wants to step forward and touch you.

And he’s speaking again, voice low, but there’s people coming down the hall, heading your way. Two figures that you can’t make out through the haze of Joel in your immediate vision. So when he reaches out and touches your hand you flinch, jutting your chin over his shoulder. A warning. Don’t do this here.

One of them calls your name and you pause, mouth open. Drag your eyes away from Joel’s features to watch the figures get closer.

“Pete,” you force a smile. “Hey.”

You realise quickly how it must look; your sullen expression, Joel staring down at you with his shoulders hunched. He must understand at the same moment, because he takes a quick step away, folds his hands behind his back.

“Hey,” Pete takes a step closer. He glances warily between you and Joel, confusion colouring his face. “Everything cool?”

Stony faced, Joel looks between the two of you, posture stiffening the longer he stares at Pete. So much larger than him, taller and broader and far more intimidating. But a man with a secret to keep isn’t one to jump quickly at confrontation, so he keeps his mouth shut. Let’s you do the talking.

Ian catches your eye over Pete’s shoulder and offers a sleazy sort of smile. You swallow down a glare and hold Pete’s gaze.

“Everything’s fine,” you lie, taking a step towards them. A step away from Joel. “What’s up, what are you guys doing in this building?”

Pete’s eyebrows pull together, and he cocks his head at you. “Said you needed a ride home today. This morning, remember?”

“This morning,” you repeat, nodding slowly. You raise your hand and pinch the bridge of your nose, thinking quickly, mind a mess. “I, uh… right, look, Pete, I actually forgot I have a meeting with Professor Miller about my final essay this afternoon.”

“Your final…” Pete trails off, frowning. “Isn’t that due in like a month?”

“Yeah,” you say vaguely, and do not look at Joel. “I’ll find a way home later, okay?”

“I mean, sure. I guess,” Pete agrees reluctantly, reaching up to grip the strap of his satchel. “Call me if you need me okay?”

And Joel’s face turns to stone at the insinuation in those words. The idea that Pete could give you anything he couldn’t. That anyone would need to swoop in and save you from him.

The pair of you stand in silence for a moment, eyes trained on Pete and Ian’s retreating backs as they head down the hall. You watch and watch until they turn the corner, disappearing from sight, and only then do you exhale a breath of relief.

You contemplate leaving him there. Turning your back on him and returning to Rachel’s lecture, ignoring his texts and letting this all fade into some painful memory. But when you look at him again—at those big brown eyes that gaze back at you—you know you couldn’t if you tried.

“You look tired,” he frowns, and it’s not angry anymore. A little sad, maybe.

“I am,” you admit, and wonder if your face betrays how much of a role he plays in that exhaustion.

“Are you hungry?”

You stare for a moment, blinking slow, and then say, “Yeah.”

Joel nods, attempts a crooked smile, and says, “Let me take you to get something to eat.”

It’s silent in Joel’s car, aside from the soft patter of rain against his windows and the dull squeak of his windscreen wipers sliding it away. The truck glides through the winding streets of Biddeford, cruising down the main road and into the left lane of a fast-food drive thru. Orders you a burger, fries, nothing for himself, passing the bag into your lap and then continuing to drive.

The bun is soft beneath your fingers. Grease soaks your skin, and you taste beef, taste onions so soft, so sweet. A crimson dot of ketchup spattered onto your pants; a bright shock of mustard on your tongue. A fry here and there. Joel’s hand, outstretched fingers, sneaking across the centre console to steal one. You shift the paper bag on your lap, tilt the opening so it faces him, easier to access, but he doesn’t take another.

He grips the wheel and asks, “Do you want me to take you home?”

You think about Pete waiting for you at the house. Think about if Ian and that filthy smirk on his face and whether or not he’ll be there too. Think about having to flesh out your excuse, your lie, and finally say, “No.”

Joel keeps driving. You eat until your pants feel tight and the greasy brown bag is crumpled in your fist and he’s pulling his truck off the road and into a short driveway.

“Full?”

“Very.”

“Good.”

“Is this your house?”

“This is it.” He drags the keys out of the ignition and knocks the door open. It’s not long, barely a second, before he’s pulling yours open with a rough yank and a soft, “Door always sticks on this side.”

A vague sound spills from the back of your throat, and he guides you up a path towards the small home. Single storey, with a large brown door and windows decorating the outward façade. Your immediate thought is that it’s very Joel, but you stop the idea in its tracks. Remind yourself that maybe it isn’t your place to think things like that.

Inside it’s even more silent, even more tense. The two of you stand in the entry way, toeing off damp shoes. Your eyes flit around his front room, but it’s difficult to focus on anything. Too much to look at, too much you want to know, and you find it easier to just look at him.

“Realised you’d never been here,” Joel murmurs after a while. He shifts awkwardly on his feet, decidedly unsure of what to say as he rests beneath the weight of your stare. “This is the, uh, the livin’ room. Kitchen’s over there.”

When you don’t respond, he clears his throat, ticks his head towards the hallway. “Bathroom is down the hall. Bedroom too.”

You feel your face shift. Deadpan stare turns to surprise, to incredulity, to blatant anger.

“Oh, the bedroom, huh?” you smile, sardonic, cutting. Your throat feels tight. “S’that seriously why you brought me here? Ice me out and then come crawling back when you want something to fuck again?”

“Woah, hey,” his eyebrows shoot up, hands drifting forward like he’s trying to calm a startled animal.

“Don’t,” you hold up a shaking hand, eyes wide and wet suddenly. “Just… don’t touch me right now, okay? What are we doing here, Joel? Seriously.”

He says your name hard and fast, surprised by how quickly it’s all unravelling, spilling from you in a tidal wave.

And spill it does. The words are wet and watery, a tsunami of pent up emotions pouring from your mouth without permission, without forethought.

“I mean, we haven’t seen each other since New York. And I… I thought being there changed things between us. But maybe I was wrong… and then you pull me out of a lecture, bring me here and say my bedroom is down the hall? Am I just… do you just like having someone to fuck whenever you want? Is that it? Someone at your beck and call?”

Joel repeats your name, sharper this name. “Don’t put fuckin’ words in my mouth.” His face pinches in anger, hands dropping.

“When it’s not convenient you try to shake me off, but when it is—at a bar, or out of town—” you list them off on your fingers, eyes growing wider and wider. “Oh, you want me then?”

“That ain’t fuckin’ true and you know it—”

“Do I?” you scoff.

“I came that night when you texted,” he implores, voice raising, all wild-eyed and pleading. “You were drunk, and textin’ and you needed a ride.”

“I didn’t ask you to do that—”

“You didn’t ask me not too either,” he crosses his arms across his chest. “You wanted me to come. Don’t fuckin’ deny that now.”

You open your mouth but he’s too quick, matching your spill with his own now.

“And as if you’re any better?” he bares his teeth now, voice low. “As if you didn’t find out I was your teacher and keep fuckin’ me just for the thrill of it. As if you actually wanted me, and you weren’t just gettin’ off on chasin’ some forbidden fantasy.”

“I…” you gape at him, unafraid to let the hurt show on your face. “Is that really what you think of me?”

“What the fuck am I supposed to think?” he hisses, exhaustion evident in the way he runs a hand through his curls and sags against the door. “You tellin’ me I should believe that you just want me for what I am? A fifty-year-old teacher who spends his time giving fuckin’ speeches to people that are hardly listenin’? Who goes home to an empty bed? That’s what you want?”

And it deflates you, a little. The wounded expression on his face – the devastating truth in those words, splashed across his expression so plainly for you to see. Disbelief.

“Is that such a crime?” you ask quietly. “To want you… and have it be that simple?”

“You shouldn’t,” he shakes his head. Grimaces. “You shouldn’t want me, I’m—I’m no good for you.”

You swallow. Feel tears hot and sharp behind your eyes.

“Then why do you keep letting me?”

“Jesus,” he exhales, and his hand is on the hem of your shirt, pulling you closer, closer, until you’re pressed against his chest, hands coming up to grip his shoulders and steady yourself. “Because I can’t fuckin’ quit you, alright?”

“Because I don’t just want you when it’s convenient,” his lips curl around the word, disgusted by the insinuation. “Because I think about you all the god damn time and if I can only have you some of the time then I guess I’ll take it. Because if you want some fucked up fantasy, then I’ll play my part if it means I get you, I don’t care—”

You cut him off, lips firm and searing against his. He goes still for a moment, mouth parting with a surprised exhale, warm when you press inside with your tongue. And then warmer, salty; tears on his cheeks, on yours.

“That’s not what this is,” you whimper into his mouth, desperate for him to believe it. “It was never about that, it was about you, Joel. I want you.”

He kisses you again, slow. All of the anger and hurt and frustration pools out of the both of you, spilling from your mouths and into the air. His lips mould over yours and his hands are warm on your waist, your back, holding you tight against his chest. When you sniffle, he pulls back, forehead heavy against yours, and sighs.

“I’m sorry,” he rasps, eyes closed. “I missed you, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean for—"

“Where were you?” you interrupt. “What happened in New York?”

He hesitates for a moment, nervous and calculating as he stares you down.

You wilt a little; dejected all over again. Recoil from him and quietly ask, “Why won’t you let me know you?”

Joel’s hand hovers in the air, as if contemplating reaching for you again, but then it drops and he says, “I was with my daughter.”

You blink.

Daughter.

Daughter?

“She lives there now,” Joel sounds a little breathless, cheeks pink as the words spill from him. “In New York, with her girlfriend. I’d planned to spend an extra day there with her, and then Nina—Nina cut her hand open at the studio and we had to go to the ER, and she had to get stitches and—” He pauses, waiting for you to jump in, to interrupt, to say anything. When you don’t, he takes a breath and continues. “And I wasn’t gonna stay any longer but Ellie was worried, and she needed me. She needed me there, and—and I’m never fuckin’ there, because she never needs me anymore. So I stayed, and I’m sorry I went silent but I was… I was takin’ care of my kid.”

You think it might be the longest—and the fastest—you’ve ever heard him speak outside of a lecture hall.

His eyes drift to something over your shoulder and his entire body seems to sag a little. But it isn’t sad. It’s a resigned, sort of relaxed thing that happens – the corners of his mouth tilt up and he smiles weakly.

You turn, follow his eyeline until you see them.

Pictures, so many pictures, lining the walls of his home. Ones you’d paid no attention to when you first stepped inside, but can now see clearly. Bright eyes and wide toothy grins.

Some of Joel younger, leaner, smiling beside a little girl with curly hair. Some of him as you know him now; scruffy and greying, beside a different girl. This one lanky and pale and grimacing toward the camera as if she were forced into being placed in front of it.

There’s one picture of the girls beside each other, teenagers maybe, sat on either end of a seesaw. The curly-haired girl is on the upper end, grinning madly at the lens, while the other sits with her feet planted firmly on the ground, laughing up at her. Two of them. Two daughters?

“Please say somethin’.”

There’s a picture of Joel and he’s holding a tiny little bundle in his arms, and he looks so young and so fucking afraid. Dark eyes wide and teary as he gazes down at chubby cheeks, his index fingers crooked around the edge of her swaddle. A warm feeling swells in your chest and your body softens the longer you look at it. He’s a father.

Joel says your name and when you turn his face is all twisted up, and he looks the smallest you’ve ever seen him. Almost curled in on himself.

“I should’ve told you,” he nods, brown eyes darting across your face in an attempt to decipher your silence. “I know that, and I—”

“I’m an asshole,” you interrupt softly, and the tears never left but now they feel heavier on your waterline. Begging to spill over again.

“Hey,” he frowns, hand coming up to cup your cheek. His thumb swipes at the soft skin beneath your eye, begging the wetness there to disappear. “Hey, hey, no—”

“I didn’t think…” you trail off, sniffling. A sickly cocktail of embarrassment and guilt and shame swirl in the pit of your stomach and you try to swallow it down, try to send it away, but it’s persistent. “I never stopped to think that something had actually happened, that you had… I feel selfish, Joel, I’m sorr—”

“You’re not,” he hushes, fingers curling into the hair behind your ear. “You didn’t know. I should’ve told you before, and I’m sorry.”

“I thought you were staying away because of me,” you offer a watery smile. “I thought maybe you and…” You can’t bring yourself to finish the sentence. Can’t make your lips form the name Rachel.

“No,” he shakes his head, jaw tight, as if reading your mind.

“Is she okay?”

“Ellie?”

