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amphxtrite · 3 years

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spencer reid x reader

chapter 2 • coffee or tea?

series summary: a new case brings the BAU to New York, investigating a string of murders involving girls who appear very similar. The unsub is relentless, desperate to fill the needs of his fantasy. In the midst of it, spencer meets the girl he been writing with, but had yet to see, prompting a love to blossom in the midst of the storm. Is disaster inevitable? Or will the duplicator’s rein fall?

warnings: mentions of kidnapping, murder, mainly fluff this chapter

chapter summary: the investigation continues, but the team is in dire need of rest after a late night of work. Spencer makes a call to the reader and a plan is put in place to meet, the only question Spencer will have to answer today is a simple one, coffee or tea?

taglist: @le-weasley-simp @thatsonezesty13 @paperandplasma @padsfirewhisky @clubfairy @kiramdd @peach-cliquee @goldeng1rl8 (message/comment to be added)

word count: 5.7k

“Hotch here.” The unit chief’s voice states, raising his cell to his ear.

“Hey Hotch, this guy’s a romantic, he’s leaving roses and quotes from books at the scenes, we’ve found two already.” Rossi’s voice sounds through the phone.

“Roses? You don’t think-”

“Yeah I do, he’s keeping them to try and make them fall in love with him.” Rossi sighs.

“But he’s angry, can’t handle the rejection for long.” Hotch finishes, nodding to himself. “Thanks Rossi, if you find anything else let me know.” He chimes, hanging up the phone and going to find JJ.

“Agent Hotchner!” A voice calls to the profiler, prompting him to turn.

“Yes that’s me.” He responds.

“Sorry, I’m Detective Dakota Trent, I’m also working on the case with Detective Kimathi, she’s just at the crime scene.” A brunette with close cropped hair greets the agent, shaking his hand.

“Good, have we come up with anything new yet?” Hotch asks, following Detective Trent to the interrogation rooms.

“Well we’ve talked to both Olivia’s fiancee and Georgia’s boyfriend. They’ve both got solid alibis and people to back up their claims, it’s not them.” Detective Trent shrugs.

“Have you heard about the roses yet?” Hotch questions, examining each of every person’s movements behind the glass.

“Yeah, Kimathi called me just before I found you, we’ve got a romantic serial killer?” They ask.

“What he’s experiencing probably isn’t love, it’d be impossible for him to feel it. My guess is this is an obsession over someone he’s lost or been rejected by.” Hotch explains. Detective Tent nods and points to another direction.

“Agent Jareau just finished interviewing Georgia’s family, you can find her through there.” They smile, Hotch thanks them and steps through.

The unit chief walks down a hallway and peers past each door until he finds the blonde sitting in an empty room; going over the case file again.

“How are the families?” Hotch asks, stepping in.

“Torn apart.” JJ sighs, closing the file and leaning against the wall behind her. “Olivia’s mom just had enough in her to clear Alice, then she broke down into tears. Isabelle’s parents had it worse though; she was an only child, a miracle one too, her mother had troubles conceiving.” She continues.

“And Georgia’s parents.” Hotch questions.

“Tried to be strong, but-” JJ pauses. “They could barely look at each other, let alone me.” She concludes sadly.

“Have any of them given any possible suspects?”

“Lots, mainly ‘strange’ ex boyfriends, but I had Garcia check them out and they’re clean.” The blonde shrugs, standing and following Hotch back out.

“They’ve given us a room to set up in, When Spencer gets back I want you to help him come up with a geographic profile.” Hotch nods, opening a door to a room filled with whiteboards and a large table.

“You got it, and maybe ask them to bring a coffee machine in, we’re gonna be up for a while.” JJ giggles, opening the case file again and placing the pictures of each scene up on the whiteboard.

“Hey we’re back from the ME, toxicology found ketamine in both victim one and two.” Prentiss states, opening the door to the board room with Spencer in tow.

“But not victim number three, does that mean he’s devolving?” JJ questions.

“Or she was a victim of opportunity, he couldn’t pass up the chance so he took her.” Spencer includes, shrugging his shoulders, and taking a seat next to JJ after seeing the map in front of her.

“Again it’s hard to know, but Morgan and Rossi found flowers at two of the dump sites so far.” Hotch tells Prentiss and Reid.

“Flowers?” Emily asks.

“A note too, some quotes about finding true love, we’re hoping you could help us with them kid.” Rossi suddenly chimes from behind the group, seeming disgusted at the thought of it. “We found the third one by the way, hidden in some bushes by the bridge.”

“What did the cards say, Rossi?” Spencer questions, removing his gaze from the map.

“The first one said ‘I’ve never had a moment’s doubt. I love you. I believe in you completely. You are my dearest one. My reason for life.’ Second one said ‘He stepped down, trying not to look long at her, as if she were the sun, yet he saw her, like the sun, even without looking.’ Third one said ‘Do I love you? My god, if your love were a grain of sand, mine would be a universe of beaches.” Rossi lists reading off his tablet.

“All of those have to do with love alright, this unsub is absolutely infatuated with the idea of finding his true love.” JJ notes, looking at her own tablet.

“Maybe this unsub has some form of erotomania? Thinking all these girls love him, so he kidnaps them only for them to ruin his fantasy?” Derek suggests, fiddling with a pen in his hands.

“It would make sense why he’s keeping the girls only to kill them, and why they’re fed while he’s holding them.” Prentiss adds, looking to Spencer who looks deep in thought..

“Well now that we know more let’s get to work, we’ll deliver the profile in the morning so every officer can hear.” Hotch states, glancing out the window at the sky which had faded to an eerie black.

“I’ve got it!” Spencer suddenly exclaims. The team looks to him curiously.

“The first quote was from Atonement by Ian McEwan, the second quote was from Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy, and the last one was from The Princess Bride by William Goldman!” He explains, standing from his seat and writing each quote on the whiteboard.

“These are all famous quotes about love, some of my favourite books too. This unsub is educated, definitely enough to read classic literature-”

“Wait Spence, the other two I can get, but you’ve read The Princess Bride?” JJ asks, excitement lacing her tone.

“Um yes, I saw it at the library so I decided I’d read it.” Spencer murmurs, turning to the whiteboard again to hide the hitch in his voice. The truth was it was another book you had practically begged him to read, he couldn’t say no. Spencer would have never guessed it would have aided him in a case.

“Oh Spence, I love that book too, you should come over and watch the movie with me and Henry, I’ve been meaning to show him.” JJ continues.

Spencer sighs in relief. “Yeah that sounds good JJ.”

---

“You’ve got to be joking.” A tired voice chimes from outside the door.

Hotch glances up at the voice, JJ inhales deeply as she wakes up, Prentiss and Spencer both take long sips from their coffee cups and Derek snores in his seat.

“Can we help you Detective Trent?” Hotch asks, turning to face them. Dakota doesn’t miss the dark bags under the unit chief’s eyes.

“Yes as a matter of fact, go to sleep!” Dakota smiles in a sickly sweet manner.

“I don’t think-”

“They’re right Hotch, you know we aren’t much help dead tired.” Rossi practically pleads.

“I could use some solid food too.” Emily adds, swirling around what remained of her fourth cup of coffee that night.

“You guys have a hotel for a reason, pretty much every other officer is either patrolling or at home, get some rest and we’ll see you in the morning.” Dakota smirks, waving the team off and heading towards the exit.

Hotch sighs and rubs his eyelids, feeling the relief of closing them before opening them again.

“Derek, Derek wake up!” JJ mutters, tapping on Morgan’s shoulder until he finally slumps forward, awake.

“Is it morning yet?” He grumbles.

“No, but we’re heading to the hotel now, and getting food.” JJ smiles, watching Derek perk up at the mention of something to eat. “What’s everyone in the mood for?” She asks, turning to everyone.

“M’ good with anything.” Rossi yawns, leaning against the door frame.

“There’s a shawarma place close to the hotel?” Spencer proposes, jabbing his thumb in the direction of the joint.

The team nods in agreement, shaking the tiredness off to walk back to the hotel.

Spencer enjoyed moments like this, when his team didn’t have to focus on a case for just a few moments, where he could let his mind rest for a minute.

“Hey player, meet any lovely New York ladies yet?” Derek chuckles throwing his arm over Spencer’s shoulder.

Scratch that, this is not what he had in mind.

“Nope.” He responds plainly.

“Right, right… What about that lady you’ve been writing too?” Derek teases, watching Spencer avert his gaze to the sky.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He murmurs. Derek’s smile grows.

“A mystery woman, Spencer I didn’t think you had it in you? Is she older? Rich maybe?” Derek lists playfully as Spencer rolls his eyes.

“Sorry Derek, maybe you’re just thinking too much.” Spencer shrugs, digging his hands into his pockets and sighing.

“Alright, I’ll back off.” Derek sighs, lifting his hands in mock surrender, only half telling the truth.

“Take a left here.” Spencer nods, pointing to a dimly lit building. “The shop is down there.” Spencer nods.

“I’ll go with the genius, you guys head back to the hotel.” Derek says, waving off the tired agents as he pushes Spencer forward towards the store.

“Hey Morgan, do you mind if I call Garcia, I’ll meet you inside.” Spencer smiles as they reach their destination.

Derek thinks nothing of it and nods, turning to swing open the door and order.

Spencer sighs and glances to both sides before turning and walking in the direction of the payphone. He had chosen this spot not only for convenience sake, but because there was a payphone right outside. It had been a while since Spencer had heard from you, and he felt bad not being able to read your letters.

Taking a deep breath he steps into the phone booth and dials your number.

“Thank you for subscribing to Lynn’s cat shop. Would you like to hear a fact about cat paws?” Your distinct voice chimes from the other end of the line.

“Well I do already know quite a bit, but hit me.” Spencer jokes back, smiling when he hears your audible gasp.

“Dr. Reid!” You laugh, sitting up straight from your lying position in bed.

“Hey what happened to cat facts?” Spencer teases gently, leaning against the side of the booth.

“I thought it was a spam call!” You justify, looking at the number again. “Hey Doc, this is a New York number-” You say slowly, putting two and two together. “You’re here! Are you on a case?”

“Yes actually.” Spencer replies with a soft smile.

“Is it about that ‘duplicator’ guy I’m seeing on the news?”

“Yes, but don’t worry we’re doing well with the profile, and he’s only killing people that fit his victimology.” Spencer reassures you.

You remain quiet for a moment.

“Y/n? Are you still there?” Spencer asks, eyebrows drawing together at your sudden silence.

“Oh yeah, s-sorry Doc. Hey if you’re up for it, we could- meet up?” You ask, turning the conversation and popping the ‘p.’

“O-Oh.” Spencer stammers, caught off guard by your sudden proposition. “I-I mean I do have to work on the case…” Spencer sighs.

“But?” You plead, leaning into your phone.

“I can meet you earlier? Six am maybe?” Spencer offers quietly, feeling his voice break.

“Ooh you’re pushing it Doctor Reid, but I’ll manage.” You tease.

“Great! Great, um where do you want to meet?” Spencer asks, relief showing through his voice.

“There’s a park beside campus, my favourite spot is the field beside the cafe.” You smirk, dropping a not-so subtle hint.

“I-I’ll be there! Yeah See you then!” Spencer mutters in an excited tone.

“Sounds like a plan. Bye Spence!” You say in a sing-song voice before hanging up.

There it was again, Spence. No matter how many times he’s heard his name before, there was something special about you saying his name. Something that made him feel good.

“Spence…” He murmurs to himself, hanging the phone up and walking into the shawarma shop.

“Bout time pretty boy, what were you even calling about.” Derek asks, as he takes a bite from his wrap.

“Just checking if forensic found anything on the flowers yet.” Reid lies coolly.

“Anything?” Derek says in a muffled voice, throwing a wrap to the brunette.

“Not yet.” Spencer says in a slight yelp, just catching it before it falls.

“Oh well, it’ll probably be there in the morning.” Derek shrugs, picking up the bagged wraps. “Thanks again.” Derek waves to the owner before exiting the store.

“Did you know the origin of the word shawarma comes from the Turkish word çevirme, which means ‘turning’ which makes sense because of the-”

“Just enjoy the food pretty boy, just enjoy it.” Derek sighs, pushing the Shawarma up against Spencer’s mouth.

“Mm-” The younger agent protests, pushing his face back and snatching his shawarma back.

“Hurry up genius, the team is waiting.” Derek laughs.

The brunette rolls his eyes and shakes his head, but speeds up his walk beside his friend anyways.

---

Spencer wakes up to the sound of an alarm in his ear and without skipping a beat he sits up and throws his covers off, careful not to wake Derek sleeping in the bed next to him.

Slowly, he picks up his bag and tip toes to the bathroom, glancing at his watch, the time reads 5:00 am, still dark out. Spencer nods to himself.

Pulling on a white collared shirt and a black- no, black was too formal. Maybe red instead? No, this isn’t a date… “Blue.” Spencer murmurs, placing the tie around his neck and tying it slowly, being sure not to mess up. “Hi I’m Doc- no wait, hi I’m Spencer.” The brunette murmurs to himself as he ties his shoes. Spencer curses himself for only bringing converses and striped socks, but his jeans covered most of it to his relief.

“Hi I’m Spencer-”

“Spence, who are you talking to this early in the morning?” Derek’s drowsy voice groans from his spot in bed.

“I’m heading out early, I’ll see you later Morgan!” Spencer calls, pulling on his jacket to fend off the cool November air and swinging his bag over his shoulder so he could head back to the police department afterwards.

Stepping off the elevator, the hotel was practically empty, Spencer sighs in relief, he must have looked like a psycho constantly fixing his hair and tie.

He exits the front door into the windy New York outdoors, suddenly regretting not wearing his scarf, but regardless, pushing on.

tousled brown hair swaying in the wind, Spencer checks himself in the glass of a building beside him, licking his chapped lips and swiveling his head back to the pavement ahead of him, careful not to bump into anyone.

Taking another turn, Spencer sees the sign for your university campus and feels his heart begin to race.

All of his thoughts began to jumble. What was his name again? Where was he going? A sudden squawk from a crow brings him back to himself, but his hot face and racing heart were impossible to shake.

As he grows closer to the coffee shop you mentioned to him, he begins to stumble, his feet beginning to fail him. He’s able to play it off as a funny walk, but when he spots the coffee shop, and beside it, the field. He completely stops.

A man grunts behind him, cursing at Spencer before turning and walking around him.

“Sorry.” Spencer murmurs, walking to the side of the pavement before crossing the street quickly.

Glancing down at his wrist again, his watch reads 5:45. Great, now he just had to sit and wait-

“What?”

Spencer’s thoughts are cut short when his vision is cut off by something...warm. Hands.

“Love is our true destiny. We do not find the meaning of life by ourselves alone-” A sweet voice whispers in his ear.

The melodic voice from across the phone, it was you!

“W-We find it with another.” He stammers out, smiling as he hears your laughter.

“Doctor Spencer Reid, finally we meet.” You sigh, removing your hands from his face and dropping them at your sides.

“Y-Y/n-” Spencer says, turning to face you.

He freezes for a moment as his eyes adjust to the light again. Then his jaw drops.

“Y-You’re…” Spencer’s eyes follow your y/h/c hair, jawline, eye shape and height.

“No, no, no, no.” Spencer murmurs, glancing from side to side, overanalyzing every single person in your vicinity.

This was impossible. So, so impossible, yet there you were. Your description matched those girls perfectly, yet here you were out in the open talking to him. You weren’t safe.

“I-I know Doc, but it’s okay, I’ve got my pepper spray and everything!” You reassure Spencer, squeezing his hand gently.

“Y/n, y-you fit this unsub’s type, you can’t just be out here like this it’s not safe!” Spencer snaps, pulling his jacket off by the sleeves and swinging it over your head to hide you.

Your eyes widen and Spencer’s stomach fills with dread.

“I-I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have yelled. I just want you to be safe.” Spencer explains, lowering his voice and leaning closer to you.

“It’s alright Spence. I knew the risk, but I just wanted to see you.” You mutter, crossing your arms and sighing.

“Hey, you- you finished Love and Living.” Spencer smiles softly, remembering the quote you whispered to him when you covered his eyes.

“Yeah, it just kind of stuck with me. Thomas Merton can really write.” You smirk, nodding your head a little.

“Well I certainly prefer him over J.C?” Spencer asks, sarcastically tilting his chin.

“J.K, but you already knew that.” You laugh, rolling your eyes.

“I did?” Spencer jokes, eyes widening when he finally realizes how close the two of you are to each other, his eyes shyly draw downwards.

“Ahem?” You smirk. “Eyes up here Doc.”

“O-Oh it’s not like that, I swear.” Spencer rushes, quickly looking back up in panic.

“Hey Spence! I’m just teasing, it’s alright.” You stammer in a hushed tone, gently moving your hands to cup Spencer’s face as reassurance.

The hits just kept coming today. Spencer internally trembles, but nods, darting his tongue out again to hide his quivering lip.

“Hey, since we’re both just standing here, do you want to grab something to eat?” You shrug, awkwardly retreating your hands to your chest.

There it was again, the sound of his name on your voice.

“C-Coffee?” Spencer sputters. “How about coffee?” Spencer repeats, clearing his voice and moving his hands from your shoulders to his sides.

“Yeah, coffee sounds great Doc.” You nod, taking Spencer’s hand and pulling him forwards.

“I’ve been going to this place since my first year here, amazing coffee, tea, and even seasonal sodas.” You gush, squeezing his hand and opening the door to the local shop.

“Any idea of what you want to order?” You ask, turning to face the brunette and shifting his jacket from your head to your arms.

“Uh, regular coffee is fine?” Spencer’s voice comes out almost as a question, he feels himself growing timid at the size of the menu.

“I’ll tell Choi ssi to surprise you.”

Spencer nods, his lips pulling up into a line.

“Ah if it isn’t my favourite little boba pearl, what can I get for you today?” A man in his late forties calls to you with a smile. “And who might this be?” Mr. Choi motions to Spencer.

“Choi ssi, I’d like you to meet my Doc.” You smile. Spencer feels his face heat up at ‘my’

“I-I’m Dr. Spencer Reid.” He explains, nodding to the man behind the counter.

“I’m Viktor Choi, and Doctor? Wow, how old are you kid?” Mr. Choi questions in slight awe.

“Twenty five.” Spencer answers plainly, shrugging his shoulders.

Viktor’s jaw drops.

“Yeah I get that a lot, are we gonna order now?” Spencer blurts, turning back to you.

“Yeah of course. I’ll have my boba, and Doc-” You pause, tapping Spencer on the chest. “Would like to be surprised.” You smirk.

“Oh adventurous.” Choi smirks back to you, raising his eyebrows. You nod.

Spencer’s eyebrows furrow, feeling something strange was awaiting him.

“Oh you’ll love it!” You smile, placing a paper bill on the counter and pulling Spencer towards a table.

From the shake of Mr. Choi’s head and your small smirk, Spencer made an educated guess you gave him more than what was expected.

“Here.” You point to an empty table beside one of the large windows that wrapped around the shop.

“A window seat.” Spencer smirks, sitting in the chair across from you.

“What, you have a profiler fact for me?” You tease.

“Well, people who prefer window seats are more selfish and easily irritable.” Spencer shrugs feeling his smile widen.

“Hey I just like to feel the sun.” You protest, looking out into the busy traffic not too far from you.

“I see.” Spencer smirks, glancing over to see you gazing into the sunlight.

Spencer is caught off guard at first, beauty isn’t usually a thing he notices, but it would be impossible for him not to admire you.

Your e/c eyes seemed to glow in the sunrise, your hair shined and your smile grew and seemed to shine brighter than the sun could ever be, figuratively though, obviously.

Strange, Spencer felt his hands clam up and heart began to race again.

“Order for miss boba and her doc!” Mr. Choi calls, drawing both yours and Spencer’s attention.

“You seemed like a coffee kind of guy.” He shrugs as you bring the two drinks back to your table.

Spencer smiles in acknowledgement before looking down at what looked to be a simple coffee with a rim of milk foam and- Spencer furrows his eyebrows, chocolate shavings.

“Don’t be deceived, his coffee packs a punch.” You smirk, stirring your drink with the straw poking out of it.

“Good.” Spencer nods, drawing a laugh from you, as he lifts the mug to his lips and blows on the hot liquid, finally getting a taste.

The first thing that hits Spencer is the sweetness, just the right amount that made him smile as he drank it. The next was how rich it is, practically gliding over his tongue like melted chocolate, of course just not as viscous.

You must have noticed a change in his demeanor because you begin to giggle to yourself.

You couldn’t help it, the look on Spencer’s face was too good not to notice.

His eyes widened, brows raised to his hairline and he tilted the cup higher in an instant to get more.

“Adorable.” You sigh to yourself, not realizing you had said it out loud until Spencer suddenly chokes on his drink.

“Oh my god, Spence are you alright?” You worry, holding a napkin to his chin as drops of coffee spill past his lips.

The brunette nods, bringing the drink back down onto the table to see he had already drunken half of it.

“It’s good right?” You grin, pulling the napkin away but not moving back just yet.

Spencer nods, already feeling a buzz, but unsure if it was from the coffee or your sudden proximity, or you calling him adorable.

His ears felt as though they were burning, and this time he couldn’t blame the coffee.

Timidly glancing up, it seemed as though you could say the same for your cheeks.

Spencer lifts his mug up again to take another sip of his beverage, clearing his throat a bit before speaking again.

“I-If it makes you feel any better, I find you rather endearing, myself.” Spencer says just above a whisper, too nervous to look you back in the eye.

“Thank you Spencer.” You smile, feeling a rush of warmth in your chest and in your face.

Without thinking you look up and tilt Spencer’s chin back up to face you. His eyes read amazement and sheepishness, prompting a giggle from you.

Usually Spencer would have pushed the hand touching him away, ready to list facts about germs to make sure no one in the general vicinity would try that again. But there was something about his racing heart and your gentle hands that smelt of lavender, that made it impossible for any words to come out at all, he barely wanted to move.

