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#he'd technically be her dad too

ghostdoodlen · 2 years

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Bruce tries to get Marinette in his family.

Overall, just choose your ship.

The last is a bonus drawing I think someone requested in discord.

Basically instead of choosing one of the bat kids, Marinette chooses Jon while Clark rubs it in Bruce's face.

UPDATE:

This has turned into a superbat post

Courtesy of @smartlanceisreal (gonna have to shout you out again for the inspiration)

They're now married. Jon is happy

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writingouthere · 4 months

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singlemom!reader x neighbor!sukuna. you miss having a baby and Sukuna is dying from a combination of your sexual tension, his lowkey(highkey) baby fever and the drudgery of attending a child's birthday party

cw: Sukuna's breeding kink, red flags are present and accounted for, no one gets laid tho so sad face. this actually ended up being way more sincere and heartfelt than I intended but honestly very typical of me

"Oh we're not together, Sukuna's just been letting me and Bug crash while we look for an apartment."

"Oh he's not my boyfriend, we're just friends!"

"He's actually not Bug's dad. No, no. But, they get along really well. She enjoys having someone else to hang out with aside from me, I think."

Your laughter after the last one plays on repeat as he goes to grab the two of you some refreshments. Sukuna feels like he's living the world's worst version of groundhog day, except instead of being some sad loser who relives the same day over and over, he's apparently a sad loser who is going to live the same conversation over and over again.

"Fuck this shit."

"Um, excuse me but could you watch your language. This is a kid's birthday party." Sukuna wants to ask the bitch who is correcting a grown man's language if he would mind watching his own fucking business but you seem to care about what these losers think and he won't make life difficult for you.

If he happens to step on the guy's foot as he leaves with two cups and a juice box caught in his elbow, well, his steel toed boots need the exercise.

Sukuna knew that if any of his acquaintances, he didn't have friends after all, could see him now, they would die laughing. Die ,because he would kill them for laughing, but fuck he couldn't even really blame them, even in his hypothetical.

Once upon a time, Sukuna was a feared criminal. People pissed themselves when he cornered them in a dark alley. Other bad guys would look at him and say, "wow that guy's a real piece of shit" and now look at him. Stuck at some three year old's birthday party. One more kidzpop butchering of an already shitty song away from committing another felony.

Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if he knew he was at least getting some pussy out of it, but he had just spent the past two hours hearing you deny him to anyone who asked and it was really starting to get to him.

He knew he was being a little bitch about it, and he wasn't upset just because you weren't fucking him. He was upset that all the things you were telling people, they were technically true. He was just letting you and your daughter crash. He was just your friend, not your boyfriend. Even the comments about him not being Bug's dad, but him being positioned as some kind of really invested babysitter, those might have stung more than the ones about your relationship but you thought that was true too.

Thinking about the kid made him look for her, not that Sukuna ever wasn't aware of where you and your daughter were. It had become instinct before he was even aware of it.

Bug was laughing with some kids he recognized from daycare and others from their regular trips to the park. Her happiness was contagious and Sukuna found his lips twitching up at the ends despite his shitty mood.

Your daughter's eyes found him from across the playground. "kuna!" she called, waving her little hand at him. He waved back with his available hand and made his way towards her. She met him halfway, her little legs unsteady on the wood chips but she didn't seem to notice. She was always like that when she saw him, she ran fearlessly. Maybe she just trusted he'd catch her.

Was it so wrong of him that he didn't like the reminders she wasn't his. That it stung, not just because of his feelings but because it just couldn't be true. He might not have fathered her, but fuck anyone who said this little girl wasn't his.

"I got you a juice, you've been running around so much you gotta be thirsty."

"Not thirsty," Bug argued leaning into him. He held up his hands that were holding the grown up drinks for the two of you, and moved the package still lodged in the crease of his elbow towards the petulant toddler. "Take it, or I'll drink it."

Bug stuck her tongue out at him and grabbed it. She struggled to get the wrapping off the straw and Sukuna didn't even notice what he was doing until she had the straw stretched out towards him and he was pulling the wrapper off with his teeth. He spit it out on the ground as your daughter gave him a polite thank-you and then walked away, sipping her juice as she went to catch up with her friends.

What had become of him?

"Need a hand?" You smile at him and Sukuna hands over your cup before taking a sip of his own. There was unfortunately no alcohol in it but drinking it occupied his mouth before he acted like a pussy and asked you, "what are we?" or "should we get married?" or something equally as pathetic.

"God, I want a baby."

Sukuna almost spit out his drink but he manages to tone it down to just a little cough before turning to look at you. You don't even seem a little embarrassed which is just infuriating. Sukuna's about to make a suggestion on how he can help with that when you sigh and point to where some loser is holding their ugly baby.

"Aren't babies just the cutest, I miss when Bug was that age."

Oh, so this was just you looking at other people's red-faced brats and feeling nostalgic and was not in fact a call to action. Sukuna rolled his eyes and leaned back on the hand closest to you so he didn't touch you as he was so tempted to do these days.

"That baby, like all babies, is hideous. All they do is cry, shit themselves and vomit and I'm not even sure Bug is the exception to that and she's the best kid there is."

You look touched at his affection for your daughter but also fired up on behalf of babies everywhere.

"You can't just say a baby is hideous, Sukuna. Those are the Zenin's. Bug is friends with some of them."

"Well are the older ones cuter, because that baby looks like someone fucked one of those hairless cats."

"Sukuna!" you hiss but he sees you smile, despite yourself. "Okay, maybe that baby isn't like the cutest baby-"

"Hideous."

You continue after smacking his arm. "But Bug was cute, okay. And I'm not just saying that because I'm her mom." You take out your phone and quickly swipe until you get to what you're looking for. "See, cute baby."

Sukuna grabs your phone and looks. It's not the first picture he's seen of a young Bug and he's taken his share of photos of her himself, but he finds himself taken in by it anyway.

It has to be a picture from when Bug was really young, she still had the scrunched up, red face that he associates with newborns. But he thinks you're right, she's still cute. He doesn't know if it's because he knows that baby will grow up to be your daughter, but he finds his thumb caressing her little baby cheeks, the wisps of hair he can see peaking out from where she's wrapped in a baby blanket. It's then he sees she's not alone in the picture and there's a different version of you holding her.

The thing that stands out to him is how tired you look. He thinks this couldn't have been too long after you gave birth but still, he wondered if you'd gotten any rest those first few months. You still didn't like talking about your ex, or the circumstances that had led you to his apartment, but Sukuna knew that chances are you were taking care of Bug single handedly and that couldn't have been easy, cutest kid or not.

"She was beautiful, she still is." He reluctantly hands the phone back to you and you look at the picture again, tears building up in your eyes.

"She is the best thing that has ever happened to me. I-I wish that the circumstances were different in how I got her. Sometimes, I wonder how I'll explain everything to her when she's older. She just deserves so much better than him, you know?"

"You both do." Sukuna reaches over and brushes away one of the tears that had managed to fall down your cheek. He leaves his hand there a moment, holding your cheek in his palm, just appreciating the warmth.

"Do you want any?"

"What?" Sukuna isn't sure what you're talking about anymore. He can only see your lips right in front of him, the way that your eyelashes brush against your cheek as you blink faster and faster.

"Babies, do you want any?"

Something short circuits in Sukuna's brain and he wants to say, fuck yes.

He wants to tell you that he thinks about it every day. Every time you put Bug on your hip or send him youtube videos of hairstyles you want to try on her. Whenever it's late at night, and little feet pad out of your room and Bug asks him in the loudest whisper he's ever heard, if he can get her some water because she's so thirsty.

He thinks about it when the sun streams through the curtains of his apartment in the morning and it lights up your hair as you move throughout the kitchen, a force of nature, a creature from somewhere far too good to have ended up here with him.

He thinks about it when the three of you go out and people just assume you're a family, because of course you're a family. When you and Bug play some made up game, or Bug gets tired even though she denies it and he carries her sleeping form against his chest. When he holds her in his lap on the subway and you lean to rest your head on his shoulder and he feels like this, this is what he's always wanted.

He's not all pure and good though, because he thinks about it late at night in his bedroom too. After a day of your smiles, of seeing your thighs stretch out of those sleep shorts you started wearing when the weather warmed up, whenever he remembers the feel and smell of your panties when he's lucky enough to find a pair in the laundry basket, he thinks about how the two of you would make some really cute fucking babies.

He's imagined it a million ways. He's imagined you telling him you've gone off your birth control and you need him now after he takes you out on an anniversary dinner. Or him crowding you up against the kitchen counter and you begging him to put a baby in you.

His favorite fantasy is currently one where you get so carried away when you finally finally fuck that you don't ask him to wear a condom and he spends the whole night making sure you're nice and good and full of him and when you tell him a few weeks later you missed your period, he'll let you freak out. But then he'll tell you that he'll take good care of you, and Bug, and your soon to be little one and he'll finally have you, all of you and once you have your second, he'll knock you up again, as many times as he can because there could never be too many mini-you's running around.

At this point, Sukuna remembers he's talking to you, the real you and he swallows a few times before he speaks.

"I do," he says simply but something must show on his face because you're looking at him in a way you never have before. He hears your breath hitch and he leans in to kiss you, and you smell so good and his thoughts are consumed by the little family he just knows you're going to have when suddenly he's pelted by a variety of sharp, little objects.

Sukuna immediately holds up his arm to shield you from what he now sees is a barrage of wood chips which are being thrown at you by an army of toddlers, including your daughter.

You immediately get up and start talking to the kids about the danger of throwing what are basically large future splinters at people's faces and Sukuna is contemplating the murder of every child that isn't his own when you turn to look at him.

You're not just looking at him, you're seeing him and oh. Maybe he would be getting laid tonight, after all.

The slow burn is almost done folks.

thank you to the amazing reception to this series and the one-shot I posted(which there will be a prequel of soon!). it's literally so insane. Masterlist will be up tomorrow which I hope helps with accessibility!

edit: masterlist is up!

#jjk sukuna #jjk x reader #jujutsu kaisen sukuna #ryomen sukuna #sukuna ryomen #sukuna x reader #sukuna x y/n #sukuna x you #sukuna x singlemomreader #sukuna ryomen smut

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mazamba · 13 days

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Baby Steps

Dani slurped her milkshake noisily as she shifted back to the visible spectrum, interrupting the argument between the so-called adults. It'd been a hectic week, she'd been part of Young Justice for less than a week, yet they already had a crisis in the form of a maybe-evil clone.

"Do you mind?" growled Batman.

"Try a different word."

Superman raised an eyebrow.

""Father" is too heavy, try "brother" instead," she continued, "I mean, Phantom's technically my dad, but I don't call him that. He's my 'cuz!"

"What we call each other isn't the problem."

"No, but it's less scary isn't it? Danny was fifteen when I met him. Imagine if I'd called him dad. He'd have freaked out!"

Batman nodded, seeing the logic.

"And even then, I kinda needed some time to put my head together, you know?" she rattled on, floating crisscross applesauce in midair like a balloon in the breeze, "It's the real reason I left the first time. Maybe some time apart would be good for them? Microdose in family!"

"What we call each other isn't even half of the problem," sighed Superman, "you're a clone too, right? You once told me it was weird to know things you didn't remember learning. Clones are made and programed, sometimes with sleeper programming."

"True, but that's what we're here for," she figured, "I mean, I can't take you on, but Superboy's a different story. If he does go nuts, he has the whole Junior League to take care of him."

"I can't ask you to put yourself in danger."

"You're not, I'm volunteering," figured Stray, finally floating down to the ground, "look, Phantom and I work because we took the time to figure out who we are to each other. You two need time to figure out what you are, not get shoved together and hope for the best."

Batman grunted.

"This is a shock, it was a shock for Danny too. Sa- A mutual friend told me he had a panic attack an hour after I left. Started looking into childcare and stuff. She had to stop him from running after me with a diaper bag and they both crashed into a tree. Tu- a different friend sent me a picture."

"Your point?" sighed the Bat.

"I just said it? Forcing things helps no one. Just... put them in general proximity of each other and let the cards lay where they may. I know what you want to help Superboy, but forcing them into a get along shirt is just gonna hurt them both. You have to think of Superman too."

"And if he does go rogue?"

"Then we stop him."

"That easy?"

"That easy."

Superman sighed. As much as he hated to admit it, the whole situation was a lot less scary by simply changing the word. And what Stray said made sense, in a roundabout sort of way.

For his part, Batman was mentally kicking himself for hyper-focusing on Superboy's needs without taking Clark's feelings into consideration.

"We'll go with your plan," he agreed, "Superman, I'll need you to have a word with Black Canary. She will mediate with you and Superboy whenever you wish to meet, but I need you both to agree to this before we move forward."

"And if we can't?"

"Then he'll have to get adopted into somewhere else," figured Dani, sitting in midair again, "nothing good will happen if we just dump him on you. Neither one of you deserve what happened."

---

I'm sick of people dumping on Clark. Considering how he and the others live, I can't blame him for being suspicious.

Some other guy got replaced by a clone that didn't even know he was a clone. It wouldn't be that weird for Connor to have sleeper programming.

If anything, this is on Batman and the others for trying to force a relationship.

#dp x dc #dani phantom #batman #superman #superboy #clark kent #bruce wayne #connor kent

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itsmarsss · 4 months

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cool. [Rodrick Heffley x fem!Reader] (Diary of a Wimpy Kid)

(from the vault)

You start working as a babysitter for the Heffleys, but a certain someone seems to be bugging his parents to go out more often. Why?

Words: 6,164

Warnings: like one slight sexual/porn innuendo

[. . .]

"What do you mean someone to watch me?” Greg yelled, exhasperated.

Rodrick laughed out loud at the whole situation. “Wait is little Greg here getting a babysitter?”

“Yes, and she starts tomorrow night," their mom replied, matter-of-factly.

“Mom, I’m in seventh grade! I don’t need a babysitter!”

“We’d believe it if the last time we left the two of you alone you hadn’t directly disobeyed the only thing we told you not to do and thrown a party while we were gone," their dad explained.

“Wait. Mom. So I don’t have to watch him? Like ever again?”

“No but you should be ashamed of the reason why-”

“Hell yeah!”

“Rodrick-” He was already up the stairs on the way to his room. She sighed.

“Mom you can’t do this to me. Do you know how bad it'll be if the guys in my grade find out you got me a babysitter?”

“They’re not gonna find out, sweetie.” She patted his head.

“And it’s not negotiable.”

“What your dad said.”

"Dad!”

“I’m sorry, kid! But if it makes you feel better, since Rodrick will be here and we’re getting a babysitter because we can’t leave the two of you alone, she’s teeechnically his babysitter too, right?”

“It doesn’t make me feel better.”

“I tried," he shrugged.

“Where are you two even going tomorrow?”

“We’re having dinner! " Susan exclaimed, excited to talk about it. "Alone, finally, because-”

“Wait couldn't she technically be Manny’s babysitter then?”

“Thank you for caring so much about what I had to say, son.” She sighed once again. “She’s not Manny’s babysitter because Manny’s gonna stay with your grandma.”

Greg huffed and made a point to be extremely loud when stumping upstairs to his room, immediately getting cornered by Rodrick.

“So… a babysitter, huh? And I thought your seventh grade couldn’t get any worse.”

“D´you think it’ll be that bad?”

“Dude they probably got you an old lady who smells like a museum whos gonna make you eat soup at like five PM and sleep at seven.”

Greg widened his eyes and furrowed his eyebrows, worried at the thought of what his brother was making him imagine. “You think?”

“Yup. And I’m not even talking about the total humiliation it's gonna be if someone your age finds out.”

“Crap.”

“Good luck with that.” Rodrick was obviously enjoying the mere thought of the torture that was going to follow.

. . .

“A babysitter?” Rowley asked, rather loudly. Greg quickly put his hand over his best friend's mouth.

“Dude! Can you be quiet?”

“Hmmph!” Rowley tried to protest.

Greg released his hand from over his mouth. “Sorry.”

“Why do I need to be quiet?”

“Because I don’t want anybody to know!”

“Why?”

“Because it’s embarrassing, Rowley!”

Rowley just shrugged. “I wouldn’t be embarrassed. A babysitter sounds fun! Maybe she’ll read you bedtime stories! And play board games with you!”

Greg just looked at him incredulously. “Just don’t say anything about this to anyone., okay?"

Rowley suddenly started to look really nervous. “You know I can’t lie…”

“It’s not lying! It’s just not mentioning it! No one’s gonna ask about it.”

“Okay. Fine.” He didn't seem that sure about it, but Greg knew he'd try his best.

. . .

You took in a sharp breath before knocking on the front door. It took no time for it to be sprung open, and you were greeted by a smiling Mrs. Heffley. You retributed the smile.

“Hi Mrs. Heffley!”

“Hey, sweetie! How are you?” She asked as she ushered you into the house, startling you when she closed the door behind you as you walked in.

“I’m alright! How about you guys? Your dress looks so pretty!”

“Oh my God, thank you! You know it’s been ages since I’ve worn a pretty dress to go out, you can’t trust three kids with a pretty dress, they're always gonna ruin it.”

“Oh God that must be hell,” you laughed along with her. “Where are you guys headed tonight?”

“Looking forward to having dinner in peace,” she laughed again. “Manny!” she yelled suddenly, startling you yet again.

A little boy walked in in his diapers, holding his pants up with both hands.

“Manny can you just please put on your pants?” Mr. Heffley followed the kid around, frustratedly asking him for what you assumed must have been at leat a fourth time to put his pants on, judging by the tone in his voice and the sigh that accompanied it.

“No!”

“Manny!” Ms. Heffley yelled yet again. The kid did what he was supposed to.

“Um I didn’t- is Manny gonna be staying with me tonight?”

“No! No,” she laughed. “Don’t worry, we’re taking him to my mother’s house.”

“Oh, right. Okay.” You tried to let out how relieved you were. Little kids were a whole other level of difficult, specially at Manny's age.

“Darling are you ready?” Susan asked her husband.

“Yeah! Yeah.”

“Greg!” she yelled again.

“What?” The boy yelled back from his room upstairs.

“Y/n’s here! Come say hi!”

“Who’s y/n?”

“Your babysitter!”

He came downstairs. Very slowly. “Mom I already-” He stopped. “You’re not an old lady!"

“Gregory! We don't say that to people! What is that about?"

“I’m sorry! I meant- Rodrick told me my babysitter was gonna be an old lady who smelled like a museum."

"Of course he did," Mr. Heffley said, under his breath.

You pretended to smell yourself. “I think I might smell more like an art gallery maybe,” you joked.

“I’m so sorry about this."

“It’s fine, Mrs. Heffley! Don’t worry about it. Now you two go have some fun, alright? Come on."

“Yeah! Okay. Right. There’s money on the table, you can order whatever you want for dinner the kids will eat whatever. Just grab the money before Rodrick comes downstairs or he's gonna pocket it. If you need anything you can call, okay? Really, anything.”

“Don’t worry about it! I promise I’ll call if anything happens! But I think we’re just gonna stay and eat some food and watch some movies, right Greg?”

“Uh, yeah. I guess.”

“Please be nice, Greg. Oh and if Rodrick bothers you tell him I said he’ll be grounded if I hear he's not letting you work alright?"

“Sure thing! Thank you. Now go!” You joked, pretending to send them off.

. . .

You and Greg had both sat down on the couch in the living room.

“So. You’re not an old lady.”

“Nope.”

“Are you in high school?”

“Yes I am.”

“What grade are you in?"

“I’m a senior!”

“Oh. Rodrick’s a senior too.”

“Cool! I don’t think I’ve seen him around though.”

“Lucky.”

“Why’s that?”

“He makes my life hell!”

“Well don’t you make his life hell at least a tiny little bit?”

“Maybe a little bit.”

“That’s just your job.”

“Trust me no girls like him.”

“Whatever, Heffley. So what do you wanna do?”

“Can we play video games?”

“Depends on what you have.”

“Apocalypse of The Damned?”

“I have never heard of that in my entire life.”

“You’re gonna like it I swear!”

“Alright. But you have to bring me the money your mom left on the table, I’m gonna order us some pizza.”

“Deal!” He ran out to the kitchen, getting back with the money in no time.

. . .

“Hey I was thinking. Can my friend sleep over?” Greg asked, obviously having been preparing himself to do so for the past few minutes, while furiously hitting buttons on his controller as you scrolled through your phone, having gotten tired of playing at that point.

“Um. Is your friend gonna give me any trouble?”

“No! You can- you can trust us.”

“Is he annoying?”

He seemed to take his time to think of an answer. “A little. But he’s pretty cool.”

“Fine, I’ll ask your mom.”

You clicked on Mrs. Heffley’s contact name.

hi mrs heffley

how's the date going? im sorry to interrupt

You didn't even have the time to finish writing the next text before she was calling you. You picked it up.

“Is everything okay?” Susan asked, clearly worried.

“Oh, yes. Everything’s fine, you don't have to worry! I’m so sorry to interrupt your date, Greg wanted a friend to stay over and I just wanted to see if that’s okay with you.”

“Is it Rowley?”

“Sorry?”

“The friend, is it Rowley?”

“Is it Rowley?” You asked Greg, leaning away from the phone, to which he just nodded his head yes. “Yeah, Rowley.”

“Okay, of course he can! And don’t worry, I’ll pay you extra for it.”

“Oh, that’s really nice, thank you. Now you should go back to your date, I'm so sorry to bother.”

“No worries! Are you sure everything’s fine?”

“Yes! We ordered pizza and we’re playing video games right now. Everything under control.”

“And Rodrick?”

“Uh, I haven’t really seen him honestly. He definitely hasn’t left his room though.”

“Okay, thank you.”

“Bye!” You hung up.

“So?”

“Yeah, call your friend. Ask him if he has any board games we can play!”

Greg did as you said, and, in about half an hour, a little boy with a yellow shirt with a dog on it stood at the door.

“Are you Greg’s babysitter?’

“Uh yeah, I am.”

“Cool!" He looked at Greg behind you. "You told me she was old!”

“Rowley!”

“What? You did!”

You laughed at the interaction and let them do their thing, only asking them to stay by the living room so you could keep an eye on them. You sat on the couch, scrolling through your phone again as you knew the pizza should be about to get there.

The doorbell rang in no time. You stood up to pay for it, grabbing the large-size pizza and tipping the delivery guy, who didn’t look very friendly at all. You brought it in. “Hey Greg can you go call your brother?”

“Yeah!”

He ran up the stairs, and you set the box down on the dining table, Rowley sitting down. Greg came back.

“He told me to bring it to him.”

“Why?"

"He just doesn't wanna come downstairs."

"You don't have to do it.”

“What? He’s gonna beat me up for it!”

“Not with me here. I got you.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. Chill out.”

. . .

“Hey you little asshole? I told you to bring my pizza!” A voice exclaimed from the second floor, and Greg muffled a quiet ‘shit’.

“Hey don’t say that!” You scolded Greg for swearing as a reflex.

“Hey? Are you not listening?” Rodrick was clearly close to the kitchen now. He walked through the door. “I said get me so-” he stopped dead on his tracks when he saw you.

“Who’s this?” He asked the boys.

“That’s Y/N,” Rowley said, through gulps.

"And I'm right here you know? You could just ask me who I am."

“Well who are you? And what are you doing… here?” He leaned over the wall, in a poor attempt to look cool. You had to fight yourself tas not to laugh uncontrollably at the sight.

“Well I seem to be your babysitter for the night.”

“What?”

“Did you also expect an old lady? You know, that's a really common and really hurtful babysitter stereotype, you really should think about the things you say now.”

“Wha- huh- yeah- I’ll just-” He let out a weird laugh, and walked up to the table, grabbing himself a slice of pizza and stuffing it into his mouth, seemingly to shut himself up.

“Well we’re gonna watch a movie after we’re done eating. You wanna join?”

“Oh he’s not gonna-” Greg started talking, but Rodrick quickly interrupted him, almost choking on his food as he did so.

“Yeah! Yeah! What are we uh- what are we watching?”

“Zathura.”

“What the fuck is Zathura?”

“Don’t swear in front of them!”

“Sorry.”

Greg looked at Rowley like Rodrick had just gone insane. Did he just apologize?

You laughed. “I’m kidding. You guys don’t mind, do you?”

They both slowly nodded their head no.

“Cool. As long as you don’t repeat it in front of your parents, alright? Don’t wanna get me in trouble.”

“We’re not five!"

“Well you do look like it,” Rodrick commented, and Greg stuck his tongue out at him.

. . .

“This movie doesn’t make any sense,” Rodrick commented, pointing at the screen.

“It’s not supposed to! It’s a kids movie about a magical board game,” you pointed out.

“Let me guess, did Rowley pick this one?”

“For your information, I did. You got a problem?”

“No.”

Rowley had, in fact, picked this one.

Greg and Rowley shared a look again. This was getting bizzarre.

The movie was over in about half an hour, and it was time for you to put Greg to sleep.

“But it’s so early!” The boy complained, and you laughed.

“I know, but you don’t have to sleep now, you just gotta go to bed! I can’t, like, force you to sleep.”

He let out an annoyed groan before agreeing and pulling Rowley with him by the wrist. “Fine.”

“I’ll be upstairs in a few!” You yelled out, and went to the kitchen to wash the dishes from dinner. It wasn’t really something Mrs. Heffley had explicitly asked you to do, but you had those extra minutes and wanted to get on her good side.

What you didn’t expect was to come in to find Rodrick still standing there, startling himself when you walked in.

“Uh hey!” His voice was high-pitched, clearly not expecting to see you there so soon.

“Hey.” You wordlessly walked to the sink, starting with the dishes. And then he offered to help you, which didn’t fit the image you had of him at all.

“What?”

“I said do you want some help? I can dry them.”

“Uh sure. Thanks.”

He just nodded, grabbing a cloth. “So did you put them to sleep yet?”

“Yeah they’re supposed to call me when they’re ready. Then I’m pretty much done.”

“Are you leaving like right after?” Was he… disappointed?

“Well not right after, your mom still has to pay me.”

“Right. She paying you extra for the dishes?”

“No,” you laughed, “just wanna score some points. This job’s good money, you know? But don’t tell her I said that.”

“Yeah, whatever.”

You nodded, a little awkwardly. “So what’s the deal with the van?”

“What?”

“The huge white van parked right outside? I assume it’s not your mom’s.”

“Yeah.”

“Couldn’t you have picked a better color?”

“What?”

“You know something other than the classic creepy white van?”

He actually laughed. “I don’t think a creep would have ‘löded diper’ written on the door.”

“Maybe you’re just trying not to look too suspicious.”

“Wouldn’t you like to find out?” Was he… flirting? Well, that was… an attempt.

“What, are you inviting me? You know, I was taught not to get into creepy white vans with strangers.”

“We’re not strangers!” He held his hand up for you to shake, which you did. “I’m Rodrick.”

“Y/N.”

“So. Ho'wd you end up babysitting Greg out of all people?”

“I mean, your dad posted something about it in the newspaper and my mom told me about it. Some extra money, you know?”

“And you’re sure it’s worth it? I mean he’s a big pain in the ass.”

“Aren’t all brothers?”

“I’m not.”

“Right. You’re like a dictator to him!”

“No I’m not!”

“He was scared you were gonna beat him up if he didn’t bring you pizza.”

“He’s dumb. I wasn’t gonna beat him up that badly.”

You laughed. “Well, we’re done. Thank you for the help. You can go now if you wanna.”

“You sound like a mom.”

“Oh my god! Stop trying to make me sound old! I'm some granny cinderella who turns into an old lady who smells like a museum when midnight strikes," you teased him, and he scrunched up his nose in embarrassment.

"Right. He told you about that.”

“Yeah.”

“Sorry. To be fair, I never had a babysitter, you know? I just thought they were all old and boring.”

“Do you think I’m old and boring?” You joked.

He snorted. “No, you’re pretty.” His eyes widened, realizing what he’d just said. Way to go. “Not in that- well not that you’re not pretty, you are, but you know what I mean. You’re uh- you’re pretty compared to what I- expected?"

It was stupid, but you could feel yourself blush a little. Why was it that you always fell for the most absolute idiots? “So I’m pretty… compared to an old woman.”

“I think you should let me start over.”

“But-”

“Y/N!” You heard Greg yell from upstairs, and you left the kitchen to go see him, going up the stairs and entering his room.

“Okay, we ready?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you brush your teeth?”

“Yes!”

“Both of you?”

“Yup.”

“Okay I’ll believe you. But your mom told me you’re on thin ice.”

Greg rolled his eyes and both boys got on the bed.

“Okay, goodnight. If you don’t sleep right away don’t make too much noise.”

“Are you coming over tomorrow?”

“Why, did you actually like me?”

“Just a little.”

You smiled. “Well no. But I think I might next week.”

“Cool! ‘Night, Y/N!”

“‘Night!”. You closed the door behind you, and walked downstairs to wait for Mrs. and Mr. Heffley to return so you could go home.

You stopped on the hallway to send your mom a quick text saying you were fine and should be leaving in a few before making your way to the living room.

To your surprise, Rodrick hadn’t gotten back to his room. Instead, he was laying on the couch, his entire body draped over it as he scrolled through his phone. He sat right up when he saw you. “Hey Y/N.”

“Hey. You not have anything to do?”

“I’m offended. But no I don’t.”

You laugh, sitting down beside him. “Okay. Well your parents must be on their way, so. Don’t have much to do either.”

“You wanna watch something?”

“What do you have in mind?”

“Well a real movie.”

“Zathura’s a real movie! I like it!”

“You actually do?”

“Yes!”

“Whatever. Well an adult movie I mean.”

“Uh, an adult movie?”

“No! Not that kind!” He was blushing furiously and you found it hilarious.

“Yeah whatever. What do you have?”

You ended up settling on a Marvel movie, but you barely had the time to start it before the doorbell rang, and you had to go get the door.

“Hey Y/N! I’m sorry we took so long, we had to go get Manny.”

“That’s fine! Rodrick and I were just about to watch a movie!”

“Rodrick came downstairs?” Mr. Heffley sounded genuinely surprised.

“Well you can finish it if you want!”

“Oh, no, I really should get going. We can finish it another time.”

“Oh well. Okay.” She put Manny down and grabbed her wallet, handing you your money. “Here, with the extra from Rowley. Hope they didn’t cause too much trouble.”

“Oh they were so cool! I was surprised.”

“Oh that’s great to hear! If they haven’t traumatized you too much we’d love to have you sit them again.”

“Oh definitely! Just give me a call.”

“Thank you, Y/N. Are you driving home?”

“Oh, no, I’m actually walking. I thought we’d be done a little earlier.”

“Oh that’s not good, we can take you-”

“I can take her!” Rodrick yelled, almost falling off of the couch in his eagerness. He stood up, walking toward you. His dad looked like he was short-circuiting.

“Are you sure?” His mom asked.

“Yeah! Come on, let’s go.” He walked quickly past the front door and into the white van.

“Sure. Bye Mrs. Heffley!”

“Bye sweetie! Tell me if he bothers you too much!”

You walked towards the van, getting in on the passenger’s seat. He turned the engine on in silence. There was an awkward atmosphere surrounding you, and you didn’t know why.

You cleared your throat. “So uh. Thanks for driving me.”

“Yeah it’s chill. Where do I turn?”

“Oh let me just- give me your phone.”

“What?”

“So I can put the address on the GPS?”

“Oh. Sure.” He handed it to you after unlocking it, and you did as you said.

“Turn left in 200 feet,” the disembodied voice said, and he did.

“You don’t have to uh- do these things for me. You know, drive me home, help me with the dishes. It’s nice, but I’m not gonna tell on you if you don’t.”

“I know. I uh. I want to.”

“You wanna do the dishes?”

“I wanna help you.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “Dunno.”

“Fine.”

You got home pretty quickly, as you didn’t live a long way from the Heffley residence, and got out of the car.

“Thank you for driving me! Goodnight.”

“Yeah!” Rodrick yelled back, and waited for you to get in to drive off. There was a smile on your lips you couldn’t shake off, and you felt stupid for it. Was the weird wannabe rock band kid really having an effect on you?

. . .

On wednesday, you got a call from Ms. Heffley again. And then on friday, and saturday, and sunday. This could not be normal, right? But it was money, so you obviously wouldn’t refuse it. So you pulled up to the Heffley residence for the fifth time on sunday, knocking on the door as usual.

Greg opened it this time, greeting you with a confused expression. “You’re here again?”

“Miss me, kid?”

“Are they going out again?”

“Apparently.”

“Mom, Y/N’s here!”

“Oh hey sweetie! Thank you for coming!”

“No problem! Where are you off to today?”

“Well we’re going bowling. Rodrick found us these pamphlets at the mall and wouldn’t stop bugging us about trying it out, so we decided to give it a go.”

“Oh he did?” That was strange.

“And you seem to have things so under control! I can’t believe we’ve been going out so much!”

“Well I’m happy to hear it. When will you be back?”

“I’d say eleven if that’s not too late for you?”

“Oh definitely not! As long as Rodrick can drive me.”

“Oh that won’t be a problem. You ready, darling?” She asked her husband, who walked by holding Manny in one arm and a huge bag in the other.

“Yeah.”

"Everything there?” Susan asked him, referring to the bag. She turned back to you. “Manny’s staying over at my mom’s for the first time today. Isn’t that exciting?”

“Yeah!" You exclaimed, not really getting all the excitement about it. You supposed you would if you were his mom. Right now you were just happy you didn’t have to watch over him too. Little kids were always more difficult.

“Okay bye everyone!”

Greg and Rodrick were right behind you the moment you closed the door.

“Can we make pasta?’ Greg asked, and damn, the little dude must have had some sugar because he looked like he’d downed like three energy drinks at once.

“Well yeah. I make a killer pasta. Is Rowley coming today?”

“Yeah!”

“Cool.”

“Do you want help with the food?” Rodrick finally spoke up, and Greg looked at him like he was speaking Greek.

“Sure.”

“Are you okay?’ Greg couldn’t contain himself from asking him.

“What do you mean, assface?”

“Did you just offer to help with the food?”

“Yeah?”

“Who are you?”

