#how is this man still weaseling himself into the spotlight
Text
oh she’s supposedly dating m*tt he*ly now…. naur
#how is this man still weaseling himself into the spotlight#ugly greasy little rat your music is shit i hope u die#txt
3 notes
·
View notes
Text
Comedy of errors Bingjiu where SJ swaps into SY's body when he dies of qi deviation. It's weird but SJ does what he always does: survive, adapt, overcome. Shen Yuan's family is the biggest adjustment but it's...fine. More tolerable than the peak lords at least.
Years pass, he's thriving and has mellowed out a bit now. Amazing what getting out of a constant trauma state and modern heart demon healing can do for a man. But, his own nature keeps him waiting for the other shoe to drop. And it does -
- In the form of his now very adult former disciple directly into his path on his way home from the grocery. RIP to the once perfectly ripe tomatoes now crushed into pulp beneath a man who should have no idea who SJ is. He's annoyed but it should be easy to get rid of the beast.
Meanwhile, LBH's finally managed to squirm his way into a reality where he doesn't have to fight that cry baby for a nice Shizun thanks to a tip from the last iteration of the pair he came across. Finally, it's his turn.
LBH proceeds to try every trick in his playbook to try and win over "Shen Yuan" even if he does remind LBH more of his scum Shizun in personality than the various kind Shizuns he's come across.
It doesn't matter- every watered down version of himself got a kind shizun and this one is HIS. Hasn't he suffered more than any of them, doesn't he DESERVE to have that kindness and love after everything?
Of course, SJ won't give in easily. But, he's read through PIDW while acclimating and it seems a wiser plan to keep up the Shen Yuan charade than come clean and risk meeting the same fate as the SQQ in the novel.
He takes every opportunity to try and foist this sticky demon lord off onto someone else. He never threw anyone into the Abyss, why is this HIS problem. Sure, the constant meals are nice and maybe the not-so-little beast is growing on him like a fungus but- that means nothing.
Trying to keep LBH at a distance works for a while, a few months at least. How the beast is managing a prolonged stay in a new world isn't really SJ's problem given he never asked for this but, he finds himself thinking about it as autumn shifts to winter.
LBH adapted fairly quickly and it didn't take more than a few days for him to switch from formal robes to something more suitable for this world each time he popped up like a curly haired weasel millipede.
After following, clinging to really, SJ back to his apartment that first day, the beast was always popping up around meal times or when SJ left to run errands. It was invasive at first but has become routine.
Still, extended stays in SJ's private space would -not- do so each night LBH was politely bundled, or as close to SY's mannerisms as SJ could infer, out the door. But- SJ thought about it as the weather module on his phone announced another temperature drop.
Where had the little mongrel been staying? He didn't recall seeing a coat earlier in the day when he shuffled LBH out after their lunch. If the farce of Master Airplane's novel was correct, LBH would be more than capable of handling himself. But SJ thought about it.
Perhaps he'd been wearing SY's face for too long, he was clearly going soft in his old age. It was easy enough to ignore in the light of day until SY's meimei had to show up at the wrong time and point a spotlight directly at the issue.
#bingjiu#b9#svsss#luo bingge#shen jiu#reverse transmigration#things i meant to continue and then just didn't
195 notes
·
View notes
Text
Works In Progress: Round-Up
@sordidmusings, thank you for your tag. It's really lit the firecracker and having the fingertips sprinting to complete these WIPS. Thank you for holding me accountable and just being amazing.
@writingmysanity, @gingernut1314: I would love to hear what you're both concocting up with your beautiful words. Share with the class, I'm all eyes and ears.
@feral-artistry, @empressofmankind: Have you got any sneak peeks of your art you'd like to tease? I am keen!!
Rules: Post the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them and then post a little snippet of it or tell them something about it!
There are a few, so I'm going to add a page break. If you're keen on reading below, I'd love to hear which ones you'd like to steer me on towards.
One-Shots
Open Mic Night (request) (One-Shot) Buggy x Reader
A night off from their regular duties, the Buggy-Pirates drunkenly stumble into a small tavern running an open-mic-night for the locals and tourists to indulge in singing away their blues and joyful lilting of melodies.
Usually one to shy away from the spotlight to support others in stampeding towards stardom; Buggy's stage-hand, under the liquid courage and support driven to her by her coworkers, decides to utilise her voice to finally chase the thrill of her own moment within the spotlight. The Clown-Captain is simply enchanted by her.
Kintsugi (one-shot) (mood board) Buggy x Reader
An artist amongst the Buggy-Pirates longs to demonstrate how truly beautiful she finds her beloved clown-captain; even though he himself cannot see it. Through the art of kintsugi and the use of the chop-chop fruit; she paints and repairs him piece by piece to form him completely within her skilled hands.
Mambo: (Dance Series) (request) (one-shot) Bogard x Reader
Leaving him jilted in your youth and opting to become a world renowned antiquities appraiser and artist, you are again reunited with your young love at a night hosted by your boss at his artistic manor. With your art showcased around the halls, embellished in hues of gold and bronze, your confidence was unwavering. Apprehension left you as he invited you against himself to reminisce with him of what could've been, swaying to the music in the arms of one another. Will the smoldered flames rekindle? If not for the rest of your life, surely one night would not change anything...
Bolero: (Dance Series) (one-shot) Garp x Reader
The daughter of a wealthy noble notices the eyes falling to her at the banquet table. Her dalliances' with those closer in proximity to her age was so far inadequate to satiate her desire for adventure and danger. If she askes this silver fox to dance with her after the evening meal, will she experience the thrill she so desires within the arms of an older man?
The Hawk and the Weasel (request) (one-shot) Mihawk x Reader
Overcome with fatigue, exhaustion and rage; the Hawk finally has the Weasel within his talons. At long last, you are captured and will be taken to receive justice at the hands of the world government. The two of you are beyond tired, but Mihawk does not trust you not to wriggle yourself from his clutches. He has no choice but to cuff you against himself, trusting only the gentle flush of the heat rising from your body against his own to be theonly way he knows you're still contained.
The Bear and the Bow (request) (one-shot) Shanks x Reader
To win the heart and hand of a fair maiden, many a foe attempted to best her in her skills as an archer. All failed in their attempt, none succeeding in besting nor wooing the warrior-woman. But there was one that began weaseling his way into her very soul: a red-head with a liver for rum, a smile like sunlight and the eyes of a commanding storm.
Jig (Dance Series) (one-shot) Shanks x Reader
A night of drinking and merriment amongst the red-hair pirates led them to spill their frothy ales atop the benches and floorboards of a run of the mill tavern; much to the disdain of the waitress being tasked with trailing their havoc and tidying their mischief. The captain of the red-hair pirates longs to bring a smile to her face; as she caught his eye with her surliness each time he graced her port, yearning for a reaction from her stony expression. Perhaps if he could persuade her to join him for a jig, she might break from her contemptuous expression.
Foxtrot (Dance Series) (one-shot) Koby x Reader
The Marine Ball was either a joy for the upper-class cadets, or the ruin of many a lowerclassmen amongst them. Admiral Garp began his instruction, pairing up the differing classes of cadets with their perspective counterparts; the pink-haired quick learner becoming flustered under the confident presence of his dance partner. Her compassion for her skill alongside his apprehension to engage in the dance drove her to teach him how to confidently and successfully lead her in dance.
Series:
Sapsorrow: (ongoing series) Mihawk x Reader
"Whom so ever fits the ring becomes wed to the warlord who owns it."
The Governess of Dracule Mihawk at Castle Kuraigana has accidentally invoked an ancient curse against the worlds greatest swordsman. By slipping a ring onto her finger, she has become engaged to the former Warlord. She lays out three impossible circumstances for him to complete in order for them to be wed, truly not knowing Mihawk's life is at stake should he fail to meet this task. Apprehensively, their walls break down as they get to know each other better in formal courtship - no matter how they try to fight it, it's happening and feelings are being caught.
The Apprentice: (ongoing series) Mihawk x Reader
Mihawk is a bitchy boss, the apprentice is his bratty underling. Professionalism, sword-mastery and affiliation for wine consumption drives their relationship.Mihawk pushed his apprentice a little too far, prompting her to submit a formal resignation effective immediately. Calling her bluff, he attempts to chaperone her towards a cellar door to begin an afternoon of wine-tasting, only to find absence at his side as his apprentice simply walked away from him. And he was angry about it.
Trios One-Shots:
S.O.S (one-shot)(mood board) Sir Crocodile x Reader x Sanji
She longs to escape, but plays into the role of complete obedience to her powerful employer. As a last ditch effort, she sings in French to avoid suspicion; claiming the gaze and attention from a young, blonde chef in Alabaster - immediately longing to release her from her entrapment.
Cabaret at Baratie: (one-shot) Zoro x Reader x Sanji
The Straw-Hat pirates return to Baratie to settle their dining debt. Music coming from the kitchen, the crew finds a mysterious woman completing domestic back-of-house duties with Patty and Carne; wearing scantily clad clothing and performing a dance of mischievous seduction with the two chefs amongst cleaning the dishes. Chef Zeff, welcoming them back, informs the crew: a travelling cabaret crew has been performing at Baratie for the past month. Two crewmen amongst the pirates become immediately infatuated by the playfulness of the woman in the kitchen, vowing to compete for her affection. Who will win? How could she possibly choose between them?
Eyes Meeting: (NSFW one-shot) Zoro x Reader x Sanji
While clutching the back of the open shirt of the blonde chef, braced against the kitchen counter as he smother's your neck and jaw with sweet kisses, you notice a small shimmer of gold in the doorframe. Was Zoro watching you? Was he watching both of you together? Keeping your eyes fixed on the door and silencing your breaths, your eyes meet with the intense hazelnut stare of the swordsman: watching you both intently.
#wip roundup#one piece#opla#opla fic#one piece live action#x reader#buggy#mihawk#shanks#zoro#sanji#koby#garp#bogard#sir crocodile
30 notes
·
View notes
Text
Her
Andy reflects on the night he can't get out of his head. Sequel to Him.
Masterlist Buy Me a Coffee
Andy sighs as he loosens his tie, needing relief from from seeing her so fired up, eyes burning into his soul as she stormed out of his office.
Her.
Never once did he suspect her to be his new assistant, and somehow that knowledge infuriates him even more. He could handle many things: a particularly rowdy client, a one night stand refusing to leave, even the betrayal of a close client- but she was something he couldn’t quite claim or put his finger on. Something welcoming, refreshing- something he desperately needed in his world.
He certainly hadn’t intended to be at the club so late either; maybe it was the burn of the alcohol allowing him to finally relax for the first time in weeks, maybe it was the stress of constantly taking everyone’s problems on his shoulders, but whatever kept him so late only allowed him to be distracted by her the moment he laid eyes on her. Sitting alone off to the side, clearly happy to be there but also not wanting to be in the spotlight- something he found refreshing after years of women trying to weasel their way to his arms for the benefits of being seen with the biggest name in Boston.
It was so innocent and obvious when those innocent eyes met his that someone finally saw him, not the man on magazines and headlines for being some “eligible bachelor”, whatever that meant. It drew him in, and before he knew it they were tangled in his sheets, her moans fueling his lust until there was nothing but feral desire, making him near animalistic as they clung to each other.
Shaking his head, Andy pulls himself from thought and looks again at her notes, unable to find a single flaw for him to correct.
Of course not.
Releasing a breathless chuckle, he sets it to a different stack and starts cleaning up, paging his receptionist to call you back in as he finally releases a breath, fighting back the smirk when he sees you still riled up. “I assume that client called back?”
She rolls her eyes, dropping into the seat across his desk while managing to maintain the the professional air her blazer gave her. “He did, and he is still incompetent, but nothing I can’t handle. What was wrong with the report I sent you earlier? If you give me time I can fix it and-“
“The report was flawless,” He sets it between them, watching her brows furrow cutely as she studies it. “Which is practically unheard of in this company.” He nods to the paper, still watching her confusion. “Keep that up and you’ll make it very far.”
He watches her embarrassment, how she dips her head and shyly brushes hair away from her face. “Thank you…” She swallows and meets his eyes, the intensity making him freeze in his seat. “Are you going to talk about what happened?”
He purses his lips, sighing through his nose as he tries to maintain the indifferent act he started weeks ago as he leans back in his chair. “Nothing happened, (Y/N).”
“Bullshit,” Her jaw clenches, eyes burning in anger as she watches his every move. “You say nothing happened and dismiss me and my work, but then you look at me like you want to fuck me into next week. You can’t have both.”
He dips his head, closing his eyes briefly and licking his lips. Of course she wouldn’t understand; she doesn’t have to live her life pushing people away and guarding herself from everyone in order to protect her heart. “You need to understand-“
“Understand?” She snaps, rising to her feet in frustration. “If you want me to go, just say so!”
Andy stills, slowly rising and eyes locked on her as he stalks closer, not hesitating when she backs closer to the wall until she’s trapped, his face inches from hers as he traps her without even needing to block her with his arms. “If I wanted you gone, little one, you would know.” He tilts his head as he watches her fumble for an excuse, finally losing that poised and practiced air and becoming more of the woman he couldn’t keep off his mind. “Why don’t you try telling me the truth?”
She practically growls, glaring up at him as he meets her eyes calmly. “You known damn well you’re the one pushing me away.”
“I am,” He says calmly, studying her newly guarded expression. “But there are certain things you don’t understand. They go far beyond what happened between us.” Things I don’t want to ruin you.
She shakes her head, jaw clenching. “I’m not interested in your <I>situations</I>, Barber.” She pushes him back firmly, only making him sway back a bit but enough for her to move away. “You’re pathetic, you know that? You’ve sat there watching me like a hawk only to treat me like a piece of meat.”
His jaw clenches, feeling an angry muscle tick in his jaw. “That’s a lie and you know it.”
“Do I?” She shakes her head, snatching her report from his desk. “I have work to do.” She storms away without a word, and he closes the door before dropping into the nearest chair and holding his face in his hands, images and thoughts making him feel restless.
She didn’t know she filled his thoughts every moment of the day. She didn’t know that it crushed him to wake up to an empty bed. She didn’t know that he had started trying to find out who she was to try something, anything to let him get close to her again. Her moans, her skin against his, even the way their bodies molded together they they belonged- every second of meeting her plagues his thoughts and reminds him how much he’s sacrificed to be where he is. He needs a partner, someone to love and who loves more than just the CEO of Barber Law. Andy wants a partner, sure, but he needs someone who sees beyond the mask he’s had on for years.
All he wants is her.
Tags: @janeyboo @mylittlefandomfanfictions @palaiasaurus64 @averyrogers83 @guera31 @soulmates8 @coffeebooksandfandom @sweater-daddiesdumbdork @pegasusdragontiger @mizzzpink @onetwo3000 @see-you-again-my-sun-and-stars @sleepylunarwolf @wheresmyplums @smoothdogsgirl @marvelouslyme96 @esoltis280 @jtargaryen18 @k-evans-writes @rainbowkisses31 @buchanansebba @katiew1973 @patzammit @time-for-a-lullaby
#him#him series#her#andy#andy fic#andy fanfic#andy fanfiction#andy x reader#andy barber#andy barber fic#andy barber fanfic#andy barber fanfiction#andy barber x reader
130 notes
·
View notes
Text
CIRCUS BOY
ACT 1 - Chapter One
PAIRING: Peter Parker x Dick Grayson
WORD COUNT: ~4k
ㅤㅤㅤDICK GRAYSON ADORED the spotlight. How could he not? It was what he'd grown up with. The tabloids had gone crazy when Bruce Wayne first took the newly orphaned boy beneath his wings, irrationally conservative newspapers sprouting unsavoury rumours on the 'truth' of his adoption. Coupled with some scarily intimate knowledge of the twelve-year old's life that journalists had no place in revealing, it made for a spectacle. But that's what came with being the ward of America's most eligible bachelor.
And having spent his earlier teenage years pent up inside to avoid the stalkers and paparazzi being thrown from the grounds of Wayne Manor, Dick relished in the attention. Mostly. The excitement had calmed down as he got older, but the public's interest never did: The gaggle of people gathered on the private landing slip awaiting his and Bruce's arrival proved just that. No doubt they were waiting for some fiasco, a slip up; the flash of the brilliant Wayne smile that the young Grayson had taught himself by copying Bruce to go with a quick scoop for the celebrity columns.
How they'd caught wind of their trip to Washington was beyond him, though. He'd kept it tightly under wraps but apparently modern media was the force that refused to quit. Dick's idea to visit the nation's capital had been a home run in his mind – a couple days away from the gloom and doom of Gotham that just so happened to coincide with his own agenda. He was there for a photoshoot: Teen vogue had been overflowing Bruce's spam with pleads for Dick to be on the cover of their Summer Edition and after a while he had tiredly given up ignoring them.
Of course, Dick had been the one to give the company his email. But what the man didn't know couldn't hurt him.
And, pure happenstance (though some weaseling with Lucius Fox didn't go awry), their little trip to D.C clashed with the grand opening of the new Wayne Enterprises' Washington office. Let Alfred never say Dick never did anything for him. Bruce Wayne was about due another public scandal. In hindsight... maybe it wasn't so hard to anticipate their coming here.
"I still don't see the point in me being here," Bruce grumbled as he straightened his cuffs, peering tiredly towards Dick. The jet lurched as it touched down on the airstrip and the boy grinned easily back at him, fingers gripping the leather arm-rests.
"It's your company, Bruce! The tower's been built with your money and your company's name plastered all over it," Dick condescended. "Which means you need to be there."
The man snorted, muscles shifting beneath his tailored suit as he stretched in his seat. "You're evil, conspiring with Alfred against me."
The boy kicked him indelicately in the shin, fishing a shiny phone from the pocket of his jeans: "It's hardly conspiring if we're both in on it. Here, hold still – I told Alf I'd let him know when we landed." He held the device up towards Bruce, tongue poking from his lips as he captured the man's confused glance in high definition.
"That's exactly what conspiring means, Dick," he said, a gentle frown gracing his handsome face as he watched the boy's rapid thumbs tap out a reply to one of their dear butler's sarcastic quips. "Is that Snapchat? How are you typing so quickly?"
"Do you know how old you just sounded?" the teen chortled, snapping another picture of the man's blank face.
"I'm only thirty."
"That's a poor argument," Dick replied, ducking his head as Bruce reached forward to comb through his dark locks roughly. He chanced a peek through one of the jet's windows, eyeing the bustling crowd poised and waiting outside. Bruce followed his gaze, and Dick watched the slight narrowing of his eyes, the tightening of his shoulders. He stared into the man's outwardly impassive face. "Relax, B. It's just reporters."
"You know just once I'd like to go somewhere and not be hounded," Bruce complained, features taut, and Dick took a mental note of the irritation in his voice. The teen shrugged, releasing his seatbelt. He tilted forward, tugging on the billionaire's tie with a charming grin as he spun into the aisle.
"what did you think this was gonna be? A vacation?" Dick asked jokingly, observing the careful adjustment of the patterned fabric. Bruce cast him a sharp look, a warning, sapphire eyes shadowed. Dick frowned. "I mean, it could be if you wanted –"
"We don't have time for a vacation," Bruce said, voice carefully guarded, and the teen's fingers twitched for something to do as he watched the man perfect his appearance. The billionaire smoothed out the invisible creases in his blazer before rising to his feet.
"I wouldn't mind, y'know. Spending some time together... away from it all."
"Gotham needs us. Like I said, we don't have the time," came the resounding sigh, and Dick's frown deepened further.
"We could make time," he insisted steadily, creeping forward. Bruce shook his head, hunching his shoulders to get a clearer view through the port windows of the bobbing heads gathered just beyond. "Batman could afford a day off and- you need to get away. Maybe the league –"
"The league has strict instructions to stay out of my city, Dick. The less meta-humans seen there, the better."
"Okay, then Ollie! He's like us, he could cover for a few days and we'd be back before you eve-"
"No," Bruce growled, turning towards his ward. He had that look in his eyes, the one he always got when his mind was made up. Dick's face mirrored his guardian's, stern and protected from any clear emotion.
"But Bruce –"
"I said no, Dick!"
The boy stared at him. At the faint rings beneath his eyes, covered by layers of make-up, at the slump in his shoulders and the slight preference he had for his right leg. Their life – their real life – was eating the man alive. Dick was tempted to retort, spit something mean to get his point across and scold the man just like Alfred would. But it would be too obvious to the press that they'd argued on the plane, and they couldn't risk the coverage.
"You should have gone with the teal," he said finally, words emotionless, and Bruce flinched ever so slightly. He gestured to the man's tie: "Red washes you out."
The Wayne pursed his mouth, meaning to reply, and the deep-set guilt in his eyes was setting Dick on edge for one of his 'you have to understand' speeches – as if the boy didn't get it. Like he was still the sniveling child Bruce had first knelt beside in the blood-soaked sands of the circus ring. "Dick, please –"
"Mister Wayne?" someone interjected softly. A pretty woman with cropped brown hair approached them gingerly, almost tiptoeing on eggshells as she made her way from the crew's quarters at the back of the cabin. Bruce's mouth snapped shut instantly. "The pilot says we're ready to disembark."
"My dear your timing is impeccable," came the man's guttural reply moments later. He winked playfully towards the hostess, eliciting a confused blush on the woman's face. "My hero."
"Let's just get this over with," Dick sighed, folding his arms across his chest as the two of them watched the blonde walk away. There was a sway in her step that hadn't been there before and he sniffed resolutely.
"You'll have to save me again sometime," Bruce called after her.
"And what, exactly, did she save you from?" Dick hissed. "Finally expressing your emotions?"
Bruce turned his attention to his ward, crystal eyes glittering. The switch between his personas was seamless, as usual. Dick always hated it; Brucie Wayne was the biggest pain in the ass imaginable. The teen held up a hand to silence the playboy immediately upon seeing the corners of his mouth twitch into a tricky smile.
"I'm not done. This - " he gestured between the two of them irritably. " - is not done. Don't think you can hide behind the idiot to escape me."
"Dickie, I could never hide behind you, you're far too small."
Dick Grimaced, drawing back against the velvet interior at the lop-sided grin sent his way. The socialite's mask was plastered firmly on. "You know what? Let's put a pin in this conversation," he muttered, spying the way Bruce's eyes lit up with the knowledge that he'd won. For now. "How about we give the public a surprise? Let's arrive fashionably early for once."
ㅤㅤㅤ
DICK COULD SENSE Bruce was mad at him, and a mad Batman in a confined space was trouble. Especially when you were trapped with him for the next seven miles.
The conversation on the plane had rattled the man. It was almost as if he didn't think the boy would notice that he was trying to work himself to an early grave. Dick had half a mind to turn their visit to Washington into the vacation Bruce was so scared of just to spite the man...
It may also have something to do with what Dick had dubbed the 'interview incident'. The newest scandal in a long line of similar mistakes the teen had made.
The original meeting had happened so long ago that he'd forgotten all about it - until one of the reporters that greeted them on the airfield brought it up again, thrusting Dick back into the unfortunate limelight: An interview with some moderately popular internet blogger had asked after some of the Wayne heir's hobbies, and it was safe to say they'd been satisfied.
The perfectly executed anecdote on 'that time he'd gone spelunking in South Africa' had seemed funny at the time, but now it was back to haunt them in all it's glory because Dick had tried to see the venomous sparkling in the interviewer's eyes as admiration rather than execration.
The blog just had to resurface now, didn't it?
Bruce was on his phone, sat at the opposite end of the limousine to Dick, scowling as he always did when reading the articles that the teen was involved in:
' 𝙱𝚁𝚄𝙲𝙴 𝚆𝙰𝚈𝙽𝙴 𝙴𝙽𝙳𝙰𝙽𝙶𝙴𝚁𝚂 𝙻𝙸𝙵𝙴 𝙾𝙵 𝚂𝙾𝙽 𝚃𝙷𝚁𝙾𝚄𝙶𝙷 𝚁𝙸𝙳𝙸𝙲𝚄𝙻𝙾𝚄𝚂 '𝚂𝙿𝙾𝚁𝚃' '
"What were you thinking?" the man asked, exasperated. Dick slid down into his seat, looking away as Bruce threw his top of the range WayneTech mobile harshly onto the leather beside him. His eyes burned into Dick's head from across the way. "'My harness broke, it's lucky Bruce was there to catch me'? Really, Dick? I'm already deemed irresponsible enough, there's no need to rekindle a raging fire."
Dick winced, rubbing his thumb along the grooves of the plush seats awkwardly. "It makes you sound like a hero?"
"Bruce Wayne isn't a hero."
"He is to me," Dick asserted, chancing a glance up through his eyelashes to spot Bruce running a hand over his face. "What?"
Bruce let out a disgruntled growl, levelling the boy with a dangerous stare. "I'm not a good role model, Dick. We've established this."
"No, you established it. I can't help thinking you're cool."
"Oh for the love of - can you stop? What's wrong with you today, Dick?" the man demanded, brows furrowed. He looked furious, but Dick wasn't so sure the anger was directed towards him.
"Jeeze, Bruce, I don't know! Maybe it's just hard to watch someone you care about suffer," the teen snapped, gritting his teeth. Blue eyes widened momentarily, a splash of light quickly drowned. Bruce shook his head.
"If you're struggling with your duties as Robin, I can -"
"God, are you even listening to me?" Dick cried, aghast. "I'm worried about you, Bruce. We all are, hell even Clark said -"
"You've been speaking to Clark?"
"That's not the point! Everyone's worried about you Bruce. Alfred, Babs, Me, the League - you need a break from being in the dark all the time."
"So you arranged this trip?" Bruce concluded, settling back against his head rest. Coal black locks brushed against the roof of the limo. Dick nodded unsurely as the tension in the car reached it's breaking point. "I should have seen this coming."
The boy chose not to reply, instead observing the minute changes in his guardian's expression as he collected the facts in his head. Why it was so hard for Bruce to understand that there were people out there who loved him, Dick didn't understand.
He played with the thin gold chain hanging around his neck, an R-shaped pendant dangling from the end: Bruce had given it to him when Dick first came to live at the Manor. Had said it was in his father's possession when he'd died - an early birthday present they'd intended to give his son after the show.
"You know," Dick began in an effort to break the strangling silence threatening to overcome the vehicle. "Spelunking gives a pretty good excuse for the bruise on my back."
"What bruise?" Bruce asked, eyes snapping to his ward. Dick shrugged, focusing on pulling the rest of his shirt free from his jeans. Having it tucked in was so last season.
"From where that guy got the drop on me a couple days ago. By the harbour?" the boy continued, feeling the palpable stress in his veins begin to release at Bruce's willingness to move towards a different topic. "I think they were one of Penguin's."
"You never mentioned any injuries that night."
"I talked about it in the mission's write-up, I swear. I described it as 'disturbingly floral'!"
"Floral?" Bruce muttered, amused. He ran a hand vapidly through his dark hair. "I think I'd remember reading that one."
"Barbara probably deleted it to get me in trouble," the teen hummed non-committedly, gaze trailing towards the system's electronics piled beside the car's windows. "Hey, what'dya think these do?"
Bruce watched him carefully, a single eyebrow raised dramatically. "Don't break anything I'll have to pay for."
"Poor you, how could you cope?" Dick snickered, unbuckling himself so he could investigate the mismatch of buttons with a new-found fascination. Bruce grunted disapprovingly.
The Grayson boy was automatically drawn to the largest switch, one with a suspect symbol plastered atop, and he instinctively pushed it. A miniature disco ball descended from a hatch hidden in the roof, sending blinding orbs of light into Bruce's eyes as it reflected the pink and purple strobe LEDs accompanying it. The billionaire squinted, shielding his eyes and sending Dick a vexed glance as the boy let out a relived breath. He grinned haplessly towards his guardian: "Oh thank god. I thought it might've been an orgy button."
Blue eyes dulled with parental fear, though Bruce's lips couldn't quite seem to decide whether they wanted to grin or stay stern and resolute. "Don't use words you don't know the meaning of," he chided, the corners of his mouth tilting upwards ever so slightly.
"I know what it means," Dick reassured, grinning immaturely as Bruce's face twisted into horror-struck regret. "It's when a bunch of people get naked and -"
"Alright that's enough of that," the man admonished, and just like that their previous argument was all but forgiven and forgotten. He leaned over to turn the switch off and the disco ball receded, lights evaporating into a boring white glow. Dick laughed brightly, copying the look of disbelief on Bruce's face.
The billionaire took a sip from the champagne flute in his hands - diet ginger beer, Dick could smell it - lifting it away from his lap as the limousine sped downtown, the wheels squealing at a sharp right corner. Bruce was watching Dick through carefully narrowed eyes, a mixture of peaceful alarm making its way across his face as the boy opened his mouth to speak again:
"Have you ever had an orgy?" Dick asked. There was a beat between his words and Bruce's reply as the man swallowed back the rest of his carbonated drink. The silence spoke volumes.
