#i DID have fun however because the party banter was hilarious and it was fun getting to hang out with ppl! | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

spwastedaffairs · 1 year

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[PROLOGUE]

Colorado winters weren’t all too crazy, however up in the mountains at Tolkien’s family owned lodge, it was. The cold bitter wind was a wake up call if you stepped foot outside and the good four feet or more of snow was enough to quickly bury anyone in, if they weren’t being careful. Outside the lodge looked cold and uninviting, the snow piled high on top of the roof, icicles hanging down off the edges, the cold wind brushing snow against the sides. But inside?

Inside the lodge it was warm and full of life, a small party held by a group of friends was just beginning to die down. A few were tired, lazing around as the party dwindled down; Butters, the only one to have retired early for the night, stood inside his room, staring out the window. Those who were still up and eager to joke around were Bebe, Y/n, Stan, Kyle, Wendy, Kenny, and Eric, and all of them had a fun idea.

Bebe holds a piece of paper in her hand, her eyes scanning its contents with a sly grin spreading across her lips. As if lost in deep thought, she walks slowly towards a nearby Bed it was perfectly made, and with a flip of her wrist, sets it down with a thud.

Suddenly, Y/n's voice rings out, startling Bebe. "Oh, my God! I can't believe you actually did that," exclaims Y/n, her eyes wide as saucers. But Bebe is quick to shush her, placing her index finger in front of her lips.

"Shhh... shhh... shhh..." whispers Bebe, looking around the room to make sure no one else was around.

This sudden commotion attracts the attention of Stan and Wendy, who walk over to the room, where they find the two girls standing closely together. "Don't you guys think this is a little bit cruel?" asks Stan, his eyebrows furrowed with concern.

Wendy, however, is quick to defend Bebe's actions. "Oh, come on, she deserves it. After all, she's been making googly eyes at Tolkien for weeks now."

Stan lets out a sigh. "It's not her fault that she has a huge crush on him, you know?"

Bebe interjects, "Nichole's been making moves on him. I'm just looking out for myself in the long run."

With that, Bebe turns around and begins to walk away. But Y/n, Stan, and Wendy follow, eager to see what Bebe has planned next.

As the group of teenagers made their way through the hallway, the sound of their footsteps echoed through the wooden beams of the lodge. The smell of pine and woodsmoke filled the air, adding to the rustic charm of the place. With each step, their excitement continued to bubble up, as they were finally reunited with their friends Kenny and Kyle.

Bebe, always the passionate one, couldn't help but make her feelings known. "Just because he's D1, doesn't mean he belongs to everyone. Tolkien is my man," she exclaimed as they walked down the hall. But Kyle was quick to retort, "Bebe, he's not anyone's man." A playful banter between the two ensued, and Wendy, Y/n, and even Stan laughed along with them.

As they approached the guest room, where they planned to rendezvous with the rest of their group, Kyle made his way upstairs to find and warn Nichole. "Nichole!" he called out, his voice echoing through the empty corridor. Meanwhile, the rest of the group snuck into Tolkien's empty bedroom.

Wendy crouched behind a partition with Stan, trying to suppress her giggles. Kenny and Eric snuck into the cabinets, determined to stay hidden. Eric pressed the record button on his phone, hoping to catch some hilarious footage. Bebe and Y/n, on the other hand, decided to hide under the bed, waiting for the perfect opportunity to make their move.

As they waited, the tension in the room built. Every sound made their muscles tense up, and they held their breath as they heard approaching footsteps. Finally, they heard the sound of the door creaking open, and the girls stifled their laughter. "Oop!... She's here. Shh!" Y/n whispered to Bebe.

The group was all in on the prank, and they couldn't wait to see Nichole’s unsuspecting reaction. The excitement and adrenaline pumping through their veins as they prepared to pull off their prank made their hearts race. As they looked around at each other, ready for the perfect moment to strike.

[TIME] 2:00 AM

Butters, continuing to watch the snow as it slowly descends outside as the wind dies down, notices a man standing outside, his body partly covered by the trees and snow covered brush.

Butters gasps in shock and feels his body jolt back, he blinks and heads back to the window, staring at the spot the unknown man once stood, rubbing his eyes in confusion at the lack of a body being there any longer.