“Oh shut it, dickhead.” You didn’t miss the nervous glance he gave you, clearly signaling something about you to Greg. And then Greg seemed to figure something out, his eyes going wide.

“Oh! Is that why you-” Rodrick looked alarmed, putting his hand against Greg’s mouth to keep him from talking, but he managed to get himself free. “Is that why you’ve been trying to get mom and dad to go out all week?”

“Hah. Don’t know what he’s talking about, pssht.” Rodrick laughed nervously.

“Uh sure. Well I’m already hungry so I’m thinking early dinner and then we can make dessert?”

“Yes!” Greg yelled.

“Okay but if we’re making the food you gotta set the table. Deal?”

Greg groaned in annoyance, but agreed. “Fine.” He went on his way, and you and Rodrick made your own way to the kitchen.

“So,” you started, as you grabbed the pasta from the cabinet. “You’ve been trying to get your parents to go out all week.”

He looked everywhere but at you. “Uh, I don’t know what the kid’s on about.”

“Well, shame. Cause I was gonna thank you.”

“For what?”

“Well the more times a week I work the more money I get right?”

“Oh right. Right. So yeah you can thank me.”

“So you were setting them up to go out. Why?”

He shrugged, trying to seem cool. “Wanted to be alone.”

“You’re not alone now. You could be in your room. Or like out with your friends or whatever.”

“I didn’t anticipate that you’d actually be cool.”

“Oh you think I’m cool?”

“Yeah.”

The water started to boil, and you threw the pasta in the pot, stirring it with a fork.

“Cool. You’re kinda cool too. You know when you’re not trying to be impressive.”

“I’m not trying to impress you!”

“I didn’t say you were trying to impress me .”

“Well I was.”

“You were.”

“Did it work?”

“Why’d you want to impress me?”

“Cause you’re cool. I wanted you to think I’m cool too.”

“Huh. Maybe I do.”

“Cool.”

“Y/N I’M DONE! I THINK ROWLEY’S HERE !” Greg’s voice came from the dining room.

“I didn’t hear the doorbell, are you sure?” You yelled back, walking past Rodrick to get the front door. Maybe you were too lost in the conversion to hear it, because the boy was standing right there when you opened it.

“Hey Y/N!” He said with a smile, greeting you with a hug, which was very on-brand for the kid.

“Hey Rowley. You alright?”

“Yeah! I brought water balloons!”

“You did?”

“Well they’re not full of water yet so they’re just balloons but yeah.”

“Cool! You should tell Greg!”

“Will you play with us?”

“Oh I don’t know, I don’t have clothes I can get wet-”

“Well that’s not a problem!” Rodrick said, and you frowned in confusion. “You can borrow mine!”

“Oh I don-”

“C’mon, Y/N, you really gonna disappoint the boy?”

“Shut up. Fine, but you’re playing too.”

“Deal.”

“Yes!” Rowley exclaimed, before taking off, presumably to go find Greg.

“Well you wanna go up to my room?” Rodrick asked, apparently having otten some confidence from out of the blue, sporting a cocky smirk.

You laughed. “You wish. Just bring me a t-shirt.”

“Yeah. Someone’s gonna be looking like the number one Loded Diper fan out there.”

“If you bring me a white shirt I will beat you up!” You yelled, and he was already on his way upstairs. You took the past out of the pot, mixing it with the sauce you’d made, which was the easiest one you could find.

Rodrick was back as soon as you set the pot down on the table, handing you a gray shirt that , of course, had ‘loded diper’ written on it in terrible handwriting.

“Thanks.” You draped the shirt over your shoulder and all of you ate in silence, apparently all stupidly hungry for some reason.

You were done pretty quickly, but made sure to get Greg and Rowley to promise to help with the dishes this time, since there were more.

“Okay! We’re gonna get changed!”

“Yeah me too!” You yelled back, making your way to the bathroom, changing into Rodrick’s gray shirt.

It didn’t hang as loose as you thought it would, and you laughed at the thought of Rodrick wearing a tight shirt for no reason. You supposed it was an old one he decided to turn into loded diper merch. Loded diper. What a stupid fucking name. You guessed it was fit.

Someone knocked on the bathroom door. Rodrick. “You done? These kids are little demons, they talk so much!”

You laughed, unlocking the door and grabbing your own shirt before opening it.

“Hello?” He looked wide-eyed, like his brain was malfunctioning, staring profusely at his shirt. “You alright?”

“Yeah,” he cleared his throat, awkwardly. “Fine. The shirt alright?”

“Yeah. A lot smaller than I expected. Does Rodrick Heffley wear crop tops?”

He shrugged, embarrassed. “Sometimes. That bad?”

“No.”

“Chicks dig the crop tops, you know.”

“Oh do they?”

“Don’t you?”

“I guess I’d have to see you in one to give an opinion.”

“Yeah that’s not happening any soon."

“Shame.”

“What?”

“I said let’s go.”

You barely had the time to walk into the front yard before Rodrick was hit on the face by a huge water balloon. You turned to see a terrified-looking Rowley at the other side. Rodrick gained his bearings again.

“Oh you’re in, you little shit!” He seemed way too determined on winning this, but who were you to judge?

Him and Rowley occupied themselves with each other pretty much the whole time, as you did with Greg, until you got hit rather strongly in the back. You stopped what you were doing, which was aiming your next balloon at Greg, who was right in front of you, and turned around to see Rodrick laughing at you.

“Motherfucker-” you cursed yourself mentally for swearing in front of the kids, hoping they wouldn ‘t tell on you, and launched the balloon at him at full speed, it landing on his chest.

“Hey!”

You played for about half an hour more until the sun set, and you decided it was best to get back inside. All three complained, and you laughed at the situation, because you supposed you did sort of sound like a mom when trying to convince them to get in, but they ended up listening.

“Okay what are we watching tonight?” You asked as you closed the front door behind you and dried your feet on the mat by the entrance.

“Oh can we watch a horror movie?” Greg asked.

“Nope, we know how that ends.”

“But we’ve changed!”

“It’s been less than a week!”

“People change!” Greg tried to plead, but you knew Mrs. Heffley wouldn’t like it if you caved in.

“No can do, Gregory. We can watch that Adam Sandler movie you wanted though.”

“With the little kid?”

“Yeah.”

“Fine.”

You were halfway through a second movie when the boys decided it was time for dessert, and you still had a little while before the Heffleys came back, so you decided you’d all bake cupcakes.

They didn’t turn out as great as you wished they would, but also weren’t half bad. They were a little flat and maybe a little toasted on the top, but were otherwise pretty edible. You covered them with some frosting and ate them as you finished the movie.

It turned out when you were done the Heffleys still hadn’t come back, so you decided to put the boys to sleep then. You came back to Ridrick looking at you at the other end of the hallway.

“Hey,” you said, not expecting him to be there.

You stood there in silence for a few moments before he cleared his throat and started talking.

“Um do you wanna hang out? ‘Till they're back?” It was funny, with him. One moment he’d be full of confidence, flirting with you at the max, but, in a second, his entire demeanor would change and he’d look unsure, insecure to ask you anything.

You were starting to wonder if he wasn’t just being a stupid hormonal teenager and if he actually, maybe, had a little bit of a crush on you. But you wouldn’t entertain those thoughts, of course. First because you could be completely misinterpreting the situations, and second because you needed the job, and you hadn’t gotten enough of a read on his mom to know if she’d be cool with that.

Still, you did have nothing else to do but scroll through your phone as you waited. “Sure.”

“Oh! Cool. Uh, my room’s right there,” he pointed to a white door by his left, and you followed him in. It actually looked pretty cool. It was sort of exactly what you expected his room to look like, except maybe a little messier, if that was possible.

To each their own, I guess. It’s not like you were the cleanest person to ever walk the Earth. You sat down on his bed, and he opted to sit down on a beanbag just in front of you.

TIt's safe to say things were a little awkward. “Uh. So. Cool room.”

“Yeah. Thanks.”

You studied the multiple posters he had glued to his walls. “Oh, The Cure. Cool.”

“Yeah. They’re not like super my style or anything. But they’re cool.”

“What would be your style?”

“I don’t know. Hard rock.”

“Huh. I don’t know. You just look like one of those guys who like rock but secretly listen to Taylor Swift and Justin Bieber or something when they’re alone.”

“What- what I would never- I don’t-” busted.

You laughed at him as he tried to deny it. “I think it’s cool.”

He stopped. “You do?”

“Yeah. Taylor Swift’s cool.”

“Yeah uh. Girls dig that.”

“Do you really know what girls dig or do you just make random guesses?”

“I’m well-informed.”

“Oh are you? You have a girlfriend or something?” Subtle.

He scoffed. “Pfft. Yeah.”

“Uh- huh.��

He gave in. “No, I don’t.”

“Okay”

“You're a girl. What do you dig then?”

“What a romantic way to phrase that question. I guess I don’t know. Never stopped to think of it. What do you think we dig?”

“Uh. Bad boys?”

You let out a laugh. “Yeah I guess. But it depends.”

“On what?”

“On whether they’re nice to us.”

“So you want bad boys who are actually nice.”

“Yeah.”

“That doesn’t make sense. Uh. But I can be nice.”

“Who said you’re a bad boy to begin with?”

“Um rock band? Cool eyeliner?” He motioned to himself, mockingly.

“Well who do you wanna be nice for?”

“Uh. You? Obviously.”

Your smile faltered. There was the confidence making an appearance again.

“What?”

“Uh. You know. So I can uh- practice. For other... girls?”

“Right.”

“Or maybe not.”

“Okay I ‘m lost.”

“Do you wanna go out with me? ” He blurted out at rapid speed.

Okay, sudden much? “What?”

“Uh. We could… go to the movies or something? You seem to like movies.”

“Right. But as a… date?”

“Yeah.”

You thought about it. It was just a date, it’s not like his mom would get mad about a date, right?

“Sure.”

“What?”

“I said sure.”

His eyes widened, he didn’t seem to have been expecting a positive answer. “Oh! That’s cool! That's- cool.”

“Yeah. Cool.”

He began standing up. “Well, do you wanna-” In that very moment, before he could finish, the doorbell rang, and you made your way past him, running downstairs and getting the front door.

“Y/N! How are we?”

You hoped the blush on your cheeks wasn’t as visible as it felt as you talked to her. “We’re great! Greg and Rowley are already in bed, Rodrick and I have been uh. Hanging out.”

“Oh that’s nice of him!” She turned to face her husband, who, in turn, grabbed your wrist.

“What have you done to him? Are you some sort of witch?” He asked you.

You laughed awkwardly. “Oh it’s all him! He was showing me the posters in his room, we like the same bands!”

“Oh do you uh. Like rock too?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Well we’re taking too much of your time. Is Rodrick driving you home?”

Oh, right. Shit. He was.

“Yeah I uh, think so.”

With that, he walked into your view, holding up the van keys. He’d apparently put on shades, probably so his parents wouldn’t see he had eyeliner on.

“Why do you have sunglasses on?” Mr. Heffley asked him as he walked past them.

“It’s called fashion, dad!”

Mrs. Heffley handed you the money for the night, and you went on your way, getting into the van with Rodrick, who, by now, didn’t need the GPS to get to your place. Except he wasn’t driving to your place at all.

“What are you doing?”

“Wanted a slushie. That cool?”

“I guess.”

He stopped by a 7/11 and bought each of you a slushie and some chocolate bars, which you ate outside. The wind started to get harsher, and you crossed your arms around your chest for warmth. He caught on to that, taking his striped hoodie off and giving it to you. You looked up at him, confused.

“What?”

“You’re cold.”

“Yeah but you’ll be cold.”

“Rockstars don’t get cold.”

“You’re not a rockstar.”

“Not yet."

You raised an eyebrow at him, unamused.

"Just take it!”

You did, and put it on. This one hung looser than the shirt you’d borrowed earlier. It did help. You tried your best to contain the smile that was insisting on forming on your lips. You knew it was dumb.

“Thanks,” you mumbled under your breath, and you could see him smirk, proud of himself. “You’re so cheesy. Wouldn’t take you for it.”

“I’m not cheesy. I’m just not an asshole.”

“You kinda are.”

“Shut up!”

You ate in silence for a bit before you decided to say what was on your mind. “Hey about that date?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t… I don’t know if we should do it.”

He tried to seem chill about it, but he looked a little hurt. “Why?”

“Well it’s not that I don’t want to! I do. For… some reason,” you added, trying to lighten up the mood. “But do you think your mom would be cool with it? I mean I don’t wanna lose this job and I don’t know if she’d really like us being alone if we’re dating.”

His face lit up. “So you’re thinking about dating me?”

Oh, you’d messed up big time now, he’d never let this go. “No! That’s not what I meant!”

“I think it is.”

“Fuck off!”

“Oh we’re using big boy words now?” He grinned.

“Shut up.”

“Well. Don’t think that should be a problem. They don’t have to know.”

“What do you mean?”

“What, do you tell your parents everything? They don’t have to know we’re dating.”

“Yeah but we’re not dating.”

“Not yet.”

“Shut up!”

“They don’t have to know we’re going on a date, then. Plus, the days you work can be like little dates.”

“Yeah except there will be two children up our asses.”

“You can manage.”

“Fine, Heffley. But if I lose my job you’ll be owing me. Like literal money.”

“Deal.”

“Cool.”

“Yeah. Cool.”

[. . .]

A/N: sometimes ur 20 pages into a diary of a wimpy kid rodrick heffley oneshot and you ask urself wtf am i doing with my life. this is the product of that. i wrote this THREE YEARS AGO WOW so i edited some of it to post it here but nothing major cause i didn't want it to lose its energy lol. btw i was in fact like. actually in high school at the time lmao. luv yall!

#diary of a wimpy kid #doawk #rodrick heffley #rodrick rules #rodrick heffley x reader #rodrick heffley imagine #greg heffley #rowley jefferson #imagine #x reader

726 notes · View notes

rosedom · 16 days

Note

AHH UR SO RIGHT, fucking him over his bike, his pride and joy, while he gasps and moans while blubbering on how good u make him, how good it is.

AHHH him in leather too, he'd look so fine with a leather jacket bro omfg (≧▽≦) the way he'd tremble when you'd bite his neck, marking him up all from his neck to his shoulders as he tries to he quiet, embarrassed that he's feeling this good with you railing him over his precious bike

Maybe he's known as the "bad boy," the complete opposite of you,, and nobody would expect the two of you to even speak to each other,, but here the two of you are, both of you pretty much trembling from overstimulation and how good you're both feeling aahdbsksbdjs

It's such a good idea omfg ahdhshdbs ur brain is so good it's amazing

-pera

"in an open match, 【 pera 】 has invited WRIOTHESLEY to play . . . dress for the slide

✦ㅤㅤ 【 CW 】 dom!male!reader, sub!ftm!wriothesley, modern au, sex against a motorcycle, vaginal fingering, PIV sex, dirty talk + teasing + lowk praise, lighthearted bickering (mid- and post-coitus), slight breeding kink, creaming, creampie, alluded aftercare .

A/N : i know it technically wasn't an invitation, but . . ye<3 + fun references of dad!wrio with sigewinne <33

"do you want to watch, [PLAYER]? press KEEP READING to spectate the match."

Wriothesley is not an arrogant, prideful man. He is humble; he tips generously at restaurants, holds the door open for anybody coming up behind him, greets people—you especially—with a kind smile.

The scars marring his body, the thick leather of his jacket and pants, the spikes and chains worn like jewelry, accessories—it’s intimidating, sure, but on him, it’s hardly such.

Little children—they bound up to him, pulled as if by a magnet. It’s adorable, it’s endearing; and Wriothesley takes it all in stride, smiling that toothy grin of his and giving lollipops and candies from God-knows-where. (He’s got a pocket in his jacket just for sweets.

It’s why he always smells like sugar, beneath his frosty cologne.)

And speaking of children... Wriothesley is so good with ‘em. He holds custody over small Sigewinne, for crying out loud! She’s quite popular in school, too; while she's certainly a ball of sunshine on her own, her father certainly seals the deal for her—especially when he drops her off and picks her up in that hot ride of his:

a goddamn motorcycle.

Now, you’re not exactly an expert in the things: all you know is that it looks badass, and it makes Wriothesley all the more ruggedly handsome to you.

And, well.

It just so happens that, now, you’ve got this ruggedly handsome, sugar-frosted man all for the taking, spread out across the seat of that damn bike. He’s got his usual get-up on for when he rides—leather jacket, torn jeans, simple tee—, his hair a mussed up mess from where he took off his helmet. The helmet is resting precariously on the back seat, a support for Wriothesley’s body as you kiss him silly.

“Hah—wait, wait,” he’s pushing you back, breathless, his leather, fingerless gloves accentuating his fingertips, the short, bitten nails of his. His cheeks are tinged pink, and he looks good enough to eat—to devour.

You hum, tip your head to the side to nonverbally ask, What’s up? but Wriothesley’s twisting around just-so, just enough to grab his helmet. He passes it off to you—with, to your delight, shaking hands—, and asks, “Can you put this on the ground?” You raise a brow, taking it anyway to do as he asks, and he continues, sheepish. “I—ah, I don’t want it to fall.”

You laugh, then, corralling back up to him once the helmet’s safely deposited on the grass (and not the pavement, thank you. You’re not a monster, letting something as sexy and sleek as that helmet risk getting scratched up).

“Oh?” You lean back in, making like you’re about to kiss him again—kiss him proper, now, without worrying about the precarious balance of his beloved helmet—, but you dip down at the last second to press hot, searing kisses across his throat. “Why would it fall?” you continue, chuckling at the soft whimper that falls past his lips. “Unless you’re thinking about something naughty.”

He goes silent; the motorcycle rocks, just a little.

You pay it no mind, though. “Dirty, dirty boy,” you coo instead, lapping at the heavy thrum of his pulse. He groans, strong, leather-bound hands coming to wrap themselves around your biceps, yet he makes no other noise besides the quiet sounds of each exhale.

Soon enough—because it seems Wriothesley truly is intent on keeping it zipped—, your mouth has landed on the softest, most tender part of his neck. You hone in on it like you’re some type of mosquito blood-sucker, lips wrapping around his skin and sucking, suckling, working your tongue over it until it blooms a pretty shade of purple.

You tire quick, though, of the lack of vocal reply from your lover. “You can’t tell me you haven’t fantasized about this already,” you murmur, suckling a new mark opposite of the first one you’ve set prominently, “about me, about me fucking you jus’ like this...” You slide your hands up from his side to cup his jaw, thumbing at the subtle stubble as he looks up at you with such icy-blue irises.

You don't expect Wriothesley to nod. “I do,” he adds on, to really fluster you.

“I—ah?” You hiccup, pause, bite at the side of his neck mere inches above your first mark. “Gimme the deets.”

(It’s fun, to be immature like this.)

He huffs above you, gentle laughter shaking you from where you suckle bruise after bruise after bruise, leaving him looking like he got mauled by a bear, or whatever. (Your possessive heart soars at seeing your claim spread across his skin, where even his jacket collar can't cover.

Everybody will know he's yours.)

“Stop talkin’ like that,” he grumbles—the effect lost by the way he laughs—, “you sound like a teenager.”

“A horny teenager.”

He barks out a true laugh at that, the sound spilling into a soft moan when you suck at the slight hollow of his throat, the area oversensitive because of the scars. “You're insufferable.”

“And hard,” you murmur, rolling your hips down into him. The motorcycle creaks at your movement, but, this time, it stays still—perfectly still. (You thank Wriothesley for the care he gave his bike, going as far as to invest in a good and proper kickstand.

He definitely didn't imagine this when buying that, though.)

It's time to up the ante, then (to really test the give of the product.)

“Lemme fulfill those dirty fantasies of yours, sweet thing,” you coo, suddenly dropping the pretense of light-hearted teasing and diving right on into adopting that tone of voice you know makes Wriothesley utterly helpless in his arousal.

Yet, “Sigewinne rides on this with me—” he tries to say.

“So?” You dip down, hot breath fanning against his lips. His eyes cross to follow your descent, trained on your mouth getting closer, closer. “I’ll clean it.

“Besides,” you continue, rubbing the tips of your noses together. His own breath tickles your face. “I want you to be reminded of this. Every time you go on a ride, you’re gonna be thinking about this—about me, about the way I ruined you right here, right on your precious lil’ bike.

“You’ll always be reminded of this.”

You don't expect the way he mutters, all breathless off of nothing but the pleasant ache across his neck from the hickeys and your dirty, dirty words—it’s a simple, a quiet but gruff, “Good.”

“Good?” You tip your head to the side.

Wriothesley only huffs again, pulling you closer with the hands he's moved to your shoulders. You swear you can feel the grooves of his gloves through your own shirt. “Good,” he repeats, easy confidence dripping from his voice. (You want him to drip with something else.) “I want to remember.”

And, really, the grin you give is downright ridiculous, this love-sick, dopey thing that has no place in such a charged environment; but Wriothesley shares it with you, your own private smiles, and then he's surging forward and pulling you down to meet him in a desperate kiss, one all tongues and teeth.

“Now quit talkin’,” he drawls, licking at the roof of your mouth, “and make g-good on that promise.”

“Promise?” You chuckle, dark, a play out of Wriothesley’s own book. It doesn't fit you, really—you, the epitome of a good boy, a handsome sonuvabitch who has grandmas tripping over themselves trying to marry off their granddaughters. (“Oh, isn't he charming, sweet Cecily?”

“Grandmama, I’m a lesbian.”)

“I didn't promise you anything, Wrio,” you coo, but your mouth and hands are hardly on the same wavelength; as you tease him with your words, dripping straight sin, your hands are unbuckling the heavy metal strung across his hips, thumbing down the fly ‘til you get your fingers wedged right between his thighs. “Maybe I should have you beg, hm? Beg to be ruined right now, right here on the same bike everybody sees you ride around town in.

“Oh,” you murmur, then, an idea springing to your mind as your fingertips press to the throb of his cock even through his briefs, “isn’t that an idea?” He whimpers, the sound so soft, so—so unbecoming, if you didn't know Wriothesley the way you do. “E’rybody’s gonna see you ridin’ this, and they're not gonna have a damn clue, are they? They're not gonna know the way you spread yourself so eagerly across her pretty seats—” you tease him by calling the bike a her, knowing how peculiar Wriothesley is about personifying the thing.

He nods, hips humping desperately into your fingers. The whole time, he's making these other soft sounds, and you're taken, over and over again, by how lucky you are to have such a strong man at your mercy. “Please,” he begs. “Quit talkin’, and fuck me.”

Snickering, you bump your palm against his mons, saying, “But you love it when I tell you all the things I’m gonna do to you.”

Unable to even deny it, he groans, deep and throaty. “I do,” he acquiesces while you take away your hand and help lift him enough to shimmy down his jeans and boxers both, “but I’d love it better if you'd do more than just talk.” You leave the fabrics bunched mid thigh as you stand him up proper and spin him around, pressing him gently into the leather upholstery.

It’s quick, after that, to curl over the heft of him, to nudge your fingers back down between his bare thighs to tease at this thick cock, his throbbing cunt. He's soaked, off so little, and it's easy, too, to slide in one, two, three, working him open in soft, gentle movements that stretch him without a biting burn.

“I’m ready,” he bemoans, shimmying his hips ‘til he bumps against your own erection, tenting at your own pants. “Fuck me!” His hips move, tantalizing, teasing, and you find, unsurprisingly, that pre-cum is seeping through the fabric of your boxers.

“Fine, fine,” you murmur, pressing your fingertips against his g-spot for the first time today, the spot swollen beneath your touch. He mewls, chasing the pleasure, and you give it to him readily as you dig your cock out from your fly, barely pushing your pants down enough to rest just past your balls.

Now that your cock’s out, you slide your fingers from his wet, loose heat. (It never ceases to amaze you, how loose a cunt he gets when he's sufficiently aroused. He opens so easily for you, sopping off of nothing but some words, some foreplay.)

No matter how wet he is, though, you're still careful to further slick him up with lubricant. You dip into him just-so, just enough to slather his hole and cock both in lube. He starts, slightly, at the starkness of something cold against where he's most hot, most sensitive. “Ah.”

Grinning devilishly against the nape of his neck, nosing down the high leather collar of his jacket, you drag out your fingers, terribly slow; and, only when you're sure Wriothesley is well aware of just where your hand is, you slather your own hard cock with the mess of lube and his slick.

“Ready?”

He huffs. “I’ve been ready, babydoll.”

You laugh at that, nudging your cockhead up and into his loose hole. The resistance is hardly evident—really, his body gives so easily for you—, your cockhead popping in in that perfectly saccharine way that always makes you groan low, makes Wriothesley whimper high in his throat.

“So open for me, babydoll,” you coo—his own word against him—, one hand dropping from his hip to brace against the seat of the bike. It hasn't gotten truly unsteady yet, but you always like to err on the side of caution when your beloved is involved. (Plus, you’re really not keen on having to buy a replacement bike for him.

A year’s salary alone probably couldn't buy a bike as souped up as his, the years Wriothesley put into the thing paying off beautifully in the long run. That damn bike's been around longer than you’ve been his boyfriend.)

Your cock slips in quick, easy, smooth, sliding right in down to the hilt, where you pause to let him adjust to your size. And, like clockwork, he shuffles his hips side to side against your one-hand hold and breathes out a low, whistling breath, says, “Okay.”

With that simple word—that small phrase, really—, you’re drawing your hips out slow n’ slick, the sound frankly obscene in the quiet around you. His bike doesn't so much as creak this time, either: it’s silent but swaying in time with your thrusts, barely noticeable and not at all that important, supporting the weight of you both and the heft of your next tender thrust.

Nosing at his sweat-damp hair, you drawl, “Look’it you, sweetheart, all open n’ pliant for me on my cock. You’re takin’ it so well, pretty thing right on your pretty bike.”

“Baby—” he starts to say something else, but he gets cut off with his own moan, your thick cock budding up against his g-spot. You feel him froth around where you're balls-deep in him, and you slide your hand from hip to mons.

“Want my hand, Wrio?” you ask, fingers brushing the mess of black curls sprouting from between his thighs.

He nods vehemently, his bangs splayed across his sweaty forehead. God, if anybody walked by, drove by—they’d get an eyeful of your Wriothesley, fucked silly and hot by your cock; they’d get their heart’s content of punked-out Wriothesley, leather gloves and leather jacket spread across leather upholstery, his accessorizing chains rattling off with each thrust.

But Wriothesley is yours and yours alone; you wouldn't dare share the sight with anybody else. As such, you curl yourself further over his stretch-out, prone body, breathing hotly against and moaning against the blushing shell of his ear.

“There we go,” you murmur, taking to circling the throbbing head of his cock with a gentle finger. He mewls into the air, his head almost limp on his shoulders. “There we go.”

“F-feels good,” he moans as he tips his head into yours. “So good.”

“Yeah?” you ask, rhetoric, switching from circling to stroking him, your pointer and middle finger lightly squeezed on either side of his straining erection, moving forwards n’ backwards in gentle undulations. You swear you can feel his heartbeat in each throb of his cock, driving you to give it to him better, sweeter. “I can feel you throb for me, sweet thing: are you already that close?”

No longer trusting his voice (which is a shame, really, considering how much you love to hear those ruined syllables pass from his lips), Wriothesley can only nod, letting his head loll even further forward ‘til he’s practically curved over the seat of the bike. You follow him all the way down: you, wrapped over his curled back; and him, head pillowed on his crossed arms. A shimmer of sweat makes itself known on the sleeves of his jacket, the leather of it catching the sun. He’s devolved to helpless moans.

While he trembles beneath you, around your cock, you hone in on that perfect angle—the angle of your fingers stroking him off, the angle of your cock bumping against the spots deep in his cunt that never fail to pull Wriothesley apart. “There we go,” you repeat, your own words coming out muddled with the pleasure threatening to pull you under, instead. “‘m gonna cum in you, gonna fill you up ‘til you can’t take anymore—y-you want that, baby? Want me to breed you while you cream my cock—”

“—yes!” His voice is shot to hell, this raspy thing that’s somehow thrice as gruff as normal and equally as hot, as absolutely, resolutely ruined. “Yes, yes! Breed me, w-wanna be bred...” He tapers off with a whimper, cunt beginning to tighten up around you as his orgasm threatens to pull him under with you—no longer just apart, but wholly wrapped in you, safe and protected.

“Cum for me, then—mm—, Wrio, Wriothesley—”

He whimpers, again, and you barely catch a whisper of your own name in the intelligible mess before you’re cumming, too, your cock pulsing with each involuntary squeeze of Wriothesley around you. Even as blood rushes through your ears, though, you’re whispering sweet words—nasty words, each one making him whimper n’ whine—, your fingers—long-trained, by now—keep up the gentle strokes of his cock until he’s too sensitive to go on. You withdraw them slowly, even as you’re still pumping him full with cum, even as his cock is still helplessly twitching and cunt still milking you for all you’re worth.

Coming down from your highs, then, is a slow, drawn out thing. You stay seated to the hilt, but you tease at the way his cunt’s spread open around the base of your cock, your fingers coming back covered in opaque white. He whines and weakly kicks his leg back, but you only laugh, bringing his cum up to your lips, tongue darting out to lick it clean. You groan—more-so for show, to get a rise out of your boyfriend—at the taste, and he seems to finally find his voice at that.

“Quit it,” he says; and, damn, did you do a number on his voice. It seems to have dropped an octave, all syrupy-slow and gruff in that way he always gets post-coitus. “‘s nasty.”

“I’m nasty?” Laughing, you nuzzle your cheek against the back of his head, cat-like in your affections. “You begged for it.”

Wriothesley groans. When he attempts to lean up, you help by wrapping your hands around his abdomen—surely leaving a patch of saliva somewhere on either his tee or jacket—and prop your chin on his shoulder... all while you’re still balls-deep.

“Hi,” you say, grinning. You can feel his eye-roll.

But he says “hi” back anyway, letting his head fall back onto your own shoulder. He tilts his face towards you and meets your gaze with a satisfied sort of smile.

“Well?” you ask. “Did I live up to your fantasies?”

He nods. “And more,” he adds; but then he’s pulling off of and away from your cock, leaving you no time to dwell on it. “I starkly remember you saying you would clean my bike.”

“I did.”

“Get to it then.”

You grumble, though, tugging him back into your with the bear hold you’ve got wrapped across his torso. “You and the bike,” you finally correct, “and you come first. C’mon.”

Whether or not you actually get to cleaning that leather upholstery, well... Wriothesley may be driving Sigewinne to school tomorrow while sitting on a barely-there, all-dried patch of his and your cum.

i got rlly carried away . . this was 3k words before i even knew it >< . . but: was this inbox from february? ye. does my pera anon still show their face? idk ! if ur still here, this is dedicated to u, honey <33 i know this may feel shallow of me, but i really do miss u guys when u disappear (；′⌒`)

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luviemax · 4 months

Text

the blue- oneshot

a/n: IT'S ABOUT DRIVE IT'S ABOUT POWER WE STAY HUNGRY WE DEVOUR!!!!!!!!!!! song inspo here :3

-> max verstappen x female!reader, no physical descriptions of reader

warnings: idk,,,,, none?

masterlist

word count: 824 words

You first meet him from a distance.

The first time you see Max Verstappen, you see him on the big screen- well, indirectly, you do, considering the fact that he was in his helmet, but indeniably, it's his charisma which entrances you.

It's his dry humour, his witty remarks, and his determination which besotted you.

By the time you know it, you're tuning in for every race. You're anticipating every win. You're cheering him on every race.

You watch interviews. You sympathise with him. You don't really like his dad.

The next time you meet him, it's face to face.

Perhaps, it's by pure coincidence, or maybe it's fate, but you meet him in a club, ironically, out of all the places.

Originally, you weren't even supposed to be going. Quite unwillingly, your friends dragged you to the new club downtown, and Max just so happened to be.... there.

He practically spins into your life with no clear trajectory.

You'd only expected to admire him from afar, but here he was, placing a drink in your hand. The two of you are sat in the VIP section, which he graciously invited you to, so that the two of you could properly talk.

Before attempting to pursue anything with him, you make it clear that you know that he's the Max Verstappen. Instantaneously, he likes that about you. Personality wise, you're a little bit like him, no bullshit, mostly sarcastic. Otherwise, you're everything he could dream of. You're gentle. You're gracious. You only speak with compassion in your heart, and you only ever treat people with kindness.

From the get-go, the two of you get along. You can read his humour, and he can make you laugh.

Gradually, the two of you start hanging out, away from the club.

He brings you to see all his favourite places. He humours you too, and lets you drag him to all of your favourite places.

It is only he who could tolerate your ceaseless ranting, and not be annoyed. It's vice-versa too; you're the only person who could truly understand what he was trying to say, and what he truly meant. Naturally, Max tended to be a little bit hot-headed from his harsh upbringing, but you were able to calm him down and make him see reason.

At one point, he even brings you to the Red Bull Headquarters, where you spent half the time with your mouth wide open, gaping at all of the wonders of the team.

Max's admiration for you is slow and festering, but steadily growing and blossoming into something more.

He realises that it's only you that he wants to talk to after a race, whether it be good or bad. He wants to explain the technicalities to you, but hey, he supposes that Charles is an adequate victim in your stead in the meantime.

You know that it's turning into something more serious when he brings you home to meet his mom.

Sophie is all smiles and chit chat. Although rational, Max's mother was a wonderful woman. His sister Victoria is too, and you get the opportunity to meet her adorable sons, and she even mentions that she has a daughter on the way.

His dad however, is more intimidating. He's calculating and cold, ruthless in his barrage of questions directed to you. What do you do? Where do you work? How old are you? Are you just messing around with my son or are you serious about this? To the best your capabilities, you oblige him and answer his questions.

Max takes things slow and steady with you.

He's in no rush to pursue you; in life he's forced to take life fast, and make things quick, so for once, he wants to take things slower, and enjoy it while he lasts.

It takes a while for him to finally bring you onto the paddock, though.

You're something that he'd like to keep to himself. Not in a weird way, but Max knew that bringing you onto the paddock would mean cameras and articles, everywhere. He knew he could defend you from them though, which is why he brought you to the race in the first place.