"Don't ask questions you don't want the answers to, buddy," the man said carelessly. Dick wrinkled his nose as he caught wind of the guilt in the his disapproving stare, cheeks flaring up. Bruce's deep laugh rung in his ears as he turned his head away, unable to keep looking at the man. "You'd make a terrible journalist."
"I'd still be better than Clark," said Dick nonchalantly and Bruce smiled gently. The teen stared out of the blacked-out windows watching the world blur past, tinted in shadow.
"Still better than Clark," he agreed lightly. Dick threw him a contagious smile as the car began to slow, pulling up in front of a tall corporation building. Bruce returned it wearily, checking his watch as the engine rattled to extinction.
Dick crawled along the seats towards his mentor, throwing himself onto the man in an awkwardly positioned embrace. One arm was slung around the billionaire's shoulders, the other hanging limply off the edge of the chair, and Bruce let out a breath of surprise as he rested a hand between the boy's shoulder blades.
"This is my stop, B," the teen drew back with a grin, squeezing the man on the shoulder. "I'll see you later."
"Have fun, Dick."
"Without you?" the teen replied as the door slid open. He ducked from the limo with a boisterous thanks to the valet. "Never!"
He winked to Bruce as the door closed behind him, feeling the smile face from his face at the despondent look on the man's face. Great. He was still mad. Dick really thought he'd gotten off easy with the orgy stuff.
He beelined for the pretentious revolving doors, sliding into the lobby. Was it the right building? All signs pointed to yes - it was certainly rich enough to be the type of venue Vogue would hire out for their photoshoots - but the mass of people milling at reception was somewhat alarming. They were all wearing some weird blazer, so maybe they were here for a group shoot. Otherwise... Dick just hoped they weren't fans.
"Hi, could you tell me what level the teen vogue shoot is on?" he asked quietly, keeping his voice low to avoid attracting attention his way. The receptionist spun to him, blinking owlishly in recognition.
"Oh! Dick Grayson! What a pleasure, they said you'd be dropping by today," he said excitedly, and Dick withheld a sigh as a few heads snapped towards them. "You're looking for level two. When you get out the elevator it's the first door on the right."
"Uh, great. Thank you." One of the blazer-clad people - a teenager, a little younger than him by the looks of it - stepped out of their group towards him as he leaned away from the help desk.
She looked nervous - nice, but nervous - and her hesitation made Dick pause despite himself. He did love the spotlight, after all. With a wave, he beckoned her over.
"Holy- Hi, my name's Liz," she said excitedly, running a hand down her ponytail. She stumbled closer as one of her friends pushed her forwards. "I'm a big fan. I mean, wait is that creepy? I'm sorry, I -"
"It's fine, see? Not creeped out." Dick grinned as he gestured to himself. "Did you just want to say hi or...?"
"Oh! Could I get a picture? Is that okay?" She asked unsurely, and Dick shrugged. He cast a glance towards the elevator - it was on the fourth floor, he had time.
"I don't see why not!"
"Oh wow, thank you!" Liz pulled out a sleek iphone and Dick pressed closer to get in frame as she held it in front of them. It was always fun, stopping for a selfie. And the girl seemed sweet enough; as long as the entire group didn't want one there was no harm done. A quick press of the screen and Dick was already pulling away. First floor. Still time.
"It was lovely meeting you," Dick disengaged softly as he began to sidle away, and Liz nodded, holding her phone to her chest with brilliant eyes as the rest of the blazer gang gathered around her, whispering. The Grayson boy shot the girl a wink for the fun of it, beaming as her cheeks darkened and the giggles of her companions filled the room. The elevator was on the ground floor.
Dick stepped into the metal cube as soon as the doors began to open, holding a finger against the button for the second floor as if it would make it go faster. The cheery elevator music reverberated from the mirrored walls, and Dick stared into his reflection thoughtfully.
Liz had been nice. Some of the self-proclaimed 'Richard Grayson' fans out there were pretty weird. And he'd met a few. He'd read a few of their tumblr blogs, too. Creepy stuff. It was always nice to find a genuine admirer who was more interested in him than feeling up his ass. Although, her hand had drifted pretty low...
The second floor was just a little too grand for his taste. Very bare. The doors to the think-box slid open with a chime and Dick shimmied between them. He was greeted by an empty coffee shop, with wide panel windows overlooking the streets of Washington below and the same amount of chairs as there were trees in a square meter of desert. It was barren and it was sad and Dick couldn't remember what direction the receptionist had said to go. Left or right?
There was a random kid curled up on one of the mauve velvet sofas, feet dangling over the edge precariously close to a mug that had been placed on the oval coffee table without a coaster. If Dick did that sort of thing at the Manor, Alfred would throw a fit.
"Hello," he said, alarmingly loud even to his own ears, and the couch's occupant shot upright instantly as Dick strode towards them. His eyes flickered to a yellow blazer discarded to the side - the same that Liz and her friends had been wearing . "Are you here for the shoot?"
"Uh..."
"Were you on your way to the studio? I could use some help finding it."
Dick slumped down on the plush chair opposite the boy, raking his eyes over him. Messy brown hair, cute nose, pretty eyes - definitely a model. "I didn't know there was a - what even is this theme you're going for here? Looks like a school-kid thing, field trip maybe."
"I- I am on a field trip..."
"Already in character. Nice. That's strong, man, I salute you," Dick grinned. He reached forward absently, lifting the cup of now-cold hot chocolate to slide a coaster beneath it.
"Character? What are you talking about - who are you?" The model-boy asked and Dick detected a hint of concern in his quaking voice. He frowned, settling back against the sofa.
"Dick Grayson," he replied curtly, watching for recognition to wash over the boy's face. He didn't get what he was looking for. Dick was beginning to think he'd gotten the wrong impression. "You're here to model right? For Teen Vogue?"
"M-model? Vogue? I- No!"
Dick pursed his lips awkwardly, tapping at his thigh as he and the not-model boy stared at each other. "Oh."
"Right," the other boy agreed. "Oh."
"This is, uh, this is my mistake, It's just I saw your group downstairs and Liz was pretty and you're pretty so I just assumed..." Dick climbed to his feet, wiping his mysteriously sweating palms on his jeans. He was usually smoother than this.
The boy's face flushed a rosy pink: "I'm not... you know Liz?"
"Uh, not really... I met her downstairs though, she was nice," Dick said slowly, debating whether or not he should just leave. He'd made a big enough fool of himself already. The other boy made an odd sound of agreement, turning his eyes to the floor, and Dick struggled to think of something else to say. He thought back to the conversation he'd had with Bruce in the car: surely there was something from that interaction he could string together to make this one more bearable.
Boy, was he wrong.
There was only one thing flooding his mind - one thing that didn't involve alter-egos and stressed out men in capes. Unfortunately, his brain didn't filter it out as a no-no for conversation starting. If anything, it ended them before they even began.
"Hey," Dick started desperately, trying to avoid the slight crackle of his voice. His throat was itchy, was that normal? The other boy peered up at him sheepishly, a faint blush powdering his cheeks as he caught sight of Dick's stare. "Have you ever had an orgy?"
[...] to be continued
#fanfiction#dc#wattpad#ao3#dc comics#dick grayson#marvel#peter parker#peter parker x dick grayson#dick grayson x peter parker#mcu x dc#mcu fanfiction#dc fanfic#circus boy
5 notes
·
View notes
Text
The View From Both Sides of The Mirror
Pairing: Harry Styles x Reader
Word Count: 23.5k
Summary: Who would have thought that being stuck on a boat with your worst enemy would be a good thing?
Warning(s): Cursing, some mentions of yachtrry, Harry being a softie, Harry also being a dick, reader being down on herself
A/N: So this is my submission for @stylesharrys 10k follower celebration! I chose the picture above, the trope enemies to lovers, prompt “That’s not what I meant, I swear. I know I can be an asshole but I'm not that heartless.”
I’ve been working on this for quite a while and I really debated deleting the entire thing a few times, but here she is, all finished and ready to be enjoyed!!
Masterlist
Add yourself to my taglist here
Request anything here but be sure to read my guidelines first!
As always, if you enjoy this piece, reblog to share with your friends :))
*
Harry Styles is a lot of things. Annoying, over the top, self obsessed, judgmental, self indulgent, careless, overly flamboyant, rude, narcissistic. He’s a lot of things, but perfect is not one of them.
The media continuously had a lot of ridiculous ideas about him, most of which were laughable. You’d often scroll through your social media and snort at the things that people would post about him. You had seen some things that were quite funny, but nothing compared to the article that your best friend, Lexi, had shown you. You full body cackled after reading the title, and who could blame you? “The Perfect Man the World Didn’t Know It Was Missing” was top tier comedy.
There were a plethora of things wrong with the title that the up and coming news station had so foolishly chosen.
The most obvious of which being the fact that he was literally 26, and he’s been in the spotlight for over ten years. The world hadn’t been missing him at all. He’s been shoved in everyone’s face for over a decade and they find a new reason to act like he’s the best thing that ever happened to the universe. They over exaggerate everything, make it seem like he was either born an hour ago or just discovered yesterday. Which was definitely not the case, as you had been told numerous times by the man himself.
The second being that they all acted like they knew him when really they had absolutely no idea who he is. The ones that covered the stories acted like they knew him as well as his childhood best friend when really they had taken a statement, at most. They had no clue who he actually was. They couldn’t tell you his favorite number, or how he fixes his toast. They don’t know the reason why he no longer wears skinny jeans. They don’t know why he’s so open with who he is and how he presents himself. None of them know anything about any of that, and it’s more bothersome than you’d like to admit. But it’s not just the people that praise him that rub you the wrong way. No, it’s even the ones that say bad things about him, that claim that he’s Satan's spawn. It was still exasperating to hear them say things about him. They acted like they knew him well enough to hate him, to paint him as the villain in their article.
Yeah, sure, you and Harry didn’t get along, but at least you had a reason. Most of the people that didn’t like him were just upset because basically everyone wanted something to do with him, and they were all mad because he was seemingly perfect. He never lost his temper (he definitely did, just not in public), he was nice to everyone (yeah, besides you), and he would never turn down a picture with a fan if it was safe to do so and he had time (that one was true. The one part of him that you don’t absolutely hate is the love that he has for his fans. He’d be nowhere without them, and he realizes that. And, although he’s not appreciative of a lot of things, he is of them).
And the final thing about the article, the one that irked your nerves the most, was that they were yet another news group to paint the picture that he was perfect, that he was the golden boy. That he had never once done something that could be seen as wrong. Which, yet again, goes to show that they don’t really know anything about him, at least not personally.
Sure, Harry Styles came off as perfect. He had to. He’s in the public eye, spotted everywhere that he goes by at least one person. He had been coached from the ripe old age of 16 to come across in that way. In his career, there has never been any room for error. One mistake could have brought down everything that the managers of One Direction were trying to accomplish.
He was conditioned into media perfection long ago. He had been told how to speak, how to act, what to wear, what to sing. Anything that could possibly cause an upset in the fandom was immediately changed, edited to make it look better. He was shaped into the boy that the world had come to love.
But Harry, the guy that you spent the majority of your waking hours with, due to the numerous mutual friends that you had, was annoying at best. Most of the time, though, he was a complete prick.
There was nothing about the man he was behind closed doors that was perfect. He was utterly and completely himself. Most people would think that’s a good thing, him being comfortable enough to himself to the fullest extent. But you? You absolutely hated those times. He was much easier to deal with when you were out in public, when he was too worried about keeping up appearances to do anything particularly shitty.
The two of you had never gotten along. From the very moment that the two of you had met, there was a tension. It was like there was an immediate distaste for one another. All of your friends could tell that the two of you would never get along, but they tried to force it anyway.
That night, he had seemed completely uninterested, like he’d rather be at some party that only had A-List celebrities on the guest list than there meeting you. At first, you had been hurt. But then you came to accept it. Came to accept the fact that you just weren’t good enough for him. You weren’t like the rest of your friends. All you did was work in photography, and you weren’t even one of the well off photographers. Sure, you didn’t struggle, but you weren’t on the same level as the rest of the people that you had formed friendships with.
Your mutual friends had tried their best to ease the tension between the two of you. They had done everything in their power to force the friendship. You had to give them props, they pulled all the stops, but there was nothing that anyone could do that would make you not loathe the mere thought of him. Maybe it was the fact that he made you doubt who you were. Maybe it was the fact that he gave off the asshole vibe. Or maybe, it was just because he seemed to not like you, but from that day forward, you weren’t on good terms with him.
Things had gotten so bad with Harry that you had even tried to find a new group of friends. You were tired of feeling like you were the odd man out, feeling like you had ruined every outing because you couldn’t just suck it up and get along with him. There had come a time when you didn’t even feel like you had belonged. All of the people that you had surrounded yourself with were extremely successful. Most of them were CEOs of something. But when Harry had met them, he had introduced the singers, writers, and musicians into the group. You weren’t any of those things. Sure, a lot of people saw you as an artist, but you could barely be seen as anything compared to the others, and that haunted you until you began to believe that your occupation as a photographer wasn’t valid.
So, you searched for new friends. You tried to find people that would make you feel like you belonged, like you were their equal. You just wanted some people that you could relate to. You hadn’t felt that in way too long, and being around Harry and his super successful, extremely famous friends wasn’t helping any.
You tried for a few weeks before realizing that it was pointless. He found a way to weasel himself into that aspect of your life as well.
Every single time you met someone new, the same thing happened. You’d talk to them for a few minutes, get to know each other a little. But each time, without fail, they’d ask “Hey, aren’t you that chick that’s friends with Harry Styles?” And each time, you’d immediately walk away, never looking back.
Nobody cared about making friends with you, they just wanted to have a way to Harry. Every cell in your body was filled with regret. You had made the decision to openly be in the same friend group as him. You hadn’t taken into consideration that once you were spotted with him repeatedly, your life would never be the same.
It left you wanting to rip your hair out. Or at least go back in time so that you never had to meet him, never had to be in public with him. It sucked that no matter how hard you tried, he wouldn’t stay out of your life. He was present even when he physically wasn’t, and it was aggravating beyond belief.
It was safe to say that you hate Harry Styles.
It was also safe to say that Harry Styles hates you.
You were so uptight, always sticking up your nose at everything that he did. You had done it since the moment that you had met him and it seemed as if you had never stopped.
You had given him a look that could only be described as one filled with disdain the moment that you met him, and from that moment on he had tried his best to distance himself from you. With the both of you running in the same circle, though, that was pretty hard.
So, he had just tried his best to ignore you. That didn’t work very well either, seeing as you always had a reaction to everything that he did. And none of those reactions were ever positive.
You acted like there was something wrong with him spending the money that he earned. It got on his nerves more than just about anything. What was he supposed to do with it? Was he just supposed to let it sit in his bank account for the rest of his life? He donates a large chunk of everything that he earns every year, it wasn’t like he was just blowing his money on meaningless things. He had his priorities straight.
He had come to despise nights out, knowing that you would be there. You always had something to say. Or not say, rather. You’d never tell him that it was exactly that made you so upset with him. Every time you would send him a look, he’d ask why, but you’d simply turn on your heel or slip out of the booth, heading to the dance floor to be as far away from him as possible.
He was a simple man, really. He just wanted to go out with his friends, buy something strong off the top shelf, and drink until he was in the cuddly mood that his mind automatically switched into when there was enough alcohol running through his veins.
But with you there? Oh, he couldn’t do that. God forbid he buys something expensive like that. God forbid that he spend his money on what he wanted to. Every time he’d order his drink, you’d curl your nose up, as if you were completely disgusted by his choice. And every time that he would get overly touchy and want to cuddle someone, he would automatically seek you out. He didn’t know why, and he despised his brain for thinking of no one else but you.
He knew that the fact that he never chose someone else to agitate probably made you hate him even more than you already did, and he went home every weekend feeling awful about it. He never meant to annoy you. Sure, he hated you, couldn’t stand the way you acted like you were better than him, like you were higher up than him even though he saw the two of you as equals, but he never meant to purposefully get on your nerves. He never went out of his way to cause you to hate him even more.
However, that didn’t stop you from thinking that he did. Didn’t stop you from thinking that he’d do anything in his power to pester you. It didn’t stop you from hating him more and more every day.
*
When your friends had called you and told you that they wanted to go on vacation, you were excited. You could use a break, a bit of time to forget about all the stress and just relax on a boat with your friends. Plus, you had never been to Brighton, so there was no way you were going to say no to that experience.
However, the initial glory of the idea wore off the moment that you realize Harry’s the only one with any kind of boat. Which means in order to have the relaxing getaway that you want, you'll have to deal with him for at least a few hours every day, if not every moment that the sun is up. If you’re completely honest, you don’t even understand how he’s going to get the yacht to Brighton when it’s kept in the States. You didn’t question it, though, because that’s the reason that Lexi gave you. Which means that has to be the reason that he has to go.
To top it off, it won’t even be like it normally is. If he gets you worked up enough, you can’t even just walk away and leave, you’ll be stuck on his boat in the middle of a body of water, with no way to swim to land without risking something bad happening.
You had already paid the deposit for the house, but you were fully willing to let someone else take your place on the trip. Were fully willing to give up the vacation because there’s no way in the world that you could spend an entire week with Harry without something terrible happening. Plus, there was only room for four people and there were many more than just that in your friend group. They could easily find a replacement.
When you had called back to tell Lexi and Sam that you weren’t going to be attending, they all but guilt tripped you into coming along, saying that they had invited you for a reason and that they would be really bummed out if you decided to stay behind and give someone your spot.They also gave you the look, the one they always hit you with when you back out of something just because of Harry.
You felt bad, always ruining plans because you were in a constant argument with him, so you tried to put your pride to the side for a moment and at least listen to what they had to say.
Against your better judgement, you agree to go, but only because you would have your own room with a private bathroom attached, and your friends confirmed that they wouldn't say anything about you hiding away from Harry if he got to be too much. They also assured you that you and Harry would be separated for the majority of the trip.
They knew that the both of you need a vacation, but neither of you can stand the other, so they promised that you would have an adequate amount of alone time to have the relaxation that vacations are supposed to bring.
After doing your shoot that night, you go home and pack the suitcases you'll need for the week that the four of you plan on staying there. You don’t pack much, just a single suitcase and a carry on. You check to make sure that you have your passport and that it’s valid, and that you have all the items from around the house that you’ll need.
Once everything is settled and put together, you flop down on your bed, switching on a random Netflix show that you’d been obsessed with lately and allowing yourself to drift off to sleep..
*
You’ll never know how your friends had let them talk you into letting them plan the entire trip. The only thing that you were told was how much your portion of the bills were and when they were due. It has annoyed you to no end, seeing that you are the type of person that likes to know every detail of what’s going on. You had been on more than enough trips that had absolutely everything that could go wrong do exactly that, leading to ruined trip after ruined trip, that you’d rather know all the plans, maybe even make a list or two so that there are no missteps or slip ups when it comes to the actual vacation.
You texted Lexi a few hours before you had to leave to board the flight to ask if you could scan over the plans and the details of the trip, not to change anything, just to double check. Of course, she said no immediately, not understanding that you just wanted to look over it and make sure that everything was in order to calm your nerves. You didn’t want to explain this to her, though, knowing that she would begin to feel guilty for not letting you see it immediately, and that’s not what you wanted to happen.
If you had talked to her and she had actually allowed you to check literally anything for the trip, though, the first thing you would have ensured was that you wouldn’t be stuck on a plane right next to Harry for hours. You’ll never understand how she could put you in this situation, making you sit next to the most loathsome person in this world, who she knows that you can’t even be in the same room as for more than a few hours.
By the time the situation registers in your mind, however, he’s already loaded his carry on and sat down in the seat. Which means that it's definitely too late to do anything about it. Yeah, you’d rather not sit next to him for hours on end, but you’re definitely not going to cause a scene on an airplane full of people. Especially not when half of them already have their phones out, trying to discreetly take pictures of Harry.
Besides, the flight attendant is already coming around checking belts and the pilot is introducing himself and spouting out information that seemingly no one is paying attention to. This flight will be over in no time. At least that’s what you tell yourself to get through the next ten hours.
You groan, rolling your eyes at the irony of the situation. Of course something like this would happen. You had only agreed to a vacation because you needed relaxation. You needed a break from all the stress. But here you were, stuck right next to one of the biggest stress inducers in your life. Yeah, Lexi had promised you that you’d have plenty of time away from Harry at the rental house, but you were definitely making up for all the time that would be lost right now.
If you didn’t know better, you would think that Lexi and Sam were plotting against you. But that’s crazy, right? They wouldn’t do something like this on purpose, would they?
You lightly shake your head, pushing the thought from your mind. They wouldn’t do that.
You pull out your phone, queuing up the playlists you had downloaded prior to boarding. You knew that you’d want to shut yourself off from the world for the duration of the trip there, so you prepared accordingly.
You take one final glance around the cabin, seeing that everyone else has begun settling in and nobody else is announcing something important. You slip your headphones in your ears, ready to relax as much as possible throughout the flight. You know that the only way to completely avoid being pestered by Harry is to completely block him out.
The first song that comes on makes you want to laugh. You obviously don’t do such a thing, knowing that the outburst would cause every single person on the plane to look at you like you’re crazy.
You couldn’t catch a break today. Of course one of his songs would be playing in your ears while your face was less than a foot from his. Of course it would actually be one of your favorites. You had never once in your life pressed the skip button on this song, but knowing that he’s as close to you as he is, you’re hesitant to even listen to the opening chords of the song.
“Carolina” blared through your headphones for a split second before you made up your mind and hit skip. You couldn’t risk being caught by him. There’s no way you would survive this if he found out that you listened to his music, especially since you have it saved to your playlist. There’s no way that you’d be able to play that off as you simply listening to it so that you could make fun of him for it later (which you wouldn’t do in general, you know how important his music is for him, and you’d never dampen the light that appears in his eyes when he talks about it. You’re not that cruel.).
It was quite frustrating, really. His music is fantastic, a perfect blend of the basic attributes that hook audiences that hear songs on the radio and a uniqueness that you can’t find anywhere else. His music was absolutely amazing, but the man that sang it… he was a different story.
You didn’t like to judge his tracks based on how fond of him you were when you first heard them. If you did that, you’d never listen to them in general.
You’d never admit it to him, but every song of his, even the covers, was scattered throughout your playlists. And every once in a while, when nobody was around, you would listen to them and genuinely enjoy them. Sometimes you’d even dance along, and that’s a secret that you’ll take to the grave.
You wanted to drift off to sleep, but didn’t want to risk him hearing if one of his songs came on. Lord knows that he doesn’t need the ego boost. So, you turned the volume down until you were confident that nobody else could hear it. You lean your head back against the rest and let your eyes slip shut, finding sleep in seconds.
*
What seems like moments later, you’re being awoken by someone. You think that maybe it’s Lexi at first, but then you feel them, the rings that he never seems to take off. You jerk your body away from him, not wanting his hands to be on you.
“Hey, it’s time to wake up. We’ve landed.” You open your eyes and glare at him, taking your headphones out. You can tell that he’s holding in a laugh and it makes you want to punch him right in the jaw. You choose not to do such a thing, however, because you’d rather not cause a scene on an airplane. So, you settle for flipping him off.
He chuckles before mimicking your action. You roll your eyes, standing up from the seat and grabbing your carry on. Harry steps back, letting you walk ahead of him. You think nothing of it until he pushes at the back of your knee, almost making you fall to the ground. What is he? A middle schooler?
You can already tell that this is going to be a long trip, regardless of what Lexi and Sam had assured you. So far, what they had said had turned out to mean absolutely nothing to you. Not for the first time since you woke up this morning, you find yourself wishing that you hadn’t given in. That you had just said no and not let them talk you into it.
You walk with a bit more speed after you step off of the airplane, trying to get as far away from him as possible. You don’t want to have to add falling over in the middle of the airport to the list of reasons why you despise flying. You had only agreed to get on the plane this time because it was absolutely necessary in getting to Brighton.
You meet up with Sam and Lexi by the luggage pick up and all of you wait for your bags. You put all your effort into ignoring Harry, only looking in his direction or humming an approval when the conversation called for it.
“Alright, well. We need to get to the car rental service and then I have to go rent the yacht.” Harry says, making you snap your head up, looking straight at him. After a second, you turn to Lexi and Sam, looking between the two.
“Oh, no, no, no. Tell me you’re fucking joking.” You spit. “Harry just had to come, huh? And you wouldn’t let me back out? Harry’s the only one with a yacht? Yeah, he’s the only one with a yacht but he’s fucking renting one.” You can’t believe this. “Look, if I had known that me being stuck in a foreign country with him wasn’t completely necessary, I would have given someone else this vacation in a heartbeat.”
“Y/N come on…” Sam starts, but you cut him off.
“What, Sam? Want me to hold my tongue yet again so I don’t hurt Harry’s feelings?” You scoff. Why did they care about his feelings when he had never once taken yours into consideration? “Well, you know what? Fuck Harry’s feelings. He’s rude to me for absolutely no goddamn reason and I’m tired of it. I wanted to come on this god forsaken trip so that I could relax. Both of you,” you point back and forth between Sam and Lexi, “promised me that I would get to relax, that I would only be around Harry on the boat. But it seems like your word is bullshit, doesn’t it?”
Your luggage rolls around and you yank it off the conveyor. “Let’s go get the stupid ass cars. And Harry?” You turn to him, pointing your finger at him and tapping his chest. You ignore the way that the contact sends shivers up and down your spine. “Don’t you dare fucking say a word to me on the way there. Don’t touch me, for any reason. You know what? Just don’t even look at me. That should make everything a little more bearable, got that?”
He nods, and with that, you walk towards the exit of the airport, knowing that there was no way you could continue that argument without bursting into tears. You weren’t upset in that way, you just had the habit to start crying when you were pissed off at someone to this point. They had really lied to your face. You know Lexi though, she’ll use the fact that she ‘technically didn’t lie because Harry is the only one with a yacht.’
You wait outside, knowing that they have the address to the car rental place, and there’s no way that you want to get lost here. You don’t look at any of them once they come out the doors, and they don’t make any effort to talk to you.
The entire walk to the shop, you stay a few feet behind them, not wanting to be too close to any of them. It’s not even so much so that you were mad anymore, that had subsided. You were hurt. The fact that they lied to you? That was something that all of you had promised to never do to one another, even you and Harry. And what hurt even worse was the fact that the people that did lie to you weren’t who you expected to ever lie to you. If anyone was going to do something like that, you expected that it would have been Harry that did it, not them. It probably wouldn’t have hurt as much if it had been Harry, but only because you had mentally prepared yourself for him to betray you, had kept your walls up against him since the moment that he showed you who he was around you.
The walk to the rental store was a short one, leaving you barely any time alone with your thoughts, which you were completely fine with. You didn’t really want to be in your head right now.
Lexi walks in, leaving the three of you outside. She comes out a moment later with two sets of keys. “Alright, who’s riding with who?”
“I’ll ride with Sam, give Y/N some time away from me.” If he hadn’t said it with the hint of sarcasm that he did, his words could have been mistaken for sweetness. But you know how he is. He makes everyone else think that he’s such a sweetheart when really he’s a prick.
*
The house is nice. Really nice, actually. The moment you walk in, you’re met with the high ceilings of the entryway. You must admit that Lexi and Sam did a great job on picking the house that you’d be staying in for the week. You walk through the entryway and see a kitchen off to the side, it’s really modern, looks like it was just redone. There’s a sitting room directly adjacent to where you’re standing. And you can see multiple doors and a hallway that leads to other rooms, which you assume are bedrooms and the half bath that would be used for guests.
You immediately go to pick a room, knowing that nobody else really plans on being in their rooms at all, so it’s not like they’ll mind. You venture down the hallway and see a few art pieces. You smile to yourself. The house is really cute. You wouldn’t mind living somewhere like this when you find someone and settle down.
You look through all the rooms before choosing the one at the very end of the hallway. There’s a large four poster bed sitting in the middle of the room. There’s a bookshelf to the right of the bed and a nightstand with a cute little lamp on it to the left. Upon walking further into the room and scanning the entirety of it, you see that there’s a dresser against the wall opposite the bed. There’s a tv sat upon the dresser. To the right of that, there’s a door that leads to the bathroom.
Even if Harry does get on your nerves during this trip, you can always come in here and escape from it all. You smile at the thought. That was truly the first thing that had been seen as a positive since you had left your house that morning.
Since it was already pretty late, you decided to hop in the shower. Grabbing your clothes for the night and walking into the bathroom. As soon as the door is closed, you begin peeling off your clothes. Just doing that puts you in a better mood, you had been wearing those clothes for far too long. They probably didn’t smell the best, having sat on your body for an entire plane ride.
You fiddle with the temperature settings on the shower for a moment before stepping in. The moment that the hot water hits your skin, you let out a sigh of relief. You can feel the muscles that had tensed up throughout the day start to relax.
