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#and it’s SUCH a gorgeous old dress I couldn’t pass it up even with missing pieces

sasa-slayer · 5 months

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Hi! This is a little imagine about Jacob imprinting on best friend!reader. I have a bunch of more ideas about this relationship, so let me know if you want to see them!

WARNING: one F-bomb and I think that’s it. Also, reader is gender neutral :)

Jacob Black was my best friend, my other half.

I met him when I moved to forks at 12 years old. I was riding my bike when he passed me on his bike, declared he was winning the “race”. He was so focused on beating me, he missed a turn and crashed into a bush. After laughing for a while, I greeted my future best friend.

We were both homeschooled and spent so many days playing games or doing homework together. And as we got older, I would sit and sketch or read as he worked on cars and bikes.

We did everything together, Jacob, I, and our other two main friends, Quil and Embry. So, you can imagine how confused and hurt Jacob and I were when they stopped talking to us; but, we promised we would never do that to each other.

Yet, Jacob hasn’t spoken to me in 3 weeks. I called him every other day, his dad saying he needed time, so I gave him space. But I was worried that I should be there to help him through whatever he was going through. I just wanted to see that he was ok.

So, I couldn’t stand by and hope for the best any longer. As the rain thundered down against my window, I pulled on my haindpainted mushroom-patterned converse and hopped on my bike.

I arrived and kicked off my muddy shoes as Jacob’s dad, Billy, opened the door with shock, immediately trying to get me to leave.

“I’m sorry, But I have to know he’s ok.” I pushed passed Billy, and sprinted to Jacob’s room. This house was my second home, so I knew how to move my hips just right to avoid any furniture.

When, I finally reached his door, I hesitated. Deciding it was best to give him a warning before I barged in, I knocked loudly, and then opened the door slowly.

“What’s going on-“

Jacob has just stood up, clearly just waking up, as I stood in the door way.

and then it happened.

Jacob slowly dropped to his knees, but I barely noticed. I had fallen down backwards, confused.

Moments of Jacob’s and my past flashing before my eyes. Me cleaning his scratched up knee as I introduced myself, him throwing me in the water at La push, us sitting in my bedroom as I braided his hair.

And then I saw moments that had never occurred. Me at a bonfire surrounded by people I didn’t know but they felt strangely familiar, Jacob engulfing me into a hug as I cried pulling a suitcase behind me, me in a beautiful purple dress and Him in a gorgeous green tux as we said our vows.

“It’s you…” I heard Jacob whisper.

I looked up to see Billy had wheeled his way over to us, and I looked at him and Jacob in terror. “What the fuck just happened?”

“I’ll gather up everyone and then we’ll explain everything” Billy said as he wheeled himself towards the phone.

I looked at Jacob for comfort, but I got lost in the emotion of his eyes. There was confusion, regret, contentment, and even excitement. And then he broke out in the biggest grin and engulfed me in a bear hug, inhaling into my neck.

I hugged back, shaking from the intensity of the flurry of emotions I felt.

“After avoiding me for three weeks, you mentally slap me with some weird voodoo magic. What a friend you are” I laugh out, pulling him into an even tighter embrace. “I’m so kicking your ass after I make sure you’re ok”

Jacob let out a breathy chuckle, swaying with me as we hugged.

“…Also, what the hell happened to your hair?”

413 notes · View notes

austinshotbutlers · 1 year

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The Wedding Date - Part Two

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x Fem!BAU!Reader

Summary: Your sister’s wedding is approaching fast and the thought of showing your boyfriend off to you family and your ex-boyfriend seems like a very appealing idea. The only problem is… you don’t have a boyfriend. Luckily your stony faced, serious, sexy boss has agreed to be your fake boyfriend for the weekend. What could possibly go wrong?

Word count: 4.1k

TW: Mentions and allusions to sex, swear words and bad writing?

A/N: Part two is here!!! I’ve tagged everyone who commented on part one but let me know if you want to be removed. The love i have received for part one has meant so much, I didn’t think it would blow up as much as it did. Thank you so much to every single one of you! There will be a part three! Part one can be found here

“Maybe we should hold hands?” You suggested as your smoothed down the red, silky dress you had picked for the party as you made your way into the extremely expensive looking lounge bar. You adjusted your hair slightly to ensure it looked perfect and once again smoothed the surface of your dress.

“Stop fidgeting, you look beautiful.” Aaron smiled and he took your hand in his.

You walked through the large doors into a gorgeous, old fashioned style bar. Family and friends were mingling all around nursing all kinds of alcoholic beverages. A waiter with a tray of champagne flutes passed and you quickly grabbed two, handing one to Aaron. You knocked it back in one, ready to face the challenges of the evening.

“You might want to slow down just a little bit.” Aaron laughed as he took a small sip from his own flute.

You were about to respond but the shrill sound of your sister cut you off.

“EEEEK!” She squealed as she ran over. “My sister is here! Who’s the hunk?” She attempted to whisper so Aaron couldn’t hear but failed miserably. “I’m getting married! I’m getting married!” And before you could respond, your slightly intoxicated sister ran off to hound someone else.

“She is going to be so drunk by the end of the night.” You say to Aaron, rolling your eyes jokingly.

“I’m just going to step outside and give Jack a call. Is that ok?” Aaron asks, pulling his phone out his suit pocket.

“Oh god yes! Go call him!” You ushered him away to let him phone Jack. This was your chance to go and refresh yourself and you made your way to the restroom. You looked at yourself in the mirror, tucking some loose hair back behind your ear before retouching your lipstick. You smiled to yourself as you remembered Hotch saying you looked beautiful, heat rose to your cheeks and you fanned your face to calm down. Once you had collected your thoughts and you had finished touching up your makeup, you headed straight out the restroom door and walked smack into someone.

“God I’m so sorry. I wasn’t looking where I was…” you looked up and immediately recognised the cold steely eyes that were staring back at you. “Luke….” You laughed nervously. “Hi.”

He loosened his tie slightly before he spoke. “Er… Y/N, hi.”

You both stood in an awkward silence for a few seconds as you took in his appearance. He had aged quite a bit since you had last seen him; the start of a receding hairline, a messy, unkempt beard and still wearing ill fitting suits. You took a mental note of how much better Aaron wore a suit.

“Where’s this boyfriend I’ve been hearing about?” He asked abruptly.

You were quite taken aback. “He’s somewhere in the bar. He wasn’t going to escort me to the bathroom.” You replied bluntly.

He was just about to say something else when the uncanny voice of your cousin filled the small hallway.

“Oh my god!! If it isn’t my favourite cousin ever!” She yelled, running over and embracing you tightly. “Seriously, nearly two years since I last saw you. I have ex-boyfriends I see more than you.”

You laughed as you pulled back from the hug. “Oh Livvy I’ve missed you.”

She smiled at you before turning to face Luke. “Hello asshole.” She says in a moody tone. “Hope it’s alright if I just steal my cousin away.” And before Luke could utter a single word, Liv was dragging you up the stairs back to the party.

“Thank god you came when you did. I think he was about to play 21 questions with me about my new boyfriend.” You huffed.

“I will always rescue you from that asshole.” Liv replied and picked up a glass of champagne. “Now here,” she passed it to you. “Drink! God knows you’re going to need it.”

You sipped at the drink and scanned the room to see if Aaron had joined the party again. Just then, you saw him on the arm of your mother as she introduced him to all of your aunts. She had clearly cornered him when he came back to the party and insisted on introducing him to all the family. You smiled as he said something which made the group laugh, all your aunts seeming to take an instant liking to him.

“Ok, spill! Who is the sexy boyfriend of yours then? How did you meet?” Liv asked as she watched Aaron as well.

“We work together at the BAU. He’s the Unit Chief.” You replied without a second thought.

“Dating the boss? Sounds like something I would do.” She laughed.

You shook your head with a laugh and then looked up to see that Aaron had managed to escape your mother’s death grip and was making his way over to you. When he reached you, he placed his hand on your hip and ducked down to place a kiss on your cheek.

“How was Jack?” You asked breathlessly, the tingle of Aaron’s lips still lingering on your cheek.

“Yeah he’s good. Tired from a long day playing soccer.” Aaron replied with a smile.

Your cousin coughed to remind you of her presence.

“Liv!” You burst out, moving to the side so Aaron could see her properly. “Aaron, this is my cousin Liv.” You introduced them. Aaron put his hand out and Liv shook it enthusiastically.

“Nice to meet you Aaron. I’m so glad Y/N finally got over that pathetic loser and decided to get herself a real man.”

“Liv!” You hissed at her as she embarrassed you but Aaron just smiled and moved so he could wrap his arm around your waist. “Let’s go get another drink.” You say to him and you both wondered over to the bar.

“What would you like?” Aaron asked as he caught the attention of the bartender.

“Anything that’s stronger than champagne.” You groaned.

“Two scotches please.” Aaron asked the bartender and he speedily poured out two tumblers of amber liquid.

“Thanks.” You murmured just loud enough for Aaron to hear. He placed his arm back around your waist, taking a sip of his scotch.

You started to giggle to yourself and Aaron looked at you quizzically. “What’s so funny?”

“Well it’s just…” you laughed a bit harder. “Hotch drinking scotch.”

Aaron rolled his eyes, trying his best to suppress the smile that was slowly forming on his face. “It’s not even funny Y/N.”

“Say that to the smile on your face.” You laughed harder and Aaron gave in, laughing with you. “I think the alcohol is finally working, I’m going to go and get some fresh air,” and you slowly made your way out to the patio, taking a deep breath in.

***

Aaron smiled as he watched you glide across the floor, heading to the opened doors. If someone had told him a month ago that he would be in LA with you, pretending to be your boyfriend, he would have said they were insane. This was so out of character for him yet it felt so right being here with you. Everything about you made his heart swell; your smile and laugh, your bad jokes, the way you tuck your hair behind your ears. But tonight, the way you looked in that red dress just took his breath away, you were simply stunning.

He turned back to the bar and asked for another scotch which the bartender handed over.

“I’ll have the same.” Someone said from beside him, he turned to look at the man. He had a long overgrown beard that definitely needed trimming and a rather bad fitting suit on. “Partying alone?” The man asked Aaron.

“No, my girlfriend has just gone to get a breath of fresh air.” He replied. “You?”

“All by myself tonight being painfully taunted by my ex-girlfriend.” Said the man with a sigh, taking a large gulp of his scotch.

‘Surely this isn’t Luke?’ Aaron thought to himself as he attempted to profile his mannerisms and appearance.

“Yeah she seems to be trying to make me jealous. She claims she has a boyfriend but I’m yet to see him with her. She’s desperate to show me what I’m certainly not missing.” He continued and Aaron immediately realised that this was indeed your ex-boyfriend. The bitter tone as he spoke about you so rudely was enough to make Aaron want to use all his FBI combat training but he refrained so not to cause a scene. Then, out of the corner of his eye, Aaron saw you striding effortlessly in your heels across the room to him.

*** You looked over the gorgeous gardens as you stood in the early evening, the sun beginning to set. While your sister may be an insufferable bridezilla, she knew how to pick a beautiful venue. You downed the last drop of your scotch and turned to look back inside at the party. Your sister and her fiancé Thomas were chatting to your dad, your mom was telling some extravagant story to a group of people who were laughing along and Aaron…

You looked for him and saw him where you had left him at the bar and talking to…Luke!

“Oh shit!“ you shouted out loud and received a couple of unimpressed stares from some guests who were admiring the gardens as well. You put the glass in your hand down on the nearest table you could find and hastily strode across the room to get to them. Without taking a single look at Luke, you wrapped your arms around Aaron and kissed him hard on the lips. His initial shock wore off almost instantly as he melted into the kiss, placing his free hand on the small of your back, kissing you back. It felt so perfect, so right and little did you know, Aaron felt the exact same.

You pulled back abruptly and turned to see Luke with a dumbfounded look on his face.

“Luke!” You faked surprise. “I didn’t see you there. Have you two met?” You asked, motioning between him and Aaron.

“Not… not formally.” Luke replied bluntly.

“Oh! Well Luke, this is my boyfriend Aaron.” You smiled, moving so Aaron could offer his usual handshake which Luke shook reluctantly.

“I… er, I should go and find Thomas.” Luke said monotonously and he scampered away before you or Aaron could say anything to him.

As soon as he was out of earshot, you turned to Aaron. “Oh my god! That wasn’t too much was it?” You asked him frantically and Aaron just laughed.

“No, not at all. It was just a surprise is all.” He smiled sweetly.

“God I’m so sorry! And I’ve got lipstick all on your lips, hang on.” You frantically grabbed a napkin from the bar and started to wipe his lips clean of your red lipstick.

The concentration on your face made Aaron smile and he watched you with such adoration.

“Thank you.” He murmured and you looked too see him smiling at you. Heat rose to your cheeks, the way he looked you made you feel like a pre-teen again. You were about to speak when the sound of a glass being tapped silenced everyone in the bar.

“If I could please have your attention.” The voice of your mother filled the room.

“Jesus. Prepare yourself for the second-hand embarrassment from my mother speaking publicly.” You whispered to Aaron and he chuckled.

“Thank you all for coming to celebrate the engagement of my beautiful daughter Sarah and her fiancé Thomas. We have been waiting for a wedding in this family for a very long time now. We of course thought Y/N would be the first one down the aisle.” The mention of your name immediately caused a lot of looks from around the room focused on you, a couple of murmurs too and you cursed in your head whoever let your mom make a speech while feeling the affects of alcohol. However, the feeling of Aaron snaking his arm around your hips and holding you close made you relax and you tried to ignore your mom’s speech but luckily, your dad interjected and took over.

“To Sarah and Thomas!” He cheered raising a class and everyone followed suit.

“Are you ok?” Aaron whispered quietly into your ear and all you could do was nod.

***

As soon as you walked into your bedroom, you kicked off you heels and threw yourself onto the bed. Aaron walked in a couple of seconds later, loosening his tie and undoing his top button.

“That was simply awful.” You groaned into the pillow.

“It wasn’t that bad.” Aaron said as he sat down next to you on the bed, starting to unlace his shoes.

“Easy for you to say.” You huffed. “When you were talking to Luke, what was he saying?”

Aaron hesitated, debating whether or not to share the whole conversation but he settled on telling the truth. “He said you were trying hard to make him jealous and he didn’t believe you had a boyfriend.”

You couldn’t believe what you were hearing and sat up abruptly. “He is such a dick!” You exclaim. “How did I deal with it for 5 years?”

“What exactly happened when he broke up with you?” Aaron asked, curiosity getting the better of him.

You took a deep breath. It was about time you shared the full story, no one knew it other than you and Luke. You hadn’t realised but Aaron had placed his hand on top of yours and engulfed it completely.

“It’s ok. Take your time.” He said with such care and kindness in his voice.

“Well, it was on our anniversary of all days. I guess we had been having some rocky patches, he didn’t like the idea of me moving to Washington and he especially didn’t like the idea of me joining the FBI. Luke is the reason it took me so long to apply for the BAU and when I finally did and told him, he was so annoyed!” Tears started to well in your eyes as you remember just how horrible the fight was and Aaron’s grip on your hand tightened which comforted you. “I ignored just how bad the fight was because everyone said it was normal but looking back, he was such a…”

“Fucking asshole.” Aaron interjected.

“Exactly. He’s exactly that.” You say. “The day he dumped me, everyone had got inside my head saying he was going to propose. My mom, sister and even his mom thought he was proposing. That’s why it hurt so bad, we were even… intimate the night before he dumped me.” Anger flared inside Aaron. How could anyone ever treat you like that? If he didn’t already hate Luke from his brief meeting with him this morning, he definitely hated him now. “No one really knew what to say to me, I was so heartbroken. I had to move back in with my parents and that’s when I decided I’d had enough and I packed up everything to come to Washington.”

“And thank god you did.” Aaron said with a smile. “The team wouldn’t work without you.” And you laughed.

“I’m going to go and get ready for bed.” You said, standing up and heading to the bathroom.

Once you locked yourself in the bathroom, you released a breath that you didn’t know you were holding. You just spilled your guts to Aaron and yet, you still knew so little about him.

***

Aaron was laying in bed when you came back from fetching a glass of water from the kitchen and you laughed.

“What’s funny now?” He asked, his voice slightly muffled from how he was laying with his head deep in the pillow.

“You’re too tall for the bed.” You giggled, walking round and placing the glass down on the bedside cabinet. You then pulled back the covers to climb in yourself. “When there’s two people in the bed, it makes me realise just how small it is.”

“I can sleep on the floor if that would be better?” Aaron offered, preparing to get out of bed.

“Don’t be stupid. You’ll get a bad back.” You said, shuffling to reposition more comfortably. “We’re just going to have to squeeze together. This is so cliché. The one bed trope from those cheesy romance books I read in college.” You groaned. “Thank you, again, for doing this for me though.”

“Stop thanking me Y/N, I wanted to help you.” Aaron replied, rolling over so he could face you.

Maybe it was the liquid courage still flowing through you from the party, but you lifted you hand and placed it on Aaron’s cheek, taking in all his features.

“You’re so handsome.” You mumbled, running your thumb across his lips and heat rose to Aaron’s cheeks before you leaned forward and kissed him softly on the lips. Aaron immediately reciprocated, his hand moving to your hip so naturally, gripping it tightly as the kiss grew more heated between you. His mouth trailed down your neck, sucking lightly at the base which elicited a small moan from your lips. This was the most intimate you had been with someone in a long time and it felt so right to be doing it with Aaron. But suddenly and abruptly, Aaron pulled away.

“Wha… what’s wrong?” You asked breathlessly, lips still tingling from the kiss.

“Maybe we should stop before we do something we’ll regret.” He replied, moving his hand from your hip.

“But?…” you paused. Maybe he was right, sex could make things awkward. Sex could ruin your friendship. Sex could fuck up this whole arrangement. “Yeah… yeah you’re right. Erm, goodnight Aaron.” You said reluctantly and turned over to face the wall.

“Night Y/N.” You heard Aaron mumble before you drifted off to sleep.

***

Aaron woke from the bright Los Angeles sun peeking through the gap in the curtain, he looked next to him at you. You had manoeuvred during the night and were sweetly nestled into Aaron’s torso, his arm wrapped around you.

‘It was right to stop last night.’ Aaron tried to convince himself. ‘If we had slept together, it would have only overcomplicated things.’

Aaron kept these thought stirring in his head to persuade himself that he made the right call. He leaned backwards carefully so not to disturb you to reach his watch. The hands read 6:08am. He was always an early bird as it was these early mornings where Aaron felt most at ease. He carefully moved his arm from where it was wrapped around you, trying his best not to wake you. You stirred a little before rolling over, still sound asleep. He grabbed his running gear he had packed with him just in case and began to change, glancing around the room for some paper. Once he was fully dressed, he wandered over to the desk and opened a draw to reveal a stack of bright pink post-it notes. Pink was clearly your favourite colour growing up he noted in his head. He scribbled down a message on the post-it and stuck it on the empty glass on your cabinet.

He quietly walked down the stairs, trying not to disturb your parents but was shocked when he saw your dad sat at the dinning table with a cup of coffee and a newspaper.

“We haven’t scared you off have we?” Your dad asked with a laugh.

“No sir.” Aaron chuckled. “Just heading out for a run before Y/N wakes up.”

“I’d ask to join you but my running days are behind me.” Your dad said. “Venice Beach was always my favourite place to run, I recommend it for your route today.”

“Thank you sir, I’ll keep it in mind.”

***

You woke up surprised to find the bed empty, the mattress cold. You stretched to try and wake yourself up before turning to the bedside cabinet to check the time on the clock but a pink post-it caught your attention. You picked it up and read Aaron’s scruffy handwriting: ‘Gone for a run, back soon x’. The kiss at the end taunted you as memories of yesterday flashed through your head. Kissing Aaron Hotchner was something you never thought would happen in a million years, yet here you were.

You pulled the duvet back and climbed out of bed, grabbing your phone and trying to turn it on but it was out of charge.

“For fucks sake.” You mutter and scavenge through your bags to find the charger. “It has to be somewhere!” You thought out loud.

“What are you looking for?” Came the deep voice of Aaron out of nowhere.

“Shit! You made me jump!” You exclaim and stand up, turning to look at him. Your breath hitched in your throat as you took in his appearance. The tight shirt he was wearing accentuated his arms and the running shorts showed off his muscular thighs. The glimmer of sweat on his face and the glow of heat from the exercise made him look even more handsome than usual. This was a look you could get used to seeing everyday.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to.” He chuckled. “If you’re looking for your charger, it’s in the big suitcase over there.” He pointed to the case that sat near the wardrobe.

“Thanks.” You say and unzip the case, reaching in to look for the cable. As soon as you fished it out the case, you plugged it in quickly and waited for the phone to get some charge.

“I’m just going to have a quick shower and then I thought we could head out for some breakfast?” Aaron suggested.

“Yeah, that sounds good. We’ve been here a day and I already need a couple of hours away from my family.” You joked and Aaron nodded with understanding.

Immediately after he closed the door to the bathroom and you heard the water running, you turned your phone on and quickly typed a message out to Emily.

7:54AM | Y/N L/N: Help!!! I think I’m falling in love with Aaron.

7:57AM | Emily Prentiss: I did warn you it would happen! What went down at the engagement party?

7:59AM | Y/N L/N: My ex is still a dick as predicted. I kissed Aaron right in front of him and you should have seen his face LOL!

8:01AM |Emily Prentiss: Did anything other than kissing happen last night? ;)

8:02AM | Y/N L/N: Shut up.

8:04AM | Emily Prentiss: Ha! You didn’t answer my question which tells me YES! Something else did happen! Spill!

8:07AM | Y/N L/N: Fine! We made out a little after the party and I think we were going to have sex but Aaron said we should stop before we did something we might regret which was of course the right decision.

8:10AM | Emily Prentiss: OH MY GOD! Of course he said that, he is so down bad for you. He knows once you have sex with each other, there is no running away from his feelings. You need to sleep with him, I bet he’s actually quite good in bed. Do you think he’s as authoritative in bed as he is when we’re on a case?

8:12AM | Y/N L/N: Emily! Stop it! I have to go, I can hear Aaron coming out the shower.

And you switched your phone off before another text could come through from Emily. She was so enjoying this too much.

***

“Any idea where we should go for breakfast?” Aaron asked you.

“There’s this really amazing brunch bar near Santa Monica pier, I used to go there all the time with Sarah.”

“Sounds perfect.” He smiled as you reached the bottom of the stairs.

“Y/N? Is that you?” Your mom called from the kitchen.

You and Aaron saw her standing at the kitchen island drinking a fluorescent green smoothie.

“What’s up mom?”

“Ahh perfect! You’re both here. Sarah wanted me to ask you if you and Aaron could join her and Thomas for one of their last minute dance lessons.” She said excitedly.

You groaned like a miserable teenager. “Do we really have to? Aaron was just about to take me for brunch.”

“Yes! It will be great fun.”

You knew then, there was absolutely no getting out of this one.

***

The Wedding Date Taglist: @wanniiieeee @notsopersonalcharlie @blackeyedangel9805 @preciousbabypeter @stxlemate @twilightlover2007 @justarandommom @impala1967dwinchester @spencermiromantiko @julyhoney @thecubanator2 @xphantomphanphanaticx @lawlesshedgehog @louderfortheback @ssamorganhotchner @essenceproxima @lespendy @stiles-argent24 @rousethemouse @tvdstelenaforever @wandererseye @bibella8swan @yourfavunsub @bibimangines @lou-the-confused-bisexual @realm8626 @sophiaj650 @bylones @howabouticallyou @madz-19 @hotchnerxo @supercriminalbean @jayxox @sweetpeterparker @mina2000alex

I tagged those who commented and reblogged part one. Let me know if you want to be removed or tagged🫶🏻

***

Part three

#aaron hotchner x you #aaron hotchner x y/n #aaron hotchner x bau!reader #aaron hotch fic #aaron hotchner x reader #aaron hotch #aaron hotch x reader #aaron hotchner #hotch x y/n #hotch x reader #ssa aaron hotchner #criminal minds #fake dating #fake dating au #the wedding date

2K notes · View notes

cheesesoda · 10 months

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Sweet Dreams

dad!leon x mom!fem!model!reader

not my gif^^

request: Hey sweetie, may i've a request for Leon Kennedy and female model hot reader.I wonder what Leon's home life is like with their s/o and daughter and son… or maybe two

requested by: @kawaistrawberry21

a/n: ty for the request !! i imagined this as infinite darkness leon, but you can picture it as whichever leon (it really doesn’t matter) ! i got a little carried away

key:

d/n - daughter’s name

m/n - middle name (if you don’t have one, ignore it)

genre: fluff, hurt/comfort, a little angst

summary: leon loves his gorgeous wife and his adorable daughter.

cw: implication of reader having absent parents, reader worries about being a bad mom, id!leon gets that dinner he wanted <3

—————————————————————————-

leon had made plans with his gorgeous wife to get dinner. they were supposed to meet back at home, and go, but leon just loved watching her do her job.

“ok, a little to the left- yup, now lean into- yes! perfect!” the photographer commanded y/n. leon watched before his wife could noticed he was there. ‘my god, she’s so beautiful. how did i get this lucky?’ he thinks to himself, smiling subconsciously at the model. she notices he’s there and smiles brightly at him. “mrs. kennedy, lose the smile.” her manager growls. “fine..” she mutters and gives him a bored expression, to which he rolls his eyes. “alright, last one; hands on your chest- yeah, chin up- good, part your lips- yes!!” the photographer orders. “…and that’s a wrap!”

y/n walks over to leon and gives him a kiss. “this is a nice surprise!” she smiled. “thought i’d pick you up before we leave.” he smiles back. leon’s smile was rare for everyone, but for you, it was his default expression around you. “and you just look so perfect, how could i pass up an opportunity to see my beautiful wife in action?” he says and you laugh. “y/n. m/n. kennedy. stunning as always! you were amazing today!” the photographer praises. “aw, thank you, paula, couldn’t have done it without you of course.” you give her a hug. “is this your husband?” she gasps. “yes, this is leon!” you grin proudly. he waves awkwardly and says hi (in true leon fashion). “damn, your husband’s fine too!” paula exclaims. “alright, see you tomorrow.” you sigh, hiding your laughs. “bye, y/n! nice to meet you, leon!” paula waves. “you too, paula.” he says and the two of you walk off, arms linked.

“don’t you have to return that dress you were wearing?” leon asks as you both get in the car. “nope, perks of being a model.” you smile.

you both make it home. “mommy and daddy are home!” your 6 year old daughter, d/n, squeals when she sees you, hugging you and leon’s legs. “hey sweetie! we missed you!” leon says as he lifts her up, perching her in his arms. your nanny, melissa, walks over to you and leon. “hi mr and mrs kennedy!” she greets you. you talk about d/n and work and tell melissa you’re going out for dinner tonight. “no problem!” melissa smiles and you and leon say goodbye to your daughter. “be good for miss melissa, okay my love?” you hug your daughter. “okay, mommy!” she says. you both say “i love you” and leave.

you get to the restaurant and talk about work and life and all that stuff (a/n: i’m lazy , sorry).

you get home at about 7:45pm and see melissa on the couch, reading. she put d/n to sleep 15 minutes ago. “thank you, melissa. we’ll see you tomorrow.” leon thanks her and gives her her paycheck. melissa leaves and before you can even move, you hear the pitter patter of little feet come down the hall. “aren’t you supposed to be in bed, princess?” leon chuckles at his daughter. she makes grabby hands at his as to signal “pick me up”, so he does. “i wanted to wait for you and mommy to get home!” she pouted. “will you read me a story?” she asks. “of course.” he says and begins carrying her to her room.

you and leon had both been gone more recently and you felt terrible. you had never wanted to be absent for your children. guilt washed over you. you make your way to d/n’s room and there’s leon reading her a story. d/n signals you to sit next to her on the bed by patting the spot on the left to her, leon already sitting on her right side. you sit down and cuddle her in your arms as you both listen to leon narrate the story.

by the time he’s done, she’s fast asleep. “good night, princess. i love you so much.” leon whispers and kisses his daughter on the forehead softly. “night, sweetie. i hope you know how much i love you.” you lay her down and smile melancholically. you and leon tiptoe out of the room and make your way into your bedroom.

he unzips your dress as he asks “what’s wrong?”. “we’ve been gone so much recently, i don’t want d/n to feel abandoned.” you sigh. “listen, my love, sometimes we have to work more times than others. you work your ass off and you still manage to be an amazing mother. we occasionally both get breaks, and we get to be with d/n more, but we have to work harder to get to those breaks.” leon reassures you. “i just- i never wanted to end up like my-“ you start, but leon interrupts you. “and you’re not. you’re not like them. you’re a fantastic parent.” he tells you. “thank you, honey. what would i do without you?” you sigh. “i know, right?” he replies sarcastically.

you both finish getting changed into your pajamas and doing your night routine and get in bed. “thank you so much, y/n.” leon whispers, hugging you into his chest. “for what?” you respond. “i’m so lucky to have you and d/n. i don’t know what i did to deserve this.” he says. “you deserve happiness more than anyone, my love.” you cup his cheek.

suddenly, you both hear a blood-curdling scream. leon jumps up so fast it almost gave you whiplash. he runs down the hall to d/n’s room and you follow close behind. there is d/n sitting in her bed, tears streaming down her face. “what’s wrong, baby?” you ask as you cradle her in your arms. leon checks the room for intruders, but there are none. “i- i had a n-nightmare… you and daddy were g-gone and i-“ she stutters through sobs before bursting into tears. “oh, i’m so sorry, baby.” you sympathize as you hug her closer, wanting to take away all her worries and fears. leon sits next to you and takes her softly from your arms. “mommy and i aren’t going anywhere, princess. i won’t let anyone hurt you. i promise.” he chokes, his eyes watering the smallest amount, but he’s quick to cover it up. she clings onto him and sobs more. “can i s-sleep in your bed tonight?” she sniffles. “of course, sweetie.” you smile.

leon carries her to your shared bedroom and lays her down between the two of you and you both cuddle her. “sweet dreams, princess.”

#resident evil #leon kennedy x reader #leon s kennedy #leon kennedy #leon kennedy fluff #leon kennedy re2 #leon kennedy infinite darkness #id!leon kennedy #leon kennedy angst #leon kennedy re4 #re4r #re4make #resident evil 4 remake

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f10werfae · 2 years

Text

Sugar Baby Love

Pairing: CEO!Rich!Chris Evans x !Reader

Summary: Finally getting their relationship sorted out leads to a hot night filled with passionate lovemaking, !Dad!Chris at the end?! Major family man vibes xoxo !Fluffy smut!

Disclaimer: This story is fiction and should not be taken literally, the behaviour is simply imaginative and the content may be inappropriate

Possible continuation: Just like Daddy

Warnings: Spit play, mentions of anal, fingering, clit stimulation, obviously sex, oral, spanking (slightly), a tiny argument but that’s it

- Requests are open!

Likes, Comments and Re-blogs are appreciated♥️

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(Y/n's P.O.V)

You could say Chris and I's relationship dynamic was a bit of a weird one. It all started when he saw me as an intern at his company under his assistant, if you asked me I thought he absolutely hated my guts. Then within months he had asked me to work under him, basically as his secretary, although one he would eat lunch with and sleep with? Slowly but surely it turned into a relationship where he’d spoil the crap out of me, as long as I spent personal time with him. Call it a sugar baby relationship? I’m not sure.

The help was definitely welcomed considering I was still at the ripe age of 25, and to have this 35 year old giving me a house and everything I needed? I was not one to complain about that.

With him I get what I want, when I want.

“Come on baby, tell your king what you want” He cooed, stroking my cheek with his thumb, his other hand focused on parking his car into his driveway.

“You picked me up too early from the party, I was still enjoyin myself” I pouted fiddling with the hem of my baby blue mini dress, hearing him sigh before unbuckling his seat belt. “you know the rules princess, i’m yours and you’re mine. Safe to say you were not actin like it, now were you?” He said in a knowing tone, bending over to my side, his lips inches away from mine as I shook my head no.

“And what do you have to say for yourself?” He said leaning back, flicking his wrist to fix the massive watch on his wrist, acting dismissively. “M'sorry” I murmured knowing damn well I was in the wrong, tears brimming my eyes know I had hurt his feelings. He had done so much for me and I couldn’t even respect his one wish, it was one dance with one guy I had dated before.

“I know you are baby, it’s okay I forgive ya. I know you love me dearly” He chuckled, leaning down to place a precious kiss onto my cheek, his hand caressing my thigh affectionately. “You love me yeah? Don’t you gorgeous girl?” He coaxed, nuzzling his nose against my neck, his tongue licking a strip up to my ear.

“mm I do love you Chris, I promise” I whimpered, his hands dipping up my skirt and fiddling with the thin middle section of my thong, his fingers basically playing with my folds.

“Good cause you know I love you even more hun” He breathed out, sitting upright, and while pulling his fingers out from under my skirt he pulled the elastic along with him. Letting the thong slap back onto my swollen clit, a jolt passing through my body causing him to hum deeply. “Get out of the car, and wait for me inside babe” He commanded suddenly serious, I knew what this meant.

Not questioning him I rushed out of his car and opened his front door with the spare key I had. Kneeling down I waited and within seconds a big golden fluffy dog hoisted itself into my arms, giving me kisses and licks all over my face.

“Oh Dodger boy I missed you, my tiny baby” I cooed massaging both his hears, when I heard those same dress shoes clicking on the floor behind me. Chris stood in front of me, his hand offered out for me to hold to get up. I gingerly took his hand, his fingers knitting perfectly with mine, bringing it up to his lips for a quick kiss he led us towards the staircase. Both of us waving a little goodbye to Dodger for the meantime.