“Ellie,” you roll the name around in your mouth. His daughter. “Yeah.”

“She’s okay,” he smiles, nodding. “They’re both fine.”

“And…” You look back at the pictures. Two. “And the other girl?”

“Sarah,” Joel says softly, pointing at wild curls and brown eyes that look just like his. And he must see the questions swirling in your brain because he speaks again. “I was twenty. My, uh, my girlfriend at the time didn’t know what to do. Didn’t wanna be a Mom, but didn’t agree with abortion, and we were so young and… well, I asked her to marry me cause it felt like the right thing to do, but she didn’t…” he shakes his head a little, a faraway look in his eye as he remembers it. “She said no. She never wanted that… so, after Sarah was born, I told her that she didn’t have to.”

“Didn’t have to?” you repeat the words, eyebrows furrowing.

“Didn’t have to stay,” he clarifies. Your lips part, surprised. “So, she didn’t, and we ain’t seen her since Sarah was a few months old.”

“Shit,” you whisper, eyes widening as the information finally starts to sink in.

“And Ellie,” he laughs then, gazing at a picture of auburn locks and shock grey eyes. “Well, that one showed up on my door some time fifteen years later. Been in ‘n’ outta foster care for years, and just started followin’ Sarah home from school one day. We did this little dance for a while; dinners and sleepovers and me slipping money into her backpack so she could buy lunch at school. And then one day she just… begged me not to make her go back to her own house. So I didn’t.”

“Wow, I…” you blink. “You adopted her? Alone?”

“I…” Joel pauses. Wets his lips, frowning as he collects his thoughts. “Alone is… I don’t think that’s the right word for it. You see Ellie was… Sarah and me, we just knew. She was family so fast. It was the only thing that made sense, you know?”

And it does, you suppose. The image isn’t hard to conjure. Joel at the dinner table with two teenagers on either side of him. Arguing over homework, over curfews, over what movie to watch. You can see the fondness in his eyes as he talks about them – the emotion laced through his words; we just knew.

“Tell me what you’re thinkin’,” Joel says, and that line between his eyebrows is back and it’s so deep that you can’t help yourself from reaching up and smoothing it over with your thumb. He catches your hand and holds it against the centre of his chest. Lets you feel the way his heart thuds heavily beneath the skin, a sturdy rhythm against your palm.

“It’s… it’s a lot to take in,” you confess, and his hand tightens over yours. “But I’m glad you told me.”

Brown eyes search yours, gaze heavy. “You sure?”

“Yeah,” you nod. “Yeah, I’m sure.”

“Okay then.”

You flex your palm against his chest. Dig your fingers into the flesh there a little.

“Can I…” he hesitates, eyes flickering down. “Do you… Can I kiss you?” You, you, you.

Your heart beats fast, and you feel his do the same, and Joel is a father, and two daughters, and I can’t fuckin’ quit you, and you’re breathing into his mouth yes, yes you can kiss me, please kiss me.

It’s warm and it’s gentle and it feels like such a kindness to kiss him now and feel less space between the two of you. Feels like a thousand apologies and explanations slipping off his tongue and you opening your arms to him, saying I understand, saying thank you for telling me.

And when you pull him closer, wrapping an arm around the back of his neck, he meets you in kind, pressing your back against the wall. He shifts his hips between yours and shows you how much he’s missed you, and only when his hand drifts beneath the hem of your shirt do you pause.

He stills, warm breaths drifting across your mouth as he looks into your eyes.

“Talk to me.”

“I’m exhausted,” you admit shyly, twisting a finger through a frizzy lock of hair at the nape of his neck. You tug at it, not meeting his eye, and watch it bounce back into a curl when you let go. He nods and kisses you again, closed lips soft and not asking for anything, never asking for more than you want to give, before he takes your hand and leads you through his house for the first time.

He runs you a bath. Makes you sit on the edge while he lays out a towel and checks the temperature every few minutes. Only when he’s satisfied that the water is perfectly warm does he help peel the clothing from your body. He grips your hand and helps you step into the tub, lowering you down into sudsy water. And when you’re settled, he pulls a stool nearby and sits, keeping you company as you soak.

“S’nice,” you tell him quietly, dragging a foamy sponge across your arms. “Thank you, Joel.”

The weight of before hangs over you a little, pressing down against your shoulders as you watch him. Gauge him. But he doesn’t seem angry or upset anymore. He leans over the lip of the tub. Runs his hands through the water, over the skin of your calf, your knee. Feels the coarse hairs that have grown there over the past fortnight and smiles when they scratch against his palm.

“Said you were sick?”

“Mhm.”

“What kind?”

“Just a cold,” you whisper. He squeezes your knee, palm against your patella, fingers soft in the flesh around it. “M’fine. Past it now.”

In the soapy water, his skin feels like silk against yours.

“Changin’ of the season,” he muses with a nod. “Normally gets me too.”

And you laugh a little at that, because it’s such a fatherly thing to say and you can’t believe how naïve you’d been to not see it before. Can suddenly picture him doing this a thousand times over; resting by the bath while one of his little girls floats in the water, nose all stuffy from the flu.

At the sound of your laughter he smiles, gaze dropping to your mouth, and the skin beside his eyes pinches. Little wrinkles, so soft and so beautiful that you want to reach out and brush your fingers across them.

“You’re so beautiful,” Joel murmurs, and his voice is hushed, so low in the small bathroom.

His fingers skirt against the inside of your thigh and you splay your legs open for him, knees knocking against the sides of the tub. He glances down through the water to where you’re spread open for him to see, shameless, and smiles.

“So fuckin’ beautiful,” he repeats.

“So are you, Joel.”

“Psh,” he rolls his eyes, offering a delicate little smile. So shy, so feeble, and so desperate to believe you. A little glimpse of that wary weight, still pressing down on him as well.

“Mean it,” you insist in a whisper. You lift a hand from the water, wet thumb grazing the corner of his mouth. Feel the bristles of his moustache, the hairs on his cheek, prickling against your skin.

“Swoony type,” you say, smiling when recognition flashes in his eyes. Stroke the fresh blush on his cheeks. “Long hair, bedroom eyes, cheeks like wine.”

“Hmm,” he murmurs, turning to press a kiss against your palm. “Can’t get away with plagiarisin’ Carson in this house, baby.”

“She just said it so well.”

“She did,” he agrees. “So did Tartt.”

“Tartt?” your mind wanes, the warm water lulling you into a sleepy sort of daze. You rest heavy against the side of the bath, gazing up at him

“Beauty is terror,” he quotes tenderly, eyes bold and earnest as he holds your stare. “Whatever we call beautiful, we quiver before it.”

You wrap an arm around his shoulders, water droplets staining his shirt where your fingers grip the material, and pull him forward to kiss you. Joel grips the inside of your leg and kisses you until your skin prunes and wrinkles. And when he notices he laughs with you, gripping your hand to press his lips against fingertips that look like raisins. Worships the soaked skin of your fingers until you pull his face back to yours; jealous of your own hands, fearful that they might come to know his kiss better than your lips.

And when the water goes lukewarm and you don’t know what time it is anymore, he dries you off with a soft towel and offers once more to take you home. But you say no, so he smiles and kisses you again—your lips, your cheeks, your eyelids—and leads you to his bedroom.

He drags a too-big shirt over your head, helps you loop your arms into the sleeves. Dark blue and warm, so warm, against your skin.

The two of you slip beneath the covers on his bed and he drags you against his side; lets you press your cold toes against his shins without so much as a flinch.

Facing each other on your sides, those hands slink beneath the shirt, rough palms cradling your ribs, your back, holding you tight against his chest until your breathing falls in sync. And those hands don’t stray, don’t move down, they just embrace you. A carefully held apology that promises I want this, to hold you, to be with you, too.

It stays like that, nothing more, until your eyelids are heavy, and his breathing has evened out. Stays like that until your hand drops from his back to the band of his boxers, sleepy little fingers plucking at the material, trying to slip underneath.

“You should rest.”

But you whine softly; needy and insistent as your fingers press harder.

“What do you need?” Joel rasps into your neck, helping you shift them down his legs.

“Need you,” you whisper back into the darkness of his bedroom. “Wanna feel you, I—”

His mouth is soft against yours, plucking those words from your mouth and swallowing them down. He sucks your bottom lip between his, prying your mouth open so he can slip his tongue inside.

His hand in on your knee, pulling your leg up until your thigh rests heavy around his hip and you can feel the hot weight of him against your core, still slick and warm and needy from when his hand rested on the inside of your leg in the bath.

And if you’d ever subscribed to the meaning behind words like sin you suppose that once this might have counted as one. An act worthy of being sent to reside in that second circle of hell, reserved solely for those overcome by lust; left to blow back and forth in the storm of their own desire. Two people who cannot touch, should not touch, who hold their hands out to feel anyways. A touch once spiteful, once desolate and removed, now so forthcoming. A touch that says this is the only way it could have ever been. And there can be nothing sinful about it anymore. No more shame or derision behind heavy eyelids, no more you shouldn’t or I’m no good for you. Here you rest comfortably in the hurricane of that second circle, and you welcome the breeze as a comfort.

Lips against yours, Joel feeds his cock to you in slow, careful passes.

Ensures you feel every ridge, every hard line of his body. And with each gentle press inside he murmurs against your mouth. Incessant, low nonsenses of so fuckin’ beautiful and god I missed you and that’s it, baby, I know, I know. His kiss smooth as an almond, tender as a fig. Ripe and wet and tremulous as his tongue finds a home against yours, over and over.

The comforter on his bed stays pulled high, up to your shoulders, and it traps the warmth of your bodies between you.

He coaxes rough, gasping sounds from you with every shift of his hips.

Long fingers grip the back of your thigh, using his hold there to rock your body into his over and over again, slowly, making sure you feel every second of it. Slick seeps out of you around his length, smearing against the inside of your thighs and his, and he groans at the wet sounds that slip from where the two of you are connected.

Joel says your name, low and gravelly, praising every syllable. He tells you how good it feels, how perfect you are, and every word is like an undressing of the flesh. Like you’re some tender butcher, peeling back layers of his skin to let the air hit hot, red, pulsating matter, flashes of thick, porcelain bone swimming amongst it all. He keeps you close, hardly an inch of your body not touching his, and yet you can see all of him. The whole surface and everything underneath it now too. And when you say his name in return and he moans, begs you to say it again, say my name again, it’s hearts on wings, thin fire racing beneath the skin, eyes unseeing, drumming filling your ears. It’s the cold sweat on his hands that hold you shaking, that feel the way you tremble and grip tighter. It’s wanting to take those bones of his and suck them clean; lick past the gristle and taste the marrow beyond it.

It's everything and it’s nothing and it’s that silly little four-letter word that you can’t bring yourself to say, let alone think, and it doesn’t even matter because he’s here and that’s enough.

His nose rests in the hollow above your collarbone and he inhales, smothering soft kisses to skin and bone there.

He says, “You smell like me,” and when he looks up and presses his forehead against yours, he almost looks wounded by it. He stills, holds himself deep inside and just stares, and his eyes are screaming I can’t fuckin’ quit you, so you lay your thumb over the dimple on his cheek and smile. “S’my clothes, my soap…”

Your body flutters and tightens around him, and your mouths fall open in soft moans, lips slotting together again.

“You like that?” you breathe into the kiss, and he tightens his fist around the back of the shirt, pressing inward until your back is arched, and your stomach is flush against his and he’s groaning yes.

“Want you in my clothes all the fuckin’ time,” he pants, and the tip of his cock presses so deep inside that you’re gasping, mouth hanging wide open. “And when you give ‘em back I’ll wear ‘em and smell like you, and then we’ll be even.”

“Even?” you laugh a little, nipping at his bottom lip. He smiles, eyes glinting in the darkness.

“Yeah, even,” he repeats it and presses forward in a sharp thrust to emphasise his point. You don’t need to hear it again to know exactly what he means.

“Tell me you’re mine,” you whisper, and he grunts, hips shifting a little faster against yours. You feel him pulse inside of you, his stomach tightening against yours.

“M’yours,” Joel murmurs, voice like velvet and honey, so soft as he leans forward to kiss you, licking the words into your mouth. You say it back, spell it out against his teeth, his lips, his jaw. Yours, yours, yours.

He says something else then, lips soft against your chin, and you’re so close; can feel it hot and burning in your gut, almost at tipping point.

“Hmm?”

“Baby,” Joel nips at your jaw, sharpening your senses. “Tell me you’re on the pill or somethin’.”