After spending what feels like an adequate amount of time in the shower, you towel off and get dressed, making your way to the bed. You crawl under the plush comforter and immediately feel the exhaustion rack your body. You turn off the lamp and roll onto your stomach, letting sleep pull you into the blissful state where nothing bothers you
*
Lexi busted into your room early the next morning, shaking you awake until you turned to face her.
“Do you need Sam and me to get you anything from the store?” She chirped, far too giddy for any normal person to be this early in the morning.
That makes sense, though, because Lexi is far from normal. She has this electric personality, usually bringing out the absolute best in everybody.
She has been your best friend since high school. She took you under her wing during your sophomore year, her junior year.
Since then, you have been through a lot together. Crushes, relationships, heartbreaks, you and her yelling at the guy or girl that broke the other’s heart. You helped each other pick up the pieces when nobody else was there to help do so.
You had been through dozens of friendships since sophomore year, but the only one that has been a constant is her.
Sure, the both of you had changed. But you had changed together and supported one another through every decision.
You had seen her cycle through different haircuts - she had chopped off her brown curls during her senior year and instantly hated them, choosing to let them grow back out to their rightful place, right below her shoulders - and hair colors - when she cut her hair, she also dyed it a bright red, which you’re still convinced is the real reason she hated the length of it as well. You had also experienced her ever changing sense of style, which was actually a plus for you most times, because when she changed her taste and cleaned out her closet, she’d give you all of the clothes that no longer satisfied her, leaving you with a new wardrobe at least once a year.
And she had been there for you too, sticking with you through your ‘whore phase.’ Which really just consisted of you dating the ‘hottest guy in school’ - he wasn’t really that hot - and then rumors spread the next year that you were messing around with the ‘hottest girl in school’ - that one was the one that got you the label, all the guys being mad that they couldn’t get with her, seeing as she was strictly into girls.
Lexi had also dealt with your late night calls, riddled with anxiety, not knowing what it is that you could possibly do with your future. She had calmed you down multiple times, talking through options with you. She was the reason that you came to realize that you wanted to be in the fashion industry in some way.
She had already known what she wanted to do, had been aware of her dreams since before she even made it into high school. She used to tell you all the time, “Y/N, one of these days, I’m going to own a Fortune 500 company.” And that’s exactly what she had done.
Which is the only reason that you got to be friends with all the people that you do. She’s also the one who introduced you to Harry, starting the rivalry between the two of you.
“No, I’m fine.” You groaned, rolling back over.
“Alright, sleepy head.” She chuckled, walking back out of your room and latching the door.
Once she’s gone, you reach over and grab your phone, checking the time. Seven A.M. You groan. Was she crazy?
You’re definitely not pleased that you’re up this early. However, you decided to go ahead and stay up. Your alarm would be going off in two hours, and you know that you’ll be grumpy if you go back to sleep just to wake up then.
You pull yourself out of bed, trudging to the bathroom. You run through all the steps of your morning routine and emerge from the bathroom, ready to take on the day.
Your way of taking on the day is going to be picking a book from the bookshelf and laying in bed until around ten, when you’re scheduled to go out to the water for the day.
*
It’s almost ten when you get the text from Sam.
We’re running late, you and H go ahead and get on the water, we’ll rent jet skis to get out there. X
You roll your eyes, of course they’d be late. And of course they’d leave you to fend for yourself with Harry.
You quickly get dressed in your dark blue bikini, the one that accentuates all your curves perfectly. You then throw an oversized band tee over your head, making sure that you’re covered enough before walking out and making sure that Harry's ready and has everything that he’ll need for the day. You’re really not in the mood to have him forget something and have to come all the way back to the house.
When you reach the living room, he’s already by the door, dressed in a pair of yellow swimming trunks and a cream colored tee. He has the yacht keys in hand, along with his phone. He already has the cooler and the bag Lexi had packed with supplies for the day (sunscreen, portable chargers, etc.).
You just stand there for a moment, looking him over, trying to ignore the feeling that you got in your stomach. You couldn’t place exactly what it was, but it had to be one of disgust, right? You couldn’t stand being around him, he was unnecessarily rude to you and you can’t tolerate him. That feeling couldn’t be anything good, it had to be disgust, or maybe it was resentment. Either way, it stopped you in your tracks.
“You coming or what, loser? It’s enough that it’s just us, do I need to hold your hand too?” He smirks.
You push down the rising feeling in your chest, and push past him, walking over to the passenger side of the suv that he had rented for the week.
He takes his sweet time strolling over, popping the trunk and placing the bag and cooler in before slamming it shut again. He unlocks the doors and you slide in, buckling your seat. You refuse to look at him, knowing that if you make eye contact with him, he’ll be more inclined to say something dickish to you.
The ride to the water is mostly quiet, the only sound in the car being the music from the radio. Some top 40s song that you haven't heard yet was filling the air, causing the silence between you and Harry to be slightly less awkward.
“What’re you gonna do when we get there?” He asks. You’re taken aback for a moment. Why was he even talking to you, let alone asking what your plans were for the day? Why was he being weird? “Because, honestly, you should probably tan, you look like a ghost.” There it is, the snide remark that was missing.
You scoff. “Harry, maybe don’t check me out every two seconds and you won’t notice.” You joke, knowing that he’s the last person on the planet that would ever check you out.
You expect him to hurl an insult back at you, tell you that he’d never check out someone as ugly as you, or tell you that he was only scanning to see what he could make fun of, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t say a word, and when you turn to him, you see that the tips of his ears are red and there’s a blush creeping up his neck. Was it really that embarrassing to be accused of checking you out?
You don’t push him, thankful for the returning silence. It only takes a few more moments to get to the docks anyway, so it’s not like the silence is stretched out for too long.
You grab the cooler and the bag this time, knowing that he’ll have to drive the yacht, and you don’t feel like hearing about how lazy you are because you didn’t do enough.
The walk to the boat is silent and filled with tension. It’s like both of you want to say something, are dying to talk to the other, but you won’t. You don’t want to talk to him, you just want to talk to someone. It’s not the same.
Once Harry gets everything ready, you climb onto the boat, setting everything down and pulling out the sunglasses that you had decided to bring at the last moment.
“So, where do you think we should go?” You ask, knowing that he’s been here before. He’ll know how far out you can go while still being able to anchor the yacht.
“Out on the water, duh.” His words are laced with sarcasm and it makes you want to throw him overboard. Too bad he’s the only person on this vacation that’s ever had enough down time to actually learn how to handle one of these things.
“You know what the fuck I meant, stop being an idiot.” You spit, hating how easily he got a rise out of you.
He chuckles before waving you off with a, “I know what I’m doing, darling, don’t worry about it.”
He seems to catch what he says as soon as it slips out of his mouth, his eyes widening and the blush coming back to his features. You choose to ignore it. You’d rather just go up to the deck and tan.
For a split second, you debate on whether or not you should lay out, knowing that he would think you were doing it because of the comment that he made. But then you realize that you don’t actually give a fuck about what he has to say or what he thinks with his final two brain cells.
So, you head up to the upper deck, stripping yourself of your shirt and laying out a towel for you to rest on.
You stay in that position, only moving to flip over so that each side gets an even amount of sun, until you hear jet skis approaching.
You push yourself up, wandering down to where Harry has set up his towel. Apparently he decided to sunbathe as well. It’s not like he needed it though, he has a tan that any woman would absolutely die for.
You quickly give him a once over, halting when you realize that he’s put a stupid hat on his head. And not even just that, he has it on backwards. What was he trying to do, absolutely kill you?
Here’s the thing, you hate Harry, sure. But you aren’t blind. You can see how attractive he is, how his tattoos run over his tanned skin, making you want to trace each detail with the tip of your finger, or more honestly, your tongue. His muscles always accentuate everything that he wears, regardless of whether it’s one of the custom Gucci suits or a random Nike tank that he threw on to go on a run. His face is damn near perfect, so much so that it makes you want to throw up. His cheekbones are high, jawline sharp. He was blessed with the dimples, which are only made even better by his eye crinkles. And God, his hands. His hands that are constantly adorned with rings, all of which could probably pay your rent for at least a year.
It’s really not fair. In all honesty, him being as completely flawless his physical attributes seem to be is absolutely not fair. You used to scoff at the fact that people were blessed with good looks. It was all genes, right? Wrong. Sure, Anne’s gorgeous and you’re sure that Desmond had to have had something going for him when Anne met him, but Harry? He came out to be a whole lot more attractive than anyone you had ever seen. And just to add on to everything, he was the person that you hated the most in the world.
You’re broken out of your thoughts by Lexi pulling up to the side of the boat and climbing in. She doesn’t even look at you, just walks farther into the yacht. You don’t think to question her, she’s probably annoyed by something that Sam said. But then you notice that Sam isn’t getting off his jet ski, does he plan on just not taking his shirt off the entire time?
Lexi comes bounding back to where you and Harry are standing, but she again doesn’t stop. She just keeps walking, clambering back onto her abandoned vehicle. You’re confused for a second, what’s going on? But then you see them, the keys dangling in her fist. You’d know those keys anywhere. They were put on Harry’s keychain the moment that he had picked them up. She has the yacht keys.
Before you can say anything about it, she’s driving off, yelling, “Have fun!” into the wind.
“They did not just-” You start, only to be cut off by Harry. Usually, you’d be annoyed by him, but this time, you have another source of irritation.
“Yeah, they just pulled an Outer Banks on us.” He sighs, walking back to where he had originally been laying.
“Are you not mad?” You try to stop your eyes from tracing the expanse of his back, but it seems to be impossible. The way that his muscles are flexing under the expanse of skin drawing you in.
“No, are you?” He sounds like he couldn’t care less, which is odd. Shouldn’t he be upset that he’s forced to spend an entire day alone with the person that he hates?
“Um, yeah.” You groan. Of course you’re mad, you don’t want to be here. How can he seem so calm?
“Why are you so fucking uptight all the time?” He blurts, catching you off guard. The words hit you like a train, knocking all the air out of your lungs. So this is why he hated you. You just thought that you gave him the wrong vibes or something, he seemed like the kind of person to judge based on that type of thing.
“What do you mean?” He looks over at you and rolls his eyes.
“I mean, why are you so uptight all the time?” For some reason, your chest tightens up and you feel like you’re going to cry. You’d known that he couldn’t stand you, that he’d rather not be around you, but hearing the real reason? Hearing what he really hates about you? That fucking hurts.
“Is that why you hate me?” At most, you had thought that maybe he just looked down on you, thought that you weren’t good enough to be part of the friend group because you didn’t own a fortune 500 company, or sell houses for the richest people in America, or sing to thousands upon thousands of adoring fans. But apparently not. Apparently he had an actual, legitimate reason, and for some reason, that stings.
“I don’t hate you.” You scoff and roll your eyes at him. Did he really think you’d believe that? “I just think that you’re uptight and you get on my last nerve.”
“You hate me, Harry. Don’t try to lie about it.” He can say what he wants, but people that don’t hate you don’t act the way that he does.
“I don’t hate you, I just strongly dislike you.” This makes you snicker. He’s such an idiot sometimes.
“That’s literally just you saying that you hate me with a different word choice.” He looks over at you, and you see the little tufts of curls sticking out from the side of his hat. The sight makes your chest ache, why does he have to be so fucking cute? Why couldn’t you be blessed with an ugly enemy?
“Whatever.” He sighs, brushing the conversation to the side.
You want to continue, but you’re almost scared to. You could just walk back up to the upper deck and continue tanning, or you could even go for a swim, but instead, you stay right where you are. You subconsciously start to play with a loose string on the shirt that you had slipped back on before coming down to Harry.
“I’m not uptight, by the way.” You say after a few moments of silence.
He scoffs, “Yes you are.”
“How so?” You’d love to hear him explain this one, even though it’ll probably either hurt you even more or infuriate you. But you’d like to know why he thinks you’re so uptight,
“You think you’re better than everyone, especially your friends. You have the money to do what you want but you turn your nose up at the finer things in life and give all of us dirty looks when we drink from the top shelf or buy something super expensive.” You’re speechless for a moment, but he doesn’t seem to be done, so it doesn’t really matter. “You act like there’s something better about you getting cheap tequila and wearing the same clothes over and over again. Well, think about it this way, yeah, I buy from the top shelf and I wear a lot of new clothes, but most of those clothes, I get sent. Most of them I don’t even pay for. Which honestly, you’ll probably find to be worse. But yeah, you’re uptight.”
After a moment, the words ignite a fire in you. “First of all, that shows how little you know about me, Styles. I don’t have the money to do what I want. I have money, sure. But not that much. I have enough money from my job to pay for rent, bills, food, and then have a little bit to splurge on myself.” You really don’t want to have this conversation with him, you don’t like to talk about your financial situation with anyone, let alone him. “But nowhere near enough to spend excessive amounts on alcohol or drop almost a grand on a striped t-shirt with a pig on it that’s literally the size of my fingernail. Not all of us can be big shot CEO’s or superstars.”
He looks shocked by your words, which just further added to your point. He didn’t know you, not at all. He pretended to know you, made assumptions about you, all of which seemed to make him hate you more and more.
“Well you still give us dirty looks.” You almost snort at his feeble attempt to save his argument.
“I literally don’t but okay. I don’t really care what you think about me. Hate me if you want to. You’ll be annoying either way.” You turn on your heel to get as far away from his as possible, but he stops you with his words.
“I’m not annoying.” This time, you actually do let out a chuckle. Him thinking that he’s not an annoying little prick is honestly better comedy than the specials they try to run on TV.
“The fuck you aren’t, Harry. All you do is make snide comments.” Who did he think he was? A saint?
“I do not. Don’t start your shit, Y/N.” He glares at you, but his looks don’t have the effect that he wishes this time, they just add fuel to the fire still burning bright inside of you.
“Don’t start my shit?” You snicker. He has to be fucking kidding. “You tell me how trashy I look in outfits that I think I look great in. You tell me my makeup looks like shit and that if I was trying to impress someone, I failed, even though all I do is put it on for myself. You tell me to stop trying so hard to get attention when I’m literally trying to blend in as much as possible.” You’re trying to hold the emotion back, to not cry in front of him, because you’ve already spent enough time crying over the things that he’s said. “You call me a slut when I have a one night stand like you don’t literally bring a different girl hom every fucking night. So I don’t wanna hear it, Harry.”
If looks could kill, the one that he’s giving you at the moment would have you six feet under. “You don’t fucking know me. I don’t bring a new girl home every night, you make me sound like a fuckboy.”
You roll your eyes. “I could make you sound a lot worse. And maybe there’s not one every night, but there’s at least one a week, and I have a one night stand what, maybe once every couple months? If even that?” You let out a shaky breath. “Yeah, maybe I don’t know you, but that’s not my fault. I didn’t make the choice to not know you. You pushed me away the second you met me, even though I did nothing to you. You didn’t let me know you. But you don’t know me either.” The tears are gathering in your eyes and threatening to spill onto your cheeks. You look up towards the sky, trying to make them subside. Once you feel confident enough in the fact that they won’t drop, you look back at him. “You’re not just annoying, you’re a dick. The shit you say? God, if you knew how much that shit can hurt someone.”
“Don’t come at me and say that any of that hurts you. You fire right back and then go on with your day.” The smirk that he has plastered on his face makes you want to knock him into a new dimension, but you compose yourself. He isn’t worth it.
“Yeah, of course I just let it roll off my shoulders while I’m around you. Have you ever thought about why that is? About why I seem to not care?” Your voice has slowly but surely become louder. “It’s because I’m not going to cry my eyes out and let myself wonder if maybe you’re right, that maybe I do look like shit and should cover up as much of my body as possible, right in front of you!” By the end, you’re screaming, and you don’t even care.
You take a deep breath and continue, “I can’t give you the fucking satisfaction. Because Lord knows that you’ll just hold that over my head too.”
That seems to have some sort of effect on him. His face falls almost immediately, that god awful smirk disappearing. His eyes seem to get softer, and a part of you wants to walk over and hug him. But you don’t. Of course you don’t. He’s the guy you hate the most.
“I didn’t know you felt that way.” He mumbles as you’re getting ready to head back to the upper deck.
“I’m sorry.” He tries, but you’re not going to let him off the hook that easy.
“Sorry doesn’t fucking cut it, Harry. It’s not like you're even sorry anyway. You don’t care about me, so don’t start acting like you do now.” With that, you turn on your heel and make your way back up to continue tanning.
Once you get back to your towel, you let the few stray tears fall. You hate that he has the power to make you cry, but you can’t help it. He just gets to you, regardless of how hard you try to guard yourself from him.
He comes up after a few minutes and you look over at him, waiting for an explanation.
“I’m going for a swim. If you need anything, I’ll be in the water.” He states, and you turn back around.
“Have fun.” You spit, the words laced with sarcasm.
He doesn’t reply. You hear his footsteps receding and then a splash signaling that he’s jumped off of the boat.
For some reason, you have a bad feeling in the pit of your stomach. At first, you ignore it, but then you stop hearing the sloshing of the water. You can’t help but let yourself get a little panicked. You may not be the biggest fan of the guy, but you can’t just let him drown.
You stand up from your spot on the towel and walk over to the side of the boat that you heard the initial splash come from.
You make your way back down to where you and Harry had fought. You grimace at the thought. Had that really been one of the last things he ever heard? No, you can’t think like that.
You look to your right and notice that all four life jackets are still hooked on the railing. Of course he didn’t take a life jacket. Anything could have happened to him and now you wouldn’t even be able to float. He could be sinking to the bottom, never to be found again.
Yeah, he can swim. He’s actually a really good swimmer, but he could have hit his head on the boat when he jumped in. Or he could have dove down under the water and ended up getting caught on something.
You rush over to slip one of the life jackets and grab an extra. The last thing that you needed was to find him and not be able to drag him back to the boat because he’s too heavy.
You jump in, the life jacket keeping you afloat. With there being no need to concentrate on not drowning, you focus all your efforts on finding Harry. You can’t see him anywhere in the general vicinity, so you start looking under the water as long as you’re able to.
You’re trying your hardest, but you can’t find him.
You start to panic. Suddenly you find it hard to breathe and the tears are streaming down your face. You immediately blame yourself. You should have just stopped earlier, should’ve realized that there’s a better time to argue with him. Maybe if you had just been a little nicer, the two of you could have gotten along for the day. Why didn’t you just stop? Why didn’t you at least accept his apology?
You’re pulled out of your thoughts by a strong pair of arms wrapping around you. You scream, not knowing who it could possibly be. You twist in their arm, realizing that it was only Harry.
You push away from him. “What the fuck, Harry? I thought you died!”
“Really? And you came out here to look for me?” He asks, and for a moment, you think he might be grateful, but you can already see the smirk forming on his lips. You choose to ignore it for the moment, though.
“Yeah, I couldn’t hear you swimming around anymore and I thought maybe you had hit your head on something or gotten pulled under or something like that. Where were you?” You’re trying to wipe the tears off of your face, but your hands are just as soaked as your face, so it does absolutely no use.
“The other side of the boat, why didn’t you just check over there?” His smirk is present in full force now.
“I don’t know, slipped my mind, I guess.” You mumble, knowing that this could have all been avoided if you had just looked on the other side of the boat.
“Seems pretty fucking stupid of you.” He chuckles.
You push even further away from him, throwing the life jacket you had brought for him in his face. “You’re such a fucking dick! Sorry that I cared too fucking much about your life to check the entire perimeter of the boat before trying to save you!”
You can’t believe him. You didn’t think of one thing, in the heat of the moment, and now you’re stupid? Wow. Okay, next time you’ll just let him drown.
You start to swim back towards the boat. He’s following you, but you don’t care enough to acknowledge it.
“I’m sorry. That’s not what I meant, I swear. I know I can be an asshole but I'm not that heartless.” You don’t even turn back to him.
“Problem is, Styles, you really are that heartless.” You spit, climbing back onto the boat, trying to get as far away from him as possible.
He clambers up after you, trying to get your attention. You actively ignore him, though.
He grabs your wrist, wrapping his fingers around the joint. You spin on your heel.
“Let me go, Harry.” you demand.
“Y/N, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.” His eyes are pleading with you, but you genuinely can’t care any less.
“Seems pretty fucking stupid of you.” You throw his words back at him.
His face immediately falls, not liking how the words hurt him. He deserves it though. All you were trying to do was help him and he was an absolute prick.
You storm back up to your towel, laying down and trying to dry yourself off.
Not too long after you head back up, he brings you a sandwich that he made with the supplies he had packed in the cooler.
“Thought you might be hungry.” He mumbles when he sits the plate down. He doesn’t wait for you to respond, just turns back and heads to where he came from.
You wait until he’s gone to eat, only doing so because it’s already made and you wouldn’t want the food to go to waste.
*
What seems like eons later, but was definitely only hours, Lexi and Sam get dropped off at the boat by a random couple you’ve never seen before.
You rush down to where they are.
“Did you guys get any closer?” Sam asks.
You just roll your eyes and stick your hand out. “If you don’t hand the keys back this fucking instant, I will not hesitate to jump off this boat and swim back to the docks.”
Lexi looks at you with wide eyes and hands over the keys. The moment that you have them in your hands, you stomp over to Harry and chuck them at him.
“Drive this stupid ass boat back to the docks, and don’t you dare fuck around or you’ll get thrown overboard and I won’t bother to come looking for you.” He doesn’t argue with you, just picks up the keys and makes his way to the wheel.
“What happened?” Lexi questions, but you just brush her off.
“Ask him, he’ll tell you with a fucking smirk on his face.” You walk over to the bench and sit down, not wanting to talk to anyone else throughout the trip back.
*
It only registers with you that you’ll have to ride back to the house with Harry after you get to the docks.
“I’m walking home.” You announce, knowing that it’ll only take fifteen minutes tops to get back to the rental.
“What are you talking about?” Harry and Sam ask at the same time.
You ignore Harry, turning back to Sam. “I’m walking back to the house. It shouldn’t take me long, and there’s no way in hell I’m riding with him.”
With that, you turn and start walking. The road is secluded, lined by trees.
After a few minutes, they drive up to you. Harry rolls down his window. “Y/N, come on, I’ll walk if it’s that big of a deal.”
You raise your hand, flipping him off. “Wouldn’t want to ruin your Gucci shoes.”
He sighs, rolling the window back up and continuing to drive. He knows better than to argue with you right now. There’s no way that he’ll win.
You slow your stride, wanting to prolong the walk as long as possible. You only speed back up when the clouds start to turn into a viscous shade of gray.
The one thing that could bother you more than Harry is thunderstorms. And you can tell by the state of the sky that a bad one’s coming.
*
You sneak back into the house, pushing the door open as quietly as possible. Thankfully, there’s nobody in the living room. Everyone seems to have retired to their rooms.
As you’re creeping down the hallway, you hear Harry talking to Lexi. Her door is slightly ajar and you can’t help but stop and listen.
“No, no. Lexi, I know. I fucked up. I shouldn’t have called her stupid. All she was trying to do was help me. God, I’m such a fucking idiot.” You can hear his voice waiver and you think for a moment that he might be crying. You quickly push the thought from your mind. Why would Harry be crying over you?
“Yeah, you did fuck up. Harry, this isn’t how you treat people that you care about.” Every trace of air leaves your lungs at that. Since when does Harry care about you? You want to blame it on him lying, but why would he? It’s just Lexi. And they have no way of knowing that you’re here. He must be telling the truth.
“I know, I know. We were arguing before then, She told me about how shitty I make her feel and it absolutely tore my heart into pieces. I don’t mean to make her feel that way.” You can’t deny that he’s crying, hearing the sob come less than a millisecond after he finishes.
“I know that, H. But she doesn’t, She thinks you get a kick out of hurting her. She really thinks you hate her.” You can visualize what she’s doing, knowing how she comforts like the back of your hand. She’s running her hand over Harry’s back, trying to soothe him. And if that doesn’t work, she’ll push his hair back and wipe the tears from his face, tell him that it’ll all be okay.
“I’m aware. But I don’t, I hate hurting her. That’s what I hate, not her.” If he doesn't hate you, then why does he act the way that he does?
“Then go show her.” You smile, Lexi knows you so well. She knows that you judge people off their actions. And that you don’t believe a word anyone says until they show you that their words actually mean something.
“Alright. I will when she gets home.” The determination in his voice makes your heart swell.
You hear him get off of his bed and you scurry to your room, not wanting to face him, and really not wanting to get caught eavesdropping. You slip inside and close your door just in the nick of time. Half a second after you’re out of sight, you hear his feet padding along the hallway to his room.
You sigh, a million thoughts running through your head.
Could he really care about you?
If he does, why is he so rude to you all the time?
How does he expect to make this up to you?
You decided to take a shower. Not only to get clean, but also to clear your head. The second the water hits your skin, you know that there’s no way this shower is going to be as quick as you had planned. For a long time, you just stand under the stream of water, letting your mind run rampant with the thoughts of Harry.
Is it a good thing that he could care about you? Sure, you see how he is with everyone else, and you’ve always craved to have that with him. And hating him is absolutely exhausting, most of the time you’d rather just fall into the easy conversation that he’s able to have with the rest of his friends.
But would it be that easy? Probably not. Nothing was ever that easy when it came to him.
Are you willing to work for it? If Harry takes the initiative and tries to show you that he does care, then yes.
Once you come to that conclusion, you realize just how long that you’ve been in the shower. Your body is starting to prune, and the water has gotten significantly cooler.
You step out and throw on the shirt that you slept in the night before, but not slipping on the shorts.
You open the bathroom door and trudge over to the bed, flopping down and switching the lamp off.
Usually, you could never fall asleep comfortably during storms, but after the day that you’ve had, your eyes are shut and sleep is overtaking you in mere moments.
*
Far too soon, you’re being shaken awake.
The first thing you notice is that it’s dark outside. Who in their right minds is waking you up before sunrise, you don’t know.
The second thing you notice is the chill of someone’s cold rings on your skin. The contact makes a shiver run down your spine.
You immediately roll over and face him. The sight of him is not great. He’s soaked from head to toe, water dripping on the floor. You almost have the nerve to scold him for not drying off, but then you realize that he has no reason to be wet. What did he do? What happened to him?
“When did you get home?” He asks, voice sticking in his throat.
“Earlier. Why are you wet?” Your voice is hoarse from sleep and you pray that you don’t sound revolting.
“Went out in the storm.” He shrugs. “None of us heard you come home. I guess when I checked in here earlier you were in the shower or something.”
“Why did you guys go looking? You could’ve just called or texted.” You say, then realize that you may have seemed ungrateful. “Not that I’m complaining, thanks for worrying about me.”
“Well, you see, Sam and Lexi thought you’d be fine. You know the way home, after all. They just thought you had stopped somewhere to cool off and wait out the storm. I went looking though, I was really worried. And I didn’t text or call because I, um, don’t exactly have your phone number.” He lets out a dry chuckle, running his hands through his hair.
Your heart swells. Harry went looking for you. He walked right out into a thunderstorm because he was worried that you were stuck out there by yourself.
“Hey, um, so I didn’t mean to eavesdrop or anything, but I heard a snippet of your conversation with Lexi earlier while I was walking to my room.” You gulp, hoping he doesn’t think you’re creepy or anything. “Did you really mean what you said?”
“Which part did you hear?” His question is laced with anxiety and he looks like he’s seconds away from passing out.
“Um, from the part where you said you fucked up and didn’t really hate me.” You mumble.
“Yeah, I meant every word. I also meant it when I said I was gonna show you that I care about you.” He looks up, meeting your eyes. You can’t help the feeling you get in your chest. This man just went out into the pouring rain, lightning falling all around him, just to look for you.
“I think you already did, H.” Regardless of how he treated you in the past. Hell, how he treated you in the past twenty four hours, you can’t help but see tha the really does care about you. Lexi and Sam, the two people in the house who were supposed to not hate you in the slightest didn’t even go looking, but the one person who was supposed to not give a fuck about whether you’re breathing or not did.
“Did you- you just called me H?” He stumbles, and a smile comes to your face.
“Yeah? So?” He said it like it was a good thing, but you could never be too sure with him.
“So, you’ve never done that before.” His expression is unreadable. Usually you can tell exactly what he’s thinking, but right now you’re coming up blank.
“Do you not want me to? I can stop saying it.” You wouldn’t ever want to do something that he’s uncomfortable with, you just thought that’s what everyone called him.
“No!” he blurts. “No, please don’t stop. I like the way it sounds coming from you.”
“Alright.” you grin “H.”
The smile that breaks out over his face is the biggest that you’ve ever seen. “Wait, what did you mean I already did?” He wonders.
“You just risked getting sick to go out in the pouring rain to try to find me.” Which reminds you, if he doesn’t get in a warm shower and some dry clothes soon, he’s going to catch something.
“It’s the least I could do.” His cheeks are turning a light shade of pink, and you really hope that it’s a blush and not him being cold.