“What are we doing Chrissy?” I asked quietly, lowkey freaked out by his unbroken silence as he pushed the door open and closed it with his foot. Lightly pushing me into our bedroom he took off his suit jacket, and headed straight into the bathroom where I saw him turn on the tap for the three person bathtub we had set up so we could relax together. These past 9 months, I guess you could say we got accustomed to living together, even if our relationship had no labels on it.

“Do you really wanna be with me Y/n?” He questioned facing away from me, unbuckling his belt and shimmying off his work trousers.

“Of course I do, what kinda question is that?”

“Do you see yourself with me, married” He questioned stopping his actions, his arms swinging loosely by his side.

“Yes”

I answered confidently, knowing I would never let this man go, doesn’t matter how hard he tries to shrug me off. He is mine and I am his.

“Ok good, because I can only see myself marrying you. I love you” I heard him say, his voice now shakier than before.

“Ya promise?” I teased, copying his words from earlier, watching as he turned around and told me off with the raise of an eyebrow instantly making me shut up.

“You wanna join me for a bath?” He quirked, his hands already pulling up the hem of my dress over my head, not even waiting to know my answer because he already knew it as a yes.

Letting me undo his tie and unbutton his shirt, we walked towards the bathroom with him getting in first so I could lay against him. “Do you actually love me?” I asked, my head against the sound of his beating heart, awaiting his answer I softly stroked his happy trail down his stomach which slowly led to under the water.

“At the start of us, I didn’t know what we were but I never expected any of this. No doubt I was convinced i’d be confined to just sexual relationships for life, but you changed it Y/n. I fell so hard within the first few weeks, that these past 8 months have been complete torture not being able to officially call you mine. I know you don’t want me for money, you treat me like a human being, you love and care for me even when you don’t need to” He said softly, his finger absentmindedly trailing up and down my arm slowly.

“What about you, do ya actually love this old man?” He joked.

“Shut up you’re not old. I am in love with you Chris Evans and even if I wanted to stop loving you, my heart wouldn’t allow it. It belongs to you now, so don’t you dare break it” I threatened feeling his chuckle vibrate through his chest beneath me.

“I wouldn’t even dream of it sweet girl” He said now a whisper, our comfortable silence accompanied by the sound of the water breaking.

His hand went under the water, shadowing around the area of my thighs before I felt his finger on my clit. Rubbing slow circles, I felt him leave hot open mouthed kisses onto my shoulder, small mewls leaving my mouth the harsher he went.

“You sound so cute princess, all for me to see and hear yeah?”

Nodding my head slowly I felt his fingers separate my folds and spreading them apart, one of his fingers now entering my wet cavern. His palm now taking over the duty of stimulating my red swollen clit, my body jerking under the water as he held me flushed against his body.

“Jus relax doll, i’m here to take care of ya, all jus for you” His voice sounding sexy as hell, he thrusted his fingers in and out of my hole rapidly, his palm wasting no time at rubbing my clit with no abandon.

“Chris baby, I-I think i’m gonna”

“Let loose baby, let it all out for me baby” He whispered right against the shell of my ear, his teeth gritted together as he went even faster on my lower half, screams erupting me as I came

“f-f- FUCK” I exclaimed feeling my legs shake and go numb after that orgasm, Chris' fingers now giving my clit slow circles to let me ride out my high. “You did so good for me baby” He cooed his arms now wrapped around my torso holding me up against his wet body. Tilting my head to the side his lips melted onto mine, his fingers now teasing my hardened nipples.

“Let’s get into some clothes babe” He whispered parting from my lips, picking me up with him and out of the bath.

(In the Bedroom)

I watched as Chris got settled into bed in his birthday suit, something we did after some hot steamy sex, he always claimed he wanted to feel me even closer. Not feeling satisfied enough after tonight I was at the foot of the bed and decided to dive under the blanket and crawl up towards him.

“What are you doing you little minx” He laughed peeking at me from above the blanket, watching closely as I took his cock in my hands and spit on it. Giving his red bulbous head a passionate kiss before taking him whole in my mouth. Feeling each of his veins under my tongue as I took him as deep as I could, his arms flipping the blanket, down putting us both out in the open.

“Fahk I love your mouth babe, making your man feel all good, you love doin that dont ya?” He growled grabbing my hair into a makeshift pony as I moaned on his cock as a reply to his statement. Pulling away from his cock I took his balls into my mouth, jerking his cock off with my hand as I licked and kissed them. His mouth sending out deep breaths and curses as if they were money bills.

“Fuck baby you still want that Birkin bag? I’ll get you whatever the fuck you want after this”

Feeling his cock twitch in my hands, I immediately sat up to squat over his cock, his hands going to hold onto my ass cheeks. Both of us moaning out when I lowered myself onto his cock, his balls bottoming out into me, his pubic hair scratching onto my sensitive clit.

“Go on babe, bounce on my cock like you always do, like the slut you are” He moaned out gripping onto my hips to help me move at a steady rhythm, his head moving up to suckle onto one of my nipples. His tongue moving rapidly around the sensitive bud as I bounced helplessly up and down.

“Fuck baby, I love your dick” I moaned out uncontrollably, with both the stimulation on my clit and nipples I felt pure ecstasy rippling through my body, spanks being sent consistently to my ass.

“Baby you’re so sexy God I can’t believe you’re all mine”

“Well you best believe it babe, cause this is all yours to have whenever you want” I moaned out again, squealing when I felt him turn me over so I was now underneath him. This man’s strength is unbelievable. Not even giving me a second to breathe he started pummel driving his cock into me, his head dipping down

“Stick out your fucking tongue” Looking at him confused I stuck out my tongue shyly, watching his eyes cloud with lust. He took my tongue into his mouth sucking on it wildly, his spit dribbled into my mouth due to his assault on my tongue.

“God you taste divine, now play with your wet clit while I fuck you” He growled, my hand going onto my clit rubbing in different directions, my swollen pussy burning in the best way possible.

His balls slapping my ass every time he thrusted into me. “Maybe I should play with your ass next time, you’d love that wouldn’t you?” He teased as I nodded, his finger rubbing over my asshole before returning back to my clit.

“Look at this baby, this is all ours” He said grabbing my chin to make me look down, a string of cum connecting both of our centres where we meet, due to how wet we had both gotten. “You’re so dirty Chris” I whimpered out, his hand holding onto my wrist to circle my clit faster, my teeth biting hard into my bottom lip.

“Want me to spit on you babe? like the whore you are, wan' me to make you all nice n' wet?”

“Mhm yes please” I whimpered out, nodding enthusiastically as I held my tongue out once again, his spit flying into my mouth and lips. Bringing his head down he pushed his tongue into my mouth and explored my mouth rapidly. His tongue darting along with mine trying to taste every inch of me,

“I love you so much” He moaned out into the kiss interlacing our hands together by my head, his cum spilling into me as I came with him. My legs buckling around his waist as I pulled him closer to me, his face hidden in my neck, both of us breathing deeply.

“I love you too babe, so much” I whispered bringing him for one last kiss, before he turned to the side and brought me up against him.

“That was amazing Chrissy” I whispered looking up to see his flushed red face, his eyes closed.

“You okay hun?” I asked sitting up to check on him,

“i’m doing amazingly baby, with you by my side. Jus never let me go please” He whispered his face leaning against mine,

“I would never Chris. Never”

(5 Years later)

(Chris' P.O.V)

“Papa can I ask you something?” I heard my four year old ask shyly, her pink unicorn pyjamas still dragging over body because they were too bit. But hey she wanted them.

“Mhm what is it sweet-pea” I asked bringing her onto my lap, closing my work laptop and letting her cuddle into my chest.

“Can I have money?” She asked chirpily, her ponytail bouncing away crazily, her big blue eyes she got from me looking absolutely adorable.

“Money for what?”

“Me n mama wanna go buy toys for Zizi” She replied cutely, talking about herself in third person, Zizi was short for Zamira a beautiful name we had found out about while on vacation that just stuck with us.

“Yeah you tell him baby” I heard my lovely wife say walking into the room, her beautiful silk robe clad body immediately catching my attention this early in the morning. She immediately took residence on my lap as she took Zamira into her arms.

“What typa toys you gonna get baby?”

“uhh Unicorns n barbies n mama wants a bubkin”

“that was our secret zizi!” Y/n said shushing Zamira jokingly, watching as Zamira gasped covering her mouth cutely. “Well if you wanted a birkin gorgeous , all you had to do was ask” I said hugging them both close to my body, placing a quick but passionate kiss onto my wife’s head, smiling as I felt her body relax into me.

“Okay here y’all go now shoo” I said giving her a batch of hundred dollar bills from my wallet, before I felt Zizi run off with my wallet

“GO ZIZI GET IN THE CAR, WE'LL GET CHANGED IN THERE” I heard Y/n shout running behind Zamira with my money in tow, Zizi running as fast as her little feet would take her, “IM GOING MAMA”

“AT LEAST BUY ME SUMTHIN BABE”

“I GOTCHU BABE” I heard her shout already walking out the front door, making me shake my head while smiling to myself. This is my dream.

————

Taglist Tags (Form is up there^^): @mrspeacem1nusone @thereisa8ella @seren-a-ity @patzammit @pandaxnienke

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tlgad1989 · 11 months

Text

the original love

Kol Mikaelson x fem!Salvatore!reader

the first chapter

Series masterlist

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a/n: this series is a fragment series, which is basically just a ton of clips and you can fill in the holes with whatever you want. There’ll be dates or years specified so it’s not super confusing. This is my first fragment story, even though I write in fragments. It’s confusing, but you’ll see.

Warnings: part of this takes place in the 1800s, mentions of and allusions to $€x, use of ✨colorful✨ language, slavery and abuse (this goes for the whole series)

•••••

November 18, 1847, Mystic Falls, the Salvatore estate

“Hi, Maiden.” An 8-year-old Damon said, cradling his newborn sister in his arms. His little brother, Stefan, who had just turned one, was sitting by Damon’s feet, reaching for the baby. Damon looked up at his mother, who smiled kindly at him, despite having just given birth and being exhausted.

Carefully holding Maiden, Damon reached down and picked Stefan up, settling him in his lap before laying Maiden into his arms. Damon held most of Maiden’s weight up, but Stefan was amazed to see her. Maiden’s eyes fluttered and a small yawn came out of her mouth as she looked up curiously at the two older boys. After helping Stefan off the chair, Damon gave Maiden a kiss on her soft forehead before handing her back to their mother.

Giuseppe Salvatore burst in then, complaining about how Damon hadn’t finished his chores. (He’d heard his mother screaming and ran to see what was wrong, abandoning his tasks.)

Lillian sat up then, ready. “Giuseppe, he heard me and came to see what he could do to help. It’s my own fault he’s here.”

“You’re damn right tis, Lillian! Damon, go finish! NOW!” Maiden began crying as Giuseppe yelled. “And, Lillian, shut that baby up!”

“That baby is your daughter, Giuseppe.” Lillian said as calmly as she could.

“Oh, wondrous. Now I have to search high and low for someone to marry her to in seven and ten years’ time!” Lillian was helped up from the bed by her servants as Giuseppe stormed out.

---

July 7, 1856

Giuseppe had his young daughter’s hand in his, a gorgeous dress adorning her small body in shades of blues and greens. The little girl was merely 8, yet had her father wrapped around her little finger. Her older brother, Damon, was with them, and Giuseppe had ordered Damon and Maiden out to go with him to get one or two more slaves - a new shipment had just come in. He had promised Maiden she could pick them out.

Giuseppe passed Maiden over to Damon, and he lifted her into his arms. Her teenaged brother was strong enough to hold her for quite some time, but he just carried her over the puddles of mud to the building where the slaves were waiting. He set her down as they entered the building.

The slaves were separated by sections into men, women, and children. The seller greeted Giuseppe and Damon heartily and he bowed to Maiden. “Hello, there, Miss Salvatore.”

“Hello, sir.” An innocent smile rested on her face.

“Damon, walk with your sister as she picks.” Damon and Maiden walked down the row and she looked at all the dark faces trying not to look down upon her. She stopped suddenly in front of a young boy, he’s maybe 10. “Damon.”

“Yes, sister?” He tried not to sound upset with her. It was his father he was frustrated with.

“I want that one.” She pointed to the boy.

Damon noticed a woman - maybe 30s - cringe as Maiden pointed to the boy, likely his mother. “Tell Father.”

“Daddy!” Maiden yelled.

“Yes, dear?” Giuseppe turned.

“This one.”

Giuseppe nodded and turned back around to make the deal.

“Come on.” Damon helped the boy off the platform and his mother knelt to hug him one last time, whispering something the Salvatore siblings couldn’t hear.

Maiden continued down the walkway, stopping at a girl about her age. “Daddy!” She yelled again.

“Yes, dear?” The whole exchange again.

With the two kids in tow, Damon and Maiden made their way back to their father. “I did it, Daddy.” She said proudly.

“Good job, Maiden. Damon, take the two out and get them ready to leave. Then help your sister in.”

“Of course, Father.” Damon gritted his teeth before leading the three outside. Soon enough, Giuseppe finished his business deal and the Salvatores were headed home.

Maiden instantly ran to get her other brother, who was in the trees. “Stefan!” She called.

“Yes?”

“Come see the new slaves I picked out!”

9-year-old Stefan was by her side in a moment. “Let me see.”

---

July 7, 1856

“Maiden picked out two lovely new slaves today.” Father praised Maiden at dinner that night.

Lillian and Damon locked eyes, subtly having a conversation, both too afraid to speak.

"Thank you, Father." Maiden's voice breezed by, attracting the attention of the children working. Even at 8, she was breaking hearts. A certain boy who was born on the plantation was certainly in love with her, and she often sent him smiles, just because she was a kind girl.

It was common among the Salvatore servants to tease him whenever they could, and he would simply roll his eyes before going back to waiting on her hand and foot.

---

September 23, 1864

“Maiden, you are to marry the brother of Katherine on your 17th birthday.” Giuseppe said as he passed her.

“What?!” She cried.

He turned sharply and marched up to her, striking her across the face, causing her to collapse on the ground. “Do not question me. I am your father, I control you.” He sneered down at her from above as she clasped her cheek.

As soon as Giuseppe turned to leave and was out of sight, Damon was kneeling next to Maiden, still in his Confederate uniform. “Maiden, sister, what’s wrong?”

“Father- he-”

Damon sighed heavily. “Come on, it’s okay, I’ve got you.” He helped her up and into her room.

The girl from oh-so-long ago, when Maiden was 8, was now the servant tasked with helping her. "Oh, dear, Miss Salvatore!" Grace exclaimed, hurrying over.

"She was hit by Father again."

"Oh, Maiden," She lowered her voice as she spoke her lady's name. "You must learn to be quiet!"

"Well, he was being unreasonable." Maiden sat on her bed, Damon falling onto his back dramatically next to her.

"What happened, Miss?" Grace asked while rushing to get a cold cloth for Maiden's cheek.

"He said I'm going to marry Katherine's brother!" Damon sat up at this. "I didn't even realize Katherine had a brother, let alone one my age! And then- Damon, are you okay?"

"Mae, she doesn't have a brother. She has no siblings, at least not any alive."

"So who am I supposed to marry, then?"

"I have no idea."

---

August 17, 1874, New York City

Maiden walked past a handsome man, but barely gave him a second glance, too busy holding her breath. He backed up, turning around to catch up to her, but she barely heard him - odd for a human.

“Hello, love.” He said in an English accent, catching her arm and attention.

“Sorry, I can’t talk now.” She said without breathing in.

“What are you doing?” He asked, smirking subtly.

“Just out to get a drink. No food at home.” Technically, she was not lying.

“What are you getting for food?”

“Why do you need to know? I’m just going to get a drink. Alone.”

“Ah, well, I do love a bloody drink.” He raised his eyebrows knowingly.

“No, sir, no blood. Just some whiskey.”

“Oh, but I was teasing. Why would I ever think you would drink blood? It’s not like you’re a vam- Oh, do you smell that? The bakery a few blocks that way is pulling blueberry muffins out for tomorrow morning.”

She tilted her head. “Are you-?” Maiden’s question died in her throat.

“Am I what?”

She breathed for the first time.

He’s not human.

“Come with me.” She grabbed his wrist, yanking him into an alley.

“Hello.” He said pleasantly, as if he hadn’t just caused the biggest disturbance to her vampire life.

“Who are you? What are you?”

“If you tell me who you are, and honestly, I will answer all the questions you have.”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m Maiden.”

“Are you really a maiden? And is there a last name?” He took her hand, kissing her knuckles.

“Yes, I’m a maiden, and no, you will not get a last name until you answer my two questions.”

“Kol Mikaelson, I’m an Original vampire. It’s why you didn’t recognize my scent. I doubt you’ve met one of my siblings to know my smell. Last name?” He still hadn’t dropped her hand.

“You’re telling me that the Original vampires, the myths my brother told me, they exist, and somehow, I just managed to meet one of you seven?”

“You’re very lucky.” He said simply. “I answered. Last name?”

Maiden could tell this was the last time he would ask politely.

“Salvatore. Maiden Salvatore is my full name.”

He smiled charmingly. “I have a feeling we’re going to get along stunningly, Miss Salvatore.”

“Are you sure we should be parted by our names? We have to blend in, you know?”

“Why can’t you just compel the humans?” Kol asked with a ‘duh’ tone.

“That’s a lot of work.”

“Are you suggesting what I believe you’re suggesting, darling?”

“I don’t know, what are you suggesting I’m suggesting?”

“I’d suggest you are a genius, Mrs. Mikaelson.”

“Why, thank you, Mr. Mikaelson.”

He offered her his arm and they walked out onto the street again. They headed to get drinks, and he compelled the bartender to allow her to drink in public. They simply conversed, just trying to learn more about each other.

As Maiden was the only woman there, Kol kept his arm around her, simply to keep up the appearance. Kol only looked 18, Maiden at 16, which must have been a bit odd to see.

At the end of the night, only a few men remained, about 12, and Kol distracted the bartender while she compelled the men to go into the back alley and wait for Kol and her. After she finished, she went up behind him and tugged on his arm lightly, playing the part of the quiet wife.

“Must dash. Things to do, right?” Kol asked with a smile, gesturing to Maiden. She smiled slightly, playing the helpless wife part her mother used to play.

They ducked into the alley, immediately attacking the men. Kol got to the last one before Maiden did, blood dripping down his chin as he watched her, ignoring the man dangling from his grip. “Would you like the last one, love?” He asked, smirking as she dropped the snack.

“Sure.” She reached for him.

“Ah.” Kol lifted him out of her reach. “What, are you not going to ask your husband nicely?”

“How about this instead?” She kissed him softly, and he lowered the man as she pulled away.

Maiden ate and looked back up at Kol, who wiped the blood off her chin, licking it off his finger. “They had drugs in their systems. Not as tasty.”

“Is that the aftertaste?”

“Yes, I can’t believe you haven’t noticed yet.”

“I didn’t say I didn’t notice.” Standing up on her tip-toes, she kissed him again.

“KOL! There you are!” At the sound of a girl’s British voice, Mae pulled away to see a girl who looked 17 at the entrance to the alley. “Kol, who is this?” She asked carefully.

“Beks, do not tell them. And this is Maiden.”

“Hello, Maiden. I’m Rebekah Mikaelson, Kol’s sister. Pleasure.”

“Hi.” She reverted back to the shy 15-year-old who was instantly jealous of Katherine when seeing her, now instantly jealous of Rebekah’s glimmering blonde hair. Glancing down, Maiden wiped the last of the blood off her chin.

“So, you’re like us, then? Just.. not Original?”

She nodded, hair falling in front of her face.

“She was only turned a decade ago, she’s a baby.”

“Oh, wow. By who?”

“She told me not to say. Said it was too dangerous for her.”

“Interesting.” Rebekah said before coming to stop in front of her. “You are stunning, how old were you when you turned?”

“16, nearly 17.”

“You are simply gorgeous, we need to go shopping. Blue would look lovely on you.”

“Oh, um, I really have to go, my brother is waiting for me.”

“Your actual brother?” Kol asked.

Maiden nodded. “Both my brothers were turned just before me.”

“Well, I’ll see you again sometime. Brother.”

“Beks, if you tell Nik-” He turned to Maiden. “I will find you later tonight, love, I promise. As soon as I get Beks safe and away from here.”

She nodded again.

“I’ll be there by 3, promise.”

Maiden nodded a final time and sped off into the darkness, away from the two insanely hot Original vampires.

---

August 22, 1874, New York City, 1:12 am

“Well, imagine what your brothers would do if they found out what I’ve done to the precious, innocent, youngest Salvatore.” Kol smirked, tightening his grasp on Maiden’s waist.

“They’re not going to find out.” She glared at him.

“If you insist, darling.” He pressed another kiss to her lips, traveling down to her neck again.

219 notes · View notes

cardierreh15 · 6 months

Text

So Anxious

Another story for Kinktober! (Again I’m not really following a list lol I’m doing my own thing) Enjoy babies 🤎🧡

***I do not give anyone permission to repost or copy my work!!!

Warning 18+: Cursing , Alcohol Consumption, Dry Humping , Fingering , Smut , Alien/Human Sex , Praise Kink , Dirty Talk , Role Playing (Superman & Goddess) , Suggestive Behavior/Dancing

Pairings: Clark Kent x Cardíerre James (Nicki Minaj)

Description: Cardíerre & Clark throw a Halloween Party!

Word Count: 3.8K

Song(in order): Water by Tyla , So Anxious By Ginuwine

One Shot

Cardierre sighed heavily as she looked down at her watch. She grumbled to herself as she pulled the sandwich tray out of the refrigerator, ‘Where the hell is he?’ Clark wasn’t the type to be unpunctual. He was pretty good with time.

She couldn’t help but wonder if it was because he was concerned about his costume. But she assured him that he didn’t have to show up with a costume. After all, this was just as much his party as it was hers.

Her phone chimed on, alerting her that her guests were now arriving. Putting her worries to the side for just a moment, she clapped her hands together, jumping up and down in excitement.

‘One second!’ She rushed to the downstairs half bathroom and adjusted her cleavage in her bra and her skirt.

The doorbell rang once before she practically ran to the front door. Unlocking the door, she pulled it to the side in a hurry with a happy grin on her face. She was hoping it was Clark, but in fact the complete opposite. She raised a brow, perplexed about this unexpected arrival.

‘Bruce? What the hell are you doing here?’ He wore a regular black tailored suit with a trench coat. Nothing out of the ordinary from him. She should’ve expected that.

Her close friend stepped from the side of the house with a devious grin. She was dressed up as Mystique from X-Men. Painted down to every detail and every accessory, she put Jennifer Lawrence to shame. ‘Now why would you think we’d pass this up hmm?’

Cardi screamed happily as she extended her arms before the girls embraced in a warm hug. It had been quite some time since they’ve all seen one another. She was residing in Gotham still and since Cardi’s promotion, it was hard to take some time off to go see her closest friends.

‘Oh my god! I’m so glad you guys were able to make it! I was preparing for the worst out here!’ She giggled before looking over at Bruce and raising a brow, ‘You couldn’t get him to dress up at least?’

‘I tried. Trust me.’ Helena giggled as she gave Bruce a gentle elbow at his arm.

‘Wishful thinking. He’s been like this since we’ve been kids. Come on! Go inside and make yourself at home!’ She stepped to the side and smiled even wider when a few more guests walked up her walkway.

Stepping out of the way completely, she told everyone to make themselves comfortable and that they could help themselves with all the snacks she’d made and had catered for them.

Standing on the porch, she let out a heavy sigh as she looked at her watch once again. It was 7:45PM. He was extremely late.

Rolling her eyes, she stormed back into her house to see that the party was in full swing. People from her job, old and new friends were making conversation with one another. This was all going so well and it was so perfect. She was just missing her most important piece. Her man.

Helena walked over to her, her head falling to the side as she noticed that something wasn’t right about the place. But with the somber look on her friend’s gorgeous face, it immediately clicked. ‘Hey, where’s Clark?’

Cardierre sighed and shrugged her shoulders, ‘I don’t know, Lena. It’s 10 til and he hasn’t shown up yet. What if the bad guys got to him? And I’m here helpless…’

‘What? Girl, ain’t nobody snatching Clark big ass off of the streets. He’s built like a goddamn tank and not to mention… There's something about him that stands out from everyone else. Ain't no way they’d pick him.’

She scoffed at the joke, trying not to laugh but she was right. ‘Yeah… He is a big guy ain’t he? Ion know I just know he’s not irresponsible like this. I know he said he didn’t like his costume but.. It’s not that deep. Hell, I don’t even know what the costume looks like!’

‘Well, you know men. They’re probably harder on themselves than anyone else. You see the shit didn’t work with Bruce.’ Helena jerked her chin towards Bruce who stood secluded in the far right corner of the room by the kitchen, ‘That fool gave me the ultimatum of not going if I forced that Magneto costume on him.’

The girls cackled with one another for a second. ‘Here. Where’s your phone? Go call him? It is the last Saturday before Halloween. There’s a ton of parties being thrown and he is probably just sitting in traffic.’

She let out a gentle sigh and nodded, ‘Yeah. You’re right girl. I’ll go call him now.’

As soon as she picked up her phone another Ring camera notification chimed on her phone. She opened it up to see a tall being pacing back and forward by the garage. They sported a huge black cape. She assumed that it was another guest who probably got lost or was just nervous as hell to walk into the party. Perhaps they thought they’d look ridiculous!

They couldn’t have been that bad. There was the Scarecrow from The Wiz here, Mystique, Johnny Cage from Mortal Kombat, A Mickey & Minnie Mouse…And about a dozen more characters. And then there was Bruce… dressed as… Bruce.

No one could look as ridiculous as he did in this moment. Sticking out like a sore thumb.

She placed her phone down before she walked towards the front door. When she walked out to the porch deck, she took a deep breath and walked to the right side where the individual was standing there like a statue. ‘Hey! You know the party is on the inside right? Why don’t you come inside! We have beer, liquor, food,... candy?’

He didn’t speak for a long moment before slowly turning around to face her. ‘Cardi.’

Her heart fell to the pit of her stomach. ‘Clark!? Baby, is that you?!’ She quickly rushed off of the deck and stopped in her tracks. She took in the moment to really drink him in.

‘Well…’ He said as he extended his arms for her to get a good look at him. ‘What do you think?’

Other than the fact that he was drop dead gorgeous, she couldn’t understand why he looked so much like the one the world knew as Kal-El. She couldn’t even explain the enthrallment she felt for him at this moment. Just swooning like a teenage girl admiring her crush.

Completely speechless.

‘I knew it. I look ridiculous.’ Clark sighed as he placed one hand on his hip and scratched the back of his head.

‘What?! What? Baby, baby no!’ She rushed over to him. ‘You just… you look just like him.’ She snaked her arm around his small waist as she reached up to cup his jaw. ‘You look amazing.’ Cardi grinned before her happy brown eyes studied his eyes for a second before they drifted down to his chest. There sat that infamous “S” but in silver.

‘Since when did Superman wear black? Where did you even get this?! Is this the costume you were so concerned about?!’ She asked in wonder.

Clark was shaken out of his thoughts with her voice. He looked down at his chest as she traced the intricate detailing of the letter. It even felt familiar. ‘As far as I know… he doesn’t. But actually I…’ he paused for a second, ‘I had a friend make this for me.’

Perhaps he called his father his friend.

‘Well, it’s beautiful. And Unique! Most certainly puts that Bright blue to shame. I bet if he were here, he’d probably try to shake you up for it.’ She giggled.

‘Probably.’ Clark laughed as he reached his hand behind her head; his fingers getting lost in her blown out hair. His other hand rested on her hip. ‘You look absolutely irresistible right now. I think it might be a little harder to focus with all these people around tonight.’ His grin remained.

‘Oh? Are we playing a little game?’

‘It can be whatever you want it to be, baby.’

Cardi bit into her glossed bottom lip before she pulled his face down to meet her in a tantalizing kiss. Slipping her tongue into his warm mouth, she welcomed his in return as they held onto one another a little bit tighter.

Then, when she broke the kiss, she let out a deep breath before letting out a giddy giggle. ‘C’mon.’ She said as she grabbed his hand and started walking backwards, ‘We can’t keep our guests waiting.’

Once inside of the party, all eyes were on him.

Bruce stood up straight, his stormy blue eyes damn near popping out of his head, ‘You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.’

Helena looked up from pouring two glasses of Pink Whitney and lemonade to see Cardi and Clark walking into the party. A huge grin of happiness curled on her face but also, she was admiring how amazing his costume looked.

She walked up to the both of them, ‘Wooow. Damn Clark! How much are they paying you at the Planet?! That’s a good lookin’ costume there.’ She grinned as she took a sip of her drink.

‘Thanks– Helena. Since you're here, I’d assume Bruce has come too, yes?’

‘Mmmhmm. He’s over there in the corner hidin’ like a Bat in a cave. You should go speak to him.’

Clark’s eyes landed on Bruce who was staring at him with a “BE FUCKING SERIOUS” glare written all over his face. ‘I’ll go say Hi. He doesn’t look like he’s having a good time. Maybe I should cheer him up.’ He looked down at Cardi, ‘Be good.’ He winked.

‘No promises!’ Cardierre grinned as she watched him walk off to be with his friend. A smile plastered on her face like the joker. She was so infatuated! It was as if what she was sad about earlier never even mattered.

Helena stared at her friend for a second before looking over at Clark. ‘Well, what happened?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean did you scold him about being late?’

‘No. I’m not his mother, Lena.’ She sighed softly before continuing, ‘It was exactly what I thought it was. The costume. He swore up and down that he looked ridiculous.’

‘What? Ridiculous? Do you not see your man?!’ Both of the girls looked over at Clark talking to Bruce. Yeah, they were gawking.

‘Are those all his muscles?!’ Helena asked curiously, squinting her eyes trying to better her vision.

Cardi’s mouth fell as she tried not to laugh before slapping her friend on the arm, ‘Yes! They are! As far as I know anyway.’ She giggled.

Helena giggled as she held the second cup out towards her, ‘Here. You drink this. It’ll take for me to shove this cup down Bruce’s throat for him to drink this mess.’

‘Thanks.’ Cardi giggled before taking a big gulp of the strong drink.

After a little while longer, the party was jumping and thumping! People were all around, dancing, singing, eating– having the time of their lives! Clark and Bruce pretty much stayed glued to one another’s hips the whole night. All until Cardierre got a little bit looser than usual.

Water by Tyla started playing and she began to let the music take over her body. She was dancing with Helena, rocking and grinding her hips with her friend. And once she caught Clark’s atlantic blue eyes staring at her through the crowd, she placed her hands on her body and began to caress herself.

Helena decided to turn up the notch to make Clark lose his mind. She took the water bottle off the bartop and poured it down Cardierre’s back and her chest. ‘WHOOOOO!’ The guests began to cheer as she rolled and rocked her hips like a belly dancer.

‘AYO CLARK! COME GET YA GIRL!’

Clark and Bruce watched closely as the scene unfolded before them. Clark reached out and carefully grabbed Bruce’s shirt, ‘Control yourself… Your woman is here.’

Cardi laughed happily as she and her friend gave one another a high five. She then skipped off to the kitchen to make herself another drink. They ran out of plastic cups so that would require her to go in the pantry.

She pulled the door open and walked inside to grab the unopened container of cups. When she turned back around, Clark was standing at the door with his big, sturdy arms folded across his chest. His head was cocked to the side, eyes wandering her body that was covered in a thin sheet of water with a few drops here and there.

‘I know what you’re doing and you’re not going to get away with it, Cardierre.’

Ooh! Her government! He meant business.

‘I-I don’t know what you mean, Clarky-Pooh.’ She gave him a goofy grin. ‘Now, can you get out my way so I can tend to our guests?’ She carefully pushed past him. But not before he could grab her by her arms and pull her back into his brawny frontside.

She gasped at the sudden movement, looking up at him as he pressed his hardened member against her back. He looked down at her with a slightly amused look on his face, ‘Do you see what you’re doing to me? Ever since I saw you tonight I’ve been thinking about bending you over that dining room table.’

Cardi giggled as she licked at her lips, ‘Baby, not in front of the guests.’ she pressed her ass against him once more and grind her hips on him, ‘I’m sure you can wait til the party’s over…’ She stopped, ‘Right?’

Clark closed his eyes, letting out a frustrated grunt before his forehead rested on top of her head. ‘Yes..’ He sighed as he released his hold on her. ‘I can wait. Go ahead and do your thing. Let me adjust myself.’ He let out an embarrassed sigh as he stepped into the pantry and closed the door.

Letting out an evil laugh, she walked back to the central area of the party to see Bruce and Helena getting well acquainted on the dancefloor. She smiled softly, so happy to see both of her close friends developing a relationship. She thought it was cute.

Shortly after, she felt Clark place his hand on her hip before placing a cute little kiss on her cheek then her head. ‘Are you having a good time baby? Was it everything you expected it to be?’

She smiled softly and looked up at him, ‘And more. Our first Halloween party and everybody looks like they are having a wonderful time. Most of all though,’ She turned around to face her lover, ‘I’m glad you’re here.’

‘Yeah?’ Clark smirked as he wrapped his arms around her waist, ‘Well what you gonna do to make use of my presence?’

‘Why should I tell you when I can just show you?’ She raised a brow with a dark, drunken smirk.

Clark looked away, letting out a chuckle before looking down at her once again, ‘Alright. That’s it.’ And he quickly scooped down, wrapped his arms around her thighs and threw her over her shoulder.