“Hey Doc, do you feel like going for a walk?” You ask, stroking your thumb down Spencer’s cheek to catch his attention again.

“Yeah, yeah a walk.” Spencer glances down at his watch, 6:24.

“I have to be back at the station for seven, but I can walk you back to your dorm?” Spencer offers, half suggesting it just to make sure you got back safely.

“What a gentleman.” You smirk standing and prompting Spencer to follow you. “You can drop the cup off at the counter over there.” You say, Spencer nods, standing and placing the mug at the counter for an employee to sweep it away in seconds.

“Now come on, we’ve still got time for me to give you a little tour.” You grin, putting a bit too much emphasis on little.

To the profiler’s surprise, you take his hand into yours as you wave goodbye to Mr. Choi.

“Bye my little boba pearl and Dr. Boyfriend!” He shouts out to you and Spencer as you exit the door. Spencer doesn’t even have time to sputter out a correction before you’re pulling him towards your campus.

“Isn’t he the best! He and his husband have been running that place for years, the best coffee in the city if you ask me.” You chuckle, slowing your speed to a steady walk beside Spencer.

“Yeah, we should go again sometimes.” Spencer shrugs, finally closing his hands around yours, growing accustomed to the feeling.

“D-Did you know that multiple studies, including one conducted at the University of California Los Angeles, show that human touch triggers the release of oxytocin, in our brain. Oxytocin is-”

“A neurotransmitter that increases feelings of trust, generosity and compassion, and decreases feelings of fear and anxiety, aka the love hormone.” You finish, smiling up at him reassuringly.

You knew Spencer began listing off random facts when he felt he’d made an atmosphere awkward. You’d started noticing these cues once the two of you began talking on the phone, so you made sure to ensure everything was fine to him.

“Yeah, t-that’s the one.” Spencer mutters.

The brunette was always cut off while he tried to explain a statistic or fact. He knew it was never to hurt him in any way, but it still got frustrating for him when he was talked over.

When you cut him off on the other hand, it is to finish his sentence and complete the fact. He was starting to see why so many people found this gesture romantic.

Your smile grows as you notice Spencer’s eyes downcast on your hands.

Rounding the corner deeper into your campus, you stop at a couple spots to tell Spencer more about your school life and how your studies were going.

“I can’t believe I’m really graduating this year.” You sigh dreamily, looking up into the sky.

“Do you have any ideas where you may want to work?” Spencer asks as you lead him to a fountain in the centre of a field.

“Well, not exactly, but I’ve still got time to decide.” You grin, digging into your pocket for something Spencer couldn’t see.

“You know the BAU will always be an option.” Spencer shrugs, watching you pull out a shiny quarter.

“I dunno doc. All that stuff might not be for me.” You sigh, closing your eyes for a moment before flipping the coin into the water of the fountain.

“Yeah I guess serial killers and psychopaths aren’t everyone's cup of tea.” Spencer says seriously, causing you to break out in a fit of giggles.

“Do you believe in wishes coming true Spence?” You continue laughing, pulling Spencer in the direction of your dorm.

Spencer’s head snaps up at his name, but his eyebrows furrow.

“Well the act of throwing valuables into water hasn’t always been for wishing, it used to be for worshipping gods and other deities, but as the years went by it became popularized to wish for things by throwing something of value into the basic fundamental of human life.” Spencer pauses looking to you apologetically.

“It’s okay Spence, I’m listening.” You smile.

“Oh okay- First used to honour gods, people began asking for favours such as a good harvest or for a loved one to get well from a sickness which is where wishing wells came from.” Spencer nods, squeezing your hand as a silent ‘thank you.’

“So to answer my question-” You draw on, looking curiously into Spencer’s hazel eyes.

“While there’s no sound science to prove anything, I don’t see why people can’t have something to believe in, as long as they understand if it doesn’t come true.” Spencer shrugs, stopping when you do, outside a large building.

“So I’ll take that as a yes, but.” You smirk.

“I suppose, besides sometimes the wishes do come true out of pure coincidence, but you can never say that.” Spencer shrugs.

“It sounds like you speak from experience.” You laugh, nudging him in the side.

“My friend Penelope wished I’d get my haircut, but didn’t tell me until I did, three months later.” Spencer chuckles.

Both of you knew you were supposed to say goodbye now, if you remained just standing there any longer you’d become a problem for sleep-deprived students. Not a good mix.

But neither of you could find the will to move, your hands stayed interlocked and your smiles remained as Spencer began talking more about a couple books and some more facts about wishing wells.

“Y/n?” A loud voice calls to you from afar. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you!” The voice chimes again, slowly getting closer.

“Oh I’m sorry Adira, I was meaning to tell you.” You apologize, letting go of Spencer’s hand to turn around and speak to the person calling you.

For a minute Spencer forgot how to function his hand, he just sort of hovered it in the air for a second, before regaining his train of thought and dropping his hand back to his side and turning.

“I’ve been worried sick y/n, you haven’t been answering your phone and with that ‘duplicator’ guy running around-” Adira begins, cutting off to wrap her arms around you. “Don’t do that again, please.”

“Alright, I’m sorry Adira, but I had a friend with me, see.” You smile, turning her to face Spencer.

“Hello.” Spencer greets awkwardly, placing his hands into his pockets and nodding.

“Wait he sounds just like-” Adira pauses. “That’s Doc?” They pause, jaw dropping as she begins tugging on your sleeve.

“Yes- that’s him.” You smile, tapping on her hand to try and get her to stop before your face overheats.

“Okay okay!” Adira laughs, rolling her eyes as she fixes her headscarf and extends her hand.

“Nice to finally meet you, y/n has not stopped talking about you since you started writing to each other-”

“Adira!” You intervene, bringing your hand to your face to hide your blush.

“Wow you’re even cuter than the photo-”

“Okay, we still have that project to work on right, let’s go.” You laugh nervously, pushing Adira towards the door of your dorm room as she remembers something.

“Oh right, I’ve been meaning to ask you about that.”

“Perfect, we’ll finish it up when we get inside.” You smile.

“Nice jacket by the way, where’d you get it?” Adira comments, poking the black suit jacket on your arm, and then back again at Spencer standing in a collared shirt and tie.

“Y/n!” She laughs teasingly, turning around and grabbing a hold of your shoulders.

“I’ll head in on my own, now have fun, but not too much fun.” She smirks, pushing you back towards Spencer before walking into the building and throwing you a wink.

“I-I’m-”

“There’s no need to apologize, I’m rather flattered you talk about me.” Spencer shrugs, looking down at the ground subtly.

“Well of course I do, you’ve become a big part of my life y’know.” You smile, taking Spencer’s large hands into yours.

Spencer smiles fondly, hiding the internal regret he held, the profiler had yet to tell any of his friends about you, wanting to have this one thing for himself in his twisted world.

Squeezing your hands, Spencer nods and glances down at his watch.

“I should get back to the station.” The brunette murmurs.

“You should get back to the station.” You reply, loosening your grip only for Spencer to pull you back.

“I-I’m happy I got to meet you by the way, please call me if you need anything, or just to talk.” Spencer pushes his lips back in a forced smile, he was reluctant to leave you alone.

“I will Spence. Catch that guy for me alright?” You smirk, wrapping Spencer in a short hug before shrugging off his jacket, placing it over Spencer’s shoulders and turning to finally walk into the building.

Spencer barely had time to react to your gesture, but while he processed it, he simply stood there. It was as though you had left an imprint of yourself on him, a reminder you were real, and really held him. He was truly awestruck.

His suit jacket held the faintest scent of your perfume, the feeling of your arms lingered on his torso and his hands still reached for yours though you were long gone.

This feeling was foreign to the brunette, but not rejected. Spencer quite enjoyed it after all.

After a few moments of not moving the brunette finally picks up his feet and turns to leave, not noticing the figure not too far away clenching his fists so hard, blood begins to trickle slowly out.

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid x reader series #spencer reid x you #spencer read x y/n #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid fanfiction #criminal minds #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds x reader #criminal minds series #criminal minds x reader series

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ggyutea · 4 years

Text

into the aether // jjk [CHAPTER ONE]

pairing: agent!jungkook x agent!reader

genre: not-so-secret organization au, rivals to lovers au, sci-fi, action, slow burn, mutual pining, future mystery 👀, eventual fluff, eventual smut (probably), teeny bit of future angst

word count: 4.4k

summary: As a rookie member of an organization that deals in investigating and neutralizing paranormal and extraterrestrial threats, you get assigned to your very first case with Jeon Jungkook as your partner, a former classmate you’ve never been too fond of. But what happens when your supposed low-tier rookie case begins to unravel into something more serious than anyone anticipated? And, more importantly, how do you come to terms with your growing feelings for Jungkook?

contents: jungkook being a little shit, y/n is a bisexual disaster, the tension is real honestly, female!namjoon, long haired Kook, mild info-dumping for context

warnings: mild cursing

a/n: behold, my first posted fic! i have absolutely no idea how long this series will be but i’m super excited about it!! i hope anyone who happens to come across this enjoys it :))

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The agency-issued suit is surprisingly comfortable. Form-fitting without being tight, the dress slacks and jacket cling softly to your body as you adjust your badge before entering your new workplace. Taking a deep breath as you push open the double doors of the Aether Headquarters, you are greeted by the sight of many bustling individuals, all dressed in suits identical to the one currently adorning your body. A potent mix of excitement and nerves light up your veins as you take in the sight, the moment almost surreal.

Your heels click across the linoleum floor as you begin to make your way through the massive atrium to the semi-circular elevator. You check and double check your badge for your assignment details, noting in relief when you realize that you haven’t already forgotten them. Floor 7, Division S01. Floor 7, Division S01, you repeat over and over again, a mantra of sorts. Beginning at a brisk pace, you inevitably slow as you take in the sights of the cavernous space. Massive glass windows stretch high towards the ceiling on every wall, letting in beams of early morning sunlight that cast a warm glow over everything they touch. Two large LED screens are affixed on either side of the main elevator across the way, one showcasing a map of the city, the other a map of the country, with all of the paranormal and extraterrestrial hotspots highlighted in bright red pulsing circles. A small cafe sits nestled in a corner to your left, baristas rushing around frantically in the midst of the morning rush. A circular desk occupies the center of the room, currently manned by two individuals as they supervise the row of turnstile doors on either side. Agents stand lined up in front of the doors, some impatiently checking their watches as they wait for the people in front of them to swipe in, others leisurely sipping their coffee.

You’re reminded that in your haste this morning, you forgot to make yourself coffee, so before you join the agents at the doors, you cheerily purchase your own steaming cup of liquid energy. You’re not sure if you really need it, with all of the adrenaline rushing through your system, but you figure it can’t hurt. Sure enough, the warmth of the drink floods your body with a sense of ease, and you can’t help the smile that overtakes your face as you swipe your badge, watching the light on the console turn green as an automated voice says, “Welcome, Agent Y/n.” Continuing your path towards the elevator, you note with glee an approaching directory indicating that the library and research facilities are to your right, with the short-term containment facilities lying to your left. Of course, you have learned about all of this in your four years of training, but learning about the immensity of the resources available in the Aether Headquarters and actually seeing them and experiencing them are two completely different things. You make a mental note to check out the library before the day is over as you enter an elevator car with several other agents.

The electricity in your veins feels nearly tangible as you ascend to your dream. You note with an amused quirk of your lips that your internal energy seems a stark contrast to the yawns and sleepy gazes of the rest of the elevator. The 7th floor arrives in the blink of an eye, and you excuse yourself as you weave past a couple agents to exit the car. After a short navigation of the floor thanks to the clearly labeled and numbered signs, you finally approach the door to your division. Pronounced in bold, simple characters, the division code ‘S01’ stares at you from the door as you regard it, a slight lump forming in your throat as you take one last sip of your coffee. Thoughts fly through your head as you go through your mental checklist. Supervisor = Agent Kim Namjoo. Your hand is on the shiny chrome door handle. Mixed division. You’re turning it slowly. Potential for other recent graduates to be working here. Before you know it, the door is swinging open and-- “Ah!” You’re suddenly met with the startled yelp of a young woman, causing you to flinch as it snaps you out of your reverie.

The woman chuckles as she brings a hand to adjust her glasses, face quickly smoothing into a sweetly dimpled smile as she looks at you. “I am so sorry,” she begins upon seeing your startled expression, “you caught me totally off guard.” She laughs lightly. “I don’t believe we’ve met! You must be Agent Y/n. I’m your supervisor, Agent Kim.” She extends her hand to you as you blush, blurting out an apology before reaching out your own hand. “Sorry we couldn’t have met under more formal circumstances, but it’s really no problem as my office is right here anyway,” she explains, gesturing to a door to her right.

“Nice to meet you, Agent Kim! I’m really very excited to be here,” you let out a soft chuckle as you begin to regain your composure. Agent Kim flashes you another gorgeous smile that puts you immediately at ease.

“I’m so happy to hear that, Agent. If you wouldn’t mind following me into my office?” She begins making her way towards her office door. You quickly oblige, stepping into your supervisor’s spacious office. Agent Kim takes a seat promptly behind her desk, motioning for you to have a seat across from her.

“Hold on just one second.” Your supervisor begins typing away at the keyboard of one of her two computers and you take the brief moment to admire the immaculately trimmed bonsai tree perched next to her. However, your gaze quickly turns back to your supervisor as you can’t help but acknowledge how absolutely gorgeous she is. Her skin has all the warmth of the first golden hues of a sunrise. Brunette hair tied back elegantly, a few strands escape to frame the elegant slope of her face. Her jawline is pronounced without being too sharp, culminating in the graceful point of her chin. You flush slightly at your thoughts, mentally scolding yourself. Great. First day of work and you’re already simping over your boss. It’s not your fault you’ve had such a wonderful first impression of her. Everything about her presence immediately calms your racing heart and soothes any apprehensive thoughts that had crossed your mind on your journey into S01.

“Alright,” Agent Kim removes something from a desk drawer before setting it on the desktop and turning her attention towards you. “First and foremost, welcome to Division S01! Like I said, I’m your supervisor, Agent Kim. This is a mixed division, which I’m sure you’re already aware of as it seems you specifically requested it.”

You nod. In the Aether, there are generally three types of divisions that field agents work in. Each is composed of agents of all levels, from rookies like yourself to seasoned veterans. Some divisions are dedicated entirely to the more peaceful reports from around the city that are generally non-violent and consist of relatively minor disturbances. Nothing too serious, but due to their nature, these divisions see a lot of cases on the daily. In your time at the Academy, you’d interned on a few of these types of cases, one of them involving the containment of an alien squid horde that was interfering with the local fishing economy. Other divisions deal with the more intense, higher-magnitude cases. Often violent, these investigations require collaboration from multiple agents throughout the division as they look into paranormal serial murder, shape-shifting extraterrestrial identity theft, and the like. Divisions like yours, S01, are a hybrid. They get the best of both worlds and are well suited for agents who are capable of handling everything across the board, and, more importantly, for agents who want to take on that kind of responsibility. Since you graduated at such a high class rank at the Academy, you had no problem securing a spot in a mixed division such as this one.

“Now,” your supervisor picks up the item she had previously pulled from her desk. “This is your tablet.” She slides the device over to you. “All of your assignments and case files will be sent to you through this, and you’ll have access to a limited virtual library via our digital databases if you find yourself needing that kind of resource. Of course, you’ll use your agency-issued ID to login and it’ll give you full access!” She beams as you hold the tablet in your hands. “Your first assignment has already been sent to you, it looks like…” she trails off, turning to glance at her computer monitor. Your heart starts picking up again. You are literally holding your very first professional case in your hands!

“Do you know what level it is, or who I’ll be working with?” You can’t help the questions that bubble from your mouth. Agent Kim shakes her head.

“Unfortunately, that information comes from higher up, so until you open the file yourself I have no way of knowing the details of your field assignment,” she says with a shrug. Your stomach twists in anticipation, and you’re tempted to unlock your tablet and read through the entire assignment right then and there.

“Alright,” you say with a tentative smile. Agent Kim returns your expression.

“Now, do you have any questions before I show you to your office?” Her eyebrows lift as she looks at you expectantly. “Don’t be timid, I know I had plenty of questions when I became an official agent, but I have found that the Academy really does a spectacular job preparing agents for the field.”

“I do have a question, actually.” Agent Kim’s face immediately brightens. “Are there any other recent Academy grads other than myself assigned to this division?” You’re already aware that your closest friends from the Academy, Yubin and Jeongin, are stationed in different divisions, but you’re dying to know if anyone you recognize from your class at the Academy are in S01.

“Ah, yes. I figured you’d ask eventually. Agent Jeong Jaehyun has been here for about a week now, and Agent Jeon Jungkook started yesterday morning. They were both listed as having graduated with your class.”

You stiffen as soon as the name ‘Jeon Jungkook’ leaves her mouth. You aren’t very familiar with Jaehyun, but Jungkook… That’s a name you’ll never forget. Top of your class at the Academy, teacher’s pet, fuckboy, irritatingly pretty Jungkook.

“Oh!” you squeeze out through gritted teeth and a tense jaw. “Good to know! Thank you, Agent Kim.”

“Of course,” she replies with her warm smile that almost eases the growing knot in your stomach. “Would you care to see your office now?”

Your office isn’t huge, but it’s certainly functional. A large sleek metal desk occupies the bulk of the room, with an equally sleek office chair to match. You silently hope that it swivels. Apart from the desk and chair, a filing cabinet stands tall in the corner, in addition to a floor lamp. Another lamp sits perched on your desk beside two computer monitors and a telephone. A screen nearly identical to, albeit smaller than, the ones mounted in the atrium sits above your desk, the blue and red graphics of your city adding a touch of color not unwelcome in the otherwise very neutral room. Immediately, you begin considering ways to add your own personal touch to your workspace, inspired by Agent Kim’s bonsai tree.

Agent Kim explains the presence of dual computers, indicating that one is strictly for classified research purposes and details regarding any cases the agency might want to keep more under wraps than others, so to speak. “The screen,” she adds, gesturing to the wall, “can be used for any video conferences, calls, and the like within the Headquarters and nationwide, as well as providing the same information as the screens--I’m sure you noticed them--in the atrium.”

You nod as she continues to talk, all the while setting your bag on your desk and beginning to unpack your few personal belongings, including your diploma from the Academy.

“I suppose that’s about all you need to know about your office for the time being,” Agent Kim says after reinforcing that your agency ID will be your key to accessing your electronics. “Go ahead and start getting yourself settled, Agent Y/n. Agents Kang and Choi should be in the offices directly adjacent to you…” she trails off, seemingly trying to recall if those are the correct agents. “Anyway,” she claps her hands together, “If you have any questions, well, you know where to find me! Let me know if you need anything at all. I mean it.” Agent Kim once again gives you that calming smile. Her smile brings you a type of comfort you can’t quite explain, and you honestly couldn’t be happier with your supervisor so far. She’s warm and inviting, intelligent, beautiful, with an air about her that simply exudes leadership and command.

“Thank you, Agent Kim,” you match her smile.

With an amiable wave, she heads out. Your thoughts very quickly turn back to your assignment, and you scramble to sit at your office chair, which does in fact swivel, much to your delight, agency tablet grasped tightly in your hands. Questions race through your mind at the sight of the black mirrored surface, knowing what lies behind the locked screen. You figure the case will probably be something low-profile, as you are brand-new, but you really hope that it’s something more advanced You did graduate close to the top of your class... which brings your mind back to Jeon Jungkook. He had the honors of graduating first, and you’ll never forget that fact. You wonder what he’s been assigned, if it’s a more advanced case than is typical for rookie agents. You probably don’t want to know, however; it’ll only make you more upset if your assignment is comparatively mundane. At least you can rest in peace knowing that as a newbie, you’ll probably be paired with a more senior officer, and, with all of the agents who work in this division, the odds of running into Jungkook on a case are relatively slim. You hoped that after you graduated you’d never have to cross paths again, but alas, here you are. You sigh and run your fingers through your hair before focusing your attention back on the excitement of being here, your future literally in your hands. The closest you’ve ever been.

Finally unlocking the tablet, you’re greeted by a relatively simple interface that allows you to very easily navigate to your newly received assignment. The small folder icon sits amidst a sea of other completely unassuming icons, the tiny graphic completely unaware about the significance of its appearance to you. You open the file, trying to empty your mind of any expectations, and then… your heart sinks. At the very top of the document, next to your own, who else’s name do you see but Jeon Jungkook. Well, fuck.

You spend the better part of the next hour contemplating whether you should read the file by yourself or get your shit together and go track down Jungkook’s office so you can go over it together. Eventually, you settle for a quick skim, though the words barely stick in your mind as you find yourself somewhat preoccupied with thoughts about your partner. How are you supposed to work with him? You certainly don’t hate him, but you’ve always had your disagreements. And you’ll never forgive him for taking your spot in the class, not to mention breaking your best friend’s heart.

After absorbing as much information as your distracted mind can handle, which consists of a jumbled mass of something about a flower shop and floating objects, your rational professional brain gets the best of you, and you head to your supervisor’s office to inquire about the location of Jungkook’s--Agent Jeon’s--office. You have a job to do, and as much as you’re dreading facing Jungkook, you’ll get the job done, and you’ll get it done well. Just as you always have. And though you can’t stand Jungkook, he’s not useless.

You approach the doorway to Jungkook’s office, finding the door already ajar, before stopping to lean against the doorframe, crossing your arms with your tablet clasped in one hand. Jungkook is currently intently focused on one of his computer screens, face tense in concentration, chewing lightly on his lower lip. Tie hanging loose around his neck, the top few buttons of his dress shirt undone, jacket foregone, sleeves rolled up to his elbows with his long slightly wavy hair dangling in his eyes… yep. That’s Jungkook. You clear your throat and give a small knock on the threshold. Jungkook immediately shoots up. “Y/n!” He exclaims, eyebrows lifted, a goofy smile toying on his face. You resist the urge to roll your eyes. “Sorry,” he clears his throat, “I mean- Agent Y/N,” he says, face growing serious as he emphasizes ‘Agent’. “So,” he folds his hands dramatically on top of his desk. “What can I do for you?” You enter the room at last, mouth pursed in a firm line. “Agent Jeon,” you begin, taking a seat across from him. “It appears as though we have been paired together for our first assignment.”