“Yeah, but that shows me that you care, H.” You say, getting up from the bed and checking to see if you had brought the extra sweatpants and sweatshirt. Unfortunately, you hadn’t.
“I’m sorry, by the way. Like really sorry. I hate myself for what I said. I’m so stupid. You were just trying to save me and I was a dick.” You appreciate the sentiment, you really do, but right now, that’s not your concern.
“It’s fine.” You mumble, because, really, it is.
“No, it’s not.” He doesn’t want to believe it, but it really is. You wouldn’t be letting him drip excessive amounts of water on the floor if you were still mad at him.
“Yes, H, it is. Now come on, let me go get you some clean clothes. Go get in the shower, there are towels in the bathroom.” You’ve come to the realization that you’d have to retrieve his clothes, seeing as you hadn’t exactly planned for something like this.
“Y/n, it’s fine. I can just go take a shower in my room.” He tries, but you immediately refuse.
“No. You can take one in here so I know that you take one and don’t just change into dry clothes.” The look he gives you lets you know that was exactly what he was planning to do.
“I’m not gonna win this, am I?” You chuckle, pleased that he knows well enough to not argue with you any further on this.
“Not a chance, now get your ass in there.” You put your hands on his shoulders and nudge him towards the bathroom. You try your hardest to not think about the way his muscles ripple underneath your digits.
“Alright, alright. I’m going.” He concedes, trodding into the bathroom.
You wait until you hear the water running before you exit the room to find his clothes. You make the journey to his room, grabbing boxers and a pair of sweatpants from his bag. You don’t bother trying to find a shirt, knowing from the countless times that he’s stripped out of one to take a nap at a friends house that he never wears them to bed.
You make your way back to your room, sitting the clothes down on the small table sat outside the bathroom door.
His vast collection of rings is placed on the table as well. He must have taken them off and sat them there after you left.
Without thinking, your hand reaches out and picks up the rose ring that adorns his hand more often than not. It’s gorgeous, and you can’t stop your fingertips from running across the designs. The band is etched with leaves and vines, and upon further inspection, you feel that there’s a little caterpillar seemingly hidden on the inner part of the ring.
It’s heavy in your hand and you can't help but wonder just how much metal was used to make this ring. It’s obvious that it was hand etched, so your mind tries to picture how big the piece was before the carving started.
After a few moments, you place it back on the table, picking up his Cartier ring. You wonder for a moment how something so simple could cost the ridiculous price that it did. Sure, it’s absolutely gorgeous, but the price tag that you know it carries is enough to make the appeal fade. You don’t have the luxury of dropping thousands on a ring.
He opens the door and you immediately drop the ring, cheeks burning from being caught. You know how much he adores his rings, and you’re scared for a split second that you’ve overstepped, crossed a boundary that he wouldn’t be comfortable with.
All your worries are washed away, though, when he says, “Wear it.” He reaches over for his clothes, a towel wrapped around his waist.
You gawk at him. Was he serious? “H, I can’t do that.” You go to scramble away, before your eyes get caught on the way that the water droplets from the shower cling to him, the sheen making his tattoos even more vivid. God, what you would do to trace every line and seemingly miniscule detail.
He gives you a soft smile, and your heart speeds up to a rate that has to be unhealthy, especially since you’re sitting still, your back rimrod straight. “Yes you can. Go ahead, put it on.” He urges.
You sigh, picking up the Cartier ring that you had been admiring moments prior and slip it on your ring finger, that being the one you wear all rings on. You glance up at him through your lashes and you can see the way that his eyes seem to have lit up. You try to ignore the way your stomach flutters, the butterflies going absolutely wild.
He chuckles, looking down at your finger, where the ring sits, looking about five sizes too small. You join along, letting a lighthearted laugh slip through your lips. It truly was ginormous on you, but you expected no less. He does have large hands, after all.
“I’ve got a chain around here somewhere, keep the ring.” He says nonchalantly, like he’s not gifting you a fucking Cartier ring.
“Harry, no, it’s too expensive.” You can’t possibly accept this ring, so you really hope that he doesn’t fight you on it. You’re pretty sure you’d say yes to just about anything if he keeps looking at you like he’s just seen the most precious thing in the world.
“If you don’t keep it and wear it, I’ll never wear it again, so it might as well be worn by you.” He argues, giving you the stern look that you know well. It’s always the one that says not to argue back, that he’ll just continue pestering you if you do.
Knowing that the argument would go on for hours on end if you didn’t, you reluctantly agree.
He gives a triumphant smile before returning to the bathroom, clothes in hand.
A moment later, he comes back out into your room and your ability to breathe is gone. You swear he’s the most perfect person you’ve ever seen. Sure, you’ve seen how pretty he is before, but you’ve never let yourself truly see how perfect he is. Maybe you prematurely judged that article. Maybe they had a point.
The muscles in his upper body ripple under his tan skin, making your mouth damn near water. You avert your eyes from his shoulders to his chest, admiring the butterfly inked onto his abdomen. You had always adored that tattoo, at times you even wished that you had thought of the idea before he had. You see the way that the ferns underneath trace his lower stomach, the endings leading a trail right to the band of his sweatpants.
God, why would you get him gray sweatpants? At this view, your mouth actually does water, wondering how good he would look with even less on.
Him shuffling over to pick up his rings is what breaks you out of your trance, your cheeks heating up from the thoughts that had been running through your mind.
He places each of the rings carefully back on his hands, sans the Cartier ring. He left that one on the table, looking up at you with a smirk.
He begins to make his way out the door, but you stop him.
“H,” you give him your best puppy eyes when he stops and looks over his shoulder at you, “Will you stay with me? I’m scared of thunderstorms.”
“Are you really?” He doesn’t say it in a mocking way, it’s more in a perplexed way. You’re not confused by this in the slightest, as far as he used to be concerned, you’re not scared of anything.
“Yeah,” you admit, “but I also want to get to know you. Feel like we’ve missed a lot while hating each other.”
He sighs, “Never hated you.”
You smile, “I know, I know, but I thought you did. Made me not able to get to know you very well.”
“Alright.” He agrees. “Let me go put my rings up and get that chain for you and then I’ll stay.”
You wait patiently as he does just that, wondering why you had never just taken the time to talk to him before. Would it really have been that simple?
“Here you are.” He speaks when he reenters the room, walking over to the stand and placing the ring on the chain. Once he’s done, he gently sets it back down, ensuring that the chain doesn’t get tangled, and then trudges over to you.
He sits on the edge of the bed, probably just intending to stay until you fall asleep, and at first you’re fine with that. But then you start to get progressively more tired, and your clinginess starts kicking in, that fact that you’re touch starved not helping.
“H.” you groan, making his ears perk up and his eyes snap to yours.
“Hmm?” he wonders.
You make grabby hands at him. “Come cuddle with me.”
A smile breaks out on his face and your stomach does the flippy thing that makes your heart race.
He slowly crawls towards you, as if he’s giving you enough time to take back your words, to give him any sign that you regret ever asking him to come up to you. Once he’s right beside you and you’ve made no move to stop him, he slips under the covers and pulls you close.
You immediately sigh in content and place your head on his chest, the sleepiness taking over more and more as you listen to his heartbeat against your ear.
RIght before you completely drift off, you mumble, “You’re not as bad as I thought you were.” You hope he hears you, but you don’t have the time to check, sleep overtaking your body and pulling you under.
*
When you wake up the next morning, you let your eyes stay shut, not wanting to be greeted with the sunlight just yet.
You shift slightly and realize that you’re still laying with Harry. You can feel his solid chest under your head, your legs are tangled with his.
After a moment, you can feel him looking at you, “It’s rude to stare, H.” You joke, expecting him to laugh.
He doesn’t, though, instead he just whispers, “Can’t help it. You’re beautiful.”
You immediately blush, burning under the compliment. You’re still not used to being this close to Harry in general, but receiving compliments from him is even weirder.
“Can I tell you something?” You look up at him, waiting for him to accept your question.
“Yeah, anything.” He holds eye contact with you, your faces mere inches apart. You could very easily push yourself up and attach your lips to his, but you refrain, not wanting to push too far. You had just started really talking to each other last night.
“I never hated you either.” You say, the words barely audible. You’re ashamed of it, of the fact that you pretended to hate him, probably making everything worse than it had to be.
“Really?” He looks hopeful, like he’s praying that you’re not joking with him.
“Really. I just thought that you hated me. Figured that we should at least balance each other out.” You let out a humorless laugh, trying to make light of the situation, but you still can’t shake the guilt. You probably could have been lying in bed with him a long time ago had you just made it clear that you didn’t hate him.
“So all this time, neither one of us hated the other, but we both thought we did?” He has a smirk etched on his face, and a very large part of you wants to close the space between the two of you. You can’t handle the smirk right now, not when his chestnut curls are framing his face the way that they are. Not when his bare chest is still pressed against you, warming you up in the most delightful way.
“Basically.” You can’t help but giggle. The situation really is quite ridiculous.
You move to get up and he pouts, holding onto you and trying to get you to stay in his arms, he’s enjoying the warmth that you’re radiating.
“Where are you going?” He whines, making your throat constrict. He sounds so pretty when he whines.
“I’ve gotta pee, I’ll be right back.” You promise, knowing that the words will soothe him.
“Don’t go…” He tries giving you puppy dog eyes, but they won’t work this time, not when you can feel the urge to use the bathroom growing.
“I have to pee, but I promise I’ll come back to exactly where I was when I’m done.” You reach over to him and push a stray curl behind his ears, reveling in how soft that his hair is.
“Good, I wanna keep cuddling.” He mumbles, and you can’t help but feel the butterflies return yet again. You can’t believe that Harry was just begging you to stay curled up in bed with him.
It all seems a little off, having him in your bed, cuddling with you. Less than twenty four hours prior, you were screaming at each other on a boat about how much you can’t stand each other, and now neither of you do? You come to find out that the both of you were faking it this entire time? The entire situation is a little confusing, but you’re a lot happier with it than you were with being at each other's throats all the time.
Now that the two of you are being more honest with each other, you figure it’s probably time to start being more honest with yourself. And that starts with admitting the feelings that you’ve been suppressing for him.
You had seen how attractive he was the moment that you had even laid eyes on one of the numerous articles about him. You aren’t shallow though, that’s not what made you have the feelings that you had developed for him. You could also see just how nice he was to everyone else, how he lit up every room that he walked into. How everyone was always put into a better mood just by his presence. You began to fall for that version of himself, the one that he was with everyone else. You had caught feelings before he even said a word to you. There were times when you had been at the same party or event, and you’d be able to feel the effect he had on everyone else. And at first, that was intimidating, but then you felt a pull to him. Like the two of you were magnets and were destined to be together.
But then you actually talked to him, and everything went south.
Now, though, you’ve realized that he’s only like he is with you because he thought that you hated him. Which is absurd to you, but you were quite distant that night. You had been overwhelmed, thinking that you were inferior to him in every way that night. Maybe that’s why he thought that you hated him, because you didn’t show that much interest, because you seemed like you didn’t want to get to know him.
You don’t really know how to process that information. This entire thing had initially been your fault, had you just gotten over yourself and realized that you’re good enough to talk to him, all of this could have been avoided.
As you wash your hands and get ready to exit the bathroom, you can’t help but wonder what everything’s going to be like. How are you going to act around each other? Is it gonna change? Are you still going to bicker or are you going to act like everything’s perfectly fine?
You scoff at yourself, of course you’re still going to bicker, that’s who you are. Plus, nobody’s perfect, all friends argue about something at points.
When you come out of the bathroom he’s sitting on the end of the bed. You raise your eyebrows in question. “Thought we were gonna keep cuddling?”
He quickly rises when he sees you. “Had a slightly better idea.” He holds out his hand and waits for you to take it.
“I’m more of a touchy kind of person.” He starts after you take his hand. “I show that I care about people by physical touches.” He pulls you closer to him, wrapping his arms around your waist. “If we’re gonna tell them that we don’t hate each other, we’ve got to at least make it believable.”
“Stop making it sound like we’re pretending.” You laugh. “You just cuddled with me throughout the night. There’s no way in hell we hate each other. But yeah, I’m that way too, so I don't mind the touches.” You assure, pulling back and reconnecting your hands.
He gives you a reassuring look as you walk out of your room and into the sitting room. Sam and Lexi stop the conversation they were having immediately and look over at the two of you. Their jaws are on the floor within moments, obviously not believing what they're seeing.
“Why are you holding hands?” Sam blurts, breaking the silence that had blanketed the room.
“H, you only do that with girls you’re dating or girls that you’re friends with. What’s happening?” Lexi adds, a hopeful glimmer in her eyes.
“Wanna explain?” Harry asks, squeezing your hand.
“Sure.” You say.
You begin to explain it to them, making sure to get all the details. Harry’s mostly quiet beside you, only inputting anything when you forget something.
For a moment after you finish, the silence is back. Lexi and Sam look at you like you’re absolutely insane. After a minute of letting their brains process the information, they finally let smiles break out on their faces, jumping up from the couch to hug the both of you, excited that you guys can finally get along.
*
After a little while of the four of you sitting around and talking, it’s decided that everyone should go out on the yacht. This time, though, nobody will be stealing any keys.
Once you get out to the desired spot on the water and anchor the boat, you turn to Harry. “Hey, H?”
“Yeah, love?” He used the term like it’s no big deal, but it makes your stomach churn in the best way possible.
“Wanna go swimming? Promise not to think you’ve drowned again.” You chuckle.
Harry doesn’t seem as amused though, still feeling guilty about how he treated you. “Sure, promise not to be a dick again.”
You walk over to him, wrapping your arms around his neck and pressing your head into his chest. “I told you it was alright, H. Stop beating yourself up over it.”
He sighs, nodding his head. You grab his hand, pulling him along the deck to the edge of the boat.
“Wanna jump together?” You look over at him and see the smile break out across his face, the dimples and eye crinkles out in full force.
“Yeah, love, let’s do it.” Before you can think too much about the second use of the word, he’s counting down from three and then you’re jumping, body submerging into the crystal water.
If you had been paying more attention to anyone besides Harry, you would have seen the way that Lexi and Sam were caught up in watching you, wondering how in the world the two of you had done a full one eighty in less that twenty four hours. Sure, they wanted the two of you to get along, but they never expected you to get this close as fast as you did.
After a while of swimming around with Harry, you decide to get out and try to tan, seeing as not everyone can be actors that get paid to go swimming and get tans.
As you do so, you can feel Harry’s eyes on your body, but you choose not to acknowledge it. For a moment, you want to invite him to come tan with you, but you don’t want to make your feelings too obvious to him.
*
When it starts to get dark, Lexi proposes that everyone head back to the deck. You agree, ready to go home and get out of your bikini.
Harry tries to get you to drive the yacht, even trying to teach you, but to no avail, you have absolutely no skill when it comes to driving boats.
Once you get to the docks and clamber off the yacht, the group splits up, Lexi and Sam going towards their car while you and Harry head towards his.
“Are you hungry, darling?” He ponders once you’re settled in the car.
“I mean a little bit, why?” You reach over to turn on the radio, letting the soft sounds of music play through the car.
“I saw this cute little diner when I was looking for you last night.” He says, handing you his phone. “Plug up the aux cord and play something from Spotify.”
You scroll through his spotify, seeing that his work out playlist is just One Direction songs. You almost snort, but don’t want to give away the song you’re going to choose.
After another moment of scrolling, you turn the volume on the speakers all the way up, clicking on “What Makes You Beautiful” and letting the opening chords play through the car.
He smirks, looking over at you. “I hope you know that you’re expected to scream this with me.”
Your features mirror his, “Oh, trust me, I planned on it.”
*
When you reach the diner, you see just how cute it really is. But then you realize that the two of you had been in the car for almost twenty minutes, which arguably isn’t a long time, but to walk this far it would have taken forever.
“H, you walked this far looking for me?” You ask, although you already know the answer.
“Yeah. Well, technically, I walked further.” He blushes at his words and your heart melts in your chest. You can’t help but feel a little guilty, though. It had been storming, full on thunder and lightning every few seconds. He could have gotten hurt, yet he put his safety to the side because he thought that you hadn’t come home yet. If only you had put aside your pettiness and just let everyone know that you had arrived home safely, he wouldn’t have had to walk out in the storm at all.
You walk into the diner, shaking the thoughts from your head. Harry leads you to a booth near the back, one that’s placed right next to a window with a wonderful view.
Moments after you’re settled into your seat, a waiter comes up to you and takes your order. You notice that he’s paying special attention to you, and it makes you slightly uncomfortable, so you turn to Harry after reciting your order. “What do you want, baby?”
He gives you a questioning look but ultimately goes along with it, not even missing a beat. He gives his order to the waiter and waits until he walks away to turn back to you. “What was that about?”
“He was staring at me, looking me up and down, it made me really uncomfortable.” You say, looking down at your hands. “Thought if he believed we were together that he’d stop, which he didn’t.” You scoff at the audacity of the waiter. “Sorry if I ended up just making you uncomfortable too.”
He reaches over the table, taking your hands in his. “Hey, it’s alright. I wasn’t uncomfortable, just took me by surprise, is all.” He gives your hands a gentle squeeze. “If he comes back over and makes eyes at you, I’ll put him in his place, okay?”
You chuckle, nodding at him. Hopefully, the waiter would get caught up with other customers or would learn some manners so that he didn’t say anything, but either way, you knew you’d be okay.
“So, anyways, how can you be so bad at driving the yacht? It’s just a boat.” Harry asks, obviously trying to hold in a laugh.
“It’s really not that hard to be bad at it.” You defend. “I know plenty of people that can’t drive a boat.”
“Have they ever tried?” His eyebrows raise.
“No.” You mumble, flicking your eyes from his gaze.
“Well that explains that.” He pauses until you meet his gaze again. “No, but seriously, it’s way easier to drive than a car.”
You clear your throat. “I’m not that good at that either, H.”
“Really?” He looks embarrassed, sorry to have pushed you, like he was worried that he had gone too far.
You really didn’t mind, though, it’s not something you’re ashamed of, you just don’t really like driving. “Really. Ever noticed how I don’t drive anywhere?”
His eyes widen in realization. “Yeah, actually. If nobody else is available, I used to drive you places.”
“Yeah, well, that’s because I suck at driving.” You say, looking down at your hands, which you realize are still being held by his. “I just feel more comfortable with other people driving me around.”
You feel him squeeze your hands again, the rings biting into your skin slightly. “I thought maybe you just didn’t have a car.”
Your head snaps up, eyes meeting his. You flash him a dirty look and go to pull your hands from his. Before you can, though, he squeezes tighter, making you stop for a moment.
“Not like that! It’s just that everything you do is in close proximity to your house.” Your hateful look subsides. You had seemed to forget for a moment that you weren’t enemies anymore. You were… friends? “There’s not really a need for you to have a car unless you were to drive somewhere far away, but usually that’s only for work and you fly.” He continues.
“Well, yeah, that’s true. But I do have a car, I just prefer not to drive it myself.” He nods his head, seeming to understand enough to let it slide.
You fall into a comfortable silence, his hands still clutching yours. You let your eyes scan over his face before wandering back to his seafoam green eyes. God, his eyes are beautiful. Everything about him is beautiful, honestly.
You’re broken out of your examination of him by the waiter coming back with your food and beverage choices. He sits Harry’s down first, and then places yours down. He doesn’t look at Harry again, just looking at you as he asks if there’s anything else that’s needed. You see his eyes trail downwards, and you give Harry’s hand a squeeze, causing him to clear his throat at the manager.
“Excuse me, sir?” This catches the waiter’s attention, making him turn back to Harry. “Could you maybe not eye fuck my girlfriend right in front of me?”
The waiter balks at him, and then tries to deny it. “I- I wasn’t!”
“Let’s not lie about it, you definitely were.” His voice is raspy and it makes your heart rate pick up. “And you were making her uncomfortable, so how about you explain to one of your coworkers why you need to switch them tables, yeah?”
The waiter just nods, walking away without so much as a glance back.
“Thank you, H.” He doesn’t reply, just squeezes your hands to let you know you’re alright. He lets go to eat, but you can see the way that his jaw is clenched.
“Hey, what’s up, you’re tense.” You try to meet his eyes, but he won’t look at you.
“I just don’t like the way he was looking at you.” He mumbles.
You make the split second decision to walk over to his side of the booth and slide in next to him. He immediately makes room for you, lifting up his arm so you can crawl into his side.
“I’m alright, you know. I just don’t like being looked at like an object.” You whisper into his side.
“I know, love. I know you’re alright, you’re strong.” He squeezes you closer to him and you feel a smile come to your face. “And I don’t like it either. I’ll punch him next time he looks at you like that.”
You reach up and run your hand through his hair, smiling at him. He leans into your touch, and that’s when you realize just how close you are. He’s got you pulled into his side, one of your thighs is slung over his, and your faces are what seems to be only a few millimeters apart.
Every part of you wants to close the difference, to press your lips to his. Every fiber of your being wants to know what his lips feel like, wants to know how they taste. You don’t lean in, though, not wanting to ruin what the two of you have going on.
You look back down, pulling your food over to you and finishing your meal.
After the check is paid, he drives you home, the only sounds in the car being the radio and the tap of his fingers against the steering wheel.
*
The next day flows by smoothly, everyone just chilling on the yacht and going for a swim.
When you get back to the house that night, though, Sam and Lexi come to your room to tell you that they’ll be leaving early, babbling on about some really good sale on jeans or something. They ask if you want to go with them but you politely decline, having absolutely no interest in jeans that, even when on sale, probably cost thousands of dollars.
They bid you a goodnight and let you know that they’ll be leaving early in the morning, most likely before you get up.
You wish them a safe trip and then roll over in bed, thinking about what this would mean. It would just be you and Harry for a few days. Would you spend a bunch of time together? Would you even talk that much?
You don’t know how to spend that much alone time with Harry, mostly because you’ve only been close enough to spend any amount of time with him for a few days.
You’re anxious, probably more than you have been in a while. You can feel your hands sweating and your breath getting caught in your throat.
Suddenly, a knock comes at your door and you immediately yell, “Come in!”
You expect it to be Lexi or Sam, but it’s Harry.
“Hey, don't you mind if I hang with you?” He asks, fiddling with his fingers. “I’m kinda bored, plus the other night I saw that mini puzzle you brought so I was thinking maybe we could do that?”
You smile at his observational skills. “Yeah, it’s no problem. Come on, I’ll get the puzzle.”
You walk over to the carry on that you had packed and grabbed the puzzle. It’s only a hundred pieces, but each one is so small and oddly shaped that you had never been able to get the placement right. You had figured you’d try to do so on this trip, but you hadn’t seemed to have the time.
You trudge back over to the bed, sitting down a piece of cardboard that you had found in a storage closet when exploring the closet a few days prior, and spread out the pieces.
You immediately get to work, him doing the same. Every time he would reach to grab a piece, his rings clack together, and you can’t help but gaze at them. You love the way that the rings look on him.
He looks over at you, catching you staring at his hands. He chuckles, before hopping off the bed, seeming to remember something.
“I’ll be right back.” He promises, not waiting for your response before coming back with one hand behind his back.
“Hold out your hand.” He demands, and you do so, holding out your right hand. “No, no, palm side down.” You flip your hand over and then he slides a ring onto your right hand.
After it’s placed on your hand, you look down, realizing that it’s a replica of his rose ring, but this one actually fits you, which means that he would have to have bought it specifically for you.
You can feel your chest tightening and your eyes begin to get a little blurry. His gesture is so cute and all you want to do is wrap him up in your arms.
“H, when did you even get this?” You say, gesturing to the ring.
“The other day after everyone went to bed, I drove to London and got it.” He says, shrugging his shoulders nonchalantly. “I saw you looking at it the other day, figured I’d get one that would fit you so that we could match.”
“Thank you, H. That’s so sweet of you.” You wrap your arms around him, and without thinking, you crawl into his lap, straddling him. “How do you even think of things like this?”
He doesn’t say anything about the way that you're sitting, just wraps his arms around your back and pulls you impossibly closer.
“When I’m not pretending to hate people, I’m actually pretty smart.” he chuckles, and you can feel the vibration of the action throughout your body.
“Don’t get too ahead of yourself, Styles.” You mumble into his neck. “You’re still an idiot.”
“Hey!” He whines, pushing you off of him only to tackle you into the mattress, tucking his head into the crook of your neck.
Subconsciously, you raise your hand up, digging into his hair and beginning to play with it. Neither of you say anything, just enjoying each other’s presence. After a while, you start to feel Harry getting heavier and heavier, his breathing getting more even.
You try to stay in that position, loving the feeling of him wrapped up on you, but he’s a lot bigger than you and all the muscle he’s put on makes him a lot heavier than you can handle, the weight being too much on your chest and making you feel like you can’t breathe.
You roll him off of you, trying to be as gentle as possible so that you don’t wake him up, but you fail epicly. The second that you’ve got him completely off of you, he grabs your waist, pulling you over to lay on him like he was on you moments prior. Your legs are tucked between his, your face pressed into his neck. His warmth is radiating into your skin and his scent is swirling around you.
“Night, love.” He mumbles, angling his face down to kiss the top of your head.
“Night, H.” You murmur back, pulling the blanket over the two of you.
You focus on the way that his chest feels rising and falling underneath yours. You can feel his heartbeat, the way that it seems to be slightly faster than usual. You don’t think too much of it, though, he’s probably just hot.
Slowly, your thoughts begin to slow down, the prospect of a good night’s sleep pulling you further and further under until you’re dreaming about Harry.
*
When you wake up the next morning, you’re sweating. At first, you don’t think much of it, you were sandwiched between Harry and a wool blanket, after all. But then you realize that there’s something off with the way that Harry feels.
He’s radiating more heat than he normally does, which is already more than most people do.
You’re worried that he could be sick, so you scurry to the bathroom to find the thermometer that you saw when you first started staying in the house.
You make quick work of cleaning it off with an alcohol wipe, not wanting to risk him getting anything worse than he possibly already could have.
You shake him awake, ignoring his groans of protest, and make him put the thermometer under his tongue. You press the button and wait for it to beep, signifying that it’s done.
You feel like you’re going to be sick when you look at the digital number that’s being presented to you. 102 degrees. That’s not ideal.
“Hospital, H. Now.” You demand, not giving any room to argue on this. There’s no way that you’re going to let him lay in bed with a fever when you don’t even know what’s causing it. Maybe some people would, but you refuse. There are countless reasons why he could have this high of a fever, and each of them had different recommended treatments. You weren’t going to risk it and treat him for the wrong thing, only to make something worse.
He grumbles a “no” and you shake your head. Of course he would fight you on this.
“I’m not risking your life, H. Get the fuck up.” You wait for a moment, watching him shake his head no again. Once you know he won’t get up, you wrap your forearms underneath his arms and lift, dragging his lanky figure out of bed.
Once he’s completely off the bed and standing next to you, you lift his arm, wrapping it around your shoulders so that you can support his weight. You grunt from the added stress on your shoulders.
You begin to make your way out to the car, making sure to stop on the way out the door to grab the keys from the hook and a water bottle from the fridge for him.
You unlock his car and all but shove him into the passenger seat, leaning across him and buckling his seatbelt for him.
Once that’s completed, you rush around the car and slip into the driver’s side, buckling your own seatbelt before inserting the key in the ignition and turning the car on.
“You hate driving, you can’t get me there.” He tries to argue, and you just laugh.
“You couldn’t drive even if you wanted to. Plus, I can get you there. I’ll be fine.” There’s no way that you were going to chicken out of this. Sure, you hated driving, but you hated the idea of something happening to him even more.
“No, y/n, it’s fine, if you don’t like driving you shouldn’t have to drive me.” The fact that he’s thinking of you right now, of all times, makes your heart rate quicken. How was he always so sweet? “I’ll be alright. I’ll just sweat it out.”
“No, Harry, you will not just sweat it out.” You say, rubbing a hand over your face. “You could die if it gets too much worse. There could be something seriously wrong. And you’re probably like this because you went out in the rain looking for me.” Sure, it’s been a few days, but that doesn’t mean that it wasn’t from that. The symptoms could have just not been showing up until now. “And trust me when I say that I am most definitely not letting you die.” You give him a look when he starts to protest again.
The drive to the hospital is shaky. There’s a few times where you think you’re going to freak out, but each time, Harry reaches his hand over and squeezes your knee in reassurance and you instantly feel your breathing even out again.
Thankfully, you make it there safely. Throughout the trip he had drank the entire water bottle and he seemed to be more alert than he was when you woke him up. You still come over to his side of the car and help him hobble into the hospital, though, not wanting him to accidentally fall and break anything.
You sit him down in one of the chairs and walk to the counter to check him in. You come back with the paperwork that the lady handed you, and you’re surprised to know that you know the majority of the answers. You only have to pester him when you get to the section about his family’s medical history and when you need him to sign the paperwork.