“I am,” you whimper honestly, and his body seems to sag against yours, hips shifting in sluggish, tired movements.

Something snaps at the base of your spine, and you tremble against him, gripping the back of his neck. Soon enough he’s shuddering into you, arms going tight around your back, trapping you against his chest as his cock pumps inside your core. And it’s warm and wet and sticky and his seed drools out of you, down to your asshole, smearing against the inside of your thighs, his sheets. Your legs wrap around his waist, holding him to you, keeping him there as long as you possibly can. Riding out your highs, and then the trembling, stuttering aftershocks in each other’s arms. He pants into your mouth and all either of you can say is mine or yours, until the words mix together and become a meaningless blur of sound murmured between locked lips.

It could be minutes or an entire hour before you manage to separate from each other. All eager little kisses and whines as his soft cock slips from your hold, thick spend seeping out of you in his absence. And you just want to sleep, want to curl up in his arms and never leave, but you slink off to the bathroom first. Wet your face and drop down on his toilet. Urinate and feel his come drip out of you. And where once, with someone else, you might have cringed at the feeling, you only feel warmth; calm.

In the bright lighting of his bathroom, you can see yourself reflected in the mirror above his sink. Hair a wild mess, cheeks and lips swollen with warmth. This woman in the mirror stares back at you and she has bright eyes. She smiles at you, and you feel your lips peel back, teeth on show just like hers. You stare at her and think god, she looks happy. When you wipe between your thighs and stand, she does too. And with your finger on the light switch, a wet handtowel clutched in your other palm, you give her one last look before turning out the light, feeling lighter than you have in weeks.

Thursday.

Joel sleeps on his stomach. At least, that’s how he ends up overnight.

Face buried deep in a pillow, one leg slung outside of the covers, with a heavy arm out to the side. When you wake, at first, you’re careful not to move. Not to breathe too heavily, not to cough or jostle him awake. He looks so peaceful like this. Heavy breaths puffing from chapped pouty lips, forehead smooth and devoid of the stress and exhaustion that often lines his face. A large hand rests close to you. Despite you drifting a part in the night, the body heat getting too much for you both, his fingers remain outstretched in your direction. The tips just grazing the skin of your stomach as you lie on your side and watch him.

A low murmur escapes from his mouth, face twitching a little, and then he’s relaxing again, humming in his sleep. You smile, and let your eyes wander.

There’s a pile of books on his bedside table, reading glasses dropped haphazardly atop them.

An Idiot’s Guide to Space, one of the weathered spines reads. Interesting.

A framed painting rests above a set of drawers on the side of his room. A vast landscape with a herd of horses galloping across it. Gorgeous hides of orange and brown and black splashed across green grass and blue sky. And on the back of his door… hangs a cowboy hat.

You move slowly, careful not to wake him as you rise and tip toe across the room. Coming to rest directly in front of the closed door, you slip it off the hook and admire it. You don’t even hear his breathing change as he wakes up.

Dark brown with a curved brim; the felt is soft beneath your fingers. The image of Joel wearing it, perhaps often, while living in Texas flits through your mind and you can’t help but smile. And then warm hands are on your hips, arms snaking around your waist to pull you back into a warm chest.

You gasp in quiet surprise, but your smile only broadens when Joel rests his chin on your shoulder, peering down at the hat in your hands.

“Mornin’,” he murmurs, voice gruff and deeper than usual. A pang of arousal swims in your core at the sound of it, but you ignore that, turning in his grasp.

“Good morning, cowboy.”

Joel groans, sleepy eyes drifting closed as he hugs you to his chest, swaying the two of you from side to side.

“Wanted to lie in,” he grumbles. “S’too early for this.”

“For what?” you blink in mock confusion, holding the hat against your chest.

“For you to see that.” He moves quick, tugging it from your grasp.

“Hey—” You gasp, wide eyed and ready to steal it back. But before you can Joel just lifts it onto his head with a heavy sigh. “Oh.”

“Oh?” he repeats, eyes narrowing.

Warmth simmers in your stomach and you smirk, stepping back to give him a quick once over.

“I could get used to this.”

“Jesus,” he rolls his eyes, moving to take it off but you grip his hand, shaking your head fiercely.

“Not so fast,” you coo. “I want the whole experience.”

“And what exactly is the whole experience?”

“You know—” You shimmy your hips a little. Imitate twirling a lasso in the air, wiggling your eyebrows. “Show me some tricks.”

Joel laughs at you, and you can see the desire in him to say no, to refute it, but the longer you stare him down, the more it cracks and fizzles away.

“Go on, cowboy,” you try out your best Texan drawl, falling down to sit on the edge of his bed.

He adjusts his legs, elbows bending as he waves two finger guns in your direction. You suck your lips into your mouth, swallowing down a laugh as he makes a small pchew pchew noise out the side of his mouth.

“Oh,” you smirk. “Is that all you got?”

“I’ll have you know,” Joel huffs, pretending to holster one of his guns. Hip cocked now, still dressed in nothing but his sleep shirt and boxers; he stares you down. “I’m startin’ to think this town ain’t big enough for the both of us.”

And that gets you. A sharp, barking laughs slips from your mouth, and Joel grins in return, the skin beside his eyes creasing as he adjusts the Stetson over his curls.

As your giggles calm, he just shakes his head, still smiling, and murmurs fondly, “Dadgum, you got a good laugh.”

Your face warms beneath his stare, and you just shake your head, bottom lip snagged between your teeth. Moving quick, Joel pinches the brim of the hat and places it onto your head. It’s a little big, and the brim falls down, obscuring your eyesight before he adjusts it for you. Then he takes a step back, hands on hips.

“How do I look?” You bat your eyelashes up at him, smiling shyly.

“I don’t know,” he fakes an air of contemplation, giving you a long look up and down. “Think you might be all hat ‘n’ no cattle.”

“Hey,” you pout. “I’d make a great cowboy; just need a pair of chaps.”

“Well, you can wear the hat and the chaps all you like,” Joel murmurs, gaze heavy. “But you ain’t a cowboy ‘til you prove you can ride like one.”

Your thighs tense and you arch an eyebrow, trying to remain nonchalant.

“Is that right?”

“S’right.”

“Mm,” you hum. You lick your bottom lip and watch the way his gaze darkens, eyes trained on the movement. “Gonna let me show you what I got?”

And so you end up back in bed, straddling Joel while he smirks up at you, long fingers twisting around the hem of your t-shirt. But when you slip a finger inside the hem of his boxers, the movement so reminiscent of last night, he laughs a little and gives you a look that says, really?

You pout, confused. “I thought you wante—”

“Uh uh,” Joel shakes his head. “Not what I meant.”

“Then what?”

“Get up here.” He lifts his chin upward.

Your eyes widen, stomach tensing a little.

Desire warms the inside of your thighs, and you murmur, “You want that?”

“Do I wa—?” he cuts himself off, eyes darkening a shade. “I said, get up here.”

Heart racing, you shimmy up his chest until your knees are planted on the mattress on either side of his shoulders. He smiles, encouraging, and you grip the hem of his shirt, prepared to pull it over your head, but he stops you.

“No,” he exhales, hand quickly gripping yours. “Leave it on for me.” And then he leans in and presses a kiss to the inside of your thigh, and you can only nod, holding your breath as you wait for him to reach where you want his mouth the most.

Face tucked in the cradle of your hips, Joel sighs your name. A rough exhalation, nose pressed into your skin. And it feels a little silly at first – your face is warm as you stare down at him, the wide brim of the cowboy hat tilting forward.

But then, breath hot and heavy against you, he mouths at the crease where your hip meets your thigh. Slow, drawn-out kisses that have your legs tensing over him, his hands slip beneath the shirt, tracing light patterns into the skin over your spine, all the way up to your shoulders. He keeps going until you’re shivering, a wet trembling mess in his hands, hips twitching forward with every touch of his mouth to your skin until he finally glides his tongue through your folds.

Your breathing hitches as he pants against you, chest vibrating with low sounds as he licks thick stripes up the entire length of your pussy. Eyes closed, he tastes all of you; tongue slipping over every piece of exposed skin that the position grants him. And with every broad stroke of his tongue, he dips inside your weeping hole and finishes with a gentle flick against your clit. So soft and so slow, building you up over and over until finally you break and begin rocking your hips into his face.

Joel grunts at first, a little surprised maybe, but in a second his hands are dropping to grip your thighs, locking you in place against his face.

At first, he guides you. Helps you find a rhythm that works, that feels good. Flattens his tongue and uses his grip to rock you back and forth over his face, groaning as you roll your clit against him, huffing and panting quiet little pleas. But soon enough your fingers are carding through his hair, holding him tight against you as you grind down into his mouth. Sharpening his tongue, he dips it inside of you and then drags upward, pulling your clit into his mouth and sucking gently.

You gasp, vision going hazy as you try to keep your eyes on him, try to watch, but it’s too good. He knows exactly what you like, and it all moves far too quickly for your liking. You can already feel your hips winding faster and harder against him, breaths falling shorter, everything in your stomach pulling tight and hot.

Joel can tell – he can always fucking tell – and one of his hands drifts over your ass, fingers slipping between your thighs from behind until his middle finger is circling your entrance.

“Fuck,” you inhale sharply, jaw going slack as he prods at your cunt, tongue lapping lazily over your clit all the while. “Please, your fingers, yeah, ohhh—”

A long finger sinks inside and you moan, head falling back.

“You like that?” he murmurs, pulling back to graze his teeth along the inside of your thigh. A second finger presses inside, and he curls them against that soft spot, fucking you slow and steady until you acquiesce, whimpering yesyesyesfucksogood towards the ceiling.

“Good girl,” he hums, slick tongue finding its way back to your clit.

He eats at you so lovingly. So generous as he lathes firm circles around your nerves, only ever pausing to suck you into his mouth again or press wet, open-mouthed kisses against the entirety of your cunt. Nose buried in the short curls over your mound, he doesn’t let up until your moans turn high pitched; strained little whimpers of his name falling from your lips as you press down harder and harder.

“Oh fuck,” you cry, hips rocking back and forth, faster now. He breathes you in, jaw shifting from side to side, matching the intensity of your movements with sharp flicks of his tongue. And when you fall apart, shoulders sagging forward, he moans, taking and taking and taking every last drop of what you have to offer.

And what an image it must be – you, wearing a Stetson, riding Joel Miller’s face. You almost wish you’d filmed it, for posterity’s sake.

He presses a small kiss to one swollen lip of your pussy, and then the other, before his head is falling back into the pillows and he’s smiling up at you.

The lower half of his face shines, lips and facial hair slick with your come, and you can’t help but grin back, a tired snort of laughter slipping from your mouth.

“How’d I do?” You grip the brim of the hat, tipping it down at him.

Joel smirks, hands squeezing your thighs, helping to shift you up and onto the side of the bed so he can sit up.

“I’d say you more than proved yourself,” he hums, leaning in to steal a kiss. You sigh, whining against his warm wet mouth, and reach a hand down to press it against his abdomen. Shifting lower, you trail your fingers over where his cock strains against his boxers, but Joel just tuts, pulling away and slipping off the bed.

“Hey,” you huff, gripping his shirt and trying to pull him back down, but he just shakes his head, laughing, and drags you to your feet.

“Gonna be late,” he tells you, squeezing your hips and pressing a kiss to your temple. “And you needa eat.”

Late. You’d almost forgotten that you had a lecture this morning. Joel’s lecture.

He turns, rifling in the chest of drawers, pulling out clothes, a pair of socks, while you stand behind him and watch, knees still shaking, with a fucking cowboy hat on your head. After a moment he turns, stares, and a rough laugh hits the air. Shaking his head, Joel grips the brim and tosses the hat back up on its hook before pointing towards the ensuite, telling you to shower.

“You coming?” you ask, and he just shakes his head, tugging on socks before padding towards the hallway.

“Cowboys don’t shower, baby,” he flashes a smile over his shoulder at you and winks. “They just dust off.”

When you make your way out of the shower, Joel is in the kitchen. Ironed black trousers and a neat white shirt cover his frame, and from across the room you admire him. That strong back, the pert rounded muscles of his ass. Fuck.

He manages to over scramble the eggs and burn the bacon because he can’t stop looking over his shoulder at where you rest at his dining table. Head resting heavy in your palm, you smile back at him. And when he puts a plate of food in front of you, you don’t have a single complaint.