‘AHHH! CLARK!’ Cardi giggled out loud before he landed a smack on her ass.

‘Hush!’ He exclaimed as he walked out of the kitchen and walked through the crowd.

Bruce and Helena watched as Clark carried Cardi across the room.

‘Oh! Everyone! Enjoy the party! Just got to have a conversation with my woman in the bathroom!’

Cardi laughed as she gave the room a thumbs up.

***

Clark placed her down on the sink before he walked over and locked the door. Slowly turning to look at her as she adjusted herself on the sink. ‘I’ve warned you already. Why do you insist on teasing me all night mama? How is that fair?’

‘Because I think it’s funny. Plus, I wanted to see how long Superman can go before he loses his shit over me.’ She grinned as she slowly spread her thighs.

‘Well it didn’t take long now did it? You got what you wanted. Now it’s my turn.’ He said darkly as he closed in the gap and stood between her thighs. ‘Goddammit. I’m an lucky son of a bitch huh?’ He growled as his large hands caressed her thick smooth thighs.

‘More like blessed… Now, stop talking and give me a kiss daddy.’

Clark grinned as he placed another animalistic kiss upon her lips. His hands desperately reached up the sides of her thighs and tugged at the hips of her panties then dropped them to the ground. He reached between her thighs as he broke the kiss, resting his fingertips on her erected nub, ‘You’re warm and wet… are you ready for me? You think you can handle me, Goddess?’

She grinned darkly, her eyes glaring at him with pure desire, ‘What’s a man to a God?’

He chuckled seductively, ‘I figured you’d say that.’ And he shoved his middle and ring finger inside of her. Easily finding a warm and cozy home there as he curled them upwards.

‘Fuuuck.’ Her head fell back against the mirror as she felt her body grow numb with pleasure. ‘Yes, Superman!’

He used his free hand to pull her top down, exposing her pretty perky breasts. Not wasting another second, he quickly wrapped his lips around her nipple.

‘Shiiit.’

Clark was so damn hard he could probably cut through rocks. But the way he was going to use her… he was going to have to ask his Lord and Savior to forgive him.

‘Aaaah, fuck Clark you’re gonna make me cum.’ She gripped the edge of the sink for stability. She began to heave and hiccup as her body began to succumb to his magic.

‘Ooh already little Goddess?’ He hissed through his teeth as he rubbed at her G-spot faster, coaxing her orgasm out of her. He then used his thumb to rub her clit with the pad of his thumb. He groaned against her soft, supple tits.

‘OH! FUCK!’ she exclaimed before she placed her hand over her mouth, watching as he practically stole her orgasm from her. But she wasn’t mad.

He smirked as he pulled her hand down away from her face, ‘Goddesses deserved to be heard.’ He reached behind himself and unzipped his suit, pushing it down to his knees. He was standing at full attention for her. ‘Don’t you agree?’

Finally coming down from her powerful orgasm, she let out a shuddered sigh and nodded, ‘I do agree.’

Grabbing her hand, he pulled her down from the sink, turned her around and placed her knee on the cool porcelain. He moved the skirt from off of her and smooth his hand over her ass. He then landed a hard smack against her rump.

‘OOP!’ Cardi giggled and looked back at her lover. ‘Is Superman going to show me that brute strength?’

Clark smirked and grabbed his member, ‘Is that what the Goddess wants?’ He pressed the tip of his member against her honeyed slit and began to sink her hips into her.

Cardi let out a sharp gasp as she embraced his length. Her head fell back to look up at him as he bottomed out into her. ‘Augh! Uh-huuuh.’ She breathed out, clenching her teeth together as she braced herself for the work he was about to put on her.

He grabbed her jaw, as he leaned down and slipped his tongue into her mouth. He began to roll his hips into her at a slow and steady rhythm. He hummed against her lips as his free hand reached up to grope at her breast.

She moaned into his mouth as he began to pick up the pace and adjust the rhythm of his hips. When she broke the kiss, she kept her eyes on him as her brain tried to keep up with the pleasure her body was enduring. ‘Gods baby! You feel so fucking good!’ She gritted through her teeth as she leaned forward to grip the sink better.

‘Yeah? Damn you’re so fucking tight baby. Ugh, you take me so fucking well.’ He groaned as he landed another smack on her ass before placing his massive hands on her small waist for stability.

‘UGH! Fuck! Oooh you’re gonna make me cum already! Hoooh my goood! Yessss!’ Her walls began to spazz and throb around his member; making it tighter for him and more sensitive for her. She gripped the sink tightly as her orgasm began to rock her from her core.

Clark laughed crudely, taunting her as he fucked her through her orgasm, in turn doubling the pleasure she had from the previous one. ‘Look at you. You’re so fucking beautiful baby. Such a good little Goddess for me?’

‘Yes! I’m a good little Goddess daddy! Ugh, fuck!’

‘That’s my little Goddess.’ He reached forward and gripped her hair, pulling her back towards his torso. ‘You think you were just going to wear that costume and not get punished for it?!’ He growled in her ear as he plunged into her harder and faster.

Unfortunately for Cardi, she was practically wheezing as he went in on her. Taking deep breaths and groans, her mouth felt like cotton. ‘N-no!’ She mewed out like a kitten. It felt so goddamn good, and she just knew the after care would be immaculate.

‘I can’t hear you little Goddess.’ He huffed in her ear, ‘You’re gonna have to speak up for me!’

‘NO! CLARK! PLEASE! DON’T STOP, PLEASE!’ she begged as she reached back and dug her pointy nails into his muscular thigh.

He wrapped his strong arm around her waist, hiding his face in her shoulder as he felt his own milky orgasm sneaking up on him too. ‘Fuck. Does Superman’s little Goddess want him to breed that pretty little pussy?’ He then bit into her shoulder gently.

‘Yes! Please, please Kal-El! Fill me up!’

There was something about her calling him by his Kryptonian name that just turned him on so much more. Perhaps it was the way her southern accent rolled with it. It just sent him on a quick downward spiral. His hips bucked sloppily as he began to tense up. ‘Ugh!’ he gritted his teeth together as he held her body close to his, emptying all of himself into her. ‘Uhhhh fuck!’ His thighs trembled, his knees buckled.

Cardi let out a heavy breath as her body relaxed against his. ‘Fuck.’ Then, she looked back at him with a drunken smile spread across her lips. ‘I fucking love you.’ She laughed.

‘No more than I could possibly love you Little Goddess.’ He chuckled tiredly as he placed a sweet kiss on her lips.

***

After the couple freshened themselves up and put themselves back together, they walked down the stairs to rejoin the party. It almost seemed as if they weren’t missed because the party was still full of life!

Clark and Cardi shared one more kiss before splitting up. He went to hangout with Bruce as she went to grab a bottle of water from the cooler.

‘Well if it ain’t Mr. And Mrs. “Mink, Mink, Mink”.’ Helena walked up with her hands on her hips, ‘You know I heard yall loud and clear right? Hell, most of the party did.’

‘Oh.’ She giggled and gave her an apologetic smile, ‘I’m sorry but, you can do whatever you wanna do when it’s your house.’ She teased.

‘I knew your ass would say something so asinine.’ Lena retorted, ‘Let’s just enjoy the rest of our night. Who knows when we’ll be able to see each other again after tonight.’

‘Sounds like a plan to me.’

75 notes · View notes

pieroulette · 1 year

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ONE KISS IS ALL IT TAKES

summary: to escape from the miserable and never ending time loop, you are willing to do anything even if it means you would kiss the priest instead of your future husband.

genre: time-loop, modern au, mafia,

pairing: jungwon x fem! reader

warning: cursing, murder and murder attempts, death, poisoning,

word count: 7.3k

a/n: 'kissing the priest' prompt was inspired by a one-chapter manhwa called 'the obsessive second male lead had gone wild'. found it through yt reels 😂 and too bad it's just 1 chapter , haven't read it though so I just thought to make a story inspired by the prompt and add the rest of my own imagination :3

Your eyes fluttered open at the sun peeking through the windows of your room, the refreshing breeze passing through the soft materials of the curtain. Stretching your body, you felt the comforting feeling and so you laid your feet on the carpeted floor, and you looked up to see the maids coming through the open door. Some of them had plenty of white towels on their left arm, some were holding a black box on the palms of their hands and some had the lacy white gown — the one you had chosen for today, for your wedding day.

Upon seeing the material, your lips pulled up in the brightest smile and you couldn’t suppress it as you approached it, tracing your fingers on the gown.

Your chest rose and fell as you glanced outside the window in which plenty of people in maid attires, butlers, chefs, guards, waiters and waitresses — all of them doing their respective tasks. Soon the invited guests would come along with their little childrens, supportive friends, uncles and aunties, friends and relatives who would give their blessing.

"You look so breathtakingly beautiful, Miss (Name)." the young maid's eyes sparkled in amazement as she finished the last touch of your wedding dress, letting it fall to the floor in a graceful way. You nodded with an appreciative smile, spinning around to check on yourself.

Tap, tap, tap. The door swings open revealing the butler with the lazy but firm look on his face, "It's time."

You, a 20 year old young lady whose mother had abandoned you since her childhood, with only your father to look after you despite his alcoholic tendencies sometimes, he still tried his best to be a good father. At school, the petty kids often bully you for being motherless too, a dramatic pity story you can say that. But heck are you gonna let that define you? So you did all you could to climb up to the top with all you had and gain whatever you could to survive in this cruel world, a lady who had just embarked on her journey to start on her career, with the sole purpose to become an independent woman, swaying your pointy gorgeous heels to stray fuckboys away and indulge in your self-made millionaire ass because you wanted it and because you deserve it.

Which makes you wonder what you are doing here? What are you doing on this fat pretty wedding dress on the decorated flowery aisle?

Well, the same old cliche story; you met him, your lover in an unusual way, got stuck in a place together for almost an eternity, and the old sayings allegedly confirming ‘it only take 7 seconds to fall in love’ which actually only applies to your future husband because sweetie that's definitely not you, falling in love recklessly are bound to land you on a steepy slimy pretty cliff if you don't watch your steps. And so you landed a strong punch to his face when he tried to kiss you because who does he think he is? A hot male lead in a rom-com office drama? Oh please.

Well, maybe he does but in a different genre because he belongs in a mafia family which you found out an eternity later after a thousand dates and a thousand punches, and the rest was history — your life seems to be stuck with guns and knives from then on instead of hot independence but well money and exquisite heels still exists either way right?

And of course a hot young man, your one and only future husband, Park Sunghoon. The firstborn of the Park family, one of the wealthiest families in Seoul. However, as wealthy as they are, unlike any other family, they prefer to stay behind the shadows and let people take the spotlight but that was what makes them extremely mysterious and alluring.

But their son was far too different, at least in the way he carries himself around others.

It's far too obvious in how he looks and behaves so there won't be a problem to guess it because he gave it away too much, Sunghoon. Park Sunghoon, the firstborn of the Park Family. He never fails to mention that around people and especially, especially around you. A narcissist as you called him which he doesn’t mind, that goddamn hottie who exudes too much charms and confidence, because he believes that he's far too good for this world. Annoying but hot, and yet you still fell in love with him.

So, it's obvious by now that this wedding was not simple, nor anything you would call ‘normal’ since your future husband is none other than a mafia’s son. The people attending this seemingly simple wedding with grand decorations, are actually mafias and their minions in disguise, well at least some of them.

It no longer matters to you though that he belongs to a dangerous background, he was the only one that ever mattered for you from now on. His family was weirdly delighted over their son picking you, you actually thought you’d have to go through 14 chapters of your story to ever marry him but you were more grateful than ever that it didn’t have to go that far.

What a hassle, let's get over to the story already, folks. Flashbacks done!

You walked down the aisle ready to meet your future husband who was now waiting for you with a big wide smile adorning his face, ah there he was, handsome as ever — and then at the guests at your either side watching you as if you were the most beautiful woman in the entire world. The soft violin music echoing through the air, the pretty decorations surrounding you, the delicious smell of the cuisine waiting to be eaten after the wedding and the sweet fragrance lingering along with it.

It was the greatest feeling, only if it was actually your first time.

Yeah, you heard that right. This wasn't the first time you got married, in fact, it's the 56th time you walked down the aisle and went through the process over and over again. The happiness adorning on your face had fell into an uninterested look as you continued your way down the aisle, since it's nothing new — you could actually compare it to watching a TV show on repeat and the only difference was you're being forced on this fucking time-loop.

And you might wonder, how did this even happen in the first place? Well folks, it might be surprising so keep your lips shut right so a bee won't randomly fly into your pretty mouth.

10 years from now, you will face your death in a way you won't ever rest in peace. Why? Because you'll die at the hands of your beloved husband, Park Sunghoon. Yes you hear that right, your sweet loving husband who set up you to death in the cruellest way possible just so you would be really dead.

How sweet, right?

10 years into your marriage, your beloved husband was no longer the same. His loving touches, sweet words, honey-like smiles, gifts that he often bought for you no matter how simple or cheap it was because for the both of you, it doesn’t matter as long as love was wrapped inside it. He no longer does any of those anymore. At first, on the very first day he seemed distant, you thought he was only tired due to his ‘work’ but how wrong you were when that day wasn’t the last day he would treat you like that.

Somewhere on a typical rainy day in late February, you found him cheating behind your back, yes a shitty man indeed, even the dead would be ashamed to acknowledge him.

Where did it go wrong? You never knew. Did your story actually turn into a pathetic wife waiting to be mercilessly cast away from her husband as soon as his young mistress in her thick makeup and in her loud devilish heels appeared with a grand entrance?

It’s only 10 years, you couldn’t have looked that old for him to fall out of love from you that quick? Tch, even if you look old then it shouldn’t have mattered that much if he really did love you. Fuck. What a joke. Men are all the same, aren’t they?

So your beloved husband had murdered you through all those timelines in the cruelest way possible, all sorts of stuff he could ever think and some of them sometimes includes his shameless mistress. The pain was real, you felt it. When the first time everything resets back to the wedding day, it was only wise that you tried to cancel the wedding but to your dismay, you were forced to walk down the aisle in which you couldn't do anything but let things unfold once again.

Death, all over again. And along with those countless deaths, love for your beloved husband slowly dies along with it as well.

You had lost count to be honest, you've grown tired but you had no choice but to keep going on and try to change something so this time-loop could end for once and for all.

With the sound of your heels echoing along with the slow violin music, you observe everyone around you — the same scenery, yet somehow there's always something little different.

The bridesmaid who was checking her gown, the uncle who has took a shot of glass even before the wedding starts and now his face was flushed red, the couple in the farthest corner of the seat who had an obvious love quarrel — refusing to acknowledge each other until the wedding ends, the aunties from your future husband's side who has now favoured you a lot, relatives from your side who was gasping relentlessly over the lavish and grand decorations of the wedding, the adorable pair of children messing around with flower in the baskets despite how their parents tried everything to stop them and all you can say but don't have the time to, all of them were always there except that for every timeline — they were doing a complete different thing.

You could memorise it all, but it's all useless if none of what you did to escape the time-loop even works. You tried everything from sleeping late so you couldn't attend the wedding, from hitting the maids' head so they couldn't help you with your dress, to actually locking Sunghoon inside the basement — but all of it was deemed useless, since no matter what you do, you always find yourself walking down the aisle with the stupid bouquet in your hands and with everything as normal like you didn't do anything at all, it was as if you were teleported there no matter what you do.

And yet, 'giving up' is nowhere to be seen in your big fat ass dictionary.

Freeze, dance, waltz, screams, cheers, clink clanks, stinky mouth and the annoying violin music that you heard for the nth time — clenching the bouquet in your fists and with a big inhale, you halted your steps, everyone was confused as to why but before they can ask you anything.

You screamed like a maniac.

Everyone stood up on their feet, some with hands on their mouth, some hid behind their partners, some tried to approach you asking what's wrong and yet you thrashed around ruining the bouquet and throwing it on the ground as the flowery petals flew around in multiple directions.

If anything can be used to describe you right now, it would be a certified maniac psychopath future wife.

“H-honey? (Name)!? What the fuck is wrong with you?!” Sunghoon’s face contorts into disbelief as he tries to approach you but you shoved him away in the process.

Well you didn't care, extreme situations require extreme measures and your dignity is the very least thing you could think of since well none of these people would even remember what you did.

Screaming at the top of your lungs, hopping on your bare feet with your pretty shiny heels between your fingers, you prayed loudly inside your heart, "Please work! Just please let this work! I don't give a fuck if I got labeled as a psychopath, I would truly turn into a psychopath if I got stuck in this useless time loop again! Please! Please—"

"The groom and the bride may kiss now." Your eyes shoot open, looking down and up only to see your future son-of-a-bitch husband with his stupid smile after he said his stupid vows as he gave a stupid kiss on your hand.

Your eyebrows knitted together with your eyes uninterested as his lips gently crashed against yours, the same cheers from the guests as they threw flowery petals on the both of you.

And this is where the real deal starts.

The moment you and Sunghoon walk down the aisle, like always, it switches to the very part where you were forced to relive all the moments and memories on repeat. The giant-ass clock hanging on the manor shows 4:12pm, the same time where the 10 years of your life will be on repeat once again.

Cold, wet and dirty.

This time, your husband was nowhere to be seen. Most of the time, your death were often inside the manor and so you being here on a dark empty street in the middle of the woods, it's only safe to assume that the son of a bitch threw you off from his car. Great, now you gotta wait for death to consume you and you wonder what is it this time. Looking down, you noticed yourself wearing a dirty rag cloth with ripped holes on it, your hair frizzy and dry but smells rotten and musty, your skin having wound and rashes on it and somehow you felt a wave of weakness wash over your body.

Bitch, did that bastard just abuse you?

You couldn't have anymore thoughts as your body grew weak as time passed, letting itself devoured by the growing weakness, your head laid itself on the cold ground. Your sight blurred and teary as you looked up to the clear grey sky, foggy and cold.

Why the fuck you gotta be killed everytime? It's honestly tiring at this point.

With that, death consumes you.

—

The same maids. Same day. Same people. Fuck everyone.

The wedding day again, when is this going to ever end? Clenching the material of your gown in your fists, you've tried everything to prevent the wedding from ever happening. You've tried every single fucking thing to not marry him and yet it's still the same thing.

Sunghoon must’ve been God’s favourite. Tch.

Why did the deity even give you the chance to restart your life if you're only bound to go through the same outcome over and over again?

You're really tired, so fucking tired.

You walked down the aisle ready to meet that son of a bitch with that same stupid smile, you took a brief glance toward the guests at your sides with with that same look as if you were a damn goddess because yes hell you are. And the soft violin music echoing through the air, you damned wish at the deities that they could at least change that to a different instrument because it's ripping your ear drums off. The pretty decorations surrounding you, the delicious smell of the cuisine waiting to be eaten, which you never got the chance to eat unfortunately and the sweet fragrance making you wanna puke at this point.

Finally, you halted your steps, standing beside the mafia's son. Sigh. You gotta do something, but what? You've tried almost everything you could think of. Your face falls down as you try to think of something. Think, think. Is that all you got? You didn't work your ass off just to be this damn stupid. Think of something, think.

You hissed when the priest starts to talk nonsense about the stuff you heard over a dozen times already, your brain is about to burst at any moment like for Christ's sake.

"Just shut up!" You immediately covered your mouth with your hand, utterly shocked that you actually voiced it out. Murmurs were heard and you could feel their eyes boring your back, but it's not like you care. They won't even remember anyways.

"Sorry father—" Heh? You tilted your head, are you seeing things?

You blinked twice to get a better view at the priest in front of you, it was weird, something was unusually odd. Something was different from the set of timelines you've been through before.

The priest is different, last time you checked the priest was an old man in his 60s with his head all bald, back slouching and skin saggy, eyes drooping with no life inside it but this one..

This one was younger, his flowy black hair almost covering his eyes, his long eyelashes fluttering as he read through the pages and the faint blush on his cheek along with his tongue briefly licking his sweet red lips.

Your breath hitched as you took in the beauty of this young man in front of you. How could such a beautiful young man turn out to be a priest? This must be a joke, well why you're even surprised, life has utterly been treating you like a joke all this time.

So it won't be such a surprise if 'life' decided to switch the priest and throw a random hot man instead.

You were snapped out of your deep thought when your future husband called out for you with concern on his face, like bitch stop with that. You mumbled a sorry to the priest and everything went back to normal again.

Yea, as if. But why did the priest switched into a young man? Don't tell me the old man regressed into his younger version after so many timelines, bish please—

"Sunghoon, do you take (Name) for your lawful wife, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do you part?"

Sunghoon's eyes crinkled with smiles, "I do."

You smiled as if you're not going to plunge a knife in my heart, Park Sunghoon-ssi.

The young priest then turns his attention towards you, "(Name), do you take Sunghoon for your lawful husband, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do you part?

His adorable and innocent boba eyes as he waited for your response and yet, fuck. Now that you observed him more, he definitely looks hot. Shit, what's wrong with you?! You have to find a way to survive, not simp on a hot young priest!

Sunghoon cleared his throat, eyes lingering with concern and worry as he mouthed 'are you okay' to you, you briefly glanced at the guests over your shoulder and their eyes laid on you confused and impatience from Sunghoon's family, and your dad as well.

"(Name), do you take Sunghoon for your lawful husband, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do you part?

"O-oh, I do. I do." you finally answered, stuttering as you cleared your throat. Yeah, I fucking do wanna leave this place as soon as I can.

The ceremonial wedding ring soon took place, with Sunghoon delighted to put the ring on your finger and you did the same, obviously with the disinterested look on your face.

"The groom and the bride may now kiss." The low and soft tone of the priest behind you was enough to take your attention away from the groom. Now that you thought of it, the kiss was the last thing to seal off the wedding and the next was the fast timeskip to 10 years and so, an idea pops in your head. It might sound crazy but you can't bear to live through the same timeline again, you're willing to take any risk if it meant to save your life.

Sunghoon places his hand on your neck and leans closer as he prepares to kiss you ‘again’, yea sike. You harshly shoved his face away with your hand in which his jaw dropped and eyes wide in response. “(Name)!?’

Pushing away the arms of your husband, you turned around to the direction of the young priest. You observed as his adorable boba eyes widened as you approached him with your hands lifting your gown so you could walk at ease.

One step, two steps.

You halted your steps in front of him, and you gasped as you took in his tall figure and his dark-colored eyes set on you. It might kill you, things might go wrong but you had no choice.

Confused, he asked, “M-miss?”

Without further hesitation, you wrapped your hands on his neck in which he was taken aback, mouthing a simple sentence you doubt he could even hear, I'm sorry father. Pulling him closer to you as you shut your eyes tight, crashing your lips into his.

Gasps and murmurs emit in the air as they watch the scene unfolding in front of them.

You didn't move your lips against his. Heck, it would be awkward. But you tasted how his lips felt so plump and soft against yours, it tasted sweet. You swore your heart is about to burst, and your cheeks burning from the embarrassment of kissing a stranger and even more so, a priest. But you really had no choice but to try another way to escape from this miserable timeline.

"(Name), what the hell do you think you're doing!?" pushing yourself away from the priest whose face was blushing profusely, his boba eyes about to pop out anytime due to the kiss.

Forgive me, lord for kissing him.

"The fuck? What kind of woman are you bringing in to our family, Sunghoon?!"

Sunghoon ruffled through his hair in disappointment as he struggled to accept what he had just seen, but it didn't take long before reality dawned on him.

"(Name)? Just w-what kind of prank is this, honey?"

His pained expression might've done wonders to your heart if you were still in love with him but you were actually way more worried for the young priest now– wait?

This is odd. You thought as you observed everything before you, and then at the giant ass clock hanging on the manor. 4:13pm.

Your jaw dropped, eyes widening in fractions as you can't believe it, it can't be?!

You are free?! You turn to the young priest with your eyes blinking back your tears as you covered your mouth with your hand to suppress your scream of joy, you are really free! The priest, he's your saviour!

The priest’s eyebrows knitted together in immense confusion as to why you were so happy.

You rushed in to the priest's arms, surprising him for the nth time as, engulfing him with your big wide hug as you mumbled a thousand thank yous to him and the entire crowd especially your future husband watching the entire scene unfolding in front of their eyes, with their eyes about to pop and questions running through their mind as to why and what the actual fuck is going on with the bride's head?

"(Name)!" Your future mother-in-law yelled at the top of her lungs, making you flinch in surprise.

Well now that you thought of it, there's no more time-loop which means everyone here is bound to remember that you kissed the priest for your entire life, which you couldn't care any less but, how are you going to actually escape now?

—

The wedding ceremony was cancelled and the guests were sent back to their respective homes through chauffeur since well, this is a wealthy-ass mafia family we got here, folks.

And here you are standing in the center of the huge living room, still in your wedding dress and the young priest miserably forced on his knees by the guards standing on both his sides. The entire family, Sunghoon and even your dad, was also present as they all sat on the couch. It feels like you're in a serious high court right now, and you committed a treason.

You were forced to listen as Sunghoon's parents talked with your dad, disappointment and rage evident on their face as they tried to understand how and why you would do such a shameful deed on your wedding day. There, Sunghoon stood beside the couch where his parents sat, his head hanging low and his bangs covering his eyes.

Shit. Why are you feeling guilty at the man who's bound to betray you and murder you in the future? This is bullshit.

After much discussion, they decided to put the blame on the young priest instead, in which you protested, saying it was your fault but Sunghoon was adamant to save you and told you to stay quiet. “Just please shut it, (Name)!” he whisper-yelled, leaning closer to you, “Do you even know this bastard?”

You shook your head, “No, of course not!”

“The why did you fucking kiss him, like what’s going on with your damn head.” Sunghoon clenched his fist and sways it in annoyance.

Like freak, I kiss him because I don't want to get married at you.

“It was my f-fault! I must’ve have eaten something stupid that’s why I wasn’t aware-” you exclaimed, begging Sunghoon’s parents, “So please, please..”

You turned to look at the young priest whose head was hanging low and then back at Sunghoon’s parents, “Please don’t blame him for it!”

—

Darkness engulfed the entire sky, birds replaced with the cicada's cries, and the busy life of the street had just begun with the crowd going all over with their lives. While yours had finally started after getting rid of the time-loop, the young priest’s life was fated to end today as Sunghoon’s parents had ignored your pleas. Gritting your teeth as you sat in the guest's bedroom, you couldn’t possibly let this happen to him.

"Hey you, the master has ordered us to get rid of the priest." One of the guards standing in front of the cell nodded, opening the lock with the keys in his hand but in his peripheral view, he noticed something odd and so he looked up.

Blood splattered across the cell before he could see who did it, slowly falling onto his knees and the life from his eyes being sucked out. A loud thud. This alerts the rest of the guards and they immediately pulled out their gun.

And there a young man in a white suit, which is none other than the priest, slowly turns around to face the guards with fresh blood leaking down on his disinterested face. Wiping off the blood from his cheek with his sleeve, the dagger in his hand glints with the moonlight. He lazily gazed at the guards and then at the corpse beside him, his chest rose and fell in a breath of sigh — it was as if this was nothing new to him.

Clicking his tongue inside his cheek, he turned his attention back to the alerted guards in their defense form, "Let's just get over it as fast as we can, shall we?"

—

Heels echoing through the dark hallway, the young man walks as if he had no problem in the world, twirling the blood-stained dagger in his fingers. The moonlight from outside the window shines through the edges of his face stained with dry blood, his beautiful dark-colored eyes holding no soul and down to his exquisite white suit that was now painted red.

He halted his step to glance outside the window, the night was still young and it's only safe to assume that people are still awake. But it's no problem for him since he's going to send them to their sweet dreamland either way.

You shuffle around the hall outside your room, biting your nails and clicking your heels on repeat, you are in a serious dilemma as to how can you save the priest for the mistake you did? It's not even close to a mistake, because to save yourself, the price was his death — he's gonna die because of you.

"This won't do." You shook your head, lifting your gown so you can walk faster through the basement, "I have to save him."

A melodic whistle.

You halted your steps when you heard it, looking at the distance to see who it was but the dark hallway with only the lamps glowing on the carpeted floor was all you can see. Even the bright moonlight wasn't helping either, and yet the whistles were only getting closer and closer which made you step backwards in fear.

Is there even a ghost here?!

A silhouette appeared, unravelling a white piece of clothing and as you narrowed your eyes to gain a clearer view on the stranger, your breath hitched when you saw it; the white piece of clothing was none other than a white suit, a priest's attire, to be exact. And the attire was not as dazzling and pure as it used to look before for it has been tainted with red. It can't be?

The moonlight shone over the stranger's face and there you saw him, the young priest. Breath of relief washed over your entire being as you tried to approach him, "Hey– oh my god, are you okay?!"

But something weird, — the sinister aura that emits from the once-innocent looking priest and your blaring instincts stopped you as you halted your steps.

You froze.

Your suspicions were only confirmed when you saw the blood-stained dagger in the confines of his fingers, playfully twirling it as if it was a child's toy and his boba eyes that once caught your heart for a moment, had turned into a lifeless soul. Covering your mouth with your hand as your body shakes in fear, you stuttered, "W-who are you-"

"I'm very pleased to meet you once again, Miss (Name)." He gave you a warm smile which was a complete contrast to the blood leaking down on his cheek, "My name is Jungwon, and I was sent to assassinate you all at once."

The priest. That innocent and adorable young priest that blushes profusely when you kiss him, turned out to be a cold-blooded assassin?.. What the actual fuck is this.

Speechless, you struggled to make out words to say, "W-what?! What did I do?!"

"Nothing in particular, just a mistake you made which I understand wasn't your fault."

"No. No. No.” You raised your hands as if to stop him, “You must be getting your address wrong since I don’t remember where I made a mistake nor a crime! Bitch, I didn’t even kill a fly my entire life!”

"The entire Park family, including yours, must be eliminated before the sun rises. It's part of the contract and therefore I asked for you to comply, I'll make it painless and quick–"

"Oh shut up!" You screamed. This can't be true, you finally escaped from that all that time-loop, finally away from the claws of your murderous husband — all of that just to get murdered by an assassin in the end? "No but why me? Why my family? Kill him instead! We haven't even gotten married yet!"

"You're his wife and therefore you're-"

"I fucking kissed you not him! The wedding was never official!"

"Connection." Jungwon pauses as he cleans the blood from his dagger with the white towel laying on the furniture, "By the looks of it, you seem smart, you should've been well-informed that your life is no longer yours the moment you formed a connection with someone from a dangerous background."

Does he think you’re dumb? Of course you knew. But could they have at least the decency to not kill you on your wedding, especially on the day you finally escaped from the time loop?!

Shit. Shit. You gotta do something. Your eyes darting over to his back and in an instant, you raised your finger pointing behind his back.

"Look! There's a guard!" A pathetic attempt to turn his attention away from you but he didn't budge, only raising his eyebrow in confusion but were quickly replaced with amusement.

"Did you really assume I was that dumb? Are you really that dense?" Jungwon chuckles, shaking his head. "Well I guess it's safe to think so when a while back ago, you chose to kiss not your husband, but a priest."

Silence. Your face flushed red from the embarrassment, you knew it was embarrassing but the fact that he mentions makes it more embarrassing than it should.

Jungwon brushes his finger against his faint red lips, "That's a nice kiss, I have to admit." his words turned to whisper at the end, you frowned but didn't bother to ask. “Too bad, I’ll have to eliminate a pretty lady like you.”

“I don’t know if I can take that as a compliment?!” you panic, feet slowly stepping backwards as he start to close the distance between you. Your survival is your priority at this point.

“Like I said, it was your fault. You are the one who put yourself into the target list.” Jungwon sighed, twirling the dagger between his fingers, then a smile — a genuine one, adorned his face. “But don’t worry, I’ll make sure it doesn’t hurt.”

He sensed your hesitance, you were frozen with too much fear washing over your entire being. He knew that feeling very well, “I’ll give you a chance to run, my lady.”

Eh? Your eyes widened when those words left his mouth.

“In a count of 10 seconds,” He leans against the wall, stroking the dagger on his cheek as he slowly brings himself to look at you, eyes holding something genuine in it that you couldn’t comprehend what it is, “Run, my lady. And I will chase you after that.”

And that’s what you did, you ran for your life. Panting, chasing for breath as you turned to the left side of the hall, trying to search for someone or any of the guards. You could still heard him counting far from another hall, his voice echoing through the darkness — almost giving you chills.

Running for your life on your fat wedding dress, on your heels and through the dark hallways — a lame pathetic, indeed. But it’s not like you could change into another dress right now. You took a brief glance over your shoulder to see if he was there, and there he was chasing after you, you swore your face ran cold and pale, gasping for air as you shook your head in desperation. You can't die here!

A hand tugged your arms forcefully behind, pulling you to his chest but you screamed for your life, “No! No! Bitch, this is not fair, you should have given me 1 minute instead of 10 seconds!!”

You fell on your back after a dramatic attempt to kick his hands away that was tugging on your arms, he then hovered on you, pinning both your wrists on the ground. You observe as his bangs covering his dark iris that was once the adorable boba eyes, sweat leaking down his blood-stained cheek, and then his red sweet lips that you once tasted before-

Shit. Are you seriously simping to how hot this priest-turned-into-an-assassin is when you're at the brink of your death? Get hold on yourself, (Name)!

You tried to thrash around but to no avail, he was stronger and faster, ultimately succeeding in pinning you down with just one hand, leaving you to observe as he pulled his dagger and pointed it to your face. Shaking your head in desperation, tears streaming down your cheeks, you cried out begging him to let you go.