You quickly go back to the counter to give her the pages back. She smiles and assures you that she’ll get everything entered and that the doctor will be right with him.
The doctor comes out and calls his name. He takes one glance in her direction and then grabs your hand. “Y/N, can you come back with me?” He gives you the best puppy dog eyes that he can manage.
You chuckle, agreeing immediately. How could you ever say no to that face?
Once you get to the room that the doctor led you too, she begins to ask a few questions. After answering them, she takes Harry’s temperature, the thermometer that she uses reading the same as the one at the house did. She decided to do a few tests, some of which nearly make Harry throw up, and then comes back with the results a little while later.
“It seems like he has the flu. Nothing too serious as of right now, though. I’ll give you a prescription to get filled for him since it doesn’t seem like he’ll be doing much for himself until his fever goes down, at least.
You smile, thanking her for letting you know, and gather Harry and the prescription paper. On the way back to the house, you drop off the prescription and wait for it to be filled.
“Can I go in and get some candy?” He asks as you get out of the car to go pick up the medicine.
“No, H,” You see him pout at you, so you quickly continue, “but I can go in and get it for you.”
The smile that he gives you makes your world slow. All you want to do for the remainder of time is just make him smile and bask in the light that it gives off. But you can’t focus on that right now, you have to go in and get his candy and his medicine and then get him back home.
He tells you what he wants, whining about how it’s his absolute favorite candy. You go buy it for him, deciding to get a few of them so that he’ll have some for later, hopefully for when after he feels better. You also get him another water bottle, knowing that he’ll have to take his medicine once you get back to the car.
You quickly go to the counter, giving them his information and then walking back out to the car.
After paying for everything, you rush back to the car and give him his medicine. After he’s taken it, he begins to munch on his candy as you drive the both of you back to the rental.
Once you reach the rental, the ride back goes much smoother than the one there, you take him back to your room and lay him on the bed.
“I can’t sleep in here.” You frown, wondering why he’s had the sudden change of heart. “You’ll get the flu too.”
You roll your eyes at him. “I’ve slept in the same bed as you already.” You sit on the bed next to him, reaching up and combing your hair through the sweaty tendrils. “I literally woke up on top of you, if I’m going to get it, I’ll get it whether you sleep in here tonight or not.”
He grumbles, but ultimately doesn’t put up that big of a fight, knowing that if he doesn, he’ll lose.
“Do you wanna take a shower?” You mumble, still letting your digits card through his hair.
“Are you trying to tell me I stink?” He tries to laugh but it comes out more as a cough and you can’t help but want to wrap him up in your arms and take any and all of the pain that he could be feeling away.
“No, you actually smell really good for being sick, but you have a lot of dried sweat on you from your fever.” You smile down at him, seeing him give you a lazy, lopsided grin in return.
“Can I take a bath?” He asks, eyes lighting up at the prospect of being able to sit down but still get the sweat off of him.
“Yeah, that’ll work, bubs.” You don’t even think about the pet name until it slips out of your mouth. You want to take it back, scared that he’ll hate it.
All your worries, along with any trace of regret, washes away when you see his smile grow, the dimples popping deep into his cheeks.
“If I put bubbles in the water so that you can’t see anything, will you wash my hair?” He questions, and there’s no way that you’re going to say no to him. And you realize that it’s not just because he’s sick. It’s because it’s just so easy to give into him, to want to give him everything that he asks for, just about no matter what it is.
You’re not going to let him know just how easily that you want to agree with him, though, so you drag it out just a little longer. :You’re really milking this for all it’s worth aren’t you?”
“I mean, I guess. I don’t know.” He sighs, looking like he’s trying to find the right words. You stay quiet, waiting for him to find the ones that he’s searching for. “I just really like it when you play with my hair, and I’m assuming that it’ll feel even better if you were to wash my hair.” His cheeks flush crimson. “Just really like having your hands in my hair, I guess.”
You feel like you’re going to explode with the overflow of emotions that you’re currently experiencing, so you decide not to drag it out any more than you already have, knowing that you’ll regret it if you do. “Fine, yeah, H. I’ll wash your hair for you.”
The way that his eyes light up makes it all the more worth it. You’d do anything to see him have that look on his face more often. You used to see a lot more of that, before things started happening that scared him. You found yourself wishing, more often than not, that he had never had someone find his address, and that he had never had people hold him at knife point. He had been slightly less open after that, kind of like he didn’t trust that many people anymore. And, even though you hadn’t admitted it since you were pretending to hate everything about him, you had missed the way that his eyes would sparkle at the simplest things, and how he would be the first to jump at the idea of a night out.
“Thank you!” He lunges up from his spot on the bed to hug you, wrapping you in his arms and not letting go for a moment.
After letting him keep you in his embrace for what you deem is long enough, you push him towards the bathroom.
“Go get the bath ready, I’ll go get you some clothes.” You nudge him, but then realize something. Before you walk out, you take his hands in yours, sliding his rings off this nimble fingers one by one until they’re all in your palms. “I’ll take these to your room and put them up, alright?”
“Yeah, do you still have yours?” You nod, pointing to the rose ring on the dresser, sitting right next to his Cartier ring on the chain. He smiles, then waddles into the bathroom.
You make your way to his room and rifle through his suitcase, trying to find something that isn’t another pair of sweatpants or swimming trunks. You want him to be comfortable but not too hot, and you don’t know if he’d be comfortable in just boxers.
You end up finding a pair of shorts at the very bottom. You grab those and some boxers, along with a hoodie of his for yourself, before heading back to your room.
You don’t hear the water running when you enter/ “Are you ready, H?”
“Yeah, you’re good!” You slip on the hoodie before entering the bathroom. You place his clothes on the counter, out of the way from everything, and come sit on the floor next to the tub.
The water and the bubbles come up to the bottom of his butterfly tattoo. You trace it with your eyes, and before you can even think about what in the world you’re doing, your hand is reaching out to trace it. You stop yourself halfway there and look up at him, your cheeks aflame.
“Go ahead.” He urges. “You can touch.”
You let your hand travel the distance to his abdomen. You begin to trace the lines of the butterfly. The wings, the patterns, the antenna. You can feel the muscles in his stomach clench as you venture towards the bottom of the wings, so you travel back upwards with your hand.
After you finish tracing what seems to be every line in the tattoo, you look up at him, slowly moving your hand north, but stopping slightly above the butterfly. Once he gives his nod of approval, you move up to the swallows, loving how they look on him.
Before you’re even done with those, he nods again, urging you to continue. So, you do just that, tracing the lettering on his body and moving down his arm to run over the ship, the rose, the hands. You trace everything that you can, ending at the little cross tattooed on his hand.
“You missed a few.” He rasps, and you quirk your brow in confusion. The only ones that you know of that could have been missed are the ones submerged under the water.
He doesn’t say anything, just lifts up his arm to show you the tattoos. You immediately reach back out, tracing over the bird cage and the masks, along with the lettering there. You can feel his body shiver at your touch, and you can’t help but mimic the action. The feeling of his skin under your own is electrifying.
“They’re all so beautiful, H.” You whisper, not completely trusting your voice yet.
“Thank you.” His voice isn’t much higher than yours.
You shake your head, trying to rid your head of the thoughts of him. You clear your throat and reach for the shampoo bottle. You pour a generous amount into your hand and begin to lather it into his hair, massaging his scalp with your fingers as you do so.
He lets out a sound that’s a mix between a pleased sigh and a moan and you almost choke on the air that you’re filling your lungs with.
“Feels so good.” He mumbles, letting his eyes slip shut. You can’t help but smile at him, the way that he looks so peaceful, so relaxed and utterly himself that all you can do is grin at him.
“Does it?” You inquire, knowing for a fact that it does, just wanting to keep the conversation going for a little longer. There’s something about the raspiness in his voice that makes you never want to stop hearing it.
“Yeah, feels better than just about anything else I’ve ever experienced.” This time, he lets out a groan that’s so close to a growl that you have to take a moment to breathe.
“I’m glad.” You all but squeak.
After you rinse his hair out and begin to apply the conditioner to his hair, he looks up at you. “Hey, mind if I tell you something?”
“Yeah, go ahead, bubs. You can tell me anything.”
He seems to mull it over in his head for a moment and then speaks up again. “Promise not to get weird or anything?”
You’re beginning to get slightly worried. Part of you is scared that he’s going to tell you that he killed someone and now he needs help hiding the body or something extreme like that. Although, if he asked, you definitely would help him, that’s just the kind of friend that you are. “Yeah, I promise.”
He looks up at you through his lashes, making sure that he’s holding eye contact with you. “I kinda, um, like you.”
You smile, he’s so dramatic for no reason. “I kinda like you, too. You’re not as awful as I thought you were.”
“Thank you, but that’s not really what I meant by that.” He has a slight grimace on his face, like he’s scared that what comes out of his mouth next will hurt him in some way.
“What did you mean then?” He still seems hesitant, scared even. “You can tell me, bubs. I don’t bite.”
He takes a deep breath, settling himself. “I meant, I have feelings. For you.” You feel like your heart stops. All the breath is sucked from your lungs. Harry Styles? Likes you? “I don’t know for sure when they turned from ‘oh, she’s pretty and seems sweet’ to ‘I Wish that she didn’t hate me so maybe I’d have a chance’, but they did.” You feel him reach out and take your hand in yours, and all the emotions running through your body threaten to spill out. “And, trust me, I know that I treated you like shit and I don’t deserve you or your love but I just had to tell you.”
“Are you telling me that Harry Styles has a crush on me?” You ask, slightly chuckling.
“If that’s what you wanna call it, yeah.” He says, cheeks getting more and more red by the second.
You shake your head, not wanting to get too excited. He had a fever. Fevers can cause confusion and can make people think things that they don’t mean. “You don’t mean that. You have a fever, you'll feel different when you wake up in the morning.”
His face falls, and you immediately want to take back what you said. “I promise you that I won’t.”
“How do you know that?” You don’t think you could just forget the words that he’s saying to you.
“Because I didn’t just start feeling this way.” Relief surges through your body, and you can feel the tears start to prick at your eyes.
“Really?” You really won’t be able to handle it if this is all a side effect of the fever.
“Really.” He assures, brushing his thumb in soothing circles on your hand.
“Well, lucky for you, I happen to understand why you acted like you did and I think that you deserve me. I’m the one that doesn’t deserve you.” You had never thought that Harry would like you as any more than a friend, even before you actually met. All your friends had told you that you guys would be great together, you just had to meet him. You always had your doubts, though.
He scoffs, “Yeah, alright, we can pretend that’s true. You’re literally perfect.”
Your heart expands at his words, how does he always seem to know exactly what to say? “So are you, H. I’ve seen it for a long time, just didn’t wanna be the girl that loved you even though you hated me.”
HIs eyes widen and a smile covers his face. “You love me?”
“I’m getting there.” You admit.
“Come here.” He gestures for you to get closer.
You scramble towards him, getting as close as possible without physically climbing into the tub.
He leans in, closing the gap between the two of you, letting his lips ghost over yours for a moment before you pull back.
“Let’s rinse out your hair and then finish up and I’ll kiss you for real, alright?” There’s no way that you’ll be able to kiss him the way that you want to while he’s still sitting in the bathtub.
He nods and lets you continue. You rinse the conditioner out of his hair, then get up to leave the bathroom so that he can get dressed. Before you can walk away though, he grabs your hand and pulls you back. He makes a kissy face and you lean down to peck his lips, knowing that he’ll just pout until you give in.
Moments after you exit the bathroom, he walks out looking completely perfect. You can see the tiger tattoo on his thigh, and you make the mental note to kiss over it later.
“Kissy?” He asks, coming towards you and wrapping his arms around your waist.
You sling your arms around his neck, slotting your hands into your hair. You nod, leaning in to kiss him, for real this time.
He wastes no time in kissing you back, this one holding a lot more passion than you ever thought a kiss could hold.
Your lips are molding with his, fitting together like they’re the missing piece that you needed to complete your puzzle.
His tongue slides over your bottom lip, asking permission, which you gladly give, opening your mouth and letting his tongue explore.
You pull away after a moment to catch your breath. Looking up at him, you see everything that you had been missing. “Promise me this doesn’t change when we go back to our real lives.”
He brings his hand up, cupping your cheek. You lean into your touch. “I promise you that, as long as you’ll have me,” he kisses your forehead, “I’ll always be right here to tell you that you’re beautiful,” your temples, “that you’re all I can think about.” your cheeks. “And, as long as you’ll let me, I’ll kiss you over and over again.” He finally lets his lips glide over yours again.
After he pulls away, you breathe, “Good, because I don;t think I’d be able to go back to normal after that.”
“Neither could I.” He assures you. “Come on, love, let’s go lay down.”
With that, you crawl into bed next to Harry, cuddling into his side. After a moment, he decides you're not close enough, pulling you in until your head is on his chest and your leg is thrown over his thighs.
You smile in content as he kisses your forehead. Who would have thought that you’d be in this place, with him? Never in a million years could you have dreamed this up for yourself. And honestly, if someone had told you a mere weeks ago that you would be kissing Harry and falling asleep next to him, you would have laughed in their face, probably even asked them if they had gone mental.
But now, here you were, laying cuddled up with the man that makes your entire world seem to light up, and you couldn’t be happier. It had been a rocky road getting here, but you would go through that day on the yacht a million times as long as you ended up back here, held tightly in his arms.
Listening to the beat of his heart, to the way that his breaths are evening out die to the comfort that having you near him brings, you drift off to sleep
*
You’re being shaken awake much too earlier, and you turn to gripe at whoever chose to wake you up. But then you realize that it’s Harry, and your face immediately softens.
“Hey, you.” He says, pecking your nose.
“Hey, why are we up so early?” You grumble.
He chuckles. “We’ve got a plane to catch.” You audibly groan, probably a lot more dramatic than it has to be. “Come on, it’s time to get out stuff together. Gotta go back to the real world.”
You sigh, not wanting to go, but you know that you have to, so you stumble out of bed and get all your stuff together.
You scramble to ensure that everything’s ready, even making sure that you clasp your new necklace on your neck and slide the new ring on your finger.
Once you zip up your bag and stand up, wracking your brain to make sure that everything is in order, Harry comes up behind you and wraps his arms around you. You immediately lean into his embrace.
“You look really fucking cute in my clothes.” He mumbles, pressing his face into your hair.
“Why thank you, never got your tour hoodie, thought I’d see how it looked.” You smirk, knowing that you had, in fact, received a tour hoodie, you just hadn’t worn it yet.
He says nothing about that, though, just groaning, “It looks fantastic.” before pushing away from your body.
“Are you ready?” He asks, looking over all the packed bags, and then over to you. HIs eyes stop at the ring around your neck, heart swelling in pride that you’re wearing his ring.
“Yeah, don’t wanna go, but I know I have to. I’ve gotta go back to work.” You groan.
“I meant what I said last night, you know?” He blurts, and you can’t help but feel relieved. He had been acting like he meant it, but the verbal confirmation made you feel even better.
“Which part?” You say, playing coy.
“All of it.” He promises. “Every single word.”
You hum in content, walking back into his arms and pressing into his chest. “I mean what I said too.”
You pull away after a moment, walking to pack your stuff into the car.
After dropping off the rental car and going through the motions of getting ready and boarding the plane, you finally sit down, right next to Harry. This time, though, you aren’t dreading the plane ride.
*
After the plane lands, Harry throws you his keys, telling you that Sam and Lexi were supposed to have dropped the car off with his extra set an hour prior. He assures you that he’ll get your luggage.
“I can tell you’re tired, sweets, go on to the car, okay?” You nod in agreement before heading out to the parking lot to find his car.
On the ride back to your apartment, you doze off in the passenger seat, his hand on your knee and fingers tracing random patterns lulling you to sleep.
He wakes you up by kissing all over your face, and you must admit that it’s probably the best way for someone to wake you up. Well, not just anyone, just him.
He gets your bags from the trunk, walking you to the door. As you’re about to go inside, he kisses your cheek, letting his mouth linger there for a moment. “Can I come over later? Gotta put up my stuff and check the mail, but I wanna see you again.”
You smile. You’d like to see him again, too. “Yeah, sure. Just come over whenever.”
He leans down and gives you a quick peck on the corner of your mouth before heading home.
In the time that you’re alone, you put everything away that you ended up not wearing and throw the dirty clothes in the wash.
As you’re fixing yourself dinner (which is arguably enough for two, but that’s just a coincidence...maybe), you hear a knock on your door.
You rush over, checking through the hole to make sure that it’s Harry. When you open the door, he immediately sweeps you up into a hug. “God, I missed you.”
“You were gone for less that three hours, H.” You breathe.
“I know, but I still missed you.” He pulls back from you slightly, still keeping his arms wrapped around your waist. “Am I not allowed to miss my girl?”
Your heart skips a beat. “Your girl?”
“Um, fuck, I- you don’t have to- don’t feel pressured.” You cut him off by placing your lips on his.
“Calm down, H.” You urge.
“It’s just, I don’t know, do you want to be my girlfriend?” He asks, eyes looking down between the two of you at his shoes.
“God, yes.” You clear your throat, realizing how desperate you probably sounded. “I mean, yeah. But I’m not gonna be able to be like all your other girlfriends were.”
“What do you mean by that?” He wonders.
“I can’t just drop everything and come with you while you’re on tour.” You give him an apologetic look. You know how much he loves having his girl with him while he’s performing. “I can’t go on excessive vacations with you, and by excessive I mean for months at a time. I don’t get paid to stand around and look pretty like the rest of them did.”
“I don’t want you to be like the rest of them were. I want you to be you.” He says, stroking your cheek with his hand. “Plus, I mean, you could technically come on tour with me as part of my crew if you wanted.” He suggests. “Be one of the photographers, or help me get everything ready. That could be your new job if you were interested.”
“Harry, I couldn’t ask you to do that.” You argue. “That’s just another person that’ll have to be paid. I didn’t do anything to get those positions anyway.” You know that all of the people on his crew were exceptionally talented, and that just wasn’t you.
“You let me see how wonderful you are at photography, that’s what you did.” You’re surprised that he remembers that. You had only shown him your work once. And it was the only time when the two of you were enemies that he didn’t have anything rude to say.
“H…” You’re still not sure about the idea. Of course, it would be fun, but you really have no business being there.
“Please? I don’t think I can go months on end without seeing you.” He whines. “I could barely go three hours.”
“Fine.” You give in. “But only if I get to stand in the audience and watch the show at least a couple times.” You had always wanted to see one of his shows from the audience, to see how well he interacted with everyone.
“Deal.” He says without hesitation.
“Alright, fine. I’ll go.” You concede. He does a mini celebration, shimmying his body slightly.
“You wanna go tell our friends after dinner, baby?” You suggest.
“Baby? I like it.” He says, blushing because of the pet name.
“I mean, you are my boyfriend now.” You reason, but also just liking the way that it sounds coming out of your mouth.
“That’s true, love. And yeah, let’s go tell our friends after dinner.” He leads you to the kitchen, fixing the both of you a plate and sitting down with you to eat.
*
After you clean up from dinner, you head out to the bar that your friends told you to meet them at.
You walk into the bar hand in hand with Harry. He sits in the booth first, dragging you in after him.
“Do you wanna tell them?” You lean in and whisper into Harry’s ear.
He just nods, turning to Lexi and Sam. “Um, guys, we’re kinda, um, dating.”
“Okay.” Sam says. Lexi nods, looking completely unfazed.
“What?” How are they being so calm about this?
“We figured it would happen. The chemistry between the two of you is impeccable. You had more passion towards each other when being dickheads than either of you have for anything else. It was just a matter of time.” Lexi explains, as if it’s completely obvious.
How they knew it was going to happen, you have no clue. You couldn’t even see yourself ending up with him. But maybe it was because you didn’t have the outside perspective.
*
A few months later, you’re on a tour bus to the first venue, and you can already feel the adrenaline running through your veins.
The very first show, you watch from the audience, taking in the scene. Seeing how his fans react, how he works the audience.It was good to study the subject before photographing them.
Also, though, getting to watch your man live his dream is pretty exhilarating. And getting to go along for the ride with him is even better.
*
Thank you for reading!! You can come discuss with me here!!
Permanent Taglist - @spidey-reids-2003, @jackiehollanderr, @scarletsoldierrr, @thewayilookatbacon, @parker-barnes-af, @lost-in-the-stars03, @kisses-holland, @josiemara, @god-knows-what-am-i-doing, @fanficscuziranout, @akila-stilinski @babebenhardy @write-from-the-heart, @slytherinambitious, @miraclesoflove @tomshufflepuff, @quaksonhehe, @a-different-brand-of-beans, @dummiesshort, @sleepybesson, @sunshine96love, @itstaskeen, @wotamelonsugar
Harry Styles Taglist - @alwayshave-faith, @hufflepuff-always-and-forever, @sucker-09 @just-chillin-out-in-me-box, @macksmedicine @wendaiii, @theresthingsthatwellneverknow,
(If you’re crossed out it’s because it wouldn’t let me tag you)
#fallinharry10k#hs#harry styles#harry styles x reader#harry styles you#harry styles x y/n#harry styles angst#harry styles fluff#harry styles smut#harry styles writing#harry styles imagine#enemies to lovers#the view from both sides of the mirror
731 notes
·
View notes
Text
Hung The Moon (1/2)
Dean Winchester x Reader
Warnings; violence, gore, character death (maybe), cursing, nooses and everything that entails, some sketchy surgery, Sam playing doctor, cricothyrotomy. (Please consider this a DARK FIC)
Bad Things Happen Bingo
Square filled: bound and gagged (kind of)
Summary: after a hunting accident that takes one of the things Dean holds most dear, he is desperate to put the pieces back together (Takes place in s12)
It happened so fast.
It was like the moment they took you woke up from your drugged state your senses increased tenfold. You felt the rough canvas material of the sack being pulled over your head, your hands and ankles had been bound with cloth as you now teetered on the edge of what could only be a chair. The old wood creaking under your weight as you tried to shift.
But it was the rope around your neck that really had you scared. It was like every cell in your body was vibrating as your mind tried to hatch an escape plan. But in all truth, how were you supposed to get out of this mess? Sam and Dean were probably out looking for you- but the chance of them getting here before whoever had taken you decided to kick the chair out from under you was slim to none.
“You can give up the thought that they’ll actually save you.” A sudden voice spoke up from behind you, her accent immediately informing you on who exactly had captured you. “We have the Winchesters running in circles as we speak. They’re miles away.”
Fucking British men of Letters. Could you ever catch a break from them?
“Toni. I wish I could say it’s good to see you.” You swallowed, attempting to wriggle your wrist out of its binding. “But seeing as you put a damn bag over my head-“
“Goodness, I can see why the Winchesters like you so much. You’re a sarcastic chatter box just like the older one.”
“You wanna tell me why you got a noose around my neck? I thought you assholes were trying to recruit us, not kill us.”
The crack of her heels against the pavement gave way to where she walked, her shadow passing over the fabric of the bag over your head. If you could just keep her talking, you could buy yourself some more time.
“That was the original plan, yes. But you American hunters are too stubborn and reckless. It’s better to just wipe you off the playing field all together.”
Even with the canvas pulled over your eyes, you couldn’t help but roll them. It was like she loved hearing herself talk. “Well alright, Bonnie. Where’s Clyde in this whole situation? I thought for sure he’d be here too.”
“Ketch is busy with those flannel clad idiots of yours. Leaving them false breadcrumbs leading far, far away from here.” She quipped, the constant clack of her heels telling you she was somewhat occupied, giving you a chance to continue working on weaseling your hand out of its binding.
“So it’s just us girls? We should make a girls night of it. Order pizzas, paint each others nails-“
“Oh do shut up.” The sound of her heels quickly drew closer as she suddenly picked up her pace, your hand came loose and she struck the chair with her foot, kicking it out from beneath you and leaving you hanging. . . Literally.
It just happened so fast.
*. *. *. *. *. *.
“I’m telling you man, she has to be around here somewhere!”
“Dean, this is the fourth farmhouse we’ve checked tonight. She’s not here. Plus, Cas is searching for anything suspicious. He’ll give us a call if he finds anything.”
“She could be dying for all we know, Sam! Now we ain’t stopping until we find her!”
Dean spun around, throwing his fist into the rotting wood of the old abandon house. They had spent the last few hours searching for any clues to your whereabouts but it was like everything they found was steering them further away.
“So whats your plan? tear apart every abandon building in Georgia until we find her?”
“If that’s what it takes, yeah!”
He knew something was off the minute he and Sam had stepped back into the motel room earlier. Not a single thing was out of place and you were nowhere in sight. Everything about it screamed unusual. If you were to leave you would have texted him, informed him that you were going out.
“You know, this has those British bastards written all over it.” he growled, pulling the keys to the impala from his pocket, the older Winchester stormed back out the door. “Now c’mon, we gotta keep looking.”
Sam watched his brother go, letting out a deep sigh. As each minute ticked by Dean was growing more impulsive in his behavior. The second they realized something had happened to you he could see the fear cover him like a blanket. He knew how much his brother cared for you. You were like the sun and moon to Dean Winchester. . .and yet you had no fricken clue about it at all.
“Sam! You coming or what?! We don’t got all day!” Deans voice echoing through the threshold and pulling him forward, his phone also deciding it was the perfect time to go off right then and there.
Fishing the device out of his pocket, Sam quickly answered, ignoring the impatient look Dean was giving him from over the hood of the impala.
“Cas, you got anything?”
“I might. But I’m not sure. The place is heavily warded against angels.” His voice loud enough through the speaker to gain the jade eyed hunters attention, resulting in him throwing open the drivers side door and sliding in, the engine roaring to life in a matter of seconds.
“Where is he?” His voice heavy with urgency as Sam slid into the car, almost hitting his head on the window when Dean threw the car into drive at a record speed, peeling off onto the two lane road. “Sam! Where the hell is he?!”
“Cas, where are you?”
There was a muffled answer, drowned out by the thunder of the impalas engine, the older Winchester taking his eyes off the road to look wide eyed at his brother. “Well?”
“He said he’s just outside of Barnwell.”
“Barnwell? That’s the opposite direction in which we’ve been traveling!”
With another click, Sam put the angel on speaker, holding it up for better sound. “I don’t know what to tell you. Maybe the clues that you have found were deliberately placed? Put there to send you in the wrong direction?”
Sam watched as his brothers head fell foreword in defeat, eyes closing momentarily as he rested his forehead against the steering wheel. “God. I’m so stupid! I’m so damn stupid.”
“Dean, no you’re not. We just couldn’t see things clearly in the panic. It happens.”
“I swear I’m gonna slit the throats of whoever took her.”
Shifting slightly in his seat, Dean pressed down harder on the gas, the world beyond the windows becoming a dark blur as he cut across the state. If anything happened to you, he would never forgive himself. He need you safe. He needed you.
*. *. *. *. *. *.
Adrenaline flooded through Deans system as he slammed against the front door, splintering the door frame in one go as he tumbled into the dark.
“Check every room. She has to be here somewhere.”
Flashlight beams danced across the dusted surfaces of the vacant homestead as the brothers searched for any signs of life. The drive would have normally been around an hour long but Dean had managed to narrow it down to a clean twenty five. The house that Cas had found had long since been abandon, so overgrown with honeysuckle and kudzu that the building looked like a cocoon of greenery. The only signs that anyone had been there were the tire tracks in the driveway.
“Y/N, you in here?” Dean whispered, taking light footsteps through the house, Sam splitting of to check the basement. Cas was still out of commission due to the warding, resulting in him hanging back on the front porch.
Eventually the hunter fell back after finding no evidence of you,instead opting to follow the direction in which his brother had gone. The old stairs creaking under his weight as he descended into the dark of the basement.
“Sam, you find anything?”
His feet had barely touched down on the cement floor before the mass that could only be Sam barricaded him from going anywhere, his younger brother taking his shoulders in a vice grip and pushing him.
“Dude what the hell? You scared of the dark now?”
“Dean-“ Sam struggled, the words sticking like cotton in his throat. “go back upstairs.”
“Sam, just let me through. I’ll be fine.”
“No, I’m telling you, You don’t want to see this. Just get out of the house.”
The tone and words hit like an icy shock to Deans system, the hunter drawing his eyebrows together as he pushed against the hold Sam had on him. Alarms going off in his head as every muscle in his body felt like it had been bound tightly with wire. Maybe if his flashlight hadn’t illuminated his brothers face he wouldn’t have been so scared all of a sudden- but his face was pale and his eyes were wide and glassy.
And then his flashlight beam fell across the silhouette just beyond his shoulders and Dean felt his heart stop in his chest. The paralyzing fear spread through his body like icy liquid metal, jade eyes widening in dread as the flashlight slipped from his palm, clattering down the last two steps.