“Oh, that’s right! I saw that. I already read the whole file. Simple stuff.” His hands are still perched steepled on top of his desk.

You gawk before realizing that of course he had gotten the file first; he’s been here since yesterday, and you figure that there was probably a fair amount of sucking up going on mixed in with, apparently, file reading. “You...already read the whole file? Were you ever going to come find me about it?” It’s about mid-morning at this point, pushing towards noon, and most agents are already well into their work days. You wonder what Jungkook has been up to all day if not coming to find you, but you suppose you can’t complain. Reading Jungkook’s name on your assignment with an hour to process that information before actually seeing him is a far better scenario than him randomly showing up at your office expecting you to work with him.

He shrugs. “I figured you’d come to me first once you found out about it and got settled. I asked her about you and she told me you’d be here today. I’ve been busy, and besides, it’s not like it’s a top priority case.”

How can he be so nonchalant about everything all the time while still managing to kiss nearly everyone’s ass? And what the hell has he been busy with? You smooth your hair back as you take a deep breath, mentally steeling yourself so as not to go off on Jungkook on your first day of work. No doubt, you’re still harboring several grudges from the Academy, but you’re a professional now. A professional. What a way to start your dream job.

“For future reference, if necessary, I would prefer that we go over the file together in detail first. This isn’t the Academy anymore, Agent Jeon. These are real people dealing with real problems and I’d like to be on the same page as much as possible at every given moment. Even if the case isn’t ‘top-priority.’”

Jungkook has been like this for about as long as you’ve known him, and although you are mere acquaintances, albeit rivals of a sort, everyone in your class at the academy was well-aware of Jeon “The Golden Boy” Jungkook’s disposition and ass-kissing tendencies. Top of your class, he always managed the best possible marks while seemingly caring about his work as little as possible. Showing his face at every party, event, club--you name it--available to him, you have no idea how he managed to get along as well as he did and continues to do. You suppose it’s probably due to his incredible charm, and some suspiciously large quantity of natural talent, not to mention his good looks. You may dislike him, but you aren’t blind. Naturally, his success always bugged you, as you constantly worked your ass off. Always trailing behind him, never quite catching up, like a dog chasing its own tail, you graduated second in your class. Years of hard work and careful studying, focusing nearly all of your attention on taking every possible opportunity available to advance your standing, was evidently not enough to best The Golden Boy. You always got the feeling he wasn’t too fond of you either, not that you really care. I guess the universe has a strange way of torturing you by assigning you two to the same division in the Aether.

“Noted.” Jungkook nods.

“What were you so ‘busy’ with anyway?” You can’t help yourself.

Jungkook shifts uncomfortably, eyes shifting away from yours. “It doesn’t matter, Agent Y/n. Sorry I didn’t come get you earlier,” he says before clearing his throat, eyes meeting yours once more. You decide to let the matter go. Work awaits.

“Very well, Agent,” you say, eyeing him curiously. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to go over the contents of the file with you so we both know what’s going on and we can go forward from there.” You put every effort of your being into injecting nothing but professionalism into your voice, even managing a small, tight smile.

“Fair enough,” he replies as you scoot forward in your chair and unlock your tablet as Jungkook does the same. Upon closer inspection of the document than earlier, you glean that the report comes from a Mr. Kim Seokjin who apparently owns a flower shop called Worldwide Bouquet downtown. He claims that his bouquets are disassembling themselves overnight which, understandably, is negatively affecting his business. He reports instances of his materials floating out of his reach, flowers being flung about his workspace, and the resulting frustration. Jungkook taps his fingers on the table as you scan the screen, one hand lazily scrolling through his own tablet.

“Sounds like some sort of sprig,” you mutter after perusing the report. Sprigs are one of the more docile paranormal creatures you’ve studied, typically materializing out of the playful spirit of a child. As a result, these spirits are typically very mischievous without malicious intent. Some have telekinetic abilities, some illusory capabilities and the like, but all in all, they are generally fairly easy to take care of and contain until their energy eventually dissipates into the atmosphere. At least, the Academy had taught you as much.

“That’s what I was thinking,” Jungkook offers. “A telekinetic one, most likely. Should be a quick job.”

You nod, slightly disappointed that you weren't going to be dealing with something a bit more exciting than a simple sprig, let alone dealing with it with Jungkook. The Aether probably isn’t too fond of handing off the more sensitive cases to newbies, even if you and Jungkook more than proved yourselves in the Academy. Too bad there isn’t too much about the case to actually discuss. You feel a bit foolish for making such a big deal about Jungkook not coming to you after he originally read the file as you feel your shoulders slump ever so slightly.

“See? Not top-priority,” Jungkook smirks. “You didn’t think they’d really give us something important for our first case, did you?”

“Am I really that obvious?”

“Yep.”

“I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t been hoping for something more, but it’s all important work Agent Jeon.” Besides, if you manage to execute this mission perfectly, considering working with Jungkook proves to be manageable, you’d hope that your next case will be of significantly higher status.

“Of course,” Agent Jeon says, tucking a stray strand of inky hair behind his ear. “The super important case of the floating flowers,” he snorts.

You scoff. “Can’t you take something seriously for once in your goddamn life, Agent Jeon? I will literally never understand how you managed as well as you did in the Academy.” Grabbing your tablet in preparation to leave and shaking your head, you stand up. Jungkook sits unbothered.

“Apparently not,” he retorts, folding his arms across his broad chest.

“Since you seem so blatantly disinterested in this case, I’ll just take care of it myself,” you huff. “Go back to whatever you were so busy with before, Agent.”

“Agent Y/n, we both know you can’t do that.”

He’s right. If you execute the mission by yourself without Agent Jeon, it wouldn’t reflect well on either of you, and you can’t risk compromising your image this early in your career. Especially if it meant you’d be stuck investigating nothing but sprigs for the next ten years.

A long sigh escapes you as you shoot a glare at Jungkook before sitting back down across from him. You force the fakest smile you think you’ve ever conjured.

“We’re going to stop by Mr. Kim’s later today to get the initial visit out of the way, okay Agent?” Your voice is thick with mock sweetness. “3:00, my office. I’ll be calling Mr. Kim and letting him know we’ll be checking in, kay?”

“Sounds great, Agent.” Jungkook returns your phony expression.

You stand up once more, this time with the full intention of actually leaving. “It was a pleasure, as always, Agent Jeon.” You straighten your jacket with one hand before promptly exiting, not bothering to close the door behind you. The last thing you hear is a prolonged, exasperated exhale. That makes two of us, you muse to yourself.

Upon returning to your office, you slump down in your chair, mind spinning with the incredulity of what just happened. You’re not sure at all how you’re going to manage working with Jungkook, especially since he seems so hellbent on being as difficult as possible. This is exactly what you were afraid of. The feeling, however, is probably mutual, so all you need to do is get through this. Hopefully after this you’ll never have to man a case with him again, even if you are still stuck in the same division.

Encouraged by that sentiment, swiveling ever so slightly back and forth in your chair, you manage to boost your mood just enough to finally be able to pick up the phone to call Mr. Kim.

Well, you sigh inwardly. This should be interesting.

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criminalminds4days · 3 years

Text

Family Matters | Chapter 5: Emily's Intervention

Hello people of tumblr!!

I hope all of you had an excellent New Year's! I got so trashed that it lasted until yesterday 🤣 I guess that makes sense considering how horrible 2020 was.

Anyway, I hope all of you had a great time and that 2021 becomes a good year for you all. Because I will be spending a lot of time with family until the 11th of this month, I have decided that I will take January to write as many chapters as possible and I will return to posting in February!

Also, I have posted the story on Wattpad, and I will be updating simultaneously.

With all that said, I hope you all enjoy chapter 5 of Family Matters 🎉🎉

Warnings: Swearing, sexual references, violence and murder references, public embarrassment, and very bad jokes!

Word Count: 3.2k

Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

Tag list: @mcntsee @lets-be-gay-for-the-angel @evelyncade @haylaansmi @paulaern @myfandomlife-blog

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(This gif is not mine)

Chapter 5: Emily’s Intervention

The importance of the following couple of days is the only reason our story will address them. Understanding the events that occurred is vital for the upcoming chapters that our favorite agents will face.

The following questions needed an answer:

What did Emily and Spencer talk about?

Why was Spencer so upset?

And perhaps, the most important, why was Emily at Spencer's apartment with Hunger Games Pajamas?

Well, let us do a quick rewind before we move on to the consequences of the visit of Tyler Hemingway and the answers to the questions above.

Emily opened the door to his room, a very surprised Derek and Spencer observed her. She didn't say a word until she was right in front of the two men, taking a few seconds to observe their reactions, making sure it was known she didn't come in a friendly mood.

"You, out." She said to the dark-skinned man, with no emotion, and a serious face as she pointed to the door.

"Excuse me? Emily this is my room, I don't know what-"

"I said, get out." Her tone was deadly, "now." She didn't raise her voice, but the message was clear.

"I am leaving, but it is definitely not because I am scared of you, it's simply because I have an appointment with a cup of coffee." He stood and walked towards the door, careful to avoid any close contact with her.

"Yeah, let's go." The brunette said, standing up and walking towards the door, only to be stopped by the woman.

"You, sit."

"I am sitting." He returned to the edge of his bed, "and it is definitely because you terrify me."

"Derek, if I find out you're spying on this conversation..."

"It's not like I want to know." He said quickly looking at the doctor one last time, with pity clear in his eyes and he rushed out the door making sure to close it behind him.

The man left in the room gulped before speaking again. "Am I going to die?"

"Not if you listen to me." She sat at the edge of Morgan's bed and her demeanor changed. She seemed more relaxed and even excited. That shift alone had the man planning for ways to run out the door without falling victim to Emily Prentiss. "Now, Spencie-"

"Please don't call me that."

"Fine, Baby genius." She smiled at him, in a slightly more terrifying manner than her demeanor when she arrived. "We need to talk about the situation that occurred during our drive to the hospital."

"What is there to talk about?"

"Can you explain to me, honey, why you are upset with our friend?"

"Please don't call me honey, it's somehow worse than Spencie."

"Answer. My. Question."

"I already told you guys, I'm upset that she's letting this guy walk all over her."

"See, I can't believe that, because you stated that part of the reason for your anger was that you still came after this Tyler character, so please tell me, what's that about?"

"She left me behind, remember? She didn't pick me up." He said as he played with his hands. Jumping out the window wasn't sounding so bad, even if they were on the third floor. If he calculated correctly, he could probably survive it.

"And that's all?" He nodded, and she sighed, clearly frustrated. "Let me try a different approach."

"I'm scared." He mumbled.

"Spencer Reid," she began, that smile still on her lips. "Is there anything you don't like about her?"

"Yeah, I mean, for once, she sleeps on the right side of the bed, which is my side, so when I had to sleep in the same bed as her I had to sleep on the left side! The left side Emily!"

"Did she ask you for that?"

"No, of course not. I just kind of did it."

"Okay, what else don't you like?"

"That she's so naive, she believes people always have good intentions, and she's always getting hurt because she doesn't understand that not everyone comes from an honest and good place. I mean she's a profiler and yet she falls for the same tricks over and over again. But that also means she's really empathetic, and nice which I guess is not a down falling but a virtue, so I guess I can't really say I don't like that of her."

"Interesting." Emily's smile turned more genuine. "Now, what are some of the things you like about her."

"I mean, she's a great friend, a reliable agent, and she's so funny. She has similar interests to me, and whenever we hang out there is nothing we can't talk about." A smile appeared on his face as the memories of their time together became clear in his mind. "She has this bright energy around her, and it simply pulls you towards her, I also love her clumsiness, it makes her, well her. I love when she laughs, and I love being around her, and there are these times where she'll rest her head on my shoulders or she'll accidentally brush her hand on mine and I get this feeling, that I have never-" He stopped, looking straight at Emily as he reached the same conclusion as her. "Oh."

"Yeah."

"I like her. Like really like her, don't I?"

"Yes, you do." Emily hugged him, "I am so glad you finally came to terms with it." She let go of him and grabbed him by the shoulders. "Now, what are you gonna do about it?"

"Nothing."

"WHAT?"

"I mean, she obviously doesn't feel the same, and even if she did, you know the rules. I wouldn't want to make her transfer, nor do I want to transfer."

"Spencer, you are seriously going to let the love of your life walk away simply because of your job?"

"I never said she was the love of my life." Emily rolled her eyes, "besides, we're really good friends, and I don't want to ruin that."

"Ugh, you are so dumb for a genius." He wanted to object, but she continued. "This is what we are going to do, you can take the rest of the week, to think about her, and if you two are worth the trouble. Once this case is over, I will go to your apartment and we will discuss the next steps over some glasses of wine. Those are more for me than for you because I'm gonna need a lot of patience." He furrowed his eyebrows but she didn't even register it. "Now, because of your little scene from earlier, you have some space, so use this to your advantage. Make me proud son."

"No, no. Please never call me son again. That was very disturbing."

"Well, then do the right thing." She walked out of the room, and he sat there, wishing Emily had never made him realize how he felt.

Now, ignoring her was torture, because all he could think of was her lips on his, or their hands intertwined, her laughing at something he said as they ate dinner, or watching a movie as they cuddled on her sofa. This was bad, it was a bad thing that was happening right now.

She was his friend, and even then, he still thought she had feelings for her ex-boyfriend. It was a disaster.

"So, what's your conclusion?"

That was the first thing Emily said when he opened the door. She was wearing black pajamas with the Mockingjay symbol from The Hunger Games, her hair was in a ponytail and she had a big reusable grocery bag on her shoulder that seemed full of something he couldn't quite make out, at least until he heard the glass clink and reached a pretty solid conclusion of what was in the bag.

"I need new friends."

She seemed unfazed by his comment and simply moved past him towards his living room. "No, no, please come in. I insist." He mumbled as he closed the door. "What are you doing here?"

"I told you, we need to make a game plan, but we need to hurry, we don't have much time before she arrives."

"Did you invite her?"

"No, but she's on her dinner with Tyler, and if he's as horrible as I think he is, she'll be here in about an hour or so, after realizing he just wanted to have sex with her."

She pulled a wine bottle out of her bag and roomed through his drawers to grab a wine glass and opened the bottle. "I would offer you, but I need you sober tonight."

"That just sounds so wrong."

"Don't worry about it, Doctor. Now, have you thought about your options?"

"I already told you Emily, our friendship and our jobs are not worth risking for some feelings that will most likely fade away."

"Why are smart people so dumb?" She asked no one in particular.

"First of all, that's offensive. Second, we don't know if she feels the same way, and third of all, in the extreme and highly unlikely case in which she did, the probability of us working out would be almost null."

"Spencer, I love you. I really do, but you need to learn how to read social cues. I am almost one-hundred percent sure she likes you, you've both liked each other for longer than you think, and I get it, your jobs are important, but when you decide to leave, what's gonna be waiting for you?"

He remained silent for a couple of minutes taking in her words. She stared at him, as she sipped more and more wine.

"I don't do, relationships really well. What if I lose her and then it all becomes worse?"

"What if you lose her because you're scared to 'do' relationships?"

"I hate it when you're right."

"Now, let's see, how should you tell her? We should make it a grand gesture, but we need to keep it between us." She opened the second bottle as she spoke. "Oh, I'm gonna have to be a third wheel for a really long time, but I guess I can deal with that." She kept drinking. "I am totally gonna officiate the wedding. Also, I think you need to do it soon, maybe when she comes to tell you you were right?"

"Emily, let's calm down for a minute."

"Can we watch Dance Moms?"

"No, I don't even know what that is, but it sounds awful."

"It's so good. The kids are so talented." She sighed, as if somehow proud of said kids. "Anyway, going back to your love life." She began once again and he simply tried to not scream.

A drunk Prentiss continued to increase the level of alcohol in her system while simultaneously rambling about the beautiful life they would have together. He hadn't said a word in what seemed to be an hour, but that didn't stop her, she kept speaking of possible destination weddings and how she needed to be the godparent of one of their kids, even if JJ and she had to share because she knew that JJ was Spencer's best friend before any of them had even joined. She also expressed that she had shipped the two of them, but decided against it once JJ had found Will and they had children.

"I told her I was definitely the best friend." She smiled, as the third bottle came empty. Her rambling had returned to Spencer's current crush. "And I am an amazing wing woman. I got Spencer Reid to accept his love."

"I did not say I was in love. I like her, but love is a strong word." He tried to take the bottle from her but she was fast, even under the influence. "You've been talking for almost an hour, and drinking that in record time. I'm a little concerned for you."

"I've just been trying to pass the time."

"Time for what?"

"For the show to begin." She wiggled her eyebrows, as she drank the last bit of wine left. "I'm gonna have to go get more."

"How about we talk about my feelings instead?" That was the last thing he wanted to do, granted it was also the thing she had been doing for the last hour, but if Emily got any more wasted, they were gonna have a problem tomorrow.

She smiled, but before she could try and convince him to propose, there was a knock at the door. "Right on time!" She whispered.

"What?"

"Just go open the door."

He walked towards the door and opened it slightly, only enough to make his figure known. He was so perplexed to see her standing on the other side that he forgot for a moment he was supposedly still upset with her. Though the fact that Prentiss had been right and she was at his door was making the air get caught in his lungs. Nonetheless, he maintained a neutral expression, waiting for her to speak.

"I came to tell you that you were right. He just wanted to get in pants." He stayed silent, simply observing her. She was upset, and he wasn't sure if it was because of the fact that he was right or because of something Tyler had said. "I actually thought he wanted to apologize, and I think part of me just wanted to believe that for the first time I was not being used, that people actually cared about what I felt."

"There are people that care about you, they are just not the wants you wanted to." He tried not to sound defensive but it seemed impossible. He cared about her, Emily cared about her, the whole team and her mom, even her cousin Nicole cared about her. He wanted her to see that, and maybe for it to be enough one day.

"No, they are! I thought I needed the people who wronged me to fix it, to show me that I was worth the trouble when in reality all I needed was for me to understand that I was. And I just needed a reminder that the people that care about me are the ones that should matter the most." A trace of a smile formed on his lips. He was included, at least he hoped he was, because what a wonderful life that would be. "I am so sorry about how I acted, and I am sorry I left you here waiting for me. Spencer Reid, you are my best friend and you come before any other jerk out there. I need you to know that this time in which I didn't have you with me was miserable. I missed you so much I spent the whole dinner with Tyler talking about you."

"You did?" He seemed genuinely surprised. Emily had predicted this too, and the meaning behind it. He wished he could control his emotions and not read too much into it, but the seed had been planted and now all he could think of is how to tell her he liked her. He was ready to say it, but thankfully he waited for her to finish.

"Yeah, I did. I missed you, and I hope we never fight again, I don't know what I would do without your friendship."

"I missed you too." She bit her lip, and he smiled, though he'd be lying if he said that her seeing him only as a friend was didn't hurt. Here he was, wishing to tell her that he wanted to be more than friends and she had inadvertently stopped him in his tracks. Instead of mopping and wishing to vanish, he decided that her friendship was better than anything else, and he couldn't lose that. He would get over here and she wouldn't even have to know about it. "Wanna come in and watch TV?" He asked, already taking his plan into action.

"I would love that." She smiled, Spencer was about to open the door and let her in when Emily spoke once more.

"That's good to hear, I am trying to get Spence here to watch Dance Moms with me but he refuses, maybe if there is two of us, he'll change his mind." She frowned, clearly confused by the presence of another voice, he opened the door to the view of a very drunk Emily in pajamas. Her frown softened and she smiled again, seemingly relieved to see her. "May I say, you look hot. Blue suits you."

"So I've been told." She gave him a knowing look and he couldn't help the beat his heart skipped. This feeling was going to kill him one of these days.

"Are you sure you can handle being in that close all night though? Maybe Spencer can lend you one of his shirts." She said, winking at them. He tried not to look completely horrified by the implication that comment had due to the fact that the girl next to him had no idea it was there, but with Emily staring at him as she was, it had become a difficult task.

"Has she been drinking?"

"It's her third bottle of wine."

"We need to cut her off."

"Yeah, we do." He smiled at her, "She's right though, if you want to borrow something more comfortable let me know." The image of her in his shirt, and the idea that her smell might stay in it even after she was gone made him want to rush into his room and get it for her.

"Careful Spencer Reid, I might take you up on that." She joked, and he prayed to all the gods he knew about that she would.

"Awwww, YOU TWO ARE ADORABLE!" The woman screamed. "Just get married already!"

The pair laughed and made their way to the sofa, she closed the door behind her and sat down, him very aware of their closeness. Emily grabbed the control and looked for the show, cheering like a little girl when she found it. Spencer felt her rest her head on his shoulder and his body immediately tensed up at the notion. He didn't really know for how long he had been feeling this way about her, but he wasn't sure he wanted to ever stop or fade away.

"Your birthday is coming up." She whispered.

"Yeah, I'm turning thirty, can you believe that?"

"You're old." He chuckled. "Do you know what you're gonna do?"

"Probably get a haircut."

"Besides that."

"I don't know. We might have a case."

"What do you want?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I need to get you something extra special for your birthday number thirty, so what do you want?"

"I don't need gits."

"You are no fun."

He had a pretty good idea of what he wanted, but he wasn't sure she was ready to hear it, or that he would ever get it. That was just life, and he had learned early on that he couldn't be greedy, he had a mom he loved, friends he could rely on, and that should be enough. Relationships were hard, feelings faded and he didn't want to be caught up in a situation where he would lose his favorite person in the world. So as he sat there, her head on his shoulders, a drunk Emily singing the themes song of the show they were watching while also giving the dancers advice, he decided that was the best he could hope for, reaffirming once again that his romantic feelings for the girl sitting next to him needed to disappear.