Thankfully, your relationship isn't that poorly received by the public at all. Quite quickly, you become the paddock's new sweetheart.

Private mornings with him will always be the best, though.

You feel nothing but safe when you're in his arms, under the sheets. Well, in public, he claims that he doesn't like cuddles, but, it's a whole different story when he's with you.

Every morning, it's something like a sacred routine for him to hold you before he goes to do whatever he needs to do.

He's most elated when he brings you to his Monaco apartment, and discovers that Jimmy and Sassy absolutely adore you.

And hey, he gets where Jimmy and Sassy are coming from. He's completely infatuated with you too.

#max verstappen #max verstappen x reader #mv1 #mv33 #max verstappen fanfic #max verstappen fluff #max verstappen smut #max verstappen x you #f1 x reader

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adventuringblind · 10 months

Text

Daddy Issues Finale

Max Verstappen x reader

Genre: Angst and hurt/comfort

Request: no but they are open for Max, Charles, Lando, Oscar, and possibly Danny Ric if y’all have any ideas

Summary: Finally needing both fathers to leave you and Max alone, you start making steps towards going no contact to protect yourselves. Suddenly, the reader finds herself in an unlikely situation and once again finds herself dealing with their fathers.

Warnings: Read the title… it literally says daddy issues. Most forms of abuse are mentioned in this fic, so please proceed with caution. Sort of kidnapping. Reader is drugged. Also, this isn’t proofread because proofreading is hard, and I am lazy.

Notes: we’re back in third person! Also, the reader gets so fed up and becomes a slight menace. I totally was not expecting it to get this dark but here ya go!

Masterlist // Part one // Part two

Max was well aware he needed to do something about this situation. He just didn't know what yet.

It had been a few days since he found her on the floor. Eye's puffy and cheeks tear stained. He felt every bit of restraint he had snapped in him. He knew that logical thing to do was try to go no contact woth both fathers. But that didn't stop him from wanting to punch both for what they did to her.

He'd convinced her to get away for a while. So you headed out with Kika for some 'girl time' as she called it.

Max, on the other hand, was sat on the couch with Pierre, Lando, and Charles. Trying his best to give an explanation of what happened without getting to detailed.

They were nosey, though. So Max was bound to spill eventually.

"He hit her- twice."

The three other men stared at him in shock. Their mouths agape at what he'd just confessed.

"That explains her behavior when I picked her up from the airport." Lando sighed.

"What are you going to do about it, Mate?" Piqued Charles. His hand rubbing against his head to try and process what he'd just heard.

"I don't know yet if I'm being honest."

They all were aware of the bags under Max’s eyes. How his voice sounded so broken. He’d seemed so happy just last week. Thinking his father was finally going to let him breathe. Jos technically did, but he turned that frustration to you instead.

Yesterday Max was given her phone. She had set it in his lap and said everything he’d need to know was in your texts. One rule neither had ever broken was going through each others phones without permission. Both sides had parents that loved to invade privacy. So the two had come to the conclusion that they would communicate what they felt needed to be at that moment.

Y/N had struggled to talk about what happened the last few months. So she just gave Max her phone and let him read what had been texted to her. It was a little easier this way. He could get find what he’d needed to know and maybe get some questions answered and she didn’t have to struggle to get the words out.

“The things they’ve said to both of us are awful, but this a new extent of that.” His voice wavered. His friends doing their best to comfort him. They all knew it was bad. It was obvious after he started joking about it like it was normal. “We both have their numbers blocked. So hopefully that will keep them away for now.”

“Well your dad showed up at your door. Do you think he might do it again?” Pierre’s voice, albeit gentle, had an urgency about it.

Max groaned and flopped backwards further into the couch. The thought hitting him like a train. His dad could show up unannounced, again. “We’ll have to move.”

“There’s an open apartment in my building.” Lando quickly suggested. “We could have sleepovers!”

It didn’t take long for the two to get the apartment. Even less time for getting everything moved in. It wasn’t too far away from where they had been living, and everyone wanted to help get them out of there as quick as possible.

Everyone had agreed not give any ideas that they had moved. Privacy becoming important for the two lovers. Both stopped their online presence aside from Max’s professional one. He doesn’t even run that account, his PR manager does. He’d had a conversation with her talking about how he’d been having some safety issues.

The two were relieved when they made it to the next race with no parents in sight. Y/N however, was still on edge about sitting in the Redbull garage. Max was understanding about it and said he could see if Christian would let her sit by him to watch or maybe in the Alpine garage with Kika.

She went for the second option. Waiting until the very last second to give Max a kiss before the race. Then she made her way through the paddock to locate Kika.

She was so close to the safety of the Alpine garage. Close to being able to enjoy the race and watch Max do what he loves. Until a familiar face had her doubling back to the safety of Redbull. Or maybe nowhere was safe.

People were closing in on her. Her breath becoming increasingly restricted in her lungs. She needed to get back within eye shot of Christian. He knew some of what happened. Enough to know that if he saw Jos around the Redbull garage, to have him escorted away. He’d probably be busy though, and she didn’t want to distract anyone.

She did feel a little better after seeing Max in first on the screen. Her eyes leaving the path in front of her for a measly ten seconds. Only to find herself falling to the ground.

She gathered her bearings and made a move to get back on her feet. Until she felt a hand in her shoulder.

“It’s been awhile,” Came the voice of Jos Verstappen.

Max had an amazing race. He was excited to win, but he was also excited to find his lover. He didn’t see her during the podium celebration. Most likely due to the crowds. He’d try to locate her in the Alpine garage when he was don’t.

As he was walking around doing his media duties, he locked eyes with Pierre. Pierre who was holding hands with Kika. Kika who was supposed to be with you.

Max excused himself from the reporter and jogged up to his friend. “Kika, do you know where Y/N is?”

“No, sorry, I haven’t seen her all day. I thought she was with you since she hasn’t answered my texts.” She explained.

All three passed looks of confusion before they all became determined to find you.

Max was texting and calling you repeatedly. Praying that neither of your fathers had actually shown up. He finally ran into Christian who was trying to congratulate him on another win. Max, however, only hear the sound of you crying from his memories. Concern flooded through Christian as he watched Max delve further into the panic.

“Max? Are you alright? Can you tell me what’s going on?” He voice calm but urgent enough to get Max to come back to his senses. Now clinging to the sound. Using it to ground himself.

“She’s missing.” He breathed

“Who? Y/N.”

Max frantically began nodding his head. The desperation to find her clearly evident.

“I’ll ask around the garage if anyone has seen her. Why don’t you check your driver room and take a minute to breath.”

He didn’t want to take time to himself. He should be looking for his love. Christian made a point though, he wouldn’t be able to think rationally if he didn’t calm down.

Now he sits alone. Letting the tears escape. Still attempting to call her only to be greeted by the cheery voicemail recording.

When he’d calmed himself down and it didn’t feel like his head was spinning, he began his search one more. Retracing the possible path you might have taken to the Alpine garage.

It seemed everyone was searching high and low for her now.

There were only so many places you could be.

Max was startled by the sudden sound of his phone ringing in his pocket. Disregarding the caller ID, he simply answered “hello” without any hesitation.

“Is this Mr. Verstappen?” Asked an unfamiliar feminine voice.

“Yes, who am I speaking with?”

“This is a nurse from the general hospital.”

Everything after that was a blur. He hardly focused on the details. Only running back to his drivers room to find his rental car keys and his wallet.

He ran into Lando on the way. Making his best attempt at explaining while rushing around to grab his things. He hadn’t even bothered changing back into regular clothes yet.

“How about I drive and you change in the backseat.” Lando shot Max a wink and despite everything going on, Max managed a smile. At least he knows where she is now.

Everything happened in a whirlwind. One minute she was on her way to see Kika and the next she was gripped by the arm and told not to make a scene.

Her survival instincts kicked in. Knowing she should listen to the man who is determined to make her and Max’s lives miserable. He really needs a new hobby.

She wanted to scream as they passed by Redbull again, but something in her stopped her lungs from doing so. ‘Why is defending someone you love easier than defending yourself?’ She thinks to herself as the two exit the paddock entirely.

It doesn't take long until Jos is shoving her into the back seat. She complies, knowing he's unpredictable.

When she finally is in the car, she notices the figure on the drivers side starting the car.

Her father had come along too.

"Isn't this considered kidnapping?" She asks sarcastically. The car pulling put and starting the journey to an unknow destination.

Neither of them speak. It's unsettling and eerie.

She wanted Max. She needed Max. She knew if she wasn't back before race end that he would be frantic.

They'd tried so hard to be safe and private at the same time. Maybe they should have just made a public statement. Now, everyone was going to find out in the most dramatic way possible.

"Are you going to murder me?"

"No, now shut up, or I will." Spits Jos.

"I would if just told me where we're going." She shrugs. Knowing she's making them aggravated.

If Jos hadn't taken her phone, this would be a very different situation. She curses whoever made women's pockets so small.

"Fine, if you need to know so bad, im taking you home. Far away from Max. Back where you belong." Her Father shouts. Knuckles are turning white from gripping the steering while so hard. "You two are bad influences on each other. You tell each other lies about your families! I've done some research, and I think maybe you're hallucinating. I'm taking you home where you can get help." He explains.

This time, she didn't say anything. The tears weren't stopping. You knew your father had said things like this before about your mom. Going as far as to try and get her diagnosed with any kind of mental disorder that fit.

It never worked because she never had symptoms of anything he was suggesting. How was he expecting to make it work this time?

The answer came sooner than expected. A moment she slipped into the back of her head to escape left her open and vulnerable.

A needle was jammed into her leg by Jos. A cold feeling spreading through her body. She had no idea what it was. Only that it wasn't good and she needed to get out of this car.

The adrenaline from her flight instincts kicked in, and her breathing picked up. They were on a slower street. One lined with small shops and pedestrians. If she was going to jump, now was her chance.

Without thinking, she opens the door and launches herself towards the sidewalk. The people around either running away or running to help her.

She vaguely remembers someone asking what happened and if they should call somone.

"Max" was the only thing she could get out before tumbling into the darkness.

Max rushs inside the emergency room. Lando dropped him right outside the door before trying to hunt down a parking spot.

"How can I help you?" Asks the nurse. A little startled by his sudden appearance.

'I'm looking for someone."

It didn't take long before he was being led back to where they had been keeping her.

Relief flooding through his veins when he layed eyes on her. Trying and struggling to sip water through a straw.

Her eyes went wide when she saw him. Flinging the blanket off and swinging her legs over the side like she would just walk to him.

He rushed over to her and gently laid her back down. Her pupils are blown, and her body is swaying side to side. Confusion takes hold of Max. "What happened to her?" He asks the nurse.

"She has a minor fracture in her wrist and a gash on her knee from the impact of the sidewalk. We're still running tests to see the specific drugs in her system, but we do know for sure she was drugged." The nurse explains.

Max feels his stomach lurch. "I don't understand. What happened to her?"

"My apologies, I thought the authorities had spoken to you already. I'll send them in to explain."

Max's head is reeling. The love of his life was drugged, and who knows what else. It doesn't matter what any reporter says. He's getting extra security.

Tears slip from his eyes as he holds you. "I'm sorry, love."

"Why are you sorry, Maxy? You're here." She slurs. A smile graced her lips despite the situation.

The sound of heavy boots makes Max look up. The girl on the bed is now entertaining himself with his fingers.

"Are you family?" The officer asks.

"Yeah."

"We should step outside."

Max got up from his place beside her on the bed. She looked at him, tears welling in her eyes. Struggling to comprehend what was happening.

"I'll be right back." He soothed her. Placing a kiss on the top of her head.

Max followed the officer outside and closed the door behind him.

"We have reason to believe she was kidnapped. Witnesses told us she jumped out of a moving car and then almost immediately passed out."

Max's mind went in so many directions at once. How could this have happened? How did nobody notice?

The officer opened a manilla envelope and slid out two pictures. "These are the suspects who we caught trying to get her back in the cat. Do you recognize them?"

Max's hand flew to his face. He couldn't get words out. He was about to sink to his knees before Lando came around the corner. Seeing him about to buckle and reflexivley running up to him. Lando pratically catchs the Dutchman and helps him get steady on his feet again.

Lando tries to get his bearings. He was about to ask Max what happened when he notices the officer and, more importantly, the pictures.

"Isn't that your dad, Max?" Max just shakes his head yes. Releived Lando is there to say what he's trying to.

Lando leans in closer, the officer surprised at the action and almost pulling away. He stops, however, at Lando's next words. "And isn't that Y/N's father?"

It didn't take them long to have the young woman discharged from the hospital. Lando driving the two home and helping check the apartment for any potential threats.

The two males could tell she was feeling awful. The doctors flushed her system with water and put a cast on the fracture. The two were exhausted.

Lando said his goodbyes and told Max to call if they needed anything. including someone to stand guard.

Max had texted everyone on the ride home that she was back safe.

A new question on his mind: What happens now? Both your fathers had been taken into custody. Mainly on the charge of kidnapping. But the officer said they could testify and get them put away for longer.

Could the two of you manage that? The side of him that wanted to make his father happy said he should go bail him out. On the other hand, the two would finally he safe. No more anxieties about awful parental figures doing unwarranted things.

Both could start to finally get the healing they deserve.

It took some time, but both came to the conclusion to prosecute. The day of the trail came far to quickly for you to prepare.

There was supposed to be a race this weekend, but it had been postponed until later in the evening due to many of the racers wanting to testify.

When both were found guilty, the couple started crying. The thought of being free from the awful cloud looming over them finally set in.

Nether of them could believe is was this good.

When Max won the race later, it was the most emotional either had ever been. Max let himself be proud of his achievements.

Months later, the two had begun to heal. A slow process. Both are patient and understanding with each other. Trying to communicate as much as possible. Finding outside help to help guide them.

Security at the paddock had gotten better. She never felt vulnerable. Mainly because someone was always with her, and Christian let her sit next to him during races. He'd joked, saying that you already look like you belong there, so he might as well just give you a job.

And as the two lovers lie in bed together, they reminisce. How their daddy issues brought them together.

372 notes · View notes

sungbeam · 7 months

Text

nonidol!kevin moon x f!reader

another summer break, another annual trip to the lake! except, it seems like when you and kev get there, you'll have to make some tweaks to the original rescue protocol.

▷ genre, warnings. childhood friends 2 lovers, fluff, hurt/comfort, humor, swearing, motherly meddling and matchmaking, shirtless kevin..., kissing, talks of academic expectations/pressure/insecurity/and lack of fulfillment, kim seokjin is my favorite plot device, this could technically be slow burn, pining-ish?, im sorry joshua + serena, little to no interactions with the other boyz 😔

▷ word count. 29.0k (...hah)

this is the sixth installment of the love in unity series! reading the prev fics is not required, but i do encourage it :] all prev yns will be referred to as _!yn

a/n: return to summer with me 😌 or for those of u on the other side of the world, we can give summer an early welcome :') treat her w kindness pls </3 hope u enjoy!!

EPISODE ONE (PILOT): DON’T YOU LOVE FORESHADOWING?

"IT still feels weird, man." Kevin Moon brushed his hand over the surface of his newly cropped hair, freshly cut specifically for this summer break, just earlier this week. He probably should have gotten it done before he took all those pictures with his graduating friends, but life had been busy as of late.

Jacob Bae, best friend, roommate, and one of the recent graduates, chuckled from the other side of the video chat. "I'm sure it does. But hey, it looks good, so it's not like you have anything to worry about."

Kevin glanced over at the car where his dad was gassing up. His mom was in the back seat, waving her arm out the window to beckon him back to the vehicle. "Thanks," he grinned. "Looks like my mom is telling me to come back. This is probably the last time I'll have signal for a few weeks."

Just behind Kevin was the little gas station he and his parents stopped at for snacks and the last leg of their drive. It was tradition that every summer his family made the trek to their lakeside cabin a few hours out of Vancouver. Except last summer, Kevin couldn't make it; in contrast, this summer, Kevin and his parents were going without Kevin's younger sister. Usually, there were a couple other families that were there at the same time, too, who Kevin had grown up with. It was usually a grand time.

Kevin adjusted the bag of snacks he'd purchased from the store that hung on his arm as he made his way back to the car.

"Make sure to take pics! And say hi to your mom for me," said Jacob.

"Why don't you say hi to her yourself, Jacob-ah?" Kevin's mom chided teasingly as Kevin took his place in the passenger seat next to his dad. Ever since Kevin and Jacob had met at that one, fateful out-of-country student mixer at university, neither of them shut up about each other to their own families. It was like finding a needle in a haystack, locating a fellow Korean-Canadian.

Kevin passed his phone back to his mom, and he heard Jacob's immediate, "Hi imo! How are you?"

"I've been doing well. Wah, you look so glowy," his mom marveled, and Kevin felt her nudge him in the shoulder. "Hyungseo-ah, maybe you should get a girlfriend, too, if this is how radiant Jacob looks after so long."

Jacob's warm chuckle contrasted Kevin's groan. The latter rubbed his hand down his face with an embarrassed wince. "Eomma," he said weakly, sliding down in his seat. Not this again.

The car began to roll out of the gas station and he lowered his window to catch the breeze as they went. He already recognized the pattern of trees in this area, and his heart fluttered at the thought of being so close to childhood again. The lake was always a favorite place of his.

"—Kevin mentioned something about other families being there?"

"Oh, yes. We're always there with the Ln family, and more recently, Kevin's cousin—you know Yuna, right? She and her husband Seokjin meet us there with their kids now."

Kevin rested his elbow along the edge of the window. "Uncle Seokjin is an interesting character, Cobie," he mused. "I think you'd get along."

"Seokjin gets along with everyone," his dad chimed in.

"You know who you should get along with, Kevin?—" Kevin already knew where his mom was going with this, "—Yn Ln! You're not gonna be shy after spending so long away from her, are you?"

Jacob's voice echoed in the car. "Who's Yn Ln?"

Kevin squirmed in his seat. "Just—a family friend. Mom, can we please not make this a big deal?" And why in the world would he be shy around his childhood best friend? Three years couldn’t have changed a person that much, could it? You were cute—but in a dorky way—that was how he had always seen you.

She sent him an innocent look. "What? I don't know what you're talking about."

"You know what I'm talking about," he said, twisting around in his seat to send her a pleading look. "I don't wanna make her uncomfortable, especially since… y'know… we're not kids anymore?"

His mom made a sound of disapproval, but relented. "Aish, fine. I won't say anything; I promise."

A beat of silence. Then from the phone, "I still have no clue what's going on."

The twins were being a pain again. Most of the time, since you were away at college, you actually missed the twin hellspawn, but you should have known that bliss would shatter the moment you had to endure another five hour car ride with them.

"—MAMA, CONNOR IS BEING A JERK—"

"WELL, ALICE WOULDN'T SHARE THE GOLDFISH!"

The noise-canceling headphones weren't working. Usually, they worked substantially well when trying to block out the frat party noises at school, but they weren't holding up well against adolescent discourse. You would have thought that once they had grown out of toddler-hood, they would calm down a little, but sibling rivalry prevailed.

You shucked your useless headphones off and twisted around in your seat to peer into the backseat. "Here, have mine," you said, dropping your bag of goldfish into your little brother's lap.

Connor's eyes lit up in delight. "Thanks, Yn!"

Your ears rang as you turned back to the front.

The drive up to the lake house was something you and your family did every summer, except, you hadn't gone two summers ago for a summer internship. It was a tradition completed with other families—namely the Moons, who were longtime family friends out of Vancouver. You hadn't seen Kevin, their only son who was your age, in two years because of your conflicting schedules. It would have happened again this year, but your misfortune had you internship-less. Then again, a trip to the lake was never a bad thing.

You leaned your head back against your seat rest to enjoy the rare moment of silence in the car. Already, you could begin to point out the familiar scenery out of your window.

“I heard we’re gonna be getting new neighbors this year,” you heard your mother say from the front row, breaking the brief quiet.

You blinked out of your daze, shifting in your seat and to give momentary relief to your aching behind. “Oh, really? Do we know who they are?”

“Aw, so Uncle Jin and Auntie Yuna aren’t coming to the lake with us?” Alice pouted from the backseat.

“No, Uncle and Auntie are both still coming up with us,” you dad piped up from the driver’s seat. He caught your eyes through the rear view mirror. “Their little ones are coming, too. We’re just gonna have even more people this year.”

“Should be fun,” you murmured. You leaned down to rummage through the backpack at your feet for your backup bag of snacks (because some part of your brain just knew that the twins would forget how to share).

“I can’t wait to see Kevin!” This was Connor; you could feel the car shake as he bounced up and down in his seat. “I’ve been wanting to show him my new helicopter—”

Your eyebrows furrowed. “Con, you brought the helicopter?”

“Yeah, and what about it?”

Before further argument could erupt between you and your brother, your mom stepped in. “Speaking of Kevin…”

You could feel the coming conversation like there were dark gray storm clouds forming in the distance—impending doom, you liked to think. You fumbled with the opening of your chip bag. “Mama, could you possibly, by any chance, not try and set me and Kevin up anymore?” There, you’d said it. It was out in the open.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” your mother sniffed. “I only think that you and Kevin would be very nice together! It’s already so convenient that our families are long-time friends, and—”

“Mama,” you emphasized. “I don’t wanna get into a relationship for convenience's sake.” Your skin was already beginning to heat. Having known the Moons for so long, as well as having kids the same age, your mom and his mom had harped on the opportunity to bring your families together through more than one way.

“She just doesn’t want to get into a relationship at all!” Your little brother cackled.

You sent him a dull look over your shoulder. “And after I gave you my goldfish?” The situation concerning relationships wasn’t as Connor so bluntly put it; rather, you simply had yet to find the right person, as it was for many people. A relationship would have been nice, but when it came, then it would come. Plus, you were pretty sure that Kevin wasn’t the most comfortable with being matchmade with you by the Mother Matchmakers either. That was what the pact was for, anyway.

“I’m just saying that Kevin is a smart, good-looking young man,” your mother teased.

You hadn’t seen him in almost three years, but how much could three years change a guy? Maybe you would admit that he was cute. If you hadn’t known him since he wore Cars diapers, maybe you would have had a crush on him. “No matchmaking,” you repeated.

Your mother sighed melodramatically. “Fine. No matchmaking with Kevin.”

“Thank you,” you said, settling into your seat. Something stirred in the back of your mind, though. For some reason, you had a feeling that this wasn’t the end of this conversation. But as you turned your attention back to the scenery whizzing past you, you let all dealings with matchmaking, boys, and relationships sink to the very back of your mind.

EPISODE TWO: IT’S CALLED AN AMBUSH

THANKS to the convenience of no signal, you could safely attempt to forget about the internship you hadn’t landed this year. The entire debacle had been a headache and a half, but the residual sadness still lingered. There was something about the lakehouse, though, that gave you hope that you could get over it. While you wouldn’t spend this summer doing something “productive” toward your career, you would at least be presented with a pleasant alternative.

Your dad pulled the family SUV into the gravel driveway of your family lakehouse, and childhood flooded back to you. All of the dark oak walls and browned window sills and wildflowers blooming in the front walkway among the grass… You could remember crashing your bike into that one bush to the side of the house where the rain gutter now stood hugging the building.

The twins had fallen asleep sometime between the matchmaking conversation and here, which left the car in a sort of serenity that matched the surroundings. Your house in particular was one of the few houses that was perched a little higher than the lakeshore. There were a couple around the lake that sat directly on the water with docks built into their lower levels though.

You notched your car door open, shouldered your backpack, then quietly lowered your car’s seat. Connor, who was sitting directly behind you, had his head tilted to the side, mouth wide open to catch flies as he slept. With a cheeky smile, you snapped a picture of him. Once tucking your phone away, you climbed into the back to shake him and Alice awake.

“Hey, we’re here,” you murmured. Your parents were already beginning to unload the car of your supplies for the next couple of weeks.

Your brother’s eyes fluttered open, and his arms stretched over his head as he began to compute his surroundings. “Mmm… I’m hungry,” he babbled and smacked his lips together.

Yep, this one was awake.

You patted his face in your version of sisterly affection as you leaned over him to get to his twin. “You gotta wait, dude. You’re gonna ruin your dinner.”

He rubbed his hand over his face. “You always sound like Mom when you say that.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” you huffed. You nudged your sister. “Hey, Alice. Up, hm?”

She shifted in her seat, eyes still closed. “Are we here yet?”

“Yeah, hon. We’re here.” With your task completed, you backed out of the car to make space for the twins to climb out after you. You took a step backwards, your foot catching against something and making you tumble into the person directly behind you. “Ah! Shi—”

“Language!” Your mom called from the other side of the car. “Hi Kevin! Wow, did you get a haircut?”

Kevin…?

You recognized the warm chuckle behind you, and the arms helping to steady you patted your shoulders in greeting. “I did!”

When you whirled around, your mouth stretched in a grin, but you didn’t expect to come face to face with the confident stature of the man behind you. He was in a tank top and shorts, which were definitely proper attire for the humid temperature, and yet, your brain was thinking about the amount of arm muscle there was. Oh, and of course, the cropped black hair. You could have sworn his jaw got sharper, too… This was not the timid-faced Kevin Moon—rising freshman in college—you last recalled.

“Kevin!” Connor’s body rocketed past you and crashed into Kevin’s legs.

Kevin bent down slightly to ruffle your little brother’s hair. “Hey, little man! What’s good?”

“I wanna show you my helicopter—!”

“Connor,” Alice said as she hopped out of the car, “Mama wants you to help bring in your stuff, and then you can show Kevin your helicopter.”

Connor’s mouth gaped open like a fish’s. “Wha—what about Yn?”

“Well, that’s just what Mama said, so,” your little sister said matter-of-factly. She raised a hand in a wave to Kevin. “Hi!”

Kevin returned the gesture with a sweet smile. “Hi, Alice.”

You and Kevin watched as your twin siblings raced into the lakehouse with their backpacks strapped onto their bodies. You could hear their hollering from out here as they fought over who would get the top bunk this year.

“They’ve gotten taller,” Kevin commented, drawing your attention back to him.

You brushed your hair from your face. “Yeah, you should’ve seen my reaction when I came back home and they were like, not small enough where I could trip over them anymore.”

The two of you shared a small laugh, and you held one arm with your other. You hadn’t realized how a few years could reset things between the two of you, but you supposed it was also attributed to the fact that three years away at college could lead to a lot of difference and a lot of growth.

“So what’s new with you?” You asked him and nudged his arm with your elbow. “Have you been working out?” You blurted, but ran with it.

Kevin smiled, reaching back to cup the nape of his neck with that sheepishness you recognized as something distinctly Kevin. Maybe things weren’t so different. “Hah, yeah actually. Is it that noticeable?”

You looked him up and down with what you hoped he saw as teasing and not you actually checking him out. “Yeah, dude. You look good though.”

“Really? Thanks, Yn. I appreciate it.” He stuck his hands in the pockets of his shorts. "You look good, too—and oh my god, I have so much to catch you up on—"

"Hyungseo! Stop hogging Yn and come in to help with dinner." Just a little ways down the path, Kevin’s mom peered out from the front porch of the Moons’ house. The houses in this neighborhood were a little more spread out than the average suburban street, but their house had always been the closest to yours.

You could have sworn you saw a dusting of pink on your friend’s cheekbones. “I’m not hogging her,” he groaned. He turned back to you, throwing a thumb in the direction of his house. “I’ll see you guys over at ours in a few then?”

You gave a nod. “For sure. My mom and I marinated a couple things for tonight this morning, so we’ll be bringing those over.”

“Sweet,” he grinned, already backpedaling toward his house. “See ya, Yn!”

“Bye, Kevin,” you chuckled and bounded up toward your house.

Once everyone in your household had settled in for the most part, your dad corralled your siblings over to the Moon house, while you and your mom brought over your family’s offerings of tonight’s dinner. Instead of entering through their front door, you simply bypassed the invisible property line between your houses and found Kevin and his dad firing up the barbeque on the back lawn.

Kevin looked up from the box of aluminum foil in his hands and dropped it onto the table. "Oh, auntie! Let me get that for you," he said, meeting you in the middle and taking the tray out of your mom's hands.

"Thank you," she said to him. "How has school been, Kevin? Remind me again—you're a…?"

"Photography major," he replied. The three of you swept past Kevin's dad on your way up to the Moons' house.

"Ah, how's that going for you?"

"It's going well—" Your mom slid the screen door open and you all deposited your shoes to the side before entering the kitchen. "—I should be able to graduate two quarters early, which is nice."

Your mom nodded her head. "That's good, that's good. Katherine, it's nice to see you again!"

As your mom shuffled over to the sink where Kevin's mom was washing a colander of cabbage, you and Kevin set the trays down on the kitchen island.

You heard Kevin's gasp of delight when he lifted the foil off his. "No way. I love your mom's short ribs so much," he said, tipping his head back with his eyes closed.

You laughed at his reaction. "Me, too dude. It's never the same when I try to recreate it at school."

"Oh, for sure," he agreed. He cocked his head to the side, a frown coming into his face. "These should probably go back out to the grill then, huh."

You considered the two trays of meat before you. "You're right."

You both covered the trays back over and began to make your way back out to the lawn.

"Has Connor showed you his helicopter yet?" You asked Kevin while you slid your shoes back on.

The screen door slid shut behind him with his other arm carrying his tray. "He did." Kevin brightened, "It's cool. That kid should go into aviation or engineering."

"That's what I'm thinking," you said. "Though, he's not the greatest at math, but I guess he still has a long way to go before he even needs to consider all that."

He nodded, sighing. "That's true. The twins have a long way to go. Crazy how far we've gotten, y'know?"

You both dropped the marinated meat trays over by Kevin's dad, only to greet your dad on the way down to help out. You were sure that you and Kevin were needed up at the house anyway; your dad had mentioned something about having Connor and Alice start on the batch of kimchi. You hoped he had set up some newspaper this time to avoid a mess.

"My sister says your porch swing broke last year," Kevin said as he followed you back into the kitchen.

"Oh yeah!" You snorted. "Pro tip: don't try to fit two families on that thing. Not a good idea."

The moms directed you both over to the fruits and vegetables on the counter that still needed to be prepped, and you picked up a knife, and Kevin a peeler.

Kevin's brows knitted together as he tossed and caught an asian pear with one hand. "You guys tried to fit both families on that thing? It could barely handle two people the last time I remember."

"Hey, in our defense," you started, already giggling at the memory, "we wanted a cool picture, but then we ended up almost putting a hole through our porch. Lesson learned."

"Lesson learned, indeed." He shook his head as he shucked the pretty ring of golden peel he'd gotten from the pear into the paper bag beside him. "Is it fixed now?"

"Should be," you said. You used the blade of your knife to help coax the peel of the red onion off, then diligently began to take the rest off. "We need a maximum occupancy sign to go with it."

He laughed. "Something like 'less than four people' or something?"

"I think it can handle four people!"

His eyebrows arched high. "You wanna test that theory?"

You glanced up from your diced onions for just a second to meet his gaze. "Uhm no. But you are definitely welcome to."

"Oh, no, no! I'm not getting looped into this solo again like you did with the tire swing that one year."

"Okay, that time wasn't my fault! You said that you bet we could ride it together without breaking the tree branch, and I said—"

Your thought train cut off when the doorbell rang. Both yours and Kevin's heads perked up at the sound and darted in the direction like a pair of meerkats. Even from this room, you could hear the front door being opened and the commotion firing up. There was only one family left to join the party, and you knew exactly who had come to make his presence known.

In minimal time, a lanky man with dark brown bangs and a magazine-cover-worthy face barged into the kitchen with his hands raised, full of grocery bags, and a child riding in a carrier on his chest. "Hello, everyone! Your favorite, most handsome uncle has arrived."

"Hi, Uncle Jin," both you and Kevin chorused, as Kevin's mom took the grocery bags from him with thanks. Your mom must have been the one who opened the door since she had gone into the other room to monitor the twins and their kimchi.

"Hello, children—wow," Kim Seokjin said as he made eyes at Kevin's arms, giving them a little squish. "Close the gyms, everyone. What have they been feeding you at college?"

Kevin's face reddened. "It's nothing, really."

"Nothing?" Seokjin made eye contact with you. "You're seeing this, too, right?"

You swallowed your laugh, but you couldn't suppress your smile. "I'm seeing it, too," you confirmed. You set your knife down and gently ran your finger over baby Leena's head; you wondered how she was still asleep with how loud her father's voice was. "Awh, she's adorable."

Your uncle by association put his hands on his hips. "Fatherhood is great, but let me tell you," he said with flair, "after two kids, I don't want anymore. I think I've seen enough dirty diapers for you both combined."

Kevin laughed. "I'm sure Yuna-noona's on the same page."

"Yes, your cousin and I are definitely on the same page," Jin confirmed while clasping a hand on Kevin's shoulder. His eyes widened, and he gave the muscle beneath his fingers a squeeze. "Jesus—"

"Jin! Do you know where the bag with the formula is?" That was Yuna, Kevin's cousin, calling from the next room over. Soon, her head poked in through the doorway, and her mouth curved into a delighted smile at the sight of familiar faces. "Oh, hi everyone!"

"I think it's in the red colored bag, babe," Jin said as he turned away from you and Kevin and waddled over to where his wife was.

"That's what I thought, too, but I can't find it."

With the young couple now off in search of their bag of baby formula, you and Kevin were again left to yourselves with the fruits and vegetables.

You scooped the diced onions up with one hand and the blade of your knife into an empty bowl for later. "Well, that was…"

"Quite an entrance?" Kevin finished. You could still see the rosiness in his cheeks. "Yup."

"You can always count on Uncle Jin to liven up a place."

"Oh, definitely." Kevin picked up another pear to peel; they would probably either be sliced up for the kids to eat or maybe used to make a dessert later. Something of the sort, at least. "Now where were we?"

You raised your brows as you picked up a carrot. "I think we were talking about how you broke the tire swing in seventh grade."