“No-no.” The word came out of his mouth shaky, his voice cracking. If it weren’t for the rotting banister and his brothers quick reflexes his buckling knees would have sent him to the ground.
The fallen flashlights beam now acted as some morbid spotlight to your fate. If it weren’t for the pair of bright yellow converse on the set of feet, neither brother would have guessed it was you. Your feet dangling a good foot above the floor, your body suspended like a puppet from the rafters.
No.no. this wasn't right. this was just some nightmarish landscape that his mind had cooked up. You weren't dead. You couldn't be. Not here. Not now. Not this way. You were supposed to always be there. The one thing that he would never lose. You were supposed to stay and he was supposed to find the courage to tell you he loved you.
You end wasn't supposed to be met with your neck in a noose.
“We gotta- we gotta cut her down.” he stuttered, finding that his tongue had practically gone limp in his mouth. They couldn’t just leave you there. “She---she-”
And then it was like a sudden adrenaline rush went through the hunter and he was pushing past the man blocking him from you. Maybe a part of him still didn’t believe what he was seeing, or that he could allow himself to really believe you were dead.
And He didn’t know what made him reach out for your wrist, but when he did- he found something he didn't expect to actually find. he found a pulse.
Eyes widening, he took a step back. “Sam, she’s still alive!” Letting go of your wrist, Dean whipped around, eyes finding the knocked over chair in the dark and racing to stand it up, jumping onto the base of it as he pulled out the knife tucked into his waistband. Sam was beside him in matter of seconds, ready to hold your body the second the rope was cut. As he did you dropped like an unstrung marionette into the hunters arms, the younger Winchester sinking to the floor. The sack was pulled away from your face and the noose was quickly loosened.
“How is she even still alive?”
“Her hand-“ Sam breathed, lifting up your left hand to show the bruises around your fingers. “She managed to wedge it between the rope and her neck before it could fully choke her.”
“We need to get her to Cas then!” Deans voice thundered around the otherwise empty room as panic overrode his system.
“If we move her I don’t know what will happen. I need you to go and grab Y/Ns emergency kit from the car. Along with the straw from your drink earlier.” Being as gentle as he could, Sam lifted the noose from around your neck, his hands shaking as he did. Meanwhile Dean was paralyzed with fear, also slightly confused as to why his brother wanted the fucking straw.” Now, Dean! Go!”
Another switch was flicked in his brain and the speed at which he took the stairs probably would have impressed most people. He ignored the shouts from Cas as he blew past, throwing open the trunk of the impala and rummaging around until he found your kit. And then he was flinging open the passenger door and ripping the straw from his cup, deciding it was better to not ask questions at this point and just grab what Sam told him. He didn’t bother closing the doors to the vehicle as he sprinted back into the house once more, almost falling down the stairs in the process.
Breathlessly, he fell to his knees and ripped open the kit, his hands shaking worse than his brothers. “Sam, what do you need?” His words falling out of his mouth rapidly. He didn’t know how to help you or what to hand his brother and he was on the verge of passing out from fear alone. “Sam!”
“I need you to cut off about a two inch piece of the straw. I also need your pocket knife.” His words earning a panicked look from Dean, but he did as he was told, handing over the objects quickly.
“What the hell are you going to do?!”
“We need to puncture her airway. Get air into her lungs.”
“And you know how to do that?!”
There was a pause. “Kinda. Read about it in a book once.”
“Kinda? What if it doesn’t work?!”
“Then she dies. Now I need you to shut up and trust me because this is the only chance we got at saving her. Now hold her head steady for me.”
Despite his whole uneasiness with the entire situation, Dean complied, moving to hold your head in place as Sam brought the pocket knife to your throat, being as steady as he could when making the incision. Everything in the older Winchester wanted to tear his eyes away, but they seemed glued to what was happening. There wasn’t exactly a gentleness either as he put the small piece of straw into the incision, having to of course make sure it reached your windpipe.
Suspense blanketed the three until there was a stuttered breath from your unconscious form and your chest ever so slightly rose as your lungs wheezed with lost air.
“Was that it? Did it work?”
“Yeah, yeah I think it did. But we need to get her up to Cas. Hopefully he still has some juice left to help fix her.”
Dean let out a sigh of partial relief, shifting so he could get a better look at you, his calloused hands moving to cup your face, still shaking from the whole ordeal. Through the blurriness of the tears in his eyes he could still make out the rope marks on your neck. He wanted you to wake up, tell him who did this to you. He wanted you to really confirm that you were still with him. But he knew it was better for you to stay unconscious.
“We’re gonna get you to Cas, okay Sweetheart? You’re gonna be fine. You're gonna be Just fine.”
Read part 2 Here
SPN Taglist (still open!)
@familybusinesswritingbro@a–1–1–3 @awesome-badass-cafeteria-sauce @music-is-all-i-need @agusdoti @callmekda @jordangdelacruz @orphiceseum @andthatsmyworld @marvelfangirllll @fandomnerdespressourself @gladiosamicitias @castielsangelsx @lxstgxrl-ck @tis-i-the-wayward-idgit @amendoise @phoenixuprisingsstuff @ericalynne007 @kaitlaitlaitl @neerness @totallyluciferr @supernaturalenchanted @dolanfivsosxox@supernatural-ocs @emptycanvasposts @akshi8278 @defenderrosetyler @heyyy-hey-babyyy @idksupernatural
#dean winchester x reader#dean winchester one shot#dean winchester angst#dean winchester#spn x reader#supernatural#bi-danvers writing#bi-danvers0#bad things happen bingo
109 notes
·
View notes
Text
Happiness is a Jealous Android
The FBI are the British of the law enforcement world, Gavin thinks sourly as he glares at the new addition "consulting" on his goddamn case. Snobby fucking cunts who think their own shit doesn't stink.
He can't do anything but be mad about it either. There's a new virus making androids overheat, and they don't know shit about how it works.
They could if Nines caught an android in the middle of it, but it works so fast, they haven't been able to grab one yet. He could just use whatever program he has meant to hack in and delete another android's code—meant for eradicating deviancy—and delete the virus instead.
"Yes, but just imagine, if the code is—" the fancy FBI computer geek says.
Nines interrupts. "For the fifth time, I cannot."
"But you understand the concept!" FBI geek throws up his hands. "Just apply it to—"
Gavin rolls his eyes. The whole fucking point of Nines is that he can't! He's not ever supposed to have new ideas, and he thinks too literally for that shit anyway.
Nines already told them the most efficient method of overheating an android three days ago, but whatever the virus does, it isn't that. And Nines can't think of anything less efficient—he can barely understand the concept of thinking less efficiently.
So they've brought in a human just smart enough to be stupid for him.
If only someone would tell this asshole that's what his job is. Just be stupid enough to think of something that works through sheer idiot accident—that's human creativity, baby!
When the GJ500 assigned to act as the FBI geek's "tactical support"—glorified bodyguard/babysitter special combo—meets Gavin's eyes and jerks his head toward the back door, Gavin can't get out of the bullpen and into the back alley for a smoke break fast enough.
"Need a light?" Nate asks, already pulling out his own pack.
Gavin's not really sure why an android needs to smoke, but he's also not sure where his ADHD ass has left his own lighter this time, so he nods and leans forward.
One thing he is sure of is how Nate checks him out while sparking the end of his cigarette. He's cruised enough to know that look, android or not.
But he settles back against the opposite nod with only a grunt of thanks. Him and Nines maybe sort of have a thing and they maybe sort of haven't talked about it. Anyway, he's only made the exception about shitting where he eats—or in this case, fucking where he works—because Nines is such an uptight, private, introverted bastard, he knows not even Connor will be able to weasel any details out of him.
"Fucking geniuses, right?" Nate says after lighting his own cigarette.
He gives a surprisingly human scoff, and Gavin can't help but snort back in agreement. He's only gotten used to Nines and Connor—said fucking genius or the android version of those evil gossipy Southern ladies. And all the other androids in the precinct are still too scared of him for anything outside of short sentences, much less small talk.
So he's never really shot the shit with an android before, but hey. Brave new world and all.
"How'd you get stuck babysitting yours?" Gavin asks.
Nate groans. "I was suckered. Fucking …" He gestures with his own lit cigarette. "Bamboozled."
Gavin snickers and maybe checks him out a little too. "Like to see the guy who could bamboozle you."
Nate grins at him. "Well, I guess I have to admit your RK probably could, but outside of that …"
His grin opens wider, revealing sharp canines. Gavin swallows. Nines has them too of course, but they're like, metal sheaths that drop down from his gums to cover his "human" teeth. Very cool, but he only gets to see them on special occasions.
"But yeah." Nate drops the grin and sighs. "Honestly, I'm still kind of new. And I don't have any fucking, deep burning desire to be a free form poet or some shit. I just wanted to do what I'm good at, so the FBI called and I jumped."
Gavin raises his eyebrows. "And they stuck you with a babysitting job?"
Nate wrinkles his face up with clear disgust and disappointment. It's weird as hell. The only other android he's seen built like Nate is Nines, who wouldn't know a facial expression if someone carved a Joker smile into his chassis.
OK, well. Maybe that's not fair. Nines does have both disgust and disappointment on lock, but in a sterile sort of way. Like a scientist observing a failed experiment and Gavin's dick is the unlucky lab rat.
(Not that Gavin or his dick are complaining.)
"What about you?" Nate asks. "Got anything to complain about?"
Gavin huffs out smoke and flicks ash off the end of his cigarette. "Why do you care?"
Nate shrugs. "Maybe I'm just interested in life at the DPD. For no reason. Snow is always whiter on the other side and all."
He barks out a laugh. "It's Detroit. If you see any snow that's still white, that's just cocaine."
Nate snorts too, and the smoke is good, and maybe he could throw the guy a bone. He'd been thinking about a career change himself not too long ago—until he got partnered with Nines, and Fowler started actually noticing when he solved cases, and maybe having Nines help keep him on track meant he blew up less at his coworkers, meant that they stopped hating him so much, meant that he might have a real shot at a promotion now.
"Connor's usually the darling golden boy," he says between drags. "And Hank goes way back with Fowler, so yeah. They get all the good shit."
Nate makes a sympathetic noise.
"Our budget's shit and anytime we catch something really good, guess who swoops in and case steals?"
He gives Nate's FBI jacket a pointed look that totally doesn't involve also checking out his barrel of a chest. What the fuck do they make these military models out of anyway? His porn history?
"Sucks," Nate says. "Doesn't sound too different though. At least you actually get to work cases. The only shit I catch is all coding and hacking, and I'm not built for that any more than you could perform open heart surgery just 'cause you've got one."
"Oof," Gavin says in return.
He gets down to the filter and drops it, stubbing out the small ember with his boot. Nate's cigarette is still going strong, since he doesn't actually need to inhale and hasn't been sucking it down. Gavin's not sure what to do with his hands now, and he's still plenty stressed, so he just takes out another cigarette.
Nate takes his out of his mouth and holds it out. Gavin gratefully presses the end of his new smoke against it to light up again.
"I think they call this buttfucking," Nate says.
Gavin sputters out a surprised laugh. "Yeah, Brits call these a lot worse."
Nate shrugs. "Takes one to know one."
From the way he pulls his cigarette back and wraps his lips around it while maintaining full eye contact, he obviously knows a little something-something himself.
But then he switches to complaining about his partner's annoying little peculiarities—like how the man apparently hates cotton balls with some sort of weird fetishistic passion—and Gavin offers up how Nines refuses to ever end a sentence with a preposition, and it's just regular coworker bitching from there.
Although they do start taking smoke breaks together, at least once a day. It's nice having someone to bitch to, since Nines is so busy doing code shit Gavin can't even comprehend, and Tina's off with her android girlfriend, plus Hank and Connor, for some feel good android-human bonding news special or whatever.
And yeah, they flirt. But Gavin's a slut and Nines already knew that. The one time Nate asked him about getting a "lunch break," Gavin told him he doesn't fuck around on cases. Even if neither of them were any use right now, fucking a coworker is bad enough—Gavin strictly does not fuck at work, or even on lunch breaks if he's in the middle of a big case.
Nate drawled he had an impressive work ethic and left it at that.
And him and Nines still haven't talked about their thing, or how serious it is, or exclusive, or … at all, really. Nines is too busy. So.
It's not a big deal if he just, has a friend or whatever.
***
Gavin leans back against the wall and tries to light his smoke in the face of harsh Detroit winds. It keeps sputtering out. Maybe he should go back inside.
Hank and Connor are back, and that's stealing the spotlight from their case getting solved, but it's not like he had shit to do with that anyway.
He's not sulking about it.
Not FBI-genius-what's-his-face being all smug, or Nines still ignoring him to mind-talk to Connor even though the case is over and they could finally have some time to …
Shit. Hold hands? Gavin mentally sneers at himself. What they had going on before was probably just like, an experiment. Lots of androids trying out sex and dating right now.
Lots of times that he's handing over his heart to someone just looking for—
Tall, broad shoulders step in between him and the wind so the lighter finally sparks and catches long enough for him to light up. He takes a drag and looks up, ready to tell Nines it's about time he—
But it's Nate.
(Stupid.)
"Scene in there a little too much?" Nate asks.
Gavin tips his head back and exhales smoke without answering.
"Got a job offer," he continues. "In New York."
Gavin hums. "Yeah?"
"Yeah. Lot nicer than fucking Detroit." Nate pauses. "Could use a partner though."
"What?" Gavin blinks and looks back at him. "Shit man. Like we're gonna run away together?"
Nate laughs. "Not that romantic, no. But you're being fucking wasted here—both as a cop and a, uhh …"
He stops and purposefully takes a long drag of his own cigarette. What the British call them. Like that's clever.
Gavin's the only one allowed to call himself slurs, but he does enjoy being verbally degraded, and this asshole is pushing right up against both of those lines. He's not really sure how mad he is about it, since Nate didn't actually say the word, but he settles for pissed because that's who he is as a person.
"Oh, fuck off," he sneers.
Nate smirks and it suddenly seems mean instead of sexy for the first time. "Like you're getting it any better from your RK? I bet he fucks like the machine he is."
Gavin doesn't deny it. Nines hasn't deviated and he doesn't care when people call him a machine anyway. And none of that is any of this asshole's business.
But Nate keeps going.
"Two weeks and I've never even seen him look at you," he says. "Y'know, look."
He drags his eyes over Gavin's body like he's mapping out all the places he plans to touch. Wants to touch. Nines assesses him, nags at him to eat or sleep or "hydrate" himself. Catalogues every minute detail about his appearance.
Sometimes he'll even look at Gavin like he's going to eat the human alive and analyze every single bite.
But his partner has never checked him out or anything. As far as Gavin knows, it's all mental for him when they fuck around. Just a way for him to have control over something in his life and put some of those interrogation protocols to use that aren't legal now that deviants have rights.
Nate looks like he wants to fuck him raw in this very goddamn alley.
"None of your phcking business," Gavin mutters.
Nate sighs and drops his smoke in the snow. "Oh, Gavin. Fine. We can do this your way."
He thinks that means the android is going to let it go, even though that phrasing is really weird. So he's a dumb idiot who doesn't even have his guard up when Nate passes by him to the door—only to suddenly grab him, turn him around, and shove him up against the brick alley wall.
Gavin slams an elbow back into his ribs on instinct, but that doesn't do shit against a private security android except make his whole arm go numb. He holds back the impulse to slam his head backward into the android's face, because that will hurt his human skull way worse than whatever metal Nate has under the plastic.
He tries to take stock of the situation instead, but then freezes when Nate leverages his taller, bulkier body to press against the whole of his back to keep him pinned.
And grind into his ass.
"Get off," Gavin snarls.
"Yeah, I intend to," Nate replies in casual amusement. "Don't worry, I'll let you come too."
"I'm. Not. Interested!"
Nate leans down to murmur in his ear. "Ah-ah. I've seen your porn history, Gavvy. This is damn near all you watch."
Watch! his brain screams. He watches that shit, might fool around with some forced submission, but only in scenes with his Dom. Which is NINES.
"I'm going to fuck you so good, you won't even remember his dumb little number," Nate croons.
"Well."
"Mm?"
Gavin huffs against the brick, just stalling for time. Or an idea. An idea would be really fucking nice right about now, but all he can think about is how his traitor dick really has gotten interested in this even though he's screaming inside and—
"Good is an adjective. You can't verb an adjective. You need to use the adver—"
Nate grabs a fistful of his hair and slams his face into the wall. He doesn't have any snappy comeback because yeah. That's all the response he needed.
But his hands have scrabbled against the brick wall long enough to find a loose one. Can't have shit in Detroit, much less well-constructed buildings. His skull and fist might not do shit versus the android's face, but a brick to the head should put anyone down.
Right?
"Now. Are you going to be a good b—"
The door to the alley opens, and Hank steps out. Gavin looks sideways at him and opens his mouth, but he chokes on the blood dripping down the back of his throat from his busted up nose and can't say anything.
"We're just having a little fun, Lieutenant," Nate says smoothly. "Nothing he doesn't beg for online."
Gavin's face flushes, and that really doesn't help the bleeding nose problem. Everyone in the precinct knows what he's like. Seen him come in the next morning after a night out with bruises on his throat or wrists. Hell, he'd fucking bragged about it.
"And I'll believe that when I hear him say it." Hank crosses over to them and wedges a thick arm between them. "Back off."
Nate steps back, and Gavin scrambles to get behind Hank, even as he hates himself for it.
"You really don't need to get involved in this," Nate says.
"I think I do."
Nate looks down at Hank's hand, still pushing against his chest. He smiles thinly and grabs the lieutenant's wrist.
"You really …" Nate leverages his arm down the way only a machine could. "Don't."
Hank struggles in the impromptu arm wrestling contest, staring as his hand gets mechanically pushed away. Nate glances down too with a smirk.
Then Hank throws a sudden left hook directly into the android's throat. It's a sucker punch, but there's no use fighting fair against a GJ500. He doesn't need to breathe of course, but his access port is at the back of his neck, with enough delicate little connections right behind his approximation of a windpipe—now crushed—for him to automatically take a step back and raise his hands to protect his throat.
Hank steps forward with him but grabs his hair this time, while also kicking out at his legs. After that, it's just gravity. Head yanked forward, legs knocked backward, and the android's stupid high center of gravity up in his chest and shoulder with all those muscles working against him.
He topples like a child's toy and hits the ground hard. Hank doesn't waste any time in grinding the heel of his shoe down on the back of the android's neck threateningly, and Nate goes still in surrender.
"You good?" he asks Gavin.
"I have a brick."
Gavin half-holds up the brick he'd pulled out of the wall. Oo, wow, great job. In contrast to the voice sneering inside his head though, Hank nods approvingly.
"Nines said your heartrate spiked and asked me to check on you, in case you were just … having fun," Hank explains.
"Which is what I said," Nate speaks with his cheek still pressed into dirty snow-slush.
"People having fun don't pull a goddamn brick out of the wall to beat your face in, asshole," Hank snaps back.
Nate's LED snaps from yellow to red, like maybe he really hadn't thought of that. Like he really preconstructed he was doing Gavin some sort of favor or something.
Nines steps out the back door before anyone can say anything else, Connor peeking out behind him. That's just great. Why not get the whole precinct out here? Everyone can crowd on in and witness this little moment.
Nines's LED goes red too as he looks at Nate on the ground, Hank keeping him down, and then slowly rotates his head to look over at Gavin's busted up face. Gavin drops the brick and spits out another thick wad of blood.
"I did not interfere," Nines says, his voice far more furious than any machine has a right to be. "With your flirting and your … schemes. I would never restrict Gavin's happiness."
Wait, his goddamn what?
"But you hurt him! You touched my human—"
Nines snarls out the claim, and Gavin swears he can feel some sort of shift in barometric pressure, like right before a tornado hits.
"And you. Hurt. Him."
Nate stays on the ground. He lies very still and doesn't say a goddamn word, actually.
Gavin reaches out for Nines. He's not really sure what he's going to say, but the moment he holds out his hand, Nines whirls around, his LED switching from red to yellow. He moves so fast and—and Gavin's dated a lot of shitty people. Really shitty. Nate isn't exactly an anomaly. So he automatically expects Nines to be mad at him.
Instead, Nines takes his hand so tenderly, they could be in a gay historical period piece.
"Yes, darling?" he asks.
Gavin gapes at him. He's still not … not really making a facial expression. His face was literally built differently than Connor's, even if it looks the same at first glance. The most he can manage is a completely neutral look, but with intensely focused eyes, like he's about to glare a tax return out of existence.
So no, Nines has never looked at Gavin the way Nate did.
But that doesn't mean he hasn't looked at him.
With …
… love?
Gavin finally finds his voice. "Hank. Can I go see Sumo?"
"Sure," Hank says easily. "Nines can bring you over, and you two just hang out for a bit."
Yeah, he bitches about Hank and Connor being Fowler's favorites and how Hank still doesn't get in before ten most mornings, but they're a lot better now. Good enough that he'll dog sit again sometimes, or get himself roped into a "family dinner" between Nines and Connor.
But this …
Gavin nods, throat all clenched up again.
"Yes," Nines answers for him. "I will take you to a secure location. Yes?"
All it takes is one more nod, and Nines is whisking him away out of the alley, but not through the station. They walk around the building instead so no one inside can see his face and ask questions, until they reach the parking lot, and then his truck. Nines unlocks it with his mind or something, opens the backdoor, and gently bullies Gavin into sitting down sideways in the backseat with his legs hanging out the door so Nines can fuss over his face.
"S'fine," he tries to protest.
Nines grabs the spare medical kit he keeps under the backseat and lays it in his lap. Gotta have one for all the bar fights he, well. That he used to get into. Sure as fuck can't afford hospital visits.
"I tried … so hard … not to … miscalculate," Nines says, voice overlaid with static.
Gavin tries to hold his face still so his partner can wipe all the blood off. "Mish-cal-coo-ate whah?"
"Jealous partners are bad."
Gavin blinks and stares at him. "Bad."
"It is … abusive."
Gavin opens his mouth and looks around the parking lot, as if the ghosts of all his actually abusive exes are going to show up, point their fingers, and laugh.
He brushes away Nines' fussy hands. "Is that why you've been ignoring me?"
Nines goes from yellow to red again. "No. Not … ignoring. Solving the case. In absence of … social module. Appropriate preconstructions. I … solving the case would make them leave. And I would have you to myself again."
He admits the last part quietly. Gavin feels like he just found out two plus two equals sixty-seven.
"You—at the party though," he insists. "You didn't say shit to me. You just hunkered down in the corner with Con … Connor. Who has a social module."
Nines nods. "Correct. I asked … for advice … to …"
He trails off and flutters his hands around Gavin's face again, then settles on carefully touching his chest, right over his heart. His big blue eyes stare at him like he's the most important person in the world.
Gavin feels his heart lurch up into his throat and pulls Nines closer by the back of his neck before remembering that even without all the blood only half wiped away, he can't kiss with a nose that's not quite broken, but still pretty goddamn close.
"Babe, just tell me," he says instead. "Phck, I have a social module. And I'm the—the relevant party. Your partner. Just fucking ask if you're not sure of something."
Nines looks down.
"The only reason." Gavin stops and swallows hard. "I even—with Nate. Was because we haven't talked about, y'know. Us. So I didn't know if, if you wanted to like, date me. Or if you were just experimenting and stuff."
Nines' whole face crinkles up in a frown. Cyberlife let him keep that expression. All the "scary" ones.
"You are my partner," the android says. "But you are also human. You have needs I cannot—"
"Absolutely the fuck not," Gavin interrupts. "You're mine. I chose you."
Nines looks up and hits him with those blue eyes again. "And are you mine as well?"
"Yeah." Gavin clears his throat. "You uh, might have to remind me though."
Nines decides the best course of action is clearly to drag Gavin closer and growl in his ear. Literally growl, like the giant unstoppable predator he is. Gavin shivers—and maybe whimpers a little—and presses closer.
"I will take you home and keep you safe and never let anyone else ever touch you," Nines says, petting his hair.
Gavin sighs in bliss.
"But you will be happy too," Nines states more quietly. "Yes?"
Gavin nods into his shoulder. Yeah. He's going to be happy. They'll both be happy.
Together.
***
***
this is another commissioned fic! my rates are $10 for 1k / $25 for 3k / or $40 for 5k, and you can also check out my patreon for my main reed900 series here ^^
80 notes
·
View notes
Text
Some Canary
Well, here it is! Thanks so much @chaotic-bard for the lovely prompt. I changed it just a smidge, but I think you’ll enjoy the final product. I plan on continuing this fic for at least a couple more chapters, that is, if people are interested :) Complete story under the cut, soon to be on ao3. If you enjoyed it, please reblog!
Chicago, 1932-- High profile mob families run almost every joint in the city, speakeasies launder money and sell bathtub gin through prohibition. Geralt Rivi is a lowly footsoldier for one of the most powerful bosses around: Tommy Morano himself. What is Geralt to do when he swoons for the son of rival gang leader Frank Pankratz?
The routine was so remarkably monotonous that the two men could almost rely on muscle memory alone. Approach the target, sit leaning slightly forward with hands clasped on top of the table. Do not remove hats or coats—this isn’t a permanent conversation. Keep eye contact with the target. Allow them to break the silence, subtly reminding them who has the power. The less chinning, the better. Let the reputation, and fists if necessary, do the talking. Once the target gets the picture, settle up or square up—no negotiating under any circumstances. Leave that to the big guys up top.
It was simple. A well-trained hound could do it. Why should tonight be any different? Geralt, none the wiser, was about to find out just how much his world could change in a night. His only warning? A few words from the night’s host and bandmaster.
“Ladies, gentlemen, and friends, now comes the time in the evening you’ve been waiting for. Without further ado, put your hands together for the lovely, the gorgeous, the sensational, Buttercup!”
It’s raining too hard for a cigarette, Geralt thinks to himself, reaching for the plain case in his pocket and carefully rolling a strip of tobacco and paper into a slender white cylinder. The paper dampened and drooped. Dammit. Turning up his collar against the wind, he walked towards the nearest dry patch of pavement he could find, a drugstore two blocks down. Ducking under the overhang, he lit his cigarette and took several long drags.
“Hey! Bum! Get outta ‘ere!” A short and rather lanky man was leaning out of the doorframe of the drugstore, shaking a broom and shouting. “We don’t want any trouble with the likes of yous!”
Geralt straightened his shoulders and grimaced hard at him. Despite the darkness of an autumn Chicago night, he could see the blood rush out of the man’s face, who quickly stammered an apology and slammed the door shut.
A rickety Ford pulled up to the curb. Geralt threw a quick glance up and down the street, stamped his cigarette butt into the gutter and climbed in.
“Where to tonight, boss?” His voice was gruff, hardened by years of smoking and a churly demeanor.
“The Passiflora. There’s a little fuckin prick there trying to weasel out of another payment. Collect 160 or take him out back and break his thumbs. Got it?”
Geralt gave a grunt and a curt nod in affirmation. He focused his gaze on the raindrops pattering against the window, toning out the superficial chatter of the three other men in the car. He hated the way they preened and boasted relentlessly at each other, always about some new broad or bar fight, sometimes both. He couldn’t stand the men he usually took shifts with, could barely keep their names straight, except for Lambert. Currently he was engrossed in recounting his latest run-in with cops—complete with obscene gestures and impressions—but when separated from the rest, Geralt found him tolerable, even funny at times. Yet, no matter how irritated he was, or how clever his jokes could be, Geralt knew never to rag on one of the Captains. Bottom-of-the-rung soldiers like him only needed to make that mistake once, and he had the scar on his jaw to prove it.
The brakes screeched in protest as the car slowed to a halt in front of an imposing brick warehouse. Lambert and Geralt climbed out, easily slipping into the ‘intimidating’ demeanor they carried for jobs like this. Lambert rapped on the door and waited. A small panel at eye level opened with a sharp crack, and a surly woman with a cigar and frizzy hair glared at the two men from behind the door.
“Who sent ya?” she said, puffing rank smoke directly into Geralt’s face. He cringed and turned away.
“Fat Sammy Morano and his cat,” Lambert replied, equally surly. The panel slammed shut, and almost simultaneously the door to their left creaked open a few inches.
Inside, Geralt’s eyes watered as his senses were assaulted with the bitter stench of bathtub gin. “I hate these fuckin places,” He rolled another cigarette. “Whose our guy?”
“The chrome dome with the green vest up by the stage. Let’s just get this over with and then we’ll get some grub, yeah?”
“Hmm,”
They wove through the tables together, trench coats occasionally brushing against a patron or chair. An irascible-looking waiter stopped them with a snide remark about wearing hats inside, and tried to seat them, but apparently one look from Lambert was enough to convey ‘don’t fuck with us’ because he quickly turned on his heel and attended to a nearby booth.