#spencer x y/n #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid #criminal minds #cm

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captainjimothycarter · 3 years

Note

From the list of ship tropes--I would love to see a Steggy drabble with modern!Peggy casually sitting on Steve's lap during an Avengers meeting :D

This is not what you wanted but this is what came out? I am not sorry. warning there is semi description of violence

If there was an opposing eye in the room about the love of his life slowly waltzing towards him with a slow sway of her hips, no one said a damn thing. And good for them to learn not to, to finally learn not to oppose the Captain unless it was vital to do so. Steve was not a cruel man. He has lived far too long to become cruel and heartless, but he is a man who rules with a hard iron fist. He will take the debates and other people’s points of view and he will consider them, but at the end of the day, his word is the law.

And the only people to oppose them, well they are no longer under his organization now are they?

After waking up in the ice and being told that all he knew was now gone, Steve dropped off the face of the earth. How could anyone expect him not to? He was a man who no longer knew himself, no longer knew what was going around him. Who had to figure out just who Steve Rogers was behind that mask. And with it, came meeting a little brunette far, far away from the city he once called home.

When he finally emerged two years later, Steve had long made a name for himself as leader of the Avengers. The public would know them as saviors people with power, money, and well, powers who did right for the public. Who took the corrupted politicians, the corrupted cops, and grounded them to a pulp. There was no warning with them, there was no buying their votes or buying their good sides. There was swiftly handling the matter. Swift and clean, leaving no mess behind, but they always knew who killed them. There was always a calling card left behind.

And once you started to take out a few of the politicians and cops, well the matter basically handled itself. At least until you got those brave, stupid souls who thought they could challenge Steve. Who thought they could attack the public rather that was with relentless taxing or bills or ridiculous laws or even cops who killed mercilessly and without reason. Those are the ones Steve loved to personally get his hands dirty with, otherwise, he had people who did his work for him.

He made the public a better place. He made the schools safer with hired veterans as guards, stronger laws opposed to gun violence, with more money fluctuating into schools than anyone ever dreamed of. He made more laws protecting the poor, protecting immigrants, easier processes in all to become a citizen. Laws and personal hand went into making it easier for veterans to get assistance rather that was with money, food, therapy, or even a home. He made medical access much easier for those around them. He did not want anyone to suffer the preventable loss of a parent, just as he had. Several times.

While the media might call him a villain or mobster, Steve just called himself a civilian doing the right thing. He never wanted to lead the Avengers, it just happened and he was damn good at it. He took his point of view from living through the horrors that he did, where being gay could’ve gotten you killed, where being poor was a death sentence, and made sure that no one would suffer in that matter. While politicians tried to tarnish his name and call for his head, the public willingly protected and loved him.

And Steve was loved by his peers. He loved them as well. They worked well together, making New York in whole a better place. Slowly they turned their eyes towards the rest of the States, but that was a long time coming.

Everyone knew who Peggy was. Her word was rule as much as Steve’s was, even if her accent made the rules seem a bit posher than his Brooklyn accent. The last politician who underestimated her as she went undercover to see if a civilian’s tip was true on rather or not the bastard was dumping toxic waste into public water, he was no longer among them. Not just for the tip being true, but for the fact he tried to corner her in the office with bad intentions on his mind.

Peggy didn’t even get to blink twice before Steve was there, piano wire in hand, face streaked with blood, as were her clothes and his. She was furious for two minutes, insisting she could handle herself and didn’t need Steve to save her until he pointed out the man was intending to kill her with poison on his lips. It still wasn’t good to her pride that Steve had saved her.

“You look well-rested,” Steve hummed as she walked around the meeting table and plopped down into his lap with ease. He wrapped one arm around her waist tightly, the other tapping on the tablet that Clint had slid him.

“I told you I wasn’t that tired,” she sighed, giving a roll of her eyes. Her legs tucked underneath his, making herself more than comfortable as she studied the tablet too. “When’s the next meeting?”

Steve hummed as he looked up at Clint who shrugged his shoulders before looking down at his watch. “Oh,” the archer breathed. “Two minutes from now. Security just said Natasha and Banner are back from their medical run. Thor and Tony are coming up now. Sam is stuck in a few meetings at the VA but he’s sent over the reports via Red Wing.”

“That’s fine about Sam, I expected with the added hands and funding he will have his hands full. I’ll text him in a few to remind him Banner had hired a few more doctors to be on sight and a few more psychiatrists so Sam isn’t trying to do it all.”

Peggy yawned and stretched, very cat-like, tucking her face into Steve’s neck. Her breath tickled his ear. “Hm. Sam is still going to try,” she reminded him. “He reminds me too much of you, biting off more than he could chew. You’ll have to physically drag him away if you want him to rest.”

“I’ll just send you to do it,” he chuckled. “He likes you better than me.”

“Of course he does. Who wouldn’t?”

Childishly, Steve stuck her tongue out at her, one Peggy captured in her mouth. Clint politely looked away at the pair kissing, relieved when the rest of their team finally came in. The heavy thump of Thor’s hammer made Steve look up, unembarrassed about them kissing.

“Christ,” he breathed at the bags under Tony’s eyes. “The hell happened to you, Stark? I sent you home to rest!”

Tony, still in the armor with the face mask melted back, shrugged his shoulders as he leaned back into the chair. It wasn’t odd of him to have these bags under his eyes. They were just about a permanent part of his feature as his trademark goatee. “You did and I decided that was a stupid order.” At Steve’s pinched face, he rolled his eyes. “Stephen - Dr. Strange - and I got discussing a few possible solutions to the toxic waste still hanging around the public water. We’re confident we’ve found a solution but it’s taken long hours to even complete the formula.”

Steve’s tongue clicked on the roof of his mouth, lips firmly pressed. “That’s amazing and I thank you both for that but you need rest or you will be useless. Don’t make me order Jarvis to ban you from the lab again. Please get some rest tonight. No lab work. I’m glad, really glad about what you two have accomplished and I am sure it will work, but it can wait 24 hours. We have Hill and Peggy’s niece guarding the areas and setting up ropes and cameras. It should be enough for a week.”

“You two were doing more than just working,” Clint snickered, ignoring the look Tony threw his way. “Oh c’mon, I walked in on your naked ass being pounded by Stephen. That’s a sight I’ll never forget!”

“It’s not my fault you don’t knock, Barton. Learn to knock.”

“Anyway,” Peggy sighed, already rubbing at her temples. “Anthony please refrain from fucking in the public labs. If you must insist on doing so, just...clean up properly. Natasha, doll, did we learn anything about Hydra or Aim’s whereabouts?”

Natasha’s lips pursed at Steve visually stiffening, trading a look with Peggy. Peggy’s fingertips dipped below the table to rub at Steve’s knee, offering comfort through touch. “We did,” she finally said, carefully. She could feel Steve’s eyes boring two holes into her. This was a delicate subject for all of them.

“You are aware of Clint’s brother still in the circus?” Another pair of baby blue eyes were staring right at her. “I made contact with him. He’s constantly on the move and no one suspects a carnie. He’s made a lookout in Hydra’s old spots during the war. Lots of them have abandoned labs that I’ve noted in my report, but there’s one that Barney has said that still looks to be in some use. It’s in the report as well. But…”

She took in a deep breath and tapped on her own tablet, flicking her wrist to airdrop a file to Steve’s screen. “Those are the shots of the Winter Soldier. Barney is sure of it. His last two victims mirror where we’ve sent donations to in order to help with the last few disasters. They’re following us.”

Steve clenched the tablet in hand, tight enough to threaten to crack the screen. Even Peggy murmuring soft words in his ear couldn’t distract him as he studied the face on the screen. Hidden behind mask and goggles, it was impossible to make out just who was under that mask. Knowing Hydra, knowing how personally they are at hand, it was even harder to make out with the recent string of murders if they were a puppet or not.

“I’ll call a few people in Germany and Russia,” Peggy said immediately, forcefully taking the tablet from Steve and replacing it with her hands. “They’ll keep a lookout. The Howling Commandos are still about, unknownst to the public thanks to Erksine’s serum being repeated. They’ll follow up with Barney’s lead too. Relay the message that we are in favor of Barney and he will be granted pardon when he’s in New York.”

“But-” Clint started, Natasha, silencing him with a look.

“Not now, Clint.”

“But,” Clint insisted, gritting his teeth. “You need someone to trail him too. Change every few days. Not that I don’t trust my brother, I don’t trust the company he keeps. Anyone can slip in and kill him the second that they are aware he’s working with the Captain.”

“That’s a good point,” Steve sighed, scrubbing at his face. “We’ll send in Daisy Johnson. She can easily blend in and I think would enjoy the chance to stretch her new powers. Thank you for this, Natasha. It’s going to come in handy. We’ll lead a trap to lead him here. Eventually, I or Peggy will be on that list. Hydra isn’t stupid enough to go after one of you.”

“Let them try,” Thor murmured, palming at the hammer and making the table shake with each stroke. “I am still behind in my friendly bet with an Agent Coulson on our count of Hydra agents down.”

“Same bloodthirsty man I’ve always loved,” Bruce laughed, looking about as tired and strained as they all felt.

“Aye, Captain, there are few more camps set up on the local borders that are being prevented from coming into the states. I know of the governor who says they are on our side but they refuse to allow them in. I was able to drop off medication and supplies with Tony’s help, but they will not last long. How should we proceed?”

“Of course he’s not. I didn’t expect him to,” Steve sighed, pinching his brow. “Peggy, are you up for a quick handle of the situation? If not, I can send-”

“I’ll go,” she replied at once, kissing his temple and hopping to her feet. “Meet me in the bedroom, will you? Once we’re done here?”

Steve watched as she paused on her way out to tussle Tony’s hair and hug Thor around the neck. She always loved to try to make him jealous in some ways, it just never worked with the team.

“Take Peggy,” he told Thor with a friendly nod. “Tony as well. You can sleep on the jet, I’m afraid it won’t be much of a cat nap. How severe do you think the medical situations are?”

“Severe enough to deplete the supplies I gave them that are to last a week three days ago,” he sighed highly, shaking his head.

“I can go,” Bruce said at once, surprising them all. His feet were always on the ground in-home. No one bothered to tell him elsewhere. He had plenty of medical and special cases to attend to. “It sounds like they’ll need my help if we’re to get the camps inside the border and processed already. I’ll pack my bag. Tones, c’mon.”

With the pair gone, Steve rubbed at his face and stood up, throwing the tablet onto the table so it clattered. “Clint,” he sighed. “I’m sorry about dealing with your brother and not telling you about it. It was...an insistent matter. We’ll make him safe. And I know that will be on your mind with worry but for now, I need you to go make a round of the police precincts for me. Natasha, do you mind doing the hospitals? Switch off midday so no one is suspicious. I have intel telling me there’s a mole somewhere and I suspect there. Soon as we get it, kill them silently. No card.”

He paused, considering the situation with a shrug of his shoulders. “Moles are important to catch, but look out for the corrupted ones. Doctors abusing their power. Not listening to people. Police with too many tickets, especially close to their end of shift. Check where their money is going. Inform the captains that their disband is coming soon and the other programs are going to be up and running by next week. We’re pushing it hard. It gives them time to reconsider where they will go within the system and if they resist you know what to do.”

With Clint gone, it left just him and Natasha. He wasn’t surprised when she hugged him tightly around the shoulders. He sighed into her, tension melting away. “Do you think it’s him?” he asked, pulling away with knitted brows.

“I know it is,” she sighed, patting his cheek. “That doesn’t mean he is a lost cause. The Howling Commandos will lead him to our trap and it will work. It has to work. Shuri and her brother are already working on means to accommodate him and take in the facts of his brainwashing. It won’t be easy but we’ll have him safe soon. Then…”

“Then we can send someone in his place to get the intel we need.” That was part of the plan Steve didn’t like but they had no choice. If they were to destroy Hydra, it would be from the inside out.

“Any ideas as to who that will be?” Natasha had to half jog to keep up with Steve’s steps.

“Right now? No. I need to make a decision soon, but everyone is useful elsewhere and I can’t afford to pull them away. Most of us are too recognizable. I am wary about sending Peggy in. She...knows the history but living it is another matter. I know she will argue otherwise but…” He rubbed at his brow and shrugged his shoulders.

“Clint can do it.” This wasn’t the first time Natasha had insisted on these ideas. “If we can get Barney to slip in as his handler, it will be added cushion if something is to go wrong. Trust me on this one.”

She did bring up a few good points, but the consequences heavily outweighed the benefits if he was to get caught. Clint was valuable and yes, Steve was wary about losing his team. “I’ll consider it,” he said, stepping onto the elevator. “I’ll talk to him tomorrow. Just make sure he sleeps tonight.”

“And you make sure you sleep. The world’s problems are not yours to bear,” she reminded him, even if he rolled his eyes.

“It is when you’re me,” he huffed, kicking at the door. “When your decisions, when your actions fail and you make the world a worst place when you’re trying to do better. I won’t let any more people needlessly die by their hands or any others. For now…”

He pressed the button to his floor in the penthouse and smiled warmly at her. “I’m going to go enjoy a night with my wife.”

As expected, Peggy was waiting for Steve. Unexpectedly, she was waiting for him in the hot tub. She watched him under hard eyes as he stripped out of his clothes and slowly sunk into the warm, roaring waters. He ignored the fruit and champagne as he swam towards her, arms wrapped around the woman he called his life partner.

She sighed in content against his lips, sitting in his lap with her legs around his waist. The way he held her close, it was desperate need of contact, for the grounding sensation to keep his head on straight. She would always be there for him. She’d been his rock for so long and she would continue to do so.

“Tell me you’ll be safe,” he whispered, despite how he knew she’d do everything in her effort to come home. This was a simple mission. In and out. Get the people in, on the jet, and to safety.

“You know I will be,” she whispered against his lips, cupping his cheek. “I promise you I will be safe and I won’t die out there. I won’t even scar.”

He smirked and nipped her lip at the teasing remark. “Not after last week you won’t,” he huffed, rolling his eyes. “Much to your disappointment.”

“It only means you can stop treating me like a glass doll. And that I’m thankful the serum worked on me too.”

“Good,” Steve sighed, pressing a kiss to her temple and resting his head on her chest. “Because my world will shatter if I lost you, Pegs.”

“Then don’t plan to ever lose me.”

Tip Jar

#Steggy #StevePeggy #Steggy Prompt #WS Bucky #Nonny Prompt #Barney Barton #ThorBruce #TonyStrange #Iron Strange #Mobster Steggy #Mob Boss Steggy #Its not what you wanted #But I weirldy love it

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nancywrote · 4 years

Text

kindergarten creep

so basically billy’s obsessed w/ steve in this one and vbdhsfgvk Yeah im sorry !

tw/s: suicide, murder, typical creepy stalker stuff :/

Steve’s got a sweet smile.

Pretty pearly, straight teeth and pink lips that look no less plump stretched than they are relaxed. It drives Billy’s stomach into knots. His heart does twirls, twists, everything inbetween.

And Steve has soft, long brown hair.

Not too dark, just the right shade of chocolate like his big doe eyes-- flawless and styled in every gorgeous imaginable way.

But he’s so honest, despite how he gels his hair and puts on a fake charming smile around women.

Billy hates seeing Steve grin at ladies, hates how he styles his hair for them and not him.

But he’s so sweet, so tasty and wrapped up all pretty with a sugar coating. Billy’s thrust into a whole ‘nother reality around Steve, just so caught up in the cherry drops of his lips and the honey pools of his eyes.

Steve’s just so pretty and handsome and charming and Billy’s a snake.

So when Billy hears that Steve’s with Nancy now, he grinds his teeth and clenches his jaw and bites his tongue until he tastes blood, smiles tight-lipped at his best friend’s dreamy talks about his newly acquired girlfriend.

The copper’s a delicacy, it runs down his throat so warm and stains his teeth with reminders. But it’s not a lot of blood.

Just a drop.

A lovely little cherry drop.

But Steve’s so happy and giddy and smiley.

Billy used to be the one who made him laugh like that.

And then after that day, all he sees is Steve and Nancy together, inseparable. Like they used to be. It makes him want to grind his teeth into dust.

His fingers twitch anytime Nancy touches Steve, his eyes harden into icicles when Nancy’s looking their way and his body feels all too tense when Nancy’s near.

He wants to touch Steve, he doesn’t want Nancy to look at Steve, and he doesn’t want her near Steve.

Things will never be the same.

So when he sees Nancy and Jonathan walking together after school, far too close for comfort, he all but closes in on this opportunity. A simple snap of the camera.

Once Nancy’s alone later in the week, he corners her and shows the photo. It’s not enough to be considered romantic, but it’s enough for Nancy to feel scared because everybody’s scared of Billy because he’s a snake.

And then the days after that, Nancy doesn’t touch Steve, look at Steve, or go near Steve. And Billy is far too pleased, because Steve’s lovely lithe body is crying into his arms later on while intoxicated and Billy gets to hold him so close and so tight knowing Nancy’s no longer in the picture anymore.

But apparently the photos weren’t enough, because Nancy’s back less than a month later with a half assed apology and a shitty excuse. Clearly, Steve’s angry.

But Steve still goes on a date with her.

And Billy, like the snake he is, like a kindergartener, like a fucking kid, gets Tommy H. and Carol and the other kids and breaks into Nancy’s locker. And they put up photos of her half-naked getting changed, pictures of her and Jonathan during her and Steve’s “break”, spread the rest of the pictures all around school. Spray paint truthful and harsh words all over the walls and lockers.

And it’s back to heartbroken Steve, back to Billy’s Steve.

Nobody questions where the photos came from, all they do is laugh at Wheeler while Billy gets to hold Steve close to him in front of them without a care in the world.

But Steve’s stopped smiling like he used to.

It’s all charms and witty comments and fake grins. It’s all King Steve.

But it isn’t Billy’s Steve.

To Billy, that doesn’t matter anymore though. Because now all Steve knows to do is grin at him like he does with women, and Billy’s heart still flips with the sight of it. Even knowing it’s fake, even though some small crushed part of him fills with anger and pity at not being given the right attention, he still gets weak in the knees.

All Steve knows how to do now is stick close to Billy and stay silent around women, because they’ll all hurt him. When he nearly got with someone else after Nancy, Billy made sure to expose that slut for the whore she was.

Even if it wasn’t real. Even if it was just Tommy H. spreading lies because Billy asked him to.

Steve believed it, the girl couldn’t counter it, and Steve was his again.

All Steve knows is to get away from women and stay with Billy. Because Billy’s never done him dirty, Billy’s never lied to him or done him wrong. Billy’s the safest and best bet.

Billy’s his best friend.

And even without the honesty, even with the distance, Billy makes sure Steve’s always close to him, always hanging out with him, always with him.

Because Billy loves making him laugh, loves hearing him giggle at something stupid, loves it when he sees Steve walking towards his car after school, and his stomach’s all twisted when Steve’s crying and hugging him some nights.

Everything Steve does just makes his heart beat faster.

No matter how unreal it is now. How fake it all is.

Steve has no reason to leave Billy.

And Billy wants to tell him how he feels, because they hug much more now, they always hang out, they’re always talking (even if it’s really just Billy) and Billy’s feelings have only gotten more sugary and sweet as the weeks pass.

The party’s the day, Steve’s birthday party, that’s the day Billy will tell him. Because there’s no way it’s not meant to be.

And Steve’s all smiley and genuine on his birthday when the kids are there and some of their school friends are there, Steve’s all daisies and dandelions and peaches when Billy comes over with a neatly-wrapped gift consisting of hair gels and necklaces that Billy just knows the brunette will wear without hesitation afterwards.

Steve’s all cute and pretty and honestly happy again on his birthday.

And Billy feels disgusting.

Disgusting, because he took that smile off Steve’s face the same way he used to put it on him. Disgusting because Steve’s happiest on the day he’s surrounded by such a small amount of people because he’s learned to rely on kids and Billy and nobody at their actual school all because of him. Disgusting, revolted, and appalled because he’s the one who’s done this to Steve. He’s the one who fucked him up.

But then Nancy’s there and he completely forgets why he felt disgusting to begin with.

All he tastes is sugar, too much sugar, and cherry drops. He’s biting on his tongue again.

Steve is the sunshine, bright and golden and loving and warm and bringing light into Billy’s world. Being the reminder of his past life in Cali. The beacon of hope that keeps his skin tan, keeps him healthy. Reminds him he’s not different, he’s the same as he always was.

And Steve’s not there when Nancy steps into the living room, and everyone treats her kindly but Billy still tastes sugar and copper and doesn’t see the sun.

Nancy looks at him bitterly, he looks at her coldly, and they rotate around each other on different planets.

It’s all too dark when Nancy’s left to find Steve. And it’s all too perfect when Billy knows Steve’s not where she’s going.

Cherry drops, and then strawberry juice far too red for its own good. Like melted chocolate, puddled beneath her head. That’s what he envisions.

Not what he gets, though.

Because then Nancy’s on the ground after her mouth’s stuffed full of pills in the bathroom, wrists bleeding and pictures placed so perfectly accidentally by her pockets spilled along the tiles.

It’s all so perfect, because Tommy’s at the party and Tommy loves lying for Billy.

And Steve’s all his again, because now he really has nobody to love but Billy.

Because the camera’s placed so perfectly accidentally on Steve’s desk that afterwards, everybody avoids him and every girl gets scared of him.

But not Billy.

So of course, when Billy says he loves him, Steve cries and lies through his teeth and says he loves him too.

But Billy pretends it’s happy tears, and kisses them away. Even with his tense muscles and scared rambles when they make love later on, Billy knows how to make it feel good. Nobody else would love him the same.

Steve’s not broken, he reassures himself.

It’s all Nancy’s fault.

Billy’s a disaster around Steve, always so flustered even if Steve’s stopped smiling. Because when he asks, he smiles. Tight lipped and clenched jaw and everything.