The evening progressed swiftly with everyone's combined efforts in throwing dinner together. By the time the sun was about to make its descent into the horizon, all three families were moved out onto the back lawn with chairs set up and meats cooking on the grill. There was something beautiful about the lake at this hour—then again, there was always something beautiful about the lake. You couldn’t put your finger on it, but even the way the mosquitoes danced in the waning sunlight made your chest feel warm and fuzzy.

If you strained your vision a little, you could even make out the shapes of people on the opposite shoreline beginning to light campfires of their own. Most of the people who lived around the perimeter of the lake sublet their properties during the non-vacation seasons like your family, the Moons, and the Kims. Then, when the time came, they would return to their lakehouse hideaways for much needed rejuvenation.

As golden hour painted the landscape glorious shades of auburn and butter, you caught your mother making her way toward you out of the corner of your eye.

“Yn-ah,” she said to you with a plate of the fruit that you and Kevin had cut earlier in her hands. She gestured for you to take it from her, then nodded up over to the house on the other side of the Moons’ place. “Take the twins and go welcome our new guests.”

You furrowed your brows. “New guests?” When you followed her gaze, you saw that the house next door had acquired a new car in its driveway. You definitely didn’t recognize it, but you managed to spot what looked like someone disappearing in the front door of the house.

“They’re one of the new families, I think,” she told you. She then gave you a little nudge, urging, “Go. We’re still working on dinner anyways.”

You glanced between the plate of fruit in your possession, then searched the back lawn for the hellspawn. When you located their whereabouts (skipping through a pair of hula hoops over by the big oak tree), you marched over to them to repeat your mother’s instructions.

“Oi!” You called out.

Alice looked over at you as she stopped her skipping. “I don’t want fruit,” she said when she saw what you were holding.

You stopped just short of Connor’s hula hoop circumference. “It’s not for you. Mama wants us to go say hi to the new neighbors. Come on.”

“Do we have to?”

“If I do, then yes. And Mama said so.” Plus, you were not planning to go alone upon any circumstance. Your social anxiety could not take showing up at a stranger’s doorstep alone and with fruit.

The twins dropped their hula hoops and begrudgingly trudged after you. No child could trump the “Mom said so” card. At least, not in this household.

With your siblings following after you like two ducklings to a Mother Goose, Kevin saw the line of you walking past from where he was stationed beside his dad. His eyes zipped from you, the kids, and the plate of fruit, then cocked his head to the side in bemused inquiry.

You inclined your head toward the house you aimed for in the distance and lifted the plate of fruit as if that was enough explanation.

He gave a grave nod for your sake, teasing of course, then held up his free hand in a thumb’s up for encouragement.

Nonetheless, you and your siblings carried on.

The lakehouse on the Moons’ other side was similar to all the others around the lake: dark wood walls, doors encased in a protective screen door, grass and flowers growing out of the cracks where the house met the earth. You could feel your siblings converge on you, nearly hiding behind you, as you all approached the front door. It wasn’t that the house looked scary in any way—it was just the prospect of new people that was the scary part. You were sure this family was just as friendly as everyone else, but it didn’t hurt to be a little nervous.

When the three of you reached the front door, you raised your hand to ring the doorbell.

You could hear the echo of the bell inside the house, followed swiftly by a man’s voice, “I’ll get it!”

Footsteps drawing closer… then the locks came undone, and finally, the main door inside the screen swung open.

“Hi,” greeted the young man on the other side.

You paused when his face became clearer after opening the screen door. He was, to put it bluntly, awfully pretty. Dark hair swept back out of his face and behind his ear, a prince’s facial features, and a smile that was as beautiful as the golden hour greeted you and your siblings. Even his voice was soft.

Alice held onto the side of your shorts pocket. “You're pretty.”

The man made an expression of humble surprise, and heat rose to your neck. “Sorry,” you stammered. “We’re from a couple doors down and we wanted to welcome you to the lake. These are for you and your family.” You managed to pass the plate over to him without being any more embarrassing.

He accepted the offering graciously. “Oh, wow. Thank you so much! That’s so thoughtful.”

You placed your hands on either of your siblings’ backs to push them forward slightly. “I’m Yn, and these are my little siblings, Alice and Connor.”

Your siblings chimed in their hellos to the pretty man.

His eyes narrowed in upturned crescent moons, smile widening. “Well it’s really nice to meet you guys. I’m Joshua, but my friends call me Josh or Shua.”

EPISODE THREE: MAMMA MIA! HERE WE GO AGAIN…

IT turned out that your mother had an ulterior motive for sending you and your siblings to greet the newcomers. She had popped up behind you soon after Joshua had introduced himself to invite him and his family to have dinner with you. You could sniff out the conspiracy from a mile away, but you still wanted to give your mom the benefit of the doubt.

When the first night passed without anything happening, though, you slowly let your guard down. (Rookie mistake.)

Everyone crashed into bed after cleaning up dinner. The move up to the lake was a tiring one, and the promise of an early start the next morning proved to be more than enough encouragement to hit the hay.

You were on the living room couch with Alice sitting on the floor between your legs the next day. It was late morning by this time, and you and your siblings had just woken up less than an hour ago. Your dad was still asleep, and your mom? Well, you weren’t really sure where he was.

“Ow, can you stop tugging?” Alice whined under her breath, her hand rocketing up to the back of her head to stop your hands.

You paused your movement for the third time in the past fifteen minutes. “It wouldn’t hurt this bad if you would just let me run a comb through it.”

“The brush works fine if you use it correctly!”

You exhaled sharply and pressed your lips together. There was never any rest between your two little siblings, whether it was amongst themselves or against you. You supposed you could just suck it up for the time being; it wasn’t often that you got to braid your little sister’s hair. She usually just liked to leave it down.

You heard the backdoor open and shut behind you, and the both of you turned your heads to see who it was. Your mom entered the house with perspiration gleaming on her face as she took off her sun hat and tossed it onto one of the dining room chairs.

“Hi Mama,” the two of you said, one after the other.

Your mom settled onto the couch cushion next to you. “Hi girls. Is your brother and dad up yet?”

“Connor’s with Uncle Jin and Aunt Yuna,” said Alice. “Daddy’s still asleep though.”

“Mm,” she hummed. She combed her fingers through her sweat-soaked hair. “It’s a warm morning out,” she murmured, then quickly added, “hey you.” She knocked her hand against your arm.

“Hm?” You asked as you finished up Alice’s braid and tied it off with the blue Cinnamoroll hair tie she’d chosen. You patted her back with your hand. “You’re done.”

Your little sister hopped to her feet. “Thanks!” She dashed away and out of the room—to where, you had no clue. You figured she knew where the food was if she was hungry.

You angled your body to squish your side against the couch cushions and face your mother. “What were you saying?”

“Ah, I was going to talk to you about the Joshua Hong boy.”

Joshua Hong. You didn’t realize you could hear a man’s name so often within twelve hours.

You made a gesture with your hand. “What about the Joshua Hong boy, Mom?”

“Well, isn’t he a handsome one?” She asked you enthusiastically, straightening in her seat. It was alarming how bright her expression became. “I spoke to his mom while Kevin and I were walking just now, and he’s only a few years older than you, you know.”

You heard a metaphorical record scratch. What? There was so much in that one sentence that you needed to unpack. You raised your hands to signal her to pause. “Wait, since when do you and Kevin take walks together?” What could they have been talking about? You knew Kevin was an exceptional conversationalist, but never in your time at the lake had you known of this interaction.

Your mother blinked. “Oh, we started the tradition when you didn’t come up with us that one year.”

“Tradition?” So this happened more than once? You didn’t know why you were so scandalized by this information—it was just Kevin after all. You knew your parents and even your siblings were all fond of him—of course they were. You were arguably even more fond of him, but that wasn’t the point. You hoped she hadn't said anything about you and him as an item at any point of time… you trusted that Kevin could handle that though; that was what the pact was for, after all.

“Why are you making such a big deal out of this?” She arched a brow. “But anyway, yes, so we bumped into Josh’s mom on the last leg around the lake, and she mentioned that he’s majoring in chemistry and planning to go into medicine. You guys might have something in common.”

You pursed your lips. Perhaps the two of you might have something to talk about, but your track was pre-veterinary rather than pre-med. There was probably a middle ground though... Maybe you were just being stubborn.

“Just make friends or something,” she said to you while standing up from the couch. “You need more of those.”

Your eyes shot wide open. “Hello? Mom?” Now that was simply uncalled for.

She chuckled impishly as she walked away and disappeared down the hall, leaving you to yourself. You were lucky neither of the twins were here to hear that burn.

It wasn’t much longer than a couple hours later that you found yourself on the backyard lawn space setting up the badminton net between two oak trees with Kevin’s assistance. Everyone was outside and awake, and the kids were all seated up on your house’s back porch munching on the watermelon that Yuna cut for them.

You tightened the string on one side of the net. “So he didn't kiss her?” You queried.

Kevin sputtered a laugh, yanking his side to test its integrity. “Yeah,” he said. “Isn’t it so funny? According to multiple sources, Sunwoo and Chanhee barged in at the perfect moment, and frankly—” Kevin raised his arms up in the air and let them fall for effect, “—ruined the moment.”

"Pfft.” You considered that for a moment. An almost kiss ruined by a comedically timed interruption from a guy drunk off liquor and love, and the friend tasked with dumping his ass at home. That was bad luck if you ever heard it. “And what about that other dude? The Hyunjae guy? Did he finally fix his eyesight?”

Your friend leaned back against his oak tree, ankles crossed over the other and arms braided over his chest. A pair of shades rested backwards on his head to complete his summer-worthy ensemble of shorts and T-shirt. “His literal eyesight is still shit, but yeah, he and HJ!Yn are together now. Took for-fucking-ever, but—”

“Language!” Jin yelled like a referee on the sideline of a soccer match. “We have children in the vicinity.”

Kevin brushed a hand through his hair. “Whoopsies, sorry!” He turned back to you. “Anyways, yes, they are finally together. Man, having someone watch my cursing makes it seem like Jacob is here with me.”

You noticed the fond twinkle in his eyes as he stared out at the still waters of the lake just down the way from you both. “You talk about this Jacob guy a lot,” you said to him. “I think I need to meet the person who’s threatening to knock me off the best friend pedestal.”

“He already has,” he jested.

You let out an indignant squawk. “Hurtful!”

Connor, watermelon juice smeared all around his mouth, added rather unnecessarily, “So you don’t want a partner and you don’t have friends. What do you have, Yn?”

You leveled a scowl at him. “An annoying little brother.”

“Hey!”

In a tone dryer than the Sahara Desert, Alice chimed in, “Guess that makes me the favorite twin.”

“I should tell you about Sangyeon. I need to yell about Sangyeon,” Kevin huffed indignantly, snapping his fingers as if the thought just hit him. You whipped your head back over. “Oh my god, dude, you know what happened at the graduation ceremony? It was like, straight out of a scene from a movie—!”

You never got to find out what was just like it was out of a movie, because your mom appeared in the distance with the Hongs. They all came wielding badminton racquets—how convenient. You didn’t mind the extra company, of course, and despite your stubbornness, you knew Joshua and his family were very nice people.

You caught the tail end of your mother’s conversation with Josh and his mom: “...Yn used to play badminton on the high school team. She could’ve gone to the Olympics if she really wanted to—”

Well, that was only partly true. Your team had gone to Nationals, but the Olympics was one step above Worlds. You liked to think you were pretty good at the sport, but you hoped your mom wasn’t talking up you and your abilities too much.

“Oh, wow. I’m a soccer person myself,” said Joshua good-naturedly. “I don’t really know much about badminton, but it seems like a really fun sport.”

"Yn's a great teacher. She taught the twins how to play." Ah, there it was.

When they were within a comfortable distance, you raised your hand in a wave. "Hi hello!"

"Hello Yn," Joshua's mom said back. "Hi Kevin."

Kevin dipped his head with a smile. "Hi Auntie."

"Yn-ah," said your mom as she took you by the arm, dragging you over toward Joshua, "I was just talking to Josh about how good you are at badminton."

Your eyes widened slightly, and you noted the way Joshua's did the same. You made eye contact with Kevin as this happened. He seemed caught at a crossroads, unable to help or say anything. "I guess I'm okay at it."

"Liar," Kevin suddenly jumped in.

You sent him a look. Wait really?

He shrugged sheepishly. "I don't wanna downplay your abilities, dude. You're really good."

Oh. "Thanks, Kev," you said, blinking. Your heart warmed at the finger guns he sent your way. It was nice to know he had your back.

"Good! See? You and Josh should play doubles together." Your mother somehow got a racquet into your hand. She clapped her hands and ushered her two other children off their butts. "Come on, you two, you can be on Kevin's team."

"But that's not what doubles means, Mama—"

Joshua sidled up beside you with an apology in his smile. "Sorry, you don't have to do this if you don't want to. I don't want you to be forced to teach me or anything."

Guilt wormed itself into your stomach. "No, no! It's totally okay," you amended swiftly. "This all just happened really quickly, but I'd be so down to teach you badminton, if you'd like."

He bobbed his head up and down, patting the netting of his racquet. "Okay, yeah. That'd be really cool actually."

You nodded, returning his expression. "Cool."

You and Joshua had somehow taken over the makeshift badminton court. The twins had gotten tired of the "big kids" playing too hard, and Kevin… actually, you didn't know why Kevin put down his racquet. But at some point, you noticed that he was just hanging out in a chair, sipping some kind of fruit juice as he observed you and Joshua. (That was what you assumed he was doing. There was a book propped open in his lap, but you hadn't seen him turn a page in a while. And he had put his sunglasses on, so you couldn't exactly see what his eyes were doing.)

You tracked the birdie as it flew over the net to your side. "Nice!" You praised, taking a few steps in the diagonal to hit the birdie back over with an easy backhand flick.

Joshua stumbled forward, but hit it back over. "Shoot," he said, barely catching himself before he crashed into the netting.

You chuckled, "Careful." You backed up and gave the birdie a gentle bump.

It sailed over the net, but it landed too close to it for Joshua to get a clean shot back over. He sighed as he bent down to pick the projectile up from the grass. "Dang. Nice hit, Yn."

Content with your shot as well, you walked over to the net to meet him. "Thanks, man."

"Hyungseo-ah!"

You watched as Kevin stood up from his chair at his mom's call. "Yeah, what's up?"

As she strolled over to him, she was reapplying sunscreen onto her arms and face. "We have more new neighbors. Since you're not doing anything, you should come and welcome them with me. There’s someone I think you should meet."

You and Kevin locked gazes for a second before he turned back to his mom. You didn't know why you kept looking at each other—this all felt like déjà vu, but maybe it was the fact that it seemed like your moms were separating you both instead of bringing you together that was throwing you off.

"Uhm, sure, Mom." He dropped his book into his seat and followed after his mom.

Your gaze trailed after him for a moment before you snapped back to reality. You swiped the sweat off your forehead with the back of your hand. "Sorry, where were we?"

Just then, Seokjin made his way down the lakeshore with baby Leena strapped to his chest again. He threw up an arm in greeting. "Hey, kids. You guys still at it?"

"Yup," you said back. "He's getting good at it!"

Joshua laughed lightly. "Ah, you flatter me. It's just 'cause Yn's a good teacher."

Seokjin's eyes flickered between the two of you. "Huh. I'm sure she is."

"Anyways," you coughed. "Did you just come from the new neighbor's house or something?" He hadn't arrived from the direction of his own house, which was on the other side of yours.

Your uncle by association gave his affirmative, one hand pressed gently on the back of his baby in his holster. "Of course! You know I'm too nosy to not have gone to introduce myself and see what's up. The couple has a girl around your age, Yn-ie. Their son is off in Paris for his job or something though."

The two men could probably see the gears in your brain turning. Another person who was around yours and Kevin's age? You really didn't want to read too much into it, but—you pushed the thought to the side. It probably wasn't what you were thinking, right?

"Uh, you good, Yn?" Joshua asked.

Your eyes shuttered. "Yeah. I was just thinking about something." You gestured with your racquet in a flourish. "How about another round?"

EPISODE FOUR: THE DAMSEL IN DISTRESS DEAL™

THE crickets were particularly melodious tonight. Their chirrups became lovely background music as you perched on the stairs of your back porch beneath the warm glow of the outside light. Moths swarmed the bulb, casting little shadow puppets along the wooden deck.

You were hunched over one of the few books you brought along with you for the trip. Your siblings liked to tease you for bringing “school work” on a summer trip, but these had been purchased out of your own interest. It was an anthology of experiences related to animal behavior. The certain piece that had originally caught your eye had been about the Alaskan husky’s primal nature to run, and their participation in dog sled racing. You’d come across it originally in a magazine on an airplane, finding yourself enthralled in a story of the stamina, determination, and hard work that these dogs faced in the brutal Alaskan winters.

When your plane landed, you had gone online and found more stories like them. Thus, the book in your lap and money down the drain. (Though, you would argue that it was money well-spent.)

“Warm night out.”

You startled, heart galloping in your chest, as Kevin appeared in your periphery and stepped into the light.

To his credit, he took on a sheepish sort of grin. “Oops, sorry. Probably should have given a warning or something.”

You pressed a hand to your palpitating heart and scooted over to give him room to sit on the step next to you. “No, it’s all good. I don’t think there was really any way that you could have warned me.” You were probably way too deep into your book to have even noticed if he was any quieter.

He took a seat beside you, posture mimicking yours with his forearms pressed onto his knees. “You’re right,” he murmured. “Whatcha reading?” He asked while inclining his chin toward the pages in your lap.

“Oh.” You kept a couple fingers wedged between the pages you were on as you flipped to the cover to show him. “It’s just this, uhm, collection of stories on animal behavior. Real fascinating stuff, actually, and a lot of it is kind of inspirational.” You tucked a strand of hair behind your ear, unsure of why you were always shy about telling people about something you were passionate about. You shouldn’t have thought so little of Kevin Moon, though. He never gave you any worries about being judged.

“Oh, that sounds neat,” he said, scooting closer. “Is it for your major? You’re still doing wildlife biology, right—or is it ecology?”

“Wildlife biology,” you confirmed. “It’s not for my major or anything, no. Just something I was interested in.”

A thought suddenly occurred to you and you were rewinding all of the things that had happened in the past couple of days. Before Kevin could comment further on the topic of majors, you piped up, “Actually, I wanted to talk to you about something.”

His eyes widened a smidge, his posture straightening. “Oh? What about?”

You felt around the porch deck for the receipt you had been using as a makeshift bookmark, hand flopping around before you snatched it up and slipped it into the pages of your book. You set the book aside. “Is it just me, or are our moms… you know…”

“Doing the Thing again?” He finished. He sighed with a little grimace, “Yeah, I think I’m seeing it.”

The “Thing” that both you and Kevin were referring to was none other than the very act of matronly matchmaking taking place between you and the new kids on the block. At least you could confirm that you weren’t overthinking it.

You recalled the events of earlier today when Kevin and his mom had come back to where everyone else was with the new family that had just arrived. The Xus were another party of just three—their oldest son was in Paris, as Seokjin reported, but their youngest, Serena, was yours and Kevin's age. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out who Kevin's mom wanted to introduce her son to.

“You know what’s crazy?” You said to him then, “On the car ride up here, I asked my mom—like, point-blank, you know?—to not try to matchmake us anymore.”

Kevin perked up. “Dude. That’s crazy, because that’s what I asked my mom on the car ride up here.”

You sputtered, “You’re kidding.”

“Great minds think alike,” he said, lip curling upward into a smile and his arms coming up in a halfhearted shrug. “But I should have known it wouldn't be that easy.”

Now that you were thinking back to your own conversation, you should have known something fishy was going on when your mom mentioned Kevin specifically… You only thought that she was being thorough in her understanding of what you were asking her to do, but turned out, it was only a loophole. “You’re so right,” you groaned and tilted your head backward. “Literally what are we gonna do?”

The two of you stewed in silence on this fine night.

There was one night, similar to this one, where you had sought each other out. You couldn’t remember what year it was—something close to sixth grade when both of you had the mind to realize the game your moms were trying to play. From that night came a pact of sorts, one that would hopefully try to steer each other away from a fate that neither of you were sure that you wanted yet. After all, eleven years old was a little premature to be talking about who you wanted to spend the rest of your life with, right?

Kevin leaned back onto his palms. “We need to make a new pact, I think.”

Your head swiveled over to him. “Amendments to the pact?”

“Either amend it or come up with a new one to fit our current situation,” he said. “A rescue protocol.”

A rescue protocol… you could see it begin to take shape in your head. The previous pact was different—an agreement between you and Kevin that you were both simply friends, no matter how many times your moms made you do chores together, or tie each other’s shoelaces, or swap numbers and emails and social media. And it had worked, for the most part; you were both still friends after all these years.

But this time would have to be different. Your moms weren’t driving you toward each other anymore.

“The Rescue Protocol—is that what we’re calling it?” You mused in an attempt to bring mirth to the conversation.

Kevin made a sound like a laugh. “Better than ‘the pact,’ I like to think.”

“How about the ‘Damsel in Distress Deal?’”

He let out an actual laugh this time. You got to watch his eyes turn up into crescent moons, the corners crinkling with pretty smile lines. His smile was always contagious, even after all this time. “The ‘Damsel in Distress Deal?’” He parroted. When he allowed the phrase to soak into his brain for a second, tongue massaging his bottom lip, he relented. “Okay, that’s actually not bad.”

You giggled. “So we either call it the Rescue Protocol or the Damsel in Distress Deal, trademark.”

“Trademark?” His reaction sent you into a flurry of snickers, hand clamped over your mouth so the sounds wouldn’t wake up your family. “What? Are we gonna advertise this idea to people?” He chuckled.

“It’s a good idea!”

“We don’t even know what the parameters are yet,” he sputtered. Kevin lightly punched your upper arm. “Silly goose.”

“Geese are not silly,” you found yourself replying. They could be mean creatures. “But I think they’re cute.”

“Jacob thinks they’re scary.”

You gave a playful roll of your eyes. “This Jacob guy again?” After a moment, you sighed, toeing the dirt on the bottom step with the tip of your shoe. “Hey, can I ask you a question?”

Kevin sobered a little, but the remnants of his merriment remained in the shine of his irises. “Shoot.”

“Are you…” You struggled to string the words together. There was a question you’d come up with already, but you didn’t know if it was too forward or not. “Are you ready for a relationship?”

The question caught him off guard. His gaze flickered from you, to the grass, to his lap, to the moon-soaked surface of the lake further down the hill. “I… I’m not sure, really,” he muttered, then added, “I think I would know the right person when I meet them.”

“Yeah,” you agreed.

“Or maybe not,” he shrugged. “Maybe I’ve already met the person I want to spend the rest of my life with, but the relationship just hasn’t gotten there yet.”

You pondered on that for a moment, then realized you agreed with that, too. If you already met the person you were meant to be with, the thought of a relationship was a little less daunting. You already knew this person. “So we’re in agreement then? This new pact is something we both want?”

“As usual, we are in agreement,” he nodded. “What’s our plan then? Fight fire with fire?”

You snorted. “Pretty much, right? We just have to, you know, swoop in whenever we can to counteract their movements. Help each other out, y’know?” You laughed at how ridiculous this all sounded. “I guess it’s really just doing what they’ve wanted us to do this whole time.”

Kevin grinned to himself. “Spend time together?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m down for that. You?”

“Yeah, man.” You shifted to angle your body toward him and stuck your hand out. “You still remember it, right?”

Kevin sent you an incredulous look, as if offended that you could think so lowly of him. He reflected your angled body, hand primed and ready. “Uh, yeah. Do you remember it?”

You clicked your tongue. “Of course, I do! It's the seal."

You knocked the back of your hand against his to signal the beginning of the handshake.

Like second nature, the two of you made your way through the unnecessarily (but also completely necessary) convoluted masterpiece that was your sixth grade handshake. It was what you used the first time you sealed the deal on the pact, and whenever you made any other agreements of significance (e.g. the Juice Pouch Accord of Eighth Grade). Now, it would seal the Rescue Protocol/Damsel in Distress Deal, too.

When the handshake combination finished (marked by twin flicks to the forehead—"Ow! You always flick so hard.”; “Yikes, hope that doesn’t leave a mark…”—and a… proper handshake), the only thing left to do was put it into motion.

Teasing, you sent him a look of approval. “You did remember.”

“Funny how you say that as if you have the better memory out of the two of us,” he quipped back with an unimpressed look.

You hummed your own amusement back to him, taking the book that you’d set aside earlier back into your lap but leaving it unopened. There wasn’t any signal in this area, so devices were practically useless, so books and board games and sports became the go-to for entertainment. It was what your parents originally liked so much about the place, and eventually you and your siblings. It allowed for moments between the moments like this… whatever this was.

Kevin leaned back onto his palms again, and the shadows and moonlight cut across his jawline like glass. “I didn’t think you’d be up so late.”

“Yeah,” you drawled and picked at a strand of grass sticking out between the boards of a stair step. “I couldn’t sleep for some reason and decided to read, but then I opened my window and realized it was a nice night out, so here I am.” You nodded to him, “You?”

He gave a soft sort of chuckle. “You know I never sleep.”

Your chest felt heavy all of a sudden. “Still have the sleeping issue?” You asked softly. It had been a big thing when he was a kid. It had started off as being a very light sleeper, but over time, you discovered that sometimes Kevin just did not get sleep.

“Yeah…” he said, "I'm usually able to sleep when I'm here though, y'know? The peace, the quiet, the familiarity—it all helps. It was just tonight that was out of the ordinary." When he glanced over at you, the side of his lip quirked upward. "Don't worry too much."

You'd always thought about the lake as your home away from home, your safe space. A part of you had always thought it was the same way for him.

“How could I not worry?" You asked, poorly masking your concern as you leaned over your knees and looked at him. “How did you ever get used to your place at uni?” There must have been some reason that he was able to survive over there.

The corners of his mouth curled upward into a smile. “I was lucky,” he admitted. “I met people who have become some of my best friends and family. I guess it’s just weird being so far away from them and it's catching up to me.”

As much teasing as you did about this Jacob character, you were glad Kevin had found him and his other friends. Being away from home like that could not have been easy. At least you could rest assured that he was taken care of over there.

He had grown so comfortable over there that even his subconscious missed them.

You shifted a little closer to him and gently leaned your head onto his shoulder. He seemed surprised at first, but relaxed and let you keep your head there. “That’s good,” you whispered. “I’m happy for you.”

A beat passed, and the crazy thought occurred to you that maybe you should have asked to do this first. “Is this okay?”

His hand warmed the top of your head. “More than okay.”

The two of you sat there like that for however long—you couldn’t really tell. Time passed by differently here, it seemed. Friends definitely comforted each other like this though, right? Right.

EPISODE FIVE: [SHENANIGANS ENSUE.]

"KEVIN, would you mind giving this snack pack to Serena?"

"Oh, I got it, Auntie!" You snatched the Ziploc bag of trail mix from off the counter where Kevin's mom had set it out. "I haven't properly introduced myself to her yet," you said as some kind of explanation.

Out of the corner of your eye, you saw Kevin look away to conceal his laugh at your inconspicuousness.

Today, the five families planned to go on a long nature hike as a large group. There was a specific path that your family, the Moons, and the Kims always took at least once every year that led out to a waterfall. It was a beautiful slice of nature, but then again, you thought this entire area was beautiful.

You swung out of the Moons' kitchen and out onto the back lawn where everyone was slowly gathering to take off. Eyes scanning the immediate area, you located Serena Xu standing off to the side plaiting her hair into a simple braid over her shoulder.

As you made your way over to her, your Uncle Jin suddenly appeared beside you. “You look like a woman on a mission, Yn-ie. What’s the sitch?”

Your brain took a second to register the reference. “Has Sana been watching Kim Possible or have you, Uncle?”

“And if I said it was both of us?” He sniffed. Sana was his eldest daughter, only three years old, but Jin and Yuna were very updated in the essential kids shows they wanted their daughters to watch.

“As you should,” you said with an indulgent nod. You turned your gaze over to your intended target.

Serena’s eyes wandered up from her hair and met your eyes, then glanced over at Jin. You hoped she didn’t think the two of you were ganging up on her or anything. Two new people at once could be intimidating.

“Hi, Serena, right?” You asked as you and Jin approached her.

She gave a small nod, pulling her braid’s end over her shoulder as she fidgeted with it. “Uh, yeah. And you’re Yn?”

“We already met yesterday,” Jin said chipperly.

Serena nodded again.

Your fingers danced along the edge of the Ziploc baggie in your hands, squeezing along the edge to make sure that it was closed properly. Your teeth ran over your bottom lip before you were passing her the bag in your hands. “Kevin’s mom made all of us snack bags, and I just wanted to say a proper hello.”

She accepted the bag, eyes wide as she inspected its contents through the clear plastic. “Oh, wow. Thank you; that’s really thoughtful.”

“Oh!” Seokjin illuminated like a lightbulb, clapping his hands loud enough to make both you and Serena wince. (You and she met each other’s eyes with awkward laughs.) “Didn’t you mention yesterday that you were pre-law?”

Your eyebrows flew upward. “Pre-law?” Your head bobbed up and down with a low whistle. “That’s cool.”

“Yeah, uh, I guess so,” she said. “It’s a little intimidating right now, if I’m being honest.”

“Yn!” Ripped out of the conversation, you excused yourself and found the source of your name. Your mom was perched on one of the picnic benches outside of the Moons’ place, slathering sunscreen on your brother’s face. Connor’s face was wrinkled in extreme displeasure as she patted the white cream into his skin with a slapping sound.

Always amusing.

Perched upon the picnic table next to them was none other than Joshua Hong. He sent you a friendly greeting wave.

“What’s up?” You asked, leaving Uncle Jin with Serena so you could make your way over to your chagrined little brother, your mom, and Joshua. “Where’s Dad and Alice? Hey Josh.”

He replied pleasantly, “Hey Yn.”

“Your dad’s grabbing something from the car with her,” she dismissed. “Would you mind showing Joshua where we put our bandages? We have so many of the little ones—”

“It’s just a little cut; I swear I’m fine!” Joshua chuckled good-naturedly. He showed you the slice in the side of his finger that was only a couple of centimeters long, but you could tell that he’d just recently cleaned it up and was holding it with a small piece of napkin.

Your mom made a noise of disagreement. “It’s going to get infected on the hike.”

You shuffled on your feet, offering him a small smile. “Sorry, man. I have to agree with her.”

“Thank you. You remember where the bandages are, right? You and Josh just go run up really quick together.”

You didn’t even realize when Kevin got here. “Oh, why don’t I just get one from my place for you?” Kevin waltzed into the conversation with an innocent expression, hands tucked into the pockets of his shorts, as he appeared at your side. “Since we’re just right here.”

Joshua gestured toward him with his hand-clutching-hand situation and hopped off from the picnic table top. “If you don’t mind.”

“Yeah, dude, it’s no problem.” Kevin’s hand met the place between your shoulders with a warm pat, and he led Joshua up to his family’s cabin for the bandages.

Your amusement followed after them as you watched them leave. Your mom sent you a curious look, eyes narrowed in question, and you could only shrug helplessly.

The hike commenced shortly after the boys got back from raiding the Moon’s medicine cabinet. Your dad and Alice returned sometime before they did, and Alice had once again requested you put her hair up in, as she said, “Something nice.” As if the wilderness would care about her nice hair-do, but you gave her a plait that matched Serena’s.

Your brother and sister kept near to you as you led the group through the beginning of the trail. Though you didn’t consider yourself as someone who exercised religiously, you never turned down a good foraging session. Your freshman environmental science course had presented you with plenty of opportunity to dive into the dense forest areas near the building. Even in the early reaches of the morning (8:30 morning labs were sometimes difficult to be disciplined about, but you were determined), when the fog clung to the forest floor and dew slipped down velvety oak leaves, you found yourself at peace.

At some point in time, Connor picked up a large fallen stick and used it as a hiking staff. “You shall not pass!” He declared after running a little ways ahead of you and mimicked the deepness of Gandolf’s voice.

You snorted as you passed by him and ruffled his hair. “Name the series that’s from and then we can talk, dude.”

“You’re never any fun!” Connor garbled, jogging after you.

You scoffed, pressing a hand against your chest in feigned offense. “I’m way more fun than you are,” you retorted.

“Okay, prove it! Make this more fun.”

“So you’re saying this hike isn’t fun?” You gasped.

Connor stabbed at the dirt path warn into the ground that weaved through the trees ahead for miles. It was by no means a challenging hike, just a lengthy one that required a bit of enthusiasm and endurance. “Well last time, you brought that thing—”

“Sugar water,” you supplied.

“—yeah, that one—and we caught butterflies!” Painted Lady butterflies were a common species of butterfly that was widespread among North America. Luckily, it hadn't been too difficult to find them.

“Woah, you guys caught butterflies last year? Without me?” Man, this guy was just everywhere today, you thought jokingly, as Kevin appeared on your other side with a boyish grin on his face. “That’s cool.”

“We didn’t catch them,” you corrected. It was more so a lure with the sugar water (a substitute for nectar), letting the kids see the insect up close, and then setting it free. You were no lepidopterologist—butterflies were cool, but no special interest of yours. “They just landed in my hand for a little. You should’ve been there to take pictures.”

Kevin hit the palm of hand against his forehead. “That’s what I forgot! I forgot to bring my camera on the hike.”

“Tsk tsk, what would your sister say now?” You chided playfully.

He pressed his lips together in a grimace. “Don’t bring her up—I can hear the echo of her voice as we speak.” To prove his point, he pressed his fingers to his temples, eyes fluttering closed, as if he really could hear his sister’s teasing from wherever she was.

You humored him with a laugh—

“Yn! I’m gonna climb that boulder!”

Okay, fun time was over. You tracked the sound of your brother’s voice, and with barely enough time to catch up to him, you set off the beaten path to follow. “Hey, you better be careful or Mom’s gonna put you on bedrest for the rest of the trip,” you chuckled as Kevin fell in step beside you. You said to him offhandedly, “Would you possibly mind…”

“Yeah, I got it.” He did a small jog over to the cluster of boulders your brother had begun to scale. Going bouldering wasn’t a new activity for you and your siblings, but you remembered that these ones were a little larger than your mom was usually comfortable with. You were grateful Kevin understood immediately.