The two of you eat fast, plucking little pieces of eggshell out as you go, smiling and laughing shyly as your feet tangle beneath the table. He watches you; makes sure you clear your plate before he takes it to the sink, murmuring something about how he won’t make you sit through me talkin’ for hours on an empty stomach. Says he’s pretty sure that counts as torture somewhere, baby.

And when he turns, dirty dishes forgotten in the sink, you’re staring at him, heart on your sleeve, and he must see it in your eyes. You know that it has to be clear as day; that forbidden four-letter word blazing across your forehead in bold letters.

Joel clocks your gaze and moves to hover over where you sit, wordlessly cupping your face in two broad palms and slotting his mouth over yours. And as he licks into your mouth, tasting the remnants of eggs and bacon and every unsaid word, you start to believe that maybe confessing wouldn’t be so bad. That maybe forbidden is a word you’ve prescribed to this feeling all on your own – that he might just be feeling the exact same way.

But he pulls back, presses two more quick pecks to your mouth and tells you to get ready, says he’ll drive the two of you to school, and the moment slips from your grasp.

Back in his car, you feel relieved to replace the memory of yesterday with this one. Windows down, the air is cool and calm against your skin as he drives you through town, sated, dopey smiles across both of your faces.

A Bob Dylan song drifts from the speakers and Joel sings along under his breath.

“We’ll meet again someday on the avenue. Tangled up in blue.” Voice low and breathy, left hand on the wheel, right hand on your thigh. You nod along to the lyrics, your fingers tracing the veins and tendons on the back of his hand all the way until he pulls over.

“Shouldn’t be seen walkin’ in together.”

“Yeah,” you agree, understanding. “Best not.”

The truck idles on the side of the road, somewhere inconspicuous down the street from campus, and you slip out his passenger door. Close it with a thud and peer in at him through the open window, eyes devouring every part of his face as if you won’t be seeing him within the hour, stood up in front of the room giving a lecture.

The truck peels away from the curb, Tangled Up In Blue still whining from those speakers, and Joel sends a quick wink out the window at you, his face a blur as he drives off. And you just smile, chest warm despite the cool Spring air on your face, walking along in the same direction – because you know exactly what that wink means. And you love it.

Our little secret.

a/n refs:

in Dante’s Inferno he said that those overcome with lust were doomed to the second circle of hell, wherein they would be buffeted back and forth by the terrible winds of a violent storm, without rest. slay.

the bacchae tr. by anne carson [read if you have mummy issues, a massive ego, or just like the idea of frolicking in the woods for a while...]

the secret history by donna tartt [read if you like unreliable narrators, strange professors and stranger students, and the nursery rhyme 'the farmer in the dell']

the end of the affair by graham greene [read if you like weird intense guys and angst and infidelity]

eros the bittersweet by anne carson [read if you're cool as fuck]

thank you for reading! x

#finally am i right?#my writing #fic: a lover's pinch #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller x reader #joel miller smut

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flowerandblood · 5 months

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The Man in the Black Mask

[ Amor • Aemond x Psyche • female ]

[ warnings: angst, violence, assassination attempt, mention of the murder of multiple people, descriptions of murders ]

[ description: After she is attacked in a fair by a strange man and narrowly avoids death, her father the king decides that from now on she will be watched over by one of his 'ghosts', a assassin acting on his orders, wearing a black mask. The man follows her like a shadow, accompanied by their past, which keeps her awake at night. Gothic horror love story, angst, sexual tension, very dark Aemond. ]

This story is several requests combined into one: sworn protector x female; Amor x Psyche; Phantom of the Opera! Aemond x female. I took the liberty of creating a completely new story from this, having only elements of each of these requests.

Series & Characters Moodboard

Lady Walford Moodboard

Gothic & Horror Sensual Moodboard

* English is not my first language. Please, do not repost. Enjoy! *

Next chapters: Masterlist

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Her father, the King, only realised how many enemies he had after a man dared to attack her while she was strolling around the fair during one of her walks. He wanted to get closer to her and slipped a dagger out from behind his cloak − if it hadn't been for the woman selling fish and her shouting, she wouldn't have noticed him or the steel gleaming in his hand.

She did what any other person in her position would have done, which is to say, she screamed in terror, stepping back, bumping into a wooden makeshift table full of vegetables, which toppled over with her − the assassin gave up at the last moment, terrified by the sudden outbreak of panic, and disappeared among the crowd.

Some elderly man helped her up, the knights of her father's guard rode up on horseback, alarmed by these frightened noises. One of them, Ser Lucas, her father's friend from his youth and the great rebellion furrowed his brow as he saw her face.

"Princess?"

She wasn't sure if her father was more furious with her or with the man who had tried to attack her. He commented on her irresponsibility and disobedience, her recklessness, and expressed outrage that her guards had not even noticed how she had escaped them.

"I just wanted to see the fair, my King." She said in a trembling voice without looking at him; she stood before him with her hair loose, wearing a beautiful navy blue gown with sleeves that reached to the ground − her shoulders were bare, on her hips a delicate golden belt made up of tiny eyes in which sapphires were framed.

"That's enough." He said agitated and impatient, raising his hand in a gesture of frustration, his dark hair and beard adding to his seriousness, his brow furrowed in anger. "Until you learn prudence, one of my ghosts will not leave your side."

She looked at him, horrified, and then turned her gaze to the man standing beside him, a few steps behind his throne, his figure hidden completely in shadow. He was dressed all in black, a hood over his head and a black mask on which a single tear was outlined under his right eye.

It was said that it was molded so that the people they were killing would have the feeling that they had compassion for them, that they were just a tool used by someone else.

People called them ghosts because they weren't seen on a daily basis – or at least that's what it was believed. They were forbidden to take off their mask or speak to anyone but her father, and were his principal emissaries that found his enemies, invigilated them and killed them.

Since the days of the rebellion and the overthrow of the earlier king, her father was perpetually in fear of an attempt on his or his children's lives, so he found, she supposed, people desperate or fond of killing, those who owed him everything and had no reason to betray them.

She passed and saw them extremely rarely, only during sumptuous feasts in the company of guests or gatherings of magnates from all over the country.

They stood then by her father's side, as always in the shadows, though invisible, constantly reminding her of their presence with their very posture, menacing and stony, the people around them afraid to look at them.

She didn't know how many of them there were in total; they were almost identical and differed only in height, besides that they wore the same clothes, masks, hoods and black leather gloves, probably to avoid staining their skin with blood.

The thought that someone like that was to accompany and guard her sent shivers down her spine − she had feared that her father would now know of her every move, that she would never leave the fortress again.

She lowered her gaze, saying no more, listening to his orders to find the man who had attacked her, whom she had described in detail to the other ghosts.

She left, feeling that if she stayed there another moment she would vomit.

It seemed to her that these black hooded figures were sucking the life out of everyone around them, that they were a walking harbinger of death and misery.

That night she heard his voice for the first time.

Her guards were outraged when he dismissed them.

"You are not a King, by what right do you command us?" Asked one of them, a cold, deep, mocking voice answered them.

"Shall I inform the King that not only are you incapable of guarding his daughter, but you refuse to obey his orders?"

She heard someone's growl and an unclear voice full of impatience, the clack of steel and armour proving that they had walked away − she was left alone with the cold murderer outside her door.

She pressed her lips together, felt her eyes burning due to the gathering tears at the realization that she had never felt more alone and abandoned than she did now.

She wriggled in bed, as she did every day, unable to fall asleep. It was raining loudly outside and she looked towards the window, seeing nothing but darkness. She felt small and even though she was lying under several thick furs, she was cold.

She rose slowly, putting a soft cashmere shawl over her shoulders, lighting a candle that illuminated her chamber with a pleasant, warm glow.

There is a man behind that mask, she thought.

He was not a ghost.

If she made any kind of bond with him, she would stop being afraid of him.

She walked to her door and stood in front of it for a long moment, feeling her heart pounding hard and fast. She swallowed hard and opened it with a loud creak of old wood.

Her candle instantly illuminated his figure − he was standing exactly opposite her door, leaning against the wall with his hands clasped in front of him. She wondered if he was asleep in that position, but after a moment she noticed something behind the translucent black material in the area cut out for his eyes, a blue iris staring at her.

She looked at him for a moment, wondering if he would move, but he stood like a statue − it seemed to her as if he were made of stone.

Was he supposed to stand like that all the time?

Her father had told her that he would gift her his one ghost.

Would they be exchanging? After all, he had to sleep at some point.

"What's your name?" She asked uncertainly, softly, wanting to sound as open and honest as possible.

Silence.

A long one.

"How am I supposed to address you if I don't know what your name is?" She asked again, looking at him pleadingly, asking him to let her at least get a little closer to him, to be able to give him humanity.

Silence.

She pressed her lips together and thought something else would make him speak.

"Should I complain to the king about you not answering my questions?" She asked lowly, wrinkling her eyebrows, wondering where she had got the courage to speak to this man in this way. A shudder went through her when she heard him let out a breath, as if he had given up, resigned.

"Call me any name you see fit." He said in a low, deep, indifferent tone, as if the fact that he had to speak to her frustrated him incredibly and he didn't understand what she wanted from him.

She felt a tightening in her throat at the thought that there was no more human thing than being given a name − it was the first thing given to a child at birth, and he renounced it.

"Shall I name you?" She asked shaking her head, not understanding what he was implying − he turned his face to the side, despite the mask she could feel the growing impatience beating from him.

"Yes. My Princess." He added after a moment, his words razor-sharp, cool, angry, mocking. She had the impression that he treated her interest as something completely unnecessary − apparently it suited him to remain in the shadows and he had no intention of coming out of it.

She looked at him with pain mixed with disappointment and thought he reminded her of one of the horrific mythological beasts her mother had once read to her about before bed, a great mighty dragon that sowed death and destruction.

"Vhagar."

She heard the word she had spoken echoed, followed only by the sound of rain, and felt that there was something final in what she had done.

"I will always treat you with respect and I will never make you do anything to humiliate you or offend your good name." She choked out with difficulty, wanting him to understand that they were condemned to each other and that this in itself was a misfortune, however, it would be even more so if they both pretended that he didn't exist, that he was just her shadow that followed her everywhere.

He did not respond.

She closed herself back into her chamber only walking towards her bed feeling that her legs were trembling. She lay down on her bed covering herself with thick furs, frozen and terrified, closing her eyes, praying to the gods to show her mercy.

That they would not lock her away in this cold, stone fortress forever until her father claimed to have found a suitable candidate for her to marry.

As she did every day, she also prayed for someone else.

Someone who had lived in this chamber before her.

The next day she got up awake, a terrible headache accompanying her from the moment she opened her eyes. She sat down at the table, covering herself with her shawl − overnight the wood in her fireplace had burned out.

She lifted her gaze as she heard the door to her chamber open, her servants entering with golden trays on which they served her breakfast.

She saw Vhagar follow them inside, his hands entwined behind his back − it seemed to her that his footsteps made no sound, that he could sneak up on someone silently.

"You're supposed to taste everything first." He said to one of them dryly and emotionlessly − the girl looked at him apprehensively, clearly already knowing stories of men of his ilk and what they did.

"My Lord?" She choked out, clearly not understanding what he was asking her.

"Anything the Princess wants to eat or drink − you are to taste it first. This is how it will be from now on with everything you bring her. Do you understand?" He asked coolly and insistently, and she nodded, lowering her gaze, pale.

"Is this necessary, Vhagar?" She asked looking at him with a furrowed brow − he turned his face towards her but answered nothing. He looked back at her servant after a moment.

"Begin."

"I've lost my appetite. Take this away. You can eat it all, let it not go to waste." She said raising her hand, allowing them to leave turning her head to the side, looking blankly at her wardrobe standing on the other side of the chamber.

She saw out of the corner of her eye that he hadn't moved from his spot, that he was looking at her, his aura giving her shivers.

She knew he was about to say something.

"My Princess…" He started and she turned her face towards him. "…are you going to eat your meal, or do I have to shove it down your throat?"

She looked at him with huge eyes, feeling her heart pounding fast.

She thought with horror that he was mad.

"That is all, Vhagar. You may leave." She said in an unobjectionable voice, clasping her hands in her lap, trying to hide how much they were trembling.

He stared at her, his black tear-streaked mask seeming even more frightening and mocking to her, cold and lifeless.

"Mmm." He hummed, though it sounded more like a purr, bowed barely visibly and left her chamber.