It’s not good enough.

It’s all Nancy’s fault.

Billy’s weak in the knees and completely vulnerable and bare with Steve, lets himself get used even if he’s the one begging Steve to use him. Even if he’s the one who gets the most out of it nowadays.

It’s all stupid, but he’s addicted, his brain doesn’t work when he gets to cuddle with his soulmate and when his dad’s finally gone from a little car accident with a malfunctioning engine, Billy’s completely free and ready to wake up to Steve’s gorgeous face every day.

The whole thing went further than he originally planned. But that’s not his fault, it’s Nancy’s.

But it all crashes down, and his dark bruises from his father’s past treatments are all the more prominent when he walks into Steve’s room to find a husk of a man with a crushed windpipe from the pressure of a rope.

It’s all Nancy’s fault.

When he bites his tongue, he realizes he’s got his lips on the cold chapped ones of Steve’s and tastes far more cherry drops than he should. Is he the snake? Is he the venom?

It’s all his fault.

#stranger things #stranger things fic #stranger things billy #stranger things steve #billy hargrove #steve harrington #harringrove #bad ending #my fic #fanfic #i'm so sorry

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linskywords · 5 years

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1M Words Week: 1 of 7

Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6 | Day 7

As promised, in celebration of my hitting 1M words on AO3 (possibly...tomorrow??!!??), I’m doing a week of opening snippets of stories I started at some point and haven’t finished yet. Hopefully I’ll end up writing most of these in the next million words. ☺️

This one is a Bennguin story in the timerverse (cf my 1988 timer story), where people get timers on their wrists that count down to the day they’ll meet their soulmate. The timers beep when you and your soulmate finally meet. I started this one, oh, three years ago at least, and would love to finish it someday. Read it after the cut!

Jamie celebrates his stag night alone in a hotel room in Ottawa.

“I still can’t believe you’re doing this to me,” Jordie says over Skype. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy you’re an all-star, but this is a travesty.”

“You could have gone to Vegas without me,” Jamie says mildly.

“So not the point,” Jordie says. “It’s the one stag night I get to throw for my little brother. The one. The only. And you’re alone in a well-lit room.”

“It’s not that bad,” Jamie says, because the hotel rooms in Ottawa are pretty nice, actually, and his roommate hasn’t arrived yet. “Beats lying in bed recovering from an appendectomy.”

“Travesty,” Jordie repeats, and looks at his watch. Jamie doesn’t need to look at a watch to see how long it is until midnight: he can see it on the timer on his arm, counting down from eight minutes and forty-one seconds. Just under nine minutes until the start of his timer day.

“What d’you think she’ll be like?” he asks Jordie.

“Brunette,” Jordie says right away. “Medium-tall. Spunky.”

Jamie furrows his brow. “Should I be concerned that you’ve thought this much about it?”

Jordie waves a hand. “Please. You totally have a type.”

“Do not,” Jamie says, though yeah, his last three regular hookups have totally fit that description. Six minutes and fifty-four seconds.

“We could be in a bar right now,” Jordie grumbles. “There could be women kissing you. Dozens of them. All the women with unzeroed timers, Chubbs. And instead you had to be an all-star.”

The bar thing actually sounds awful to Jamie. There were lots of reasons to be excited about being invited to the All-Star Game, and not having a normal stag party was not in the top five, but—and he’ll never tell this to Jordie—it might be in the top ten. The idea of dozens of women kissing him, one after the other until they all blur together, just sounds awkward and invasive.

“And you’re very proud of me, right?” he says to Jordie.

“Fuck this,” Jordie says. “I’m getting the champagne.”

Jamie doesn’t have any champagne. He sits back and watches Jordie struggle with the cork, which is better entertainment than most of the stag parties he’s been to.

Three minutes and fifteen seconds. He knows nothing is going to happen right at midnight—there’s no one here for him to meet, for one thing—but his stomach is bubbling about as much as the champagne in the bottle Jordie still hasn’t opened. As soon as the clock ticks over to midnight, it’s the day. It could happen at any time. Anyone he sees.

He wonders what it’ll be like: looking at his soulmate for the first time. What she’ll think. What if—when she looks at him and realizes she has to spend the rest of her life with him—what if she thinks—

The cork pops off the champagne, finally, and Jordie even manages to get most of the foam into a cup. “Well,” he says. “This isn’t the stag night I started planning when you were sixteen. But at least there’s champagne.”

“I don’t have champagne,” Jamie says.

The look Jordie levels at him says that that’s no one’s fault but his.

Jamie hesitates. “Jordie,” he says, and then thinks better of it.

Jordie waits for him to go on, then heaves a sigh. “Get on with it. I know what you’re like when you have something you want to get out, and you only have one minute and thirty-nine seconds left as an unzeroed person.”

“When soulmates look at each other, they always like each other, right?”

“Probably not,” Jordie says, and just when Jamie’s considering a panic attack, he adds, “but that’s not going to happen to you, because you’re not an asshole or ugly or an acquired taste in any way, so stop worrying about it and enjoy the countdown, okay?”

It doesn’t seem like a countdown is a thing that it’s possible to enjoy. Jamie watches the timer tick over from eleven seconds to ten, starts counting along with it (“Out loud, Jamie, come on, I don’t have your timer here in front of me”), ten, nine, eight (what if she hates him), seven, six (what if his timer goes off and no one else’s does and his is the one timer in the world that’s broken), five, four, three (it’s probably someone really old, like ninety, or someone horrible who’s mean to him or maybe it’s a criminal or a murderer or someone dying of a fatal disease, oh God), two, one—

Zero.

Jamie stares at his zeroed out timer and feels wound a hundred times tighter than he was before, as pumped with adrenaline as he would be if they were nineteen minutes into the third period and one point down.

“Well,” Jordie says, draining his glass of champagne, “any minute now, little brother.”

***

If Jamie expected to be able to sleep after that, he was clearly a very deluded person.

He lies awake for about two hours, practically vibrating, and then he gets up and throws on a pair of pants and a shirt and goes out into the hallway. The farther he steps away from his room, the more on-edge he feels—because in there, yeah, it was his timer day, but it was theoretical. Out here, it could actually happen. He could meet anyone, any second.

He doesn’t meet anyone. The halls are empty, except for one woman with a maid’s cart, and Jamie’s heart rate goes through the roof for a split second before it’s clear that neither of their timers are beeping.

After half an hour or so of not seeing anyone else, he goes back to his room, and this time he must finally be tired enough, because he actually falls asleep.

***

The next morning feels normal for about two and a half seconds before his mind wakes up and screams TIMER DAY TIMER DAY TIMER DAY at him, and then it’s all he can do to stumble out of bed and pull on clothing.

It’ll be okay, he tells himself as he pockets his keycard and goes down to breakfast. Your soulmate is supposed to be the person in the world who loves you most and is best suited to spend her life with you, so no matter what fantasies his mind was spinning last night, there’s not much chance of it actually being someone horrible. Or someone in her nineties. And he’s never heard of a malfunctioning timer. That was just silly.

There’s a continental breakfast, but a lot of the players are flying in this morning, so the dining room is still sparse. Jamie’s really really jumpy, because there are other people in the room now, and any of them could be it—but his timer stays quiet.

He ends up sitting with, of all people, John Tavares and Phil Kessel, and there’s not a lot of conversation. They talk about where they’re from, and Tavares asks polite questions about the Leafs, which is nice because Jamie doesn’t have to talk much. He makes his escape as soon as he can.

He doesn’t know why people look forward to their timer day. It’s torture, really, walking around and waiting for it. This would be the good thing about having gone to Vegas with Jordie: at least he’d be hungover right now and surrounded by teammates, probably sleeping till noon and then going out to breakfast en masse. There’d be a cushion between him and the world. He wouldn’t be wandering around a hotel waiting for someone to turn a corner.

On the other hand, he wouldn’t be an all-star.

His gut is still sore from the surgery a couple of weeks ago and he hasn’t gotten back to his regular workout schedule, so he goes to the hotel gym and tests himself on the weight machines. It would be pretty easy to overdo it and hurt himself, but he has both the trainer’s voice and Jordie’s in the back of his head telling him not to be an idiot, and he doesn’t. But he does let himself zone out, and for fifteen or twenty minutes he’s able to forget why he’s tense.

The hotel is more crowded when he emerges from the gym. More of the players are getting here, and Jamie walks through the lobby and smiles and nods at these players who he knows mostly as famous faces and sometimes as dangerous opponents. It’s so weird to think he’s one of them now. He’s always thought of himself as sort of middle of the pack—good enough to be in the NHL, maybe, but middle or bottom of middle once he got there, someone who works hard but who doesn’t have the natural advantages of these guys. And yet here he is. He almost wants to sneak away before someone spots him and notices that he doesn’t belong.

They have half an hour before lunch, so he goes up to his room to change. If he’s not impressing these guys now, he really won’t when he shows up at lunch in his gym shorts and tank top. He takes a quick shower and maybe spends longer on his hair than usual. But it’s not because—he’s not worried about impressing his soulmate. He wants her to see the real him. Just…maybe the real him with the best hair possible.

He leaves his room a little later than he should, hurries down the hall and around the corner, and almost runs smack into a woman.

Wow. He stops and stares at her, because she’s gorgeous, really dark hair and dark eyes and sweet creamy skin. Her eyes widen when he comes round the corner, and for a second he thinks, yes—but there’s no beeping. The timer on his wrist is silent.

“Sorry,” he says, and moves past her to go downstairs.

Get it together, he tells himself, because he really can’t assume that he’ll end up with someone like that. That’s a recipe for disaster. His soulmate has to want him, too, obviously, and so she’ll probably be someone more in his league. He just has to wait and—and go to lunch, because he’s really late now.

***

It doesn’t seem to matter that he’s late, once he goes in: all the guys are just milling around, loading up plates from the buffet and starting to sit down at the little round tables. Jamie grabs a plate and sidles up to the buffet. It’s a little awkward, not knowing anyone in the room. He nods at Marian Hossa and one of the Sedins—he’s not sure which—and accepts a serving spoon from Geno Malkin, who he’s not even sure speaks English. But Geno smiles at him, and so does everyone else, and it’s okay. He’s here for hockey, and he knows how to handle being the new guy in the room. This is the easy part of the day.

He’s scooping green beans onto his plate when he hears the beeping.

For a second he freezes. Then he looks up to find the serving staff—because that makes sense; they’re the only women in this whole room full of men. But there aren’t very many of them, and the two he sees behind the buffet don’t look like they’re searching for their timer person. And the beeping is still going on.

The whole room has fallen silent around him. Everyone’s staring at him, and Jamie feels himself flush. What if—timers aren’t supposed to malfunction, but—

But no, there are definitely two sets of beeps. He turns and follows the sound. It seems kind of far away—maybe across the room, and he moves forward. People step back to let him pass. A big knot of people part at the far side of the room, standing back to reveal—

Zdeno Chara, standing next to a young guy from Boston, the one who’s only in his second year.

Tyler Seguin.

Jamie takes one look at his face and thinks, wow, and for a second that’s all he can see. Then he remembers all the people staring at him, sees the way Tyler’s eyes are round in his face. Hears the silence in the room.

This can’t be real.

A blush rises to Jamie’s face. Tyler’s—well, he’s kind of ridiculously good-looking, but right now he looks nothing short of horrified.

“Um,” someone says off to the side, “did that just happen?” And everyone’s talking now, a low murmur running through the room. Everyone except Tyler and Jamie.

Someone clears his throat above the noise. It’s Chara, the Boston captain. “Obviously, we’d appreciate all of your discretion on this,” he says, voice sounding a little rough. Tyler nods fervently, and Jamie feels like his face is going to burn off.

“I’d better go,” he says, mumbling so that probably no one can even hear him, and he turns and speeds from the room, still holding his stupid plate of chicken.

#but what happens next??#i guess i'll have to write it to find out #1m words week #bennguin #hockey rpf

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cipheramnesia · 1 year

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Just me and my burn scars.

#cipheramnesia #queer #disaster brunette with resting murder face

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daniellelarusso · 5 years

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No Time For Us - Parksborn fic

Happy birthday @lorvstyrell. I love you! I wrote this in less than 24 hours (but thanks to my phone it isn’t posting til today), but I hope you like it anyway!

This is a mix of verses, with no real point of canon. I just took things from a variety of versions of the two and hoped it worked out to be perfectly honest.

There is no feeling like slowly losing yourself to something in your head, to coming undone and knowing it with no way of stopping it. It was mostly due to this feeling that Harry Osborn had picked up drinking the way he had. There was nothing else to get him through the day.

And since he had found out that Spiderman, who he had been obsessing over for so long that it had become all consuming, was his best friend, he hadn't stopped drinking. Perched on the kitchen counter, Harry refilled his glass of scotch and took a long drink, dark eyes fixated on one spot on the wall across from him. The anger inside of his chest, that had been inside of his chest for months, felt foreign. As if it was someone else's. Perhaps it was because the person he had wanted dead was suddenly Peter fucking Parker, the only person who had ever seen him as enough.

Yet, the knowledge did nothing to quell his rage, to calm him or to make him forgive. It did nothing to halt the ever growing madness inside of him. Instead, his brain felt on fire. Everything was worse, stronger, angrier, crazier. The closest thing he could get to calm was detached. It was like it was someone else’s life, someone else’s best friend.

This was his fault. He wouldn't have known at all if he hadn't used his father's resources to release Doc Ock to bring him Spiderman. Bring him to me and you're free. And when the supervillain brought Spiderman to him and Harry unmasked him… It was an indescribable feeling that had easily been the worst of his existence. His shock had been what led to Peter leaving to find and stop Doc Ock, as Harry hadn't been able to stop him, hadn’t even been able to voice anything but Pete’s name. And then Harry had started to drink.

Hours later, however, Harry had stopped (honestly, only because he had sat in his living room and found time passing without noticing at all) and was nearly sober when the curtains started flapping from a rush of movement. It wasn't wind, he could tell that quickly. Which meant it could only be one fucking thing. He turned quickly, spotting Spiderman standing against the wall opposite said window. They stared at each other for a moment before the masked “hero” collapsed in a heap on the floor.

Part of Harry said good, and wanted to leave him. Wanted to walk away and make another drink while he watched him struggle. And it was in those moments of rage that Harry realized that Peter was bleeding profusely from his abdomen, that he could possibly die. Let him die on the carpet. Watch him struggle for breath until he gives up, whispered Norman's voice in his head.

But he couldn't ignore the memories in his brain. Sneaking their first beers on his roof, talking about girls even when Harry had only wanted the boy in front of him, sitting outside Peter's room for a whole day after Uncle Ben was shot until Pete finally let him inside. Whatever Spiderman had done, it was still his Pete in that goddamn suit. Isn’t it?

He didn't remember making a decision, but the next thing he knew he was kneeling on the ground by the man in a heap on his floor

Harry removed the mask, almost tentatively, still finding himself somehow surprised at who was underneath the mask. His eyes went over his friend's exhausted and sweaty face, and then down his body and over the bleeding wounds. “Fucking hell, Pete.”

“Didn't know… where to go,” the brown haired man murmured under his breath, and, even as Harry wanted to not care, the weakness in his voice hurt.

“Get out of the suit,” Harry said stiffly. If he was going to help him, he sure as hell didn't want to do it when he was dressed as him.

He watched as Pete got to his feet slowly, swaying a little as he stood as if he might fall. Good. Let him, he could hear Norman’s voice whispering. But hat was only one part of Harry, and the rest of him, the parts of him that had gotten his own ass kicked to keep Peter safe from bullies, felt differently. Groaning and grumbling to himself, he got to his own feet and slid an arm around the waist of Peter, ignoring the furious yelling in his head. As usual, his own eyes meeting Peter’s was enough to drown his father out (mostly). But it didn’t take long for his eyes to register the suit on Peter’s body and he pressed his chapped lips together in a thin line. Harry despised the suit he was touching, hated who was under it almost as much as he loved him.

“You killed my father.” Harry's voice was flat, empty, not at all accusing. He stated it like the fact that it was, not anything else.

Peter only groaned. “You don't know…”

“Oh, shut up or I’ll let you die.”

It was an empty threat, and they both knew it, but Peter shut up none the less. The walk to his bedroom was long, longer than it had ever felt. And it wasn't until they reached his bed and he set Peter on it that he realized he probably should have left him where he was and helped from there since he didn't know just how bad it actually was. But it was too late now. Dumb as it was, he'd moved him.

Following Peter's instructions, Harry proceeded to help him pull the stupid suit off until they reached a point where Peter could get the rest off himself. Watching him pull it off his legs and then toss it to the ground, Harry let his eyes rake over his nearly naked form, to check his wounds of course. There was a deep cut across his stomach, along with several lighter, though not shallow, cuts over the rest of his chest. The chest that Harry had seen a thousand times, getting dressed for gym, or changing after food had spilled on his T-shirt. His brows furrowed as he looked over him again.

“How didn't I know?” he finally whispered. Even with as well as he knew Peter; every line in his body, his lanky shape, his voice and all of its tones, his brown eyes, his smile, he had had no idea at all who he was. He'd obsessed, deeply, over Spiderman for years, and he had still not made any connection. Hardly surprising. You never were one for noticing anything of any importance, came the ever present voice of his father, bringing Harry to squeeze his eyes shut for a matter of seconds while he tried to push it away.

When his eyes reopened, Pete was looking at him. Pain was written over his face, and Harry couldn’t tell if it was from his wounds or the disaster between the two of them. “No one does. And.. Harry, it has to stay that way. No one can know.” A favor. He hadn’t even started cleaning him up and he was already asking a goddamn favor. He was starting to see the resemblance between Spiderman and Peter Parker,

Harry’s eyes hardened instantly as he got to his feet. “Don't tell me what to do,” he said as coldly as he could possibly manage. “You're lucky I’m not letting you bleed out on the floor.” As he turned to get supplies, he could have sworn he saw Peter wince at the words. Good, he thought bitterly, unsure what he was even angriest about. Oh, he hated Spiderman for killing his father, and he hadn't figured out yet if that spread to Peter or not; but that aside Pete had also lied to him for years about this, about something that had started as just being important to Peter but had quickly spread to Harry when his father had been murdered. And those lies had led him down this path, down the path of finishing almost an entire bottle of whiskey just to sleep, of talking to himself and his dead father several times a day, of obsessing over catching Spiderman. Overall, it now seemed that Peter had set him on the path of losing his mind.

Shouldering his way into the bathroom, Harry grabbed every bit of first aid he could find. What are you doing son? He killed me, your own father. And you're helping him? You should be driving a knife further in that wound. You disloyal little rat. Kill him. Or are you too weak to manage that? Another thing Peter’s better at than you- killing. His hand was gripping the edge of the sink, ragged breaths coming from him as he tried to ignore his father's fury. He ran the same sentence through his head again and again before finally whispering it out loud. “You aren't here.” You were never here as far as I was concerned. Peter was.

He slammed the cabinet closed and went back to the bedroom, kneeling down in front of Pete. His eyes raked over him again, taking in the damage (and maybe a little bit of the lean muscle of Peter’s chest). “So Doc Ock did all this? You must have been distracted. Or you just fucking suck.” Once upon of time, that would have been a joke and he would have looked up with a wolfish grin and Peter would have affectionately rolled his eyes. But things weren’t simple anymore, and it was something bordering on sardonic contempt in Harry’s voice instead of jest.

He could tell Peter was annoyed without looking up, even before he spoke, “Yeah, gosh, I wonder what distracted me. Not my best friend wanting to kill me right before I had to go stop Doc Ock from destroying the city. So, gee, what does that leave?” If he wasn't so pissed off himself, Harry would have cracked a smile at the very least. He had always thought Peter was cute when he was annoyed. He got all antsy, and that got him going on his rambles. But Pete wasn’t rambling, and Harry wasn’t fucking with him. So instead, he bit back the first retort that popped in his head, focusing on pouring the alcohol on a rag.

“Thought heroes were above getting distracted.”

“Thought you didn't consider me a hero.”

Harry cast an irritated glance up at Peter then, only to be met with the brunette's own sour look in return. In the golden days, this banter would have been mixed up with laughs and playful shoves. But they hadn't been themselves in a long time. Between Harry’s growing obsession and desperation to know the identity of the so claimed superhero, he had been distant and angry, particularly with Peter. And the deeper in his obsession that he got, the more distant Peter got in return. That made even more sense now. Before, Harry had assumed that it was Peter protecting the masked murderer, which he supposed was a little true at least. Just not how he had thought.

“Trust me,” Harry muttered darkly, eyes flicking back to the wound before him, “I don't.” He pressed the rag, now soaked in alcohol, to the deep cut and he would have been lying if he said that he didn't get any satisfaction from the hiss of discomfort from Pete. The satisfaction didn't last long, unfortunately, instead replacing with bitter concern. “Didn't know he'd do this much damage to you. How'd he do it?” He was careful to keep his vice as flat as it could be, to not let any worry he might have creep in.

“Looking for tips?” Peter grumbled before hissing again as Harry pressed the rag to another part of the cut, his fist tightening on Harry's black sheets. The sight of it got an immediate internal reaction, as if Harry had been shocked by something electrical, and it caused the muscles in his gut to tighten and constrict. Clearing his throat, trying to ignore how dry it sounded as he worked to refocus himself on the task at hand. After a period of silence, Pete sighed and finally answered, “Shards of glass he grabbed. Hard to dodge that many arms.”

“Glass?” Harry asked skeptically.

“Yeah, a big piece,” Peter snapped back defensively. “It was basically a window.”

“That what you killed my dad with? A window?” he asked in a low tone, eyes darkening, though he didn’t dare to lift them to look at the man in front of him. He didn’t need to, he could feel the shift in Peter without seeing him or hearing his voice. It was immediate, like Pete had only just remembered why Harry was angry at all. And that did nothing except pour gasoline on the fire of rage in his brain.