He was already standing below where Connor was, playing along with whatever roleplay your brother had made up, all the while hovering in case he fell.

The rest of the party caught up to you at this point, and Alice, Uncle Jin, Sana, and even Josh converged upon the rock formation in a flurry of giggles and mirthful playtime. You observed the action with ill-concealed fondness for everyone there as they came together and helped one another climb to the topmost boulder as if it were the peak of Mount Everest. Something warmed within you at the sight.

On your left, Yuna, who was on Leena duty this morning, came to stand beside you. Some of the parents were pulling out cell phones to record all the chaos going on. “Why don’t you go up with them?” She asked, inclining her head to the rock formation.

Josh was just beckoning Kevin up with him, and you saw Kevin’s head turned back over his shoulder. When his eyes found yours, Kevin waved you over, too.

“I should,” you murmured in agreement.

Yuna hummed as she adjusted the little bonnet on Leena’s head. “You know, Kevin…” she began. You waited for her to finish, but she smiled instead, shaking her head. “Nevermind. Go have fun, you bean.”

You giggled at the nickname, then wasted little time going to join everyone else. You could probably ask her what she was going to say later.

The evening found the group of you gathered on the shady back lawn between yours and the Moons’ cabin for dinner once again. The Xus and Hongs had all retired to their own respective houses for downtime, so it would just be the three original families. You perched a little ways away on the back stairs of your house’s porch, a bowl of peelable tangerines in your lap. At your feet, you had rolled the edges of a brown paper bag you’d found beneath the sink to use as a disposal. All of the compostable waste you and everyone else produced while here would become great fertilizer and mulch. It was something you usually had your siblings help with, especially before you left the lake.

Kevin had his cap turned backwards as he made his way over to you in flip flops. “That seat taken?” He asked with a nod toward the board next to you.

Your eyebrows rose. “All yours.”

“Thanks,” he beamed, doing a silly waddle, then sitting down next to you. He reached into the bowl on your lap for an orange, and you moved the compost bag between your bodies. “Your mom was talking about Josh again,” he said as he dug his thumb into the skin of the tangerine. Its juices sprayed into the air and released its sweet fragrance.

“Why am I not surprised?” You sighed with a shake of his head. “You know, he’s really good with my siblings though.”

“Oh, is he?”

You shrugged, shoveling a tangerine half into your mouth. “Mm—yeah,” you said once you’d swallowed. “But you’re also good with my siblings. I dunno, it was just an observation.” Based on what you saw on the hike, you could confidently conclude that your siblings agreed with both Kevin and Josh. They were both friendly beyond means, easy on the eyes, kind on the soul.

Kevin didn’t say anything for a beat, and still didn’t say anything until he’d finished the orange in his hands and picked up a new one. “I hear he’s going into medicine. I have a friend who’s going into medicine.”

“Which one?” You asked, then joked, “Don’t tell me it’s Jacob now…”

When Kevin gave you a sheepish expression, you shook your head, “Okay, now I think you’re obsessed with this guy.” All the teasing was in good fun, of course.

“He’s just my soulmate,” he lamented with a hand draped over his forehead for added effect. “No biggie.”

“Damn,” you laughed. You popped a wedge of tangerine into your mouth, eyes going to the sky for a moment as you pondered on something. “So you say that when Jacob met his current girlfriend, it was because of you.”

“Yup.”

“So you set them up? You matchmade them?”

He nodded. “I’m very proud of myself, actually. I take credit for all of their milestones and anniversaries. I better be the Best Man at their wedding, and—”

“But you matchmade them; doesn’t that make you a hypocrite?”

Kevin’s speech came to an abrupt halt. You watched, in blatant amusement, as his face contorted and arranged itself in the five stages of grief. “Oh my god… I am a hypocrite.”

For a moment, you felt bad for laughing at his blanched expression. “It doesn’t make you a bad person,” you assured him.

“It makes me a hypocrite.” He hung his head, but shot back up just as quickly. “Okay, but wait! It’s different.”

“Do tell.”

“It’s different because Jacob never told me he didn’t want to be matchmade.” The calculations taking place in his head were as stark to you, the observer, as if he was working it out on a white board. His eyebrows knitted together. “Yeah. That’s the difference. Plus, that match was fully successful, and he ended up putting in a lot of the work himself by the end anyway.”

You bobbed your head in agreement. “Fair enough.”

Kevin settled his chin on his hand, eyes slicing back over to you. “Aren’t you a hypocrite, too, then?”

You blinked. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

His face said it all. “Jenna from fifth grade.”

Oh. It all came rushing back to you…

But before anything else could be commented on the matter (read: before you could go through your own miniature existential crisis like Kevin had), a presence appeared, squatting down between the two of you. “What—” Jin covered Leena’s ears as he sat down, “—is the mother-effing tea?”

You and Kevin immediately scooted over to make room for the uncle coming in hot. You moved the compost bag back to the other side of your leg.

Kevin chuckled. “You said ‘mother-effing.’”

“Aish,” he exhaled, wrinkling his nose up. “Yuna’s on relax mode right now and has two beers in her. I get a pass, okay? Now catch me up on all of the exciting stuff.”

You and Kevin traded glances. “What exciting stuff?”

Jin’s expression flattened into a deadpan. “Don’t be like that. You two have been so secretive lately; I wanna be let in on the secret stuff.”

“I don’t know if it’s necessarily a secret…” You drawled.

Kevin scratched the back of his head. “Uh, yeah. Well, we’ve kind of figured out that our moms are trying to set us up with Josh and Serena instead of each other now.”

You didn't know what you were expecting Uncle Jin to reply, but he gave a nod. "Ah, I can see that." He sucked in a breath through his teeth, "Why did they suddenly go 360 on the two of you? It seems kind of out of left field."

"Well, we kind of asked them to stop trying to get us two together."

Jin hummed. "Yah, that makes sense. It all makes sense now." He made an old-man noise out of his throat as he shifted his position and the way that Leena rested on his chest. You and Kevin buckled down and hung off his words. "They probably only mean well, you know that, right? Right. But I can see that you both are still uneasy about that, and I get that, too. So—I'll tell you what.

"I'll help you guys out," he said. "I think they already know I'm nosy enough to butt in everywhere, so it shouldn't be a problem for me to… tch tch, y'know—" He gestured very indulgently with his hands, "—do my thing—am I making any sense? It's been a long day."

Another look passed between you and Kevin, then you both shared a laugh, relief making your postures relax and your grins widen. "No, we understand completely."

It seemed like you just gained an ally.

EPISODE SIX: CAN I BE A ROCK IN MY NEXT LIFE? THANKS.

THERE was a collection of jet skis that someone around the lake owned, and Kevin's parents would rent them out once every summer for everyone to use. Of course, it was mainly for the older kids and adults; thus, your siblings and the little Kims were banned from partaking in the festivities, much to your siblings' chagrin. It was for safety reasons that they were forced to find some other method of entertainment for the day.

You trudged your way down the path from the Kims' house to yours. In your hand, you wielded the light blue stick of baby sunscreen Seokjin asked you to fetch for his girls, but based on the fact that Leena, Sana, nor Yuna were even out here, it was safe to assume it was really for him.

Those who were participating in riding jet skis, and some who just wanted to watch and soak up the summer sun, were gathered somewhere between your house and the Moon house again. The two properties shared a single dock made of wood faded out from the sun and washed by the lake water. You could recall summer after summer running down the pier and cannonballing into the water.

"Hey! I got your sunscreen!" You hollered as you neared the group down by the water, raising the sunscreen stick up in the air.

The five or so heads turned toward you at the sound of your voice. You didn't miss Kevin's presence specifically, his arms sticking out from the life vest strapped to his chest. You did not deign to look further.

Jin raised his hand. "My Savior! Thanks, Yn-ie!"

You tossed the sunscreen down to him and he caught it between both of his hands before beginning to slather the cream all over his face.

You noted the last life vest sitting on the edge of the dock closest to land and made a beeline for it.

Just as you descended the hill, your mom appeared in your view with an empty plate in her hands, the bottom ringed in a translucent red liquid. "Yn, honey. Can you do me a huge favor and chop up the last watermelon? I didn't realize we would need more. Your dad and Kevin's dad are driving into town right now for some extra provisions and an extra large watermelon."

"Oh, sure." Your eyes skittered to the vest on the dock, but you realized slicing the watermelon wouldn't take too long.

You took the plate from your mom without further comment and began making your way up the hill to your house.

As you slid the door open, the sound of chatter carried from the living room floor. Eyes peered up from where they were seated, surrounding the coffee table on the floor. A colorful array of beads and string was strewn over the surface, and you came to a distinct conclusion as to where all the non-jet-skiers had gone.

"Hello everyone," you mused, closing the screen door behind you.

Josh was the first to say hello back. "Wanna join us? We're making friendship bracelets." He lifted the craft in his hands as if the beads and materials displayed weren't proof enough.

You leaned over the back of the couch. "Looks like fun! Maybe I will."

Outside by the lake, Kevin monitored the back door of your cabin for when you would make your way back out. He had been wanting to race you on a jet ski ever since the owners brought them over for everyone to use.

There were a grand total of five people surrounding the opening to the dock: Kevin and his mom, your mom, Jin, and Serena. Everyone except for the moms were strapped in lifejackets in preparation to board one of the two jet skis sitting in port.

"Huh," Jin said as he craned his head up in the direction Kevin's was in. "Wonder what's taking her so long."

"I'm sure she's just taking her time or something." Kevin pushed off of the post he was leaning against. "I'll go check up on her—"

“Oh, no-no-no! It’s okay,” your mom protested, her body already turn-tailed to head up to the house. Even Kevin’s mom made a gesture for him to stay put. “We’ll go check up on Yn.”

Kevin’s mom then gestured with her arm toward Serena, who had wandered off further down the dock to inspect one of the vehicles waiting in the water. “Why don’t you go help her with the jet ski?”

“And me!” Seokjin boisterously slung an arm around his cousin-in-law’s shoulders and swung him toward the entrance of the pier.

Kevin’s eyes went wide when he almost tumbled face-first into the hardwood. “Shit,” he sputtered. “Uh, Uncle Jin?”

“Yep?”

“That sounded fishy to you, too, right?”

Jin let out a laugh and patted Kevin’s shoulder in consolation. “Yep.”

“I feel like I haven’t seen you all afternoon.” The words left your mouth as you blocked the unforgiving golden hour sun with a hand to your forehead. The light at this time of day gleamed across the surface of the lake and gave the illusion of a molten pot of gold. You imagined swimming in it, dipping your toes into its warm innards from the end of the dock.

Kevin stood at the edge of the lake’s shoreline with his hair dried from a day of jet skiing, a fresh T-shirt over his chest and the lifejacket from earlier nowhere to be seen. That, along with the jet skis. Those had been returned a little over an hour ago. “We were off doing our separate things, I guess,” he said, his arms folded across his chest. “Speaking of, where’ve you been? You went to cut watermelon and never came back.” He added a small laugh to his words, hoping you wouldn’t think he was bothered by the fact that the two of you didn’t get to hang out on jet skis together.

“Oh, heh.” The sheepishness in your voice made him glance over at you. You didn’t know why you were suddenly getting so shy about it, but from the pocket of your shorts, you withdrew a small piece of beaded string, tied at the end in one of those fancy loops that were adjustable. You didn’t know how it was done; Joshua had done something with the end like magic. “Yuna, Josh, and the kids were all inside making friendship bracelets and they kind of roped me into it.”

“Ah.”

“This one’s for you,” you said, holding it out to him. It was a quirky piece with white block letter beads strung together next to acrylic star and pony beads. You’d scavenged a crescent moon somewhere amongst all the pandemonium, and it sat next to the letter N on the chain.

Kevin peered at you and his irises gleamed with the brilliance of golden hour. He frowned in joy, delicately accepting the chain from you with his bottom lip jutted out in a combination frown-pout. “You’re incredible,” he gushed as he inspected the little gift. “Dude, I’m honestly so touched. This is so cute.”

You broke out into a grin, your heart bursting with pride in your chest. “Glad it’s not cringy.”

“I’m offended for you,” he scoffed, aghast. “How could you think this is cringy?” It was probably a genuine question, but you kept silent as you watched him loop the end of the bracelet around his wrist and struggled to figure out how to tie off the end with one hand.

You stepped forward, and he stuck his hand out to you. “Shua showed me how this works,” you murmured, wracking your brain for the quick how-to Joshua showed with his own wrist. (You had been too confused to ask him to see it done again, and only nodded and smiled.)

“Shua?”

“Mm, yeah, apparently he makes a lot of friendship bracelets, especially for friends at school.” Your tongue stuck out of the corner of your mouth as you tried something and… “Ta-da!”

With the bracelet secured onto his wrist, Kevin beamed like a kid on Christmas, and held it up to show it to the setting sun. “It’s great—it’s perfect. Thank you, Yn.”

It was some sort of cosmic magic that corralled everyone back down to the shoreline again, but this time, with all of the kids and non-jet-skiers, as well. Another tradition that your party liked to share every year at the lake was rock-skipping. Perhaps it was more of just an activity than a tradition, but it was something that none of you failed to remember to do whenever you were up here. Since you were a kid, you had been practicing to hone your technique.

Your siblings and the Kims, especially, all ran up to the shoreline beside you and Kevin, and the search for the perfect throwing rock began. In the chaos of merriment and childlike glee, the lot of you trudged into the cooling water of the lake’s shallow shore.

“I know you just gave me the coolest friendship bracelet ever,” said Kevin from beside you as he sifted through the rocks beneath his flip flops, “but I hope you know that I’m gonna crush you this year.”

You snorted. “Okay, Kevin.”

“No, I’m serious!” You guffawed at the sight of his expression; he’d even stood up straight in the water, a pair of flat stones in either hand. “My friend YH!Yn—she’s an engineer, right—”

“Oh, so you’re gonna win by cheating?”

“Nuh-uh,” he rolled his eyes, unimpressed by your posturing. “She showed me this video online. You know Mark Rober? She’s a huge fan, but that’s besides the point. The point is that the video taught me the perfect technique to rock-skip.”

Something in you liked to think that was still cheating, but then again, neither of you had ever really established any ground rules to this, and certainly none about doing research. Your eyes narrowed. “Explain yourself.”

Kevin decided between one of the two rocks in his hands with a brief peek at both of them, before discarding the one in his left hand back into the water with an anticlimactic sploosh. “You’re supposed to launch the rock so it hits the surface of the water at a twenty-degree angle.”

Joshua trudged into the water near both you and Kevin with the sleeves of his plaid over-shirt rolled past his elbows. “I don’t even know what kind of rock to look for, and you guys are bringing trig into this?”

“Oh my god, don’t even get them started,” Jin grumbled from a handful of meters away from the three of you. He kicked through the shallow water with his eyes pinned to the ground in his own search for a rock to skip. “Yn almost gave me a black eye one year.”

“That was an accident and I was ten!”

“Yeah, well rocks hurt!”

Joshua bent down slightly and scooped up a rock from the water. He considered it for a minute, taking in its size, its weight, and how pretty it was. “I guess this can work. So do you guys have, like, a training boot camp for beginners or something?” He chuckled.

“I can show you,” you offered once you’d decided on your own rock for the first round.

“Tch,” Kevin huffed, “if you wanna show him the wrong way to do it.”

Your jaw unhinged. “If you keep this up, I will take back that friendship bracelet, Moon Hyungseo.”

Jin covered his mouth with one of his hands and sidled up next to Joshua. “Ooh, she used the government name.” That coaxed another laugh out of the Los Angeles boy.

Kevin held his decorated wrist to his chest. “You can pry it from my cold, dead hands.”

Suffice to say that when it came down to it, Kevin did have the better technique. There were really four main things to consider when rock-skipping, one of them being that the rock ideally should hit the water at twenty-degrees, as Kevin had mentioned before. Though, you did have to give yourself some credit for managing to work your way up to thirteen skips in a row without the help of an engineer friend.

EPISODE SEVEN: ALWAYS TREAT YOUR PLANTS WITH CARE

VACATION granted you the express permission to be the laziest bum in the world. After three years of college work, sometimes it was nice to have even a single day to yourself to do what you always wanted to: relax. In a world that moved as fast as this one, it was nearly impossible to take breaks without feeling the aching guilt of a day without productivity.

But there was something about the lake… you didn't know. Maybe it was just because years of coming here and associating it with the ease and carefree air of childhood that made it easier to sleep in and feel the sun on your toes.

The house and the neighboring ones were quiet this late morning. At ten or so, the Kims had swept up your siblings and their children and towed them off to town for ice cream and provisions. (You hoped they remembered to grab you some bird seed. You still had yet to replenish the bird feeders around the lake.) You weren't sure where your parents were off to, but you recalled them briefly mentioning a visit to the hidden swing at Lookout's Peak about a three mile hike from here. That meant that you had the whole house to yourself.

And what else did that mean? That you would not be in the house.

When it hit noon, you ate a quick lunch at the kitchen counter before gathering up your supplies to head outside. There was always a spare picnic blanket stashed in the hallway closet, and you grabbed a book, your neglected sketchbook, and a pencil to come along with you.

The weather was perfect, you liked to think—temperate, and not popsicle-melting, with a hint of a breeze wafting through the boughs of the oak trees. You trudged your way over to the largest oak tree with the most amount of shade, gunning to get some full relaxing done when you realized that you were not as alone as you thought you were.

You and Kevin locked eyes from where he sat against the trunk of the tree, his iPad left at his side and his camera being fiddled with between his fingers. The friendship bracelet you gave him the other day still hung around his wrist.

"Hi," he grinned. "I thought you went into town with the twins."

"Ah, nah" you sighed pleasantly as you shifted the things in your arms, "I decided to sleep in. You?"

"Same here." He amended, "Well, as much as someone like me can sleep in." He gestured to the picnic blanket bundled over your arm. "How about I help you with that?"

With teamwork (because that made the dream work), the two of you laid out the picnic blanket on the shady grass beneath the oak tree, overlooking the view of the lake. You settled yourself atop it while Kevin moved his things beside you; shoes were discarded at the edge, so you both sat comfortably on the blanket, half-facing the other.

You reached for your sketchbook, inclining your chin toward the DSLR now sitting abandoned as he picked up his iPad. "What were you up to before I got here?"

"Oh, uh, just looking through some photos I took this morning to maybe use as a reference," he said, twirling his Apple pencil between his fingers. "I keep forgetting to take pictures on this trip."

"Maybe it's a good thing," you offered. You tucked a lock of hair behind your ear and flipped to a blank page. "Let's you live in the moment, y'know?"

"Yeah. I guess so." He tapped the end of his pencil against his cheek. You were never the type for fancy technology and equipment, mainly because you were a little stubborn, but nothing could beat a good pencil and paper. "I'm gonna draw you," he suddenly declared.

A giggle bubbled out of your chest. "What? Me?"

"Yeah, why not?"

"Well then, I'm gonna draw you."

His eyebrows shot up, an amused smile worming onto his face. "You do you, honey."

The two of you, coincidentally, came to share quite the handful of interests. One of them was sketching, and you liked to give credit to your ecology and biology classes at school that gave you the time to practice your drawing skills, even if super accurate drawings weren't always required. It just gave you an excuse to combine two things you loved.

You never did pick up how to use a DSLR though. At least, not like Kevin knew how to.

You sat there for a moment with your cheek to your fist and your eyes glued to the man across from you. Drawing people was difficult—it was always the subtle details that threw you overboard, the movement of the hands and fingers, the crevices in the wrinkle of one's eyes, the… the look. The thing that made them look like a human being.

Kevin had always been a beautiful subject matter. His bone structure was near perfect in your eyes; his smile was awful to draw just because it was so pretty, and you couldn't do it justice. You could never achieve the right curl of his lips, or infuse it with his humility. And even now, you watched the way his eyelashes fell so gently over his eyes and the dusting of pink falling across his cheekbones…

"You're staring."

You blinked, breaking out of your daze. "I'm studying my subject," you clarified pointedly and began to sketch out a rough outline of his head. A portrait would do just fine for the day.

Kevin mimicked your position from earlier where he leaned in slightly and rested his cheek against his fist. "There was this internship I turned down this summer."

His words made you glance up from your paper for a moment.

He continued on, straightening, then absentmindedly sketching out an outline for your face. "It was supposed to be in New York, at this studio, but…" He blew air out between his lips, "I don't know; I couldn't do it. It was a great opportunity and it didn't call to me, but I feel so guilty about not even trying."

You waited a beat in case he wanted to continue. You could see the conflict warring across this face, the subtle flex in his jaw at his frustration—with the portrait or himself, you weren't sure.

"Sorry, I don't know why I suddenly just thought of that," he said to you. "I was just thinking about this place and not being here last year, and I think my brain just went to that."

You looked over at him in earnest. "I feel you, I mean… some things just aren't meant to be, and you shouldn't force it. That's how you get burnt out, y'know?"

"Yeah," he murmured in agreement.

"I was looking at an internship, too," you piped up with a shape exhale. "I—I didn't get it, clearly, but uhm…" It still hurt.

Kevin frowned. "Oh, man. I'm sorry, Yn. I feel like I'm just complaining now that—"

"No, oh my gosh, no!" You hurried to interrupt him. "Don't be silly," you said gently, "you shouldn't invalidate your feelings like that. Some things just really aren't meant to be." It didn't mean it hurt any less that they weren't, but maybe this was the path you were meant to take instead. "It's something I'm coming to terms with, too, but don't compare your troubles against mine. Please."

He worried his bottom lip between his teeth, and it took him a little to finally try for a half smile. "You're gonna get the next one."

You smiled back at him. "Thanks. And you'll find one that suits you."

"I hope so."

"Do you ever worry about," you began as you played around with the slightest curve of his nose on your paper, "not being who people want you to be?"

He hummed. "What do you mean?"

"Like, successful. I'm not really sure where I'm going with this." You didn't know where this had sprouted from in the first place, but one insecurity in particular had nested in the inner cavities of your chest and made itself a home. As someone who wanted to be at wildlife encampments, not catering to fancy rich dogs in a clinic, your path wasn't conventional. You were becoming a veterinarian, but your parents always thought you would end up someplace nice with a pay that was equally nice. Something practical, something they didn't have to worry over. Your calling was… elsewhere though. Somewhere a little more difficult to reach without the prying eyes and mouths of those around you.

Kevin marinated on it. "I think… the two of us are kind of similar in that way. We're both not taking on things that people have expected of us."

Out of everyone you knew, you had a feeling he would be one of the few who could empathize. "There's—there's this thing I want to do," you said. You couldn't figure out the words to string your thoughts into coherent speech; you felt like it would never come out right. But Kevin was patient. "I've always wanted to go on safari expeditions, and observe wildlife in the wild, and do research, and work with conservatories. It feels so unattainable sometimes, when I think about the people looking at me and expecting something good. Does that make sense?"

He gave a thoughtful nod, his Apple pencil tucked behind his ear for the time being. "Yeah, that makes sense. I remember you talked about it before."

That rang a bell. "When I made you watch the David Attenborough Our Planet doc series," you mused. In association, your brain sparked images of late nights, blue-light screens, and flashlights beneath blanket forts. You had been fully convinced Kevin would say the documentary series would be boring like everyone else, but to your pleasant surprise, he had been just as enthralled as you'd been.

"You didn't make me," he smiled. "I liked it."

Your chest warmed. "I still have it downloaded on my phone if you wanna watch."

He screwed his face up in amusement, shaking his head. "You're one of the biggest dorks I know. And I know so many dorks now."

"I'm still your favorite dork though, right?" You smiled down at your paper when you were satisfied with how his eyes turned out.

"Always."

A beat passed, and from your periphery, you saw him tap the blanket in front of you to get your attention.

"Hey, you're gonna be okay," he said. "One day, you will go hide in a bunker in the Siberian winter to wait for tigers like a crazy person—"

"Okay, wait, out of all the examples you watched in the doc, you chose—"

"Anyways!" He grinned at the look you sent him, unfazed. "We're both gonna be okay, alright? We're chasing dreams, and sometimes the chase is hard, but the reward is sweet."

You knew he was right; of course he was right. Talking things out was always a good idea, especially with a trusted person, and who better to trust than Kevin Moon? You had friends who understood, but not really understood.

You reached for his pencil with the end of yours and you bumped ends like ET. The corners of your lips curled upward as you met his gaze, and you were struck by the softness in his rich, chocolate irises. No sketch, painting, portrait could do those beautiful eyes justice. "Don't call me a nerd for this."

"No promises."

You fixed him with a look. "There's this thing that plants do called phototropism. Because plants need light to synthesize into food and energy, they often turn and grow towards the nearest light source. So even in, let's say, a dark hole in the ground—if there's a crack in the roof that brings light in, the plant will grow in that direction, and probably grow its way out." You cleared your throat. "Thanks for showing me the light."

Kevin's eyes shone big and wide, doe-like you liked to say, almost in awe of the explanation of a basic function plants performed to survive. But twisted in a certain way, and one could apply it to everyday non-plant life, as well.

"Now how can I possibly call you a nerd after that?" His voice went raspy and he had to clear it, too. "I think I'm getting misty-eyed," he said, fanning his eyes.

You chuckled at his antics. "Oh, hush. I guess it's my way of saying thanks for reminding me I'm not gonna be a failure." It was scary how often you thought about it, especially at college.

Kevin reached over and warmed one of your hands with his. "You're not gonna be a failure, Yn. I promise you that."

All of the kids were asleep in the back of the Kims' minivan, and it took two trips back and forth between the car and the living room to transfer all four sleeping munchkins. By the time Jin and Yuna were done, the former was certain he was going to need a cane much earlier in his life than previously anticipated.

He held his back as they made their way out onto the back porch. "I think I'm aging faster," he said to his partner.

Yuna sputtered out a laugh. "Aye, so dramatic, and for what? You're gonna survive."

"No sympathy," he sighed melodramatically as he hung off her frame. "I wonder where everyone else is."

His voice trailed off as they stood on the porch and overlooked the valley below. Just further out, they could easily see the occupants of the big oak tree between yours and the Moons' houses. You and Kevin sat slightly angled toward one another, not quite sitting next to each other, but not quite facing each other either.

The laughter was apparent on your faces as Kevin showed you something on his iPad. You grabbed the screen with ill-concealed delight, your eyes lighting up like a pair of fireflies. "No, oh my god, the little sprout on top of my head! You didn't!"

Yuna murmured softly to her lover with a chuckle, "Should we go say hello?"

Seokjin adjusted his position so now his arm rested around her shoulders. A smile etched onto his face at the view; he was so fond of the very thing neither you nor Kevin could see just yet. "Well, how could you possibly want to break that up?"

EPISODE EIGHT: NOD AND SMILE… YUP.

YOU weren't really sure why it took so long before you all deigned to take a proper dip in the lake, but as they said, better late than never.

The sun beat down on the little lake population, even at ten in the morning, which made it perfect weather to go swimming. Your house was a-bustle with life, thunderous footsteps, and motherly yelling to her children of “You better all have sunscreen on!” You were just finishing up the task yourself, rubbing in the last handprint of sunblock onto your calf before you were grabbing your towel at the end of your bed and heading out.

You caught Alice coming down the stairs with her floral one-piece on and a set of blue goggles strapped to her head. This morning, her hair was in two braids. “Do you have sunscreen on?” You asked her as you opened the back screen door.

“Yes,” she groaned as if this was the hundredth time she’d been asked that question today. Knowing your family, it probably was the hundredth time. “Do we still have the flamingo floatie?”

“We can probably pop down to the shed and see,” you suggested. You blinked in surprise at the person you found leaning against the railing of your back porch. “Why hello there.”

Joshua glanced up from the piece of string in his hands that he had tied at the ends to form one, large ring. “Hi guys! Either of you ladies know how to play Cat’s Cradle?” His hands slipped in between the string so that the ring rested on the backs of his fingers. In a movement that sent a wave of nostalgia down your spine, he maneuvered his hands through the string to form the zigzag pattern correspondent with the beloved childhood game.

“Ooh! Me, me!” Alice bounced around on the balls of her feet and rushed over to where Josh was to pick out the next pattern.

The screen door behind you opened up again as soon as you stepped foot onto the deck. Your dad appeared with your little brother, both of whom were dressed in rash guards and swim trunks. Your dad hustled his son along. “Yn-ah, we’re going down to the shed to get swimming things. Wanna come?”

“Wait, Daddy, can we get the flamingo floatie?” Alice asked your dad. Joshua finished up the next pattern, and your sister was quick to grab the next.

“Sure. We have to go now, though.”

With little else left to say or do, your dad ferried your little siblings off and around the house to where the shed was. It was tucked out of the way somewhere between your house and the Kims’ place.

You sidled up beside Joshua and slung your towel over your shoulder, noting his tank top and shorts. “You going for a swim with us?”

He gestured to his attire, nodding. “Seems like it. My parents wanted to run into town to do some shopping, see the sights. Your mom mentioned last night that you all were planning to go swimming today, so I thought I’d tag along, if that’s okay.”

“Yeah, man—it’s totally cool.”

You gazed far out toward the lake down the lawn. There were already a few people there, including Kevin and the Kims. Sana and Leena were already frolicking around in the water with their dad, while Yuna and Kevin stood off to the side on the dock. It seemed that Yuna had brought down a pair of foldable chairs to set up there, perhaps to soak up a little sun.

The two of them exchanged a couple more words before Yuna left him there so she could go pick up Leena from falling face-first in the water. Leena was still an infant, after all.

You decided that this would be a good time to run and join him, but your thoughts slowed to a halt when Kevin picked up the bottom hem of his shirt and pulled it over his head. You even heard Joshua beside you lose his breath. The sunlight had to be a paid actor or something, because the way it glowed across your friend’s shoulders, enunciating the firm muscles in his back, had to be illegal in nature.

Joshua’s low whistle of appreciation met your ears. “Wow… he’s ripped.”

You nodded absentmindedly. “Yeah.” Whoops, did you say that out loud?

The man simply chuckled and bounded down the porch. “C’mon, Yn. Let’s go join them before he catches you staring.”

If there was anything else that you and Kevin took seriously besides rock-skipping, it was the game Marco Polo. The rules were simple: an elected tagger would play with their eyes closed, yelling out “Marco” in order to locate other players in the water. The tagger had three or five opportunities to open their eyes (this was enforced for safety reasons) in order to tag everyone. Those who were not the tagger were required to reply with “Polo” in response to the tagger’s call.

Boundaries of the game ranged from your house to Kevin’s house, and no hiding beneath the dock. (Only the tagger could pass beneath that zone.)

By the time it was Kevin’s turn to tag, nearly an hour and a half had gone by, and you could feel the sun’s rays seeping into you. The heat was getting to you, and by the looks on everyone else’s faces, it was getting to them, too. But… one last round never hurt anybody.

"Are you guys ready?" Kevin's mom stood on the dock with her hands on her son's shoulders. Kevin's eyes were screwed shut where he sat on the edge of the dock, his feet swinging where they dangled over the water. Everyone stood scattered in the water, biding their time before Kevin's mom let him hop in.

She surveyed the surrounding water for nods of confirmation. You lingered just at the outer edge of the boundary, face half in the water with your eyes peeking out to hide your smile. You would swim back in should he come this way, but the buoy behind you kept you from cheating.

When she was satisfied with what she saw, she patted him on the shoulders. "Okay, Kevin."

He lowered himself into the water. "Marco!"

"Polo," came the wary response, a voice from every corner and reach of the boundary, it seemed.

He honed in on a voice—not yours, it seemed, but Uncle Jin's—and slowly treaded over toward that direction. You saw your uncle's eyes widen in fear, and he ducked under the water for a swift second to attempt at a silent getaway.

"I can hear you," Kevin chuckled as he swung his arm over his head to adopt a freestyle stroke. The tone of his voice sounded awfully menacing.

"YAH! GET AWAY FROM ME!" Jin screeched, no longer trying to stay quiet.

One by one, Kevin picked people off. Yuna had a little disadvantage since she had Sana clinging to her back the whole time, so she was given a merciful second life. But when she was caught once more, it was onto dry land for her and her daughter.

Kevin treaded water on the other side of the boundary. In the water, it was just you two.

"Fighting, Yn-ie!" Jin cheered from the shore. A towel was draped over his shoulders with Sana sucking on a watermelon by his leg.

You saw your siblings and Josh raise up their fists in encouragement. "Get him, Yn!"

"Wow, thanks guys," Kevin replied dryly, shaking the water out of his hair. His eyes were miraculously still closed; you had no idea how and when he got so good at this. He still had one more opportunity to open his eyes.

You grinned. "Are you sure you're not cheating by the way?" You drawled with a feigned look of consideration, as if he could see what you looked like.

He gasped. "Me? Cheating? My abilities are far greater than the need to cheat."

"Okay, prove it."

Why did the universe curse you with such a big fucking mouth?

A swear left you as he launched himself across the safe zone. It was like he knew exactly where you had been hovering in order to reach his ridiculously long arms over his head to try and tag you. You gunned out of the way, narrowly missing the dock as you backstroked back from where he came to avoid him.

"Marco!"

"Screw you—polo!"

His white teeth glistened as he grinned, eyes closed completely shut still. Damn. "I can smell fear."

"Sometimes you can be so dramatic," you taunted.

"Now that's just hurtful." And he took it personally.

Around and around you both went, lakewater thrashing as your arms and legs kicked and pumped as hard as you could. You felt so agile and free at times, a dolphin in your own right.

There was a lull in the game for a minute when you managed to evade Kevin's grasp yet another time. He was patrolling the other side of the dock while you loitered just around the corner, by a post. You could hear on land that everyone had turned their attention away from yours and Kevin's competitiveness in favor of the bag tossing boards Kevin's dad brought out.

"Oh, Yn," he smiled, brushing a hand through his hair absentmindedly. "I'm gonna get ya."

If you weren't worried about being so close to him, you would have thrown a retort right back.

But there was another poor, poor hinge to your plan, and that was the very core of the game you were playing.

He whispered, "Marco."

You screamed internally. "Polo," you whispered, barely audibly.