She let out a loud breath, burying her face in her hands, feeling a desperate burbling in her stomach from hunger, thinking that she would not give him the satisfaction of letting him dominate her life, ordering her servants around, locking her in a cage.

She asked her servants to help her dress − she put on this time a light-coloured gown with a fine gold belt around her hips made up of tiny chains, some of her hair pinned back in a bun, some falling down her bare back, her sleeves reaching all the way to the ground.

She walked out of her chamber without looking at him, without telling him where she was going, hearing that he immediately moved to follow her.

Her shadow.

She saw the ladies of the court looking at her, terrified of who was accompanying her, as if she were being followed by death itself − people turned their faces away and froze in silence, not knowing what to do, how to react to this unwanted sight.

She headed for the main castle library hearing him enter behind her − he stopped at the door when it slammed behind them, standing in front of it with his hands folded behind his back.

She was starving and decided to distract her mind with some reading. She picked up a few books on the history of her kingdom, sitting down at one of the large oak tables right by the window to get more light. She opened one of the books in front of her, looking for the chapter that interested her.

"You may sit down, Vhagar." She said dispassionately, not wanting him to think she expected him to stand there like some stone pillar, but he didn't move from his place.

An hour passed before he spoke to her, snapping her out of her reverie.

"You need to eat." He communicated a little more softly than before − she felt him looking at her, but she did not lift her gaze to him, uninterested.

"My servants will not taste my food. You yourself watch the cooks and what they put on my platters." She replied with reserve, answered by a long silence.

"Very well."

She looked up at him, sighing quietly, his face turned towards her − she knew what was the reason for his impatience, what he was afraid of.

What would the King think if it turned out that under his watch she had begun to refuse food and starve herself? How would that reflect on him as her protector?

She rose from her seat, putting her books slowly back on the shelf, returning to her chamber without changing another word with him.

As she sat down to supper with her father, her younger brother, and his closest associates, the King immediately asked her what she thought of her new sworn protector, who stood behind her chair right next to the wall, as usual, hidden completely in the shadows.

She swallowed loudly a piece of the roast she had just had in her mouth, noticing with a kind of discomfort that her father spoke of him as if he had given her a thing, not a man.

"Thank you, Father, I do indeed feel safer in his presence." She lied, clutching the wine cup in her hand and taking a loud sip from it, wanting to end the subject quickly.

The King nodded, looking impatiently to his confidant secretary, a companion to all the major battles won during the rebellion.

"Has Prince Aemond's body been found at last? It's been eight years, for goodness sake." He said sternly, impatient; as far as she understood, only his body of the entire Targaryen family had not been found after the great massacre that had taken place in the fortress where they were now feasting.

Lord Ronan grunted loudly, shifting in his seat, blinking rapidly as if thinking of what to answer.

"We are getting closer, my King. We're searching the city's underground, likely to find his corpse soon. The cut of the sword fell right on his face, he couldn't have survived that." He said with a certainty that was filled with the need to sound as convincing as possible, which did not escape her or her father attention.

She lowered her gaze, setting down her cup with a loud clang of metal on the wooden tabletop, looking down at her plate, losing her appetite completely.

The entire royal family slaughtered in their beds after her father at the head of the army stormed into the fortress, elected by the people to rule after the inept reign of King Viserys.

"With apologies, I will retire to my chamber. My King. My Prince. My Lords." She said bowing in turn and moved ahead, not waiting for her father's permission − she heard rustling behind her, she knew her ghost had not left her side.

They walked in silence through the dark corridors of the fortress illuminated only by the warm light of torches − she knew the way to her chamber by heart. Her mind, however, was elsewhere, wondering what would happen if Prince Aemond lived.

If he came in with his army and slit their throats as her father had done to his family.

She stood in front of the door to her chamber, glancing up at his tall black figure towering over her like a cold shadow.

"Thank you for your devotion, Vhagar. Rest now." She said turning her head and opened the door, but stood in half step, surprised to hear his voice behind her.

"How does it feel to sleep where she slept?" He asked with a kind of excitement, as if the thought of it gave him satisfaction.

She felt her heart start pounding like mad, a cold sweat on her back at the thought of Princess Helaena bleeding to death in the bed she was now sleeping in.

She looked up at him − in the light of the torch she could see through the black fabric his blue irises, his pupil looking at her in such a way that she had the impression that he was a predator who was looking at his prey, whose entrails he was about to tear apart.

She was silent for a long moment.

"Horrible." She said dispassionately lowering her gaze.

"I imagine her lying in my place and all I can think about is that the same thing will happen to me one day." She muttered, feeling his heavy gaze on her − there was some kind of tension between them, though she didn't know why. "I pray every day for her forgiveness."

"Ghosts do not forgive." He said coldly, as if stating some foreboding, indisputable fact − she looked at him with a pained expression, furrowing her brow.

"What else can I do?" She asked in a trembling voice, but got no answer, his black mask with a tear running down his cheek looked at her indifferently.

"Sleep well, Princess."

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Aemond Taglist:

(bold means I couldn't tag you)

@its-actually-minicika @notnormalthings-blog @nikstrange @zenka69 @bellaisasleep @k-y-r-a-1 @g-cf2020 @melsunshine @opheliaas-stuff @chainsawsangel @iiamthehybrid @tinykryptonitewerewolf @namoreno @malfoytargaryen @qyburnsghost @aemondsdelight @persephonerinyes @fan-goddess @sweethoneyblossom1 @watercolorskyy @randomdragonfires @apollonshootafar @padfooteyes

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aphroditeslover11 · 6 months

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A Night At The Opera

More requests are on their way, I seem to have come down with something again so everything is just taking a while.

Anyway, some preferences inspired by my trip yesterday of what it would be like to go to the opera with a few of our boys. It’s fun alone, but I dare say it would be more entertaining with one of them!

Moodboard below is sourced from Pinterest photos.

Robert Fischer:

I feel like if he was going to an opera it would usually be for something to do with business, he would probably be more interested in networking than the music. After a while of you being together he would ask you along to one of these events, probably to the MET opera in New York.

He would be surprised when you were actually excited about going, waving the libretto in front of him and trying to tell him everything that you had found out about the composer before you went.

He would make sure that you were treated like a princess all evening, being driven to the theatre with him in the back of a private limousine and being pandered to all evening with champagne in the private box that was booked for his party. He would go so far as banning any business talk during the performance so that you could watch undisturbed.

He loved to watch how your face lit up as the singers dived from aria to aria, even crying in parts. He was aware of what was going on on stage, but spent most of the evening watching you. At the end you would fly to your feet in a standing ovation, realising moments later that you were the only one in the box doing so, he would quickly stand up, joining you to stop you from feeling conspicuous. Of course, after the successful business man was up, the rest of the box followed in suit.

He would become a patron of the MET opera after this, telling you as a surprise on your birthday. He’d go to events with you as often as he could.

Tommy Shelby:

He would only ever go to an opera if it was absolutely necessary, most likely something to do with his new intelligence activities.

He’d be the most unenthusiastic audience member ever, probably saying that opera was a pile of rubbish. Even if he did happen to actually enjoy it he wouldn’t admit it, worried that it would impact his image.

If you asked him to go back with you he’d playfully tease you and tell you to take Alfie instead. He was more than a bit irritated when one day he received a phonecall saying that you had called his bluff, actually spending the evening at the Royal Opera House with Solomons!

Lenny Miller:

He’d take you to the opera at the Palais Garnier in Paris for his birthday. He was a relatively cultured person and had been a few times before, unlike you who were completely unfamiliar.

The idea came from when you had forced him to watch Pretty Woman one evening and had asked him what the opera was actually like. Hence, he had decided that for your first opera visit he was going to take you to see La Traviata.

He gave you the full treatment beforehand, even though it was his celebration. He made sure that you went shopping for a new dress and whatever else you might need. You used the opportunity whilst he was at work to buy his present as well, a new watch that he wore on the evening of the performance.

The evening was amazing, going out for dinner before heading to the theatre. You were in a private box, about two tiers up with an amazing view. Lenny managed to book it through a contact he had from the agency.

He was nervous that you wouldn’t share his enjoyment of the performance, but he could see it in your eyes how moved you were by the music. You were on top of the world when your drinks arrived at the interval, snuggling into his side for the second act. Pretty Woman had been right, there certainly was something romantic about the opera.

Oppie (pre Los-Alamos):

Every year his friends went on a trip to opera and every year they managed to bully him into going. It was no secret how much he despised it, always finding it too much for him and walking out after the first act.

This year he was finally planning on saying no, only then to find out that you (who he had developed a secret soft-spot for recently) were going along as well. He melted to butter when you asked him if he would go along and immediately agreed.

On the car journey there he would be in a foul mood, constantly reminding himself that it would be worth it though. He tried to focus on how you were pushed against him each time there was a bump in the road as a reminder of your presence.

As the orchestra played the first note he was filled with dread, knowing what he had just sentenced himself to. It turned out to be worth it though, as when things began to get uglier it was his hand that you reached for. He was sure that he was in.

This was the first time he managed to stay put for the entire performance.

#oppenheimer #american prometheus #cillian murphy #oppenheimer x reader #cillian murphy x reader #peaky blinders #tommy shelby #tommy shelby x reader #anna #lenny miller x reader #lenny miller #inception #robert fischer #robert fischer x reader #opera #fanfic #preferences #pretty woman

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bylertruther · 1 year

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BYLER SPACE OPERA AU MOODBOARD

MIKE WHEELER is a senator's son that fell from grace soon after the forced disappearance of his best friend, Will Byers. All too aware that there would be no justice for his friend, or for any of the other missing persons, Mike eventually took it upon himself to find him, wherever he may be. Having fled with a ship he helped modify for off-the-radar travel, he sails the starry seas tirelessly, year after year, trading his hard-earned skills for any information that may lead him back to the light. And though his mission is to find his friend, he's managed to earn himself quite the reputation in the bounty hunting world, too. Mike may come from a high-seated and affluent family, but make no mistake: he cuts the rot from the rind of every village he passes through, and has an uncanny ability to sniff out all that isn't right. It isn't within him to turn a blind eye to evil or those in need of help. What drives him to search for Will is exactly what drives him to aid others: his heart, his undying belief in a better galaxy, and his contempt for the great many that do nothing. He's allied himself with what remains of the now-disbanded Hellfire Club, but mostly travels alone with only his repurposed astromech droid, DST-1N, to keep him company. It's lonely—this life that he's made for himself. So much so that sometimes he thinks he can hear Will come through on the radio, humming a tune from their childhood to soothe his aching heart. Will never responds, not ever, but that's okay, because Mike's coming. He doesn't care what DST-1N, or Lucas, or anyone says. Will is out there—alive. He just has to find him.

WILL BYERS was the first of many forced disappearances in Hokkins, targeted for reasons that still remain unclear. He doesn't remember much of his home-planet, or that ill-fated night. In fact, he doesn't remember much of anything. The life he'd once had, and what recollection of it may have survived, slips through his fingers like little grains of sand—the same sand that makes up his new home now, and wedges itself into every nook and cranny of his existence. All that Will knows is the blistering sun overhead, the strange girl that begs him in that stern, but endlessly wide-eyed way of hers to not question this life they share, and the rules they're to follow if they wish to see another day. Eleven, he soon finds out, won't tell him the origin of his scars, or even the origin of him himself, but she does tell him about other things—about how to listen to the world around him, how to harness the light that lives within him, and how to keep the dark of night from creeping in (even if, sometimes, she looks at him like he's the dark they need to look out for). In turn, he teaches her how to create things, about the joys of music, and how to make a life of what they've been given. Most days, it's enough. He tells himself that when they manage to barter enough scraps for a piece of fruit to share, or come across a particularly fiery redhead and her much-adored hoverboard. He tells himself that when their shack becomes a home, and when scared strangers become friends, become siblings. Still, he dreams. Somewhere out beyond his reach is a world full of luscious green and bountiful life. A world where there's someone to ruffle his hair and fuss over him; to make room when he climbs into their bed after a nightmare, and encourage him when no one else will; to play and learn and grow with him, and make hushed promises that they never wanted to break. He sees them in the flames sometimes—those someones. Most of the time it's a woman with a worn face and trilling voice, begging him to please talk to her. Other times… it's a man. Freckle-faced, with a dark, unruly mane and a fierce gaze—a gaze that softens and turns watery whenever he feels as time and space bend to bring them together, and their hearts beat in sync to play the same wild drumming song. His sister tells him that it isn't real—that these are illusions meant to trick him and tempt him back to the hell she plucked him from, but—but Will knows them. He knows with heart-shattering clarity that his dreams and the light do not deceive him. He knows that man, and he knows in some inexplicable way that he would never hurt him—that the woman, too, would never in her life hurt him. He knows them, and yet… he hides. Because he knows, too, that there's a reason his sister keeps him hidden from the world. There's a reason she keeps him close to the flames at night, why he remembers nothing, and why it is so important that it stays that way. So, no, Will doesn't reveal himself. Instead, he listens. He hums, and he tugs on the strings which connect them all, and hopes that they'll hear him. I'm here, he says. I'm right here.