You notice the glint of hesitation in his dark colored eyes, a sense of hope forming in your heart upon seeing it, only for it to be broken with one sentence leaving his mouth, "Forgive me, my lady. It's my job and I have to complete the task given to me."

If only, if only, the time-loop still exists then you would've still survive. It's really pathetic that you faced death either way but you still wanna live, you still want to live. Think! is there a way for the time-loop restart again?

You gasped as he raised his dagger in the air, preparing to plunge it to your heart. At that point, everything moves into a slow motion as your rapid heartbeat echoes through your ear, your chest tight, fists clenching and your wrists aching with his tight grip around it.

“Don’t worry, I’ll make it quick.” Jungwon whispered as he prepared to plunge the dagger to the direction of your heart in full-force.

Heavy and rush footsteps approaching from the distance, "Hurry! The assassin is around here!"

Jungwon snapped his head to the direction where the voice came from, eyes widening in fractions as he's supposed to finish his mission in a silent and quick method, not invite the entire manor to watch like a damn spectator.

This is it. You took advantage of the situation by grabbing the dagger but to your surprise his firm was stronger as he turned his attention back at you, a smirk adorning his lips, "Not so fast, my lady." And with that, he successfully pulled the dagger away from your grip but you immediately took action by pulling your left knee, raising it up and using your entire energy to kick his chest with your heels which resulted in him falling harshly on his bottom and his head hitting the carpeted floor.

You stood up on your feet, panting as you gripped your gown up to give an easy way for your heels, and then you kicked the dagger away from his hand with your heels.

Groaning in pain, Jungwon hissed and spit the blood out. Eyes narrowing in annoyance as it shouldn't have been taking this way too long to kill a random weak girl.

He spitted the blood out, you froze as it caught your attention. Something was off. His blood-stained lips, wait. Wait. Hold on. This guy. His goddamn pretty face and his.. red lips, the same sweet taste. The wedding. Why did the time-loop disappear in the first place? It's because of the kiss! Yes, it was! But was it because of him? You had no idea. But if you do it again, would everything return back to the wedding ceremony?

But that would mean, that I'll have to kiss him again?!

"There he is!" The guard alerted the rest of his team, and one of them came Sunghoon whose face ran cold and dry as he saw the entire scene unfolding in front of him.

"(Name)!"

Shit. What's he doing here? But who fucking cares.

You immediately pulled Jungwon who was trying to grab the dagger again, to your chest and to his surprise, your face was inches away from him. Rapid heartbeat echoed through your ear as you inspected his dark-colored eyes, those freaking boba eyes and that eyelashes fluttering as he blinked in confusion. Both of you gulped at the intimate proximity, but you ignored it as you clenched his collar in your fists, he tilted his head, “Are you planning to kiss me again in front of your husband?”

Silence ensues between you both as chaos was approaching fast.

“No, I already told you, he’s not my husband.” You spat out, “And yes, mind me stealing one more kiss?”

Before Jungwon could react, you pulled him closer and crashed your lips into his. His eyes widening for the nth time while yours were shut tight, the same sweet taste from his lips mixing with yours once again. Breathing heavily as your lips were pressed together, and at that point you could feel the thud of his heartbeat.

—

Your eyes fluttered open at the sun peeking through the windows of your room, the refreshing breeze passing through the soft materials of the curtain. Wait?!

You immediately sat up, inspecting yourself if you had any injuries and to your relief, there was none. Did it actually work? You hurried to the window and looked around and saw that everything was repeating again just like a time-loop. So the kiss did work. Just who the hell is that guy? An assassin yes, but why the fuck a kiss can return the time-loop?! It might’ve just been luck. A luck that occurs twice.

Now there’s no way he would exist in this timeline for there must be something different, which means the priest has probably turned into an old man like it did before. But what’s that lingering disappointment in you? You should be happy, that freaking killer doesn’t exist now, he’s so much more dangerous than the time-loop itself.

Ruffling your hand through your hair, you sat back on the bed. A surge of happiness washed over you but a part of it was disappointment because that would mean you would have to repeat everything all over again.

Tap, tap, tap.

You don't even need to acknowledge the maids or the butler anymore, it was a routine at this point. But you can't give up, you've survive all those death up to this point so you can never give up. If you actually had the chance to overthrow the time loop before then you can do it again. Don't give up.

The entire scene on repeat for the 58th time as you walked down the aisle with your head hanging low, observing the bouquet with violet flowers in your hand and for once through all that timelines, you trace you finger over it and find it gorgeous. You knitted your eyebrows in confusion as the bouquet consists of white flowers before but you quickly ignored it as it's just a damn flowers, not that it matters anyway.

Finally halting your steps in front of your stupid future husband once again, you couldn't be bothered to look at his stupid smile because you fear you're going to punch this bouquet at his face. You didn't fail to notice his suit has changed into a white one, narrowing your eyes at the fact that the time-loop shitty thing manage to change everything but not your death.

Why did they even switch the priest to a younger one in the first place? Speaking of the devil, that goddamn pretty face.

That cat boy. You remembered him, those adorable boba eyes that turned into a sinister look when he revealed his true self, his lush black hair covering almost his eyes and especially, his sweet red lips. You wonder where is he now– you must be a certified psychopath already since you are looking for an assassin who tried to murder you in the previous timeline. What a joke.

The priest went all over the wedding stuff again, and you frown as to why the voice sounds familiar and yet you ignore it, not really bothering at this point. Sigh.

"Jungwon, do you take (Name) for your lawful wife, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do you part?"

Wait. What? You whipped your head at the priest and your jaw dropped with your eyes about to popped out, what the actual fuck is Sunghoon doing over there as a priest?! If he is there, then? Then?!

Turning your eyes to the groom, your future husband; those same hair, eyes, nose and lips. Innocence adorning his face with his eyes brimming with fondness as he looks at you, the same sweet red lips tugging up in a pretty smile.

What in the fucking time-loop is this?!

Wait. Does he remember? If Jungwon is the groom then he.. then he's the mafia's son now? Are you kidding me? The assassin sent to assassinate the entire Park family and especially you has now become their son?!

You're marrying the person who tried to assassinate you. Fuck-

Then as if something pulls him back into reality, his eyes brimming with fondness were replaced with confusion, “W-what?” Jungwon’s eyebrows were knitted in immense confusion as he looked at himself, raising his hands, turning it back and forth. And then back at you, who has the exact expression as him.

Silence.

“Why the fuck am I marrying you!?”

-> secondary blog: @llyzblog

#enha #enha imagines #enhypen #enhypen x reader #enha x reader #enhypen oneshots #enhypen scenarios #enha fanfic #yang jungwon

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strawbrygashez · 1 year

Text

POSTAL 4 DUDE X GOTH READER

Rings

You and Dude are going to a concert!!! :D how fun!!! This isn’t serious or super long but I hope at least someone likes it!! 🖤🦇👻🪦⛓🔪🔮

————————————————————————

“Now would ya look at that!” Dude teased after catcall whistling at you once you’d finally emerged from the bathroom and into the living room where he’d sat waiting. You couldn’t help the slight blush that came though you’ve been with him for a year now and have heard him complement you plenty of times. It didn’t help he had his glasses off for the moment and you could see him looking you up and down with a certain…kinda glaze to them, almost like he could pounce on you right then and there.

But he knew better than that right now since you spent so lo- “I guess it makes up for the hour and a half you’ve spent getting ready!” He added in, his hungry glance suddenly switching to a playful one. God his moods could switch fast. You rolled your eyes at him. He knew damn well that it takes time to put together a look this intricate, especially with the makeup and all the layers of different things you decided to toss together for today. But you couldn’t stay annoyed at him too long when he stretched his arms out towards you with his grin still not leaving. You two probably should have at least started to be on the way to the concert by now but…yknow, it wouldn’t really hurt to entertain him for a minute. Besides the venue was surprisingly close this time and you wouldn’t be devastated to miss the runner up bands so..fuck it.

You grin as you walked closer to him but before you could prepare yourself for whatever he wanted, he suddenly grabbed you by the waist and tugged you down to sit on his lap, back facing towards him. “Dude! Be careful! I-” you started but cut yourself off as you felt him pull you closer so he could nuzzle his face into the crook of your neck. He stayed silent a bit as he took your hands in his and gave you a kiss on your shoulder before speaking. “God, you’re gorgeous. You know that?” Even though you wanted to point out how he’s just gone through at least three different emotions in the last couple minutes, you instead just frowned a bit as your blush came back even worse. “W-whatever Dude….” was all you could say. He chuckled a bit as he moved his head to rest his chin on your shoulder before lifting one of your hands up and slightly moving it as though he was inspecting it. “I think you’d be proud to know I still haven’t chipped the nail polish you did last night! See?”Dude said as he put his hand out next to yours. Your sharp and long nails still indeed matched his in color and cleanliness. In the past when you’ve done Dudes nails, he always ended up picking at the nail polish before even a week could go by. It never really bothered you or hurt your feelings though. He’s always just been one of those guys who needed to be doing something with his hands or messing with something but it did feel nice to see all of his black nail polish looked as good as you did it the other night.

“Oh wow. Yeah I am proud of you babe! Were you looking forward to dressing up too today or something?” You asked him with a smile. Maybe you also should have told him to get ready while you were…seeing as he was still in his clothes from yesterday but oh well. “Hmm..I dunno. I was just more careful because you seemed so excited about today, so. Why? Are you wanting me to dress up and be some kinda vampire prince for the day?” He teased. The truth was he was actually genuinely a little excited to dig through his clothes and find his old black trench coat and whatever old band shirt that has survived the passing of time (which should be commendable if you’re being worn by Dude of all people) but you didn’t need to know that. Maybe he should tell you though that it does make his heart flutter a bit when he matches with you but..maybe later. That’s too soft for even right now.

You shrugged and interlocked your fingers with his before leaning back on him some. “Wear whatever. I don’t care.” It was the truth. You liked Dude for who he was, not what he wore or looked like. You didn’t expect a guy who was getting grey hairs already to still wanna dress to the nines with you. To be honest you were even kinda surprised he wanted to be in a crowd with a bunch of younger alternative people dancing around. “Nah. It’s fine. I got some clothes that have probably been begging to see daylight again anyways.” Dude replied before he tried to think back to the days when he’d somewhat tried to dress in a alternative style (though unlike yours. Yours was much more beautifully crafted and traditionally goth than whatever he was doing.)

If he had to guess it was probably back in the early 2000s when he was still with his bitch of a ex. He would have maybe been even more darkly inclined back then if his ex didn’t give him as much of a hard time already for dressing ‘like a freak’ for wearing his old trench coat everywhere, even during the heat because it just felt nice to wear and was useful. But before he could let himself slip too far back into those depressing thoughts, he felt you suddenly untangling your hands. He looked back down at yours as he watched you slip one of your rings off your finger and onto his. Before he could ask anything, you faced towards him with a grin and joked “There. At least it will look like you tried to dress up anyways.”

He just sat there for a moment, looking at you and then the ring. Trying really hard not to think too hard about the fact that the feeling of wearing rings similar to ones you had on made his heart beat faster and got him thinking of giving you a certain ring. He’s sure you could tell though by the way he felt his cheeks get warmer. “Y-yeah. Whatever. I uh- I think we’re cutting it close yknow? I should probably start getting dressed now so…” he gently took you by your waist again, sliding you off his thighs and onto the couch before standing up and doing his best to ignore your confused reaction. “You okay?” You asked as you watched him scratch his head, a habit he does when he’s nervous. “Yeah..I-I’m good. Just gonna get dressed.” He stopped himself and tried to get his wits back. “Dont worry! I won’t take a whole half a day like you do.” He teased. To his relief you just rolled your eyes again and grinned. Taking this as a go ahead, he left to go dig whatever clothes he could up.

Once he came back in, you couldn’t help but swoon a bit over how handsome he looked. He’d mentioned something about having a black trench coat and black combat boots before but seeing them in person…along with some fucking killer band shirt with some spiked bracelets..now maybe you wanted Dude to entertain your thoughts like you were willing to do for him earlier. But this time you two really should be leaving so you’ll have to save those ideas for afterwards. He only seemed a little bashful at being in a style different than what he was used to for so long but he seemed to perk up after you got up and now were checking him out. “You…look super fucking hot in that babe.” You complimented him, chucking a little at just how taken back you were. Before he could be worried that the laughing that followed was because he looked dumb, you again took his hand and looked him up and down, biting your bottom lip a tad which, of course gave him his confidence back. “’Course I do! I can obviously rock anything.” He joked but you knew it really was the truth. This man could look hot in even a garbage bag in your eyes.

Agreeing with him with a little ‘mhm’, you gave him a kiss on the cheek (that would have to suffice for how you felt now). He grinned as you pulled away and you were going too until you noticed that you’d left a black lipstick stain on his cheek. You only stared at him for a minute but that was long enough for Dude to piece two and two together of what had happened, especially when you went to go wipe off his cheek. He grinned even more widely as he stopped you. “Like hell you’re getting rid of that sweetheart.” Ugh. “Cmon Dude you already look so nice and-” and for some god damn reason before he could hear you out, he decided to fucking run and burst out of the house before you could try again. You were stunned only for a second before he yelled out, “CMON WE’RE GOING TO BE LATE!” God. Like he expects you to run after him in your platform boots. You act like a normal human being and take your time getting everything together and locking the door behind you before you finally turn around to see Dude already in his truck, in the driver seat, waving for you to come on.

#postal dude #postal dude x reader #this was rlly goofy..I’m gonna be doing a p1 x goth reader that’s gonna be more serious 🫡#also can u tell I suck at naming fics!?!#sorry for any mistakes as usual!!!

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xtrafluffyteddy · 2 years

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Oh my heart

Pairing: Eddie munson x reader

Mentions: a little bit of angst, confusion, mixed emotions, happy ending!!!

You and Eddie had been together for almost a decade now. You had a nice house just outside of Hawkins and the cutest little baby boy named Ozzy who was the spitting image of his father. Eddies band had taken off after highschool which meant long tours, but he always made time for and Ozzy always showing Ozzy the love his father never gave him.

You smiled as you watched Eddie play with Ozzy teaching him where to put his little fingers on the frets on his favorite guitar. Even during these touching moments you couldn’t help but feel like something was missing. Even after a decade and little one you couldn’t help but wish Eddie would ask you to marry him. You know marriage is just a dumb certificate but you couldn’t help but crave it after all this time.

“Heys Ed’s” you question as you did your usual nightly routine staring at Eddie through the large mirror in your shared bathroom “what’s up sweetheart?” You think for a moment then continue “would you ever marry me?” You wash your face before walking towards your shared closet pulling on one of his old shirts “why do you ask sweetheart?” He questions sitting up a bit in bed to make room for you “it’s just that we’ve been together for so long and I dunno i just thought why haven’t we gotten married yet, and I know, I know it’s just a dumb piece of paper but have you ever even thought about it?” You climbed into bed looking over at him as you got comfortable “no I haven’t sweetheart” he finally replies after what felt like an eternity “oh” you thickly swallowed feeling disappointment build in your chest “okay Eddie good night then” you curl up on your side facing away from him ignoring his questions of what’s wrong and to please talk to him.

Weeks had passed since that talk, everything had gone back to semi-normal. Eddie went back on tour leaving you with Ozzy which you didn’t mind it was a good distraction from the whole him not wanting to marry you.

Eddie had been planning to propose to you for weeks when you had suddenly asked him that night. It threw him off in all honestly when you asked, he thought maybe you were onto his plan so to throw you off he told you he wasn’t thinking about marrying you, but he didn’t realize how badly those words would affect you.

When he returned back from tour he found Steve Harrington standing outside his house “what’re you doin here Steve?” He questioned setting down his guitar case to find his keys “she left Eddie” “what do you mean she left?” He asked frantically “she left said you guys wanted different things and that she needed time to think”

“Why didn’t you stop her?! Tell her the plan?!” He shoved past Steve fumbling to unlock his door heart dropping into the pit of his stomach at the thought of you and Ozzy not being in there “I can’t believe I fucked up this bad” he pushed open the door stopping dead in his tracks at the sight of you in a gorgeous red dressed surrounded by candles.

“Hey Ed’s” you smile “what’s- what’s all this?” He questioned setting down his guitar case “who said I had to wait for you to ask me?” You get down on one knee taking out a silver banded ring with a black onyx inset and bags carved into the band. “Eddie…” you take a deep breath before continuing “in all my life…I never- I never” you begin tearing up trying to keep it together “I never thought I would be so lucky as to meet and fall in love with my best friend” you wobble a bit.

Eddie quickly kneels down in front of you taking your hands into his. “I had this whole big proposal planned. I thought for so long it mattered what I said, and where I said it, then I realized the only thing that matters is you. You’ve made me the happiest man alive” he tears up rubbing his thumb over your knuckles “you’ve given me everything I thought I’d never have so if you’d let me” he takes out a solve ring with a gorgeous moonstone in the center. “Sweetheart will you marry me?”

You throw yourself into his arms crying tears of happiness into his neck “yes yes yes!” You repeat over and over pulling him into a passionate kiss “I love you so much honey” you mumble against his lips “I love you more sweetheart” he holds you tightly like you’ll disappear any minute.

“Can we come in now?” You hear Steve sniffle from outside the door. You look at Eddie then back at the door “yes yes! Come in?“ you call out giggling as Steve, Nancy, and Robin fall through the door holding a giggling Ozzy.

#eddie munson x reader #stranger things #eddie munson #eddie munson imagine #eddie st4 #eddie munson stranger things #eddie stranger things #eddie my beloved

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ghostinthewires · 1 year

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so everyone else is posting horny smut for Valentine's, unfortunately on this blog it's sad Primo ficlet hours.

A Lost Love

It had been 8 years since the love of Primo’s life had died, and every Valentine’s Day only seemed to open the wound anew.

Most of the time he could push away the memories. He always took the long way to the orchard so he could avoid the lavender plants that reminded him of her perfume, and tried not to look at her jewelry that he had kept safe in a box after her death. But on Valentine’s Day it was impossible, and even though he tried to mentally prepare as best he could, it never got easier.

The siblings and ghouls were all excited. He didn’t resent them for it. He did enjoy seeing them all so happy, and only slightly abused the fact that so many of them trusted him in order to hear all the gossip the next day.

He would always start the day out strongly, smiling at breakfast at all the happy couples and the whispered confessions taking place. But as the day went on, he would find it harder and harder to bear and would inevitably end up in the greenhouse alone with his thoughts.

And that was how he found himself now. He had escaped the busy corridors full of laughter and smiles and come out to the comfort of his plants. There was plenty to be done anyway, and his brothers knew why he would be absent.

His thoughts drifted to her as he worked with some seedlings. Satanas, he missed her. Missed her gorgeous long hair, and the way she would beg him to braid it for her. He could never refuse. Missed the way she would bring him tea after long hours in the greenhouse and would let him show off what he’d been working on. She was always so interested in his plants, asking so many questions.

He missed the way they could fall into bed together after a long day, and how the only place he had ever felt truly at home was in her arms. What he wouldn’t give to be held by her one last time.

He put down the pot in his hands and gripped the edge of the workbench, head bowed and eyes squeezed shut. He was not going to cry. She would have been sad to see him still like this after so many years. But he couldn’t help it.

Sighing, he walked to the back of the greenhouse where there were benches and sat down heavily. His old bones couldn’t keep him standing for too long anymore. She would have laughed affectionately, kissed his nose, and rubbed his back. She was always stronger than him anyway. Physically and emotionally. She was the only thing that got him through being Papa.

A fond memory resurfaced at the thought. He was backstage after a show, his ghouls somewhere nearby. There was shouting from down the corridor, and swearing. He had stuck his head out of the dressing room to see her, face scrunched up in anger as she berated the security for not doing their job properly.

“I just walked on in here! No pass, nothing!” she had shouted. “If I was somebody who wanted to hurt one of the band, you wouldn’t have had a fucking clue!”

She was always so protective. Of his ghouls too, they had loved her. The incident had ended with one of them teasing her, asking if she thought they couldn’t look after themselves. It was an easy distraction and had allowed the security to escape without further beratement. The ghouls were forever teasing her, and she had never learned not to rise to it.

He smiled sadly at the memory, tried to laugh but all that came out was a grief-stricken sob. It broke the dam, and he buried his face in his hands as he started to cry. 8 years was such a long time to be without her. It was so difficult.

She had died from illness. He remembered the day she had gone as clear as crystal. It had been a hot summer day, and the windows in their bedroom had been opened to let in the breeze. He’d held her hands tightly as she went, and managed to save his tears until he was alone with his brothers. They’d just hugged him tight, let him cry. There were no words to comfort, nothing they could have said that would have fixed it. He would never forget their kindness on that day, and the days that followed.

He wept bitterly until there were no more tears to cry and was left with only heaving gasps. He wiped his face with the back of his hand, glad that his morning self had had the common sense to not put on his paints.

He sat for a while in the quiet, painful grief. It twisted around his heart and made every breath painful. He was broken out of it by rustling through the other side of the greenhouse, and almost imperceptible footsteps.

“Mountain?” he called out, grimacing at the way his voice cracked. Silence. That was odd. The earth ghoul was the only other person in the abbey that Primo could think would be out here on a day like this. He stood slowly, wincing as his joints complained. Making what she would have called “old man sounds” with that cheeky grin.

He slowly moved back to where he had been before, pots lying discarded. He couldn’t hear any more footsteps now, although in his old age his hearing seemed to be going. He turned back to the bench and frowned in surprise.

Amongst the pots and seedlings, was a card. It was made of pink paper, and had a crude drawing on the front, done with what he guessed were colouring pencils. There was a figure in the middle in red, and eight others surrounding, all in black. It looked like something done by one of the abbey children. But when he opened it, he found something entirely more heartwarming.

To Primo,

Happy Valentine’s Day!

We all love you and appreciate what you do, for us and for the abbey.

Lots of love,

Mountain, Sunshine, Cumulus, Rain, Cirrus, Aether, Dewdrop, Swiss

Most of the writing had clearly been done by Mountain; he recognized the earth ghoul’s neat and precise handwriting. But the signatures were all individual, dotted about the page in different colours with little drawings of hearts and plants. He realized now what the drawing on the front was; him and the ghouls.

He shut the card to look closer at the drawing, and felt tears begin to well in his eyes. His own ghouls had all gone back to Hell by now. They technically should have stayed on earth until Primo died, but they hadn’t wanted to stick around just to do chores and paperwork until then, and he had let them go with his blessing.

These ghouls were Copia’s, but he had taken them all under his wing anyway. Mountain was his favourite, but they were all incredibly sweet for demonic creatures. They hadn’t needed to do this for him. He wondered if one of them had seen him crying. It didn’t really matter.

He wiped his face again and set the card up on a shelf, smiling at the drawing. He wondered which of them had drawn it as he went back to his work.

He didn’t notice three pairs of eyes hiding behind a hedge just outside the greenhouse, peering in through the glass. Sunshine, Mountain, and Rain all grinned at each other to see him put their card up on a shelf. They didn’t like to see the kind old man upset and were pleased to hear him humming now as he went about his work. They crept away with the cover of the hedge, then raced each other back to the abbey. After all, it was Valentine’s Day, and the other ghouls were waiting patiently.

#ghost the band #papa emeritus 1 #primo #nameless ghouls #mountain ghoul #rain ghoul #sunshine ghoul #ficlet #my writing

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senjuushi · 1 year

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Event Translation — Brand New Journey ~Italy Expedition Volume~

Episode 8: Galleria Umberto I

—After their one full day of sightseeing was over, (Player Name) and the others returned to Naples.

A recently built arcade stands right in the middle of a street lined with shops both new and old.

Marks: There are so many people out, even though it’s nighttime.

Carcanore: Hey, look, it’s Galleria Umberto I.

Marks: ...? What’s that?

Benetta: This shopping gallery. It was built in the 19th century, during the large-scale redevelopment of Naples that followed the cholera epidemic.

Benetta: After that, problems such as deterioration did come up, but it’s still the foremost shopping gallery in Naples, and always bustling with people.

Carcanore: The domed ceiling is fifty-eight meters tall, and isn’t the mosaic on the floor gorgeous? It depicts the twelve constellations.

Carcanore: You can find everything from fast-food restaurants to menswear stores with a century of established history here. There are other such galleries and shopping districts around, but I think this one is the most “Naples-like” of them all.

Benetta: Precisely. —ah, that reminds me.

Benetta: I have some business at the shoe store. Did you receive the items you ordered?

The boutique Benetta went to was one of an ultra-luxury brand.

Cutlery: H-Hold on a second! Is this... Salvatore Gamoferra*!?

Carcanore: Yep, Benetta only wears Gamoferra shoes.

Cutlery: I thought you were wearing super well-tailored clothes...! How much do your wardrobes even cost...!

Benetta: Sorry to keep you waiting.

Marks: Is this store really that impressive?

Cutlery: It’s a first-rate brand! It’s beyond expensive.

Benetta: We hold Bella Figure in high esteem, and that means maintaining a pristine appearance.

Benetta: Wearing products made by a trusted brand that represents Italy is only natural.

Benetta: All of your clothes are from this brand as well, aren’t they?

Cutlery: Eh! Seriously!? You gave clothes like that to tourists who were just passing by...

Benetta: I couldn’t bring shame to my guests, could I? Especially when they saved Bonito’s life.

Carcanore: Anyway, wanna take a little break and hit up a bar? There are some places here that are famous for their cannoli.

Benetta: Before that... Bonito.

Bonito: Yeah?

Benetta: Go put these shoes in the car, please. It’s not becoming to walk around with a large number of shopping bags.

Bonito: ...a-ah! No problem at all.

Carcanore: ......

The bar was crowded with a large number of people. Tourists and residents of Naples all mingle together.

Master:

Today’s been fun.

We were able to enjoy Italy to the fullest thanks to you.

Carcanore: We should be thanking you too! You gotta come again sometime. I can show you around way better next time.

Cutlery: Yeah. ...I thought bars like this only served alcohol, but there’s all kinds of food here too, huh?

Carcanore: Yep, everyone here in Naples has their favorite bar.

Marks: The pubs in England feel totally different. This place is lively, but still relaxed...

Benetta: That’s also Bella Figura.

Marks: Really?

Benetta: Indeed. Well-becoming behavior is also essential.

Benetta: That’s why, even when going to bars, it’s unheard of to dress poorly or disgrace yourself with intoxication.

Benetta: My gun, as you can see, also honors beauty.

Benetta placed his gun on the table. The upper third of the slide is missing, and the barrel is exposed.

Marks: ...the barrel looks off. What does that mean for how it functions?

Benetta: It means that it’s beautiful.

Marks: ...beautiful... Master, do you understand? I don’t get it at all.

Benetta: It’s fine if you don’t understand. ...is Bonito not back yet?

Carcanore: Should I pay now? Umm... I wonder if I have one for this place.

Carcarnore pulled a pouch out of his bag— stuffed full to bulging with its contents.

Cutlery: What’s that?

Carcanore: Hold on a sec... got it!

The pouch had all kinds of discount coupons inside, and Carcarnore took one of them out.

Carcanore: I got this coupon half a year ago! The expiration date is... wow, just in the nick of time! It’s today, how lucky~♪

Cutlery: ...is this Bella Figure too?

Benetta: No...

Benetta: Carcanore is a fine person, and fundamentally Bello. However, I don’t think this frugal behavior is ideal...

Carcanore: I can’t help it. Even I don’t know why I do it— it’s just my nature, at this point. Or maybe a habit?

Carcanore: Also, can you cut it out with the “frugal behavior” jab? I just understand the value of money! Isn’t it smart to think like that?

Benetta: I’m not going to answer that.

Bonito: Sorry for the wait! The shoes are in the car now.

Bonito finally returns. Instead of sitting down, though, he took a step back. For an instant, (Player Name) feels a chill run down their spine.

Marks: —nh!

*gunshot*

Benetta shot Bonito.

Cutlery: ...huh?

Notes:

*“Salvatore Gamoferra” is an altered version of “Salvatore Ferragamo”, a real (and also highly expensive) Italian brand.

#Senjuushi #千銃士 #Marks #Cutlery #Benetta #Carcanore #Translation

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messers-moony · 3 years

Text

Accepted | F.H

Paring: Five Hargreeves X Wife!Reader

Summary: Five craves nothing more than to be accepted and loved by his siblings. That doesn’t appear to happen when he time travels back to 2019 after disappearing for seventeen years.

Five had never seen anyone so beautiful before. Even in the apocalypse, she was gorgeous. He knew it wasn’t because they were the only ones left either. She had his heart from the moment they accidentally ended up in the apocalypse together.

Y/n was a normal girl, an ordinary girl. She had no powers, completely powerless. It just so happens she was walking down the sidewalk and brushed shoulders with Five, which brought her with him.

He couldn’t be mad at her. It wasn’t her fault that they had brushed shoulders. He should’ve been more careful. Y/n was a shy and skittish girl. Not very talkative. It took her a week to use her voice after being thrown into the end of the world.

Despite Five’s commonly inpatient nature, he was extremely patient with her. She was all he had now, and he felt completely comfortable with her. It took a year for her to open up to him, to trust him finally.

She told him all about school and what it was like while Five listened intently. He loved listening to her talk about normal kid activities, things he never got to participate in. Y/n promised him once they got back to save the world, no matter how old, they’d do those things together.

The girl had a certain aura around her that just made him smile. After five years, they were inseparable. Five couldn’t imagine life without her. He couldn’t fathom how he lived without her. He could tell her anything and didn’t fear of being judged.

He had been strong for so long, but not he didn’t have to be anymore. He could let loose and be himself, whether it was being playful, cheerful, upset, or angry. He could be him, and that’s all that mattered to him.

At the age of twenty, they decided to date, knowing it’d be a risk but a risk well taken because Five proposed at the age of twenty-five. Obviously, getting married wasn’t really an option. Nevertheless, he always thought of her as Y/n Hargreeves. His pride and joy.

At the age of forty-one, they were both taken into the commission– a job they both loathed. However, in order to get back to their time, it had to be done. Every night after a mission or a long day, Five would snuggle up Y/n’s chest and sob.

It became a daily routine for the next four and a half years. Every night Five would cry. He missed everything and hated everything. He regretted not listening. He hated the killing. He missed his siblings. Y/n would sit and listen while rubbing his back.

She thought for sure that his siblings missed him. Oh, how wrong she was. She found that out when they returned back to their timeline. Both lovers had fallen to the ground back in their thirteen-year-old bodies.

“ Does anyone else see Little Number Five and a little girl, or is that just me? “ A male queried as five people peered at the two.

Y/n and Five both got up from the ground looking down at their attire. Their clothes were ten times too big for them now. Five appeared to look just as young as he did forty-five years ago, and so did Y/n. Five couldn’t help but smile at her gorgeous appearance that he hadn’t seen in years. She was beautiful at all ages, but he was particularly fond of her teenage form, as was she of him.

“ Shit. “ Five muttered as he walked past them, and Y/n followed.

Five led her into the Hargreeves manor. It was a huge house, one that consisted of too many bedrooms and bathrooms for one person. He held her hand tight, and he stood at the end of the table. At the same time, his siblings piled around the table.

“ What’s the date? The exact date. “ Five’s voice was stern as he began making food, “ The 24th. “ A brunette female responded.

“ Of what? “ Five asked, annoyed, “ March. “ She replied again.

“ Good. “ Five said, opening the loaf of bread.

“ Are you gonna introduce us to your lady friend? “ The male from earlier questioned, and Y/n took refuge behind Five.

Five sighed as he pulled her next to him, letting his arm rest upon her waist, “ This, is Y/n Hargreeves. “

“ Hargreeves? Is she dad’s biological child, or was there another child we didn’t know about? “ The big male quizzed, and Five smirked, looking up at his siblings, “ Or perhaps the most obvious conclusion, but you guys aren’t smart enough to see what’s right in front of you. “ Five insulted, which made Y/n lightly hit him.

“ She’s my wife. “ The boy summarized, kissing her cheek, “ Wife?! You guys are thirteen. “ A woman in a blue shirt interjected.

“ Ignore that. What just happened outside? “ A large male queried as Five continued to make his food, “ It’s been 17 years. “

Five scoffed, “ It’s been a lot longer than that. “

Gently Five removed his arm from Y/n’s waist, and spatial jumped behind Luther to grab something. Y/n was hesitant but took a seat on the counter as her husband's siblings stared her down

“ I haven’t missed that. “ The big male murmured, “ Where’d you go? “ Questioned a male in all black.

“ The future. It’s shit, by the way. “ Five replied as he spatial jumped from getting his marshmallows and back to the front of the table, “ Called it! “ The skinny male exclaimed

“ I should’ve listened to the old man. You know, jumping through space is one thing. “ The teen began as he looks through the fridge, “ Jumping through time is a toss of the dice. “

The boy looked up from what he was doing and took his sibling's appearances in, the ones he missed dearly but saw all dead. If you were Y/n, you could see his green eyes glass over. But if you were the Hargreeves siblings, you saw a heartless and cold teenage boy.

“ Nice dress. “ He complimented, “ Oh, well, danke! “ The skinny male exclaimed.

“ Wait, how did you get back? “ Asked the anxious brunette, “ In the end, I had to project our consciousnesses forward into a suspended quantum state version of ourselves that exists across every possible instance of time. “ Five answered.

“ That makes no sense. “ Blurted the black-wearing male, “ Well, it would if you were smarter. “ Five smirked.

“ Five, stop. They’re trying to understand. You probably sound insane. “ Y/n spoke up for the first time since coming back, “ Oh, I like her. “ The skinny male chuckled.