Who was he to get to forget? To not live with it every goddamn day, to not have Norman whispering in his ear about it constantly? Peter got to go about his life, got to forget about it. Harry didn’t, and he was never going to be able to. Instead, he was left to obsess and turn the details over in his mind when he should be sleeping.

“Harry-”

“I forgot water. To clean the rag,” he said quietly, abruptly standing and walking into the bathroom again. He pulled a bucket from underneath the sink and set it in the tub to fill with water, sitting on the edge himself while it did. His head fell into his hands easily, his fingers rubbing through his auburn hair as if he could massage away the anger by doing it. It wasn't that easy, of course. If it was, he probably would have worked through all of this long ago. Osborns don’t help the enemy. “He’s not my enemy,” he croaked finally, feeling the lines of his face crease with stress against his hand.He hoped to God it could stay that way, that he wouldn’t continue down this path knowing the true identity of Spiderman. He sat there, unmoving for several minutes, ignoring the sound of the water rushing over the edge of the bucket. The sound of his name was the only thing to pull him from the dark thoughts swirling in his mind.

“Harry,” rasped a tired, weak voice from the doorway. Head shooting up, Harry turned to see Peter standing (well, more like leaning) in the doorway. Despite trying his utmost, Harry's eyes moved swiftly over the other's form, taking in the lean muscles that hadn't been there before Spiderman. Another reminder that he should have known, yet it did nothing to ease the desire in his chest. “It's not… what you think.”

“I think,” Harry said in a tired voice, “that you have a death wish.” He turned off the water and got to his feet, gently leading Peter to the toilet, sitting him on it carefully. “But this'll work better anyway,” he said quietly. “Stay here Pete.” He ignored the brunette's quiet but stubborn protest as he moved to the other room and swiftly grabbed the things he needed, slightly annoyed at having to do this all over again. He returned to Peter anyway, setting down the things on the floor as he sat on the edge of the tub, scooting closer to his oldest friend. “Okay. Trying this again then.”

Peter watched quietly as Harry wet a new rag with alcohol again and pressed it to the wound. At the sharp intake of breath from his friend, Harry looked up at him, eyes apologetic this time, and the sad look Peter gave him told him that he understood, that he was under no impression that Harry was sorry for anything more than the stinging of the alcohol or maybe his part in Doc Ock's return. It was a long silence without anyone speaking, just with Harry cleaning out the wound and Peter occasionally making a small sound. He couldn't help but wonder what the other man was thinking about, if it was about Harry's dad or Harry knowing his precious secret or…

Harry, on the other hand, kept thinking that he had always thought that when he was finally this close to Peter's bare chest (let alone nearly naked body in general) it would be for a completely different reason than this. It was these thoughts that led to the silence becoming suffocating, unbearable.

“You're an idiot,” Harry said quietly. “So fucking stupid.” He wasn't sure what had brought it out of his mouth, but it was fueled by many things. One, Peter never once over the years picked up on the evident and blatant torch Harry had always carried for him, unfair as that one might be. Two, Pete was stupid enough to become something like Spiderman- as if he wasn't signing up to be hunted down and nearly killed again and again by doing this. Three, lying to Harry and not telling him everything immediately. Four, not saying anything as Harry obsessed and searched for Spiderman. Five, nearly getting himself killed tonight. Six, showing up here of all places after the fact.

Peter looked up, his brows furrowing in confusion as he stared at him. He opened his mouth and then closed it again, his fingers drumming on his bare thigh. “Okay,” he said finally. “Go on.”

“No, that's it,” Harry said flippantly as he tossed the rag in the bathtub, grabbing a bandage instead. He stayed quiet for a few more beats before losing his self control. “You shouldn't have come back here tonight. I could have killed you.”

Brown eyes stared back at him as he spoke, and Harry found himself forcing his gaze away uncomfortable, turning his attention back to the bandage instead. “No. You couldn't have.”

Harry swallowed thickly, not moving even though he still had to finish. “You don’t know what I'm capable of, Pete,” he ventured quietly, his voice quaking just slightly on the words. After all, how could he know when Harry didn't even have an idea himself?

“I do,” Pete said finally, voice nothing above a whisper. “And it's not that.”

You're wrong, Harry wanted to say, but he couldn't. Part of him didn’t want Peter to understand how bad he had gotten, how angry and even violent, how unhinged. But it didn’t matter because he was suddenly too distracted by the hand coming to the side of his face, tilting it up again. And then, the rest of the world melted away, even Spiderman and Norman Osborn. They were both erased from his mind because his best friend's face was mere inches from his and he couldn't even breathe. Peter leaned closer then, his lips briefly touching Harry's before pulling away a little bit, his eyes opening as he looked at him, brown eyes searching, asking. Harry didn't think, didn't pause. He just lurched in and kissed Peter with everything he had. Peter responded instantly, bringing a soft sound that he couldn't even name from the back of Harry’s throat.

Harry moved a little, readjusting on the edge of the tub to get closer, a hand coming to rest on Peter's thigh and feeling something in him jump as he felt the bare skin. And then the sexiest sound Harry had ever heard came from Pete’s own mouth, something between a sigh and a moan, and he squeezed lightly, prompting more of it. The hunger in the pit of his stomach grew, prompting him to gently brush his tongue over Peter's lips. Peter opened his mouth for him, met his tongue with his own, and Harry was filled with the overwhelming feeling that they should use been doing this the whole time. They should have always been…

But they hadn't. And things weren't simple anymore.

Harry forced himself to pull away from the kiss, his eyes focusing on a spot on the bathroom floor. “Pete…” The words wouldn't come, and he didn't even have a clue what they were supposed to be. “I need to bandage your wound. We're almost done.” Peter closed his eyes, his head hanging just a little for a moment until he nodded and looked up at him.

Pushing himself further back on the edge of the bathtub, Harry unwrapped the bandage and pressed it to the wound before wrapping gauze around it. When he was done with that, he finished it with medical tape. He wet his lips as he leaned back a little. “So… There.”

“Yeah… Thanks.” Peter wet his lips before leaning forward again. “Harry…” It was clear that he was struggling to find the words, something Harry certainly understood. He let out a small, frustrated noise and Harry knew he was settling for something different. Because he knew him. But then the words he did say were all fucking wrong. “I just... I don’t want us to change. Not from...” His voice shook a little when he continued, “Not from Spiderman.”

A cruel scoff fell from Harry’s lips, his eyes darting away quickly as a sneer transformed his lips. To be fair to Pete, he had always thought that when their friendship changed it would be because they had kissed or had sex or... Or were dating. Not because of all of this. “Yeah, well. We don’t get what we want, Pete.”

“We can.” Peter’s voice was soft, urging, and it prompted Harry to look at him, eyes guarded and angry. No, they couldn’t. Peter was naive, he always had been. He saw a world that didn’t exist, people as they wanted to be or should have been or could be. He didn’t live in the real world and it had always felt endearing, like he needed to be protected. But right now all Harry wanted was to hit him. “You're not your dad.”

Harry stood abruptly, eyes hardening even further as he looked at the man before him. “Yeah, well. You know the way out then.” His tone mirrored one he had gotten from Norman again and again, one that stated clearly that the conversation was over, that he was done. He walked back into his bedroom, not even sure why the hell that comment had shoved him over the edge. Norman had never been dad of the year, Harry himself had always complained about him profusely. So being told he wasn't Norman should have been something good.

“Harry.” He didn't have to turn around to know that Peter was following him. He knew him better than he knew himself. Or so he'd thought yesterday, today he wasn’t that sure. “I just meant… I mean-” He stopped talking, made an irritated noise and then tried again, “You're better.”

Harry pressed his lips together and turned around, eyes flashing dangerously. “So you won't impale and leave me then, hm?”

“I told you, you don't know the whole-”

“Then tell me!” Harry roared finally. He set his jaw, eyes virtually begging his old friend to tell him the truth, to vindicate himself. “Tell me if I don't know!” Multiple times, it had seemed like Peter would have, had Harry not interrupted him. But he knew better, knew Pete better. He wasn’t going to tell him anything and whatever reason he thought was so important would be the end of them as they once were.

Peter readjusted, taking in an obviously pained breath as he wet his lips, gaze overwhelmingly sad. “I can't.”

“But you didn't kill him,” Harry repeated flatly.

“No.”

“Can you look me in the eyes and tell me that?” He stepped forward, desperate for this to be over, for them to be able to move past it. “Look me in the eyes and tell me you didn't kill him.”

Peter looked down, closing his eyes as he let out a breath and Harry already knew what his answer would be. His heart sank in his chest as Peter looked back up and his eyes were wet. He shook his head, voice breaking as he said, “I can't, Harry. I- I can’t.”

Harry looked down and nodded. “Yeah. I know. I figured. Well, until you can… I won't be able to let this go, Pete. I can’t. And if this was reversed, if you thought I had shot Ben... You wouldn’t either.”

“I know.” Peter took a shaky breath before clearing his throat and saying, “Maybe I should go then.” Harry nodded wordlessly, afraid to look at Pete for fear that he might ask him to stay. He couldn’t do that, as much as it pained him to recognize the fact. They were at a crossroads, and it was too late. Too many years, too many secrets, too much hurt. They missed their chance - and that might have been the part that burned the worst.

Yet when he heard Peter cross the room and pick up that goddamn suit, Harry couldn't help it. He looked back at him and met Peter's watery eyes with his own. There had been a lot of lies, secrets, pain. But Harry also remembered playing together as children, remembered Peter crying to him when his parents left, remembered growing older and first noticing how goddamn good Peter's hair looked. He could easily look back on the first time he wanted to kiss Peter, really kiss Peter -like a real grown up kiss. They had been 13, he had just seen an older kid shove Peter to the ground and he had felt like a hero going in there and standing up for him. And he'd sat on the ground beside him and talked to him about how much better he was than any of these stupid kids. Peter had looked at him with a look of such admiration, even love, and Harry had realized then and there what Peter meant to him, and so he had always wanted to keep him safe. And now he couldn't even keep him safe from himself. But Peter made him want to try, he had always made him want to try.

Oh, goddamn it.

Harry walked across the room to Peter, who immediately dropped the stupid suit, and one of his hands fisted into Harry’s shirt while the other cupped his jaw, and Harry cupped Peter’s face in his hands, pressing his lips to his with an intensity he had never kissed anyone with before. Peter let out a sigh against his lips, moving the hand from Harry’s jaw to his auburn curls and twisting his fingers in it. Harry could feel his heart pounding in his chest as he dropped his own hands then, one exploring Pete's chest while the other tightened around his thin body.

This was never going to work. They both knew it, it was clear. There was too much and they'd waited too long. But damnit if they didn't have tonight.

#parksborn #peter parker #harry osborn #spiderman #parksborn fic #mine #lorvstyrell #happy birthday babe <3

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justalosersdiaryofmisery-blog · 5 years

Text

A Necessarily Sober Night’s Ramblings

I’m sitting here in my bed, writing on a shitty, hundred dollar netbook that rests on a book thicker than my fist to prevent overheating. The floor of my room is covered in a disgusting salad of dirty laundry, trash, and books, all sprinkled with a frustrating amount of cat litter from the box a few feet to my right. A space heater with more personal space than anything else in the place keeps me warm in the mornings and nights, and the fan that’s blowing my hair at the moment keeps me cool during the afternoon and whenever else I’ve been drinking.

I’ve got Altered Carbon playing beside my word processor; just started watching it. It’s impossible for me to focus on any one thing, so its there just to keep the excess ‘brain energy’ or what have you busy while I try and write this all out. All this nonsense. The lamp resting on my nightstand, which is currently sitting in the midst of the chaotic disaster that is my floor rather than being pressed up against a wall, is annoying but helps keep the anxiety down a bit.

The anxiety is still drumming my heart and shaking my hands, but it would be worse in the dark. I enjoy knowing what’s surrounding me. If I turn off the light, I can only assume what rests in the darkness. I don’t think there’s any monsters hiding beneath my bed amidst the beer cans and paper plates, I’m not a child. But there’s knowing, and then there’s knowing. When the light is gone, the whole world becomes Schrodinger's fun house.

Plus, if I turn out the lights, the odds I step on a sharp piece of aluminum on my way to the bathroom magnify ten fold. Foot lacerations are the fucking worst. Slicing your palm isn’t that bad because you don’t always have to have your dick in your hand. Plus, for the most part, your always aware of the palms of your hands. You forget the bottoms of your feet, and the trail of blood you leave behind is a bitch and a half to clean up.

Not that I’d clean it from my own carpeted floor, but there’s certain expectations for the world outside the stained and battered walls of my bedroom. Smiles required, pleasantries demanded; it’s a whole other ball game out there. That’s not some dramatic piece of speculation either. When I was a child my parents threatened to beat the frowns from my face and decried my silent coming and goings as disrespectful disobedience. Now that I am a man in age and burden if not status however, I am free to move more freely. The habits have already taken root though.

Despite my already volcanic anxieties simmering and sizzling beneath my flesh, I’m having another energy drink, my third of the day. I went to the store earlier for something fizzy and calorie free to drink, and despite knowing I must be wary of caffeine, I was swayed by a little sticker promising ‘3 for $5!’. It’s a rare moment that I’m without thirst, but unless I have sweat through my clothes in exhaustion (an even rarer moment) or am exceptionally hung over, drinking water gives me heartburn.

It’s a touch allegorical, really. Water, that most basic material of life, burns the ever living shit out of my throat.

People don’t take caffeine seriously enough. It’s just like any other drug, if a bit milder. At first it puts a bounce in my step, then in a few minutes my mind will be racing with dark thoughts and fears, and if I go without it for too long my head feels like someone is taking an ice pick to the top of my skull. Sometimes the initial jauntiness is worth it though. That ‘sometimes’ keeps me coming back.

There it is. Reading this back, you won’t remember the pauses between sentences, the distraction filled minutes as Altered Carbon takes priority over writing between paragraphs. I say that so it won’t feel quite so jarring when I say that anxiety is carving a butcher’s knife through my gut and up my sternum after just mentioning the jauntiness caffeine can bring.

Anxiety and just a hint of anger are filling me. Thinking on it now, and exploring this idea for the first time (though I’ve brushed against it like a virgin schoolboy ‘accidentally’ bumping into a pretty girl before), I’m realizing there’s always anger somewhere in this stack of flesh. Anger I was bred into, that was taught to me, beat into me. It’s always there. Just, I keep it buried away and hidden. Once, I did that so that I wouldn’t get in trouble, so that I would be safe. Now I do it so that the people around me will be happier.

The only people I’ve ever intentionally physically hurt are my male family members. My younger brother, in adolescent rage reminiscent of my father’s, has been strangled, punched, thrown, and kicked. It was never unprovoked, but always unearned given the severity. I never bruised or truly damaged him, but still. Trauma is trauma. The words I spewed at him were instinctively and specifically chosen to hurt him, to damage him. It’s left me with a quandary similar to that of the chicken and the egg. Did his little man complex come from my infrequent but scarring abuse, or were the assaults unleashed by his constant needling and provocations?

Then there’s my father. Him I tried to kill once. He was drunk, and violent. He was roaring and screeching with anger at my mother, worse than normal. I went to figure out what the fuck was going on, he put his hands on me, and I snapped. I threw him to the ground, and amidst his punches and slaps and scratches I began to choke him. Tears and spit pouring from my face I bared my fangs and produced more animalistic sounds than actual speech.

My mother was futilely trying to pull me off, begging me to stop. I didn’t care. I was beyond reason at that point, my id was in full control. Like a flare in a moonless night however, a thought brought me to a stop. I had my second day of work at a new job the next day, and couldn’t afford to spend at least the night and next day in jail for murder. That lone, paragonal thought amidst a sea of frothing rage was all that saved my father’s life.

Other than those two examples however, I’ve never allowed myself to be a violent person. Or rather, I’ve never had the courage for it. I get the fight or flight shakes just from passing a slow moving vehicle, let alone a face to face confrontation. I wonder if that’s who I am, or who I was made to be.

My first girlfriend, who could technically be called my ex-fiancee if you don’t dismiss a six month, hormone-fueled, teenage puppy love engagement, was victim to some verbal abuse throughout the two or so years we spent together. She was a piece of work herself though, and although I cringe to think back on my words and feelings back then, I don’t think less of the man I am today for them. I see it as character growth. She cheated on me, lied to me, and was certifiably crazy herself. She and I have both come a long way since then though, and I’ve learned to be a better man based on the awful example I set for myself.

I say we’ve both come a long way, but in reality, she’s got a college degree and is dating a successful musician while working for a governor. I’ve got a GED, am entirely alone, and as of the end of March jobless. There was a brief spike in my life a little over a year ago. I only weighed one-hundred and sixty pounds, I was on the second rung of the company I worked for’s ladder, I had a girlfriend, I was happy. That’s all long gone now though.

See, even though I hunt for zero calorie sodas and energy drinks, I still eat too much food. I drink too much alcohol. I lay around in bed like a fucking pile of ooze. I was going to call myself a slug, but even those invertebrates get more exercise than I do. I probably weigh Two-ten by now. Two-fifteen maybe. I’m sure if I were sitting on a scale right now it’d read in the two-twenties, between my clothes, belly full of spaghetti sauce-drenched pizza, and general fat ass.

As of today I’m twenty-two years old, five-eight in the morning and in shoes, with short brunette hair and just the one tattoo, a coyote on my left arm. My upper right arm and my left ‘tit’ are covered in scars. I have a handful spread over the rest of my skin; faded ones all across my legs, one across my stomach, one on my right ‘tit’, three partially faded bands on my right forearm. All self-inflicted, obviously. I have a small patch of fur all across my chin that struggles to reach the center of my lower lip, stubble spreading back from it towards my throat, and a curled moustache above my mouth.

I fucking hate when television shows have non-English parts. It prevents me from being able to just spend the extra ‘brain energy’ on them, and instead I have to divert more of my direct attention to follow along.

Sometimes I want to carve out my own eye. Even though my left eye is (diagnosedly so) the weaker of the two, whenever I envision it, it’s always the right one I slice out like an avocado pit. The cut would start close to the center of my forehead and run all the way down to my jaw, stopping just a hair over the line and onto my throat.

I don’t think that comes from any weird sort of mutilationist fetish, or one of those weird (Ha, who am I to judge?) mental illnesses where a part of your body feels alien. I think its just a desire for attention? If that’s the right way to phrase it. I want to be special, look special. All those bad-ass pirates and fantasy characters have facial scars, typically over their eyes, and I want to be like them. I want to be special.

I want to be special. I want to be important. I want to feel like I actually matter. No amount of self reaffirmation has ever been enough for me. I’ve always needed ‘affirmation’ from others, and I’ve rarely ever received it. And it can’t be just anyone who gives it to me, it has to be someone special, someone whom I respect. The words of those I subconsciously deem as ‘below’ me mean absolutely nothing, no matter how reverential or supporting.

As for who I respect, which isn’t the right word at all, I’m not really sure. Beautiful women. Impressive men. Members of authority. People with experience in fields that I respect (this time it is the right word). I’ve had coworkers who practically begged me to hang out, less than attractive women who nearly molested me in their flirtations. All it ever did was annoy and nearly disgust me.

It’s a strange dichotomy, my ego and self-loathing. On one hand, I’m disgusted by myself. I look in the mirror and see a hideous, fat, disgusting, waste of human existence who could die tomorrow without the world so much as blinking. On the other hand, I recognize my intellect, sense of humor, virtues, and what few skills I have as being exceptional.

I hate myself, but somehow still place myself above others.

It’s funny how little self control I have compared to what little drive I have. I crave love, yet haven’t been able to muster the willpower to eat healthy and exercise. I crave fortune, yet haven’t been able to finish writing (Really writing, with editing and everything) a book. I crave attention, yet stay hidden away in my room and when out in public avoid standing out at all. When I crave a McChicken, I’ll drive to the McDonalds across town at 3 AM for it.

I guess I’m just short sighted. Back when I still played chess, I could never think more than a single move ahead. When a problem has a single-step solution, I can find it near instantly, no matter how obscure or obfuscated it is. Throw in just one more step, however, and suddenly I’m lost as an orphan looking for his mother in a department store.

That applies to long term goals too, even when the answer is spelled out for me step by fucking step. Step one, cut the calories down to less than two-thousand. Step two, take the dog(s) for a walk everyday. Step three, repeat steps one and two for the next six months. Just like that, I go from fat lard-face to looking like a young Leonardo DiCaprio.

But I just don’t do it. The one time I succeeded with a diet, it was based on routine. Every morning on my way to work, I’d get two McDonalds burritos with mild sauce and a large diet coke, no ice. Every night after work, same thing. Right now, jobless and hopeless, there is no routine in my life. That’s just an excuse though, I know that. Doesn’t mean I fucking do anything about it.

It also helped that back then I spent every night with a woman I was in love with. Kira. Black haired, thin as a skeleton, cheek bones like daggers. Her nails were more like claws, and she’s never without her eyeliner that stretch out like wings from her beautiful brown eyes.

When we met, she hated me, so of course I sought her approval. She hated me just because I sat in her spot one time. She, never to my face, called me an inbred hobbit. After several random encounters at work (which is where I met her), we also bumped into each other at the vape store. A casual, friendly conversation lead to her messaging me at work the next day, and a friendship quickly formed.

After that, it didn’t take long for love to form. One sided love. I asked her out, she rejected me. My love diminished but quickly re-blossomed. I confessed full-blown honest to god love to her. Again, she rejected me, with a full (and requested) letter explaining why. That letter tore me to pieces. Not because it destroyed my hopes for ever having her, but because every reason she listed was (to my eyes) nonsense.

She said I wasn’t artistic, I consider myself to be a great story crafter and a half-decent writer. She said she thought I’d be controlling and possessive, when I am nothing of the sort. She said I wasn’t ‘edgy’ enough, in so many words, even as I carved my flesh into ribbons. Even to this day, when she describes her perfect partner’s personality, she describes me to a T, or at least to a lower-case t.