#byler #byleredit #byler moodboard #byler au #mike wheeler #will byers #stranger things #mine #my edit #long post #mb

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storyofmychoices · 2 months

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Thank you to everyone who helped make my birthday special. I seriously needed all of your love and kindness this week.

My real life was beyond challenging, I wondered if I was going to get to the end of the week. I didn't even get to celebrate my birthday because things were so bad with my dad, so to see all of your love and support here, it meant EVERYTHING to me. I wish I had the proper words to tell you how much you all mean to me. I know I say it, but please know that I mean it, from the bottom of my heart, I can't say thank you enough for making me feel special, appreciated, and loved. I am so so eternally grateful to you for the time, effort, and thoughtfulness you put into your gifts or even just your kindness in sending a sweet message. I appreciate you all so much!

Thank you 💖

Thank you for all of these amazing gifts and messages! I hope I don't miss anyone, if I do, please let me know. It's not my intention to overlook anyone!

Blades of Light & Shadow

Bumbling Adversaries by @dutifullynuttywitch Mal and Daenarya run from a fearsome adversary

Daenarya's Birthday Drabble by @lilyoffandoms Mal, Tyril, and Maiele plan a surprise party for Daenarya

Insomnia by @thosehallowedhalls On the night after defeating the Dreadlord, Mal watches Daenarya sleep and reflects on his place in her life.

Mal x Daenarya kiss art by @lilyoffandoms

Crimes of Passion

Drabble by @lilyoffandoms Lilah and Ruby discuss a certain someone and Lilah's interest in him.

The Morning After (Lilah art—mature) by @lilyoffandoms

Mother of the Year

Levi and Lily post it note fun art by @lilyoffandoms

Open Heart

Can I have this Dance Quote Edit by @aallotarenunelma

Something Sweet (fic + art of Olivia) by @jerzwriter Casey, Merida, Bryce, Ethan, and Tobias help Olivia celebrate her birthday even from afar.

Red Carpet Diaries

Alex Hunt Moodboard by @lorircreates

The Hollywood Theatre by @princess-geek In a Regency AU, The Duke of Holly (Thomas Hunt) is looking for a singer for his new opera when he finds Lady Alexandra Spencer.

Thomas Hunt Classic Hollywood Portrait by @oh-so-youre-a-nerd

Thomas x Alex edit by @choiceswithmika

The Unexpected Heiress

Christine Jane Hayes (MC) Portrait by @lilyoffandoms

Some Lovely Asks:

From Nonny

From ao719

From Nonny

From angelasscribbles

From Nonny

From the-soot-sprite

From trappedinfanfiction

From ladylamrian

#hbd to me #march2024 #gifts #art gift #writing gift #edit gift #lovely things #things that make me smile #things that make me cry (happy)#the loveliest of people #thank you #storyofmychoices #lovealexhunt

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enaelyork · 5 months

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Happy Halloween!!!🎃🧡🍭🍬👻🍫

For the trick or treat challenge, if I may, I'd love a Thrawn x OC moodboard (TRICK 🎃) with Vampire AU theme, and a Thrawn x reader headcanon (TREAT 👻) with First night theme

Thank you sooo much!!!🎃👻🎃👻😘

Hiiii

I'm so so so sorry. Halloween is over but i was very busy and i'm a workaholic girl ^^ So here we are.

First night with Thrawn x Reader - Headcanon

Absolutely nothing will happen because neither of you knows what to do.

...

Okay, it's a joke. (Or not)

Really. I don't see anything conclusive about this. It won't be wonderful, because Thrawn is simply not an expert in this area. He is a military genius and thinks that everything is handled exactly like a war.

As for you, you are terribly anxious. You are afraid of not being good enough and disappointing him. I mean...It's the first night you're going to spend together and you have no idea how it's going to happen. I imagine that to be sure, you will put on your best underwear and wear your favorite perfume. You will leave nothing to chance.

You have decided to spend an evening the way you like it: an opera or an art gallery, a good meal.

The difference is that this evening, you offered to spend the night at your place.

A very courageous proposal when you know that he first asked you why you wanted him to sleep with you even though you didn't live very far from each other. (He's too smart to understand this kind of simple thing).

So you ended the evening at home, in your living room for a last drink. And there was an indescribable atmosphere between you, mixing anxiety and excitement.

It's not like you've never made an intimate gesture towards each other. No. You've kissed before (although your first kiss was a disaster since your teeth clashed) and even held hands in a public place. But this is new and you wonder if he will be able to take the first step towards you.

Damn, this was going to be carnage.

However, his hand brushed against yours and you saw it as an invitation. You approached him to kiss him and he offered no resistance.

After you bumped several times against the painting, the wall, the sofa and spilled the bottom of your glass on the carpet with your foot, you ended up asking him to go to your room.

It was soft, delicate and also a little clumsy. However, you were very surprised to see that Thrawn mastered certain aspects (he carried you to your bed, kissed you on the neck and did not hesitate to touch you with tenderness). You weren’t so sure of your knowledge about him.

Besides, you wondered about him for a long time: did he function in the same way as you? Did the Chiss reproduce like humans? You were surprised that he reassured you about it before you even had to ask him the question.

You spent more time getting to know each other than actually sleeping together. Which allowed for some rather awkward moments between you, notably when it was necessary to put on a condom and you had to initiate it. It was quite sexy after all.

You had to ask him to stop asking questions and enjoy. And also to stop comparing what was happening to you to what he had read in books the previous week.

#star wars #grand admiral thrawn #thrawn #fanfiction #star wars headcanon #star wars thrawn #thrawn trilogy #grand admiral thrawn x reader #thrawn x reader #awkward

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agerefandom · 11 months

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Agerefandom 2022 Masterpost

This is a belated collection of my content from 2022! If you’re interested, here are the previous years: 2021 and 2020!

In 2020, I wrote eighteen fics: In 2021, I wrote twenty-two. In 2022, I only wrote five full fanfictions, but that’s probably because I was writing so many more headcanons this year! Here are the fanfictions I wrote last year:

Angels At The Window (Hazbin Hotel, caregivers!Charlie and Vaggie, regressor!Reader) As Sleeping Amber (Phantom of the Opera, regressor!Erik, caregiver!Christine) Flourishing In Sunlight (Avatar: The Last Airbender, postcanon, regressor!Katara, careiver!Zuko) Fancy Tuna and Frantic Texts (Ouran High School Host Club, regressor!Haruhi, caregivers!Tamaki and Kyoya) Natasha Is Young (Great Comet of 1812, regressor!Natasha, caregiver!Helene)

In 2020, I wrote thirty-two headcanon posts! In 2021, that went down to nineteen, but in 2022 I wrote forty-three headcanon sets!

regressor!Gary King (World’s End) caregiver!Jareth (Labyrinth) regressor!Vaggie (Hazbin Hotel) flip!Sans (Horrortale) regressor!Adam/creature (Frankenstein) caregiverse!Sundrop and Moondrop (FNAF Security Breach) regressor!Brahms Heelshire (The Boy) regressor!Severus Snape (Harry Potter) caregiver!Pennywise (It) caregvier!Annabelle Crane (Magnus Archives) regressor!Beetlejuice (Beetlejuice musical) regressor!Jade Harley (Homestuck) caregiver!V (V for Vendetta) caregiver!Val Frizzle (Magic School Bus) regressor!Stanley Pines (Gravity Falls) caregiver!Alastor (Hazbin Hotel) caregiver!Angel Dust (Hazbin Hotel) caregiver!13th Doctor (Doctor Who) regressors!Anna and Elsa (Frozen) regressor!Angel Dust (Hazbin Hotel) caregiver!Count Dooku (Star Wars) caregiver!Caleb Widogast (Critical Role) caregivers!Ruby and Sapphire (Steven Universe) regressor!Dana Scully (X-Files) regressor!Victor Frankenstein (Frankenstein) regressor!Stevonnie (Steven Universe) caregiver!Anakin Skywalker (Star Wars) regressor!Sam Winchester (Supernatural) regressor!10th Doctor with caregiver!Rose Tyler (Doctor Who) regressor!Eleven (Stranger Things) regressor!Bea and caregiver!Mae (Night In The Woods) regressor!Monika (Doki Doki Literature Club) regressor!Yuri (Doki Doki Literature Club) regressor!Sayori (Doki Doki Literature Club) regressor!Natsuki (Doki Doki Literature Club)

Disney Caregivers Gaston (Beauty and the Beast) Belle (Beauty and the Beast) Snow White (Snow White and the Seven Dwarves) Bruno (Encanto) Tiana and Naveen (Princess and the Frog) Oogie Boogie (Nightmare Before Christmas) Ariel (The Little Mermaid) Captain Amelia (Treasure Planet)

Under the ‘keep reading’ I’ve collected links to my thirteen favourite moodboards from the seventy-three I made in 2023, and some of my favourite art and edits as well!

Favourite Moodboards:

caregiver!V

regressor!Will Graham

regressor!Dipper Pines

regressor!Erik/Phantom

regressor!Peter Parker

regressor!Kylo Ren

caregiver!Count Dooku

regressor!Charles Xavier

regressor!Cal Strider

caregiver!Bakugou

regressor!Shigaraki

regressor!Noah Czerny

caregiver!Jasper Cullen

Favourite Art/Edits:

Tokoyami and Dark Shadow

regressor!Jade Harley

regressor!Angel and regressor!Charlie edits

regressor!Himiko Toga

regressors!Mae and Gregg

regressor!Ashton and cg!FCG

regressor!Bruno Madrigal

#this was in my drafts from before my hiatus!!#i was supposed to put it out in january #but that's when i dropped off the map whoops #anyways here it is now!!!#sfw agere #fandom agere #misc fandoms #agere writing #masterpost #agere headcanons #regression headcanons #my writing #2022 masterpost

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memes-saved-me · 2 years

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The Phantom of The Opera AU Moodboard

When Steven is handed the leading role of the opening night due to an accident which causes Thomas Hagan to quit he soon comes to learn it was at the hands of the famed Opera Ghost who wishes for him to take centre stage.

In the vast underground tunnels of the theatre Steven finds himself enamoured by the mysterious figure who visits him in the night and when his masks finally slips he finds that the love he has for his soul is not jilted by the flaws of his face.

#a happy ending?#yes #harringrove #edit #Billy's face isn't my best manip but vibes

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pinespittinink · 5 months

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“You must be almost done,” Zachary says, ushering me through the silent sets from past shows to the chaperoning wings of the mainstage. “Lottie will live. Come, you need to see the portal open.” He looks back at me, leaning close to speak in a lower, more appropriate tone. His smile is beaming, as though he holds enough beautiful secrets to flood the sun. “When you look through it so closely, I think it might just be another universe.”

🎭 welcome to the glavenisean theater 🎭

hello again, i am back with another moodboard as i figure out how to find images on unsplash! also here to say that i've sent out over fifty queries so far for TGGT, with a handful of requests out at the moment too!

what's this wip about? would i like it? aside from TGGT's intro post right here, this story is about a tailor who joins the crew of a phantasmagorical theater, falls for a Very Handsome Man, and quickly gets struck by hallucinations and dreams about the theater itself. because something....something just isn't quite right there, beginning with the mystery of why there was a job opening for Morgan to take to begin with.

there's also my ridiculous list of "if you like these things you might like TGGT"

Erin Morgenstern (The Night Circus, The Starless Sea), Hotel Magnifique, Weird Literature™️, ergodic writing and unreality (à la House of Leaves), found family, awkward gay main characters, elusive genderqueer characters, Moulin Rouge, the Phantom of the Opera, anyone who’s a nerd about backstage theater, Black Swan by BTS, the aesthetic of the Roaring 20s, rollercoaster plot twists, setting as a character (Piranesi), lush, tactile descriptions, and lyrical prose.

my taglist is seven months old so let me know if you want to be removed or added!: @sentfromwolves @cabaretofwords @antique-symbolism @muddshadow @florraisons @flowerprose @bebewrites @hysteriwah @the-void-writes @carrotblr @tananaphone @monstrousfreedom @phantomnations @inkingfireplace @saphoblin @theskeletonprior @midnight-and-his-melodiverse @perasperaadastrawriting

#the great glavenisean theater #writing community #writeblr #writeblr community #writeblr edit #my edits #seriously if you want off the taglist let me know! it's going to be sparser going forward anyway as i'm not exactly pumping out #new tggt material right now

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footprintsinthesxnd · 6 months

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Hi Jess hope your doing alright 😊 I saw you wip ask game. And Music of the night sounds really interesting 👀

Have a good time and take care 🩵

Hello Vanessa,

I’m good thanks. Hope you’re having a good week too.