“ I’m Klaus. “ He introduced, “ Pleasure. “ Y/n greeted with a smile.

The strong male looked baffled, “ How long were you two there? “

Y/n sighed, “ Forty-Five years. Give or take. “ Five answered, “ So what are you saying? That you two are 58? “ He questioned again.

“ Our consciences are 58, apparently our bodies are 13 again. “ The teen boy answered, “ Wait, how does that even work? “ Questioned the brunette again.

“ He got the equations wrong. Meaning his math was off, bringing us back into the same bodies we left in. “ Y/n softly explained as Five ate his food.

“ Guess I missed the funeral. “ Five said as he picked up a newspaper on the table, “ How’d you even know about that? “ Asked the large male.

“ What part of the future do you not understand? “ Five barked, “ Heart failure, huh? “

“ Yeah/No. “ Contradicting answers.

“ Nice to see nothings changed. “ Five said, clicking his tongue, walking away.

“ Uh, that’s it? That’s all you have to say? “ Questioned the curly-haired woman asked the boy who was walking away.

“ What else is there to say? It’s the circle of life. “ Five said now out of the room and into the rest of the mansion.

“ Well, that was interesting. “ The big male concluded.

Y/n sighed, “ I’m sorry for him. The past few years for him haven’t been the greatest. Just know he cares about you guys. “

“ I’m Vanya. “ Smiled the anxious brunette, “ And that’s Allison, Luther, and Diego. Klaus interjected earlier. “ Vanya introduced, pointing at each member.

“ Nice to meet you all. I’m going to go find Five. “ Y/n smiled as she walked away.

It took a couple of minutes, but she eventually found what seemed to be like their bedrooms. Only one door was shut, so she knocked hesitantly on it. Sniffles were heard on the other side.

“ Five, it’s me. “ Her voice was serene and quiet, “ Come in. “ His voice was muffled through the door.

Her hand turned the door handle, and she walked inside. Gently she shut the bedroom door and locked it, knowing he hated people seeing him vulnerable. Y/n turned to see him sitting on his bed with his elbows resting on his knees, hands on his face crying.

She knelt in front of him, taking his hands into her own, “ They don’t care. “ Were the first words muttered from his mouth, “ They do care. They’re just confused. “ Y/n replied.

He shook his head and sat on the floor in her embrace, sobbing, “ It’s going to be okay, Five. I’m right here. I’ll always be right here. “ Y/n reassured as she ran her hands through his hair.

She felt a gentle kiss being laid on her shoulder, knowing it was his way of acknowledging what she said. After minutes passed, he had stopped crying and instead fell asleep, right in his lover's arms where he was always accepted.

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softykooky · 4 years

Text

the habits of a broken heart.

☾ genre : soulmates au, unrequited love, art student!JK, english student!Y/N, angst, fluff, subtle enemies to lovers

☾ pairing : jeon jungkook x reader

☾ summary : jungkook and you are soulmates. so says the matching crescent moons on both your wrists. however, things are never as easy as they seem, and you are quick to learn that falling in love with someone who does not believe in love is a one-way ticket to heartbreak.

alternatively,

“You still are, you know. Worth it.” You release a shaky breath. “But I was stupid to think that I am too.”

☾ word count: 26.3k (my biggest one yet!)

☾ author’s note: this took forever oh my gosh! i really hope you like it! it’s my first time writing such a big single piece, and trying a different style. thank you so much for your support, always! please let me know what you think ♡

The first time he had his heart broken, Jeon Jungkook had been 13 years old. He was fresh out of middle school and so ready to face his freshman year with an impressionable mind and plenty of voice cracks to earn him months worth of teasing. You see, at the age of 13, Jungkook wasn’t something to swoon over. He had yet to grow into his ears and Dr. Park assured him that his braces would be off as soon as she could get them. He was a little lanky and a bit too reticent to be considered social. So when a girl in his grade comes up to him, nervous and stuttering, and asks him to go to the heavily romanticized homecoming dance, Jungkook has already come to the conclusion that she might be his soulmate, even if he was far too young to get his mark yet.

Her name was Mina, and Jungkook is confronted with this memory every time he visits home and his mother makes the family flip through the photo albums dating back to his high school years. He grimaces every time he sees the picture of them together. Him in a pink button-up to match her offensively ugly ruffled taffeta dress.

Mina broke up with him three months after that picture was taken, through one of her friends no less and in front of his entire gym class. Jungkook couldn’t remember how long he cried for while he felt the pain from his first heartbreak would never go away, regardless of how much time passes. He held onto his mother and sobbed out the agony and humiliation of Mina not wanting to be his girlfriend anymore, and how he had lost his soulmate before he even knew it was her. His mother assured him that without the mark, there was no way to be sure and that there was hope. But back then, all Jungkook could think of was ways to avoid Mina the next day, especially when they sat next to each other in 3rd period biology.

At 13 years old, Jungkook thought he would never find love again.

He is 18 when he stands alongside his parents in a pale examination room and awaits his destiny. He’s leaving for college the next day, yet the only thing that’s making him nervous is the mark that will inevitably appear on his wrist in the next few minutes. The same one he would find on his soulmate’s, and Jungkook wonders if there is the possibility of scaring everyone away when the first thing he’ll ask on a date is: can I please see your wrist?

To say the least, Jungkook is petrified. Because that mark on his wrist is going to serve as a constant reminder of his missing piece, and Jungkook knows he’ll always feel lacking until he finds them. It’s a crescent moon. Small and black and nestled comfortably on his skin. He knows many times the marks don’t have any correlation with the couples, but Jungkook wonders if you are an astrologist. Or an astronaut. Or just had a weird affinity for the moon. He smiles when they congratulate him and can’t stop himself from thinking that he might be in love with you already. Wherever you are. When he leaves for university, he feels less lonely when there is a crescent moon to accompany him.

Contrary to the beliefs of his 13-year old self, Jungkook does fall in love again. Hard. This time, it was a girl with brown hair and big eyes and a smile so pretty he could see it from across a crowded room. She was a grade below him; a frazzled college freshman with no clue to where her lecture hall was, and he: a sophomore who had a compulsion of changing his major every other month. When he met her, it had been chemical engineering and three weeks before that was film composition. Her name was Yoojung, 18 years old while he was 19.

Her soulmate mark is a single star, and even though he knows she is not his soulmate, he can’t help but to think how perfectly their marks complement each other. How they would make a perfect night sky.

They had met at a frat party, no less, and the combination of cheap booze and bad hiphop music had made her look so incredibly gorgeous under the dim lighting. They had their first kiss in a random person’s living room, highly intoxicated and much too irresponsible and Jungkook had barely even remembered it in the morning until she showed up at his doorstep and invited herself in. Yet it wasn’t too long before he made a perfect space for Yoojung in his life.

Each day after his physics lecture, he’d go to her dorm and they’d chat over breakfast until she had economics at 10 o’ clock. After she was done, he’d insist that they go get a greasy hamburger at the joint his friends took him to when they got high and, she’d end up dragging them both to the health food restaurant that prided themselves on only using organic. Leave it to Jungkook to find himself a vegan girlfriend.

Sometimes though, when he looks at Yoojung, his mind drifts to his actual soulmate and a little flower named guilt blooms in his chest. But he is so young and his other half could be anywhere in the world, so Jungkook thinks there is no harm in allowing himself to indulge in a little affection. These days, it wasn’t completely abnormal for soulmates to part ways, and when Yoojung is in his arms, Jungkook likes to think that his soulmate would understand. They would want him to be happy. In the middle of synchronizing their busy student schedules and sneaking in quick kisses through cramming for finals, he had found it unnervingly easy to fall in love with her.

Deeply and blindly in love.

Yoojung brought him home to her family on fall breaks and the occasional winter vacation and Jungkook had melded perfectly into their dynamic. The son I never had, her father would tell him over the dinner table while her mother constantly made sure his plate was piled high. Her little sister was visibly in love with him, and would ask Yoojung where he was every time she came home from university, yet avoiding him at all costs when he was there.

Jungkook’s own family, however, was a different story. To put it delicately, they had liked it more when he came home by himself and left her at school. It had put a strain on their relationship sure, but at the end of the day, Jungkook loved her. A simple love.

Every day he remembers that their marks do not match. But if this is love and he feels like he is on cloud 9 with every moment they are together, Jungkook begins to doubt if the universe’s will is truly divine and successful. Maybe Yoojung was his soulmate and it did not matter what was on their wrists.

He loved her intensely, and she did him. She was the first thing on his mind when he woke up and manifested in his dreams when he slept at night. To Jungkook, Yoojung could do no wrong. Like some sort of divine being or angel that the heavens sent just for him, and he found himself thinking maybe he wouldn’t mind spending the rest of his life beside her.

But he would come to learn that the higher the climb...the harder the fall.

Jungkook and Yoojung were together for the better part of 4 years before she cheated on him with a guy that she’d supposedly met a couple weeks ago. When Jungkook screams at her asking why she had been disloyal, Yoojung shows him her wrist. Her single inked star.

“I found my soulmate, Jungkook. And I love you so much, you know I do. I didn’t know how to tell you so I…”

The rest of her words fade into white noise and all Jungkook can do is look at her and commit every detail to memory as he feels her fade farther away. Her teary and remorseful brown eyes. Her plush lips. The fan of her eyelashes and the mole on the side of her temple. He’ll never get to see her like this again.

“I was ready to be with you, soulmate or not. I know it’s not fair but I wanted the same from you”, he whispers, falling down on the couch and burying his face in his hands.

“Soulmates be damned, the universe was wrong. I was so hideously in love with you. How could you not at least tell me when you met him?” Jungkook feels his heart collapsing in on itself with every word of resignation. Of burgeoning acceptance. Yoojung can only mirror his desolate expression and stares down at the star on her skin.

Jungkook wishes it were a moon.

“Just go, Yoojung.”

It would have hurt less if it was only a one night stand with a stranger she did not know the name of. He was in love and spineless enough to move past a one night stand. However, Yoojung had found her soulmate and fallen in love with him. Jungkook had merely acted as a placeholder for the real deal to come along and sweep her off her feet.

This time he doesn’t cry. Just stares out the window of his living room and wonders what it would be like to disappear altogether. When the door is slammed shut, and he is left to nurse his aching soul, Jungkook apologizes in advance to the person that shares the same mark on their wrist as him. He no longer believes that soulmates exist.

When Jungkook looks back at his 13 year old self with the innocent construct of what heartbreak feels like, he wants to laugh and maybe slap that stupid boy upside the head. Yoojung had destroyed him. Destroyed the innocent and starry-eyed person that he’s tried so hard to preserve. Destroyed his vulnerability and bright outlook on life and in their place, cultivated walls of rock and steel meant to keep everyone out and him safely tucked inside. In her wake, Yoojung left behind a shell of a man who pushed his emotions so deep he became numb and forgot what it was like to feel.

So Jungkook does what he always does to push away the hurt. He changes his major; to art history this time. He stacks up bracelets on his wrist to forget the mark of a moon. He scrapes up his rainy day money and treats himself to the most expensive pair of Saint Laurent boots he’s ever worn. He tests the limits of the human liver, and takes advantage of the biceps and jawline he’s acquired since high school to establish a reputation.

To his friends, Jungkook remained raucous and always down to order infinite rounds of shots until he couldn’t see straight. To those that looked even closer, Jungkook was so completely shattered he didn’t even feel it anymore.

The second time he had his heart broken, Jungkook was 23. He promised himself he wouldn’t let it happen again.

◐

“For the last time, Jimin, I’m not going to give you a blowjob so you can pay for my student loans.”

You don’t know how many times you’ve had this conversation with your roommate. Most of the time, it was convenient to have a roommate whose parents were loaded and sent him monthly installments that looked more like small loans than allowances. You knew he just wanted to help. Heck, he probably would be willing to pay them off for you without the promiscuous favor, but you had made it clear to Jimin that you wouldn’t be riding off of his charity.

“Ugh, Y/N you’re really no fun”, he sighs, falling backwards onto your twin-sized bed and feigning devastation. You reward his melodrama with a giggle, ruffling your hands through his fried hair. Jimin had a knack for changing his hair color as quickly as his mood.

You look at the bill that’s staring back at you from your computer screen, and it feels like it’s just reached out and punched you in the face. “Hey do you think it’s a common mistake for bank tellers to add a few too many zeroes?”

“Y/N.”

“Yeah, you’re right. I’m rationalizing as a self-defense mechanism.” Sometimes it was annoying that your roommate had a degree in psychology. Then again, Jimin was making more money than you and your degree in English.

You sigh deeply and look up at the ceiling in attempts to quell your tears of frustration. And also because it is a plea to whoever is up there controlling your destiny: please I’m begging you. Melt my debt away.

You and Jimin sit in comfortable silence and he plays with the hem of your worn comforter while you scroll through the emails you have been ignoring in your inbox. You want to smash your head in at all the deadlines. Times like these, there is one thing that brings you comfort and always has since you turned 18.

The quaint little crescent moon that sits right atop your radius.

You had a habit of pressing your thumb against it and feeling your pulse against the mark, stupidly wondering if your soulmate’s heartbeat has synched up with your own. If he was out there somewhere, touching his mark and wondering the same about you. He was taking his sweet time, that’s for sure. Jimin sees your nervous tic and sighs again.

“You’re so hopelessly romantic it makes me want to barf, Y/N.” You scowl at his words and chuck a pillow at his unsuspecting face.

“I don’t understand you, Jimin. Your soulmate is out there and you’re not the slightest bit curious? You don’t want to do anything extra to find them?” Jimin looks at you with a knowing smile.

“That’s exactly it, though. I know they’re my soulmate and I’ll find them when the time is right. So why worry about it? It’s better not to force anything.” His statement is followed up with a grin and his fingers reach out to pinch your cheeks. This was the dynamic of your friendship. He is easy-going and flows like a careless river. You’ve read one too many books to not vie and daydream for the moment you lock eyes with your soulmate.

Your mom always said that you’ll know just from a look. It’s like getting hit over the head with a ray of sun, she said. Like suddenly their eyes are the only eyes you ever want to look into again. Since then, you’ve dreamt for the day you find someone with that same moon on their wrist. For now though, you had more immediate concerns more along the lines of crippling debt.

“What do I do, Jimin? Should I be a stripper?” He laughs and the thought makes you groan. You couldn’t even walk in heels, much less try to dance or look like you didn’t have two left feet. Stripper life just wasn’t for you.

“Hm...I could call in a few favors for you at the office. Get you an internship or secretary position.”

“Maybe. Too much nepotism. Your father owns the office you work at”, you remind him, and his eyebrows crease further in thought. God, maybe you do have to be a stripper.

“Wait!” Jimin yelps so suddenly you almost fling the computer off your lap.

“I think I know someone. He’s been looking for a model for his art portfolio or something, and he said he’s willing to pay.” Jimin reaches for his phone and his thumbs type up a storm while you watch from the sideline.

“I think he mentioned it’s about a month-long project. You’d just have to be on call whenever a stroke of genius arrives.”

“That sounds great! I’m an amazing model!” you crow, to which Jimin giggles again.

“The several candids I have in my camera roll tell a different story, Y/N.” Naturally, he receives another pillow to the face. But you follow up with a cheery kiss to his cheek as you rejoice in the new opportunity for cash flow by a celebratory dance, which looks more like a wiggle when you remain seated on your bed.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!”, you chirped, “I owe you one.”

“Hey...I know how you can repay me.”

When you look towards him, his eyebrows are raised inquisitively and there’s a devilish smirk on his lips.

Jimin gets a third pillow to his face that day.

◓

Jungkook’s favorite type of arguments to get into is whether Neo-classicism or post-impressionism had the most impact on European art and architecture. Call him a snob, but he loves to prattle on about Degas and Caillebotte until his opponent tires or concedes out of pure exhaustion. Jungkook regards it as a battle strategy: bore your enemy so that they stop fighting.

He’s in the middle of a heated debate with his classmate from graduate school when he receives a phone call from Park Jimin. Now, Jungkook has no idea how or when Jimin became an installment in his life, or how he’s roped his way into his inner circle. He just remembers waking up one day with a killer hangover and finding that there was a pink-haired stranger lying on his floor. When he tried to shoo him out, the stranger shoved a wad of money in his shirt pocket, muttering “just five more minutes”, and Jungkook was in no position to deny easy cash. Jungkook now considers Jimin one of his close friends.

“What’s up, Jiminie?” He laughs into the microphone.

“I told you not to call me that, you brat. I’m older than you.”

“I’m taller than you.”

“My dick is bigger.”

“I-okay fine you got me there.” He hears Jimin wheeze over the line as he tries to rein himself in to say what he needs to say.

“In all seriousness, though. I have a proposition for you.” Jimin lilts in a mischievous tone, which makes Jungkook nervous enough to get up from the café table he had been sitting at with his friend and careen to a quieter corner.

“Shoot.”

“Okay, so you know how you were telling me about your portfolio for the gallery. The one you have to submit by the end of the season? How you needed a model on call 24/7 in case inspiration struck?”

Jungkook wants him to spit it out because he has been searching high mountains and low valleys for someone that would be willing to be his muse for a month or two. Constantly at his beck and call so he can finish this damn portfolio and get his name out there in the art world. Maybe start debating post-impressionism with the cream of the crop.

“I think I’ve found someone to do that for you.” Jungkook exhales in relief at his words.

“She’s my roommate and she’s super low on cash and unemployed with a bachelor’s in English literature, so she’s got time to spare.” Perfect. That way, Jungkook can call her whenever he needs to.

“That’s amazing, Jiminie. Can she meet me at the art building tomorrow at noon? We can start right away.” Jungkook breathes through the phone, a small weight coming off his shoulders now that another thing had been accomplished. One less thing he had to worry about on the journey to his goal. Jimin confirms the plans and they exchange pleasantries before Jungkook hangs up as the man on the other line starts screaming about his burning lunch on the stove.

Jungkook catches sight of the mark on his wrist when he looks down, and quickly rearranges his bracelets so that it is once again covered to his eyes. Out of sight and out of mind.

The gallery portfolio had been a thorn in his side. It had been months in the making and if he allows himself to reminisce, Jungkook remembers the nights he and Yoojung stayed up until dawn and talked about his blossoming interest in art. How he wanted a space of his own to display his works. Back then, she listened to him with stars in her eyes and basked in the afterglow of post-coital cuddling, promising that she would help him achieve it.

His heart sinks at the memory of the imprint of her tresses of hair spilling on his bedspread. He burned those sheets the second she left.

Jungkook represses his intrusive thoughts about Yoojung and wills her to get out of his head. He forces it down until it feels like he’s just dumped ice water over his heart and vomited out any semblance of emotion. He makes his way back to the cafe table with a sly smile that hides the internal ache he’s promised himself to never let anyone suspect of.

“So what were you saying about Renoir’s Moulin de la Galette?”

◑

The art building is situated besides a library, with a bakery flanking its left. Two years spent at the university, and you’ve never once stepped foot there. Maybe it was the daunting abstract sculpture on the front lawn or the prejudices you held against annoying art snobs on their high horses, but you often found yourself subconsciously avoiding the space in intimidation.

“Okay, Y/N, you’re going to do this so you can pay off your loans”, you whisper under your breath, words meant for your ears and no one else’s. “And if he asks you to pose nude, you run the opposite direction.”

It was easy to get lost in the building. For art students that know how to draw, they really took advantage of abstractionism to make the most confusing map you had ever seen in your life. Luckily, with some direction from the vapid front desk secretary and some intuition, you were able to to find room 62B. You don’t think you’ll be able to forget the number 62B if you tried, Jimin had screamed it to you so many times as you left the apartment.

The door soundlessly opens with a nudge of your hand and you stick your head inside.

“You know when Jimin told me he found me a model, he didn’t mention her lack of punctuality.” His voice is calm and subdued with no lingering annoyance, even if his words are uncourteous. You whip around to him and the first sight you see of Jeon Jungkook is merely a tuft of brown hair behind a vast canvas. And some expensive looking leather boots that anchor his feet to the ground.

You clear your throat and approach with an outstretched hand and the shiniest smile you can muster.

“I’m Y/N. Jimin’s roommate. It’s nice to meet you.”

“You can call me Jungkook.”

It is when he steps out from behind the canvas that you finally understand what your mother meant when she said meeting your soulmate feels like getting hit over the head with a ray of sunshine. You can’t describe it any other way, but that’s exactly what it feels like. Like the air becomes so sweet in your lungs it turns to viscous honey. Like suddenly the person standing in front of you is Valentine, encapsulated.

You know he feels it too, yet you don’t know why he forces himself to remain blasé, and if you hadn’t seen his widened eyes and heard the gasp from his lips you would have never suspected anything at all. Stranger courtesy is abandoned and you forcefully grab his wrist, turning it over to find his mark while pulling up your sleeve to reveal your own.

A little black crescent moon.

Right on the pulse point.

Just like your’s.

When you finally muster up the nerve to look into his eyes again, you wonder if it is healthy for the human heart to beat so fast and so thunderously it feels ready to jump out of your chest. Jungkook, however, still wears that same expression on his face. Flat and cold, not even a glimmer in his eyes. He stares at you disinterested and wrenches his wrist from your grasp.

“Wait, Jungkook...aren’t you….”, you sputter through a desperate smile, “aren’t you happy?” He stays silent and trains his attention on the canvas in front of him, but you can see the conflict that swirls in his iris.

“I’ve been looking for you for so long! And I’ve finally found you. In the art building no less, just my luck that-”

“Y/N, I don’t know what you expect from me but I’m not looking for anything right now.”

There were no objectively ugly words. But you think the ones that have just spewed from Jungkook’s lips come pretty close. They stoke a fire in your chest.

“What do you mean? We’re soulmates”, you faltered, sinking deeper into confusion as you stare at the unaffected man in front of you, whose only concern is the conglomerate of paint on his palette.

Jungkook sighs monotonously. Almost as if he had better things to do than be here.

“It’s only a mark on your wrist. And we just happen to have the same one. Amazing that you still think somehow one single person was made entirely just for you.” His words are bored and he doesn’t even have the decency to look you in the eye when he speaks. You think you might want to punch him if you weren’t so speechless.

“Look”, he sighs as if you were inconveniencing him, “I’m not going to sugarcoat it and tell you that I’m the one you’ve been looking for this whole time. We have the same mark, but...I’m not the guy you want.”

“B-But...I’m your soulmate. We-we’re made for each other.”

Jungkook scoffs harshly, and you want to sink into the ground. “That’s just a silly myth.”

“So you don’t...believe in soulmates?” The words felt wrong to say when all your life, finding your soulmate felt like the ribbon at the end of the finish line. But here he was now, and you felt so small under his gaze. Like you weren’t meant to be there and standing in the same room with him was a concoction for heartbreak.

“No.”

Jungkook’s syllable pangs in your ear, and you think it might be your least favorite sound. Then you leave. And if it was hard for you to meet your soulmate - the person who you’re destined to be with - who doesn’t believe in you, then walking away from him was a different cross to bear.

You take the bus home and ignore the glare of strangers when you burst into tears at a red light, and cry the rest of the way back. Your mother hadn’t described this. She prosed on and on about the feeling one gets after finding a soulmate but never mentioned to you how it feels when you find out they want nothing to do with you. What do you do when you realize the person you’ve been chasing for forever has been trying to run away at the same time?

Jimin holds you together that night on your bedroom floor, while you break apart and scratch at the moon on your wrist until your skin breaks. He listens to the words you sputter; as much as he can decipher when they are drowned out by the painful sound of your sobbing. Jungkook’s beliefs bleed into your consciousness. Perhaps he is right and perhaps there is no such thing as true soulmates, and the marks are obsolete.

However, when you fall asleep in your friend’s arms from the physical fatigue of violent crying and the sheer mental exhaustion of meeting Jeon Jungkook, your mind comes to a more painful conclusion.

A more truthful conclusion.

Your soulmate only needed to meet you to decide that he did not want you.

◒

Jungkook doesn’t believe in soulmates. He thinks they’re a stupid coy to give people false hope. An illusion to feign happiness and to take Yoojung away from someone she genuinely loved. Though in the hours of the night, when he is by himself and the bed feels too big for one body, Jungkook wonders if there is truly a reason why someone has an identical moon on their wrist. But he is still so broken and unhealed from the wounds Yoojung left behind.

So instead of soulmates, he thinks about what she must be doing. If she’s eating well. If she’s moved in with her own soulmate and if they’re happy together. Jungkook is an involuntary masochist and he pays for it with every pillowcase that becomes stained with his tears.

He sighs out an expletive after downing a shot of whiskey, relishing in the familiar burn as it slides down his throat. Alcohol doesn’t seem to be working efficiently, though. He’s only barely tipsy after years in college building tolerance, and he can still see your face each time he blinks. Like you are imprinted on the back of his eyelids. Jungkook wonders why Jimin had cancelled on the group tonight.

There is a little devil called remorse and it stands atop his shoulder, unseen by everyone but him, and Jungkook decides he will get rid of it by calling another round of shots. From his seat in the dirty booth, he can see Min Yoongi and his soulmate practically dry humping on the dance floor. If anyone asks him if he ever gets jealous seeing soulmates happy and in love, he’ll laugh in their face and tell them he pities people like that. People that are so blinded by the system. But loneliness is a stern mistress and it makes him think of you. How lovely the moon looks on your wrist. How your hand felt so warm when it caressed against his skin.

He tips his head back again. Vodka this time.

“Dude, are you okay?”

To his right comes Kim Taehyung, designated driver extraordinaire, and he looks at Jungkook with friendly concern laced with amusement. Jungkook nods contentedly.

“Soulmates are so bullshit, Tae”, he snickers, fingers tracing the rim of the shot glass and smirk on his face to mask the bitterness of both the alcohol and his heart. Taehyung spares a knowing glance, resting a hand on his friend’s shoulder with the weight of knowledge of Jungkook’s past.

The night is young and so is he. He drinks until he can no longer taste the liquor and forgets altogether about what had happened only a couple of hours before. Until the crescent mark on his skin just looks like a shapeless black blob, and it makes him smile. He thinks he likes it better that way.

Taehyung drops him home and personally tucks him into bed while he is still in jeans and his shirt smells like the bar. His sleep is dreamless that night. When the morning comes and his friends tease him about how he begged Taehyung not to leave, Jungkook will laugh and blame the alcohol for his foggy memory. He won’t tell them that he does remember, and that he was only grasping at any warm body to soothe his aching loneliness.

◐

Usually when he first opens his eyes in the morning, Jungkook is thinking about the next class he has to attend and if he is late (which is usually most of the time). This morning, albeit morbidly hungover, Jungkook thinks of the apple strudels they sell at the bakery next to the art building. Mrs. Kim always gets the pastry to filling ratio just right. But when he opens the door with a jubilant smile on his face and the scent of baked goods already in his nostrils, Jungkook has a feeling apple strudels will have to wait.

There you are. In all your messy-haired glory, huffing like a caged bull in the doorway of his apartment, fiery gaze directed completely at him and all he can think to say is:

“How do you know where I live?” Jungkook schools his face expressionless in your presence. He hopes this will discourage you, but it only makes you angrier.

“Park Jimin”, you snarl.

Of fucking course, it’s always Park Jimin. Jimin who drunkenly sleeps in his bedroom and now Jimin who is leaking his address to any stranger.

“Um”, Jungkook stammers and takes a step back, “what are you doing here? Didn’t I get my point through yesterday?” He can see the statement catching you off guard, and the fury in your eyes dwindles to dejection. Only for a millisecond though, before you are aiming your wrath at him once again.

You take a deep breath. “What is wrong with you?”

Jungkook can think of a lot of answers to that query. He opts to interpret it as a rhetorical question and keep his mouth shut.

“You just...found your soulmate! I’m your soulmate! And you don’t even want to get to know me? At all?”, you scream exasperatedly. Jungkook catches the gaze of a middle aged lady who is not-so-discreetly staring at the two of you, and pulls you inside his apartment by your arm. If you weren’t so frustrated, you would have been flustered at the physical contact.

“Listen. Soulmates don’t end up together all the time. I’ve told you I’m not really interested in anything right now and it’s not a priority”, he takes a breath through his passionate monologue, “and I’m sorry that that’s not something you expected, but I….don’t want a soulmate.”

Maybe...he just doesn’t want you.

When he says them out loud to a living breathing person, Jungkook realizes how cruel it sounds. He can see it in the way your eyes have become glossy under his living room lights and the way you shrink into yourself as self-defense against his blows. He rationalizes that he’d rather tell you the truth than lie to you now, only to hurt you later. Really, he’s doing you a kindness. Right?

You turn your back to him to gather your thoughts, and wipe the tears that you refuse to let him see. The salty drops sting the raw skin of your wrist after last night, and you are brutally reminded of the current reality. His brutal honesty makes you want to abandon all hope, but you were a woman with a plan. You came here for a reason, not to just lose your temper in your soulmate’s apartment and tell him what you really thought about him.

“I have a proposition for you”, you asserted calmly, staring Jungkook in the eye as he remains unbothered.

“Now I reckon something’s happened to you to make you lose all your faith in soulmates, so I’m not forcing you to do anything you don’t want to do.” Your eyebrows furrow when you speak focusedly.

“We don’t have to be together. That’s your will. But…”, you hesitate, pushing past the uncertainty and fear of another rejection from Jungkook, “will you let me at least try? You don’t have to promise anything. Can we just start as friends?”

Naturally, Jungkook wants to shoot down your offer, kick you out of his apartment, and pretend like he never met anyone by the name of Y/N. Call it divine intervention but when he looks at you, pleading for any semblance of connection, he feels a tug at his heart strings. So Jungkook makes another promise to himself. He would let you “try”, whatever that entails. But there was no virtual possibility of letting you any closer than necessary.

You both stand in contemplative silence before he lets out a resigned sigh. “On one condition”, he responds slowly, but there is already a premature grin growing on your face and you don’t think you could stop it even if you tried.

“You still have to be my model for the art portfolio.”

You agree before he even gets to take another breath.

“Deal.”

When you finally make your way out of Jungkook’s apartment, parting ways with an awkward number exchange and a ‘see you later’, there is a simultaneous feeling of hope and desolation. The optimism for Jungkook combines with the insecurity that perhaps you, just as you are, is not nearly enough to make someone fall in love. Especially someone who disregards their soul connection to you.

You walk back to your apartment with a heavy heart that warms with embers of determination. Jeon Jungkook was an enigma. A Bastille fortress of self-defense mechanisms and destructive tendencies, and you know that there is unresolved pain. Call it a soulmate instinct or something, but you see it in his eyes. You see it in the way his face begs to show emotion but his mind refuses to acknowledge.

You know Jungkook is not obligated to accept you after the dust settles, much less fall in love with you. Under the peach blossoms of the campus sidewalk, you make a promise anyway. To yourself and to your soulmate and the silly little mark on the inside of your wrist. Even if he does not love you, you vow to help Jungkook learn to love himself.

◓

When you are harshly woken up at 5:30 in the morning, the last person you expected to be blowing up your phone was Jeon Jungkook. If it weren’t for the pure exhaustion seeping through your bones, you would have been excited about your soulmate calling you. Alas, slumber was your soulmate now. Jungkook would have to step down.

On the other side of the paper thin wall, Jimin is frustratedly banging from his room, your ringtone reverberating throughout the entire apartment. You pick up his call without even opening your eyes.

“Hello?”

“Y/N I need you to come to my apartment as soon as you can.” There is no sleepiness in his voice. Just clean and cold like it always is and he has hung up before you get the chance to scold him for waking you up at this unholy hour. You’re about to give him a piece of your mind but you remember he is paying you very handsomely for your efforts, and reluctantly drag yourself out of bed to call an uber. Thank god he doesn’t live too far away otherwise you’ll stick a foot through his canvas for the transportation bill.

The front of Jungkook’s apartment door is strangely therapeutic, and you find yourself falling asleep standing up after you’ve rung the doorbell. Either time passes too slowly when you are sleep-drunk or Jungkook moves to get the door as quickly as your grandfather does. Whatever the case, you are about to pass out on his doorstep if he doesn’t come soon.

“Y/N, why are you just standing there? The door has been open.”

“Jungkook. Why are you making me do this so early?”, you yawn, pushing inside the apartment.

Jungkook takes in your discombobulated appearance, and almost wants to laugh. You were still in your pajamas, and the bun on your head now looked more like a heaping blob that drooped down your temple. It was obvious that you had just rolled out of bed and he almost feels bad for disturbing your sleep, but he does not decide when his strokes of inspiration spontaneously appear.

The living room is bombarded with Jungkook’s art supplies and stray canvases, and you take note of the clay sculpting table that blends in as furniture next to his kitchen. You plop yourself down on the stool across from Jungkook’s easel, eyes still half closed and impossibly tired.

In this moment, Jungkook wipes the fact that you are his soulmate from his mind. He needs to do the portfolio. That is all he’s keeping you around for, and the only reason he agreed to your plan was so that you would remain his art model.

In the silence of his makeshift art studio, Jungkook paints whatever comes to his mind, referencing your figure on the stool for the curves he can never get right without a model and need for a human presence to translate onto his canvas. You become more lucid as time goes by and the sun starts to rise from outside his window, sitting up straighter and paying more attention to his concentrated face as Jungkook pours himself into his creation.

Looking at him in this light, you realize that he is beautiful. And not just because he’s your soulmate. Jungkook’s hair is scruffy and stubbled, undereyes sporting impressive dark circles. But the way he caresses the paintbrush and the way his body moves to the beat of the painting is poetic. He glances at you sporadically, eyes darting to and fro to capture as much as he can before the creativity burns out. He is beautiful and it makes your heart ache to know that he does not want you. In spite of the bond the universe has created.