His head whipped in your direction, and before you could even blink, he used his shortcut beneath the dock to yank your wrist back toward him. "Gotcha!"

"Goddamn it," you groaned as you rested up against the post behind you. The water in this area was just shallow enough that your feet could reach the bottom.

Kevin chuckled as he finally opened his eyes. He blinked feverishly to adjust to the sunlight, then ran a hand through his slicked-back hair. He was so close that you could see the water droplets on his head dribble down the sharp slope of his nose. He took in his surroundings, a sly kind of smirk curling up onto his face. "No hiding beneath the dock, Yn."

"I technically wasn't beneath the dock," you shot back.

"Mhm," he pressed his lips together, brows furrowing. He moved closer and braced one arm against the post above your head. "Say I believe you."

You brushed the sudden butterflies in your stomach away as the heat melted your brain (and not Kevin). "That sounds like you don't believe me."

"Well, either way…" He brought a finger close to your face and tapped your nose. You could have sworn you saw his eyes dart downwards for a second, away from your eyes, toward your mouth. "I win."

EPISODE NINE: KINDLING FOR ALL KINDS OF FIRES

A campfire was always in order.

There were quite a few things that needed to be done before it could happen, however. One of the few things on the list just happened to be going out to find firewood, as well as filling up the bird feeders you left hanging out in the forest beyond. You could kill two birds with one stone. (Definitely not literally though. You hoped you never needed to kill two birds with one stone unless it was for pure survival purposes.)

The bird seed you'd requested to be brought back was… somewhere around here. You couldn't remember where exactly Auntie Yuna said they put the bag, but you would go hunting for it.

You meandered through the first floor of your lake cabin, gradually approaching the kitchen area where you heard voices. As far as you were aware, your parents were holed up in the kitchen with Kevin’s parents, as well as Kevin himself. Your siblings were probably either upstairs or at the Kims’ place. Probably.

“—know Judy’s daughter, right?” You recognized your mom’s voice among the fray. By this time, you stood in the middle of the living room with your hands on your hips. Where in the world was that sneaky bag of bird seed?

Kevin’s mom replied next, “Ah, she’s doing that drawing major or something, right? I forgot what it’s called—”

“Animation,” supplied her husband.

“Yes, that’s the one.” A clinking of metal on china; they were most likely digging into the trifle cake that was assembled earlier in the day.

“I hear there’s something going on and it’s getting more difficult to find work for them.”

A disgruntled sound. “Yah. That's the risk that comes with those art majors. If she had gone into bioengineering like Judy wanted her to, then she wouldn’t be worrying so much.”

You paused from your position in the living room. From your vantage point, you got a clear view into only part of the kitchen, but it was where Kevin lingered with his back to one of the cabinets. He had a bowl of dessert in one hand, the other using the tines of his fork to prod at a bite of cream and cake. His head was tilted down though, and you caught his periodic glances toward the part of the kitchen you couldn’t see where the adults probably were, prattling on and on as if he weren’t standing right there.

Your heart sunk to the pit of your stomach.

Why was he subjecting himself to this? Why didn’t he just pick himself up and leave—? The thought came to you that maybe he thought he deserved to hear this.

Having surveyed the living room enough to know that the bird seed wasn’t here, you did happen to note the presence of his camera sitting on the coffee table. You snatched the device up and headed for the kitchen.

“I think it’s good to cultivate creativity, but there’s a difference between a career and hobbies—”

“Psst.” You grappled onto the side of the doorway, quietly catching Kevin’s attention.

His head perked up at the sound and his eyebrows shot up in question. He offered the bowl in his hands to you. Want some? He mouthed.

You shook your head, then used your free hand to wave him over. Bird seed?

He seemed to understand. With one, massive bite, he finished the rest of his bowl, deposited it in the kitchen sink, then quietly slipped out of the room with you.

When the two of you were in the clear and you were following him over to the closet beneath the stairs (damn, had you really forgotten that this closet existed?), you handed him his camera. “I’m invoking rescue protocol,” you told him.

Kevin accepted his camera with a furrowed brow, watching as you opened up the closet door and found a canvas sack of birdseed sitting there. Huzzah! “Wait, but…” He considered you for a moment, and a slow smile slid onto his face. He ducked his head and threw his camera strap around his neck. “I appreciate you. Have I told you that?”

“And I—” You grunted as you picked the bag up into your arms and used your foot to kick the door closed. “—appreciate you. How’d you know this was where the bird seed was?”

“I just remembered what Uncle Jin said,” he told you with a shrug.

The two of you meandered out of the backdoor and onto the porch in a silent agreement to go fill some bird feeders together. The forest at this time of day was streaked in golden sunlight, emerald green leaves painted over in an amber wash of glitter. It felt warm and comfortable like autumn, but with the color palette of summer. The air was fresh, not crisp, and there was still a dollop of pollen floating around in the air from the tailend of spring.

You and Kevin entered the forest proper, and you shifted the bag into your right hand when you finally got the bag’s handles up and at ‘em. “I know the protocol wasn’t meant for those kinds of situations,” you started.

Kevin let his camera rest in his hands at midriff once he had fiddled with the settings enough to his liking. “I know.”

“They’re wrong, you know?” You turned to look at him as you stopped at the first feeder and let the sack of seed and grain fall to your feet with a thump against the earth. Before you opened up the bag, however, you peered up into the wooden house hanging from the branch, slobbered in messy paints and melting smiley faces. There wasn’t a speck of grain or seed left in this one. Satisfied, you bent down to rip the bag open and take out a scoop with your hands.

The shutter of a camera lens fired. He sighed, lowering the camera so he could inspect the test shot he took. “I’ve come to terms with that—all of their opinions, I mean.” He lifted the viewfinder back up to his eye and took another shot as you shoveled the bird seed into the hole. A small stream of it missed and tumbled to the forest floor. “Sometimes I do think like that, though. Whether or not I should have stuck with psychology and become a teacher instead of photography.”

You folded the edge of the bag over itself after dusting your hands off, and the two of you continued onward. “Are you happy with photography though? Do you like the things you’re learning, the work you’re doing?” That was one of the few metrics that kept you clinging onto your dreams—your hands were getting scraped and sweaty holding onto the side of the cliff face, but even though your shoe slipped against the ledge and threatened a long drop, you held on. Some days, you thought it was a sad, desperate effort; others, you found extra strength to dig your soles in.

He didn’t have to think much before answering. “Yeah, I do. It’s… it’s fulfilling.” He shot you a glance. “I guess it’s something I enjoy so much that most days it doesn’t even feel like work. All of the logistic, ‘real world,’ adult stuff is kind of a headache, but…” Even though his sentence trailed off, you could still follow.

You plopped the sack of seed down on the ground beneath the next bird feeder. “I know that it’s hard to think about what-ifs, and I’m kind of a hypocrite about it, too—but I think—” you scooped up a handful of bird seed and poured it into the opening. This house had a little sunshine painted on the roof. “—Kevin, I think you made the right choice. Obviously, it shouldn’t matter what I think; that’s just what I’ve observed so far.”

“It matters what you think,” he replied quietly. “To me, at least.”

The two of you shared a smile as you dusted your hands off again. The chase is hard, but the reward is sweet—those had been his words to you the other day.

“Do you want me to carry that for you?” He mused, in view of your struggle to pick the damn thing off the ground.

You suddenly gained a spurt of strength and energy. “I’m—great.”

His low chuckle followed you as you went. You could hear his shutter go off again.

“Thank you for assuring me that I took the right risk.” Kevin fell into step beside you once more with his camera cradled in his hands. There was a softness to his eyes again, a kind of tenderness you recognized only when it was just the two of you.

You went for a smile. “I feel you, you know? Maybe not on the same level, but you’re not in crisis alone, okay?”

His shoulder bumped against yours. “Get on my level,” he jested.

Your smile haplessly curled up further. “Yeah, yeah, you five year old.” You leaned over his arm to peer at his camera screen. Your heart hammered, blood spiking, when you saw what the subject of all his shots had been thus far. “Oh my god, have you been taking pictures of me?”

He giggled at your reaction. "What? What else am I supposed to be taking pictures of?"

"Uhm?" You gestured with your arm in a wide arc. "There is literally a whole world around us. Nature is much more photogenic than I am." A nervous laugh bubbled out of your chest as you adjusted a lock of hair that had gotten in your face.

"You are totally photogenic," he scoffed. "Literally look."

The two of you stopped in the middle of the path so he could show you the pictures he had taken thus far. Like most people when they saw a picture of themselves, you wanted to grimace, but you tried to search for what Kevin was seeing.

They were all incredible candid shots. The color was so vivid and bright, the edges crisp and focused. He had captured you at the moment when you were smiling, peeking into the bird feeder. It was that split second before the smile bloomed into something bigger when it only teased at the corner of your mouth.

You leaned back and coughed. "I only look good because you made me look good."

"Now that's bullshit."

You both resumed your walk to the next bird feeder. He said to you, "You can't possibly appreciate nature's beauty without appreciating your own, Yn."

You tilted your head and sent him a sidelong glance. "Why did that sound actually profound?"

"What do you mean actually profound?" His face arranged into an expression of offense. "Am I not regularly profound?"

You smiled to yourself. "I mean… if you had to ask—" Click! "Hey, now wait a minute!"

He beamed something boyish at you from over his camera lens. "Whoops?"

The bird seed bag thumped onto the forest floor again and you moved to check the inside of the next bird feeder. To your utter delight, you were greeted by the sight of sticks and mud and leaves slotted together in a messy riffraff, otherwise known as a bird's nest. You could hear the bright chirping coming out from the feeder's hole, and dark gray feathers poked out.

"We won't disturb these ones," you whispered, backing away to collect your bird seed. But before you left, you took a little of the grain to sprinkle on the outer landing ledge.

You didn't even realize you had been smiling out of pure giddiness until you reached the next feeder on the path. You had always secretly hoped that a bird would take over one of the houses as their own. Lo and behold, that hope manifested into reality.

Kevin helped you out with the next one since this tree was hung with a duplex. It was similar to a human duplex; the house was split down the middle to hold double the feed. The two of you carefully transferred seed and grain into its proper place.

"If you really are uncomfortable with me taking pictures of you," he said as the two of you picked up where you left off, "then I can totally delete them." He made a gesture with his hand. "No harm, no foul."

Heat rose to your cheeks. "It doesn't bother me that much," you admitted sheepishly. "They were good pictures."

"See!" Elated, he slung an arm around your shoulders and tugged you against his side with an affectionate shake. "You see the vision? Do you see it now?"

You couldn't possibly say no to him when his expression was brighter than the sun at high noon. At this moment—this perfect moment—when the sunlight streaming through the trees painted his face in a filter of buttery gold… you could definitely see the vision, but perhaps not the exact one he saw.

EPISODE TEN: YOU WOULD NOT BELIEVE YOUR EYES…

"OH, thank god, you guys went and got firewood!" Jin pressed his hands together in prayer as he jogged over to you and helped transfer the lumber in your arms over to his. On your way back from replenishing the bird feed, you let Kevin hold the remainder of what was left in the bag while you picked up any spare tinder for the fire. There were quite a few loose sticks around that would work nicely for the campfire tonight.

He walked off with your gatherings from the trip, and you and Kevin continued up to your lake house to drop off the bag of bird seed.

"So you were saying about the animal representation thing?" You piped up, recalling where the two of you last ended before your return to home base.

"Oh!" Kevin grinned. "It's so funny because some of my friends—you can totally see the resemblance of an animal, right? But then others don't really get an animal. Like Younghoon: he's just kind of bread."

You nearly tripped over a patch of dirt. "Bread?" You stammered incredulously. "Come again?"

"Bread," he nodded. He murmured in thanks to you when you slid open the screen door for him so he could shuck off his shoes and step inside the house. "But Changmin's a squirrel. Or a giraffe. That's what JC!Yn calls him, anyway; it's because of his long neck."

"Huh," you pondered. Interesting friend group they had going on there. You wondered what you would be…

As you passed by your bedroom on the first floor, you could hear your phone sounding off in aggressive vibrations even through the wooden walls and the closed door. You swore under your breath and pushed into your room to turn it off, then paused when you realized why it had gone off in the first place.

Fireflies.

"Everything okay?" Kevin's voice came back around the bend, his head poking into the space and the bird seed bag nowhere to be seen. He must have put it away just now.

You glanced up at him as you silenced the alarm and tucked your phone into your pocket. You hadn't needed it all that much this entire trip, but you would definitely hold onto it tight tonight. "Huh? Oh, yeah. Ready to head out?"

He didn't question your behavior and nodded. "Ready when you are."

Sometimes campfire smoke burned Kevin's eyes, but that was mostly when he was younger and didn't know any better. The embers of the fire were always so warm and inviting, always luring him toward it and inviting him to stare into its core. He could still feel the sting of the ash in his pupils as he looked at it from afar now.

The summer sun had sunken down into the horizon and gave way to a comfortable nightfall. Above your heads hung curtains of leaves from oaks, and above them was the blanket of night sky bedazzled in stars. Nature, as you had said earlier today, was quite photogenic.

He sat perched slightly away from everyone in the group, settling at the picnic table with his back to the table surface so he could still face into the fire. When everyone regrouped, Joshua had brought along an acoustic guitar and played it for everyone now.

"Sunday morning, rain is falling."

Someone lit up in a small hoot of approval. Kevin observed the group before him, the several families that had come together. He was especially pleased that the Hongs and the Xus were still hanging out with the lot of them, the latter being around a little less, but still coming out to join the fun, nonetheless.

He hadn't even realized when the last time his mom tried blatantly pushing him towards Serena. At some point, she stopped and it slipped his mind.

"Clouds are shrouding us in moments, unforgettable. You twist to fit the mold that I am in."

Kevin scratched his jaw as he turned his eyes down to the iPad settled in his lap. After he had finished up dinner, he ran inside to swap out his camera for his device to get some sketching done. There wasn't a particular project he was working on; he just wanted to practice a little.

When he lifted his gaze back up to pick a subject, he found himself looking in your direction. Your dad and Connor brought out the goodies to make s'mores. Long, slim skewers were passed around the circle, and the kids were the first to receive marshmallows to spear.

You and your sister sat beside one another and you helped her grab two of the mallows to impale. The light from the fire flickered across your face in differing levels of shadow, a play on contrast. Your expression seemed softer here—he wasn't really sure what it was. Maybe it was the tenderness at the corner of your eyes as you laughed at Connor's marshmallow falling burnt into the pit; maybe it was the triumph you shared with Alice when you helped her sandwich her marshmallows between a slab of chocolate and twin graham crackers.

He liked to believe his hand started before he consciously knew what he was doing.

"That may be all I need… In darkness, she is all I see."

"Are you sure you don't want me to make you one?" You asked your brother as he grabbed his redemption marshmallow from the bag.

Connor huffed, puffing out his chest. "I got this."

Your eyebrows flew upward. "Okay, big guy. Have at it." You chuckled and grabbed a marshmallow for yourself, sticking it onto your skewer to let it broil over the heat.

Kevin traced the lines of your face with his eyes, his hand transferring that memorization onto his screen. Sometimes human expressions were a little difficult to portray accurately, and there was a thorn pricking the back of his mind, urging him to do you justice. He didn't know if he could.

Your head slowly swayed to the sound of Joshua's pretty melody, the corners of your mouth tilting upward. Kevin shifted his position on the bench and drew the little tick mark at the edge of your mouth for that slight smile.

He always knew you were beautiful—for fuck's sake, he'd practically said it today in the forest. It had been among the crush of other important conversations, but he meant it. He still had the image of you engraved in his brain, the moment when you discovered the family of birds in the feeder house. You'd lit up like a goddamn star.

You stood up from your spot once your marshmallow became the perfect golden tone over the edges. You stepped over to the chair that held all the ingredients and smooshed the marshmallow between chocolate and cracker. Then, you turned and marched over to him.

Surprise alerted in his features, and he subtly tilted the screen of his iPad up against his chest. "Hey," he greeted softly while you approached.

You returned the expression and held out the s'more to him. "Here. It's for you."

The organ in his chest did a somersault. "What?" He laughed, "For me?"

"Yeah, silly. I don't know why you're so far away, but I know you like 'em." You settled on the bench next to him with one arm braced behind you on the table and your legs crossed, one over the other.

"Thank you," he said, using one of his hands to bite into it with childlike giddiness. The mixture of flavors exploded in his mouth—the crunch of the graham cracker, the soft, gooeyness of the chocolate and marshmallow. A perfect, sweet treat, and done exactly right. "Mmmh, this is so good," he mumbled behind his hand to catch any crumbs on his lips.

You chuckled. "Nice, glad it has your stamp of approval." Your eyes wandered down to his iPad, and you could see the white screen lit up against his shirt. "What have you been up to?"

His eyes widened a smidge, and there came a bashfulness to his face. (Cute.) "Oh, uhm," he swallowed down the remainder of the s'more and tilted the screen away from you. Huh, strange. "It's nothing really. Just sketching."

You hummed in understanding, though it was a little out of character for him to hide it from you. "Ah, I see."

The two of you descended into silence, and you leaned your back against the table to get comfortable. Kevin passed you sidelong glances from the corner of his eye, unsure of how you knew he wanted you to stay. (Because he definitely did want you to stay.)

Perhaps this was a sign. Thoughts had been brewing in his head as of late, and he wasn't quite sure what to do with them. They all just… sort of piled up in his hands and he didn't know how to free them up to reach out to you.

He opened his mouth to say something—anything—maybe even about the pact—to retract the pact?—it didn't matter.

But when he turned to look at you this time, your gaze was elsewhere. That soft, tenderness remained, but you had turned your attention to Joshua.

Ah. He shouldn't have jumped so soon. A hopeless kind of ache twisted in his stomach that made him uncomfortable. He briefly glanced down at his screen of what he'd sketched of you so far and decided it might be better to finish it later.

Fireflies. You nearly forgot that you planned to sneak out and see fireflies tonight.

By the time the campfire was cleaned up and everyone was tucked away into their beds, it was probably nearing midnight. You quietly rustled around your room in the dark and used only your phone's flashlight to gather things into a little knapsack—just the essentials, of course. There was no need to get fancy with it.

You wished you had signal so you could text Kevin and warn him ahead of time that you were about to go appear at his window, but you figured it would be fine anyhow. Even if he wasn't awake, the excitement buzzing inside of you could hardly wait.

Shouldering your bag, you headed out the door and crossed the divide between your house and the Moons'.

You located Kevin's window on the second floor, quietly rejoining when you realized it was cracked open. This had to be fate; what other reason would his window be open? (Clearly not for the cool, evening breeze or anything…)

You cupped your hands around your mouth. "Kevin!" You stage-whispered. "Kevin!"

A moment later, a head popped out the open frame. His hair stuck up a little bit and his eyes squinted down into the darkness at you. "Yn?"

"Yes," you said with a grin that he probably thought was idiotically too large. You waved him down. "I'm gonna go see fireflies!"

It took him a second to compute. "What time is it?"

"Like, midnight."

"Okay."

Seven minutes later, Kevin emerged from the back door with a T-shirt and sweatpants on, a yawn splitting his face. He shook his head out as if he was shaking out the remaining remnants of sleep from his system. You met him on the back stairs.

"So what's this about fireflies?" He asked you as the two of you ventured off into the wilderness.

Last year when you were up here at the lake, there was one night when sleep refused to take you. Your solution had been to go on a walk, and as completely dangerous as that sounded (because it was), you'd stumbled upon the meadow you now took Kevin toward. You hadn't the faintest why you never knew about this place after years of coming up to the lake town, but it was where the fireflies took flight.

The meadow was not too long a walk from where you both lived, and by the time you arrived, Kevin was wide awake.

"It's just over this crest," you told him, the jubilation in your voice nearly spilling over.

Kevin smiled at the sound of your excitement and eagerly followed you up the hill.

As soon as you made it over, you lost all your breath in awe. The meadow sprawled at your feet for miles was completely a-glow. Little beads of yellow-green light dotted the field in every corner like light bulbs strung together by invisible string. You had only ever seen this once in person, the rest via the internet and popular culture (movies, TV shows, and the like), and yet, it never compared to the real life experience.

You and Kevin stood there for a moment to soak in the sight. What a wonder of nature this was.

When you finally gained the sense to, you dug around in your bag for wherever you'd stashed your phone. Your tongue stuck out of the corner of your mouth as you fidgeted with the settings on your phone camera. You just wanted one little picture to show one of your professors at school, but it seemed your camera-working skills left much to be desired.

"Here, let me," Kevin murmured and gently took the phone from you. He showed you the screen as he fixed the settings—et voilà! Like magic, the field before you became visible on your camera screen in the crispiest, sexiest quality you had ever seen. "And… there you go."

He clicked the photo for you and handed you back your phone.

Mouth agape, you zoomed in on your completed photo. "Thanks, Kevin!" You gushed as you admired his handiwork.

He clasped a hand against the back of his neck. "No worries. Just a few tricks I learned."

You still warmed at the gesture. With your phone now tucked away, the two of you could sink back into the glory of the field of fireflies.

You heard Kevin's voice, soft, "How do they light up like that?"

"Bioluminescence," you replied in a whisper back. "It's a biochemical reaction that basically lets them convert energy into that light you see." There were plenty of other examples of bioluminescence in nature, as well. One particular instance you'd read about once, was a wave of bioluminescent algae appearing on the shores of a Southern Californian beach during the summer. It was neat stuff.

"Wild," he marveled.

A wave of calm fell over your form. You'd never felt so at peace in your life—just you, the outdoors, and one of the few people who made you actually feel this comfortable. You swallowed at the thought.

You were suddenly hyperaware of how close you were standing to him, the backs of your hands grazing against each other. You could feel his skin, his knuckles against yours—and maybe your brain was making it up, but the touch felt intentional.

For a second, you indulged yourself in what it might be like to close the distance and take his hand into yours. Of course, it wouldn't have to be in the romantic way; friends could hold hands… right? They could hold hands and your heart could skip several beats and he could look at your lips, and you would still be friends. Right?

You cleared your throat, and the sound seemed to thunder in the silence. "We should—we should probably head back," you said, sparing a glance at him.

He caught your eyes and held them. His lips turned upward, and the shine in his eyes was fond. "Okay."

With renewed energy, you made the trek back into the neighborhood. Your bucket list items for the summer had nearly all been checked off—not like you had a physical list written out. These were simply traditions you hoped to fulfill every summer while you were here in your happy place.

The crickets chirped a lovely serenade as you and Kevin strolled back onto the street where your houses stood. At the point where you both needed to split off, you nudged him with your elbow. "Thanks for coming out with me tonight."

"Thank you for inviting me," he countered with an amused hum.

"Good night, Kev."

You both lingered for a second. "Good night, Yn," he said back, pausing for a moment. Then he leaned over toward you and pressed his lips to the crown of your head. Your eyes fluttered shut. "Hope the lovebugs bite."

EPISODE ELEVEN: ROCKING THE BOAT

IF there was one thing that Kevin Moon was good at (besides the myriad of things he was actually good at), it was waking up his cousin to exercise with him in the morning.

"I think I deserve a nice, fat stack of pancakes after this," Yuna grumbled after nearly tripping over a raised tree root and kissing the forest floor. She grappled onto her cousin's shoulder to steady herself, the cousin in question giving a light chuckle at her antics. "When your mom said we should exercise together, I thought she meant the next time I was in Vancouver, not right now."

"Well, it's only because Yn's mom planned to go out with my mom this morning," Kevin mused. "Usually I have a designated walking partner."

"Woe is me. Alas, I have become your Plan B," Yuna sighed melodramatically with a hand draped over her forehead.

This morning, at a lovely 9:46am, the lake and its surrounding forest was just as alive and awake as Kevin was. The sun had taken up its perch in the clear, blue sky and the birds had long since begun their morning songs. They were awfully loud at this part of the lake, the exact three-quarter mark around the perimeter. Kevin thanked his parents for choosing houses away from this area—he would have never slept ever if they bunkered up here. (Not that he slept anyway, but that was beside the point.)

The walk began a little later than he usually did with your mom, but he granted Yuna a bit of leeway since she hadn't exactly been given a head's up. (He argued the opposite, but he let this once slide.)

"You're so dramatic," he chided playfully. "Watch out for that rock."

Yuna's mouth morphed into a deep frown, eyes wide open, as she narrowly missed being nature's fool another time. "Oh, speaking of Yn… Yn's mom? Whatever, I just mean Yn."

Kevin perked up at the topic change. His brain was fresh from last night's midnight endeavor with you and the fireflies. His lips still tingled from when he ventured to kiss you on the head… he wasn't sure where that courage had come from, but the memory of it kick-started his heart into a gallop. "What about Yn?"

She shrugged. "I dunno. You tell me." A smile crawled onto her face, and Kevin could smell her slyness a mile away. "The two of you have been hanging out a ton recently."

"We usually stick together," he sniffed, fidgeting absentmindedly with the beads on the bracelet you'd made him.

"Aish," she pressed her features into an unimpressed look that reminded Kevin of a typical Chanhee deadpan. "You're so unhelpful. You know what I'm talking about!" She smacked the side of his arm, and Kevin erupted into a fit of laughter.

His smile grew shy. "I don't really know what to say! I'm sorry—that's the truth." Because how could he even begin when it came to you? Where did it end, where did it begin?

"I see the way you look at her, Kev."

Kevin shoved his hands into his shorts. Suddenly the bird nest he spotted in a nearby tree became all too interesting. The bird nest reminded him of the birds who had made a home out of one of your feeders, and that reminded him of the adorable elation on your face when you discovered it and that reminded him of—he came to a stop. Oh, god, he was so far gone. "How do I look at her?"

Yuna peered at him curiously, then stopped to face him. "You look at her like I look at Jin. At least, that's how I think I look at him." She offered him a supportive smile. "But right now, you look like you're going through your midlife crisis."

"I might as well be."

She barked out a laugh. "Save that for when you buy a house, my friend."

He rubbed his temples with a wince. "Houses, domesticity, money, partners. Why is adulting so hard?"

"Hey, you'll get through it," she told him and nudged his shoulder. "What's going on, dude? What's on your mind?"

Kevin swallowed. He still hadn't the faintest idea where to begin, but everything had to start somewhere. Yuna had always been kind to him (a menace at times, but that feeling was mutual), and he trusted her with his vulnerabilities. He toed the ground. "Okay, last night, I kissed her—"

"YOU WHAT?"

He sputtered, red rushing to his face, as he grabbed her shoulders. Her eyes were practically falling out of her head. "Nonononono! Let me finish, you—I kissed her on the forehead, okay?"

Her gaping mouth closed only slightly. "Oh…" She thought about it some more. "Oh."

Kevin nodded gravely. "Yup."

Yuna straightened with a furrowed brow. "Well, that's not that big of a deal, is it?"

"What do you mean that's not a big deal?" His hands shot to the top of his baseball cap. "How is that not a big deal!"

"That's because the two of you refuse to acknowledge or entertain the obvious!"

Kevin hissed when she reached over to give his forehead a very hard flick. He rubbed the spot that began to smart; getting flicked in the forehead twice in one lake trip was twice too many. "The obvious?"

"That you guys can have the mushy gushy feelies without it being a product of the placebo effect from your moms' collective matchmaking efforts."

He made a face. "That was a lot of words…"

She deadpanned. "Kevin, listen to me: just because the two of you made a stupid pact when you were ten—"

"Eleven."

"Whatever. Eleven—doesn't mean that you can't leave room to, you know, amend that. You have to give yourself the opportunity to explore it, especially when I can clearly see that your feelings are changing about this girl." Yuna grasped her cousin by his shoulders this time in an attempt to telepathically insert these words into his brain. Or at least, just make him listen.

The words seeped into his head. The two of you had already made amendments earlier this trip, but you had never commented on the "only friends part." He even entertained the idea of bringing it up to you last night at the bonfire.

He didn't realize Yuna already began tugging him along the path to circle around the remainder of the lake to get back to the house. Everything was so muddled… but a part of him recognized that Yuna was right. He just wished he could get an idea of where your thoughts laid.

There were moments when you thought life could be like a movie, but then why was doing this pedal boat thing so much less glamorous than it seemed? Then again, maybe you shouldn't have thought doing this at high noon was the greatest idea.

You should have been like your Uncle Seokjin, who sat to your left, swallowed up in a blue lifejacket, a pair of big sunglasses, and a crocheted bonnet with a duck face to keep his face out of the sun. Yeah, maybe glasses would have been a good idea.

Sweat dribbled down the side of your face and down the slope of your nose, and you wiped it off with the back of your hand. "It's so hot, Uncle. We couldn't have waited until later today when it cooled down?"

He leaned back, his cheeks and skin reddened and damp from the heat and the fire in his calves from pedaling. "Okay, okay. Let's stop here."

"Right in the middle of the lake?" You asked incredulously, but immediately brought your feet off the pedals to give your legs a deserved break.

"What better place to do so?"

The two of you lounged in your seat beneath the molten afternoon sun, limbs screaming, water draining from your bodies through your pores. This would have been nice if you brought a sun umbrella… or maybe some water… man, did you make so many poor choices today.

"So what's going on with you and Kevin?"

The question snapped you out of your heat-fazed daze. You nearly thought you hallucinated him saying that. You stammered, "What about me and Kevin?"

You could see his overexaggerated facial expression even from behind his sunglasses. "Yah, don't give me that. You know what I'm talking about—I saw you two last night."

You lurched out of your seat and caused the violent rocking of the boat. You and your copilot let out twin swears as the boat evened out on the waves, and luckily, did not capsize. "Sorry—the fuck? You did?"

"Actually, I didn't," he snickered. "But now I know something did happen. So what's the tea, girl? Hit me with it. It's hot outside but I always take my beverages scorching." He shifted in his seat, carefully, in order to give you his full attention.

You couldn't believe he dragged you out to the middle of the lake just for this conversation. Total Uncle Seokjin move. You walked (or pedaled) right into his checkmate.

Moments of last night flooded into your brain—the campfire, the fireflies, the kiss, the… the him. Kevin. You gulped. Where did you even think to begin? "I took him to see fireflies last night."

Jin scrunched his eyebrows together. "Fireflies? Since when did we have fireflies? You didn't take me to see the fir—oh, you know, what? It was your little romantic moment; I got it."

"It wasn't a romantic moment!" You sputtered helplessly, uselessly. "It was—it was a moment of serenity and scientific marvel."

"You are such a nerd. What did he do, huh? Did you guys hold hands or something?"

Almost. "No," you said. "He… he did kiss my forehead once we got back though."

"Aha!" You both careened as the boat trembled violently from Seokjin's sudden Einstein epiphany. "I knew that something happened," he said once the boat slowed to a stop again. "I just had a feeling in my gut."

"Are you sure it wasn't the yogurt you had this morning?"

"How dare you," he huffed. "I brought my lactose pills. And hey! Stop changing the subject."

You laughed aloud, but inwardly, your gut was churning. Maybe you could blame the heat, but you knew the real reason why you were suddenly feeling as unstable as the pedal boat you sat upon. The idea that the entirety of your friendship could be so easily uprooted… well, perhaps not easily. Picking apart your friendship would be like flushing weeds out of a garden—you would have to get at the roots, and right now, the roots were so deep that you would fall into the ground before finding the bottom.

Not that you wanted to uproot your friendship, or relationship, with Kevin. Of course not.

What did that forehead kiss even mean? What did all of the moments you shared between him this summer, as a whole, even mean? Why, all of a sudden, did you want the way he looked at you to mean something different besides platonic affection? Why did you want more when you had never really thought about more before?

You voiced all of this aloud to your uncle, who sat staring out onto the calm surface of the lake. When you were finished with your ramble, he said, "You need to get your shit together, girl."

You coughed. "Thanks, that was so helpful."

"I'm told that a lot," he beamed. "But really, those are all very good questions, Yn. And they're super important, too."

You frowned, lifting the rim of your baseball cap to wipe away the perspiration collecting at your hairline like a cult. "Do you think that these mixed feelings are a result of all the matchmaking going on? Like, somehow, we've let it affect how we view each other?"

"Honestly?" He sighed, his shoulders lifting and dropping in a half-hearted shrug. "Could be. But, Yn honey, is it really such a bad thing? And let's think about it this way—how do you feel about Joshua?"

You didn't need to think too hard about it. "He's a catch, but not my type of butterfly."

"Exactly, and oh my go—"

"Don't," you chuckled menacingly, "call me a nerd."

He gestured vaguely with his hand. "I wasn't; I was gonna call you a dork."

You snorted. With another swipe at your dripping neck, you said, "But Kevin and Serena—"

"'Kevin and Serena' don't exist," he told you with a smack of his lips. Jin peered at you from over the rim of his glasses, which in kind, made the duck's beady eyes stare straight into your soul, too. "That girl bats for the other team, and Kevin has shown zero interest in her other than helping her not fall off a jet ski."

Huh. You leaned your elbow onto the knee of one leg, propped up to your chest. "Well when you put it that way…"

"When I put it that way," he finished for you, "it makes it a little clearer, hm?" You were quiet for a moment, and Jin gave your shoulder a pat. "Some things are just meant to be."

The words, so familiar to you, rang true as a bell. Some things are just meant to be. You couldn't help the smile that started to work its way onto your face, and it was all thanks to Seokjin helping you sweep away some of the webs confusing your brain. You weren't completely confident, but you could feel yourself being nudged in a certain direction, and this time, you weren't pushing back.

The tide could take you where it may.

Your uncle by association added quietly, "Haven't you thought just once that, after all this sneaking around, there's been another reason for it other than a pact?"

EPISODE TWELVE: FISH IN THE SEA, ANTS IN THE GROUND

BY the time you and Jin returned to solid ground, you discovered that Kevin was away with his dad helping the Xus pack and clean up. Today they would be departing the small lake town, as they hadn't planned on spending as much time up here as the rest of you did. You and most of the others already said your goodbyes at the campfire, so you had little else to do but twiddle your thumbs until you could confront Kevin with your thoughts.

A shower always produced productive results, especially after melting Wicked Witch of the West style in the middle of the lake.