The routine was so remarkably monotonous that the two men could almost rely on muscle memory alone. Approach the target, sit leaning slightly forward with hands clasped on top of the table. Do not remove hats or coats—this isn’t a permanent conversation. Keep eye contact with the target. Allow them to break the silence, subtly reminding them who has the power. The less chinning, the better. Let the reputation, and fists if necessary, do the talking. Once the target gets the picture, settle up or square up—no negotiating under any circumstances. Leave that to the big guys up top.
It was simple. A well-trained hound could do it. Why should tonight be any different? Geralt, none the wiser, was about to find out just how much his world could change in a night. His only warning? A few words from the night’s host and bandmaster.
“Ladies, gentlemen, and friends, now comes the time in the evening you’ve been waiting for. Without further ado, put your hands together for the lovely, the gorgeous, the sensational, Buttercup!”
The curtain rose to reveal a lean man in a dazzling pigeon gray pinstripe suit. Humbly waving down the audience’s raucous applause, Buttercup began to pluck at the delicate strings of his guitar. His voice—silvery and saccharine, yet somehow still mellow—rang clearly through the now silent room.
Stars shining bright above you
Night breezes seem to whisper ‘I love you’
Birds singing in the sycamore tree
Dream a little dream of me
Geralt was suddenly thankful for the chair next to him and quickly sat, trying to catch his breath. Years later, every time he told this story, he insisted that his Buttercup stole the air right out of his chest.
Say ‘nighty-night’ and kiss me
Just hold me tight and tell me you’ll miss me
While I’m alone and blue as can be
Dream a little dream of me
Gone was his sour expression, gone was the rank smell of moonshine. The scratched wooden floor and sticky tables of the speakeasy seemed to fall away, leaving only two men, one guitar, one spotlight, and a long-forgotten smoldering cigarette.
Stars fading, but I linger on dear
Was it Geralt’s imagination, or was the singer… looking at him…?
Still craving your kiss
His hair, slicked back and shining underneath the stage lights, reminded Geralt of a Clark Gable movie poster he once saw. Had he ever noticed someone’s hair before?
I’m longing to linger ‘till dawn dear
His eyes, his face, his hands, were the most beautiful Geralt had seen in his life. Those lips, soft and pink, shaped so delicately around the words of the song, he found himself staring at them, wondering how they’d feel…
Just saying thi-is…
A sharp smack upside the back of his head brought him sailing down from the stars back to the speakeasy. Back to the job, where Lambert and the target were staring at him, the former’s face covered in bewildered rage, the latter’s face still shaken, albeit slightly confused.
“As we were saying—” Lambert emphasized the last two syllable’s in Geralt’s face, who cleared his throat and straightened his shoulders once more.
“You can se—ttle up now, or we’ll take it out back,” All three men at the table tried desperately to ignore the voice crack that took every drop of intimidation out of his words.
Nevertheless, the target fell into the familiar routine, terrified of Lambert if nothing else. “Aw jeez come on boys, you know I always come through, I just need a little more time is all, just until next week I pro—” he was suddenly on top of the table, Lambert’s fist pulling his shirt collar far too forward for comfort.
“Out back it is,”
The two men stood and strode quickly towards the side door, the target scrambling to keep up with the fist still clutching his shirt. Geralt took one last glance back at Buttercup, who to his utter surprise, was glaring at the group as they left the hall.
…
A dull crack echoed down the alley as Lambert’s fist left the target’s face. He groaned and stumbled to the side, bracing himself against damp bricks. “Pl—please, my wife—”
“I don’t want to hear it. 160 today, or we come back and fuck you up for real,” He dealt another blow, this time aiming for the target’s stomach. Two more hits and he was coughing and sputtering.
Geralt stood to the side, keeping watch on the street for any unlucky passersby. Keep your cool, focus on the job, he thought to himself, rolling another cigarette, thankful that the rain finally let up. The rattle of a doorknob and sudden burst of light, however, startled the paper and tobacco right out of his hands.
“Why good evening fells, waiting at the stage door for me? My my, a bit forward isn’t it?” Buttercup draped himself carefully against the doorframe, but his smirk faltered as he took in the blood dripping down the bald man’s face and the imposing nature of the trench coat cornering him against the wall. “Is there some sort of problem here?”
“Scram, kid, this doesn’t concern you,”
“Why, sir, don’t be so shy! I’m sure we can come to an… understanding…” he winked at the two bewildered racketeers and sauntered gracefully down the stairs. “I’m Julian. Aren’t you two a coupla tall glasses of trouble? Might have my hands full tonight,” Geralt carefully controlled his expression, trying to ignore Julian’s intoxicating smile and the fluttering in his chest. “What’s your name, hon?” He was addressing the target now.
“Eu—Eugene” A quite preoccupied Eugene held his bleeding nose in one hand and wrapped an arm around his midsection. “P-please—mister, I don’t-t have it all now, j-just just give me until next week, hey? N-n-next week, I promise, sound reasonable fellas?”
“Shut up!” Lambert barked.
“Now now! That’s no way to treat a faithful patron of the Passiflora, now is it? Eugene here is a friend of mine—” Julian strode over to the wall where Lambert was towering over the target and nudged his way between the two men. “Tips well and brings friends in whenever he can. Lord knows I owe him some money, why don’t I settle up?”
Lambert’s face darkened. Straightening his shoulders and looking down, he towered over the performer. “Don’t make me say it again, kid. This doesn’t concern you. Go back to your dressing room.”
Julian only laughed, seemingly impervious to the serious threat levied against him. The sound—so musical, even gentle—made Geralt’s breath catch in his chest.
Shock, confusion, and then comprehension quickly flashed across Lamberts face as he found himself with a fistful of cash. Counting it quickly, he grabbed Geralt’s arm and pulled him towards the street. “Let’s get out of here, before I do something stupid,”
“Toodeloo, sweethearts!” Julian called after them, helping Eugene stagger back into the building.
…
The car was quiet except for the rumble of the engine.
“Some canary, huh?”
“SOME CANARY? SOME?? CANARY??” Lambert’s voice was shrill with fury. “YOU FALL HEAD OVER GODDAMN HEELS FOR THE SON OF MORANO’S WORST FUCKING ENEMY, AND ALL YOU CAN SAY IS SOME? FUCKING? CANARY? JESUS CHRIST GERALT WHERE THE FUCK IS YOUR HEAD?”
“You mean that’s—”
“You guessed, it bub. That’s Julian Pankratz, of the Pankratz crime family. You know, those German pricks who’ve been trying to take down Morano for the past FIFTEEN YEARS??”
Geralt coughed out a nervous chuckle. “Yeah, some canary…”
************
I hope you liked it as much as I enjoyed writing it!! Here’s a link to the song jaskier sings :))
#fic account#geraskier#the witcher#prohibition era mob au#geralt is a gangster#minor violence#just some punching#little bit of blood#fanfic#geraskier fic#fic rec#I worked really hard on this#please validate me lol#mob boss#gangster#if you enjoyed it please reblog#a reblog goes a long way#historical fiction#cigarettes#smoking#fic prompt#lets play gwent#chaotic bard
31 notes
·
View notes
Text
In the Still of the Night: Javier Peña x reader
(a/n originally this was a steve randle fic I cooked up once upon a sleepless night. but after re-reading it I decided to turn it into a javi one shot because pedro pascal owns my ass. this takes during season 2, specifically episode 6. Also for plot’s sake pretend you are a nurse who used to work with Connie)
Javier trudged up the small flight of stairs that led to the front door of the apartment building. It had been another late night stuck behind a desk. Another late night with a plethora of leads that inevitably led nowhere. It had taken the pot of coffee he and Murphy had been drinking to gradually turn into hot burnt bean flavored water for the two exhausted Agents to finally throw in the towel. Maybe Javier could convince (y/n) to let him steal some of the gourmet coffee she had stashed at his place.
Recently, he had taken to staying longer and later, trying desperately to weasel in the information he received from Los Pepes without causing suspicion. Javier knew he was on thin ice with Steve after that incident at the checkpoint when they were close to catching Blackie. It was a wonder his friend hadn’t let anything slip, but then again he knew Murphy was more inclined to let Javier deal with his shit on his own. Besides, he had told Steve he could handle it. Couldn’t he?
Javier signed, leaning his forehead against the cool wooden door to his apartment. How had he never noticed how truly exhausted he was? He felt heavy, weighed down by all that had been happening in Columbia lately. His feet felt like cinder blocks as he took a step back to unlock the door. The seasoned agent wanted nothing more than to eat, sip an ice-cold beer, take a shower, and collapse into bed. Maybe he would be lucky enough to sleep soundly with little to no nightmares. Undisturbed till his alarm would sound off early the next morning.
"Damn it", he groaned, searching blindly for his apartment key. He had forgotten to put it back on his key ring after he had made a copy for (y/n). He exhaled in relief, having found the piece of metal nestled in the pack of cigarettes in his breast pocket.
‘I told you to put it back on there! One day you’re gonna lose that damn thing for sure, and I promise I’m not giving you my copy to get in!’, Javier smirked imagining his girlfriend scolding him. Her voice would be tinted with laughter, her threat empty. The pair had each other wrapped around their respective fingers. There wasn’t anything (within reason) that the young nurse wouldn’t do for Javier. And when the used to be bachelor was told he was whipped he simply shrugged and said, “Listen, when you really care for someone you’ll do whatever it takes to show them that. (y/n) says jump? I say how high.”
Much to the surprise of his colleagues (Steve included), Javier had moved past the honeypot method to get what he wanted from certain informants. And to add more to the surprise, (y/n) was very much aware of the man Javier Pena used to be. It never ceased to amaze him how open-minded she was. Most women would have run-away after being told of the things he’d seen and done in the field. “At the end of the day, you come home in one piece to me. But don��t think about trying that crap again while you’re with me.” she had said one night during one of their few late-night conversations.
"(y/n),cariño? You still here?", Javier called into the seemingly empty apartment. He stepped in, closing and locking the front door before moving towards the living room area where he threw his leather jacket over the arm of the cream-colored couch. All the lights were off, except the one in the kitchen. He turned on a lamp, the white envelopes sitting on the coffee table littered with some paperwork caught his eye. He’d deal with it tomorrow.
"Babe?" he called again, climbing the steps that led up into the kitchen. He glanced at the clock built into the stove, the neon green glowing numbers reading 12:30. He spotted a plate of food resting on the small circle table, and a pink sticky note stuck to the top. He smiled softly, wondering how she managed to take care of herself, her busy workday, and still make time to cook for him.
Javi,
I hope you came home at a decent hour. I’m still here, had a long day. You missed the dust bunnies I excavated from under your couch.
Love, (y/n)
It read, her neat handwriting taking up little space on the small piece of paper. Javier paused a moment. Dust bunnies? Had she cleaned his apartment? He took a quick look around the area laid out in front of him. Gone were the empty bottles and cups he usually left lying around. The thin film of dust that usually graced his small television screen was gone, and it actually smelled nice in the room. The musty male and cigarette odor had been replaced with the smell of cleaning products and a candle she had left burning on the stove. Placing the note down, he turned to blow it out; the time now read 12:40. Javier turned to the fridge, grabbed a beer and took his lukewarm dinner in front of the TV in the adjoined living room. Maybe he could take a crack at some of those papers still sitting out there.
[One hour later]
Javier woke with a start, the black and white static on the tv illuminating the room. He blinked blearily, standing up to stretch. How long had he been asleep? He meandered over to the kitchen, disposing of his empty plate and bottle. The stove time now reading 3:00.
‘May as well just head to bed, no point in showering now.’ Javier thought, making his way into his bedroom, turning off the few remaining lights as he went.
He stood staring at himself in the bathroom mirror. Not necessarily enthralled with the tired, grumpy looking man staring back at him. The past few months had taken their toll on him, the bags under his eyes adding on a year or two. It didn’t help that his vision hadn’t been up to par as of late either. He refused, however, to get glasses until absolutely necessary. He could already hear the jokes that would be made at his expense. “Having trouble in any other departments Pena?”
Rolling his eyes, he shut off the bathroom light and shivered as the cool ac hit his bare legs and chest. Clad in only his boxers, he moved out into the hallway, trudging zombie-like into his bedroom, his dark brown eyes taking a moment to adjust to the darkroom as he quietly shut the door behind him. Javier picked up on (y/n)’s soft breathing as she slept, everything but her head swallowed up by the thin white blanket on their bed. It was a wonder she had slept through the noise he had been making since he had gotten home hours earlier. She really must have had a long day. Ever since Connie and Olivia had left back to the States, the (y/h/c) nurse had taken more hours, helping to fill in the spot her blonde friend had left. And in some ways, maybe Steve had taken to staying longer to avoid an empty apartment. Something Javier had once been used to, but now the thought of having to start sleeping alone in his queen-sized bed made him cringe.
An orange street light filtered in through his blinds, casting a soft spotlight onto the bed, drawing him closer. The "spotlight" shone on (y/n), illuminating the soft unique features of her face. Her mouth slightly open as quiet snores slipped through. Javier yearned to freeze time. To simply lay in this lumpy bed, with the most beautiful kind-hearted woman he’d ever met. His mother had only been the one other woman who cared this much about him, and it hurt that couldn’t she meet her. Javi was sure she’d love the passionate young woman as much as he did. He crept closer slipping under the covers, curling his arm around her waist to draw her closer to his bare chest. He lay a soft kiss to the back of her head, the sweet scent of her shampoo clouding his senses. He was content.
“Javier? Is everything okay? What time is it?" the young woman mumbled her voice heavy with sleep, raising her head slightly to catch a glimpse of the alarm clock on the bedside table. 3:30 am.
"It's me, baby, everything is fine. Go back to sleep."
"Okay. I love you."
"Love you too," the tired man said, kissing the back of her head as she fell back asleep. Javier lay awake for only a few moments more, finally succumbing to the slumber that was now his master.
Javier Pena knew that when the morning came he would have to return to that godforsaken office, and shift through the same pile of papers, and deal with the weight of his actions resting on his shoulders. But for the time being as he lay next to the love of his life in the fleetingly late hours of the night/early morning, he could pretend that he was just another man off the street, far away from Escobar, far from cocaine, and far from Columbia.
A reality that only existed within the still if the night.
(i hope you all enjoyed my first Javi fic....and I hope i didn’t write him too OOC. Let me know what yall think, and my requests are open! more work to come soon. <3 roach)
taglist: @sunshinepascal (dm to be added!)
71 notes
·
View notes
Text
Waiting for Your Curtain Call - ch 1
Rating: M
Ship: Kristoff/Anna
Chapter 1: Your Show Last Night
Tags: Modern AU, Bodyguard AU, Popstar AU, KristAnna, human!Sven, Eventual Smut, Slowish Burn, Fluff, Bodyguard Kristoff, Popstar Anna, Popstar Elsa
Read on Ao3
Next Chapter
Kristoff Bjorgman was proud of his job. It was strange being in the limelight, but not all at the same time. Anna and Elsa Arendelle’s devoted fans knew him as Anna’s bodyguard. They knew Sven was Elsa’s too. He was on tabloids next to Anna, but he meant nothing to the picture. He was just there. Usually in black and with his shades over his honey-brown eyes. Kristoff had never had to be truly violent with anyone—not yet, at least. Anna and Elsa’s career as a sister-pop-princess duo was still growing, meaning the obsessive fans weren’t as psycho as others had to deal with.
What Kristoff couldn’t stand was the pompous boy-band prince that Anna was dating. The guy was obnoxious, stuck on himself, and not good enough for Anna, that was for sure. Sure, Kristoff may have been a little biased because he—well—may or may not have been crushing on the ginger girl for as long as he’s worked for the Arendelles…
But it wouldn’t work. The pop princess and her bodyguard? No way. Oh, but the fans ate up Anna dating Hans Westergaard. He was part of a boyband consisting of him and his twelve older brothers. Kristoff could barely keep up with boy groups of five, let alone thirteen. Hans seemed to be the weak link. The baby of the group. Which made him the “cute one” but apparently… not very talented. At least from what he heard. The guy could carry a tune, sure, but nowhere near what his brothers could. Kristoff was pretty sure he could show the guy up himself with a guitar.
Not that Kristoff was one to brag or anything.
But Hans made his job hellish and difficult. The last thing Kristoff wanted was to guard that twinky little weasel. When the guy was with Anna, Kristoff was obligated to look after them both. And it grinded his gears more than he could say.
He turned the corner, looking in every crevice of the concert hall unable to find Anna. She was supposed to leave the stage and return to her post. But as usual, when Hans was there… she wasn’t where she was supposed to be. When he checked in the audience, big surprise, Hans was no longer in his seat. Kristoff growled, clamping his palm down on Sven’s shoulder, pinching the bridge of his nose.
“Where is Anna?” he asked, clearly annoyed.
Sven shrugged, brushing his hand from his shoulder. “I don’t know, man. You know how she gets when Hans is around.”
“I swear when I find them—”
Sven bumped him. “You’ll find her. Just don’t beat Hans to a bloody pulp. The guy’s face is all he’s got.”
Kristoff snorted at that before taking off to search the premises. He’d been checking the whole lot and she was nowhere to be seen. His blood boiled hotter every passing minute he couldn’t find her. If something actually happened to her and he didn’t know because of her little stunts like this, he’d never live with himself. Unsurprisingly, Anna wasn’t in her trailer after her portion of the concert either. Elsa was, however, when he went to check for Anna in hers.
“Can’t find her again?” the elder sister asked with a sympathetic smile.
He sighed. “She does realize she puts my job on the line every single time she does this, right?”
Elsa rolled her eyes. “Hans is more important to her right now. He eats up all her attention.”
Kristoff chuckled at that. “You don’t like him either, huh?”
“Can’t stand him.”
Humming in agreement, he stepped out of her trailer. “If she gets in touch, please tell her I’m looking for her. I pray for both of them that I don’t find them first.”
Elsa waved a hand. “Good luck.”
As Kristoff left the door, Sven was standing by the trailer door. “Still nothing?”
“I’m going to break that little prick like a twig.”
His partner just laughed at that. “I don’t know if Anna would forgive for that one. This is her first relationship, after all.”
“I know. And she’s acting like an immature teenager!”
“Anna is eighteen.”
“And in the spotlight where she could be targeted by anyone!”
“Did you check the backstage dressing rooms? There’s one that’s unoccupied. Maybe they’re in that one.”
Kristoff frowned, not wanting to imagine what he could possibly find in that room. He had to suck it up, however. This was his job. And he wasn’t going to let that Backstreet Boy wannabe take it from him. There was no hiding his anger as he stomped back inside. One would think when someone is a special guest on a talk-show, they’d behave. But no. Not Anna.
Kristoff was almost entirely positive that Hans tagged along today so he could get his fifteen seconds in as he watched Anna from the audience. Because of course, he had special front row seats to watch his girlfriend. And of course, the host of the evening pointed out that Hans of Th1rt3n was there. Of course, of course, of course.
When he reached the “empty” dressing room, he heard shuffling from inside. Kristoff swung the door open, a scowl on his face. Oh, and what did he know! There were just the people he was looking for. Anna sat up on the dresser with Hans standing between her legs. Disheveled clothes, swollen lips, and tangled hair… It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what the couple had been up to.
“Get out of there,” Kristoff sneered.
Hans just smirked, straightening his designer jacket before turning his attention back to Anna. His chin held high, he looked back at her with a lustful gaze. “I’ll call you later.”
Anna giggled at that. “Okay.”
The pop prince gave him a smarmy stink eye as he brushed past him with clear intent as his shoulder bumped against the blonde’s. Kristoff slammed the door behind him, arms crossed as he glared at her.
Seemingly unsure how to respond, Anna’s gaze flickered around the empty room. “Hey, Kristoff.”
“Do you know how much trouble you could get me into? Your father wants you under my watch at all times. You’re going to get me fired, Anna!”
“I-I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“Yes! Yes, you did! You know exactly what you’re doing sneaking away with him. This isn’t fun and games. You can head back to his mansion and do—whatever the fuck it is you want to do with him. But you can’t do it here. Not while I’m supposed to be protecting you!”
Anna scoffed, waving a hand to brush off his concerns. “Please, Kristoff, you don’t have to protect me from Hans.”
He gaped at her, then. “Yes, I do, Anna! That’s part of my job. One that I won’t have anymore if you keep doing this,” he swallowed the lump in his throat, brows pinching as he gazed at her. “We’re friends, aren’t we? We have to be there for each other.”
She hoped off the dresser then, a pleading puppy pout on her face. “Yes, yes! Of course, we are, Kristoff. I-I’m sorry… I know I haven’t been a very good friend to you. I know you’re trying to do your job. It’s just that Hans—”
“—Is very convincing, huh?” he finished.
Anna nodded. “I’ve never, ya know, been with a guy before. All of it is so… exciting and new? I’ve never had the rush of someone wanting to sneak off and spend time with me.”
This whole conversation had a bad feeling swirling in Kristoff’s gut. He was supposed to protect her. Physically, at least. It wasn’t his job to protect her heart… her emotions.
No matter how much he wanted to.
o~o~o~o
Kristoff took the heat from Agnarr after Anna’s disappearance. After watching him be shouted at, he hoped Anna may have had a change of heart. Especially with the guilt-stricken look etched on her face. She apologized over and over the next few days. Despite feeling a bit guilty himself, he couldn’t help but feel a little satisfied.
The next few months, however, still sucked ass as Hans became a frequent guest at the Adrendelle home and their events. After the talk show incident (and watching Kristoff get chewed out), Anna had been more aware of her surroundings and how her actions could affect other people, which he was grateful for. Hans did not share that sentiment.
Kristoff knew Hans seemed like a bit of a controller, but damn, he had underestimated that thought. He wasn’t sure if Hans was pissed that he’d interrupted their romp in the dressing room, if he could tell that Kristoff had feelings for Anna, or if he was just an asshole. Or if it was all three.
No matter which it was, the brat purposely tried to get under Kristoff’s skin as much as he could. And somehow, he’d still look like the innocent party. It was just little things he would do. Smart ass comments that would make Kristoff look stupid, tripping him—yes, tripping him like a grade school bully—but somehow made it look like an accident. It was annoying that he felt like he was back in high school. What was next from him? A “kick me” sign on his back? He wouldn’t put it past him.
And no matter what a pain in the ass he was. No matter how much he couldn’t stand the fucker. He never wanted it to end the way it had.
The cheating scandal broke on the tabloids first. None of Anna’s team, none of her friends… no one told her. She saw it on social media when they were about to head out to a charity performance. There was a gut-wrenching sob from behind her bedroom door. The sound sent his heart plummeting to his feet. Kristoff and Elsa both heard it. They slammed open the door as quickly as they could. Anna was huddled at the foot of her bed, slumped over on the floor, shoulders shaking with meek sniffles.
He was on his knees next to her in an instant. “Anna? Hey, talk to me. What’s wrong?”
She stayed silent, her cries wracking her body as she held her phone up to him. The image of Hans kissing one of their back of dancers, his hands way too high on her thigh while they sat at a bar lit up the screen.
Why that little—
Kristoff felt an animalistic growl leave his throat before Elsa was over his shoulder. He handed her the phone, and the elder sister’s stare turned icy.
“I’m going to kill him,” she murmured.
“Not if I get to him first,” Kristoff sneered.
Anna grabbed his shoulders, surprising him out of his brooding. “Please, stop. Both of you,” she muttered, pleading.
He opened his mouth to refute. He wanted to tell her she didn’t deserve this, that he knew that bastard was trouble, knew that he deserved a good square in the jaw—but when he saw the hurt in her eyes. All the furry melted. Kristoff felt his shoulders relax as he placed his hands over hers, taking her tiny palms into his own.
“What do you need, Anna?” he asked, gently squeezing her fingers.
Her eyes were wide at the question. “I… I don’t want to go to the concert.”
Elsa hitched a breath at that. “Anna, you have to. We’re in this together…”
Smiling pitifully up at her sister, there was so much anguish in her gaze. His chest tightened at the sight. God, he wanted to take her pain away. He felt so frustrated with himself for not sticking up for her sooner, telling her that Hans was bad news and she should stay away. He had known all this time that the asshole was going to hurt her. He just didn’t realize it’d be so soon. Or like this.
“Please, Elsa. Tell them I’m sick or something. I-I can’t sing like this.”
Her sister sighed. “People are going to know why you aren’t there.”
“I don’t care if they know… I can’t do this.”
“Anna—”
“Hey,” Kristoff interrupted her, “look, we’ll deal with the PR stuff later. Just tell them Anna wasn’t feeling well,” he released Anna’s hands, moving to stand over her next to her sister. Her fingers dragged along his forearms as he stood. It made him wince… had she not wanted him to let go?
“Papa is going to be furious,” Elsa replied in a warning tone.
He nodded. “I know, but we have to respect what Anna needs right now.” Kristoff gestured towards the door with his head. “Can we talk for a second?”
Elsa rubbed her hands over her arms, hugging herself gently. “Yeah, okay.”
Looking back down at Anna, he gave her a reassuring smile. “We’ll be right back, okay?” He took Anna’s phone from Elsa just as the elder sister went to hand it back to her. “I—uh—think it’s best that I held onto this for the moment, yeah?”
Both sisters nodded silently. He hated having to treat them both this way, but it was his job to make sure Anna was safe. And from now on he knew that meant that went for her heart as well. He wouldn’t let her go through this again.
Never again.