You wonder if in his focused hazed, he notices the new glaze across your eyes and the silent sound of your soul calling out for his. You wipe away the first dripping tear as quickly as it came. You know Jungkook sees, but does not bat an eye and you can’t tell if you’d rather prefer him to acknowledge it.

It’s 8:00am when he puts the paintbrush down, takes a step back, and surveys his work. His eyes trail over each organic line and areas where he decided to use burnishing instead of cross hatching. It’s far from perfect, but it’s enough.

“Okay. You’re free to go”, he announces, plucking the painting off the easel and resting it against the wall, hidden from your eyes.

“W-What? That’s it?”, you sigh disappointedly, “you’re not even going to let me see it?” Jungkook shrugs. His detachedness makes you want to rip your hair out and sob into your pillow at the same time. You don’t understand how a person could be so unfazed.

“S’not ready for debut. Thanks for showing up, though.” He doesn’t spare you another glance. Just goes back to cleaning his brushes and dumping out the glasses of murky paint water. You ignore the twinge of hurt in your chest and slide off the stool.

“Okay, fine. Now it’s my turn. Would you like to go have some breakfast?”, you smile expectantly to Jungkook, who stares at you with an indifferent gaze. His first instinct is to make up a half-assed excuse to get out of this, eager to detach himself from you as much as possible and avoid any more interaction. However, he was insanely hungry, and the glimmer in your eye just looks so hopeful even Jungkook couldn’t bear to shoot you down.

He sighs with resignation. A little breakfast couldn’t hurt, and he wasn’t going with you necessarily. You were just...going to the same cafe in the same direction as him and likely sitting at the same table. Yeah, that’s it.

“Hurry up, I’m hungry.”

“Wait...actually?”

You blinked in shock at his lack of resistance.

“Yes. Now come on. I know a place with really great apple strudels.”

You weren’t aware that by ‘breakfast’, Jungkook actually meant sitting in complete silence and wolfing down food like your life depends on it. You want to be grossed out when he inhales 3 apple strudels in less than 10 minutes, crumbs flaking on his shirt without a care in the world. Yet you just feel endeared. The sight makes you smile. And maybe if Jungkook did not detest you, you would have leaned over and kissed the cinnamon sugar right off his lips.

“So….”, you sip on a sweet coffee, “Jimin told me you’re going for a masters in art history?”

Jungkook nods halfway through a bite of his pastry. “Yup.”

“Is it something you’re really passionate about?” you inquire, desperately wanting the conversation to delve into something that wasn’t so surface level.

“Uh huh.”

“What are some other things you’re interested in besides art?”

“Totally.”

Jungkook is completely clueless. He only spares glances to the windows and occasional looks to his oh so precious breakfast treats. You want to slap him and be angry, but you only sigh. It shouldn’t be so hard to talk to your soulmate, yet it felt like trying to pull teeth when he was so completely disinterested in you. You wonder if this is worth it.

You look up at him from your steaming cappuccino cup and use your wildcard.

“In my opinion, Botticelli’s Birth of Venus did little for the Italian Renaissance movement.”

Your statement almost has Jungkook falling backwards in his chair and choking on a piece of fruit filling, eyes growing as wide as saucers when he finally processes what you just said. A flaming insult to the entire art historian community.

“What do you know about Botticelli?”, he sneers, and you internally celebrate for this is the most emotion Jungkook has shown since meeting you.

“I know that his work supposedly epitomizes the spirit of the Renaissance”, you swirl the coffee in your cup nonchalantly, lips curving into a knowing smirk. “But if you ask me, Bellini’s San Giobbe Altarpiece did much more to encapsulate the values of 15th century Italy.”

Jungkook’s speechless expression is one that you want to take a snapshot of and frame it to your wall. It is glorious, and arguably more artful to you than Botticelli himself. So what, you had conveniently forgot to mention to him about the class you took junior year of college, with a professor that made you engrave the fundamentals of Italian painting in your brain. It’s so much more gratifying to see him stunned silent.

Across the table from you, Jungkook feels a warm smile itching to display itself. Before it can appear, he disguises it as a cold smirk. He feels something akin to a butterfly at the pit of his stomach, but blames it on indigestion and the inhuman pace at which he devoured his breakfast. Yeah that must be it. There was no way he was feeling butterflies.

He cracks his knuckles, raises his cup to gulp down a lukewarm green tea, and rests his elbows on the table separating the both of you.

“I don’t suppose you could tell me your thoughts on the influences of neo-classicism in the 18th century?”

◑

“No, Y/N, turn to your left a little”, Jungkook frustratedly sighs behind the camera lens.

“Your left or my left?”

He pauses. “....left.”

To any outside eye, you and Jungkook look like two buffoons trying to take pictures on what might possibly be the windiest day of the season, under the peach blossom trees. Jungkook had called you earlier that day and stressed about how he needed mixed media in his beloved portfolio, and photographs were the next topic of interest. Though you couldn’t understand why he couldn’t just set out a fruit bowl on his windowsill and call it still life photography.

Jungkook stares down at his camera, dissatisfaction clear on his face. You almost want to apologize for your abhorrent modeling skills but hey, he was the one that chose you.

“Hmm...try staring at that boat in the distance”, he dictates, standing beside you and aiming the lens at your side profile. You do as he asks, but don’t hear the shutter of the camera. Jungkook sighs again and leans forward, so close you could feel his warm breath hitting your skin. You hope he doesn’t notice the beet blush on your cheeks.

Jungkook’s hands meet your chin when he uses it to slightly tilt your face downwards. He positions you in the way that he wants you to pose and you finally understand why photography is considered an art. Because it’s almost as if Jungkook is molding you like clay, to get the silhouette he wants to capture with his camera lens. The day is brisk, but his skin on your’s lights you on fire.

“Okay, that’s…..that’s perfect”, Jungkook breathes, hurriedly picking up the camera that had been hanging onto his neck by the strap and angling it. At the moment his index finger presses down on the button, there is a gust of wind that surrounds the both of you.

The breeze loosens a strand of your hair and it falls into your eyes. You let your eyes drift close for a second, smiling into the cold air that tingles on your skin. Jungkook’s breath catches in his throat and he thanks the skies for the howling wind so you wouldn’t be able to hear his thumping heartbeat. But surely it’s only because it’s cold. And absolutely nothing else. Jungkook coughs inconspicuously to snap himself out of his trance, sighing in relief when he realizes your eyes are still closed and that you hadn’t noticed his internal struggle.

He drags you to a bridge next and makes you lay on the cold wood to which you vehemently object before you remember that he’s paying you and that you want him to fall in love with you, not dislike you more than he already does. After the bridge, Jungkook makes you kneel beside the park pond and dip your hand in the icy water and you find yourself wanting to do the same thing to his precious camera.

Before the two of you have realized, the sun sets into the horizon and tinges the sky in a combination of purples and pinks that Jungkook himself has a hard time replicating on canvas. He aims his lens at the clouds and takes a picture that he knows won’t make it into his gallery. He just felt the need to have something to remember this day by. For no reason in particular…

A buzzing coming from your coat pocket alerts you both of the time that has passed and how the sky has considerably darkened since you began the session. When you fish your phone out, Jimin’s contact photo is staring back at you while the marimba ringtone continues playing. You put the phone on speaker.

“Hey Jiminie”, you smile and Jungkook catches a glance of it. And the discomfort in his chest is definitely, 100%, not jealousy. Not at all.

“I told you not to call me that! What is with you younger people and your disrespect for the elderly?” The corner of Jungkook’s lips twitch into a subtle smile at the similarity of your’s and his conversations with Jimin.

“Okay, okay, grandpa. What’s up?”

“Can you come home ASAP? I may or may not have broken the stove trying to make soup.”

The redundancy of his confession makes you sigh, as Park Jimin desecrating your shared kitchen space was not a rare occurrence by any means.

“I’ll be right there”, you chided through the line, “please do not cook anything else before I arrive.”

“Thanks Y/N-ie, you’re the best!” Jimin’s voice is far too cheery and you make a mental note to nag him a little extra when you get home. The phone call is ended promptly and you turn around to Jungkook, eyes widening in surprise when he has already packed up all his photography gear. The sky had turned dark and the streetlights had been turned on to illuminate the park. If you had craned your neck upwards, you would have noticed the stars that awoke again to shine down upon the city. But you didn’t. You only saw the stars that were twinkling in Jungkook’s eyes.

“Uh”, he stammers, “I’ll walk you home. It’s late.”

“Oh! Uh...Thanks.” Though he was still cold and indifferent, your heart jumped in elation. Perhaps this could be considered baby steps.

The trip home is quiet, only the sounds of your tandem footsteps on pavement and the rustle of a breeze through tree leaves fill the space of silence. But the quiet is not uncomfortable. Just a bit awkward as you two try to figure out how to be around one another. Jungkook’s hands are shoved in his pockets and your fingers itch to intertwine themselves around his own. To press your soulmate marks together and feel them calling out to each other. But you and Jungkook are anything but normal soulmates. For you are already head over heels in love with him and he is adamant on not sparing you a crumb of affection.

To your disdain, the apartment was closer than you thought and the short walk with Jungkook ended before it really even began. You could practically hear Jimin’s impatience emanating from the third story of the building.

“So I’ll see you later?”, you smile meekly. Jungkook readjusts the strap of his camera bag before nodding. He is walking away before you turn around to enter the apartment building and even though it was something small and mundane, you wished he would have waited to see you get in safely. You make your way inside, more downcast than you had been before.

You don’t see when Jungkook turns around. You don’t feel the reassurance that washes over him when the door shuts safely behind you.

That night, Jungkook is reminded far too much of Yoojung. When he goes to make his usual chamomile, he finds her mug at the very back of the tea cabinet. She must have forgotten it when she packed up her stuff. When he spoons in the sugar, he remembers how Yoojung drinks her tea with honey instead. And when he feels himself start to fall apart, he remembers how Yoojung is not there to keep him together.

Jungkook pushes away his pain, abandons the lukewarm mug of tea, and opts for an early bedtime to sleep away the ache. The camera sitting on his nightstand, though, beckons him to look over the photos you both had taken that afternoon.

In the moment, he had been dissatisfied with the pictures, always thinking there must be a better angle or a better position you could shift into. However when he looks down at his camera now, in the quiet and solemnity of his bedroom, Jungkook can’t help but to think they are absolutely perfect.

He doesn’t know whether to credit his own artistic skill or you; for breathing life into his photographs. It’s the lines of your hands, the slope of your nose, and the stray strands of your hair that makes his pictures more human.

The ones he ends up picking though, are not perfectly staged and not the ones where he made you change the position of your stance for 10 minutes. No, the best pictures were the ones he took without you noticing. When you had just been enjoying the cool breeze or admiring the beauty of peach blossom season. When you point out a cool looking bird and when you stared annoyedly past the cameras lens (at him no doubt).

Yoojung is gone from his mind for just a tiny fleeting moment. For little reason at all, Jungkook finds himself smiling. And there is only the company of the moon to see it.

◒

It is ten o’ clock in the morning and Jungkook comes to a realization that in the couple weeks since he has met you, he has sighed more times than he has in the past 23 years of life. Jungkook sighs when you text him first thing in the morning about the dream you had the night before and describe it in painfully vivid details. He leaves them unanswered. Sometimes he wished you would just email him the google document instead. He sighs when you fidget in your seat when he’s trying to paint and keep focus, but you are only interested in asking him the snacks he has in his fridge or when he’s going to finish. He sighs when you and Jimin collectively trash his art studio by spamming his $1,000 camera with ugly face pictures and sword fighting with his sable paint brushes. Jungkook often has a hard time believing that both of you are in graduate school.

Today, he sighs when you bombard into room 62B of the art building; what is supposed to be Jungkook’s completely zen and peaceful creative space. You are tiptoeing around him as you always do, scared that you’ll do something to set him off and your soulmate will disown you for good. He glances at you once, eyes quickly darting back to the sculpture he is molding on the clay table and saying nothing.

“There’s a new cafe that just opened right across from the apple strudel place”, you gulp tensely. “I was gonna go check out the competition.” Your words seem deaf to Jungkook’s ear and he only furrows his eyebrows, fingers fussing over the mass of clay. There was just something he couldn’t get right. He didn’t know what it was.

Jungkook pushes away the sculpture frustratedly, wipes his hands on his apron, and finally looks at you. Maybe he did need a break and come back to it with fresh eyes. That’s all it was, though. A break. He wasn’t going because you asked him to.

“They better have blonde roast otherwise you’ll be compensating me for my time.” Jungkook is as ruthless and blunt as ever and you decide to look past it as you always do. Him agreeing to go with you was a mini success.

“Welcome in! You’ve stopped by at the perfect time. The strawberry scones have just been taken out of the oven!” The cafe employee is far too enthusiastic for receiving minimum wage and greeting grumpy people off the streets who just want to be caffeinated. His name tag reads Jung Hoseok.

“Oh, strawberry is my favorite”, you whisper, the statement only meant for your ears but Jungkook picks up on it anyway. He declines to tell you that strawberry is his favorite as well. Hoseok’s eyes light up when you and Jungkook approach the entrance, like he finally succeeded at luring a customer.

The cafe isn’t anything special. A bit more modern compared to the one across the street and you think you prefer the latter because this new one doesn’t have the owner’s handsome son standing at the cash register. He may not be your soulmate, but even you had to admit Kim Seokjin was a beautiful man if there ever was one. However, this cafe is warm and has ceiling length windows that let in an obscene amount of sunlight. Jungkook makes a mental note to try some pictures here in the future.

Jungkook’s phone buzzes in his pocket and you are already leaving him behind in the dust, walking straight to the counter and peering up at the menu deep in thought. You turn around to see that he is immersed in mysterious conversation, and take it upon yourself to order him a drink.

“I’ll have a matcha latte. And uh…”, you decide, trailing off as you wonder what kind of drink Jungkook would enjoy. “And an iced vanilla mocha latte, extra whipped cream, extra chocolate syrup. Do you guys have rainbow sprinkles?”

A little sugar never hurt anyone. Especially someone so often bitter like your one and only soulmate.

When Jungkook hangs up and makes his way to the corner table where you are situated, the sight of the concoction on the table is enough to give him an instant cavity. You hide your smile behind the mug of matcha. He grumbles and sits down swiftly, sticking the straw past his lips in defiance and you can only watch expectantly.

“Well…do you like it?”

This is when Jungkook realizes you didn’t order this to spite him. You just had completely zero idea what he liked and disliked and chose the first thing you thought was best. As cold as he is, he doesn’t have the heart to tell you that when he drinks coffee, he likes it black. No cream, no sugar, and the darkest roast with the most caffeine to push him through those nights spent in front of a canvas or over a clay table.

Jungkook fights to keep steady from the ambush of sugar and wills himself to swallow it down. There is sticky chocolate syrup on his hands and it feels cosmically more uncomfortable than paint. But Jungkook manages to look up at you and nod, to which you reward with a smile.

“I knew you would like it”, you say smugly, giving yourself a mental pat on the back. “You look like you have a giant sweet tooth.” There is a mellow giggle that follows your statement. Jungkook feels a flutter at the bottom of his stomach, and convinces himself it’s only because it sounds so much like Yoojung. He catches sight of the moon on your wrist, and pushes the feeling away even farther.

The two of you spend the rest of the midday there, tucked away in a corner of a cafe and losing track of time as you always do. Jungkook finds himself forgetting about the mountains of work he has to do to finish his art gallery portfolio, and the unfinished sculpture back at the studio that’s just not right.

Today, he allows himself to enjoy your presence and get to know you more. Your favorite color is yellow. You had a dog named Benny when you were a child. You detest beer with a passion, but enjoy a nightly glass of pinot grigio. Jungkook barely notices when the entire cup of coffee has disappeared. Every last rainbow sprinkle.

On second thought, he feels that maybe there was something sweeter than his unexpectedly delicious iced vanilla mocha latte with extra whipped cream. Maybe that something was sitting right across from him, rambling about the fundamentals of English literature with unexplained vigor.

Jungkook’s soul feels lighter when he goes to bed that night. And when he finally succumbs to Morpheus, his last lucid thought is of you; sun beams coming from the large cafe windows that comb through your hair. He looks at you through his mind’s eye and all he can see is the potential heartbreak you have the power to put him through. The fan of your eyelashes. The curve of your smile. The plush of your lips. All he can see is Yoojung as she crushes his soul in her bare hands.

Yet in the midst of his internal conflict, Jungkook’s subconscious allows him to fall in love with you a little bit. Perhaps not love just yet, but affection. Like a toe dip in uncharted waters or sticking his finger in a bowl of creamy cake batter just for a taste. The walls he has built are still there, strong as ever, but perhaps a couple bricks look a bit askew. He doesn’t know, but his soul calls out to your’s through the fortress.

◐

“Y/N I don’t know why you thought this was a good idea.”

“Oh hush, just close your eyes and point where your heart tells you to.”

In the lobby of a train station, facing a map and an ETA board is where you and Jungkook will be embarking on your next “date but not really because you don’t believe in soulmates so let’s just hang out”. It had taken a good two hours of nagging and whining on your part to convince him to abandon his portfolio for just a little bit to go an outing. Now standing here, with you excitedly bouncing next to him and a mystery destination, Jungkook feels something akin to utter regret.

“What if I choose somewhere that’s a thousand miles away? Or just in the middle of nowhere?”, Jungkook groans, still putting up an unbothered and cold front.

“Well then we will go somewhere that’s a thousand miles away or in the middle of nowhere”, you quipped back at him. Jungkook had a feeling he wouldn’t be able to get out of this one.

He reluctantly places a hand over his eyes, sighing with resignation before pointing to a random spot on the map. There is a giggle that sounds to his left and Jungkook finds himself wanting to hear more.

“Wonderful choice”, you smiled, “couldn’t have picked it better myself.”

Jungkook peeked his eyes open one at a time, scared of seeing what his intuition has chosen for your guys’ spontaneous destination. He breathes out a sigh of relief when he sees that his fingers landed on a town on the outskirts of the city, 20 minutes away from the university. He silently thanks the universe for not sabotaging his wallet and time.

“We’re never doing this again, Y/N”, Jungkook speaks as you are in front of him, skipping happily to the front desk to buy two train tickets.

“Wasn’t it fun, though? The thrill?”, you chuckle at his demeanor, to which he only shakes his head vehemently. You note the newest thing you’ve just learned about Jungkook: he has an aversion to uncertainty and spontaneity.

The train ride was as brief as it was uneventful. You spent the time rambling to Jungkook about all the quips and quirks about yourself and he only listened. Though he kept quiet, his face was free of any annoyance or indication that you were speaking too much. Jungkook only stared at you and unknowing to you, he soaked in every bit of information like a sponge. If anyone asked, he could tell them what foods you were allergic to, what colors wash you out, and what vegetables you hated the most.

“Wow you didn’t have to pick somewhere so far away, Jungkook.” You muse as the two of you step out of the train car. So far away in fact, that if you were to crane your head up enough, you would be able to see the university from a distance.

“Hey, you were the one who made me choose”, Jungkook spares a rare smile, “Would you rather we have shelled out our wallets to go on an 18-hour train ride?”

“Okay, fair point.”

The city was as abundant as it was big, and the both of you walked aimlessly from avenue to avenue, stopping occasionally whenever you see a dog you just can’t help but to pet or whenever Jungkook complained about his sore feet. As cold and indifferent as Jungkook made himself out to be, you’ve quickly come to realize that he’s actually a big baby. He still hasn’t let you in or even lowered his walls by a tiny centimeter, but you like to think that even agreeing to go anywhere with you could be considered significant progress.

Jungkook doesn’t notice the pounding of his heart whenever his hands graze against your’s, walking side by side so close he can feel the heat emanating through your coat. He doesn’t notice the peace he feels, just the synchronicity of his feet as he places them on the pavement.

The fraught wind that blows straight at Jungkook’s face prompts him to look up from where his eyes were cast on the ground. He almost staggers at how strong it is, but finds himself weak in the knees for a completely different reason.

Of course.

Of all the days, of all the times, of all the people in this entire city.

Of course she had to be the one that was currently staring at him from across the intersection.

The red light seems to go on forever. Either that or time has just spontaneously frozen, Jungkook can’t tell. But his eyes are fixed on hers and his feet bolster him to the concrete when all he wants to do is sprint the other way and forget he ever saw this ghost from the past.

Yoojung looks as beautiful as the day she left him.

She’s gained some weight and her cheeks have filled out, but it looks healthy on her now (Jungkook always chided her for forgetting to eat). She stares at him with a combination of shock and guilt and something he wants to overthink into affection but he won’t give himself that satisfaction anymore. She dyed her hair. Light brown looks good on her.

She looks...happy. As happy as anyone can look when they’re rushing through thick crowds of a city, traffic horns blaring like a dilapidated symphony.

In the heat of it all, it’s impossible for you not to notice Jungkook’s sudden change in demeanor or the way he has suddenly stopped breathing. When you follow his gaze, there is a girl on the other side of the street that shares the same starstruck expression and even from the outside looking in, you can feel the weight of something painful in his eyes. In her stature.

When the lights turn green, the throngs of city dwellers migrate across and you stay beside Jungkook when he doesn’t move a muscle. Not even a finger twitch. But she does. And he can only fight to keep the ache away when Yoojung gets closer with every millisecond. Until she is standing right in front of him and he can smell her familiar vanilla perfume.

“Jungkook”, she speaks, apprehension in her voice. “It’s been a while...how are you?”

Yoojung only spares you a side glance while keeping attention on Jungkook and you only grow more curious as to who this strange woman is.

He wants to speak so badly but his tongue remains frozen. He turns to you with flabbergast in his eyes and shakes his head to snap out of the daze of confusion. Of seeing the love of his life again. Or who he thought was the love of his life.

“Could you give us a minute, Y/N?”

You didn’t know why but the words that came from his lips made you feel disappointed. Perhaps you were just stupid for thinking he would introduce you. Tell her that you’re his soulmate and scream it at the top of his lungs with sheer pride. But your imagination has hurt you countless times and you had a feeling this one wouldn’t be the last. You manage a curt nod and push away the twinge in your heart. There was a boundary between you and Jungkook and today was not the day to cross it and introduce yourself as his soulmate to any random stranger.

Once you are out of vicinity and have found solace in a bookstore 10 feet away, Jungkook allows himself to breathe in Yoojung’s presence.

“I didn’t know if you were still in the city”, he falters, voice coming out quieter than he would have liked it to. But what was he supposed to sound like confronting the supposed love of his life.

“I never left, Jungkook...my entire life is here.” She sighs, smiling lightly with eyes seeping with guilt.

He scoffs. “I don’t know Yoojung, you seem to leave behind important things pretty easily.” Jungkook feels himself getting angrier and resentful by the second, and though he knows it is unfair of him, Yoojung’s mere presence brings back all the wounds he never truly healed from.

Granted, on a concrete sidewalk next to a traffic light pole was not the best place to have a heart to heart about failed relationships. But when has the universe ever given Jungkook the best things in life. He is devastatingly cynical for someone who dedicates his career to art.

Yoojung wears a frown on her face, but there is no vindictiveness there. Just an overwhelming sense of remorse that Jungkook communicates as pity.

“I don’t know how else to say that I’m sorry”, she sighs, eyes falling to the ground. Jungkook wishes it would just open up and swallow him whole.

“Then don’t say anything.” He turns to walk away.

“Wait! Jungkook can we...can’t we catch up or something? For a couple minutes?” Yoojung is visibly desperate, and her hands are outstretched as if wanting to touch him but keeping herself from overstepping the line.

Jungkook glances through the window of the bookstore, and you are situated on a chair, already nose deep in a hefty book. He wants to smile and tease you for being such a nerd, but the weight of Yoojung’s presence makes him reinforce those walls of indifference tenfold.

He exhales frustration and inhales temptation, looking back into Yoojung’s familiar eyes and nodding. Jungkook walks to a nearby bench and sits down with no words exchanged, looking forward coldly even when he feels her warmth next to him. A couple months ago, Jungkook would have set all his canvases on fire to feel her beside him again. Now, he’s not so sure.

“So…”, she starts, “who’s that cute girl you were with?”

“No one.” He shoots out a little too soon with no hesitation. Yoojung gulps.

“You know Jungkook, it’s okay to find someone. I-I know I hurt you, but I’m glad if you’ve found someone who doesn’t.” Jungkook doesn’t say anything so she continues.

“I’m really happy for-”

“I never really forgave you Yoojung.” He stares blankly at the passersby and tries to ignore the ache in his bones. The one that’s been there the day she left and took a piece of his heart with her.

“And I don’t want to blame you for my decisions but I want you to know that I push away a lot of people because of you. People that don’t deserve it.” From the corner of his eye, he can see her nod solemnly to his words and fidget with her hands in her lap. Part of him feels guilty for unloading on Yoojung. Part of him feels like maybe he deserves to.

“What you did was really shitty. Astronomically fucking shitty. And I’ve spent the past eternity hating you and maybe I still do, but…”, Jungkook takes a deep breath, “I want to forgive you now. If not fully, then partially. I hope you can understand that.” He finally tilts his head to look at her and though the smile on her face is as beautiful as he remembers it to be, Jungkook no longer feels the longing. No longer feels the sting that he usually does when his thoughts take him back to the years they spent together.

Jungkook doesn’t want to call it closure, not yet anyway. Sitting here on the bench, he still wants to scream and yell and tell Yoojung of all the nights he’s spent alone since she left. He still wants to drag her back and wonder if she could love him again like she used to.

But he doesn’t. He listens when she tells him about her new job and her new apartment right by the lakeside. They share snippets of their separate lives. Just deep enough to rekindle something warm but shallow enough to not invite anything else in.

When he walks away from the bench and into the bookstore, Jungkook stills feels the walls that he has built around himself. He is still scared of opening up and being vulnerable but the anger held for Yoojung for so long is no longer a raging fire. More so a wickering flame.

When he spots you, though, he remembers why he built those walls in the first place. He remembers how easy it used to be for him to climb a high peak and fall to his demise. Your eyes widen when you catch sight of him, lips curling into a wide smile and clear excitement in your expression. The book in your hands is tossed aside and tunnel vision reserved for him and him only. Something blooms in his chest and he can’t remember the last time someone’s been so elated to just simply see him...aside from his dog. Jungkook reminds himself to act uncaring. If he pretends long enough, he’ll start to believe it himself.

◓

The train ride home feels longer than the one there. The minutes drag by and perhaps it is because of your drooping eyes or the way Jungkook is looking at you with a different tenderness than he has been before. His stare is not harsh. It’s soft and sweet, but subtle enough for you to wonder if you are just imagining it. The night has always been unforgiving and cold even in the spring, but perhaps all that’s needed to breathe some warmth, is a 15 minute train ride and a wrist with a crescent moon.

Yet every time you become more smitten with Jungkook, there is a harsh reminder that follows you everywhere like a designated storm cloud.

Jungkook does not love you. And you are trying and you will continue to try but his eyes tell you something he is too courteous to say. You see it now as he sits across from you and admires the skyline from the window. It makes you wonder if it is soulmates he doesn’t believe in, or if it is just you that he can’t bring himself to accept. With every cold glance and wall that he puts up, you start to convince yourself that it is the latter.

“We’re here, Y/N”, Jungkook speaks quietly, interrupting your drifting thoughts. He turns around and leaves the train car with hands tucked in his coat pocket. Did you expect him to escort you out and hold your hand? Of course not. But you were tired of Jungkook being so indifferent to your existence.

You follow him glumly out the doors that slide close after you step through. Then it zips off again and you wonder where it would have taken you if you just stayed in your seat. If Jungkook would have even noticed that you hadn’t followed him when he left.

You sigh into the night air and wish it was winter so that your breath could be visible as a white cloud. Maybe then Jungkook would notice that you were a living being beside him.

“Who was that girl that we met back there?”, you murmur hesitantly. Jungkook nearly chokes on air.

“No one”, he responds curtly, effectively cutting off the conversation then and there. It makes your heart sink. She must be important and all you want to do is know every single detail about their relationship, but the look in his eyes warn you to not pry.

You don’t think you can forget the way Jungkook looked at her from across the street. Like he had been lost this whole time and she was the North star. You saw the way his eyes twinkled in the midday sun and sparkled even more when she came closer. You wonder if you’ll ever be able to have that effect on him.

“Hey, next time you should pick a place you and I both do not live in”, you giggle, nudging his shoulder with your own. It makes him smile and even though your heart feels heavy in your chest, Jungkook looks so beautiful when he smiles.

The two pair of feet subconsciously carry you both to the front door of your apartment building and the scene is too familiar from the last time. You expect him to turn around and whisper a hushed goodnight under his breath, and you’ll have to watch the back of his head disappear down the street. But he doesn’t. Just stands across from you quietly and waits for you to say something. So you do.

“Jungkook, I’m sorry if I brought up something you didn’t want to remember. I don’t really know your story but it seems you two have a lot of history.” You want to tell him how hard it is for you to be his soulmate when he is so clearly vying for the warmth of someone else. Someone who didn’t have a crescent moon on her wrist.

“I know you’ll tell me whenever you’re ready, and if that’s never then I’ll keep waiting until forever. But I’m here if you want to talk or unload and I already know I can help because…” you fidget with your hands and look around nervously.

“Well, because I’m your soulmate.”

When you say it loud and explicitly, Jungkook thought the statement would have made him recoil. But it doesn’t. It just seeps through his consciousness and feels warm when he thinks about the weight of those words. You are his soulmate, regardless of if he believes in such a thing or not. You carry the same mark as he does on your wrist and somehow, by some intangible factor, the universe had decided that you were created for him and he for you.

And when he looks at you. Really looks at you. When Jungkook processes your sincere words and how you manage to deal with his insurmountable boundaries even when you barely know him…

Jungkook has never wanted to kiss you more.

So he does.

Your lips taste like mint chewing gum and the ghost of words you wish to tell him but can’t. He feels you stiffen until you completely melt in his hold, and Jungkook cradles your face with both his hands, pulling you closer to him until there is no barrier between you but the clothes on your back and the emotional distance. You feel so far away even when you’re this near. Was it a trick of your imagination when you felt the moon on your wrist tingling?

It doesn’t last as long as you would’ve liked it to. Jungkook yanks his hands from you like your skin scalded him and takes several steps back. His chest rises up and down violently when his breath comes out ragged, posture stiffening as the gravity of what just happened finally absorbs. You’re there, he knows you’re there and standing in front of him. So why is it he can only see Yoojung. Yoojung and the star on her wrist and apologies on her lips. Yoojung and the tears in her eyes when she walks away.

You can only stare confusedly when his body goes rigid, and a sudden coldness envelops you both.

And in the haze of post-embrace, like any two normal lovers, you catch something in his eyes that sets a heavy feeling in your stomach. Before you can confirm if it’s just a trick of the light, Jungkook is already running in the opposite direction and you can only see a shadow of sullen love that follows him. He is gone and you are standing alone, wondering how moonlight could feel so cold even on a spring night.

You don’t get any sleep that night. Every time you close your eyes, there is only the sight of Jungkook’s disgust and regret to lull you to dreams.

20 minutes away from your apartment, there is a boy who doesn’t sleep either. He won’t text or call to tell you that he can’t shake off the feeling of your skin on his and your breath fanning his cheek. He won’t admit to himself that tonight, when he looked at you, he felt the possibility of falling in love. He won’t tell you that the moon on his skin longs to be traced by your hands. No, he just shares those secrets with his pillow as its linen soaks up his tears.

In the midst of it all, there is one verdict that becomes clear to him.

Jungkook wishes he had never told Jimin he needed a muse.

◑

The next three weeks is dedicated to trying to get in touch with your soulmate. Through the whirlwinds of utter confusion and desperation, you try texting, calling, emailing, even showing up at his art studio and apartment to no avail. It seemed he had a talent for avoiding soulmates.

It hurt, to say the least. That he left you high and dry after giving you the most intense

kiss of your life and doesn’t even have the decency to let you know he’s alive. The feeling of his lips still burns on your skin and you wonder if you are a complete fool for being so smitten with a person who, quite possibly, hasn’t spared you a single thought after that night. You just want - no you just need some clarity.

Jungkook makes you wait another week before replying.

It is an impossibly sunny day when you wake up. Your neck is stiff from sleeping like a contortionist and your heart aches even more than your muscles with every passing morning with radio silence from your soulmate. You want to call him and tell him you’re sorry. That you’ll forget anything ever happened. It hurts to even think about it, but for Jungkook, you would go through a little more pain so he would let you into his life.

Outside the hall, Jimin is singing along to a familiar melody of a song you don’t know the name of and judging by the aroma that wafts through the cracks of your door, he has successfully made a pot of coffee. He has been an anchor throughout this whole thing, and sometimes you make a secret wish to the stars that Jimin had been the one with a crescent moon on his wrist instead. Perhaps that way, you wouldn’t have to go through the agony of chasing love that is constantly sprinting away from you.

Your phone lays on the bedside table and buzzes innocently to start the morning. When you reach over and scroll through notifications routinely, there is a name there that makes your heart pang. Makes you want to throw up and celebrate at the same time. A text from Jungkook. Your fingers shake as you open it.

I no longer need a model for the portfolio. Thank you for your involvement. Compensation will be provided promptly.

The day you met him, you already knew that Jungkook was cold. He never dawdled around a painful truth or toed the line between bluntness and sparing feelings. Jungkook spoke his mind, collateral damage be damned. But this is a different type of cold. This one feels more like dry ice on warm skin. Like the numbing chill of a fading hope. Like winter’s first snowfall when autumn had promised you it would forever stay.