I treat our bond as though we are siblings, and I believe that’s how she sees me, though I feel a much stronger love than that for her whilst single, and she feels nothing for me. She treats me like garbage. One time I begged her for company, knowing that if left alone I’d make an attempt on my life, and she said no. No one else came either, but I thought she of all people would understand and care. But she didn’t. And despite the handle of vodka, bottle of nyquil, assortment of pills, and sheer amount of blood loss I endured that night, I lived to suffer the pain of her betrayal.

With her it’s always apologies and broken promises. She’s sorry she abandoned me for the millionth time to be with her new abusive boyfriend, she promises it won’t happen again. She’s sorry she disappeared without a word of warning, and promises she’ll warn me in the future. She’s sorry that she broke her promises, she promises it won’t happen again.

And yet I love her. I’ve given her thousands of dollars. I’ve bought her over a hundred meals. I take care of her when everyone else abandoned her. I helped her get her shit together when agoraphobia had grabbed hold of her. I’ve given her everything I could possibly give, sacrificed everything she’s ever asked for or needed that I had.

But its never enough for her. It never will be. She will never care about me and my needs. I don’t need her romantic love, as much as I would enjoy it. But never once has she sacrificed for me. Never once has she gone out of her way to make me happy. She gave me a stack of ‘coupons’, to be redeemed for things such as ‘a guaranteed hang out session’ or ‘You can pick the music all day’. The one time I tried to redeem one, the first one I mentioned, she blew me off.

But of course, she moved to a whole other state for her drug addicted, physically and verbally abusive boyfriend. Then when she came back I took her back following a promise that she was completely done with him. I’m sure she will, or already has, broken that promise.

Despite all that, she is the most important person in my life. The thought of her killing herself makes me genuinely want to die too. Without her, there’d be absolutely no one in my life that I truly love. She is a fire amidst a barren tundra without which I’d freeze to death, even if she flickers in and out of existence that I’ve wished to die in her absence.

My only other friend is Whitney. The strangest person I’ve ever known, and one of the most genuinely wholesome and good people you could ever have the pleasure of meeting. She’s sweet, kind, caring, generous, intelligent, and fun. She’s also asexual, so there’s no hope for romance there either. She lives a busy life, between college and work, so it’s rare I ever get to see her.

Everyone else in my life is temporary, fleeting. They either abandon me purposely or drift away like clouds.

My last girlfriend, the only other serious one I’ve had besides my ‘ex-fiancee’, abandoned me out of the blue. One moment, she was saying that she loved me and that I was her perfect man. The next, she provided a list of issues she had with me and said that they were irreconcilable. She left me with trust issues that have plagued every attempt at romance I’ve had since. I lost my virginity to that girl.

And when we broke up, you know what happened? Her shit head best friend went and spread all of my personal information to our mutual friends, in a horrific way that painted me to be a violent and hurtful man who was ruining her life. And they believed him. Even though he was known to be an over-dramatic, hyper-aggressive piece of shit, they believed him. In spite of all the good things I’d done for them and absolutely no personal experience with me to back his words up, they took it as gospel. I had non-romantic commitment issues before then, but damned if they weren’t magnified ten fold after that.

Every other romantic trist I had after her has had its issues. One time, whilst I was seeing a shrink and given pills that amplified my anxieties to levels beyond my control, I went full blown crazy with a girl. Demanded to know where she was, why she was ignoring me, sent over thirty texts in as many minutes. I quit that medicine the moment I ‘came down’.

Another I ‘broke up’ with after we agreed that she couldn’t handle just hanging out in my car, and I can’t handle going to clubs. Another couple ghosted me. Another was even flakier than Kira, and far more blatant about it. Another just wasn’t that into me, even if he (an FtM transgender person) wouldn’t admit it.

Right now, the biggest source of my anxiety is the fact that Kira has yet again disappeared. I’m used to that, but this time she explicitly said she would text me ‘soon’ when we hung out three days ago. The girl is a fucking suicidal drug addict, and doesn’t care about the pain it causes me when she disappears like this. The fears and anxieties that fill me hurt so bad you wouldn’t believe it. I’ve told her this countless times. She just, doesn’t, care.

I want to punch something, tear my room apart. Its a disgusting mess now, but the mess is settled at least. A path to the door amidst the refuse, big piles pushed against the walls. It could be much, much worse. I feel like I’m about to explode, all these feelings bursting out of my fucking rib cage. But she doesn’t care about that. All she cares about is herself.

There’s only two people in the entire world I’ve truly cared for, like really, wholly, undeniably loved and felt empathy for. My ‘ex-fiancee’, and Kira. But even for those I didn’t feel that way for, Whitney or my ex-girlfriend, I treat them right. Better than right. I buy them gifts, I look after them, I tell them I love them, I do my best to be the best friend or boyfriend I can be.

I’m a heartless monster, but at least I have the manners to act better than that.

You know something, I legitimately can’t remember the last time I cried. Probably when Kira and I first started becoming friends, she demanded I open up and tell her everything if I wanted her to do the same. So I did, and I broke down. Since then, not a drop. I just don’t have it in me. I’m tired. I’m tired of being alive, but outside of drunken and seemingly random spikes of suicidal ideations, I’m too scared of death to try and kill myself tonight.

The thought of death, of everything just disappearing, terrifies me. It has since I was a little kid, we’re talking four or five years old. I don’t want to die, I never want to die. I want to live forever, or at least to know that there is reincarnation or an afterlife. I fear the ocean too, specifically being in the middle of the water with no land in sight and seeing a silhouette approaching me. But that’s not what my fear of death is. That’s a shock, a jump in my seat when I watch a video on youtube.

My fear of death is primal, unadulterated terror. It keeps me up at night, it forces me to keep a light on when I want to sleep, it gave me a love for twilight hours as they brought an end to the darkness when I was a child. It brought me peace.

Kira finally texted me back, simply saying ‘’I love you’. It could be her last words, it could be an apology for going back to her shit head ex, it’s definitely a lie to either herself or to me. It brought some measure of peace, though left a trail of underlying fears in its wake.

I just wish I could be happy, but for that I need at least one of the three B’s. Booze, blood, or betrothal. The last B is hyperbolic, I don’t need that much of a commitment, just some sort of romantic connection with someone. Gotta keep the pattern going though. When I’m drunk, my troubles fade away. When I’m cutting, the pain distracts me. When I have a girlfriend, I feel accepted.

Right now I have none of those things. I might cut my arm here in a bit, but I doubt I’ll be getting a girlfriend sometime tonight; and its too risky to be drinking on a night like this. So, I’ve just got to wallow in my own misery.

I meant to write chapter two of a new book I’m working on tonight. It’s a dark, nautical comedy set in a fantasy-ish world about a dull yet narcissistic pirate captain and his misadventure to regain his fortune. I started writing it to keep myself busy while I wait to distance myself from the first book I wrote, a more serious piece. That one’s about a man and his new apprentice facing a rebellion of monsters who are supposed to coexist with humans, but are sick of their treatment as second class citizens.

I need to distance myself from it because every time I look at it I want to delete the whole thing. It all feels too fresh, too personal. I can remember every keystroke that I put down, and since I was the one who typed it all, it must be trash. That’s how my mind sees it. I need to forget.

I’ve just started episode five of Altered Carbon, haven’t paused it once, haven’t stopped writing except when they speak in another language or I don’t know what to wrtie next or when Kira texted me. I’m starving. By starving I mean I’m hungry, just enough that my stomach hurts. I’ll probably go grab more food like the fat ass, no-self-control shitstain that I am.

I hate when people tell me I’m not fat, or when people say it shouldn’t matter. I am fat, and it matters to me. I don’t find fat people attractive. Never have, never will. I remember once, back when I was dieting and nearly at one-sixty, a (fat) girl said to me “Why are you still dieting? You look great.” I responded by lifting my shirt up (I didn’t have the scar on my stomach at the time) and jiggling it, which immediately elicited an ‘Ew!’ from her. I said, “That’s why.”

It’s not a crime to be fat, nor do I treat fat people any worse than their skinny counterparts. I just think its extremely unattractive, just like me. I don’t want to be fat. I just don’t have the willpower to put a stop to it. And I hate myself for it. Maybe if/when I get a new job I’ll be able to get back into my routine. It’d be a lot easier if I lived on my own, and could choose the pantry and fridge’s contents myself.

But for now I’m stuck living in my parents’ house. I thought once I bought a new car, I’d be able to save up and move out. Then I met Kira, and spent thousands on her. Then I allowed myself to be talked into going to therapy, a waste of time that I put a stop to after being told that I’d never be happy and to keep on cutting, that put me in debt to pay for. Then my car broke down, and I’ve had to open a new credit card for over nine-hundred dollars and spent another four-hundred up front, and her check engine light is already back on.

Oh, and I don’t have a job anymore after getting fired for spending too much time helping coworkers, so its not like I can get a place with the two-hundred and twelve dollars I get a week with unemployment. I’ve dreamed about living on my own since before I was even a teenager. I’ve always hated my parents. Every time I think everything’s about to turn around fiscally, life comes around and shits down my fucking throat and cuts a hole through my trachea so it can fuck my feces-stained esophagus. Every, single, fucking, time.

God that therapy was fucking worthless. I did what the guy said in regards to cutting. I tried rubber band snapping, icing, writing out my feelings. None of it had the same sense of distraction and gravitas. So, he told me if it helps and I’m being safe, keep doing it. So I have. I wanted to stop though, not for my own sake, but because the people who say they care about me (in other words, Whit) don’t like it and I can understand why. Again though, no will power.

When it came to my moods, I told him about as much as I’ve told anyone in my life about myself. At first it felt good, he looked at me like some sort of specimen. By our last session though, it felt more like I was a chore to him, a frustrating waste of time. Although I didn’t bother to remember the words verbatim, he more or less told me that sometimes there just isn’t anything you can do to stop being miserable, and you’re just stuck that way. So, since that was the case, I stopped going.

There was another professional I saw there, a woman who was there to actually prescribe medicines. After the first one ruined a budding and potentially great relationship, I was hesitant to try another. Given the fact that it was also expensive as fuck and I was constantly broke, with or without hesitation I couldn’t try another kind. She refused to prescribe me medicine for my ADD either, even though she did diagnose it. Said we needed to get the depression under control first. Maybe I’d be less fucking miserable if I could concentrate on one thing at a time instead of constantly having my attention diverted between two to three things every waking moment of my life.

It’s funny, when I finished my first book, I thought I’d be happy. Filled with a sense of pride and accomplishment that would spur me forward in life. So I rushed it. The last couple chapters were far below my typical word count. Whitney pointed out that fact, and the fact that a lot of the earlier chapters were subpar comparatively, so I went back and finished it ‘for real’. I rewrote most of the earlier chapters, filled in the later chapters, got a real, proper first draft done. And still nothing.

Now I’m telling myself that once I can edit it properly instead of just grimacing through the prologue I’ll feel it, but I don’t believe it. Maybe if an agent wants it, I’ll feel it, but I don’t believe that. If it were miraculously published, then, then I might feel a hint of genuine joy, but I don’t believe that. I keep pushing the goal posts of finding happiness further and further back to excuse my failure to do so.

Fuck, I don’t even know why I wrote all this. I don’t feel any better. I feel like an overdramatic, self-important, delusional cunt. Same old same old I suppose.

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xx-thedarklord-xx · 6 years

Text

Forever?

“No, you utter moron.” Draco snarled out in a whisper. “The instructions clearly read to add one bat spleen not two.”

It took a lot of self-control for Harry to reign in the urge to commit murder. There were too many witnesses and Snape would probably enact revenge before he could even blink. He had thought that maybe after the war things would mellow down between the two of them, but it would seem that arguing was the only familiar action either of them could resort to.

“If your ginormous head and ego wasn’t in the way, I might have been able to see that.”

Draco narrowed his eyes dangerously as he wondered if Snape would look the other way if he just dunked Potter’s head in the cauldron. It would have to improve the Gryffindor’s stupidly handsome appearance. Part of him—a small part—didn’t want to fight with the brunette but the rest of him loved the normalcy to it. The simple but yet established argufy.

“I will have you know that my ego could do with more inflation and my head is proportionate to my body.” The ‘unlike yours’ was left out but Draco felt as if his point had been met.

That had Harry arching a lone brow. “If you inflate your ego any more than it already is, I fear what will happen to the rest of us. We will be collateral damage to your impending disaster.”

“Salazar, I swear if you don’t start improving our potion instead of standing around like the gaping fool that you are, I will—”

“You’ll what?” Harry interrupted, folding his arms across his chest and glaring angrily.

“Potter, quit talking and actually participate in today’s potion.” Snape’s voice rang out, catching the rest of the class’ attention.

Before Harry could point out that Malfoy had been talking too, the man continued with a smirk. “Ten points from Gryffindor.”

For a brief—nearly minuscule—moment, Harry thought about telling the man exactly what he thought of his unfair treatment, but common sense kicked in and he wisely kept his mouth shut. He had also thought that the man would improve after nearly dying but of course that was just asking too much.

It wasn’t until Snape turned around that Harry looked back to the potion. He pointedly ignored Malfoy’s smug smirk.

“Karma; such a beautiful thing.” Draco whispered, loving the way the brunette clenched his jaw angrily. Merlin, he never felt more alive than when he was baiting Potter.

“I fucking hate you.” Harry whispered back, shaking his head firmly when the smirk widened. He was too distracted by the Slytherin’s pretentious but perfect teeth that it wasn’t until the cauldron emitted a horrible smell that he knew a mistake had been made.

“I deserve an Order of Merlin for having to deal with you.” Draco growled as he shoved the other boy to the side and began trying to fix whatever the idiot just did.

“Hey!”

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

Ron looked to the ceiling briefly as the arguing increased and a headache was beginning to form behind his eyes. “I can’t take much more of this.” Harry was his best friend and a part of his family, but he couldn’t’ take the fights, the sneering, the insults or the obvious stalking that was happening with Malfoy.

Blaise, who was working as Weasley’s partner for the day snorted loudly. “You and me both. If I have to hear Draco talk about Potter and his ‘stupidly handsome face’ one more time, I am going to transfigure him into a bug and squish him. It would be a painful death but satisfying for me nonetheless.”

“Well.” Ron began, alarmed and definitely wary of the other boy as he scooted to the side a couple inches. “Harry talks about Malfoy too. Quite a lot actually.” He didn’t bother to mention that it was in regard to ‘suspicious’ activity. But there was only so many times that Ron could believe that Malfoy doing absolutely nothing by himself was suspicious. Harry’s excuses were weak at best. A pattern was forming and he knew that Harry was blind to the reality of the situation.

“Really, now?” Blaise leaned forward, ignoring their potion for a moment. This was far more important. “They say there is a thin line between love and hate.”

“Who says that?” Ron wondered curiously as he checked the board before stirring counterclockwise. “Sounds like they don’t know the real definition of love.”

Blaise rolled his eyes. “I heard a muggleborn say it. So, your guess is as good as mine.” He paused to make sure the redhead was following the instructions correctly. “But what I am trying to say is that perhaps these two don’t really hate each other. Sexual tension is a great definition as well.”

The statement had Ron choking slightly as he barely avoided jerking the entire cauldron. He turned to face Zabini directly, ignoring the amusement in the Slytherin’s eyes.

Ron’s first instinct was to vehemently deny this altogether but the more he thought about it, the more it was beginning to make sense. “What about when they were younger? That wasn’t sexual tension.”

“Does it look like I am an expert on the behavior of two idiots in love?” Blaise countered raising his hands. “I am offering you my opinion as a third-party observer.”

“Hmm.” Ron hummed in thought as he watched Zabini add in a few rat tails for their potion. It wasn’t until the Slytherin reached forward to stir, that he covered a surprisingly warm hand with his own. “The instructions said to wait for the tails to dissolve before you stir it.”

Blaise looked down at Weasley’s hand, surprised by the contact but not perturbed by it either. “Well, you are turning out to be an excellent potion’s partner.” He watched the way a bright red hue stained Weasley’s cheeks in slight fascination. This wasn’t the first time they had been forced to partner but it was the first time they had done so with such familiarity.

The praise wasn’t something Ron knew what to do with. People didn’t praise him often. If ever. “Thanks?”

It sounded more like a question than anything, but Blaise found it endearing. Which was an unsettling realization. Weasley shouldn’t be able to shake his foundation, not after carefully building it up over the years.

“Perhaps they aren’t the only ones who could benefit from being paired together?” Blaise mumbled just to see the flush spread. There was truth to his statement which was still unsettling.

Ron looked down at his hands, just to realize that his own was still covering Zabini’s. He slowly pulled it away as he felt his face heat up. He wasn’t sure what to make of the flirting. Romance was so far from his capabilities that is was laughable. For the longest time, he had always thought that Hermione would be his forever, but they weren’t compatible. Not in the way that mattered. Not in the way that he had hoped they would be. Love isn’t always enough.

“You tell me.” Ron retorted, meeting warm but surprised brown eyes. Perhaps if this had been before the war, he might have fought or even disagreed. But things were different, he was different, and this was something that he wanted to explore.

“You are just full of surprises.” Blaise whispered, unsure of how to proceed. Weasley was intriguing him in ways that he had never experienced before.

A throat clearing had them both jumping. They turned as one to see Snape peering at them with furrowed brows. “Pay attention to your potion.”

There was suspicion his tone, as if he wasn’t sure what was happening between them, but he said nothing more as a billowing of a cloak showed his departure from their table.

“If you elbow me one more time with your bony sticks of a limb, I will stab you with this flobber worm.” Harry’s voice floated over, causing Ron and Blaise to sigh heavily.

“Oi!” Draco cried out indignantly. “I will have you know—”

“We have to do something.” Blaise spoke up, tuning out the renewed arguing. “I am going to murder him if this continues much longer.”

“I’m waiting for when that was supposed to have been a bad thing.”

It took a moment for Blaise to realize that Weasley was teasing him. He couldn’t help the small smile that quirked at the corner of his lips.

“I can’t exactly propose an outing with you if I get thrown into Azkaban for murder.”

��“An outing?” Ron stirred the potion once more, wincing when he realized that he had gone counter clock wise when he shouldn’t have. “Is this a trip to the courtyard? Because that’s pretty vague.”

Blaise took over the stirring as he attempted to fix their potion. “I was thinking more along the lines of Rome. My mother has a summer house there and perhaps a date would be a better descriptor.”

Rome. Ron blinked rapidly as he tried not to become flustered. A small part of his brain wanted to tell Zabini that he didn’t need to try and impress him, but a larger part of his brain was adamantly quashing the objection. Because he really wanted to go to Rome with the Slytherin. Screw the courtyard.

“Alright.” Ron whispered, peering at the other boy. “I’ll go on an outing with you, if we can figure out how to stop them.” He gestured to where Harry and Malfoy were still arguing, only now in whispers and grunts.

A fluttering of Blaise’s heart had him trying to stop from showing his pleasure at the agreement of a date. Potions was turning out to be his favorite class.

Before Blaise could suggest anything, someone yelled loud enough to have everyone freezing all movement.

“No!” Snape called out loudly, causing Harry to jump and the bottle in his hands dropped into the cauldron.

Blaise grabbed Weasley and ducked under the table in time to avoid a giant explosion.

Screams, smoke and Snape’s voice was the first thing that either of them registered before they scrambled up to check on their friends.

Harry and Draco were sprawled on their backs, feet the only thing visible as their bodies were underneath the table.

“Potter! Malfoy!” Snape barked out menacingly.

The sounds of frantic whispers could be heard as neither Harry nor Draco responded to their names.

“Potter get out here and explain exactly what you just did!” There was a dangerous quality to the man’s voice and it had Ron wanting to back away and never come back. Harry was grown, this was all on him. It wasn’t his potion after all.

“Hey!” A tiny voice squeaked out angrily before a small child crawled out from under the table. “Don’t yell at him. It was an accident.”

Blaise dropped his mouth open in horror as he realized that this was Draco. He would recognize his friend anywhere. Draco couldn’t be more than five. If that.

Little Draco was pulling an equally small child that was obviously Potter, out from under the table as well. Blaise clutched Weasley tightly as he felt his mind go blank.

Ron blinked rapidly as he looked to a little boy with a mop of messy hair and glasses too big for his face. His friend was tiny. So tiny. The Gryffindor robes were massive on the child that was now Harry. He almost didn’t want to know what had happened but one look into scared green eyes vanished that thought process.

Harry trembled a little as he looked around the room and wondered where he was and why he was here. Usually dreams weren’t this vivid. The last thing he remembered, Aunt Petunia had sent him to his cupboard without dinner for not adding seasoning to their chicken. He tried explaining that he couldn’t reach the spices, even with the chair, but no one cared.

Draco wasn’t sure why he was in Uncle Severus’ work but he didn’t like the tone of voice from him. Nor did he like that his godfather was making his new friend scared. He wrapped an arm around his friend and glared at Uncle Sev.

“Be nice.” Draco chided, his other hand coming to his hip.

Someone choked in the background and it took Ron a moment to realize that it was Neville. He too realized the irony of the choice of words.

“I don’t get paid enough for this.” Severus whispered before turning to the rest of the room. “Class is dismissed. I want a three-foot essay on today’s potion done by the end of the week. You will all redo this potion next class.” He waited until most of the class left before sighing at the sight of Zabini and Weasley.

“I suppose you can come with me to see Madam Pompfrey.”

Harry and Draco inched closer when the three of them turned to the both of them expectantly.

“I don’t have all day.” Severus drawled, gesturing them forward.

Draco grabbed Harry’s hand and they both shot suspicious eyes towards the rest of the group.

“I’m Draco Malfoy.” The whisper wasn’t as quiet as he hoped it would be and it was heard by the rest as they made their way out of the room and down the hall.

“It’s nice to meet you, Draco.” Harry whispered back just as loudly but also shyly, eyes roaming the halls and looking at the paintings with pinched brows. “I’m Harry Potter.”

A small gasp had Harry peering back at his friend.

“Really? Dobby read me books about you! But you are prettier than I imagined.”