#kristanna#kristoff x anna#frozen trash#the queen & her reindeer king#ash writes#frozen fic#anna x kristoff#kristanna fic#waiting for your curtain call#wfycc
13 notes
·
View notes
Text
122. boom boom (1936)
release date: february 29th, 1936
series: looney tunes
director: jack king
starring: tommy bond (beans), joe dougherty (porky), billy bletcher (soldiers, enemy, general hardtack)
something you don’t see everyday—a cartoon released on february 29th. jack king’s first official cartoon prominently featuring porky (he made a very small cameo in hollywood capers). jack king would only direct a handful of porky cartoons, but they’re effectively disconcerting, strange, and downright offputting. at the same time, they’re fascinating because of that. we don’t really get any of that offbeat mood here. instead, beans and porky are soldiers in the midst of the great war. they’re sent to rescue their hostage general, but the obviously unsafe environment makes that task quite a challenge.
if the title isn’t an obvious indication as to what the cartoon entails, the opening shot of bombs exploding amuck solidifies our understanding immediately. i already love the lighting of the explosions reflecting off the fence, very moody. while king isn’t as cinematographic as, say, frank tashlin, he certainly is more ambitious with his camera angles and staging than friz freleng or even tex avery. a closeup of a bomb exploding in the dirt transitions to a shot of silhouettes charging forward. elsewhere, a dog blows his bugle, interrupted by a bomb. the bomb explodes and he now lies on the ground, injured, weakly blaring out “taps”. great, snappy timing.
some more explosions and violence just for the hell of it. a cannon is extended, targeting a dog perched inside a chimney and shooting below. the perspective on the cannon is great, a lovely curved shot as a dog pops out and conks the other dog on the head with a mallet, who slumps over. fatal cartoon violence!
elsewhere, a horse is desperately attempting to weave in and out of a barrage of bullets. a particularly threatening bullet follows him closely, tearing his backpack and clothes to shreds and attempting to do the same ritual to his metal helmet. the bullet weasels its way under and propels the helmet upwards, shredding a hole right in the middle of it. animation is quick, fast, and exhilarating. the hat snaps back down to its rightful owner with such force that the horse gets himself stuck inside the helmet, the helmet acting like body-fitting handcuffs.
nevertheless, the horse manages to seek refuge in a crumbling building, shutting the door with his foot. no matter-the bullet shoots right through the door and explodes almost everything in sight. lovely, rubbery, smooth animation as the bullet thins out and turns into a snake-like saw, tearing the helmet restraint off of the horse, who’s ducking. the bullet zips away, and buys the horse enough time to gallop over to a shelf full of bullets. now, the horse drags over part of a broken piano (not unlike the harman-ising days), the mallets hitting the bullets and firing them off. unfortunately for the horse, a spare bullet crashes right behind him and explodes. a looney tunes staple as we see the angel of the horse floating carelessly in heaven, strumming yankee doodle dandy on a lyre. death, always a good punchline! (see daffy going to hell and coming to terms with it in draftee daffy. it’s hilarious!)
another collection of gags as the soldiers engage in the fight. a particularly dopey dog with a prominent overbite fires a pop gun, the cork flying back and smacking him right between the eyes. meanwhile, a dog shooting a machine gun trembles from the impact as he slowly walks away. back to the overbite dog, shooting again and this time pulling his helmet over his face for protection. just as he believes he’s outsmarted himself, he pulls the helmet back up, just in time to be pinged once more (a gag parallel to porky’s trouble with a rubber horseshoe in the village smithy).
the stuttering dog from into your dance and hollywood capers pulls the pin out of a hand grenade and mistakenly tosses the pin instead. the impact of the explosion sends the dog flying into the air. conveniently, a first aid truck happens to be trucking on by. the driver scoops up the dog in a net and dumps him carelessly into the back of the truck.
porky’s turn for the spotlight. he whistles as a signal to his soldier buddies, and they all dive into the war zone. smart of his buddies to jump back into the trench, leaving porky alone to his oblivious self. he crawls forward on his hands and knees, visibly wary. a famous jack king hat take as his helmet flies into the air in surprise at the sound of a distant explosion. he tugs at his collar, sweat beading his face. he tiptoes forward...
and immediately flies back into the trench, right inside of their base (a great transition between the scenes as his body hurtling forward wipes the screen). he attempts to dive under a bunk bed for shelter (occupied by beans), but instead breaks the bed thanks to his weight.
beans wakes up and scratches his head in befuddlement. he shrugs it off, jumping out of bed and dragging the cowardly porcine by the feet. porky rises to his feet as beans pats him on the shoulder reassuringly—“take it easy, porky ol’ boy! take it easy!” porky’s not one for the war life as he stutters “phooey! i wish i’d-a stayed on the farm!” a fellow soldier, a snarky hippo, pops his head up from his bunk and chides “is mama’s little man afraid?”
just as porky’s about to assert that no, mama’s little man is NOT afraid, the sound of a nearby explosion interrupts his confident façade. he cowers under a table while the surrounding soldiers mock him, all singing “you’re in the army now” (including vocals provided by a random duck). porky shudders audibly at the thought. beans orders porky to snap out of it, and helps himself to spoonfuls of (heh :)) beans, porky cautiously peering out from beneath the table.
elsewhere, a bird flies amongst the fire, inevitably getting shot and spiraling towards the ground, right into the trench. it drags itself inside, where porky and beans are having a hearty meal of baked beans. exhausted, the bird collapses right in front of the duo. beans notices a scroll lodged in the bird’s helmet and pulls it out. it reads: AM BEING HELD PRISONER BY ENEMY IN OLD FARMHOUSE. SEND HELP — GEN. HARDTACK”.
right away, beans drags porky along as they race out of the trench. beans wastes no time boarding a motorcycle, leaving porky in the dust. speedy, quick animation as beans practically runs porky over, tossing him into the sidecar. the speed is to be commended—it actually conveys a sense of urgency and exhilaration. it seems tex’s knack for speed as demonstrated in gold diggers of ‘49 is finally rubbing off. porky struggles to keep his hat from flying away in the wind.
an anthropomorphized bullet (the original bullet bill!) has its sights set on beans and porky. a lovely overhead shot as it watches them speed by, hurtling straight after. the sense of speed is heightened even more, a tame parallel to tex’s speed in gold diggers. lovely, dynamic shots as they fly past curves and weave through trees, even running right into a tree that separates the motorcycle and the sidecar.
regardless, beans and porky reunite as they fly over the battlefield, their transportation falling beneath them. the bullet still whizzes after them, and the two dive into a hole for cover. the bullet explodes, yet porky and beans pop out unscathed like whack-a-moles in the distance. a lovely visual and great use of cartoon physics as the two physically lift up their hole and carry it a few feet, transplanting it back into the ground and ducking once more as another explosion endangers them.
seemingly alone, bullet nowhere in sight, beans and porky dash to a crumbling building, both peering inside. general hardtack is being tortured by his captors, bound up by ropes. one of the captors lights a candle under his feet and gives him the hot foot, forcing him to talk. beans comments “that’s general hardtack!”, and with some quick thinking he ties a spool of barbed wire to a nearby rocket.
with the strike of a match, the rockets are ignited and propel straight inside. the rocket wraps up one of the enemies with barbed wire, and then the other. beans and porky save the day as they push both captors over, beans cutting the rope off of the general, much to his gratitude.
now free, all three of them rush outside and spot a parked plane. they board and prepare to fly home. of course, no one is safe in war, not even the heroes of the cartoon. the plane is almost immediately shot to pieces, nosediving straight to the ground. fade transition as our heroes are now all in a hospital bed, bandaged up tight. the general awards beans a ribbon, who rips it in half and pins the other shred to porky. iris out as they all have a good laugh about it. such is war!
certainly one of king’s best entries by far. this is one of the rare cartoons i have actually seen before, but seldom remembered. while i’ve repeatedly mentioned how offputting his porky cartoons are (this is more of a beans cartoon honestly), it is interesting to see how he characterizes porky for the first time—as a bumbling coward. the energy was very high and upbeat in this one, and it actually conveyed a sense of urgency and exhilaration, which i welcome with open arms. the gags weren’t too side-splittingly funnt, but they aren’t exactly dull either. the horse dying and going to heaven is always a plus. beans and porky had a nice dynamic going, and this cartoon does have a lot of personality. the animation was stellar, very fluid, smooth, rubbery, malleable, and fun. while this isn’t the most fantastic cartoon out there, it’s certainly one of the better ones we’ve seen thus far, and potentially worth a watch just for the hell of it.
link!
7 notes
·
View notes
Text
&&. announcing his grace, ( roman yurivič ), the ( 39 ) year old ( duke ) of ( gomel, belarus ). he is often confused with ( cillian murphy ). some say that he is ( hateful & blunt ), but he is actually ( goal-oriented & educated ).
Meet Roman Yurivic was born on the 7th of November of 1981. His birth wasn’t a major event. It was briefly mentioned in the papers --- and his mother took the spotlight. She looked divine just a day after giving birth! To call Maryna Yurivic vain would have been an understatement. She had always been praised for her beauty and had always been surrounded by admirers. Golden locks, sharp nose and tall frame. He inherited her beautiful blue eyes --- which were the most he got from his mother.
The first few years of his life he spent mostly with nannies. His father started paying him attention when he was old enough to talk. When he became mildly entertaining. Roman’s relationship with his father, despite the man being distant, was a good one. The older he got, the more time they spent together. Played football, went hunting, talked about books. His father started to put more pressure on him when the monarchy was reinstated in Belarus. Their titles meant something again, they had land, they had a role. When he turned 12 he was sent to a military school, apparently it was, without a doubt, the best way to help him become an independent person. He was allowed to quit when he started upper secondary school. His father would have preferred him to stay at the academy, his mother didn’t have an opinion... He needed to get away. He needed to see what else there was. So he switched schools at the beginning of his upper secondary education. He moved to live in Minsk in a pitiful studio apartment, alone. Following his own path cost him the benefits of having a rich family. His father wasn’t angry with him for having quit the military academy, but if his son wanted to follow his own path, he had to work hard for it. So Roman had to earn his own money and used up his savings while trying to weather through the wild years of upper secondary school.
Roman didn’t care for hunting at first, it was a bit boring if you asked him. A lot of walking and no talking: what was the point? The pastime became interesting when his father told him that if Roman ever wanted to go on the hunting trips his father did with the king, he’d have to know how to shoot. He got his first invite when he was 17 --- and continued to be a regular member of the king’s hunting party from then on. It didn’t take long until he ate his lunch at the palace instead of the school cafeteria in Minsk. A bit daunting at first but soon Pyotr Yurivic was called ‘uncle’ and not his majesty. Soon he didn’t have to worry about making ends meet since he left the palace with a backpack full of food and a couple hundred rubles in his pocket. That was around the time he realized how convenient being friends with the right people was.
He joined the army after finishing upper secondary school. It was just something respectable to do and he had no idea what he wanted to do with his life. So the army it was. He rose up the ranks mainly thanks to his ability to hold his tongue and for being friends with the king. His peers found it mildly amusing and his superiors thought he was cheating the system. Which, to be frank, he totally was. The first year in the army was an easy one --- it reminded him his school years. It was just like camping with friends and a few lectures here and there. The second year? Not so much, he was sent to Afghanistan, something he had not expected to happen. He had thought he would rise up the ranks without having to take part in an actual war. What good was being the king’s ‘nephew’ if you still ended up having to risk your life? At the first opportunity, he returned home. It came a bit over a year after he had been deployed: he received a million dollar wound to his right knee. He was sent home with a smile and a permanent limp.
While Roman had grown close with his father over the years, his mother he had forgotten. She was a socialite, not a mother, if you asked him. A guest at the dinner table on those rare occasions she didn’t have a soiree to attend. His father had always had a bigger problem with his mother than Roman had had. After his first year of college, his parents divorced and his father began working more. Roman didn’t have time to think about it too much being so busy with school, he didn’t care what his parent’s marriage was like.
He did his bachelor’s in Minsk and continued his studies in Paris. He did one year of marketing and communications but deemed it useless and concentrated on macro economics. After getting his diploma, he stuck around in Paris, having fallen in love with the city --- the city of lights had much more life than Minsk, a city that was only beginning to flourish after communism. He continued to take part in the university life, doing courses here and there, dabbling with law and even the arts.
It was a stroke of luck for him when he ran into Giselle d’Orléans. The princess of the campus --- quite literally. Everyone wanted to be part of her clique, and why wouldn’t have they wanted? She was beautiful, intelligent, and always seemed just a little bit disinterested in hearing you talk --- which just made you want to get her attention more.
But what he did differently than everyone else was that he didn’t try to get into her circle of friends --- he made her join his. Few months of hanging out together, going to poetry readings, and they were dating. For the first time in his life, he felt truly lucky. 2007 was over in a blink of an eye. In spring of 2008, they had a nice apartment ( courtesy of the French royal family, naturally; Roman had no money ) in Le Marais.
In 2010 they got married, it was a bigger spectacle than he had expected. If it had been up to him, they would have just eloped and been done with it. There was no need to televise the whole wedding.
Flash forward to the birth of Margaux, he was at the top of his world. Had he really deserved what he had gotten? He hadn’t expected anything to disturb his quaint Parisian life. But a letter came in October of 2013, informing him that his father had passed away.
It complicated things. He had to spend more time in Belarus, which didn’t exactly sit well with Giselle. Couple years went by and he found himself getting irritated by his wife on a daily basis --- and the feeling was mutual. The couple divorced in 2015.
Roman continued to split his time between Belarus and Paris for a few years, unwilling to miss out on seeing his daughter grow up. Margaux and Giselle were pushed out of his mind when a new person became part of the Belorussian court: Milena Romanova. He didn’t like her. The second he heard the news of Pyotr’s engagement to the Russian, he knew he despised the woman.
To Roman, Milena has always been a greedy gold digger --- willing to take advantage of a wrinkly old man. But more importantly, she was going to get in the way of him getting the Belorussian throne for himself. Even if his bloodline wouldn’t have automatically made him the first in line, his bond with the king would have. Except now Milena was in the picture, cutting every single thread that connected Roman to Pyotr. He cannot stand the idea of having a Russian monarch.
TL;DR: Weaseled into king Pyotr’s life, got married to Giselle d’Orléans, divorced her, became the duke of Gomel, thought he’d become the Belorussian king, hates Milena.
9 notes
·
View notes
Text
Villain month, day 24: bonds
Oichi
AO3 Link
@villainmonth
“Are you still glaring at that picture?”
Shigaraki gripped the picture of the green haired boy from the USJ tighter, causing it to crease slightly. He turned his glare to his daemon. She was unaffected, of course.
“I hate him,” he said. “I want him gone.”
“You’ve said that before. Many times.” She plucked the photograph out of his hand with her tiny paws and threw it onto the ground behind Kurogiri’s bar. “I don’t like him or his daemon either, but you have more important things to worry about than some baby hero who might not even make the cut. Giran is supposed to introduce us to some potential recruits. Focus on that instead.”
“I am focused.”
“No, you’re not.” She pounced on his hand as he began to raise it. “And stop scratching your neck!”
Before Shigaraki could reply, the door to the bar creaked open.
“Shigaraki,” Giran said. “We’ve been spreading the word about how something big is about to go down, and found some interested people.”
Oichi scampered up Shigaraki’s arm and wound herself around his bare neck. Her silky fur soothed the itching of his skin.
“Well? Who are they?”
Giran held the door open and a young, blonde haired girl and a severely scarred man accompanied by a large, white wolf daemon stepped inside.
“Oh my god your daemon is so cute!” The blonde girl squealed. Her daemon, a giant huntsman spider, crawled across her face.
“You’re right,” the daemon said in a deep, smooth voice incongruous with his small body. “Can you drink his blood? I want to be her.”
Oichi bristled, her fur prickling against Shigaraki’s neck. “Watch it,” she snapped. “Or I’ll bite your legs off.”
“Wah! So mean!” The blonde girl giggled.
“That’s fine,” her daemon said. “They grow back.”
“What the hell,” the scarred man said. “You’re so gross but you have such a cutesy daemon. Is that a weasel?”
Oichi hissed. Shigaraki scratched his neck, but she batted his hand away.
“She’s a Japanese marten,” he gritted out. “Kurogiri, warp them away. I hate these types. A brat and a guy with no manners.”
“Rude,” the blonde girl’s daemon said. “You’re the one who isn’t using your manners here.”
“Come now...” Kurogiri said. “They’ve traveled all this way. Why not hear them out? Our esteemed broker here went through all this trouble to bring them to you. We can be sure that they are competent fighters, at least.”
Giran took a long drag from his cigarette. “That reminds me. I’ll be taking my finders fee now.”
Kurogiri nodded.
“As for the introductions... Let’s start with this cutie here.” Giran jerked his thumb at the blonde girl. “The media has been keeping her name and face out of the news, but she’s a suspect in a series of deaths by bloodletting.”
“My name is Himiko Toga! This is my daemon, Takao. Life’s hard. I want to make it easier. I wanna be Mr. Stainy. I want to kill Mr. Stainy! So let me join you!”
“We want a world where we can be true to ourselves,” Takao said.
“Yup!”
The scarred man squinted at them. “Isn’t your quirk turning into someone else by drinking their blood? How is wanting to be Stain being true to who you are?”
“Her wanting to be someone else is being true to herself,” Takao said. “Staying in one shape, as one person, is not who we are at all.”
“I don’t get it. Are you some sort of freak?” Shigaraki pressed four fingers onto the bar counter to keep himself from scratching his neck.
“Don’t be so judgmental,” Oichi said. “You’re not the most normal person yourself.”
He ignored her.
“You both have similar goals. I’m sure she’ll be of use to you,” Giran’s meerkat daemon said.
“Next, this young man has no exceptional crimes to his name...” Giran patted the scarred man on the shoulder. “...But he is enamored with the hero killer’s ideals.”
“I’m not so sure about this,” the scarred man said. “Are they really dedicated to the cause? They’re about to let this lunatic join.”
“Hey, hey,” Shigaraki said. This is why he hated dealing with new people. They were always so difficult. “At least the freak girl can state her own name. Why don’t you try to be a proper adult and do that?”
“I go by Dabi right now. My daemon’s name is none of your business.”
The daemon at his feet said nothing; her tail thumped against the floor.
“No, tell us your real name.”
“I’ll tell you when you need to know it. Anyway... the hero killer’s will, I plan to make it a reality.”
“No need to answer a question I didn’t ask.” Shigaraki stood, swaying on his feet.
Oichi’s claws dug into his shoulder. “Stop,” she hissed into his ear. “Stop! You’ll regret this later.”
“Everyone nowadays is all ‘Stain this’ and ‘Stain that’...”
“Don’t do it, Shigaraki,” Kurogiri said.
“It pisses me off. I’m in a bad, bad mood.”
Oichi was saying something, but he couldn’t hear her over the pounding in his head. Dabi’s daemon leapt to her feet.
“Oh, are we fighting?” said Takao.
Shigaraki lashed out at the same time as Dabi and Toga, but none of their blows landed. Kurogiri’s mist enveloped their hands and redirected their attacks.
“Please calm down,” Kurogiri said. “If we are to act on your desires, we need more members. We can do nothing if the organization does not expand.”
Chieko, Kurogiri’s butterfly daemon, fluttered near Shigaraki’s head. “This is our chance,” she whispered. “We need to act while we’re still in the spotlight. I advise you to use whatever you can, even if it is his will. Use it to bring them in. Don’t reject them out of hand.”
“Shut up.” Shigaraki yanked his hands out of the mist portals. He stormed out of the room, and slammed the door behind him as hard as he could.
“That was a disaster,” Oichi said once they were out of earshot. “You’re never going to get anything accomplished if you keep throwing hissy fits. Hopefully those two will still agree to work with us.”
“I hate Stain. Nobody shuts up about him. Barely anyone mentioned our nomu. He’s all anyone ever talks about.”
“So? Who cares about that jackass? Take that stupid hand off your face and talk to me properly.”
Shigaraki’s fingers twitched. He hated being bossed around. He took Father off.
“Stain can’t do anything right now. He’s rotting in Tartarus, but you’re free to fulfill your own will. People will forget about him soon enough. Out of sight, out of mind.” Oichi perked up. “Plus, now we’ll have more people to talk to. It’ll be less lonely, for sure.”
“I hate people,” Shigaraki grumbled. He ran his hand over Oichi’s fur. “I don’t need anyone other than you and Sensei.”
“Yeah, yeah.” She leaned into his touch.
(If you enjoyed my fic, please consider buying me a coffee.)
#bnha#bnha fanfic#boku no hero academia#my hero academia#mha fanfic#shigaraki tomura#daemon au#villain month 2019
8 notes
·
View notes
Text
Shades
9.
One of the most effective weapons Oliver and his Team used, one that truly made their core work, was communication. Oliver had given Felicity and John each a comm link. He shifted on the slab inside the drawer and activated his.
“What’s happening,” he sent out?
Felicity’s voice was immediately in his ear. “I’m in the security room just inside the main entrance. No sign of our mystery guest.”
“The roof is clear,” John spoke next. “I don’t see any movement yet.”
Felicity looked at Oliver’s phone in her hand. The GPS software was showing that her phone had stopped moving. It was stationary two blocks from the morgue. “Oliver, he’s stopped two blocks away,” Felicity informed her husband.
“John,” Oliver responded. Anything?”
“No…nothing.” John scanned the darkness of the neighborhood around the morgue. There was one streetlight that was working. It was a couple hundred yards away from his position. It looked like a spotlight lighting a lonely stage. But still no movement. “Oliver,” he added. “I’m not getting a good feeling about this. Your prison buddy is up to something, something planned.”
The three of them went silent as each contemplated John’s report. “He figured out he was being tracked by Felicity’s phone,” Oliver told them. “Be ready for anything.”
“Copy,” John replied.
Felicity pulled the gun Oliver brought her from out of the of her coat. She checked to make sure it was ready to protect her as she clicked off the safety. “Oliver, wouldn’t it be easier if all of us were back in that room with you? I’m suddenly nervous about us being separated.”
“Felicity, it’s alright. It gives us a flank, one that Stan won’t be able to fully protect. John, come back inside and make another sweep around us. Be stealthy, my friend. Stan is a weasel. But weasels can be very vicious.”
“Well,” John said. “I’ve fought assassins, a bunch of extraterrestrials playing mind games, a lunatic magic man…the list is continuous. I think I can handle one crazy person skulking around in the dark.”
“I have no doubt,” Oliver told him. “But still, don’t think you are, or any of us are, a hundred percent impervious to harm. You can’t always see crazy coming.”
“You guys,” Felicity jumped into the conversation. “Both of you are good at what you do. But I think what Oliver is saying…” Then she saw movement in the shadows near the main entrance. “Oliver,” she said, bringing their discussion to an end. “I see something or someone moving by the front door. He wouldn’t be stupid enough to just stroll in and…well; he knows we were tracking him. Wouldn’t that give him an advantage on sneaking up on us?”
“Felicity, I’m a couple minutes away from you,” John told her. “Can you confirm if it’s Stan?”
Felicity raised the gun in her hand as if to ward off the threat she was seeing moving in the shadows. “Negative. I can’t see any better without more light. But who else can it be? Maybe I’m just jumping at shadows.”
“Guys,” Oliver interrupted. “It’s Stan. He’s here. Just protect yourselves and let him make his way to me. Stealth, remember?”
Sometimes you can’t see crazy coming, Oliver reminded himself.
*
Stan did indeed make his way into the morgue. But not through the front door. When he found this place a few days ago, he walked throughout the building, familiarizing himself with the layout. There was an emergency door on the other side of the building where he had stashed Felicity. He entered there. Once inside, Stan made his way towards the main entrance and the hallway leading down to the body storage area he left Felicity in. Then he heard footsteps ahead of him and stopped to calculate how close he was to whoever was walking. He turned the corner of the hallway he was in and saw John carefully stepping through the darkness they were both in.
Stan went back around the corner he had come from. So, Oliver had some help. He is also here, Stan told himself. They’re laying some kind of trap for him. He remembered passing an open janitor closet a few steps back. There should be something heavy enough in there to use in taking out that guy in front of him.
He moved towards the closet. On the way, Stan kept waiting for Oliver to drop out of the sky and land on him. Where was he?
*
Felicity was beginning to doubt seeing anything but shadows. She still had her eyes glued to the front door though. She was starting to learn the same lesson Oliver had when out in the field. Trust yourself. Don’t let doubt stop you from taking action. Even if it was only shadows she was seeing, Stan was still out there somewhere, lurking. An intense anger suddenly surged through her. I was out Christmas shopping, damn it. This son of a bitch drugged me and kidnapped me. He put me on a cold slab in a drawer where dead people were stored. She remembered lying next to Oliver a couple weeks after he came home. He told her about Stan and how he had basically done the same thing to Oliver. He told her that Stan was very disturbed man.
Now, as she peered into the shadow in front of her, Felicity made the decision to leave the security room and go back to her husband. It was an instinct. It felt like the right thing to do. She was not going to let anything or anyone hurt the people she loves.
Felicity left the security room and moved towards the hallway that would take her to Oliver. She became another shadow, another shade, moving through the darkness of the abandoned morgue.
“Oliver,” Felicity spoke through her comm link. “I’m coming to you,” she told him. “Stan is crazy, but he’s not stupid enough to think I’m still inside that drawer. He’s going to try and take up out one by one. I told you it didn’t feel right to separate.”
Then Felicity heard a loud thud in front of her, followed by a louder groan. It sounded like a body hitting the floor. She raised her gun and took aim.
“Oliver, I got him,” she told her husband.
@it-was-a-red-heeler @memcjo @swordandarrow @hope-for-olicity @lageniuswannabe @faegal04 @laureningall @gabriellamarie97 @icannotbelieveiamhere
31 notes
·
View notes
Text
Fill the Void [2/5]
By this point in your life, you were used to fading into the background. Used to being just another face in the crowd. Used to standing by, while others took the spotlight. Specifically, while 80% of the population took the spotlight. You most certainly were comfortable in your place behind-the-scenes.
Yet, Hawks took great joy in breaking you out into the public scene. He loved to show you off, taking you out every chance he had. Movies? You two were at every blockbuster that came out. Galleries? Every event, every opening, he was there, dragging you behind him. Dinners? He took you to every restaurant you knew, and many more you didn't. Even if you weren't always entirely interested in whatever date he took you on, it was wonderful just to spend the time with him.
What wasn't so wonderful, was the cameras that followed the two of you around. They took pictures of you constantly, at every opportunity. Anytime you stepped outside, they hounded you, trying to catch every moment, whether you were at Hawks' side or not. And while he may have been more accustomed to the attention, you floundered and panicked at the lack of privacy.
It wasn't long before the tabloids started arriving at your apartment, either. You didn't know if it was the outlets themselves sending you copies of heir papers, or if some well-intentioned fool thought you'd enjoy seeing your own face plastered on every page, but the result was the same.
You tried to get rid of them before Hawks found out that more had arrived. He knew how much they upset you, and had, on several occasions, had several 'polite' choice words with the major news outlets because of it. It might have been easier to just... not read the papers, but curiosity often got the better of you.
'Pro-hero settles for a civilian'
'Quirkless rising through the ranks'
'Love? Lust? Money? Read the real story here!'
Everyone had an opinion, and it seemed like they were all determined to shout and shout until you drowned.
At the end of every day, your Hawks returned, ever faithfully. He'd take any newspapers that you hadn't hidden or otherwise disposed of, and would fling them from your bedroom window. His laughs would echo out onto the street as the two of you watched the pages fly in the wind.
“They don't know anything,” he murmurs to you, fingers threaded through you hair. He fights to keep the smirk off his lips. You know he doesn't take the whole thing seriously, there's not a doubt in his mind. He has the freedom to choose, because he has the power. The status. The most to lose.
Maybe they're right.
Somehow, somehow, the sudden publicity of your relationship seems to have a positive consequence. The infamous number two hero becomes the talk of the nation. The man with the pitiful lover, the lovesick puppy who can't keep her name out of his mouth. The less Hawks shares about you, the more the crowds speculate, and the more attention he draws to himself. His agency is put at the forefront of every mission, ever event, every patrol. Applications upon applications, begging the public idol to make an appearance. To let some group or other ride on the coattails of his fame.
Hawks becomes much busier, suddenly. He no longer stops by between patrols, no longer drags you out of your office for late lunches. No flowers at your desk in the mornings, no 'personal escort' after work. No, now he arrives at your apartment, the sky long since darkened, feet dragging and wings drooping. He barely manages to drag himself into your bed at night, falling into your arms and asleep before he lands. His plumage is sparse, and he leaves limp feathers all over your floors. No matter how often you sweep, they always seem to linger.
Still. You promised each other. 'I'll never let you go.'
Hawks used to beg you to watch his interviews. He was snappy and short-tempered and full of smirks, and he did whatever he could to fluster whoever he was with. Sometimes you would watch it live, other times you would watch snippets online. It made him happy, knowing that he was putting on a show for you. Knowing that the whole world could see how little they mattered compared to the treasure waiting for him at home.
Now, he begged you to avoid watching them. He used to be in control. He was always the one making the probing comments, the barbed questions. Now, they had ammo, and more than enough resentment.
One evening, on your way home from work, your car is caught up in a massive traffic jam. People yell and shout obscenities at each other. Horns honk. No cars move. You groan, and watch the advertisements on the giant screen above your heads, bolted tightly to the skyscraper. Your fingers drum against the steering wheel. And then you see his face.
The pixels don't do him justice. They make him look flat and annoyed and pale, and you know first hand that he is so much more. He sits on a smooth, stiff black couch, beside the hero Endeavor. The interviewer- a man with a thin, weasel like face – sits to their left on a matching armchair.
You watch Hawks' face closely, trying to imagine there in the car beside you. He'd make some joke at the interviewer's expense. He'd tell you he smelled like onions, or about how tiny his feet were... something silly and stupid. Anything to try to get you to laugh. You don't even register what the interview is about until the camera moves, focusing in on Endeavor's brutal, livid glare.
“What my partner does with his personal time is his business.”
“Are you sure you won't comment on their potential children?” the interviewer probes. At this, Hawks chokes, his face turning red just as quickly as yours. “After all, you had four children through a quirk marriage, so we know-”
“You don't know anything. I won't repeat myself again.”
“And there you have it, folks!” the interviewer sings, gesturing towards the duo. “Endeavor, the number one pro-hero in everything but personality!”
Hawks opens his mouth to protest, and as his bushy eyebrows furrow, you feel laughter bubble in your chest. You recognize, even from this distance, even through a screen, the storm brewing in his eyes.
“And you,” the weasel-man says, pointing to Hawks, whose mouth moves soundlessly. Your lover's face takes on a feral look, his clawed fingers tapping roughly on the microphone attached to his shirt. “We've heard plenty of rumors of this girl you keep shut in at him, but you never seem to care to comment. Anything you'd like to say?”
Hawks shakes his head forcefully. That familiar defiant light enters his eyes, and you know he won't budge. A screen begins to lower behind the three men, as Hawks and Endeavor become more and more agitated. The interviewer reaches out, and black goop shoots from his fingers, cementing the heroes to their couch. The camera readjusts its view as pictures are projected along the screen. Pictures of girls, blondes and brunettes and redheads. Skinny, curvy, muscular. Some posing on the front of magazines, some posing with Hawks himself.
“What's the difference between them and her? You never seemed to worry about keeping them out of sight. My, my, even your breakups were rather public.”
“They have nothing on her.” Hawks' mic is working again. “She's different.”
“You're right, there. She's quirkless. She can't challenge you, so there's no competition. You're automatically the better of the couple.”
Hawks' fists are clenched. Your nails bite into the skin of your arms.
“Right? Right?!”
The car behind you honks loudly, repeatedly, and you realize that the traffic has begun to clear. You tear your eyes away from the screen, hands shaking as you grip the steering wheel and move the car forward. It seems like seconds pass, and you're in front of your apartment. The home you share with Hawks.
You keep driving.
First Part
Next Part
#fill the void#bnha#mha#my hero academia#hawks#bnha hawks#endeavor#goopy weasel man#aka my favorite oc#reader insert#hawks x reader#suprise!!#i haven't finished anything else sooooooo#another two parts left after this#maybe three
171 notes
·
View notes
Last Seen Blogs
televising-net
Televising
youthinkidknowmyselfbynow
The Sanctum Santorum
portugalisrael
Sans titre
karenfordonte
Caring For Donte
alunasky-blog
Alunasky