Phone in your hand and tears threatening to drip down your cheeks, you wish you would have waited a bit more before opening his text. Perhaps that way you could have spent the rest of your morning basking in the spring sun, drinking Jimin’s inevitably bad coffee, having hope that Jeon Jungkook would grow to care for you. Perhaps if you hadn’t opened it so soon, your soulmate would still seem in reach.

Jimin’s mug nearly drops out of his hand when the door of your bedroom is slammed open. He flings it to the side when he notices your red-rimmed eyes and the shaking hands that clutch onto a cellphone. You scream and sob at the universe, at anyone, asking why it was you that had to experience the chaos of longing. Jimin was there to hold you, as he always is, and helplessly listen to the sound of your heart breaking once again by the hands of Jungkook.

◒

Room 62B of the art building is a place you hope to never have to visit again. Though it’s walls contain memories of you and Jungkook, and the evenings navigating his gallery portfolio along with your convoluted relationship, the wallpaper bleeds with a longing ache. A yearning pain. And if those walls could talk, you don’t think you would want them to say anything at all. They would only murmur what you are slowly accepting to be true.

Jungkook, your soulmate, wants nothing to do with you.

When you hesitantly rap on the door with a fisted hand, the sound of him rustling from inside makes you want to run the opposite direction. It opens before you get the chance to change your mind and the sight of him nearly takes your breath away. He is beautiful as he always is, hair ruffled and mussed from undoubtedly running his hands through it compulsively. His lips are pink from biting on them and the dark circles under his eyes tells you of the dreams he has deprived himself of.

Jungkook is painfully gorgeous and painfully not yours.

“Y/N...I sent you a text earlier.” His voice is saccharine but the words taste so bitter.

“I know. I read it”, you murmur, shrinking in on yourself.

“I....Can we talk, Jungkook?”

His eyes dart around nervously at your question, chewing on his bottom lip and tapping the toe of his shoe as if he was impatient and you were bothering him. And you have known that simply being around Jungkook hurts but the light at the end of the tunnel only continues dwindling.

You understand why he is acting so restless when your gaze drifts past him and into the room. There is a girl perched on a stool, across from a canvas and easel that you know awfully well. You don’t recognize her but it’s only in your nature to begin comparing every aspect of yourself to this stranger. She sits on her hands and swings her legs back and forth, head in the clouds and eyes trailing the ceiling. She isn’t aware of the weight of her presence in the studio, nor the turmoil she has brought to you, who is standing just outside the door.

The oxygen in the hallway thins and the breath you’ve been waiting to release since knocking catches in your throat. Coming here, you prepared yourself for a long and inevitably heart-wrenching talk with your soulmate. But you hadn’t prepared for the possibility that he had replaced you overnight.

The only thought that blares through your mind is that this is your fault. For letting yourself think you were worth more to Jeon Jungkook than any other stranger. You can no longer find it in yourself to be angry at him. Just yourself.

“You…”, you gulp down a whimper, “you replaced me.”

Jungkook follows your vacant stare past him and sighs, realizing you had most likely deducted what this scene looked like. You would be right. Between the weeks of trying to understand what you were to him and the impending due date of the portfolio, Jungkook was sure the best way to move past this confusion was to just speed full steam ahead. That meant finding another muse. You were no longer an option.

You only stare down at the floor, but Jungkook begins speaking anyway.

“Y/N, I…I’m sorry.” You scoff at his words, feigning anger when inside, you truly didn’t know if you could piece yourself back together this time.

“Look, Y/N. It’s not you. It’s just that…”, he breathes deep, not knowing why it was so hard to say. “I’ve stopped believing soulmates were truly a thing a long time ago. I’m sorry.”

It’s not the first time you’ve heard these words but it doesn’t mean they hurt any less.

“I didn’t want to initiate anything, Y/N, but you did and I let you and that was my fault to let anything start. I shouldn’t have when I knew nothing would come of it.”

It was a fault to him. It never should have happened.

“So you just thought you would kiss me and decide that I meant nothing to you afterwards?”

“It was a mistake.” It was painful to think it but when you hear Jungkook say it, you experience a new kind of ache. A humorless chuckle bubbles past your throat.

“I really thought you would grow to love me. Now I know it’s not your fault that I’m a complete fool. To fall head over heels for my soulmate who wishes he had never even met me. Much less share a mark.”

You can see Jungkook’s eyes widen at your confession, but you can’t find it in yourself to care. It was the truth. He deserved to hear it.

“You shouldn’t. You can’t.” He reaches up to pull at his hair frustratedly.

“Can’t what, Jungkook? Love you? You think I want to be in love with someone who wishes I didn’t exist?” You hate your voice for breaking, but its impossibly painful when he does nothing to deny your statement.

“What do you want me to say, Y/N? What can I say to make this better?”

Try: I love you too.

“I don’t need you to say anything you don’t mean, Jungkook.”

“Then shouldn’t you leave?”

Jeon Jungkook is cruel even when he doesn’t mean to be. There is oblivion in his gaze, and his question is one of genuine curiosity. But it still stabs you exactly where your heart is most tender. Yes, I should have left.

“I guess I thought you were worth the pain, Jungkook. When you pushed me away and wanted nothing to do with me, I thought you were worth hurting for just to try a little more. Worth the uncertainty of being around you but never getting to actually be with you”, you numbly mutter, uncaring about the rivulets of tears down your face. Not like it wasn’t something he’s never seen before. There is more to come on the tip of your tongue, and Jungkook stays quiet to let you speak. There is conflict in his vision, but you don’t want to give yourself the false hope that he cares for you.

Look where that has gotten you before.

“You still are, you know. Worth it.” You release a shaky breath. “But I was stupid to think that I am too.”

Saying the words are revelation for you as much as it is for him. All this time, you’ve been running away from the truth in the pursuit of your soulmate. You hadn’t realized that the chase led you astray.

“And I know that loving me is not easy. I’m…”, you force the words out so he can at least hear your turmoil by his hands. “I’m never really good enough for anyone. Why did I expect that I would be good enough for you?”

Jungkook’s expression crumples into a frown. “Y/N, no, that’s not what I mean-”

“You don’t have to tell me what you mean, Jungkook. I meet you and the first thing you say is that you don’t believe in such a thing. I try to get close to you and all you know to do is push me away. And I try so hard to be enough but how can I when Yoojung still has your heart? So you don’t have to say it. I know what you mean.” You’ve stopped crying but the ache relents, and you can only look desperately at the boy who’s slipping from your grasp with every passing second.

“I’m sorry.” The message is redundant.

“I can’t…” Rip off the bandaid.

“I just can’t love you.”

The words make their way past his lips before he can stop them, and they shoot through your core ruthlessly. A sharpened dagger to soft flesh. It manifests itself in a physical pain that reverberates across your chest, and when the last strength left in you is used to stare at Jungkook through a pained and teary gaze, you are deaf to everything but those four words.

I can’t love you.

You’re not sure what he is sorry for at this point. If Jungkook is apologizing for not loving you, you don’t blame him. If he is sorry for entertaining the possibility, you don’t blame him. If he is sorry that you are the one with a crescent moon on your wrist, well...you don’t blame him either. All your life you cherished it like some kind of gift from the universe. Now, nursing your crumbling soul in front of Jungkook, you wish it had never appeared in the first place.

You shake your head, tucking your lip in between your teeth to stop the sob in your chest from escaping. Through the crack of the door Jungkook hadn’t shut fully, the girl was still there, patiently sitting where you were supposed to and making herself scarce after inevitably hearing you bare your heart to a boy who had no interest in it.

Humiliation goes hand in hand with heartbreak, and the embarrassment that comes with confessing your love and insecurity urges your feet to run home. But even you cannot deprive yourself of looking at him one more time.

His wavy head of hair. The scar on his cheekbone that makes him look even more beautiful, if that were possible. The gloss in his dark brown eyes, and the way he looks at you through stone cold walls. You commit it to memory, however painful, before you walk out of his life.

“Be happy, Jungkook.”

You truly mean it.

◐

The sound of your footsteps getting farther away from him is a sound Jungkook thinks he’ll remember for a long time. It almost prompts him to run after you, cradle you to his chest, and profess how sorry he is again and again until you can truly feel the sincerity. But he doesn’t. Only remains behind the self-procured walls and watches when your figure disappears down the hallway.

Cold. Unbothered. Indifferent. That’s what he had always told himself when it came to you. But the hallway feels so lonely and the ghost of your presence feels even lonelier, and Jungkook wonders if he had been wrong.

He walks back into the studio, permanent frown on his face and shoulders hunched over in stress. The paintbrush feels like a stranger rather than an extension of his arm, as it always does, but Jungkook begins painting anyway. Looking at the girl in front of him, he is reminded of the look on your face when you realized he had replaced you completely in the span of three weeks, without even giving you a notice. Her presence in his art studio suddenly feels entirely suffocating.

“Mina, Get out.”

“What?”

“Get out of my studio. I don’t need you as a model, anymore. Thanks.” His voice cut through the tension of the room, like a hot knife to butter. He recognizes it as the voice he always forces himself to use around you, and grows even more aggravated.

The girl scoffs annoyedly, snatching her handbag from the floor and rushing out of the room. Obviously she had thought something more was to come from Jungkook’s art arrangement. He made sure to let her know that was not the case.

There is a gnawing in his chest. Deep and subtle, but it becomes more prominent as the window view from his studio turns from blue to black. He ponders about spending the night in here, instead of going home to his bedroom where he is forced to consult with the agony of solitude. On top of everything today, Jungkook doesn’t think he can handle that.

Every time he closes his eyes, he sees the pain in your face when he tells you that he can’t love you and he hears the shaking in your voice when you tell him the things that weighed on your soul. He thought the word “wither” was only reserved for flowers. Jungkook didn’t realize a person could wither until he saw it right in front of him.

In truth, he didn’t know. He didn’t know if he could love you or not. And to Jungkook, that was already a feat in itself. He’s spent so many months convincing himself that his emotional fortress was impregnable. So many nights over whiskey bottles telling himself that love was only for fools and pretenders. To be uncertain about love, now, well...that’s something he is not yet ready to admit to himself. Much less admit to you. But letting you any closer was a fatal game.

Being uncertain about love means being uncertain about getting hurt. Jungkook has a feeling he wouldn’t make it out in one piece if his heart fell into wrong hands.

He does end up returning to his apartment that night. But the walk feels far too long and the air feels far too frigid, or perhaps is it because he can’t hear the tread of your footsteps beside him?

Whatever the reason, tonight feels more lonely.

The stars tell him it’s because he does not like the person he’s alone with.

Back in room 62B, there is an abandoned painting on a rickety easel. He hadn’t even had the will to wash out his paintbrush, and he’s sure he’ll pay for it the next day. Looking at the piece now, his professor would tell him that there’s too many colors. Too much contrast and nearly not enough depth in his strokes. But what was he to do when he had kicked out his new model and couldn’t get the image of your visible heartbreak out of his brain?

A familiar wrist with a quaint crescent moon sits on the canvas, and he sure as hell didn’t use Mina as the inspiration. Jungkook reminds himself to throw out the painting tomorrow morning.

◓

The grease on Jimin’s skillet pan is always so hard to clean. The dish soap never truly cuts through the oil, and no matter how much you rinse it over with scalding water, it still feels soiled. On a normal day, it wouldn’t frustrate you so much. Today, a month-and-a-half after your soulmate made it clear to you that you had no place in his life, you want to throw the pan out the window and cry on the kitchen floor until it collapses with the weight of your tears.

You settle for throwing down the sponge and making Jimin wash his own dishes.

The phone-that you usually now tend to ignore-buzzes on the counter, and you groan at your complete lack of desire to answer it. But the screen lights up with your roommate’s name and you hit the green button.

“Y/N! How are you feeling, lovebug?” Jimin’s cheerful tone on speakerphone makes you want to cry. You can only imagine how terrible it is for him to be your roommate when all you know how to do now is mope and cry about a boy who probably hasn’t thought about you since. But he’s been holding you through all your breakdowns, and even sets up the air mattress on the floor of your bedroom when some nights are a little bit harder than most.

“I’ve had better days”, you glare at the pan in the sink. “What’s up?’

“So I have a friend…”

“Jimin, no.”

He sighs over the phone understandingly, but still not satisfied. “I know it’s only been a month Y/N, but it doesn’t have to be anything. He’s not looking for anything serious either. But maybe it would be good for you to take your mind off things.”

It’s been a month. Four weeks. Roughly 31 days, and you still remember every word he said to you in the hallway of the art building. Every pause and quiver of his breath, and the way he looked so completely indifferent to your pain. Was one month enough for you to let go even after finding out Jungkook never planned to hold on in the first place?

“Look, you don’t have to decide now. I’m sorry for pushing you if you’re not ready.” His mumbling is apologetic and it makes you realize that Jimin genuinely means well. Maybe you weren’t ready to move on from Jungkook yet. Maybe you never will be. He was your damn soulmate, after all. But maybe a distraction couldn’t hurt.

“Okay.”

“Okay?”

“I’ll do it.”

You can practically feel him smiling like an idiot over the phone. “Really?!” You sigh into the speaker and Jimin knows better to continue talking before you change your mind.

“His name is Namjoon, he works with me at the office. Super cute. Super hot. Super smart. Checks all your boxes!”, he rambles on about the nitty gritty details and though a part you is proud that you’re making the decision to move on with life, you can’t help but to realize that no one will ever be able to “check all your boxes”.

Not if they’re not Jungkook.

“He sounds great, Jimin.” Anyone can tell your happiness is disingenuous, even through the phone. Jimin tells you that he had already planned a date (without your knowledge), and sends you on your way with a quick goodbye when his taxi arrives. The silence of the apartment after the conversation leaves you feeling even more weighted, but hopeful for the possibility of a distraction. You had a feeling you won’t be able to forget the likes of Jeon Jungkook if you tried. But, if only for a night, you were to forget the pain of loving him, you’ll take that chance.

◑

“What do you mean they all ‘feel the same’?” Jungkook is exasperated. He had drafted a complete version of his portfolio, working through the nights by the sweat of his brow. Now his professor was telling him that all his pieces felt the same and Jungkook thinks he might commit arson to the art studio.

Professor Sejin sighs contemplatively, taking off his glasses and throwing them on the table, all too familiar with Jungkook’s periodic art tantrums.

“I mean that your pieces lack any variegation. The portfolio is well done and coherent, but the completed package is one-noted. It’s consistent. But too much so.”

Professor Sejin’s words make him fall back into the chair dejectedly, shoulders slumped and disappointment in his eyes at the critique of his art. Though it is hard to hear, Jungkook always welcomes productive criticism. The older man sympathizes with his downcast eyes and the visible stress on his back.

“Look, Jungkook”, he affirms sincerely, “you just need to find some dynamic. Something to make people know that you can do more than one tone of art.” It’s obvious that the professor has a soft spot for the boy in front of him, who looks like his entire world is collapsing. The portfolio folder is handed back to him and Jungkook has the urge to burn it and not hear the word “gallery” again in the next decade.

“I have faith in you. You’ll figure out what it is that you’re missing.” The smile on the man’s face is congenial. Genuine. And even though he has an ambitious amount of work to do, Jungkook finds the will to nod, haul himself off the office chair, and begin the trek back to his studio.

The pinnacle of spring is approaching and the sun shines brighter with each morning. Not that he would know or care. He’s spent the last month locking himself inside, dedicating every fluid ounce of energy towards completing his project. It’s been surprisingly easier, and Jungkook finds himself finishing paintings, sketches, and sculptures with ease. Like untapped inspiration had revealed itself to him suddenly. Yet it still wasn’t enough...at least not according to Professor Sejin.

Headphones drown out the cacophony of hustlers and bustlers with the laughter of children as accompaniment. He doesn’t allow himself to enjoy the music of the city. Not anymore. It gives him too much space to think, and Jungkook has a feeling that’s not good for anyone and definitely not good for him.

The sight of a familiar bakery with particularly delicious apple strudels is enough to stop him in his rush, feet winding down until he is standing outside, staring at the door and wondering if he could go in without being reminded of you. Well, it might be too late for that anyhow, but further signs of protest are halted when he hears his growling stomach.

Jungkook had morbidly underestimated your presence in the memory of his favorite cafe. You are everywhere. He sees your smiling face when he looks up at the chalkboard menu, soul vying for you to be next to him and excitedly choosing a new fru-fru drink that would undoubtedly have excessive sugar. He hears your giggles ruminating through the cafe while the other patrons only hear the music over loudspeaker. He practically feels you near, but that doesn’t matter now. It’s better this way. No one gets hurt this way.

Jungkook plops himself at a corner table and buries his face in his hands, fingertips soothing over his pulsing eyebags and wrinkles he’s gotten from sleep deprivation. He desperately needs an espresso shot. Or five.

“Hey…”, a voice makes him snap his head up. Jungkook recognizes the stranger as the owner’s son, who always stands guard at the cash register. The tag on his lapel reads Kim Seokjin, and Jungkook has a distant memory of you gushing over how nice Seokjin’s hair was. He had acted unbothered back then, but Jungkook would die before telling a soul that he was annoyed and jealous when you thought the cashier was cute.

“Jungkook, right?”. He has a kind smile and a natural air of invitation. Jungkook nods.

“I’ve seen you around a lot. Where’s that girl you always come here with?”

“I don’t see how that’s any of your business”, he nearly hisses, antsy at the mere mention of you. He instantly regrets it though. Seokjin looks like he’s been cornered with a blunt weapon, and it makes Jungkook sigh at his own asshole-ishness.

“I’m sorry”, he mumbles, “just not a good day. At all.”

There is a pause and hesitation before the boy speaks. “Do you...wanna talk about it?” Seokjin’s question is met with silence.

There is a predictability about Jeon Jungkook. He doesn’t open himself up to anyone. He pretends that he doesn’t have problems so well, people start to become convinced. He avoids new connections like it’s the plague. But there is something so idiosyncratic about Kim Seokjin that makes him want to talk. Makes him want to trust a complete stranger.

So Jungkook nods, depositing his black backpack besides him and lets himself breathe deep.

“Her name is Y/N….”

In the lukewarm air of the café, Jungkook tells Seokjin about you. About the tiny crescent moon on your wrist that identically matches his - even unwraps his cloth to show it - and how he pushed you away hard enough to put an ocean’s worth of distance between the two of you. He tells Seokjin about Yoojung and the stars on her skin that have been plaguing him since the day she left. He tells him about that damn portfolio that refuses to be finished; one that he apparently has to start over because Professor goddamn Sejin says it's too boring. He allows himself to unload, and wow is it easier to breathe when you talk about your feelings. Jungkook reminds himself to do that more often.

The “conversation” seems to stretch for hours (if a conversation can be considered one person unleashing all their hidden baggage on the other while they sit in silence). Jin listens intently through the entire ordeal, offering occasional nods and encouragement for him to continue. When Jungkook finally finishes with a deep breath, falling back on the chair looking completely worn out, Jin fixes him with a hot tea before speaking.

“The portfolio is important to you, Jungkook. If it’s important to you, you’ll find a way. Something tells me that you’re not one to give up so easily”, he quips with a playful lilt in his voice. Jin’s genuine faith in him makes Jungkook believe in himself.

“And as for Yoojung, well, I can’t speak on your pain. You are the only one that narrates your experiences but as much as she seems like a villain in your story, perhaps she has opened a door.” Jungkook thinks his voice sounds far too wise to be coming from a guy in his 20’s.

“Would you have known how to nurse a broken heart had it not been for her? I’m sorry she did that to you, Jungkook, but..Yoojung is your past. And I see so much in your future.”

Jungkook only stares into the abyss of his tea cup. The reflection that stares back is someone he desperately wants to learn to love. When he looks up again, there is a sad glimmer in Seokjin’s gaze. Something so despondent that he feels second-hand pain.

Jin pulls up the sleeve of his knit sweater. On his wrist sits a faded marigold, so blanched it almost blends in with his skin and makes him wonder if it will just disappear one day. Jungkook feels his blood run cold.

“It’s been two years since she died”, he stares solemnly at his skin, “I don’t think a day has gone by that I haven’t thought about her.”

Jungkook’s thought about his soulmate mark disappearing before. Even hoped and prayed for it the days after Yoojung left. But now, when he sees it up close on Seokjin’s wrist, Jungkook doesn’t want to wish that loneliness upon anyone.

“She was so damn...persistent”, Jin laughs, fondness dripping in every word. “Like your Y/N in that way, I suppose. She had a goal and was hell-bent on achieving it. She was so kind and strong and much more of a badass than I could ever be. I loved that about her.” There is sorrow in his voice when he uses the past tense, and Jungkook feels even worse for pouring his heart out about his very alive soulmate.

“She was studying to be a doctor, you know? Ironic that even the best doctors couldn’t have saved her in the end.” His sentence trails off and he loses focus gazing out the window, fidgeting with the ring on his left hand with a faraway look in his eyes.

“I don’t mean to ramble about my dead soulmate for no reason, Jungkook. And I’m in no position to tell you what you should or should not do regarding Y/N. But if I could restart this life with my soulmate, there wouldn’t be one second I would waste not at her side.” Jin’s tone is not accusatory or convicting. Just honest.

“It’s normal to be scared and apprehensive. Hell, I would be more concerned if you weren’t going into it with a shit ton of skepticism. I was terrified. Yet out of the billions of people that could’ve had my mark on their wrist, just knowing that she was that one was enough for me to love her.”

The cup of tea has long gone cold. Jungkook only manages to stare at the mahogany table, thoughts too heavy to voice aloud, so Jin continues.

“I think I would give anything to know that such a person still exists for me. Someone out there that was chosen by an unknown, cosmic force for an unexplainable reason just for me. To see a mark that matches my own. Well…”, Jin breathes deeply, tears welling in his eyes but not falling, “I think that must be the most wonderful thing in the entire world.”

◒

Seokjin’s words stick with him long after he has departed from the café. Long after the tea has settled in his stomach along with the weight of what a soulmate means to this stranger whose life story he has learned in the course of an evening.

Even so, Jungkook’s not sure what he should feel. The fear of vulnerability still feels like a designated thundercloud above his head, and the thought of letting you past his walls makes Jungkook want to run the other way.

At the same time, the trepidation doesn’t feel so heavy anymore. It’s still there, and he can’t pinpoint exactly what happened but when he sees your smiling face behind his eyelids, Jungkook doesn’t feel scared. When he focuses on what you look like under sunlight, or your eyes staring at him through a camera lens, there is no fear of the broken heart you could leave him with. Just something warm. Something that feels an awful lot like...love?

But what does Jungkook know about such things?

He shrugs it off his shoulders, and readies himself for a night of inevitably restless sleep. He blames it on the impending due date of his beloved portfolio, but really, it is you. You and your insistence on trying every single coffee shop in the city. You and your convoluted idea of a date; letting your partner choose the location with their eyes closed. You and…

Just everything about you.

He falls asleep well into 4am. The thin strap of cloth sits on his bedside table. Even if it is only for the night sky to see, Jungkook lets his soulmate mark breathe.

◐

It’s been so long since you’ve dressed up or cleaned up to go out anywhere, the reflection that stares back feels like a stranger. You’ve opted for a bold red lip, meticulously applying your makeup so that even the wing of your eyeliner was sharp enough to kill. Jimin forced you to curl your hair too, of course. The girl in the mirror looks beautiful. You know that she is beautiful.

So why is it that you can only see the face that is not enough for Jeon Jungkook? A person that he is unable to love. No, not even foundation can cover the face of longing.

“Y/N”, Jimin sing-songs, “hurry! You don’t wanna be late do you?” No, you don’t want to be late. You want to not go. Maybe retreat to your bedroom and cry the night away again. But you won’t tell him that when he is so clearly ecstatic that you’re spending a night out for the first time in months.

The restaurant looks like it is entirely out of your budget. Well, you reckon any restaurant is out of your budget with all the debt that looms overhead and your painfully apparent unemployment. Waiting for Namjoon is less than exhilarating, and you spend the time fiddling with your bracelet that conveniently covers the crescent moon. These days, you can’t bear to look at it anymore. Your eyes are glued to the little mark, before a voice sounds from across the table.

“Sorry I’m late, traffic was insane. You must be Y/N, nice to meet you.” You weren’t sure what you expected Kim Namjoon to look like but were pleasantly surprised. Namjoon looks like he takes care of himself, neat and clean and sporting a very shiny watch that looks like 4 months’ worth of rent.

“And you must be Namjoon. Likewise.”

When he pulls out the chair to sit down, you can’t help but to notice the cloud on his wrist. It was smaller than yours but you had no doubt it felt just as heavy. If Namjoon felt your gaze on his skin, he did nothing to show it.

“Hey, I know I just got here but…”, he sighs and takes a look around the room, “do you wanna get out of here? Find the cheapest and greasiest food we can?” His request makes you smile, and you grab the purse that rested on the table.

“Namjoon, I think that’s the best idea you’ve had yet.”

You and Namjoon manage to find a diner that wasn’t far from the fancy restaurant, and you thank the skies that you didn’t have to pay $50 for a salad tonight. Just some pocket change for quite possibly the best and oiliest hamburger you’ve ever had.

By conversation that happens through mouthfuls of food and faces smeared with milkshake residue, you come to learn that Namjoon is an unsurprisingly nice guy. He studies poetry, but is working as a secretary at an office, hence his connection to Jimin. He loves to garden and talks about his bonsai plants to you like they’re his kids, even pulling up pictures on his phone and gazing down at them fondly. It makes you smile. He plays the piano, and likes to take long bike rides when the weather permits.

It’s nice to have someone reciprocate your effort. It’s something you haven’t experienced in a long time, all credit to one Jeon Jungkook. Namjoon is warm in all the corners where Jungkook is cold.

In a word, he is pretty damn perfect. And if he had a crescent moon on his wrist, you probably wouldn’t bat an eye or have a lick of doubt in the universe. He encompasses everything you want, so alike you in so many aspects it makes you wary. If Namjoon had your matching soulmate mark, you would already be in love with him.

But he doesn’t. And that thought alone keeps you from feeling anything but platonicity. He is not Jungkook. You don’t think anyone can make you feel the way Jungkook does. You want to curse the stars for making this so.

It’s well into the night, and you both remain planted in the diner booth, chatting and chuckling over a plate of french fries. It’s when you drift off while he’s talking about his latest attempt at focaccia that Namjoon sighs and sits back in the seat.

“What?”, you confusedly ask after he suddenly stops speaking.

He smiles. Stays silent for a couple seconds. Then speaks.

“So what did your soulmate do to you?”

His question catches you off guard and you can only stare at him, frown on your face and words lost on your tongue.

“You’ve been staring into space every 5 minutes this whole night, and fidgeting with your bracelet so much I’m surprised it hasn’t fallen off”, he explains, tenderness and sympathy in his tone.

“Every time I speak, you have this sad look in your eyes and I have a feeling you’re imagining someone else’s face, Y/N. I’ve enjoyed talking to you...a lot. But I can tell you want to be somewhere else so”, Namjoon places his elbows on the table and gazes at you endearingly, “tell me about your soulmate.”

You stare at Namjoon through shocked eyes, glistening with the onset of tears that you manage to keep from escaping. Gosh, you were pathetic. Already wanting to cry at the mere mention of him. Or maybe the fact that someone could see through your facade. You take a deep breath.

“His name is Jeon Jungkook.” Your voice quivers, and Namjoon continues listening intently. You are reluctant to continue because you know that once this conversation begins, there is a chance you might have to confront yourself again with the pain of loving someone who doesn’t want love. You internally apologize to Namjoon in advance, for you might cry on this first date.

“I…I’m completely head over heels in love with him but after everything, I’m not sure I have the slightest clue what love is. Because what sane person can fall in love with a person who has made it clear that that love wouldn’t be reciprocated from the get go?”

You fiddle with the plastic straw in your milkshake, searching for the courage to go on and tell him about every thought that you have denied yourself the satisfaction of verbalizing.

“He loves apple strudels, you know. Eats them every time like they’re the last apple strudels he’ll ever have and he doesn’t give a damn who’s watching”, you chuckle, gaze drifting off to space. There is a fondness in your eyes as you speak, and Namjoon does not miss it.

“He’s as punctual as the day is long. One time I was late to a photoshoot and he almost made me cry lecturing me about the importance of being on time. But now I’m never late.”

The memory makes you, as well as Namjoon, smile.

“He paints like his life depends on it, and he’ll get oil paint on his face without noticing and sometimes I just want to reach out and wipe it off. But I think he’d murder me on the spot.”

“How come?”, Namjoon offers his first words in the midst of your monologue. You’re not sure what to say next.

“Well...I think Jeon Jungkook might be the coldest person I’ve ever met”, you dejectedly sigh. Reality tastes bitter even with remnants of whipped cream on your lips.

“Every time I was around him, it felt like I was willingly breaking my own heart just for the chance to know that he was next to me. That in this entire world of billions of people, the one with the same moon on their wrist was next to me. And...I guess I didn’t really need him to love me yet”, your gaze locks onto Namjoon and you find he is already staring at you with utmost curiosity and subtle pity.

“Jungkook alone was enough. I just wish he could have felt the same about me.”

Perhaps the reason why the truth is so painful to speak is because people have a tendency to run from it. Then when it catches up to you, it’s a harsh trip and fall to the rocky ground. There is no cushion when you land.

Namjoon doesn’t offer advice. Doesn’t dish his own experiences to relate to your own or even make any comments from his perspective. He just sits and listens in silence, but it doesn’t feel like he is disregarding you. No, his eyes tell you that he soaks in every word. You hope you’ll get the chance to do the same for him...if he ever decides to share his story with you.

The two of you leave the diner with a prospective to be friends, and no plans of a future second date. You had a strong feeling that spending the entire evening talking about your unrequited soulmate love had something to do with that. Nevertheless, though Namjoon didn’t work out as a distraction, you were glad to have met him. It made you realize something.

Even if Jimin thought you were ready to move on. Even if you thought you were ready to forget. It might be a lifetime before you finally let go of that boy.

◓

The morning reeks of rain and dew, humidity nearly clawing its way through his window and turning his apartment into a swamp. When he wakes up, it is not to his blaring alarm clock, but the uncomfortable sensation of a sweaty shirt sticking to his back. Jungkook groans, already tired of this day. It seems hopeless from the beginning.

As much as he wanted to stay home and crank up the air conditioner so much that his landlord would come running, Professor Sejin’s voice reverberates through his eardrums.

You art is too one-noted, Jungkook.

Be better, Jungkook.

You’re talentless and will never succeed, Jungkook.

Of course, these are not Professor Sejin’s verbatim, more so Jungkook’s own mind that twists his teacher’s constructive criticism into something else. He is a master at feeding his insecurity.

Jungkook chugs down a lukewarm cup of black coffee, and his stomach growls for something with a little more sugar and maybe a dash of rainbow colored sprinkles. He guesses he has you to thank for that. The art studio is always a daily destination, and this day is no different. Jungkook has a plan to dedicate himself to fixing his portfolio and maybe finish that clay piece he never got around to.

The studio is too cold for his liking; Jungkook can’t remember how many times he has begged the superintendent to lower the AC. The cold he can deal with. The loneliness, however, is a different story. Jungkook is always alone. Alone when he’s in his apartment. Alone when he’s in class. Alone when he’s in the art room. These days, aloneness feels more haunting when he knows he had the option to escape it, but chose to stay. A part of him is ready to admit that it’s because of you.

Jungkook hums a random melody that had been stuck in his head since the morning, fingers gliding over the slick sculpting clay. The days are easier now. He doesn’t think about you so much when the sun is out and there is the bustling of the busy city to distract him. The nights, however, are just as difficult as they have been. Jungkook’s last drifting thought is of you, and your face torturously carries over to each dream. Like his entire being misses you but he refuses to accept it.

He takes a deep sigh in relief once the sculpture feels finished. Professor Sejin wanted something more dynamic, so there: his very own realist clay piece drawing inspiration from Praxiteles’ sculpture of Aphrodite. He sits back in pride, admiring his own handiwork and giving himself a mental pat on the back. It looks great. Perfect even. It looks….

It looks like you.

Jungkook pales at the realization as the clay face stares back at him. No, this was supposed to be Aphrodite, the goddess of beauty and love, inspired by the ancient Greek artist that sculpted her. Then why does she have your nose? Those eyes are definitely your’s and even those cheeks are identical. Jungkook hadn’t even realized that in the rhythm of his art, he got lost and accidentally sculpted your face instead.

He walks away from the clay table and hurriedly yanks off the soiled apron around his waist, confusion swimming in every cell of his body. How had he just...made a sculpture of you? With no knowledge that he was doing it?

Jungkook leans with his back against the sink, staring down at the floor with furrowed brows and a thundering heart. With a sudden epiphany, Jungkook leaps from his position and pulls out all the canvases, printed photographs, graphite drawings, and clay pieces he’s made for the past few months. Everything he can grab in the small studio space.

It is then that he comes to the daunting realization:

Holy shit.

Professor Sejin was right.

Everything feels the same. His whole portfolio has one note and no dynamic or diversity because...well, because all of his pieces are of you. Not you, necessarily, but your breath has come alive on his art in some way, shape, or form.

The multimedia painting he made two weeks ago using polystyrene sheets was supposed to mimic sunlight through a stained glass window, but Jungkook hadn’t even noticed he'd drawn the window of the café you dragged him to on its opening day. And the colors of the glass is just the twinkle of your eyes when they stare back into his.

The photoset he spent hours taking around the city, after taking a 15 minute train ride, were just repeats of all the places you two went to that one day. The book store. The park. The streetlight where Yoojung stopped him. He hadn’t even realized he only saved the photos associated with a subconscious memory of you.