There was time, you realized, to bring things together. Of course, there was a part of you that shied away from wanting to even address this epiphany. What if bringing this up opened up a whole new can of worms? In other words, what if talking about the elephant in the room only led to regret? You didn't want to lose Kevin, and because your families were always so close, you didn't want to lose this. This connection, this tradition, this place.

Too many memories made their home here at the lake. It was your happy place… his happy place. It was everything.

Everything could change, and wasn't that terrifying? But it could also be great, and who best to share the scariest, greatest moments of life with other than your Kevin Moon?

As rubber tire wheels ate gravel, Kevin nodded to his dad and set off back across the lawn toward your cabin. The afternoon had him busy with helping the Xus head home, which he didn't mind doing, of course; the lot of them had fun with his party, and his party with the lot of them. He and Serena left on friendly terms, undeterred by his mother's half-hearted attempt to get them sort of talking. Serena said she understood.

Kevin needed to talk to you though. After the morning was spent with Yuna getting him to see the big ass elephant in the room—trunk in his face and trumpet in his ear—there was no other course of action left but to tell you the truth.

The truth. God, the truth. The truth was that he didn't want the old pact in place anymore. That was it, plain and simple. It was crazy to think about how long the two of you had let it restrain your relationship—wait, did you want it to though?

"Hey Kevin!"

Kevin slowed to a stop, attention perking up at his name when he saw Joshua making his way over to him. He worried his bottom lip. You didn't… like Josh, did you? He just had to be sure because, well, that would throw a rock into things. "Oh, hey, man."

Joshua offered him a bright smile. "Hey. Did Serena and her parents just take off?"

Kevin cupped the back of his head. "Uh, yeah! Just now, actually."

"Cool, cool." Joshua nodded his head. "I wanted to talk to you about something."

His heart threw itself over the side of a cliff. Oh no. He let out a laugh, hoping to push the nerves out of his voice, but he was sure it wasn't too convincing anyhow. "Really? What—what about?"

"It's about Yn—" Oh, double no. "—I kind of," he winced, "noticed that her mom was trying to… nudge us together?"

"Oh god, let me be the first to apologize—"

Joshua broke the tension with a chuckle. "Hey, it's no worries! I just didn't know if you were aware or not because you and she kind of seemed like a couple to me, but I didn't know if her mom knew."

Kevin blinked, heart quickening for a different reason. "What?" He stammered. "Sorry, can we rewind?"

"Hm? That you and Yn are a thing? Are—are you not?" He gasped, eyes going wide. "Shit, that was stupid of me to just assume. Sorry if that was totally awkward!"

Oh, but quite the opposite. Kevin could feel the blood rush to his cheeks, clear as day. There was a warm feeling in his chest knowing that more people thought that you and him looked like a couple. It was ridiculous how the thought got him giddy now. Kevin shook his head though. "No, no, you're good, dude. But we aren't a couple." Yet. Hopefully.

Joshua cocked his head to the side curiously. "Oh? I guess… it's still a little strange of me to assume, so I apologize. You're…?"

"Interested?" A nod. "Yeah." (Wow, that was a verbal admittance. One step closer to the real thing.)

Kevin cleared his throat and grabbed his shoulder with his opposite hand. "You're not—you're not interested in her, are you? I mean," he rushed to add, "it's totally fine. I understand—"

Joshua shook his head. "Oh shit, no, I'm not interested. Not that Yn's a bad person or anything, but I'm taken."

Pause.

…that made sense.

Joshua laughed, ducking his head to hide the smile that blossomed on his face. "Yeah, I'm already spoken for. My parents don't really know yet, but… yeah. I didn't wanna get in the way of whatever you and Yn have, and hopefully I'm not saying this too late."

On the contrary, a weight lifted from Kevin's chest and he sucked in a lungful of summer breeze. "Nah, man. Thanks for saying it in the first place; I appreciate it."

"Yeah," Joshua said pleasantly. He nodded at him, lips pursed with one eye squinted. "She digs you, too, you know? I've seen it all throughout this trip."

Hope filled his heart like the air ballooning his lungs. He didn't know what to do with all of these. They just kept coming up onto the stack of things in his hands that he wanted to take into consideration and tell you to your face, once and for all. Your face just kept flickering in his mind's eye, and the nerves were slowly melting into excitement. He wanted to share this with you, as the two of you had done for years.

"I hope so."

Joshua clasped a hand on Kevin's shoulder. "I would say 'go get 'em, tiger,' but I have a friend at school who is scarily obsessed with tigers, so I'll just say—" A squeeze of his shoulder, "you got this."

Kevin didn't know what to do with that extra factoid, but he gave Joshua a grateful grin. "Thanks, man."

The pair split off from there, one heading back toward his own cabin, and the other, marching toward the future. Whatever laid ahead, he could take on.

His step gained a skip, and soon, he was jogging across the green until he appeared at your back porch. He hadn't really prepared anything—no romantic gestures, no flowers or candles, no chocolates. All he had were the words on his tongue and his newly realized love for you. Love, a strange phenomenon. He had his love for you stashed away in his breast pocket and it blossomed every summertime.

He let himself into the house and went poking around for you. "Yn? Yn, you back yet?"

No answer.

He ducked his head into the kitchen, the living room, before he came upon your bedroom door left slightly ajar. Through the sliver, he saw the bottoms of your feet on the bed, and he gently knocked on the door before pushing through.

"Yn…? Ah," His voice quieted to a whisper.

You were curled up over the bedsheets, asleep. Kevin slowly tiptoed his way over to you where your body was angled toward your phone screen, lying discarded on the pillow and actively running an episode of Our Planet.

A smile, fond and tender, pressed itself into his mouth. He reached over to carefully turn the downloaded episode off to descend the room in complete silence.

His head swiveled toward the foot of the bed where your patchwork quilt hung off the railing. He carefully draped it over your sleeping form, then made his exit.

You deserved the rest. And though he couldn't confess to you now, this gave him the time to ensure he got this exactly right.

EPISODE THIRTEEN: THE DAMSELS IN DEVOTION DEAL™

TIME passed by differently here.

One moment, you were biding your time and indulging in an episode of Our Planet; the next, the bedroom was dark and the house was quiet. You roused from sleep confused and delirious. You stretched your limbs up over your head, taking note of the quilt draped over your body.

Huh, you wondered how that got there.

Your eyes fluttered and squinted when you stood up and saw a flicker of amber light from outside your window. The view looked over only part of the backside to the house, so all you could see were the shadows that the campfire created. They danced by way of the breeze, their puppetmaster.

The time on your phone read a (slightly alarming) ten o'clock. You hadn't realized you slept that long. Maybe you were more tired than you originally thought.

Wait, then why was the campfire still blazing?—

"Yn! Psst!"

You pressed your face against the open slit in the window to track the sound of your name. Déjà vu swept over you as you discovered Kevin making his way over toward you from the outside. "Kevin? Is everyone still up?"

He shook his head. "No, no. I've just been waiting," he admitted sheepishly. "Come on out. Have you eaten yet?"

"Oh, no. I just woke up."

"Ah… right." He clasped the back of his neck. "Well, come out anyway. We can sit together."

Together. You liked the sound of that.

Without wasting more time, you promised him two minutes and scurried out of your room to round to the back door. The campfire crackled on your side of the lawn, rather than the middle of the properties this time, and Kevin tended to it on one of the two foldable chairs present.

You took a seat in the open seat. "S'mores?" You chuckled, noting the basket of ingredients at his feet.

He ducked his head. "Yeah," he loosened a laugh, "I thought I'd make you a s'more this time."

It was just a s'more, and yet, here was the organ in your chest palpitating in your chest. You didn't reject the s'more, of course, and watched him skewer a marshmallow and hold it over the blazing embers. As he did so, you caught the way his other hand fidgeted with your bracelet on his wrist, how his tongue darted out to wet his bottom lip. Was he as nervous as you were?

The thing, Yn.

"There's something I—" You both stopped short at your simultaneous words. They were the same, too, and had the pair of you fumbling.

"You first," you said, gesturing to him.

He hummed and tried for a smile. "Do you remember that night in sixth grade when we made the pact?"

You nodded.

"It was kind of like this actually," he mused. The marshmallow had browned into a beautiful gold, and you reached into the basket to help him assemble the chocolate and graham cracker pieces. Your fingers grazed his as he squished the outer crackers together to hand it to you. "A late night, s'mores, the campfire."

You took a chunk out of the s'more and swallowed before adding, "Seems like so long ago."

"Right?" He slipped the metal skewers back into the basket and leaned his arms onto his knees, body angled toward you. "The pact, I…" He considered his words as they melted on his tongue like the chocolate and marshmallow on yours. "I wanted to ask if you would think about another amendment."

You met his eyes now. The burning fire reflected in his dark irises, warm and bright. "An—an amendment," you parroted. Was this what you thought it was? You finished off your s'more, hoping not to choke when he told you whatever he wanted to tell you. You suddenly wondered if the s'more was just to soften the blow.

Kevin nodded. "Yeah, another amendment. We didn't really discuss the biggest part of the original pact when we made the rescue protocol."

"The 'just friends' clause," you finished, breathlessly.

"Yn, I don't wanna be just friends anymore."

It didn't hit you at first. You swore the ash from the fire was making you hear things, but it hit you, milliseconds later. "Oh."

He pursed his lips for a moment. "It's taken me a stupidly long time to come to this conclusion, and I was thinking about what we were talking about the other night—about if we were ready for relationships. And I said that maybe the person I wanted to spend the rest of my life with was someone I already met.

"Yn, I think I'm in love with you," he said. "Not just in a way that friends love each other, but something… something more. And I wanted to let you know because—if I'm being completely honest—I want to share everything with you."

You could feel the way your lips curled upward and your heart soared. "I wanna share everything with you, too. And I don't know how long I've sat on this, but what I do know is that I feel so much for you." Every admittance that was released into the night air like sparks flying was another card laid out between you two, face up. "This place, the lake, has been my place, Kevin. But I want you to be my person."

He smiled at you, sweet and boyish, the type of smile that made you feel on the edge of seventeen. He helped you out of dark places with that smile; he was always showing you the light. "Your person," he murmured, letting that sink into his tongue and be familiarized with it. "I would love to be your person, Yn."

Your hand found his across the gap between your chairs. His thumb caressed over the side of yours, and he tucked his other hand over top until you were enveloped in his clasp—safe and sound.

When the fire was reduced to nothing more than ash and memory, you and Kevin raced each other down to the water's edge. The lake was stilled beneath the moonlight, a pool of silvery mercury. You reached for his hand again and intertwined your fingers firmly, a comforting weight and hold.

It felt right.

"So since we made an amendment to the protocol again," you started as he swung your laced hands between your bodies, "we need to seal the deal."

A grin bloomed on his face, and he bit his lip. "Hear me out," he drawled. "Maybe we should update the seal, too."

You narrowed your eyes in jest. "You just don't want me to flick your forehead."

"Sue me, you flick hard," he laughed.

"But shoot."

He licked his lips and turned to face you. "Can I show you?"

Your heart gave one big lurch as he leaned over to you. You closed the rest of the distance and sighed something happy at the feel of his lips against yours. It was gentle and brief, his mouth parting from yours to give you enough room to back away.

You could feel your twin smiles. "I kind of like it."

"Yeah?" He hummed. "Well, that can be our practice round."

You shook your head and threw your arms around his neck to pull him back over to you. His arms curled around your middle, hands pressed to your sides and holding you close.

When you broke apart this time, his warm chuckle ran a delicious bolt of electricity down your spine. "I know things are gonna be different now… But we got this."

It was the way he looked at you—the one that assured you he was the same Kevin he was three years ago and beyond; the kid who broke the swing set when you challenged him to a bet; the kid who sketched butterflies in meadows, and now sketched you in the firelight; the kid who would never judge you or ridicule you for your feelings, but validate them, always. You didn't know how you were so blind to it before.

It wasn't so scary anymore, not when you knew he would be there with you.

"Yeah," you said softly, running your thumb down the back of his neck, "I'm not really worried."

He let out a breathy laugh, and it coaxed one out of you, too. Kevin pressed his forehead to yours, pressed a kiss to the tip of your nose, pressed his heart to yours.

Some things really were just meant to be.

a/n: now the question is how are they gonna tell their moms... 🤡 if you enjoyed, pls remember to reblog, or comment, or send in an ask!! thanks for reading :] see you in at your convenience!

permanent taglist: @flwoie @vatterie @seomisaho @hqrana @ja4hyvn @tinkerbell460 @kaaimins @hyunjaespresent-deobi @otterly-fey @zzoguri @floatingpluto @winterchimez @ethereal-engene @gyulfriend @polarisjisung @jaehunnyy @shakalakaboomboo @loveliestfelix @bless-311 @zhaixiaowen @leaz-kpop-life @amourdsr @pxppxrminty @kqyutie @sseastar-main @kxthleen14 @fluorescentloves @mosviqu @justalildumpling @jaerisdiction @super-btstrash-posts @jundundun @http-gyu @mvvnsseul @outrologist @vernonburger @maessseongs @ericlvr @kflixnet

#deoboyznet #bjnet #kflixnet #the boyz x reader #kevin moon x reader #the boyz fluff #the boyz imagines #the boyz oneshot #the boyz scenarios #the boyz drabbles #kevin moon imagines #kevin moon fluff #kevin moon oneshots #kevin moon drabbles #kevin moon scenarios #the boyz fanfic

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spdrvyn · 6 months

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wrong kind of rivalry — MIGUEL O'HARA

☆ you and miguel are constantly at an impasse, but your coworkers seem to think otherwise. requested here.

rivals to lovers. fluff. hurt/comfort. lotsa romance. sorry, this one took a while for me to put out, school and stuff </3

"Not even a chance. Every single I enter the room, those two are arguing about hoo or ha."

"That's 'cus you don't see the chemistry, ol' man."

Mayday babbles in the carrier, reaching out of her dad as her little fingertips graze the stubble on the lower half of his face. He coos at her and Hobie smirks, flicking a curl that curtained her forehead.

"I bet fifty pounds that those two are shaggin' behind our backs."

"Shagging? Uh, oh, oh—" Peter covers his mouth in shock, before moving them to cover Mayday's ears. "Don't say that, there's a baby present."

Hobie chuckles, "She don't have a clue,"

"Clue about what exactly?" Miguel frowns, putting his hands on his hips. His presence seems imposing like actually, but at least one person has gotten jumped by his sudden intrusion in conversations. Would you really be part of this strike force if it hadn't happened to you?

"Clue about the world, existence, growing up." Peter retaliates, but it's clear that it was just a panic response. Mayday giggles and Miguel raises a brow at it.

"Right," he rolls his eyes, walking past the both (technically, three) of them. It's hard to tell if he's actually out of earshot, but neither of them care.

Peter leans in closer, "Fifty dollars."

The bellowing silence of the room was enough to sweep anyone away, the two spiders awaited the familiar hum of the portal as they waited and waited and waited.

Unfortunately, both of them had lives to attend to. Peter knew that M.J. couldn't, wouldn't, be mad at him but he could already imagine the amount of subtle glares he'd be getting while putting Mayday to sleep. Hobie also had his own duties, uninformed and mysterious but duties nonetheless.

That works well on your part, those two don't get to see you and Miguel huffing and puffing back on the way to his office as irritated banter fills the air.

"I just don't get what's so hard to understand about this,"

"Maybe if you just left it be, there wouldn't be anything to discuss."

The way that Miguel seems to just want to brush this off causes your blood to boil, it makes you want to get syringe and suck the life out of yourself. The urge to pull your hair was growing too strong.

Not to mention the eyes of multiple Spider-people on you, it was an embarrassing sight. For them to see you chasing after your rival a.k.a. boss as he ignores whatever the hell you're talking about.

Before the big, intimidating sliding doors to his office close, you trail quickly behind him. You're desperately out of breath, limbs aching from the long trip you've made to the tip top of headquarters, but you try like you always do.

"I messed up, Miguel." the dejected tinge in your tone makes Miguel's nails dig into the inside of his fist, his lips purse into a straight line. "You're allowed to be mad at me, just because we're... different now doesn't mean that I'm free from punishment."

"Different? Is that what you're calling our relationship now?"

"Dating feels like such an awkward term,"

"Maybe our secret is getting to you," Miguel's lips quirk up into a small smile. God, he looks pretty. Big fingers cradling your chin upwards so that you can look at him. Properly. "Anomalies slip more often that I want, it's just a fact and it's bound to happen every once in a while. I've gotten used to it by now."

"I know, but still-"

"No buts," he says, firm. "Do whatever you want, try to recompense for your mistakes but I'm letting you know now that it's fine."

You let out a frustrated sigh, Miguel lets go of your face but not without pressing a kiss to your temple.

"I will find a way to make it up to you, just watch me. I'm very capable." you frown, making your way out of his office.

Miguel shakes his head, gaze locked on the determined look on your face. Sure you will.

#spiderman: across the spiderverse #spiderverse #across the spiderverse #atsv #miguel o'hara #miguel o'hara x reader #x reader #x gn!reader #miguel o'hara x you

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suzukiblu · 3 days

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Ko-fi thank-you sentences for an anon behind the cut; mistaken identities and interdimensional refugees. ( chrono || non-chrono )

But why the fuck is Alfred calling him–

“Sorry for the wait, Mr. Wayne, your local self thought it might be for the best not to come in-person! You wanted to avoid a fuss. I mean–he wanted to avoid a fuss,” Rita says brightly, looking sheepish, and Kon remembers, very abruptly, everything she’d said about Gotham tabloids and also the fact that she’d “recognized” him after he’d scooped up a traumatized kid who was calling him “Dad” and then, uh–well, flirted with her. And also literally every single story he has ever heard about Clark and Bruce successfully passing for each other, in costume and out.

Well . . . shit.

Well, that definitely means the local Bruce Wayne is out Batman-ing his way through the current interdimensional crisis. But also, what the fuck has Kon just gotten them into? Jon seems to just be rolling with it, thank fuck, but there's no way Alfred Pennyworth actually believes he's a version of Bruce Wayne.

. . . does he?

No, no, he definitely doesn't. Interdimensional bullshit aside, it’s Alfred. He's just a really good liar and a trained actor with a flawless poker face. Alfred lies better than Tim lies, for fuck's sake, which is goddamn saying something. So Kon might end up a little mortified later when he's admitting he got mistaken for an alternate version of Gotham’s number one airheaded himbo DILF Brucie Wayne by an aid worker, but . . .

Well. He doesn't even know who he'd be admitting that to, at this point.

He doesn't know if he'll ever . . .

“The car is just down the block, sir,” Alfred says, and Kon tells himself he can do this. He always does, doesn’t he? He can handle his own shit and he'll take care of Jon and go meet the local Batman, apparently, and then embarrass himself explaining how this happened to him, and maybe . . . maybe the local Tim will be there.

It won't be his Tim, but right now he just really wants to see his face, one way or the other. He's not gonna be picky about which “Tim” he's actually seeing.

“Cool,” he says, trying not to sound too screamingly not-Gotham. He seriously doubts he manages it, though. He’s no good at the voice-mimicking trick Clark does and even if he was, it wouldn’t exactly be subtle to start doing it now.

He and Jon say goodbye to the kids, who make a lot of very kid-like disappointed noises, and Kon suggests another game for them to distract themselves with–one that won’t require a technical adult running it–and then Rita’s got some paperwork for him and Alfred to both fill out and sign, and a couple other aid workers rubber-stamp them through, and absolutely no one asks to see his ID or even for a second doubts that he’s a version of Bruce Wayne. Except–hopefully–Alfred, anyway.

Kon seriously cannot tell for fuck either way, the man might as well be a promethium wall. At this point he’s just counting on Alfred’s weird all-knowingness bailing him out here. Worst case scenario is explaining himself, obviously, but if he doesn’t exist here . . .

Well, “Lex Luthor made me” is probably not a great start, with most Batmans. Especially after going to see said Batman under what is, technically, false pretenses. Like–obviously Alfred wouldn’t have come out in the middle of an interdimensional emergency for Conner Kent; he showed up here expecting a younger version of his boss.

Probably would’ve come for Jon, he guesses, if only as a favor to the local Clark, since the guy’s presumably distracted figuring out how many dangerous strangers are currently in their reality with the Justice League, but still.

Then again, for all Kon knows, the local Luthor is dead or irrelevant or a selflessly benevolent saint who feeds orphan puppies on the weekend, so who the fuck knows.

Kon cannot actually imagine Luthor ever even existing in the same room as a puppy without it knowing well enough to piss on his fancy leather shoes, but look, alternate realities include the word “alternate” in them for a reason. Like, the word “alternate” is very much the operative word there.

If nothing else, the local puppies might just be stupid.

Kon’s not really a dog person, personally. Krypto doesn’t count, on account of being an alien and therefore not an actual dog. The first Krypto he knew was an actual dog, though, and they just did not vibe whatsoever.

He and Alfred sign the last couple papers. Kon fakes Bruce Wayne’s signature because he’s spent enough time in Wayne Manor to know the difference between that and his autograph, and thanks fuck that the eidetic memory finally kicked in last year. Seriously, it is such bullshit it took that long for him to get it, considering Clark and Luthor both have one.

Alfred doesn’t actually react to the signature, but Kon does notice him noticing it.

Probably what he’s noticing is that it’s not the same signature that his Bruce Wayne used in his early twenties, because there’s no way that hasn’t changed in twenty-odd years.

Rita smiles at them and sees them all off happily with some reference numbers and exchanged contact information, and they don’t say anything on the way to the car. Kon keeps carrying Jon, which maybe isn’t normal human behavior, especially for someone who’s supposed to be passing for a ditzy socialite who allegedly only has vanity muscles as opposed to actually functional ones, but Kon kind of doesn’t care about that right now. Like, not even slightly does Kon care about that right now.

Alfred leads them to a shiny black towncar and opens the door for them, and Kon gives him a nod of thanks and bundles Jon into the thing. Jon sniffles once, and kinda of clings to him a little. Kon figures it’s fair. He was never “ten” himself, obviously, but it seems like a rough age to put up with this kind of bullshit during. Like–definitely it does.

“You’re good, kid,” he swears, less because it’s a promise and more because it’s something he’s gonna make happen, squeezing the kid’s shoulder the way Clark always does when he’s doing the reassuring thing. “I’ve got you. I’m with you. Okay?”

“Okay,” Jon says, sniffling again and scrubbing an arm across his eyes. “Um. Sorry.”

“Don’t sweat it, Jonno,” Kon says, and Jon’s face crumples for a moment before he visibly steels himself and nods. Kon squeezes his shoulder again, then gets into his own seat and buckles himself in more out of the habit of trying to pass for human while in civvies than to actually, like, need to be buckled in. TTK kind of cancels out the risk of getting tossed around a car in an accident, and he’s invulnerable on top of that, plus the super-speed, so . . . yeah. Definitely car accidents are not a concern.

He really wants to help this kid. He wants to at least get him to the local Clark, if nothing else. Like–if they all get stuck here, or there’s nowhere else for them to go . . .

Well, it’d take a pretty different Clark than the one he’s used to not to want to take in any version of Jon, so as long as this reality actually has a Clark . . .

Well, Kon’s probably not gonna be watching the kid long, in that case.

#anonymous #wip: mistaken identities and interdimensional refugees

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creedslove · 8 months

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imagin javi dating a young woman who’s an elementary school teacher back in laredo😶😶

Javier Peña x f!reader

A/N: I love this idea, my beautiful anon!

• when Javi returned to Laredo after his time in Colombia he wasn't looking for a woman, nor a family, nor a relationship, despite how hard people tried setting him up with daughters, sisters, cousins or nieces of theirs as everyone seemed to have forgotten his bad reputation after leaving Lorraine at the altar, and as he was now the city's hero after his Escobar years, he was suddenly considered a good catch

• so he still attended the parties he was invited too, greeting old friends and relatives but keeping his emotional distance; Javi knew it was best for him to keep away from women for a while as gossip spread faster than a wildfire in Laredo and he didn't want trouble

• he also didn't want any more hookers, he was also tired of that, he was getting old and he started to feel bad about the fact he had to pay a woman to give him some lovin' for a couple of hours

• so Javi lived his quiet life for a couple of months, just helping his dad out, going for a drink at the local bar, sometimes catching a movie at the small movie theater downtown and even paying a visit to the local library to see if he found anything interesting

• and that was when he ran into you; more like bumped into you, because as he wandered the hallways of books trying to find something that would actually pull him out of that boredom wormhole he got himself into, he saw a pretty young thing carrying a lot of books in her arms - probably more than she could carry on her own, who definitely didn't see him coming and went right towards him

• so technically he didn't bump into you, you bumped into him

• and even if Javier managed to steady you with his large, strong hands on your hips, several books fell on the floor just as you looked at him a little shocked and confused at what had happened

• and with your faces mere inches away from each other's, unintentionally staring into each other's eyes you realized Javier Peña was painfully handsome

• yes, you knew who Javier Peña was because there wasn't a living soul in Laredo who didn't, everyone had heard the stories about Laredo's local anti hero, from a man who was known for being the lady's catch and leaving his poor bride at the altar, to the brave and fierce agent who managed to take down the biggest drug lord in the world

• but what the stories didn't specify was how handsome he truly was

• and Javi wasn't different either, while he held you by the hips, he couldn't even believe his eyes, you were definitely the most gorgeous woman he'd ever seen

• no one in Laredo, Colombia Washington DC or anywhere in the world had been as beautiful as you were

• he was actually so distracted he only then realized he was still holding you by the hips, clearing his throat as the two of you shared a shy laughter at what had happened

• you both apologized for your clumsy first encounter and introduced each other, while he helped you pick the books up from the floor and carry them to the nearest table - after all, Javier was a gentleman

• he knew he should leave and not bother you, but instead, he sat at the table as the two of you chatted, he humbly told you about his (former?) job as a DEA agent even if he wasn't very sure yet and he was surprised to see you were a school teacher, fresh from college

• though he was clearly interested in you, he was also kind of upset to know he was old compared to you, the age gap was quite relevant and he assumed you would only want to hang out with guys your age

• but Javier couldn't be further from the truth, he was just into you just as you were into him; you liked each other and the attraction was big, so it didn't take long for you to start dating

• Javi thought it was funny because he hadn't been in a relationship for long, but it finally felt good and right

• and he was loving to fall into that domestic rabbit hole with you, every day meeting after work for quiet dinners, great sex and enjoy each other's company

• and just as Javi opened up about his job to you, you told him about yours and let me tell you: he had a lot of fun listening to the crazy, funny and shocking stories you told him about your students

• he liked some kids he had never met just by the sweet way you talked about them, and he hated others just because they made you stressed at work

• he loved helping you grade papers and tests, sitting next to you with a red pen and sharing a pile of paper so you could enjoy your weekend together

• he would totally meet you at school to bring you lunch, pick you up for a date or just to put on his badass DEA agent face and scare the kids who mess around too much in class and annoy the hell of you

• he loves listening to you teaching the kids and he can't help but picture the day he will have a tiny little Peña attending your class, he just wasn't sure if his little Peña would call you 'teacher' or 'mommy'

____

#pedro pascal #pedro pascal x reader #pedro pascal x you #pedro pascal x y/n #pedro pascal fanfiction #pedro pascal fanfic #pedro pascal headcanon #pedro pascal headcanons #javier peña #javier peña x reader #javier peña x you #javier peña x y/n #javier peña fanfiction #javier peña fanfic #javier peña headcanon #javier peña headcanons

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noirvette · 1 year

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main 3 + butters! gen dating headcanons!!

notes: gender neutral reader!! first ever official post too omg kinda (very) nervous ........... if it's ooc mb guys :( Aged up characters!! Highschool au kinda thing

♡ STAN MARSH

Definitely thought about asking you out super suavely but then Kyle said something about how he'd manage to screw it up so he decided to not do that.

Since he's not going like all out for a confession of any sorts, he would simply wait near your locker at the end of the day until you got to it

As you're leaving he runs up to you and asks to walk you home. It's on that walk home that he builds up the courage for a confession

Hypes himself up as he's walking but he's actually talking out loud so you know he's about to ask you out

Tell him that you heard him hype himself up after you accept his confession and he gets so embarrassed what a cutie.

Now for when you guys ARE together bahahaha.

Sends you tiktoks at like 3am and you wake up to your alarm to find 78 texts from him and they're all tiktok links. The captions are either "this is so you lol" "babe.. this is so us" or just "real".

On the whole texting thing, a red flag of his is his dry ass text responses . Unfortunately don't expect a lot of words coming from him, he might get better at it during the relationship or if you say something to him, but really he'd prefer facetime or calling.

Personally I see him using snapchat a lot? Likes how quick of an update in life the app sort've is, so expect snaps throughout the school day if you guys don't have classes together. Expect a lot of snaps from him at football practice or something too.

Would LOVE for you to meet his parents, mom, Sharon. Randy is.. special in his eyes and would rather just talk to you beforehand about how his dad is rather than you meeting Randy face first.

Shelly goes two ways, either she does not care that her brother is dating someone, or she immediately pulls you from Stan to gossip about him.

FOREHEAD KISSES!! SLAMS FIST ON TABLE

Stan isn't a whole big fanatic of pda, but a quick forehead kiss or just rubbing his thumb over your knuckles while holding hands when you guys are out is top tier affection for him.

In private though? He is not letting you go. Kisses or cuddling, any sort of skin contact is good for him. Even if it's not technically skin contact and you guys are just in the same room, his eyes are ON you and they are giving major heart eyes.

Gives you his jersey to wear for football games and he'll point you out in the crowd anytime he scores. If South Park wins expect him to buy you food to celebrate. If South Park loses expect him to buy you food to "console" you on the loss (he's sad about the loss but doesn't want you to think that he's sad)

Is the big spoon normally when cuddling but there are rare occurrences where he's the little spoon, like for example he's extremely tired or if he's upset. Don't talk about him being the little spoon though, his pride may get hurt a bit over it.

Isn't the best at consoling you if you're sad, so what he'll do is listen to what your issues are, order food, and binge movies with you.

♡ KYLE BROFLOVSKI

FREAKED about asking you out bro. He is thinking of every possibly way you could reject him and every possibly way you could accept him.

He hasn't had the best luck with dating and so he might be the type to prefer you to ask him out first.

However? If he overhears you telling a friend about your crush on him? His self confidence just got a major boost and he's asking you out the second your next class with him is (so long as Cartman isn't also in that class).

Otherwise, I could see him show up with flowers to your house and a simple like "Dinner? Maybe? Us? Alone? Saturday? 7pm?" He phrases each word as a question like he isn't sure about it.

I also feel like Kyle isn't a "good" texter and is another one who prefers calling or facetime. However unlike Stan who just can't text for his life, Kyle just likes seeing your face.

Like Kyle can text he just views it as somewhat annoying to do? Like if he wanted your attention on something he'd rather talk to you. Text reminds you dates though.

Uses pet names but only in private, unless it's to get your attention. If you're zoned out he calls out a quick "Hey! Babe!" and boom your eyes are on him.

Doesn't like over the top pet names and gets genuinely disgusted if you start calling him "sugar plum" or "honey bear" even if it's a joke.

Loves study dates, it's like his go to type of date. Even if it's not for the same class, just really likes studying with you. I can also see him "teaching" you what he's studying to help him learn better, this works especially well if it's about a class you're not taking.

Another guy who isn't a big fan on pda, might throw an arm over your shoulder when walking in the hallways to just have you close by him but don't really expect any affection in school.

Because of that one basketball episode (and how often the boys play basketball throughout the seasons at the park), Kyle is definitely on the basketball team and like Stan, has given you his jersey. He gets all red and proud if he sees you wearing it at his games.

Jealousy is rough with him. He often gets jealous and it stems primarily from his own insecurities, not because he doesn't trust you. He 100% does trust you, but the fact he's never had a full on official relationship kind of worries him that you'll realize he isn't the type of guy to be a boyfriend and that freaks him out so he just gets jealous at guys who spend too much time with you.

Reassuring him with cuddles or quality time or just being WITH him let's him know you aren't going anywhere.

Meeting his parents is HUGE to him. Family means a lot for Kyle, this is mainly targeted towards his mom and his brother.

His mother honestly make take time to get to liking you. She may initially think you're not good enough for Kyle or you're a hinderance for him but she comes around QUICKLY once she realizes how happy Kyle is with you and really that's all the confirmation she needs to know you're a good person for him.

I feel like his dad just, accepts you right off the bat, like "Oh hey Kyle who is this?" "My partner, dad." "You got someone to date you? Damn." And he just nods at you and you're good.

Ike loves you, like boom "Hi! I'm Ike!". If Kyle is dating you and Kyle trusts you than immediately so does Ike. Expect Ike to steal Kyle's phone just to text you. Also please just download roblox to play with him, he may never let you go after that though.

♡ KENNY MCCORMICK

Wasn't a whole lot of preplanning when he asked you out. Honestly he just goes for it.

Wasn't a big spectacle when he asked you out. Was sort've nonchalant about it but in a suave way (Stan wishes he could be like this).

Definitely geeked about it when alone in his room though. Karen walked by his room seeing him dance around and knew that you said yes. (Kenny has most definitely raved about you to Karen).

Considering his family's income he probably is the type to just take you out on a naturistic date. Like walking in the park, maybe a small picnic, nothing fancy or extravagant, but domestic and homey.

Compared to the other two, Kenny is HUGE on pda. Hand holding, kisses, bear hugs, etc. he has made that school KNOW you guys are together, from day one.

His eyes are on you the second you step into the room and they are not off of you until he cannot physically see you anymore. You are like the light of his world.

I feel as if late night drives with him are another type of date for you two. He's fixed up that beat up truck in his yard and then just drives you to a special spot he knows on a cliff overlooking South Park and you guys just hang out up there for hours, talking about whatever comes to mind. Or just simple driving around.

Lets you take aux ALWAYS, doesn't matter if you're not in the passenger seat, aux always gets handed to you.

Texts you all the time. Maybe not all the time but you get me. He's also a multiple texts in a row rather than the one text containing all of what he wants to say.

Spams "Baby, babe, hun, baby, baby, babe" a bunch of times till either you respond or he figures you're busy and then gets to what he's meaning to tell you.