So Music of the Night (I’ve used the name from one of my favourite songs from the Phantom of the Opera) is a one shot fic with George Luz.

George takes the reader to a dance that Easy Company go to while they are in England. George later confesses his feelings while they are dancing outside (don’t want to give too much away as to why they are outside etc)

But yeah it’s the George Luz x reader dancing fic that I told you about in the comments of your George Luz moodboard post. I’ve actually nearly finished this fic so I should hopefully be posting in next week or the week after 💕

Here’s a little snippet:

“I guess dances in Swindon are pretty popular,” George remarked, his hand resting firmly on her hip, as he guided Y/n through the crowds of people to where a group of their friends stood by the bar.

“LUZ! Y/L/N!” Skip called out, waving them over to him. He was standing with Malarkey, Hoobler and Penkala, all of whom were nursing their warm pints of beer.

“We were starting to think you two weren’t coming,” Malarkey spoke, taking a long swig of his pint, a small smirk dancing across his lips as he watched Y/n cheeks heated up.

“Sorry, George was waiting for me to get ready. It’s been so long since I’ve had to do anything with my hair…” Y/n began but George just placed his arm reassuringly around her shoulders.

“It’s the price of beauty, boys, and isn’t she a stunner?”

#band of brothers #george luz #george luz x reader

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nemo-of-house-hamartia · 9 months

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Welcome back! good to see you back here, I missed your content! for the aesthetic game, can you please do one for Dottie and one for Mathias? love them!

Hi there Nonnie! Thank you for your kind words, it's good to be back indeed! :D Allow me to present the Aesthetic for Dorothea and Mathias (also, keep an eye on my dash, because I have other requests for these two, so I have more aesthetic things coming for them :D)

🌹DOROTHEA MARIANNE STARRICK ✨

MOODBOARD:

PLAYLIST:

"Morning Star" - Blackmore's Night

"Winter's Bloom" - Adrian Von Ziegler

"Ghost of a Rose" - Blackmore's Night

STEAL HER LOOK:

QUOTES :

“Those freckles make you seem like a galaxy of stars, just waiting to be explored and loved.” - Nikita Gill

“All men have stars, but they are not the same things for different people. For some, who are travelers, the stars are guides. For others they are no more than little lights in the sky. For others, who are scholars, they are problems... But all these stars are silent. You-You alone will have stars as no one else has them.” - Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Le Petit Prince

“...her who whose beauty is not like earthly beauty, dangerous to look upon, but like the morning star which is its emblem, bright and musical.”- James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

“In a Wonderland they lie, Dreaming as the days go by, Dreaming as the summers die: Ever drifting down the stream- Lingering in the golden gleam- Life, what is it but a dream?” ― Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass

HER AESTHETIC:

Starlit sky; Northern Lights setting the sky blazing; stargazing alone on a secluded beach with the waves as gentle company; frost-covered roses in a hidden garden; walking down a path in the forest at night holding a silver lantern as a sole guide with the snow gently falling silently all around; abandoned manors hidden away in the depths of an ancient forest; ghosts still dancing together in ballrooms accompanied only by the music of their memories; sitting by the fireplace on an ancient rocking chair and reading an ancient tome under a thick pelt; sipping on warm rose tea while looking at the snow falling outside; snuggling under the comfort of heavy blankets in a canopy bed;

🌙MATHIAS SÉBASTIEN DE BEAUMONT🎨

MOODBOARD:

PLAYLIST:

"Hijo De La Luna" - Mecano

"Outdoor" - Roberto Cacciapaglia

"Adagio" - Il Divo

STEAL HIS LOOK:

QUOTES:

“Because when he sings...even the birds stop to listen.”- Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games

“Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent”- Victor Hugo

“Now I want to live like everybody else. I want to have a wife like everybody else and to take her out on Sundays. I have invented a mask that makes me look like anybody. People will not even turn round in the streets. You will be the happiest of women. And we will sing, all by ourselves, till we swoon away with delight. You are crying! You are afraid of me! And yet I am not really wicked. Love me and you shall see! All I wanted was to be loved for myself. If you loved me I should be as gentle as a lamb; and you could do anything with me that you pleased.” - Gaston Leroux, The Phantom of the Opera

“He stared dully at the desolate, cold road and the pale, dead night. Nothing was colder or more dead than his heart. He had loved an angel and now he despised a woman.”- Gaston Leroux, The Phantom of the Opera

HIS AESTHETIC:

A small nook to sit and reflect quietly; new quills and parchments; the perfume of freshly brewed coffee, the way the air smell when Autumn is about to arrive, the feeling when the fingers start tickling the ivories and a melody is born, completely encompassing one's soul; the sound of rain against the glass of the windows; riding a horse with the wind caressing one's hair, free from all fears and worries; songs sung together with friends; the perfume of orange flowers and neroli still lingering on the pillow; the sight of the full moon after a night storm; waves crashing against the sand in the distance;

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

#Aesthetic Game #Assassin's Creed #OCs #Mathias De Beaumont #Dorothea Starrick #Moodboards #this was SO MUCH FUN #also sorry for the delay I was immensely busy in the past couple of days due to finally moving into our rightful apartment #now I am catching up with the asks #I will have them out in the next few days :)

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dwindlinghaze · 5 months

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hi, so happy that you’re having an event !! can i please get a 🩰 and 🪞 (just the vibe you get from me and my akk ig, also i looove you theme so very looking forward to the moodboards)

male preference, marauders era / well, im 21, studying literature and linguistics in the uni. im leo (which says a lot)/ im really into literature - my fav books are probably classic english novels like little women and frankenstein. but i also adore sci fi and fantasy / i love abba and taylor swift a lot / i love wearing sweaters, classic suits and vintage shirts with collars and puffy sleaves. also obsessed with jewellery (pearls, golden rings an hoops) / my weird obsessions are true crime and supernatural (the tv show)/ i love going out in cinema and theatre/ i am bubbly until you are disrespectful to me or which is worse to my friends, my bestie says she’s scared when im mad/ hate stupidity and being late/ hope to become a researcher in the field of education 🦢🕯️

heyy ty for participating in my 500 celebration 🫧

☾⋆｡𖦹 °✩

🩰 : i ship you with remus lupin

╰┈➤ remus loves spending time with you in silence while reading english classics. it could be in his dorm, library, couch, anywhere.

remus' head was positioned against your thigh, he was listening attentively as you read 'little women' out loud to him. "I can't say 'yes' truly, so I won't say it at all," you said. "do they end up together?" the boy looked up at you. "jo and laurie?" you ran your fingers through his hair as your face stretched into an amused smile. remus hummed in reply. "well, we've got to finish the book to find out," you answered although you knew the ending all too well.

╰┈➤ remus loves seeing you in sweaters all snuggly and warm, he'd lend you his sometimes too. oh and also, he thinks your style looks so flattering on you and would definitely buy clothing items or jewelries that remind him of you. you didn't care if it was expensive or not, you love anything that he gives you. pearls, rings, and hoops give the vibes of elegance which he adores so much!!

both of you were shopping together and he stumbled across a gorgeous piece of clothing. "wait, this one will look stunning on you! try it please?" his finger pointed to a puff sleeved top with pearls decorating it. "well, what do you think?" you questioned as you did a spin with your arms out. "i love it." he ended up buying it for you and you kiss him in return.

╰┈➤ you and remus will have a movie night twice a month to watch sci-fi movies and if you're having a rough day, he'd put on supernatural- because he knew it's your favourite- while cuddling you on the bed with different kinds of snacks to cheer you up. he would take you out to the cinema when there's a good film you've been eager to watch or on special days he will get you tickets to see live theatres.

"honey, c'mere to bed," he said when he saw you walking in, face tired and body exhausted. "i've got your favourite snacks," he continued as you plopped down beside him, a sigh escaping your lips. "thanks, love," you gave remus a chaste kiss before positioning yourself to get comfortable under the blanket with him. "relax yourself, dove, you've had enough of work today," he kissed the top of your head before pressing play on the screen.

"oh my god you did not!" you gasped when remus held out two tickets to watch 'the phantom of the opera'. "i know you wanted to watch a live performance lately so...." he said shyly as a wide smile appeared across your face. "it must cost a fortune!" you shook your head in disbelief, looking at him with love and admiration. "don't worry about that." he just loves making you happy.

╰┈➤ after hearing from your friend about how scary you were when you're mad, the last he'll do is making you mad. he's a bit reckless sometimes so he'd be more careful about what he says or does.

╰┈➤ remus is a man of discipline. he would never be late!!!

╰┈➤ he is so supportive of your dreams of becoming a researcher in education. we all know he's very academically smart and well educated so he gives you little opinions (though you don't need it because i'm sure you know what you're doing but love hearing his thoughts anyway)

╰┈➤ i also ship you with james potter solely because you both have fire signs and uh hello?? twin fire signs (yes a taylor reference)

#dwindlinghaze's 500 celebration #moots <3 #🩰 dancing princesses #remus lupin x reader #remus lupin fluff #remus lupin imagine #marauders x reader

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flowerandblood · 5 months

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The Man with the Cold Lips

[ Amor • Aemond x Psyche • female ]

[ warnings: sex content, oral sex, fingering, smut, angst, domination, violence, trauma, mourning ]

[ description: After she is attacked in a fair by a strange man and narrowly avoids death, her father the king decides that from now on she will be watched over by one of his ‘ghosts’, a assassin acting on his orders, wearing a black mask. The man follows her like a shadow, accompanied by their past, which keeps her awake at night. Gothic horror love story, angst, sexual tension, very dark Aemond. ]

Series & Characters Moodboard Lady Walford Moodboard Gothic & Horror Sensual Moodboard

Yesterday's trailer and the panel with ewan did something to me, so I think that dark aemond is the most appropriate thing I can give you today and that's it. It begins!

* English is not my first language. Please, do not repost. Enjoy! *

Next chapters: Masterlist

_____

Although she knew it was dangerous, after what had happened she forbade telling the King about what she had discovered. Some part of her hoped that Prince Aemond was alive − she was willing to help him regain the throne if only he would agree to spare her brother's life.

She spent the rest of the day alone in her chamber, covered in thick furs, thinking hard about what had happened.

About Vhagar.

He told her she knew his name, so he must have been someone she had seen on a daily basis before. Her discovery frightened him enough that he was willing to kill her − however, did he really want to do it out of fear of her father's wrath and the fact that he would lose his position, or was it something else?

She bit her lower lip at the thought that a part of her suspected she might be working with the Prince, to be his liaison, a devoted servant who by some miracle had managed to get into her father-king's closest guard.

He gave up the idea of murder because he knew that even if he had faked her suicide − the King would have blamed him for not watching over her and he would have lost everything, so he came up with another excuse, hiding himself behind sheer terror, hoping that she would believe him.

However, what purpose did what happened between them afterwards?

She pressed her lips together, feeling the heat in her body at the memory of that overwhelming feeling of fulfilment, that wonderful tickling and tension rising in her lower abdomen with each of his thrusts.

She placed her hand on her womb, swallowing hard at the thought that he had come inside her, that she could expect a child because of his seed.

She squeezed her eyelids shut, trying to breathe calmly, thinking only of how much better it would have been if he had let her die that night.

Her father had demanded, despite her objections, that she join the funeral feast in her mother's honour, so she walked reluctantly down to the great hall, her ghost following her at a greater distance than usual.

She thought that he himself was horrified by what had happened between them and the consequences that might follow.

She sat down at the table next to her brother, her father smiled at her and she reciprocated the gesture, thinking with amusement about how easy it was for her to pretend.

"There she is, my daughter. My treasure, my greatest support." He said with a pride from which her throat squeezed.