Jungkook can’t explain it, but he feels you in every single picture. Every piece of art that his hands have manifested since you walked into his life, stupid smile on your face and that little moon on your wrist. He feels it...and call it artist’s intuition or something but perhaps that’s why Professor Sejin could feel it too.

Even though he stopped making you his muse months ago, you are still the root of inspiration for whatever he’s produced since. And if that’s not enough to finally tell him what he needs to hear. Finally make him realize that he’s fallen in love with you without even knowing it, the universe doesn’t know what will.

The minutes it has been since he realized your place in his life melts like slow dripping honey, feeling like an eternity when it is mere moments. Jungkook regains his focus in the haze. He knows what you mean to him now, but there was something he had to fo first.

He swipes all his paintbrushes and palette knives to the side, sweat on his brow as he furiously rearranges his portfolio. He takes out the pictures of Mina - no one would miss them anyway - and trashes all the photos he took before he met you. He only uses the art he’s created post-Y/N and tucks them in the manila folder so rapidly, there’s paper cuts on his fingers. But he doesn’t feel them. Jungkook has only one objective.

He snaps a picture of the new clay sculpture he’s just finished. The photo goes into the portfolio with the name ‘Aphrodite’, but Jungkook knows better about whose face that truly belongs to. Not that anyone would bat an eye. He thinks you are as beautiful as the goddess herself.

The trip to Professor Sejin’s office is short, unsurprising though, since Jungkook sprints the whole way there. When he arrives, and the professor can only stare as he’s bent over and huffing violently trying to catch his breath, Jungkook reminds himself to spend less time at the studio and more time on the cardio.

He throws the portfolio onto the man’s desk unceremoniously, nearly collapsing on the chair across from him and not ready to speak yet. Professor Sejin confusedly rifles through the folder quickly, too quickly, and sighs, ready to offer Jungkook yet the same critique again.

He opens his mouth, but Jungkook cuts him off.

“Before you say anything…”, he gulps, finally ready to admit the truth to himself.

“I want you to know that I’ve met my soulmate, a-and there’s a reason why you feel that my portfolio is all the same. There’s a reason why you feel it’s all one-noted or that there’s no progression.” Jungkook takes a deep breath and closes his eyes, and you are there behind his lids.

“It’s because she sowed the seeds for all of them. Everything. Those paintings and photos and sculptures are just symptoms of what I’ve been feeling this whole time after meeting her. She’s practically the artist, not me.” Professor Sejin stays silent at his monologue, gaze unreadable but eyes sharp and trained solely on Jungkook.

“Maybe...Maybe art doesn’t need to be super variegated all the time. Maybe it’s supposed to be a cohesive unit and the pieces should string to each other. Maybe paintings should have a relationship to photos and them, to sculptures. Maybe you’re just...wrong.”

He is exasperated and passion flows out of him through every pore. Jungkook looks expectantly at his professor, who has the open folder in his hand and still in the process of taking in his words. When the adrenaline starts to fade, he realizes that he just dissed his venerable teacher.

“With all due respect…”, he coughs, “sir.”

Professor Sejin lets Jungkook spend the next couple minutes in complete torturous silence so that he can finish reviewing his portfolio. The tension is cut with the sound of the man’s hands slapping together as he closes the folder. Jungkook prepares himself for a stern lecture.

However, when he looks up, there is a smile on the man’s face. There’s no malice there, or even disdain. He pulls off his glasses, sets them on the table, and sits back in the office chair, arms folded over his chest. Jungkook can feel his heart threatening to pound past his rib cage.

“Jungkook…”, Professor Sejin declares, “I think you’ve got a contender for the gallery spot.”

◑

If someone had asked you what Jeon Jungkook meant to you, you would look them in the eye and tell them that he meant nothing. Because it’s easier to pretend that someone does not mean anything to you after they pretend that you do not exist. That the universe had not given you both matching marks and deemed that your souls were meant for each other. Jeon Jungkook is a stranger to you. One that you wanted so badly to love. But you’ve come to learn that no matter how hard you try; you can’t love someone who doesn’t want to love at all.

So the days trickle by as they usually do. Painstakingly slow and viscous with memories of a boy named Jeon Jungkook and the way he has hurt you enough to last a little bit over forever.

“I understand why you don’t want to go, Y/N. But aren’t you the least bit curious? Especially after that fancy invitation in the mail?” Jimin’s query is innocent. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t make your blood boil.

“I don’t know...the thought of going to my soulmate’s grand art gallery when the last time we spoke, he told me he can’t love me, just doesn’t seem appealing Jimin”, you snark, burying your face into the bowl of cereal you are now spooning far too aggressively.

“But...it’s been months. And he wouldn’t have sent you an invitation if he didn’t want you to come.”

This conversation has happened too frequently since that red envelope arrived at your apartment. You cried your eyes out when you opened it, both out of pride for Jungkook and the fact that no matter what you did, the universe found a way to keep you from moving on.

A sigh heaves through your chest, and the cereal is abandoned by your loss of appetite. “I’m not going to show up there and have him tell me again all of the reasons he can’t be with me. I barely survived it last time.”

“But what if, Y/N?”

There is a glimmer in Jimin’s eye and he radiates so much hopefulness for you, you can’t help but to feel it too.

“Isn’t the what if already enough? You used to tell me that Jungkook was worth anything. Isn’t he worth the risk this time too?”

You don’t have anything else to say after that because as much as you hate to admit, perhaps Jimin is right. Jungkook is worth going through anything for, even if he wants to stay as far away as possible. Call it a fluke in the postal system that the invitation to his gallery landed on your doorstep, but can you allow yourself to read between the lines and dare say that he sent it himself? Can you put yourself through such a perilous thing like optimism?

Jungkook has left you battered and broken for the past months. But you would give your heart to him to break all over again if he asked.

◒

To say that you did not fit in with those dawdling around the art gallery was a gross understatement. You didn’t just not fit in. Your entire presence and aura defied every expectation, and suddenly, watching the upper echelon of the city mingle with champagne and gaze critically at Jungkook’s art, makes every breath feel like an insecurity.

The boy in question was nowhere in sight, and you now regret not dragging Jimin with you. The invitation had specifically prohibited plus one’s, and though Jimin whined to no end about his hurt feelings and emptily promised never to talk to Jungkook again, you managed to keep him home. Now, you wish you were back at the apartment with him.

The pieces were, in short, completely breathtaking (to no surprise, of course, this was Jungkook you were talking about). Though you knew he always held doubt in himself, in the short time he allowed you to be in his life, you had never once thought he was anything less than spectacular. Yet you could not allow yourself to completely enjoy them. Each brushstroke and paint color you remember from his palettes, or the filters on the photos that you helped him with, was agonizing to look at.

You are standing in front of a canvas titled “Windowlight” when a man comes up beside you. He nurses a flute of bubbly champagne and makes no move to gain eye contact. Unknown to you, Professor Sejin knows exactly who you are. He’s seen your face in his student’s portfolio one too many times.

“Artful use of mixed media, isn’t it?”, he mutters.

“I suppose so.”

“He’s quite the prodigy. Have you met him yet? I’m sure he’s lurking around somewhere.” The man takes a sip from his glass, smirk on his lips hidden from your eyes that still blankly stare ahead.

“Yes. He’s a...friend.” We share a soulmate mark. He hates my guts.

He hums a sound of affirmation and you ignore the weird feeling it leaves in your stomach; one that tells you this stranger sees right through you.

“Ah, how rude of me. Professor Sejin. Arts director and senior advisor.” He spares you a brief glance, but you make no move to shake his hand or pretend to be courteous. You don’t have the energy for it tonight. Just being in this building, surrounded by everything Jungkook has touched, makes you want to collapse into yourself.

“It was nice to meet you, Y/N.” He speaks nonchalantly, and you almost miss the fact that you never told him your name. Your brows crease in confusion and you are ready to turn and interrogate the stranger, but he is already walking away, gliding smoothly across the gallery. Before he gets too far, though, Sejin cranes his neck and makes eye contact.

“Oh, and be sure to visit the one called ‘Moon’. It’s upstairs, next to the Aphrodite sculpture on the second level exhibit”, he entreats, a suspicious lilt in his voice.

“Something tells me you’ll appreciate its…sincerity.”

Honestly, you’re not sure what you expected when you came to Jungkook’s art gallery tonight. But to be approached by a stranger who already knows your name, who dubiously instructs you to seek out a mystery art piece, was not on the list of expectations. Still...Professor Sejin’s words made you curious.

Through the night, your eyes subconsciously seek out that familiar head of fluffy brown hair and a tall gait that always seems to stick out, even in a large crowd. It was as if Jungkook versed himself in complete camouflage, so much so that you began to doubt that he was even in the building.

The traipse through the gallery is done in silence and solitude, and you tune out the sounds of popping champagne and raucous laughter coming from the second floor, as the patrons undoubtedly banter over which piece to auction off. You hope he keeps them. You’ve never seen someone appreciate art the way that Jungkook does.

You catch sight of a few pieces that you recognize, ones that you remember him showing you when he had finished. You always excitedly told him every single one was a masterpiece, and Jungkook only rolled his eyes and made minimal effort at hiding the blush on his cheeks. Your steps falter when you come across a set of photographs in black and white, set in consecutive frames next to each other and it feels so warm despite the lack of color. Jungkook just had that special talent when it came to photography.

It’s the bookstore. In the city during the impromptu train ride you had coerced him to take. Your heart catches in your throat as you recognize all the other ones immediately because well...you’ve been to all those spots. A familiar pressure builds in the back of your eyes, and you swallow down a whimper of pain.

The urge to leave becomes too strong. But not strong enough to quell the slow burn of curiosity from Professor Sejin. There is a chance that you might not run into Jungkook at all tonight with the vast space and people bumbling through the corridors. It hurts to think that you might never see him again at all, but you’ll allow yourself another indulgence. Something is calling you.

Moon. He titled it Moon? You grip onto your wrist reflexively and run your thumb over the mark, like you did when you were younger and still had hope for soulmates. The pulsepoint there beats under your finger and lets you know how alive you are. Compels you to give into your curiosity, even if it might decimate your already crumbling heart. The stairs that lead up to the second floor are short, but the trek feels like it knocks the wind out of you, or perhaps that was just the anticipation of what was waiting for you on the other side.

You were right to be scared. Because right in the smack dab center of the circular room is where you see it, and your gasp is one that can be heard from each wall and corner.

A painting of you. A portrait from the waist up, with oil paint and so much detail, Jungkook has even managed to line the shallow wrinkles by your eyes when you smile. You have never considered yourself beautiful in any sense but the way he has captured you on canvas starts to make you believe that you truly are. You feel Jungkook in each streak of the brushstroke where he hadn’t spread the color evenly. It is as if the painting is alive, and though you are staring at yourself, it doesn’t feel like the way it does in the mirror. Doesn’t feel like a reflection.

No, this feels like looking through Jungkook’s eyes. It is what he sees in you, rather than what you see in yourself. And what he sees is beautiful. Through the haze of shock and confusion as to why he chose this as the centerpiece, you don’t notice the warm presence that lurks behind you. The one that has watched your every move since you walked into this building.

“Yeah, that’s my favorite one too.”

You whip your head around so quick it nearly gives you whiplash, but the sight of him is the nail in the coffin. Jungkook is cleaned up in a black suit, and an unfamiliar smile on his lips he rarely lets you see. A genuine one that he’s tried to hide so many times but now that it’s clear and up close, you resent him for keeping it from you.

Jungkook is just as gorgeous as the day you lost him.

But looking at him hurts. You don’t know why you’re even here, and why he sent the invitation, or why he was standing in front of you now and there is not a sliver of antipathy in his eyes. You don’t know why your face is plastered in the center of the gallery. Most of all, you don’t know why you are still weak in the knees for Jeon Jungkook.

“Although, I have to say, it was a close race between this one and the pictures I made you take at the lake, when you nearly dunked me in the river because it was so cold”, he breathily laughs but you aren’t able to get through the shock just yet. If Jungkook notices your starstruck state, he doesn’t let it affect him.

“And I definitely have to give some credit to the one I painted after you told me about your dream”, Jungkook prattles on, “where you were a mermaid who planted peaches under the sea, remember? That’s an honorable mention.”

These memories make you want to smile but in this moment, the best you can do is try to hold yourself together when your eyes begin to warm with tears. Jungkook stays silent when you do. He notices you haven’t said a word and your gaze refuses to meet his.

“Why are you doing this, Jungkook?”, you curse yourself when your voice cracks. “Why are you telling me these things? Haven’t you hurt me enough?” Jungkook’s smile drops off his face, and for once, you can see your own pain reflected in his eyes.

He takes a deep breath, hands hanging limply at his side that itch to wrap themselves around yours. To feel your skin. Feel your mark.

“I…”, he hesitates in his words, “I remember that day every night when I go to sleep, Y/N. Every time I shut my eyes, I just see your face when I told you I can’t love you, and I don’t think I’ve ever felt such aching before. Not even when she left me.” Jungkook’s voice is tinted with desperation but it just makes your walls rise higher.

He’s lying to you. Your tongue wants to protest, but he continues.

“I see you in everything”, Jungkook breathes out, like he is also admitting it to himself.

“The paintbrushes I can never put down to the black coffee I force myself to drink nowadays because the ones I actually like, the ones with too much whipped cream and vanilla syrup, just reminds me of you.” His brows are knitted, and his feet vie to step closer to your quivering form. But you look like a caged animal about to bolt at any moment.

“And when I’m reminded of you, I am reminded of…”, he gulps down the fear, “I’m reminded of how I am utterly in love with someone who deserves so much more than what I have put them through.”

The blood that runs through your veins drops to subzero temperatures, and you swear in the split millisecond that you have absorbed what he’s just said, your heart ceases its beating. The world stops turning, and the waves still for a brief moment. You can’t find any words just yet, but Jungkook can see straight through you and your stupefied expression.

“Y-you’re lying to me, Jungkook. Stop lying.”

“I’m not lying, please…” Jungkook knows he’s losing you by the second, but he’s promised you he would persist. He just wants you to listen. Wants you to feel how sorry he is, and how his soul screams to be next to your’s.

“I can’t explain how it happened. Like it was an epiphany. Like someone has been screaming at me and I had been ignoring them, and that someone was my own heart.” Jungkook doesn’t stumble over his words once. He does not stutter because it is the plain white truth.

“Stop, Jungkook.”

“It’s been knocking on the door of my chest and when I finally let it in, it just yells and shouts ‘oh my god, you’re in love’ and then I realized oh my god, i’m in love. In between painting you and convincing myself that soulmates meant nothing to me, I’ve completely and unquestionably fallen in love with you, Y/N.”

Jungkook can’t decipher the look on your face. Something between the lines of disbelief and heartbreak, and it makes him want to split at the seams at the pain he’s put you through. How he’s convinced you you’re impossible to love. He vows to make it right again.

“Jungkook-”

“And you’re wrong, you know. You’re not hard to love. Hell, I was dead set on never loving again and you managed to make me so smitten, I can’t paint or draw a damn thing without including some aspect of you in it.” Jungkook steps back and gestures to all the canvases and photos that hang on the wall.

“Take a look around, Y/N. It’s all you. Every piece.” Once he says it, you finally notice Every piece of art in this room can be traced to you, or a memory you two share. It’s so clear, you don’t know how you missed it before. You feel yourself in the art Jungkook has poured his soul into. Instead of making you feel elated, these words that you’ve been waiting your entire life to hear just ignites the sting.

“Just stop. Please.” It is only a weak whisper through your lips, and he ignores it.

“If you can’t forgive me, I get it Y/N. I can’t forgive myself either. But can you just know that you are enough. You are more than what I deserve. And I know you told me to be happy, but there is no way I can possibly do that without you.”

When your gaze falls to the floor, you notice that his wrist is clean of any bracelets or watches. Come to think of it, this is one of the first times you are seeing it clear and in the flesh. Jungkook doesn’t tell you, but nowadays, he doesn’t allow anything to impede on the sight of the crescent moon.

When your guard is down and you are distracted, he finds the perfect time to finally reach forward and take your hand in his. His touch is gentle when it wraps around your wrist, tugging off the ribbon that circled it, and revealing the matching mark. Your pulse jumps under his fingers, and skips a beat when he runs a thumb over the moon. You are already melting with such simple contact, and you almost allow yourself to succumb. Almost.

It’s as if suddenly his skin was scalding, and you snatch your wrist from his grasp at lightning speed. The tears that have strayed down your face are wiped away as quickly as they came. The surprise on his face is missed by your eyes because before he can comprehend what is happening, you are bolting down the staircase and out the glass doors of the gallery. No, you cannot forgive him yet. What would you do if he hurt you again? You don’t think you would survive.

You ignore the pain of seeing his art pieces as you run, now that you know you are the muse behind them all. The only noise is the sound of blood rushing in your ears, and you are oblivious to the racket of Jungkook’s shoes clapping against marble flooring as he chases after you, expertly dodging the other patrons and butlers holding trays of champagne.

And Jungkook? Well, he is oblivious to the complete turmoil that runs through your every nerve. He only sees your back, and not the way you bite your lip painfully to keep the sobs from escaping. Not the way your pain is exhibited clear as day in the crease of your eyebrow and the wrinkle of your nose.

The air outside is so cold it bites at your nostrils, but makes it easier to breathe. The wind calms the thundering heart in your chest.

He must be lying. There was no way he had a change of heart now, not when he was so rooted in his belief before. There is no virtual possibility, on any plane of existence, on any dimension where Jeon Jungkook has fallen in love with you.

Right?

The hand that circles around your wrist tightly to keep you from getting any farther tells you that you are wrong. He did come after you. Jungkook’s strength forces you to stop running, but you can’t find the courage to turn around and face him just yet. But you don’t make an effort to pull away, and he takes it as progress.

“You can run if you want, Y/N. You can walk away from me and from us, but don’t doubt that I’ll always be chasing after you. For as long as it takes.” He is panting and speaking through heavy breaths, but you hear him. Loud and clear.

“I won’t let you leave again. Not like last time.”

There is no malice. No coldness, and for the first time since you’ve met him, his words feel like warm honey instead of monotone ice. He is utterly distraught when you turn around slowly, hesitant like you’re afraid he will break your heart right then and there.

His heart shatters at the wetness at your waterline, and the way you look up at him; completely vulnerable and scared.

“Do you promise?”

There is a lot of weight in your three-word question. It’s not as innocent as meets the eye, and Jungkook knows it. He feels it. When you ask him if he promises, it is an invitation back to you. You are offering him your heart, which he has already broken and bruised, and trusting him to be careful with it this time around. Jungkook already knows he loves you. And if you let him, he’ll spend the rest of his life making sure this promise remains unbroken.

“I promise.”

It’s a commitment. One he used to be terrified of making, but it seems so easy when it’s for you.

And when you fly forward to wrap your arms around him, Jungkook feels like home. Like the stars twinkle a little brighter and the earth stops spinning for a mere second, just for the two of you. You feel him squeeze you closer, just as tightly, and Jungkook wants to kick himself for depriving you both of a simple thing called love.

You are here, souls and now bodies intertwined, and Jungkook lets the pain of past hurt fall away. Pain is so miniscule when you are by his side. When you pull back, Jungkook frowns at your red-rimmed eyes, and the tears that still persist. He wipes it away oh so softly, as if you were delicate clay and he, a sculptor.

“Please don’t cry anymore, princess, it breaks my heart. I’m so sorry.” It is the softest, most sugary tone you’ve ever heard out of him. But hearing affection from his lips makes you feel that perhaps all of this sorrow, this longing, has been worth it. He has been worth it. He always has.

“I love you, Y/N.” Jungkook’s words are almost as beautiful as he is.

His lips are familiar when you lean forward and kiss him. Yet they are different. This time, the hands on your waist hold you a bit more carefully, even closer if that were possible. You can feel his thudding heart as it beats against your own, learning to match rhythms with each other, and Jungkook cradles your face in his hand like you are the only artwork he has truly been proud of.

And it’s true. All the canvases and paints and camera film seem wasted now. Nothing he ever makes will be quite as alluring as the art he holds in his arms in this moment.

“I love you too, you goddamn idiot.”

You meant it all those months ago, and you mean it now. If Jeon Jungkook was the sun, you would gladly change your name to Icarus. If Jeon Jungkook was the moon, then you are the tides that he pushes and pulls. If Jeon Jungkook belonged to you, well...you don’t have to imagine that anymore. He is your’s, as you are his.

Old habits die hard, but they are not immortal. They wax and wane, and remind you that in the cosmic vastness of things, you are only human. Humans whose hearts beat in tandem and souls made to complete the other. Humans with identical crescent moons, lost but now found.

Old habits die hard. But you have learned to fix those of a broken heart.

☾

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f10werfae · 2 years

Note

chris evans and goth! reader are married and have baby girl together. their baby is never fussy, eats peacefully and rarely cried. one day their baby cried.

Crybaby

Pairing:Husband!Dad!Chris x Gothic!Mom!Reader

Warnings: none really just mega fluff

Summary: Looks like that pregnancy test in the vlog meant something, and sprouted into the cute and loving mini evans, Alice. Follow the adventures of their cute family with quite the image.

Part 1 : A Week in the Life of The Evans

- Requests are open!

Likes, Comments and Re-blogs are appreciated l♥️

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(Y/n's P.O.V)

The best thing about being a family woman? Grocery shopping. I don’t know what it is, but I feel compelled to just be prepared for any and everything. It just so happened that today was one of Chris' day offs, so he ended up being dragged along with Alice and I to the local supermarket.

He walked protectively by the side of the shopping cart, baby Alice sat in his arms happily babbling away to herself. Today I had dressed her up in a Wednesday Addams inspired outfit, her short brunette hair also twisted into two small pigtails due to her not having enough hair yet.

Despite being only 10 months old, she was sweetest girl alive, definitely taking on the best traits of Chris and I. Never crying, and I mean never. Sure she whimpered here and there, but not a single tear would come out. As ironic as it sounds she is our very own angel.

All her baby clothes were complete opposites, Chris choosing somedays to dress her up like a small farmer/football player, whilst I had chosen to dress her up like me with the darker look.

Straight from the get go we had gotten her accustomed to a noisy house, even the first song to get her to sleep was one of my own singles. Even with all this, she had the smile, manners and aura of an angel. Always being a bubble of joy. When she was first born Chris and I were terrified when we didn’t hear a massive lung stretching cry, only to find out that when she was out, she was instead looking around the cold hospital room curiously.

“Babe, our Wednesday Evans has drifted off” Chris laughed quietly, turning around to show Alice passed out with her head on his bicep, her arms hanging by her sides as she breathed softly in his arms.

“Alright let’s get to checkout and get our baby home” I smiled getting out my phone and taking a quick photo before heading for the cash registers with our groceries.

(In the Car)

“Hey beautiful?” Chris called out from the passenger seat, his eyes checking on Alice who was snoozing in the backseat through his mirror every few seconds. She had him wrapped round her tiny little finger.

“Yes my dear lover” I answered rubbing my hand onto his thigh, his hands gripping the steering wheel harder.

“Ay ay stop that, or else you’ll have to finish what ya started”

“Yes sir” I joked putting my hand back onto my lap, my head leaning onto the wall of the car.

“Well I didn’t mean you couldn’t hold my hand gorgeous” He snarked grabbing my hand while at a red light and resting it on his, while using the gearshift.

“Once we get home, do ya think it’s okay if I shave my beard off?”

“You don’t have to ask for permission baby, but why?”

“Well it’s gettin' a bit humid now that it’s summer and I jus wanna let my face breathe a little bit, and I was jus askin you cause I know how much you love it on your lips. Both Sets by the way” He winked, my jaw falling to basically the ground,

“And you kiss your daughter with that mouth? You weirdo”

“Hey you married this weirdo”

“Touché baby”

(Once Home)

“Okay bub i’m going to put Alice on the bed, you can get started” I stated carrying a still sleeping Alice up to our bedroom. Creating a small barricade with four pillows and setting her in the middle of our bed, not a single whimper or sound. Was this girl even real?

Watching Chris get in, I heard the sound of the shower turn on as all my attention focused on Alice. Her cute button nose, along with her soft chubby cheeks. Oh how I wish she stayed like this forever, just our sweet girl.

I didn’t even notice she had woken up when her hands had aimed up to grab onto my dangling pieces of hair.

“Look at you sweet girl, you’ve opened your eyes already? A good nap?” I cooed in a high pitched voice, picking her up and cuddling her against me. She was growing up so quickly.

She pulled out a cute yawn before resting her head back onto my chest, raising her head back up instantly when she hears the bathroom door open. Revealing a newly shaven Chris.

He comes over swiftly laying a soft kiss on my lips, before rubbing over Alice's head when all of a sudden she let out a startling scream.

Tears, whimpers, squeals the whole shebang. The poor thing was inconsolable as she hid in my arms.

“D-did I do something?” Chris asked worriedly sitting down on the edge of the bed beside us, his hand covering the bottom half of his face when suddenly Alice reached her hands out for him.

When she saw his full face again she would turn away and hide.

“She’s never cried like this before, do ya think she’s sick?”

“Honey, Alice has never seen you without a beard. I think she’s just spooked right now, aren’t ya gal?” I said catching onto her behaviour almost instantly.

“Oh baby, it’s still daddy” He whispered rubbing her arm softly, slowly recognising her father’s voice she turned around. Watching as he made funny faces at her and played peek-a-boo. Within minutes it was almost like she had never cried, she was back cuddling into Chris' arms like she never left.

“She’s always going to be our precious Chris, no doubt about it”

#romance #chris evans imagine #chris evans x reader #chris evans fanfiction #chris evans #chris evans oneshot #dad! chris evans

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moved2usagiiboo · 2 years

Text

Chapter 41

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Hot droplets of water hit your skin as you stood in the shower, glass door fogged up from the steam. Just what the hell was going on? It wasn’t too long ago when you were a nobody, not desired by anyone. No friends, no enemies, no love interests— now all of a sudden everything changed, and in a matter of weeks.

The soap suds begin to disappear as the water washes them away, revealing your now clean skin. Turning the handle to the side you sigh— grabbing the towel from the top of the shower, hanging on the door you wrap it around your body.

Using a spare towel found on the ground you wipe the mirror clean of the fog, your face flushes a bit when you see your chest. It looks as if you’ve been mauled by a wild animal— in a way, you did.

Fingertips ghosting over a bite mark that look particularly bad, it stung to touch.

You miss Ran.

You miss your brother.

Your mom.

Your dad.

“I want to go home.” A soft whisper was quickly shut down as you heard knocking on the door.

“All done princess?” Haru asked from the other side of the door.

A lump in your throat became hard to swallow, but you did despite the struggle— “Y-Almost!” You yelled loud enough for him to hear.

“Hurry, I wanna see you.” You looked over to the side of the counter to see a change of clothes— not really. Just another one of his dress shirts.

Great, no pants— at least you have an old pair of boxers. You hope they are unused.

You would like to think he isn’t a bad guy, after all he was your best friend, then you realize— he kidnapped you, touched you in your sleep, not to mention won’t even give you a pair of pants.

But your major flaw has you seeing the best in others, especially those you care about. No matter how hard you try to pretend, how many times you say you like being alone— you don’t, you just don’t know how to talk and make bonds with people. That’s probably why you grew so attached to both Ran and Haru.

As you worked on the top buttons to hide the purple and red bruises that covered your chest and neck you heard to door open. Jolting in surprise you were happy you already button the top.

“Sorry~ You were just taking so long.” He whines as he walks behind you, head held down as he pulls you in by your waist. You can see everything through the mirror, his gaze, your disgusted face. The way his arms clench around your stomach as he nuzzles into your neck.

“I missed you.” It’s barely audible from how deep his face is buried into your neck, as if he’s trying to suffocate himself.

“H-Haru…” A fragile voice calls his name, he loves it.

“Hm?”

“Please let go, I-I need to finish changing….” He looks through the mirror seeing your bare stomach peaking through the shirt. He smiles as his chin rests on your shoulder blade before he stands tall, groin against your back as he works on buttoning them for you.

You try to move his hands, quivering as they touch his. “I can do it.” You look down at his hands slowly doing the buttons.

“Hm? But I’m already doing it?” He finishes one, awfully slow. Now working on another. “Just be a good girl and watch for me.” One hand turns your face to the mirror, forcing you to watch his gaze. Deep blue eyes, you would consider them gorgeous if he wasn’t so deranged.

“Y’know, I had to do this last night too. My pretty baby couldn’t even button herself up properly.” He hums as he finishes another.

“You drugged me.” You weren’t wrong but the way he glared at you made it seem as if you lied. Your body quivers, head heavy as you can feel every second passing by. Time is your number one enemy as of right now.

Finally, he finished. “All done!” He cheered, lips into a large smile as he looks at you through the mirror— “You’re so pretty….” It’s a whisper but you can hear it— don’t let the compliment run to your head, he’s a maniac.

He notices the stiffness in your body, he’s slightly hurt but it’ll take time for you to be comfortable around him. One hand moves gripping right under your chin, you whimper softly at the grip he has on your upper neck. Your neck on full display, your shaken eyes look at his through the mirror and you see just hoe pathetic you look— You shut your eyes, refusing to look at him or yourself. He places three kisses going up your neck before releasing your face.

“Come out when you’re ready~”

You hate every second of this.

“Boss! We couldn’t find anything from northern Tokyo!”

“Nothing on our end either!”

“It’s like the two just— vanished?”

Phones were blowing up with calls and text messages, none were helpful. Anxiously biting his nails stood Ran as he came across another dead end. He gathered all the men and for what? A harsh kick against an unsuspecting trashcan sent the object flying. Ran huffed before smoothing his hair back.

“I know you’re worried, but we’ll find her.” Rindou spoke from his lurking corner.

“How is it possible that she just fucking disappears?” He doesn’t smoke, as a matter of fact he hates the smell of cigarettes but that doesn’t stop him from lighting one anyways.

“Don’t know, but we talked to that red-headed bitch and she didn’t know anything. Matter of fact, she was drunk out of her mind.” Rindou leans against a wall closer to his brother, watching him take deep inhales from his smoke.

“Apparently, her mother cut her off. Daddy’s spoiled girl lost all her money, daddy’s in jail while mama’s off living her best life. Fucked, isn’t it?” Rindou takes one of the cigarettes from Ran’s hand, his brother lights it for him before cooking his eyebrow.

“So?”

“Figured you’d be curious about your plaything.” A scoff from Ran.

“I don’t give a shit about her, only thing I care about is finding Y/n. Everyone else can burn in hell for all I care.” Pulling his cigarette out his mouth before flicking it onto the ground, crushing it under his dress shoe. The familiar vibration and sound rings from Ran’s phone. He holds up his finger, “one second” to Rindou as he answers his call.

“Gin?” Was all Rindou hears before his brother walked off, he took another drag of his cigarette liking the way the flames burnt through the stick.

“Boss!” Rindou hummed as he heard his title being called.

“We found something!” The man runs up to the brothers holding a phone in his hand. “Does this belong to Mr. Sanzu?”

A red iphone with a phone charm attached to the bottom, a duck. It’s definitely Sanzu’s.

“Good work, where’d you find it?” Rindou grabs the phone, inspecting it. So that’s why he didn’t answer his phone.

“Over on some street not far away from the frat house.”

“Hm, do me a favor—” The subordinate eyes gleamed at the idea of helping out his boss, “Don’t tell anyone what you’ve found.” The subordinate’s gleamed died down instantly.

“B-But why?” He questioned. Shouldn’t Ran know about this? He bit his lip at the command from his boss.

“I need to check something… Don’t worry, I’ll tell Ran after.” He put a hand on his shoulder, squeezing it tightly. “You aren’t questioning my orders, are you?”

He shook his head no in fear, shoulder burning from the grip.

“Good, now go meet up with Kakucho’s team.” His hand let go of the man’s shoulder, he grimaced in pain— he thought his shoulder was going to be crushed. He bowed to Rindou before scurrying off.

Staring at Sanzu’s phone he felt as if he should pray; “Please don’t let my suspicions be correct, if so— Sanzu will need a lot more than God to protect him.” He thought as he went to unlock his phone.

64539, Mikey.

💞 Taglist babes 💞

@beidouluvr @axlongchamp @rinrinfoxy @konigasaki @yeehawnana @bontensucker @q-the-rockaholic @paulmccartneysleftasscheek @st4rryhae @m4yam0 @kusuinko @ikissbaal @haitanihime @bajitorasprincess @lagrimasdeglitter @snowyseungs @bontensbabygirl @piracyandatiny @kris-1 @tirzamisu @averageslt @haitanis-sugarbaby @graceb4boys @justanotherantisocialteenager99 @kawasbaby @minimalisticstyle @hayami-17 @azzy-ar @gulfkfl @talakaissi @asra-x @ihateuguys @queen-flower @wack0-genius @halcyondaisy @crybabylisa @loonashadow @bxnten @soushswag @sugusshi @hiidenchihu @rindous-wife @moontofuu @chosoisbaby @roscdust @icrytoopracom @denkis-slut @rizakari @red-clouds (Let me know if I didn't tag you! If you were removed from the taglist, I couldn't tag you. My apologies.)

Psst- This story belongs to me please do not post anywhere else without permission first. That's illegal ⚖️ Reposts are okay

Long kidnapping arc wins 😩

Don't worry, it won't be like 10 chapters long— Maybe like 1-3 more 💞

I'm sorry if I'm late with replying to asks and comments. My dumbass just either forgets or .. falls asleep 🚪🚶

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