“You read about me?” Harry wasn’t sure what to think of that. Why would he be in any books? “You think I’m pretty?”

Draco nodded firmly, tightening his hold on Harry’s hand. “I can’t believe my first friend is Harry Potter!”

“Friend.” Harry whispered, testing the word on his tongue. “I’ve never had a friend before. Dudley says I’m not allowed to have friends.”

“Cousin.” Ron mouthed to Blaise when the boy looked at him curiously. He noticed out of the corner of his eye that Snape had turned to him as well.

“Well Dudley can lay in a field of Devil’s Snare.” Draco retorted, clenching his free hand tightly. “I say you are allowed to have friends. And my word means a lot, ‘cus I’m important.”

“Does it?” Harry wondered if that meant that Draco was royalty.

“Uh huh.” The nod Draco released had his hair falling forward. “My father says that being a Malfoy is the only good thing I am. But he also said that Malfoy’s are the best, so it must be a good thing.”

It didn’t sound like a compliment to Harry but he didn’t want to tell his only friend that. He moved closer to Draco, not wanting to be by the adults. They couldn’t be trusted.

“Don’t worry.” Draco whispered, turning his head towards Harry’s ear. “I’ll protect you.”

There was fierceness to Draco’s tone and it was welcoming, warm and promised safety. Harry wasn’t one to trust other people but every fiber of his being told him that Draco meant it.

“I’ll protect you too.” Harry vowed, wondering if he could actually do that. He wasn’t sure how to fight but he was good at hiding! Perhaps that could count?

Draco looked down at the ground as his face heated up. Usually only Dobby was the one who bothered to be around him and that was because he was ordered to. “We’ll protect each other.” He offered softly.

“Like a team?”

“Yeah!” Draco nearly yelled in excitement. “A team! Me and you forever!”

“Forever?” Harry asked, eyes roaming his new friend’s face.

“I like that.” He whispered when Draco nodded quickly.

Harry wouldn’t mind having Draco forever.

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

I’m supposed to be working on a chapter for a story but this has been in my head for a while. I will write more to this soon!

#Drarry #Draco Malfoy #Harry Potter #harry x draco #draco x harry #Ron Weasley #Blaise Zabini #Potion accident #Kid fic #sort of #De-aging #Part one #Protective Draco #Protective Harry #Cute Draco!

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onceabluemoonwrites · 6 years

Text

How To Stay Together Outside the Mafia (Thanks, Mukuro)

Summary: There was nothing wrong with needing reassurance, but it had been blowing up lately with all his guardians, and Tsuna hadn’t been able to figure out why. Now, however, it was all crystal clear.

This was a Code Red situation. His angst babies were insecure and he would have to make sure their run-away-with-the-dark-thoughts-because-that’s-a-fun-road-to-go-down brains would once again understand the situation as it was.

He might be dame, but he had learned. There was only ONE thing to do in a situation like this: Call your mom!

And the rest of his family, because he wasn’t that hopeless.

FF.net | AO3

You can find my fic master list here.

Disclaimer: I don’t own Katekyo Hitman Reborn

‘’BUT I DON’T WANT TO BE DECIMO!’’

Tsuna’s voice shook the very foundations of the house.

Mukuro sighed and pushed another cookie cutter into the dough.

When he moved in with the Sawada’s, he’d narrowed his eyes at Mama- as this woman insisted he call her- who’s flowery aura of… Surprisingly not death, though he had the idea that the woman that birthed Tsunayoshi must have the same strange dual qualities. He was certain it could turn murderous any moment, and yet still smell like fresh laundry and lavender.

…She seemed like the type that would scent her victims with her personal brand of perfume.

‘’What do you want for our boarding?’’

She’d blinked, tapped her lips and beamed. ‘’Well, if you insist, I’d love to have some help with baking! Making treats for the whole family is a lot of work! But don’t worry, I do it with love and I’m sure you will too!’’

Mukuro had flinched away from the disgustingly bright woman, but had accepted the apron she handed him. Frowning, he’d unfolded it. It was a frilly, purple garment. The upper part was shaped like the top-half of a heart, with the lower half having the likeliness of a ruffled skirt. It would have been adorable on Chrome, but this was apparently Mukuro’s apron, and he was going to rock it.

Sure, cute was a no-go, but that was Chrome’s area. Mukuro was the drop dead sexy half of the twin act. He would work Lolita like no man had worked it before!

Cackling to himself, he swung his narrow hips to let the ruffles bounce properly and set out to help his Mama.

…Calling her that was just practice for when he took over Tsunayoshi’s body. Yeah. That was it.

Sawada Tsunayoshi was devil spawn. Literally.

‘’Welcome to THE Sawada Household, Mukuro. Welcome to Hell.’’ He had murmured when he’d come home on Mukuro’s arrival day, before falling over the table in exhaustion.

Mukuro had not believed him. He’d even joked about it! “I’ve already been to hell six times. Not to this particular Hell, no.’’ Sarcasm, so lovely, applicable in every situation.

By now, however, reality had sunk in. The Sawada Household was the seventh Hell Mukuro had landed in, and he wasn’t all that eager to leave. This one taught the deadliest tricks, mind you. Sawada Nana was the greatest Satan he had ever seen.

Top techniques included: The Flowery Aura of Death, Set-the-Table, Mama’s Disappointment, the Guilttrip, Religion inducing Cooking, Yes-You-Must-Go-Bathe and the most deadly of all: Love Makes the World Go Round (Fly, you fools!).

So here he was, a few weeks into his stay at the Sawada household, making little cat-shaped cookies for Chrome, yoyo’s for Chikusa and paws for Ken. The only ones he owned up to making specifically for someone were the paws, of course. He couldn’t help but snigger as he pushed the mini-paw out of the cookie cutter with a fork. Comparing Ken to a dog in any way was guaranteed to get great reactions. Teasing him was just too much fun!

The door slid closed behind him, and an arm reached past him, snatching up part of the dough. Nobody touched the dough.

Mukuro’s fork missed the hand by a hair’s breadth.

‘’God fucking damn it, Rokudo! Let a man have his cookie dough!’’

Whirling around (ruffles rushing, to his eternal pleasure), Mukuro smiled at Gokudera. ‘’Well, well, well, Ha-ya-to~~ Have a little argument with the boss?’’

Gokudera shivered.

Popping a chocolate chip into his mouth, Mukuro smirked. Gokudera’s insecurities were just too easy to play into and those flowery aura of death lessons were paying off. Mama was awesome (No, not a personal meaning, it was a general opinion.

…

Okay, maybe not just a general opinion, but Sawada Nana’s food was Worthy of Worship and Mukuro was pretty sure she somehow managed to enslave him through it, the devilish woman!)

‘’He’s still refusing to talk about the future. Any attempt to talk to him about being Decimo, our future together… It just fails,’’ Gokudera stared morosely at his empty hand as if he were seeing the bottom of a whiskey glass (if Chrome asked, Mukuro had no idea how that might look) instead of a cookie dough-free hand. The way his eyes widened reminded Mukuro of a mutt. This was probably what people meant when they talked about ‘’puppy dog eyes,’’.

Mukuro handed the white-haired adolescent more dough. A technique to keep him talking. Sympathy was for the weak.

…Tsunayoshi not becoming Decimo was a problem if Mukuro wanted to possess his body and destroy the mafia. Then again, Tsunayoshi being in a relationship with Tsunayoshi 2.0 (the red-headed one) and Cherry-blossom-chan (even just thinking about calling Hibari that made him cackle in glee) meant Cherry-blossom-chan had touched that body. Tsunayoshi was tainted now and possessing his body might result in cooties.

Letting Chrome join the Vongola might be an option after all. She deserved to be happy and being one of Sawada’s guardians certainly seemed to do the job!

Mukuro wanted to wash his mouth out with soap, the sugar was too much.

But, in the interest of Chrome’s future happiness, Mukuro couldn’t let Tsunayoshi go on about not becoming Decimo. Because if he wasn’t Decimo, then what use would he have for a tool like Muku- Chrome?

Chrome would be all alone again, without heating! No more cookies to bake for a house full of people, no more ruffled aprons to wear, no Fran to antagonize about his crush on Le Petit Prince (Squealing? Mukuro? No, that was Chrome! Honestly, you people!) and most of all: No one to love an asshole like- he meant cutie- Chrome.

Leaving the fork stuck in the counter and Gokudera with more cookie dough, Mukuro stalked out of the kitchen. Tying his apron strings tighter, Mukuro clenched his jaw. He was going to do something selfless for the first time in years.

Protect his adorable Chrome’s future and defend Gokudera’s hurt feelings so he could snigger about it later.

No self-interest at all! The things Mukuro did for his subordinates!

Now, on to make Sawada Tsunayoshi cease his attempts to abandon his post as heir!

‘’Sawada Tsunayoshi!’’

A disembodied voice resonated through the room. Mist drifted, engulfing the bed, kotatsu and desk with little effort. The door creaked, the curtains skid closed, the sound of metal against metal.

An eerie silence settled.

‘’If you’re just here to spy on me, get out or be more subtle.’’ Tsunayoshi looked up from his attempts to straighten his tie, completely ignoring the fact that only his upper half was completely covered.

‘’My, my, my, Tsunayoshi, so forward!’’

The brunette didn’t even bother to wave him away. ‘’I’m too used to you guys storming my room at all hours.’’ A tired sigh.

The room darkened. ‘’I heard your fight with Gokudera. As the Socially Inept Person in this household, I must say-‘’

‘’Isn’t Kyouya the Socially Inept Person?’’ Tsunayoshi continued to struggle with his tie. Honestly, the guy was a fashion disaster. How a respectable Madame Murder like Sawada Nana had birthed him… Mukuro had no idea.

Before he could answer, the brunette opened his mouth again. ‘’Oh, wait, Kyouya’s the Social-Skills-Nonexistent-Get-Tetsuya-To-Translate Person.’’

If even Tsunayoshi thought so, then how did their relationship even work? Did Kusakabe just… sit there all the time? Next to them?

…Then again, Tsunayoshi 2.0. doubtlessly had that woman (Adel, the one with the Murder Maniac tendencies) hovering over him, so maybe she and Kusakabe just did well in company.

Mukuro would have to look into that later- the greatest blackmail material ever.

‘’But what were you saying about Hayato?’’

Mukuro’s fist clenched. Tsunayoshi said it so casually, as if nothing had happened. And that was, as even he could admit, absolutely awful in the face of all Gokudera’s work. Mukuro hated do-gooders, but the bomber spent a lot of time with the Sawada’s, and there was no way the illusionist couldn’t notice all the effort the man put into becoming a better righthand man. And this reaction? It was utterly unfair to him.

Damn it. Mukuro had picked up a stray again. Just don’t feed them, and it will be alright, was the golden rule, but he kept breaking it, and the minute he fed them, he was gone! …Let’s just bury that underneath a mountain of denial, ne?

Curse the heavens for creating the Mist with a pinch of Sky flame-alignment! Mukuro pouted.

Appearing from thin air in front of Tsunayoshi’s nose, Mukuro jabbed a finger into his chest and hissed: ‘’Stop saying you don’t want to be Decimo. The fool is trying so hard to do better and you just keep throwing that back in his face every time. How do you think that makes him feel?’’

Tsuna sighed. ‘’You can’t force me into a career just because you want me to be, Mukuro.’’

‘’I said Gokudera wanted it,’’ Mukuro crossed his arms, ‘’He’s never had a safe family before- you can’t take that from him!’’

Tsuna’s mouth fell open. ‘’That is what this is all about?’’

‘’What else would it be about? The cookies? Because there’s sure a hell nothing wrong with those, I assure you!’’

‘’I know, I know, go put them in the oven- we’re going to need them in a bit.’’

‘’I wasn’t making any!’’ Mukuro yelled as Tsuna pushed him through the door opening. ‘’I wasn’t!’’

Slumping against the door, Tsuna rubbed his temples. God. Mukuro was insecure and had a Small and Breakable Heart (…and would probably slit your throat with the pieces left of it but that wasn’t the point in case). He was one of the most reassurance-needing guardians, and Tsuna’s storm was Gokudera.

There was nothing wrong with needing reassurance, but it had been blowing up lately with all his guardians, and Tsuna hadn’t been able to figure out why. Now, however, it was all crystal clear.

He might be dame, but he had learned. There was only ONE thing to do in a situation like this: Call your mom!

And the rest of his family, because he wasn’t that hopeless.

Sitting on a chair in the circle, Tsuna stapled his hands against each other. ‘’’We’re here today because it has come to my attention that we have a communication problem.’’

Gokudera almost choked on his drink. ‘’What?! How has this not come to my attention before?!’’

Yamamoto patted him on the back.

‘’It has come to your attention. We’ve been fighting about this since forever and I’m done.’’

‘’’Giving up is EXTREMELY not right, Sawada!’’ The rest of the room’s occupants began to talk too.

‘’You have to be Decimo, Juudaime!’’

‘’…Kufufufu, making my dear Chrome cry? She’s Murder Moe, Tsunayoshi, she knows where to find you!’’

‘’LAMBO WANTS TO STAY WITH MAMA!’’

Tsuna slammed his hand down on the table. ‘’This is exactly what I mean! If you would shut up for a second, I could tell you-‘’

‘’Shut up, dame-Tsuna.’’ Reborn jumped down from the ceiling fan, but before his mallet could connect with Tsuna’s skull, the brunet’s eyes flashed a deep orange and he threw Reborn aside. Landing on the table, Reborn opened his mouth, but Tsuna had enough.

"GOD FUCKING DAMMNIT, WOULD YOU ALL LISTEN TO WHAT I SAY WHEN I FUCKING SPEAK?! Not you Chrome, you’re a sweetheart.”

Taking off the ring, he threw it on the ground and stomped on it a couple times. It hurt his feet more than it did the ring harm, but god, that felt good. ‘’I’m NOT becoming Decimo, and if you all would just listen, you’d know this DOES NOT mean the end of us as a family.’’

Gokudera deflated like he was a balloon and Tsuna just stuck a pin in him. ‘’Oh.’’

‘’Yes, oh.’’ Tsuna sat back down. ‘’Though, to be honest, I could’ve handled this better too. I should’ve known this was the problem and just taken it out at the root. I’m sorry.’’

Ken scoffed. ‘’Pretty words, Sawada, but how do you wanna keep us together then? I sure as hell ain’t seeing results here!’’

Tsuna shrugged. ‘’No offence, but you guys were born into the mafia. You might want to destroy it, but it’s hard for you to think in terms of life outside of it. I thought we might be able to come up with something else together.’’

‘’Besides, this house will always be a home for all of you.’’ Nana smiled, hugging Lambo to her chest. The little boy melted into the embrace.

‘’Mama’s the best.’’

Nobody protested. Unanimous agreement there.

It was silent for a moment, the only sound to be heard was Kyouya munching on a tonfa cookie. …Tsuna was pretty sure Mukuro had put poison in there. He clearly was nowhere near Bianchi’s level, though, because Kyouya hadn’t kicked the bucket yet.

Then again, maybe he was trying to give him diabetes. Death by sugary goodness. Mukuro’s evil knew no bounds (according to the boy himself, that was. Though the corner of Kyouya’s mouth creeping up while he was happily munching on the cookies was definitely creeping Tsuna out).

‘’…So,’’ Bianchi murmured, ‘’Just because the mafia threw us together, it doesn’t mean we have to stay in it together. We can go be together somewhere else. That’s what you wanted to say, right? But what’s the next step?’’

Tsuna cleared his throat. ‘’I have a four-step plan and it’s guaranteed to work. This is how it’s going down…’’

‘’Sawada, that plan EXTREMELY sucks.’’

Yamamoto laughed, rubbing his neck. ‘’Sorry, Tsuna, but Ryohei’s right.’’

‘’Of course it sucks!’’ Haru rummaged through her bag and threw keys, pads and a crowbar onto the table, before she found the magazines she’d apparently been searching for. The glossy covers gleamed in the light. ‘’Us, opening up a food factory? Please, we’d sell poisoned goods and be back in the crime business before the day was over- and that is if we didn’t get bored and destroy the whole place! No, I have the perfect solution!’’ Kyoko did jazz hands behind Haru before the effect. Together, they struck a pose. ‘’A fashion house!’’

‘’…Wut?’’

‘’Oh, come on, Tsuna-kun! Don’t be like that!’’ Kyoko bounced up and down. ‘’We have the perfect skillset for it! Hana, we have a chart, right?’’

‘’I thought the chart was going to stay a secret,’’ Hana hissed into Kyoko’s ear, but she did pull an enormous chart out of her handbag.

‘’Mary Poppins,’’ I-Pin breathed, eyes big and starry, looking like Christmas had come early. Lambo squealed, making grabby hands at the older girl.

Hana stared at her for a moment. ‘’Okay, never doing that again. It attracts kids.’’

Lambo pouted, but Nana kept him quiet.

The rest of the room was staring at the charts. Putting on her glasses, Hana began using her laser pointer. ‘’As you can see here, we have thought about the finances. There are several people who would definitely invest in our ventures, especially with young, talented designers like Haru and Mukuro-san.’’

‘’Runway shows wouldn’t be a problem either,’’ Kyoko pointed out, ‘’I know you’ve done a couple of runway shows before, Hibari-san, and distinctive walks like Ken and Chikusa’s would do very well! They’d be able to establish a brand right away!’’

‘’Sasawaga -kun’s energy could also work,’’ Chrome said quietly, ‘’Plus, his athletic abilities give him options other models wouldn’t have. He could easily maintain his boxing on the side.’’

‘’Ooooh! Good idea!’’ Haru fished a pen from underneath the pads and the crowbar and scribbled it down on the chart right away- ignoring Hana’s grimace at her neat work being messed up.

‘’Also, Reborn-san likes suits and Tsuna-san is the perfect watch model!’’ Haru elbowed Hana, ‘’I mean, have you seen his wrists?! Holy objects, I’m telling you!’’

Kyoko giggled. Tsuna gaped.

‘’Hmmm…’’ Mukuro tapped his lips, ‘’My dear Chrome, you would do VERY well with perfume spots, don’t you think?’’

Chrome hid a laugh behind her hand. ‘’Only if it’s called ‘Murder Moe’.’’

Bianchi cocked her head. ‘’Hmm… Bit of a silly name, but I could definitely cook something up for a fragrance with an atmosphere like that!’’

‘’Hey!’’ Ken shouted, ‘’No making fun of Mukuro-sama’s nicknames!’’

‘’Shut up, Ken!’’ Mukuro threw his trident at him like a mother hen curbing her ducklings by pecking at them until they stood in line. ‘’Anyway,’’ he flicked his hair out of his eyes, ‘’I would only agree to such proposal if I got my own shoe line.’’

Gokudera’s mouth dropped. ‘’Are you mad?! Wait- don’t answer that. Of course you’re getting your own shoe line. I mean, have you seen your shoes? If I knew where to buy boots like that spiky pair you wore yesterday, I’d have gone bankrupt already!’’ He bit his lip, ‘’Um. If we’re doing this, that is.’’

‘’Of course we’re doing it,’’ Bianchi rolled her eyes, ‘’I’m tired of you stealing my crop tops. If we have a fashion house, we might actually be able to satisfy your clothing addiction.’’

Gokudera narrowed his eyes. ‘’Pot calling the kettle black!’’

Nana laughed. ‘’That’s family to you!’’

‘’…Now we’re on the topic anyway, Yamamoto-san, would you be willing to model? We’d love some more eye-candy.’’

‘’Eye-candy, huh?’’ Yamamoto’s eyes narrowed.

Haru smiled like the cat got the canary. ‘’Why, yes, we need someone to dress up like a giant grape so Lambo will sit still during the onesie shoots!’’

Yamamoto’s jaw dropped.

Kyoko appeared behind Haru, tucking a lock behind her ear. ‘’That’s not what you said last night, sweetheart!’’

She winked at Yamamoto. ‘’Don’t worry, Takeshi-kun! Byakuran-san sure won’t be the only one who will enjoy all those shirtless photoshoots!’’

Never mind Flame Fashion™, who the hell let Byakuran talk to Kyoko-chan and how much time did they have left before the world imploded?!

In the end, it all came down to this: No matter what Mukuro said about Tsuna’s fashion sense, Vongola was the final boss, and they defeated it together.

Author’s Note

Xanxus became Decimo and buys Flame Fashion in bulk. Dino is eternally grateful to Mukuro for designing the sexiest heels in existence because Xanxus rocks them.

Interviewer: “Where did your brand name come from?”

Haru: “Funny story, actually! We kept saying our people were flaming!”

Kyoko: *beams and the world falls in love,” So we called it “Flame Fashion” because we’re on fire!’’

Tsuna: *looks at the camera with dead eyes* They set everything on fire. Everything. There is no escape.

I might write some more about the Flame Fashion house, so if anyone has suggestions, don’t hesitate to tell me! Maybe I’ll get inspired because I know you lot- you’re enablers! Also, a fun experiment: send some KHR fashion headcanons through my ask! I’m curious what you guys think what kind of high fashion the KHR characters would wear! For an example of what I’m talking about, I’ve got a post here.

Thanks a LOT to @i-w-p-chan for squealing with me! The line “GOD FUCKING DAMMNIT, WOULD YOU ALL LISTEN TO WHAT I SAY WHEN I FUCKING SPEAK?! Not you Chrome, you’re a sweetheart.” was her first reaction when I told her what I was writing and she gave me permission to use it! :D

Other than that, the moment between Bianchi and Gokudera was inspired by this post by @incorrectkhr !

The ‘’Mist with a pinch of sky’’ was inspired by @nightmare-aoife ’s Mukuro from the Cradle ‘verse!

And also thanks to @operaeagleicelynlacelett for asking me about Mukuro doing chores and Tsuna one-upping Reborn which reminded me of this, and got me writing again!

#sawada tsunayoshi #khr #fic #rokudo mukuro #gokudera hayato #fanfic #onceabluemoonwrites fic #fanfiction #my posts #how to stay together

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