Only a few years ago she would have believed his words.

She felt him grasp her hand and she reciprocated the embrace, stroking his skin with her thumb.

"She's no longer a child and I've decided it's time to find her a suitable candidate for a husband." He said lightly, she felt her heart stop, the smile disappeared from her lips, on her face only pain mixed with disbelief.

They were at a feast dedicated to the funeral of her mother, his queen, and he was discussing her marriage.

"I ask that willing lords report to me on this matter." He said contentedly, letting go of her hand, and she closed her eyes, trying to calm herself.

She felt him standing behind her, felt his menacing, dark aura, and wondered what he was thinking.

If he imagined her lying in bed with another man, letting him sink deep between her thighs.

She left the feast quickly that evening, explaining to her father that she was tired, which he accepted with understanding. When she stepped into her chamber her servants helped her to pull off her mourning gown, once again offering her condolences, blowing out all the candles one by one.

She lay comfortably under the thick layers of furs, looking out the window at the cloudless sky full of stars, thinking about what had happened, unable to believe that by some miracle she was still alive.

As she began to slowly fall asleep she shuddered suddenly; she heard the door to her chamber open − Vhagar stepped inside without a word and closed it quietly behind him.

She watched with a rapidly pounding heart as, with an unhurried, lazy step, he approached her windows, untied the curtains and covered the only source of light with them, repeating this act until complete darkness fell around them.

She could see nothing but blackness.

She heard the sound of steel hinges opening, then the sound of a belt being unbuckled and the rustling of robes falling to the floor.

She lay still, her lips parted in horror and disbelief, felt once again this familiar, throbbing sensation between her thighs and embarrassing, sticky wetness.

She listened to his footsteps, the old wood creaking under his feet as he finally climbed onto her bed, she heard it bend under his weight.

She felt the touch of his big hand on her cheek and trembled, taking a deep breath, realising he wasn't wearing gloves, his warm breath wrapped around her face.

She tightened her hands on his bare, muscular shoulders as his fingers slipped into the ties of her nightgown and just ripped them open − she squealed when she heard the sound of the fabric being torn and a cool breeze surrounded her flesh.

"− I won't stop −" He said in a trembling, deep voice, so startlingly clear that shivers ran through her, her mouth parted wide in a helpless moan when she realised he wasn't wearing a mask.

She squealed loudly, her body arching all over, her hands clenched in his hair when she felt it, his cold, wet mouth clamped down on her warm breast, playing with her nipple, sucking and licking it, the spot between her thighs throbbing with pleasure and desire.

"− oh − oh, gods −" She mumbled out, never having felt anything like it in her life, his hands ripped her chemise off her and only then did she feel his whole naked body pressed against her skin − it was such an overpowering, shocking sensation that she was out of breath.

She wanted to enjoy every second of what was happening, his lips teasing her nipple with a loud click, clearly taking great pleasure from it, his hands tightened on her hips, forcing her to spread her thighs wider in front of him, her fingers stroking his hair − she thought with a trembling heart that they were unexpectedly soft and long.

"− we can't −" She choked out with an effort, wanting to retain the remnants of her sober thinking and decency.

He, however, only chuckled under his breath, amused, his hand from her hip slid down between her thighs − she whimpered loudly as his fingertips ran over her heat, collecting the moisture that had already managed to flow out of her, oversensitive and delicate.

"− should I leave you like this? − I'm not that cruel −" He hummed under his breath with a kind of excitement from which she quivered all over. She heard him raise himself higher on his elbow, his nose ran over her cheek − she gasped as she felt his fingers begin to apply more pressure, in sure, circular motions teasing the bud hidden between her folds.

All she could think about was that he wasn't wearing a mask, her hand rised involuntarily to touch his cheek.

"Tsk-tsk." He hissed as he caught her wrist − his tongue ran over her upper lip as his middle finger made its way inside her, searching with it for the spot he had rubbed earlier with his length. "Don't."

She mewled with delight and her body shook with a shiver of pleasure when he finally found it, her hips responded to his touch with desperate rocking, her mouth parted invitingly, letting his tongue deep into her throat, their lips joined in a sticky, loud, hot kiss.

She panted loudly along with him, stroking his hair as she felt him slide his finger out of her, impatient, his lips sucking and brushing her fleshy skin again and again as the tip of his manhood pushed against her swollen slit, thrusting forcefully inside her.

She clasped her hands on his bare back feeling the scars beneath them and cried quietly into his mouth, trying with difficulty to fit him inside her − he throbbed all over in arousal, her breasts pressed against his chest in the tight embrace of their bodies.

They both started to moan between loud, wet kisses as he began to root into her hot core − this time she was so wet that a few pushes of his hips were enough for him to begin slipping into her with ease.

"− mmm − that's it − so fucking good −" He panted into her mouth, gripping her hips tightly with his hands, stretching her tight walls with his length with every movement of his hips.

She moaned helplessly beneath him, stroking his hair, neck, shoulders and back, all sweaty from exertion, their lips finding each other in messy kisses over and over again.

"− fuck − do you really think I'm going to share what's mine? − that I would allow some mere, petty lord take you? − hm? −" He hissed out and she felt her walls clench tightly on him at his words in pleasure, heat surged through her lower abdomen from which her head completely spun, her helpless whimpering answered him.

"− p-please − I − ughmm −" She babbled, unable to focus on anything other than how he slammed his manhood into her, how wonderfully it teased the spot hidden in her walls.

She wrapped her legs around his waist, wanting to feel him closer, tightening her fingers on his back − she heard him groan low feeling it, speeding up, thrusting into her like crazy.

"− you want it, don't you? − my seed − deep, deep inside you − fuck, say it −" He breathed out between quick, deep, brutal thrusts − she felt him looking at her, felt his hot breath on her face, his forehead pressed against hers.

"− y-yes − please − fill me, fill me, fill me −" She mewled, both of them moaning loudly as a powerful orgasm shook her body, her core began to clench against him, forcing him to let go, his length twitching all over as his semen spilled deep inside her.

"− good gods, yes, take it −" He exhaled in delight, his thrusts sloppy and desperate, pushing his seed as deep into her as possible.

"− you're mine − I'm going to fill you every night − gods, you're going to bear me so many children −" He gasped in bliss, slowly coming down from his peak, the whimpers of pleasure coming out of her lips at his words − she wasn't sure she'd ever experienced anything like this in her life.

"− please −" She mumbled quietly like a helpless child, running her hands over his naked skin, wanting to remember that wonderful feeling − they were both hot and sweaty with pleasure, their bodies sticking to each other, her breasts pressed against his bare chest.

They both sighed when he finally fell on top of her, embracing her, their fingers sinking into each other's bodies, wanting to feel each other as much as possible, though she wasn't sure if two people could connect in any physical way more than they did now.

She could feel his loud, raspy breath against her cheek, the tip of his nose running over her hot skin, as if he wanted to check that it wasn't all just the result of his imagination.

"− stay − stay inside me −" She whispered, and he sighed quietly, as if relieved, with a gentle movement of his hips sliding his already half-soft manhood fully into her, hiding himself deep inside her.

Even though she knew it was wrong and irresponsible, that she couldn't trust him, that he was a traitor, she had never felt safer with anyone before, her eyelids closing involuntarily, having not experienced a peaceful sleep for so long.

"− don't open your eyes until I leave −" He whispered in her ear and she nodded, stroking his soft hair, her lungs filled with his scent, male sweat, steel, dust and fire.

His arms held her in a tight embrace through this night and many nights to come, making the days blend into one for her.

Each time he came to her he would cover the windows with curtains so that she could see nothing, and then sink his lips and tongue into the warmth between her thighs, groaning in delight as he felt how much of her moisture flowed out of her, only to end up rooting deep into her, as he promised, filling her with his seed.

He always rose before dawn − she could see through her closed eyelids that the first rays of light were sneaking into her chamber despite the curtains, that if she opened them she could see his face.

She feared, however, what she would see.

All she could think about all day was the night, what he brought to her along with the brutal, deep thrusts of his hips.

When he took her, he would say that he was her husband, that only he had the right to touch her, that she would only bear his children.

She was his.

He used to show this to her by standing closer than usual when she was eating or reading, by no longer leaving when she was taking a bath or changing, staring at her shamelessly, promising her servants in her presence that if they said anything to the King, he would end their lives.

"Vhagar doesn't mean it and he would never hurt you against my will. Am I right?" She asked coldly, frowning at him as the terrified girl tried to attach the long sleeves to her gown with trembling hands.

"Mmm."

When they were alone he would dare to approach her from behind as she sit, his leather-gloved hand running over her throat only to grasp her cheeks tightly and lift her face up, forcing her to look at him.

She stared into his eyes obscured by the dark material, at his mask, indifferent, cold, mocking, his thumb gently massaging her skin.

He didn't need to say anything − she could feel the tension between them quivering in the air, making her feel a throbbing inside her.

"Tonight I'm going to make use of those lips." He hummed softly, parting her lips with his finger − she closed her eyes, feeling that she couldn't last, her hand lifted swiftly the thick layers of her gown and slid deep between her thighs, sinking into her moist warmth.

He sighed quietly, looking down at it, clearly taking satisfaction from the fact that his mere presence made her unable to bear it, that she needed to relieve herself.

"− do you want it so badly? − me fucking those moist, sweet lips? − hm? −" He cooed, and she only whimpered, tilting her head back, resting it against his stomach, with a loud, embarrassing click rising and falling on her fingers, teasing her pearl at the same time, feeling her nipples grow hard with arousal.

"− please −" She mumbled, although she didn't know what she was asking for, they couldn't do it now − they had to wait until night fell, like every day.

"− you look wonderful like this −" He murmured, stroking her cheek with his thumb, his voice trembling slightly − she knew that he was already completely hard, that he was dying at the thought of being deep inside her at night. "− so devoted −"

She mewled at his words and felt him clamp his hand over her mouth, stifling her moans that escaped her throat as she reached her peak − she felt her walls clench hungrily on her fingers, wonderful waves of heat surged through her body again and again. She heard him gasp with satisfaction as he saw her body spilling in front of him on the chair.

"− mine −"

That night as they lay in complete darkness, both of them falling asleep, his nose snuggled into the hollow of her neck, his soft manhood deep inside her, she dared to ask him the question that had long been pressing against her tongue.

"Are you Prince Aemond's envoy?"

Her question hung in the air as if in the void; she felt his body freeze − for a moment he did not breathe, his fingers tightened on her soft skin.

Silence.

Long, cruel, cold.

"Yes."

She swallowed loudly, a shudder went through her at his words. He felt it and leaned in, placing a soft, warm kiss on her shoulder, his fingers squeezing her breast with affection.

"I want to help him. Can you convey this to him?" She asked in a whisper and felt him flinch all over, letting the air out of his lungs in disbelief − she felt him lift a little, his hot breath on her cheek.

"What do you mean?" He asked in a trembling, low, deep voice, as if he couldn't believe what he was hearing. She pressed her lips together feeling her heart pounding like mad.

"I will support him if he spares my little brother. If he agrees, I'll do whatever he wants." She said in pain, feeling a squeeze in her throat − his lips pressed quickly against her skin, greedily, violently, kissing and sucking her, his length throbbing hard inside her.

He began to move again, slowly rooting into her with a sigh of delight and relief, saying no more until they reached their peak together, panting loudly, their bodies heated and quivering with exertion.

"− be patient −" He whispered in her ear with such tenderness that she felt her heart squeeze, heat spilling over her lower abdomen. "− soon − I promise you, we'll be married soon −"

After what he said, she fell asleep filled with hope, with the fact that she wanted to believe his words, that he would really protect her, that perhaps a great bloodshed could be avoided this time.

That they would really get married.

She thought that now, that everything had come together in her mind, she could finally look at him − her future husband, the man who had taken her for himself, who brutally and indivisibly stormed into her heart.

That was why, even though she had sworn to him that she would not do so, hearing him get dressed in a hurry she lifted her eyelids.

She felt her heart freeze, her throat squeezed so tightly that she couldn't catch her breath.

He sensed something was wrong, subconsciously realised she had broken her promise and lifted his gaze to her, his hands clenched on the belt of his coat.

A large scar ran across his right cheek, in his eye socket not a blue iris, as it seemed to her when she looked at him through the thin black material, but a sapphire, glinting dangerously in the first rays of the sun, his lips clenched into a thin line, in his healthy eye pain, disappointment and anger.

"You shouldn't have done that."

_____

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