Instagram feed is you two on dates among other things that he does (like pics of himself or with the other guys). You take up most of his feed though.

Doesn't get jealous actually, he's pretty secure in your guys' relationship, however if someone is clearly bothering you and you look like you're pretty uncomfortable, Kenny is punch first ask questions last because now he's running away with you in his arms.

♡ BUTTERS STOTCH

Was a nervous WRECK to ask you out :(

He, thanks to Kenny's advice, stopped you in the hallway before lunch to ask you out. and he was so red. Let him get his whole confession out to you though, he has a lot of sweet words to say about you.

Insert Glue Song by beabadoobee the entire time he's confessing to you, he's definitely tangled in love, stuck by you (haha).

Accept him and he's showing you off immediately to his friends. (Cue in Cartman who actually is just shocked, like... flabbergasted).

He goes all out for your guys' dates. Dinner, park/walk, full on research mode on how to have the world's most perfect date.

Gets grounded because he walked you home and now he walked into his own house late (I hate his parents).

Does not blame you!! Blames himself for not rushing home :(, tell him it wasn't his fault either.

Gets nervous with pda but loves it!! He's so willing to kiss you or hold hands, you may have to initiate it though, he doesn't want to screw up so he's incredibly awkward the first few times you do any sort of pda.

At carnivals he tries and wins you any stuffed animal he sees but in the end he fails at the rigged carnival games, you may have to drag him away or he'll be in debt from trying to win you things.

Buys things for you as gifts that remind him of you. Like he may just be window shopping or with his mom helping her out as she shops and he sees something on a shelf and immediately it makes him think of you so he HAS to get it.

Makes you things too, (y'all remember that episode where he made paper cutouts for stan's gang? yeah i do), like has made birthday cards, holiday cards, etc completely by hand for you. Made you a paper cut out of the two of you guys holding hands.

When he finally brings you around his parents his parents are also in disbelief. Now that they know he's dating, they're a bit more lenient on his groundings (still hate his parents).

Likes to fall asleep on call with you, you guys gave a routine that at 9pm if you guys are both home, you call each other to just fall asleep, you may not even talk once the call starts, just sleep.

AHHHH hahhaahah, thanks for reading my first post!! oh em gee i was so nervous writing this and now im even more nervous to post!! if you guys would like me to expand upon any of these headcanons or do another part (with one or all) lmk!!

#stan marsh #stan marsh x reader #kyle broflovski #kyle broflovski x reader #south park #south park x reader #butters stotch #butters stotch x reader #kenny mccormick #kenny mccormick x reader #kyle broflovski headcanons #stan marsh headcanons #kenny mccormick headcanons #butters stotch headcanons #south park headcanons

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rocknroll7575 · 3 months

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Knight of Olympus: Titans Lullaby - Ch.1: Like a Shooting Star

Summary: Jaune Arc fell, however, instead of landing on the beach of the Ever-After, he lands on the beach of Camp Halfblood. It seems like Jaune's life, is truly a Greek tragedy.

XXX

Percy Jackson has had a very long summer, what with the Sea of Monsters as well as the fact that Thalia was back and alive.

Annabeth was happy and Grover was too, and Percy couldn't be more happy fir both of them, as he was sure it was a relief to have her back, however, once she fully regained consciousness, they did have to inform her about the whole... Luke's situation, which he could tell, struck her hard.

Even worse, both he and Thalia would have to stay at Camp for the rest of the summer, or else Luke and the Demi-Gods with him, plus the other monsters, would target them.

But enough about the bad news, some good news was that Tyson had gone down to his dad's domain to work for him there, which Percy was happy to hear, he hoped that he would have a good time, but Percy still felt a little saddened by his departure, but he was sure he'd see Tyson again.

Next to that, everything was working out, and while they still had Luke and Cronus to worry about, Percy was taking a break after a long adventure, now sitting on the beach and looking up at the stars.

"There you are, Percy,"

Percy's head turned around, only to see Annabeth standing behind him. He smiled at her before responding, "Hey, Annabeth" he greeted.

Annabeth walked over and sat down next to him, "What are you doing out here?" She asked.

Percy looked back up to the sky, "Just relaxing," He replied, "definitely need it after everything recently," He told her.

Annabeth nodded in agreement, "I feel you there," she replied with a long sigh

Percy looked at her with a raised brow, "Thalia, how's she doing?" He asked.

"So far, she's doing good, Grover and I had to fill her in on everything she's missed, but she's taking it all pretty well... for the most part," She replied.

"Luke?"

Annabeth nodded.

Percy let out a sigh, knowing a little how Thalia had felt. He had trusted Luke a long time ago, he was a mentor to Percy when he first came to Camp Half-Blood, but after everything he did with Thalia's tree and in the Sea of Monsters, Percy would not forgive him. Percy then quickly put those thoughts aside and looked back to the starry sky, and when he did, he noticed something that was not normal. It looked like a shooting star and appeared as if it was coming closer to them. Percy nudged Annabeth and pointed at the object flying toward them. Both quickly stood up, ready to run should it hit the beach, however, while the object was getting closer, it was not going to hit the beach but instead struck the sea.

"What was that!?" Annabeth asked.

"How am I supposed to know that!? Wouldn't you know!?" Percy asked.

Annabeth looked at him with a raised brow, "Why would I know!?" Annabeth asked.

"You the Daughter of Athena if I recall!" Percy replied.

Annabeth groaned, "Whatever! Look, just go check what it is!"

"Why me!?"

"You're the only one who can technically breathe underwater!"

"Fine!"

Percy ran into the water, but as always, he didn't get wet, as a bubble of air surrounded him and he moved toward where he was sure the object fell into the water. Annabeth watched as Percy was fully submerged under the ocean. Annabeth waited with anxiety, wondering what had fallen into the ocean and hoping she had not just sent Percy to his doom.

After a few minutes, Percy suddenly shot out of the water with someone's arm around the back of his neck, and Percy dragged whoever it was with him.

"Annabeth! Could you help me? Quick!" Percy cried.

Annabeth ran over to the person's other side, put their arm around her neck, and helped Percy drag him back to shore. Once on the beach, they set them down on the sand and turned them over, and that was when they both finally got a good look at the person.

He had short blonde hair that seemed to spike up, and he wore what appeared to be white armor with gold trim, and had navy blue jeans, brown boots, and a red sash wrapped around his waist under a belt.

"Who is he?" Annabeth asked.

Percy shook his head and shrugged, "Don't know, but help me get his armor off, we need to perform-"

The man began to gag and spit up water from his mouth and quickly turned around to spit out more of the water that no doubt filled his lungs and once he was finished, took long and deep breaths.

"Hey! Hey! Are you ok!?" Percy asked as he had his hand on the man's back.

The man didn't answer right away but he turned to Percy with a confused look, "W-Where am I!?" he asked. "Is this Vacuo? No... Vale?"

Percy shook his head, confused about what he was talking about, "No, you're in Long Island," Replied the boy.

The man still seemed confused, "Long Island?" He asked.

Annabeth nodded, "Yeah," she replied, "Do... Do you remember how you got here?" She asked him.

The man seemed to think hard about his answer, "I remember the bridge... I was running to the gate to get to Vacuo before... I fell..." He replied, suddenly it seemed as if he remembered something, "Oh Oum... Penny... I..." he said softly, his voice nearly breaking into a sob.

Annabeth quickly reassured him, "It's alright, everything's fine now," She told him. "Can you tell me your name? Do you remember that?" She asked.

The man slowly nodded, "Yeah... my name is Jaune... Jaune Arc," He replied.

The girl nodded, "Good, good, nice to meet you, Jaune," Annabeth greeted, "My name is Annabeth, and this is Percy," she told him, gesturing to the son of the sea.

Jaune nodded, "Nice to meet you both, but can you please tell me how I got... wherever it is I am now?" He asked, still looking utterly confused.

Percy looked at him, "We saw you fall from the sky and land in the water, you looked like a shooting star, man," Percy told him. "Speaking of that... What... Are you?"

Jaune was confused, "What do you mean?"

"Are you a half-blood?" Annabeth asked.

"A what?" Jaune asked, even more confused.

Both of them exchanged a look and then Annabeth looked back at Jaune, "I think you might wanna come with us back to our camp," She told Jaune, before turning to Percy, "Maybe Chiron or Mr. D will have some answers,"

Percy chuckled, "Chiron, yes, but Mr. D... I don't think he'll care too much," He replied.

Jaune was confused, but he did as the kids said, getting up and following them back to their camp. As they walked, Percy noticed Annabeth taking a few peeks at Jaune here and there, and he was confused as to why she was doing it, but if he had to guess, she was trying to figure out who or what he was, after all, a normal person, even a half-blood, doesn't just fall out of the sky.

Percy was also wondering why he looked almost like a knight, his armor looked way too new, so a time traveler was out of the question, and Percy noticed that Jaune was looking around as if trying to figure out where he was.

Percy decided to try and get as much information out of Jaune as he could, after all, he didn't want to bring in a potentially dangerous person into the camp. "So, you never answered Annabeth's question," Percy said, "Are you a Half-blood?"

Jaune looked at him with a raised brow, "I'd answer if I knew what a Half-Blood was," Jaune replied.

"Half human, half God," Percy told him, "Like me, I'm the son of Posiden, but my mom, was human,"

Jaune seemed to be shocked by this, "Your... Your dad was a god!?" Jaune asked.

Percy nodded, "Yeah, Posiden," Percy told him.

"I... Who?" Jaune asked.

Percy was baffled that Jaune didn't know who his dad was. "You know, Posiden, god of the sea and earthquakes?" Percy said.

Jaune still seemed rather confused, which just made Percy more confused as to how Jaune couldn't know who his dad was, who in their right mind didn't know who the Olympian gods were.

"We're here," Annabeth said.

Percy turned back and saw that they were finally back at the camp, and once they arrived back, they saw a bunch of campers, still up and just training or hanging out, Percy even saw the Stroll brothers planning something, Percy then turned to make sure Jaune was still following behind them, but he saw Jaune appearing to be in shock at what he was seeing.

"What is this place?" Jaune asked.

"Camp Half-Blood, home, and safe haven to all Half-bloods as well as a summer camp for the rest of us who still have family outside," Annabeth told him.

"Ok... gonna have to ask more about that later, but for now, I'll wait," Jaune replied.

After walking through the camp, without Clairesse or her cronies popping up, which Percy thanked the gods for, they arrived at the Big House where Annabeth rushed ahead to see who was inside, and when she entered, she saw Thalia and Chiron in a conversation.

Chiron looked at Annabeth with a raised brow, "Annabeth, what seems to be the matter?

Annabeth looked at the Centaur, "Chiron, we need your help because something strange happened when Percy and I were at the Beach" Annabeth told him.

Chiron looked a little worried, "What happened?" He asked.

"He happened," Came the voice of Percy

They all turned to the doorway where both Percy and Jaune stood, and Jaune simply stood there, eyes wide, no doubt shocked at the appearance of Chiron.

"Who is he?" Chiron asked, his tone laced with worry.

Percy looked at him, "We hoped you would know," He said. "He fell from the sky like a comet!"

Chiron walked over to Jaune and looked at him, examining him for a moment, "What is your name?" he asked.

Jaune was snapped out of his shock as he looked at Chiron, "Uh, Jaune Arc, sir," Jaune said.

"I see... why are you wearing armor?" Chiron asked.

"Well, for protection," Jaune replied.

Chiron sighed with a smile, "Yes, of course, but why are you wearing it? What are you protecting yourself from?" Chiron asked.

Jaune realized what he meant and quickly answered, "Oh, well, from Grimm," He replied

"Grim? Like the brothers Grim?" Annabeth asked with a raised brow.

"Uh... I don't know if I've ever heard them called that..." Jaune replied, referring to his own gods.

However, before more could be said, Mr. D entered the room, a diet coke in his hand and he appeared to be going for the fridge, only to suddenly stop and quickly turn to the group, where his eyes fell on Jaune.

Chiron looked at him, "Ah, Mr. D, we were just-"

However, Mr. held up his hand to silence him as he walked over to Jaune and looked the young man up and down before looking him in the eyes, "Name?" he asked.

"Jaune Arc, and who-?"

"Shush!" Mr. D told him.

Mr. D then proceeded to look him over and then looked at Chiron, "Where'd you find him?" He asked.

"Percy says he fell from the sky," Chiron said.

Mr. D then glanced at Percy and let out a sigh, "Another thing involving you, eh, Peter Johnson?"

Jaune turned to Percy with a raised brow, "I thought your name was Percy?"

"It is!" Percy said with an annoyed groan.

"Whatever," Mr. D said. "Well, he's no half-blood, he's human,"

Chiron looked at him with a raised brow, "But how is that possible?" he asked. "He shouldn't being seeing all of this, much less have passed the barrier if he were human,"

"Because he's not a regular human," Mr. D said. "You're not... from here are you?" Mr. D asked Jaune. "This world, am I right?"

Jaune took a moment to answer but he gave the god of wine a quick nod, "Yeah, wherever "here" is, I'm starting to think so..." Jaune replied.

Mr. D snapped his finger and pointed to the sky as he turned around, "Right!" he said. "Chiron send words to the gods that we've got some big news! Very big news! Gonna have to call an emergency meeting!" He said.

Chiron was confused, "What for?" He asked. "What do you know?"

Mr. D turned around and looked at the Centaur with a smirk, "Because this guest of ours... is not from this world," Mr. D said.

Everyone was confused as to what he was talking about, but Chiron did as Mr. D asked and sent word to the gods about what Mr. D had said and quickly, they all responded quickly and said that the Meeting would happen soon and to bring Jaune to Olympus right away.

Jaune had no idea what was going on, where he was, or who he was going to meet at this "Olympus" but there was one thing Jaune was sure about...

He wasn't on Remnant anymore, and he was sure things were just going to get more complicated... as if they weren't complicated enough.

Jaune's hand touched his side and noticed that Crocea Mors was not strapped to his side, it was gone, yet he could've sworn he had it strapped to his side Jaune looked at Percy, "Hey, Percy, did you see a sword and sheath when you saved me?" he asked.

Percy looked at him and shook his head, "No, why? You had one on you?" Percy asked him.

Jaune nodded, "Yeah," Jaune replied. "But I guess it's gone now," He said.

Percy noticed the sad expression on Jaune's face, "If you want, I can take a look in the area where you fell to see if I can find it, Jaune," Percy replied.

Jaune slowly shook his head, "No, it's alright," Jaune replied. "Let it be lost," Jaune replied.

Jaune didn't want to see that weapon again. But he would... sooner or later.

XXX

Jaune, along with Mr. D and Chiron arrived at the Empire State Building, however, Jaune was given some campe attire before arriving, once they got out of the van, and began walking into the lobby, Jaune looked at Chiron, now sitting in his wheelchair.

"So... how is this going to go down?" Jaune asked him.

Chiron looked at him, "Honestly, I don't know, in all my life, such a thing as a man from another world and appearing in ours has never occurred," Chiron said. "But a word of advice, Jaune, be as respectful as you can, the gods are easily angered,"

"Well, not all of us,"

Jaune jumped as he turned to his right only to see a man. The man had a nice bronze tan, a sun tattoo on his left shoulder, and wore a pair of sunglasses obscuring his eyes. He had sandy blonde hair that seemed to glow brightly and wore a sleeveless light grey shirt, faded jean shorts, and a pair of sandals.

Chiron smiled when he saw the man, "Ah, Lord Apollo, a pleasure," he greeted.

Apollo looked at the Centaur with a smirk, "Sup Chiron, been a while, how are my kids doing?"

"All are well, and out of everyone, it seems Will has picked up your knack for healing, he's been reading a lot of books on the subject," Chiron said with a smile.

Apollo smirked, "Kids gonna do wonders that's for sure," Apollo said. He then turned to Jaune with a smirk, "And you must be the man from another world, eh? Nice to meet you, I'm Apollo, God of the Sun," He greeted.

Jaune smiled at him nervously, "A pleasure to meet you, Apollo," Jaune greeted back, "Jaune Arc, Huntsman," Jaune replied with a smile.

Apollo's brow raised, "Huntsmen? That a job title or something?" Apollo asked.

Mr. D suddenly appeared and nodded, "Yes, turns out where he's from, he hunts monsters called Grimm," Mr. D told Apollo.

"Sick!" Apollo said with a smile, "Also, good to see you D!" Apollo said, greeting his half-brother.

Mr. D rolled his eyes, "Yes, wish I could say the same," He replied, "Now then, I think the others are waiting, so let's not keep them waiting or else," Mr. D replied.

Chiron nodded, "Yes, you three should be off, I will wait down here with the Van," Chiron said. "Good luck, Jaune," Chiron told him.

Jaune looked back at him and gave him a quick nod, "Thank you, Chiron,"

With that, the two gods and Huntsmen went inside and made their way to the elevator, Apollo pressed a button and the four went up, and as they did, Jaune couldn't help but feel himself getting more and more nervous. After all, he was in another world and meeting said Gods of this world, who may or may not decide his fate.

Finally, the elevator stopped and when the doors opened, Jaune was in awe at the sight of the throne room, the chairs were massive and so too, were the gods, each dressed up in certain clothing, some looked ancient, others in more modern clothing.

"Seems that Apollo and Dionysus have arrived," Said Posiden.

"Good then," Zeus said, "Then let them take their seats and we can begin," He said.

Apollo and Mr. D grew larger and walked over to their thrones, sitting on them and facing Jaune, who looked up at them with both shock and awe but quickly snapped out of it as he realized the meeting was about to begin.

Zeus looked at the other gods, "We're gathered here today to discuss Jaune Arc, the man from another world, and to assess if he is friend or foe," Zeus said. "First, Jaune Arc, why have you come to our world? What are your intentions?" the king of the Gods asked.

Jaune looked at him and knew that he must be Zeus since he was the first to speak, "I'll be honest, I don't know how I came here, to your world, as for what my intentions are, I don't know that either," Jaune replied.

"You do not know how you arrived in our world?" Hera asked.

Jaune nodded, "Yes," He replied.

To his left, Posiden leaned over and seemed to try to get a closer look at Jaune, "Well, he is indeed human... but there's something different about him,"

"I see it too," Zeus said. "Tell us what that thing that surrounds your body," Zeus said.

Jaune was confused as to what Zeus had meant, but quickly realized what he may have been referring to, "Do you mean my Aura?" Jaune asked.

"Is that what you call it?" Athena asked. "Interesting... what does this Aura do?" She asked.

"It protects me from any physical damage for a while but gets weaker the more I'm hit, but thanks to my Semblance, it allows me to boost it back fully if it gets too low," Jaune replied.

Athena nodded, no doubt finding the power that the young knight possessed interesting, but still looked at Jaune as if analyzing every inch of him, trying to figure out if he was a threat or not, based on the information of his powers.

Hera looked at the young man, and asked another question, "Tell us about your world, Jaune Arc," she told him.

Jaune nodded, and he explained to the Olympians what Remnant was, the dangers of it, what his and his friend's jobs were, and the threat that he and his world faced. After telling them about his world, Jaune noticed that some of the gods were interested in where he came from, but a few, he couldn't get a read on.

However, instead of asking more questions about his world, Zeus decided to continue the questioning of the young knight. "Tell me, Jaune Arc, what do you remember before you arrived in our world?" Zeus asked.

Jaune gulped, feeling terrible talking about it, but he had to tell them, so he began to tell them about the plan he had made back in Atlas, the bridge, Cinder's surprise attack, RWBY's defeat, and then... Penny's death and his part in it. At that point, Jaune was visibly shaken and he felt the words caught in his throat. However, he took a few deep breaths and continued, telling them how he missed the gate and fell, and then how he was saved by Percy and Annabeth.

The gods were indeed intrigued by the blonde story and were each trying to take all the information in, and after a few minutes, Zeus sat forward and looked at his fellow gods.

"I believe it is time to decide on what to do with Jaune Arc," Zeus said.

Hearing that, Jaune felt his heart nearly stop, as his mind raced with a million thoughts on what they could decide. Would they see him as a threat and kill or imprison him? Would they force him to work for them? Would they try and help him find a way back home?

As Jaune's mind was racing with these thoughts, Apollo sat forward and looked at Zeus, "If I may, I'd like to not kill him or imprison him," Apollo said.

Artemis looked at her brother with a raised brow, "Any reason why, dear brother?" she asked.

Apollo looked back at her with a smile, "I don't see him as a threat, and he could be a great asset to the demigods at Camp Halfblood, " Apollo said. "Plus, I like him, and he hasn't wronged us in any way, so why do anything harmful, when he hasn't proved to be a threat?"

Artemis nodded, "I have to agree with you, brother," She said. "I'm with Apollo,"

"I'd have to agree with my nephew and niece, brother," Posiden said as he looked at Zeus, "We can have him teach the children at Camp, this way we can keep an eye on him, and assess if he's a threat or not, should he be a threat, we can easily punish him, but if he shows he is useful, then we shall trust him,"

Zeus seemed to contemplate what he had heard from the Sun god, before addressing the other 11. "I believe Apollo may have the right idea as well as Posiden," He said. "Jaune Arc will serve Camp Halfblood as the new combat instructor, where he will be monitored by Dionysus and Chiron, and also serve gods like the rest of the Demigods to test to see if he is friend or foe... All in favor?" Zeus asked.

Every god raised their hand in agreement.

Zeus gave a quick nod, "Good," He said, then looking down at the mortal man. "You are dismissed, Jaune Arc, you are to return to Camp Halfblood as soon as possible," Zeus ordered. "And remember, we are watching you,"

Jaune nodded and because he didn't know what else to do, he bowed quickly before looking at the gods. "Thank you, and uh... have a good day," Jaune told them before leaving.

The gods themselves also began to disperse and leave the meeting, and Mr. D walked with Jaune back to the elevator, and the god patted him on the back. "Welcome aboard kid, and good luck," Mr. D told him, "You're gonna need it," He said.

Jaune looked at him with a raised brow, but he had a feeling he was right.

As he left, a certain goddess watched him leave as a million thoughts ran through her head, she didn't like unknowns, and Jaune Arc was now the greatest unknown to her as well as the rest of her family, but she wasn't just going to stand by and watch, she would test him and in those tests, analyze him and figure out if he posed a threat to them all.

She wasn't the goddess of wisdom and battle plans for nothing, after all...

XXX

How was that for a first chapter eh?

Also just to let you all know, another RWBY character will appear in the future, but it's gonna be someone you're not expecting~!

Also, this takes place the same day as Thalia wakes up at the end of Sea of Monsters.

But what do you think is going to happen now that Jaune is in the PJO universe? Who will Jaune team up with? Who will he face off against? Which gods will he piss off? Which gods will take an interest in him? And what will his role be at Camp Half-blood?

Guess you guys are just gonna have to wait and see!

#rwby #jaune arc #percy jackon and the olympians #percy jackson #annabeth chase #thalia grace #chiron #dionysus #pjo hestia

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batneko · 1 year

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bowuigi A/B/O idea, except we're 100% going with alpha Luigi and omega Bowser (he wears a collar, he has a kid with no "mother," think about it people!!!)

So, in the Mario world there's a LOT of different types of people. Toads and mushrumans like Peach don't technically have gender at all, it's just outward presentation. And even the groups that have A/B/O dynamics don't always express it in the same way. With Koopas, omegas are quite rare but they're expected to be big and strong instead of dainty and swooning. Gotta protect the eggs, after all!

But there's a lot of social capital to be gained from Having An Omega, and no matter how respected and feared Bowser is it's never quite enough to stop some alphas from thinking they can own him.

(choose your own angsty adventure for where Junior came from)

That's one of the reasons he's so fixated on Peach. Not only does she not have any expectations because of his gender, but no one else looking at them as a couple will either!

Then along comes the Mario brothers, both of them reeking of alpha, repeatedly dominating him and taking away what he thinks is the key to a happy future... It's maddening.

Mario and Luigi were never exactly typical alphas. They're too short, too friendly, they cook and clean and help out around the house. Of course all those traits made them plenty popular with women and omegas (if the ladies don't find you handsome they should at least find you handy), so the occasional bully or rude comments stopped bothering them a long time ago.

It didn't take them too long to adjust to their new world, but sometimes they're still surprised by things. It's never occurred to them that koopas might have alphas and omegas. Aren't they reptiles? (No.) Although Bowser smelled sweet, they just assumed that was what the big koopas smell like (technically true) and didn't worry about it.

Then there's another villain trying to take over the world, and to get Bowser out of the way they dose him with hormones and trigger his heat. Mario doesn't hesitate to chase off the villain, but Luigi hangs back to make sure Bowser is okay.

Bowser is furious. Mad at the villain, mad at his own body, mad that he doesn't know any alphas he can actually trust. If there was somebody he could just fuck and get this out of his system, he'd chase that other villain down and teach them a lesson the hard way. But instead he's going to have to lock himself away until it passes, and...

And then he smells Luigi.

He's frustrated, angry, and his brain is only working on about half capacity. He growls, "Put out or get out."

And Luigi, who is still reeling from the realization that Bowser's scent wasn't a coincidence after all and is also only thinking at half capacity, says, "Are you joking or is putting out an option?"

Afterward, they don't talk about it. Luigi understands that it was an emergency and Bowser's not interested in him. And he's still adjusting to thinking of Bowser as an omega, so he can't exactly say he's interested in Bowser either. They defeat the villain, save the world, and Bowser seems satisfied with the beating he got to give. Job well done.

Later on Luigi sends a polite message to make sure Bowser is still all right and never hears back. In fact, nobody hears anything from Bowser for months.

When they finally run into each other again, Bowser is carrying a tiny baby koopa in his arms. Exceptionally tiny, actually, with big blue eyes and a tuft of dark hair.

Luigi is pissed. He and his brother are not quick to anger, especially not for alphas, but you don't just bear a man's child and not TELL him. He's been a papa for months and he doesn't even know the baby's NAME? Bowser didn't even ASK FOR INPUT ON IT? ITALIAN NAMES ARE BEAUTIFUL. THEY COULD HAVE NAMED HER AFTER HIS NONNA.

Bowser is absolutely flummoxed that this is the part Luigi is most upset about, but agrees that she can have a middle name.

(And then ✨awkward dad romance✨ ensues.)

#bowuigi #luigi #bowser #super mario bros #batfics #kinda #long post #also kinda #bowigi #luwser #that version is actually correct for once #bowluigi #green shell #alpha/beta/omega dynamics #ABO AU #implied offscreen mpreg #a/b/o au #a/b/o

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blushweddinggowns · 9 months

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Part two to this

"How would you feel about meeting up with Trisha?" Steve asked one night, completely casual. Like he didn't just send Eddie in to a tailspin, "We were talking this morning and-"

"You talked to her this morning?" Eddie interrupted, nerves coloring his voice, "I thought you already talked to her on Monday?"

Steve leaned back onto Eddie chest with a sigh, tilting his head to stare up at him from their spot in bed, "Sweetheart, we've talked about this. You don't really get to be jealous considering I left her for you. On our wedding day. I think it's safe to say you won babe."

"I'm not jealous," Eddie mumbled into his hair, a complete fucking lie, "Just...concerned."

"Concerned that I'm going to leave you for the girl I left for you? You don't think that's a little counter-intuitive?"

Eddie knew he was right, of course he was right. He was being stupid, but that didn't stop the fact that he was scared. And okay yeah, technically he had no reason to doubt their relationship. It had over a year since he crashed Steve's wedding and stole him away. And it had been a great fucking year.

The first few months had been a little rough, jumping from not speaking for years to suddenly living together was bound to have some complications. But they got over them quickly enough, mostly because Eddie hadn't been fucking around when he said he'd do anything to keep Steve around.

If anything, it was all too easy. Suspiciously easy. It made him feel a little paranoid, that he was just allowed to be this happy with a guy he didn't deserve, after getting him back in one of the most dramatic, inconsiderate way possible.

He just...got away with everything a little too cleanly. And Eddie would be lying if he said he wasn't scared shitless at the chance that he could lose him. Even if that chance may just be in his head.

Eddie sighed, breaking eye contact as Steve stared him down, "I'm sorry."

"You should be," Steve said, leaning up to press a comforting kiss to his mouth before continuing, "But I love you anyway. And for the hundredth time, we're just friends. She's not even mad anymore. Sending that check over to her dad definitely smoothed things over. She even has a new boyfriend already."

Eddie may not have liked his ex-finance, on the selfish basis that she had gotten way to close to marrying the love of his life, but paying for their wedding was the least he could do after stealing the best part of it. Being rich and famous had to come in handy sometime right?

But that didn't mean he wanted to meet the girl.

"Come on," Steve tried, turning his body to make them face each other. He wrapped his arms around Eddie's neck, shamelessly ready to pull out the puppy dog eyes, "There's nothing to be worried about. I love you, obviously. And no one else. Besides, she deserves the chance to chew us out a little, considering what we did. Don't you think?"

He had a point, Eddie knew that he had a point. But just because it was the right thing to do didn't mean that Eddie wanted to deal with it. But it's not like he had a choice, not when Steve decided to pull that disgustingly adorable face.

And that's how Eddie found himself sitting across from the girl whose husband he stole, just two days later. It was awkward, or maybe Eddie was just awkward, because she and Steve were talking like they were old friends, instead of the bitter exes that they should be.

Trisha Rogers was a pretty girl, unfortunately. Tall, blonde, and put together. Like she could have just hopped right off the set of Baywatch. Her attractiveness was definitely not helping with Eddie's growing paranoia, but it wasn't exactly a shocker that Steve almost married a Farrah Fawcett clone.

But the pleasant smile on her face when she turned the conversation to him kind of was, "So you're the guy who ruined my wedding, huh?"

She turned back to Steve, a perfect brow raised, "He's cuter than you said he was."

Eddie blinked, glancing over at Steve, "You talked to her about me?"

"Since the start of our relationship," Trisha answered for him with a nostalgic sigh, "Actually, I think his exact words were, 'He's like if sexy fucked adorable and gave birth to a man who would ruin your life.' Something like that. He was surprisingly upfront about the whole 'I'm in love with someone who doesn't want me' since the get go."

"I wasn't that bad!" Steve whined, "And you're the one who kept asking questions about him!"

"And you're the one who failed to mention that he might pop up a year later to steal you away," Trisha said with a warm smile, "And if you had I would have gotten someone else to have a sham marriage with."

"Sham is kind of a strong word there Trish," Steve laughed, "I always thought of it as a marriage of convenience. Besides, it was your idea in the first place."

Sham? Convenience? What the hell were they talking about? Eddie looked between the two of them, brow furrowed at the words and the weird way they were smiling at each other, "Am I missing something here?"

"Well long story short, I met this really hot guy right?" Trisha started, winking at Steve, "And he was a great boyfriend for like, a solid two months. Then I find out he's still in love with an ex I'm still not 100 percent deserves him. And the romantic side of the relationship kind of died there. The sex kept being great though."

Trisha laughed at the way that made Eddie grimace, the shit head. He was starting to understand why these two got along in the first place.

"Anyway," She continued, "He made it pretty clear that he wasn't going to be an ideal life partner. But a friend with benefits was still on the table. And as a friend, he was set to do me the biggest solid imaginable, before you came along."

"She wasn't going to get her trust fund until she got married, her Dad's a massive traditionalist," Steve finished for her, "That's where I came in."

Eddie could feel his eye twitch as he looked over at Steve, "And you didn't think to mention that?"

Steve shrugged, "You're the one who looked constipated every time I said her name. Do you blame me for not bringing that up before?"

"Yes!"

"Oh he is cute when he's mad," Trisha giggled, "You hadn't been kidding about that."

Steve grinned, snaking a hand under the table to lace their fingers together, "Isn't he? And I am sorry about not following through. We both are. I just...got a little bit caught up in the moment."

Trisha shrugged, "It's okay. I mean, I'm still kind of pissed because of the humiliation factor, but everyone felt so bad for me I got to keep all the gifts. And my Dad gave me the trust fund anyway. He has some pretty choice words for you by the way."

She turned to Eddie, a tiny smile on her face, "But he's a big fan of you for sending the money over. He wanted me to mention that if you ever want to leave Steve at the altar you already have his permission for my hand in marriage-Hey!"

Eddie held back a laugh, watching as Steve lazily lied, "Oh whoops? Did I kick you on accident? Sorry about that."

She laughed, "Okay, okay! No flirting with the soulmate! Got it. So what's been new with you? Besides the whole life partnership thing?"

They talked for a little while longer, with more than a few more jokes being made at both of their expenses. But they definitely deserved it, even if the circumstances of their relationship weren't as serious as Eddie originally thought. It helped, especially since it was becoming crystal clear that this girl had every intention of staying Steve's friend. Though...he was still a little pissy that they slept together, as irrational as it was.

He kept that insane thought rightfully to himself.

But either way, by the time they made it home, Eddie's paranoia about the girl who almost married his soulmate was functionally dead.

"I still wish you had told me about the sham part," Eddie groaned as they stepped through the front door, "Could have saved me some serious heartache there Stevie."

Steve grinned. He wrapped his arms around Eddie's neck, stopping them in the hallway to give him a quick kiss, "Consider it payback for ignoring me for three years."

He knew he was joking, but that didn't stop Eddie from flinching. He was 100 percent right, if anything Eddie deserved a much worse punishment for putting Steve through all of his bullshit.

"Oh, don't pout," Steve said at the look on Eddie's face. He leaned in, pressing kisses all over his face, comforting him despite the fact that he didn't deserve it, "I already forgave you, remember? Now you can consider us even."

Eddie shook his head. He refused to let himself off the hook for this, not when he came so close to losing Steve forever because he had to go and be an idiot. He wrapped his arms around Steve's waist, pulling him in until they were flush against each other, "Don't let me off the hook yet. I got a lot more groveling to do. Preferably for the rest of our lives."

Steve grinned, hiding the smile in the crook of Eddie's neck, "I can live with that."

#steddie #steddie fic #steve harrington #eddie munson #stranger things #everyone was so sad for the bride so i did an epilouge #magic happy ending for everyone #because I can #who can stop me?#no one #revisionist history lets goooooo #steddie ficlet #runaway groom steve and groom thief Eddie

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