He runs out his bedroom door and heads over to tell somebody what he had just seen when he notices Nichole’s bedroom door ajar. As he opens it up slowly, he calls out, “Nichole? You in here?” with no response, Butters opens the door fully, taking in the room.

A small note lays on her bed and Butters picks it up

“Nichole..” Butters reads, “you are the girl that I’ve always wanted and I’ve been nervous to fully commit to saying this, meet me in the guest room at 2:00am, I have to show you what I really feel for you. Yours truly, Tolkien.”

Groaning, Butters sets the letter down and heads downstairs, “this cannot be good”, he thinks.

As Nichole approached the room, she felt a mix of excitement and nervousness bubbling inside of her. She had received a note from Tolkien, inviting her to meet him there, and she couldn't help but wonder what he had in store for her. As she entered the room, she spotted Tolkien immediately, and a smile spread across her face.

"Glad you could make it," Tolkien greeted her, his voice low and sultry.

Nichole felt a shiver run down her spine as she replied, "Of course. What did you have in mind?"

Tolkien grinned, then leaned in to whisper in her ear, "Maybe we should start with a little, you know, making out, and see where it goes from there."

Nichole's heart raced as she nodded, her body already tingling with anticipation. She began to remove her shirt, but a sudden commotion caught her attention.

"Oh, my God! She's taking her shirt off!" Bebe giggled.

Nichole froze, confused and embarrassed as she had begun to undress as well. As more of her friends revealed themselves from their hiding places, she began to feel a sinking sensation in her stomach.

"Tolkien? What are you doing here?!" she demanded, turning to face him.

"I'm sorry, Nicki. This all got outta hand, but..." Tolkien trailed off, looking guilty.

Kyle burst into the room, calling out Nichole's name, “Nichole! Nichole, hey, Nicki.... Don't... it's just a..” but it was too late. She was already on the verge of tears, her eyes watering as she realized what was happening.

"Stupid prank," Kyle muttered angrily, his gaze flickering over the group of friends.

"Ugh... damn!" Eric chimed in, clearly irritated with the situation.

"You guys are jerks. You know that?" Kyle spat out, his anger directed at his friends.

Kyle followed in Nichole's footsteps, calling out to the girl as she exited the room. Meanwhile, Tolkien rushed after Nichole, determined to make things right.

"Nichole!" Kyle called out, but it was too late. The damage had been done.

[TIME] 2:04 AM

As Butters enters the main room, Nichole runs past him and outside, noticing it was Nichole, he runs out after her calling her name, “Nichole! Nichole, there is someone outside!” Seeing how far she had gone already, Butters sighs as he heads back inside the lodge’s main room.

“What the hell?” He asks himself in disbelief and then he hears a faint call out of “Nichole” from Kyle and he looks up as everyone else enters into the room.

“Can someone tell me what’s going on? Where is Nichole heading off too?”

Bebe makes a noise of annoyance and rolls her eyes, “She just can’t take a joke, it’s whatever..it’s fine, Butters.”

“It was just a prank, Nichole!” You yell out, waving your arms, irritated at what you believed was childish behavior.

“What the hell..did you do?” Butters exclaims, anger and shock evident in his voice.

Tolkien puts his hands up in defeat, “We were just messing around, Butters.”

“Yeah it wasn’t serious!” Kenny chimes in.

Butters slips his shoes on and scoffs at the rest of the group, “You guys are such jerks you know that? What is wrong with you all?” As he finishes his sentence, Butters runs out the door in the direction that he had last seen Nichole head off too to go search for her.

The rest of the group can hear Butters faintly call out for Nichole as he heads off searching for her, and they then awkwardly turn to one another. Stan clears his throat, “Do we…go after him and search for Nichole too..?”

Kyle crosses his arms and his eyebrows furrowed, obviously displeased with the group, “You know, I think you guys are the last people she’d like to see right now.”

[TIME] 2:11 AM

The wind howled past Butters' ears as he called out Nichole's name into the cold, snowy darkness. The fog was thick, and visibility was nearly zero. He stumbled over tree branches, his boots crunching through the snow. Butters knew he couldn't afford to be cautious. Every second counted, and Nichole's life might be hanging in the balance.

As he climbed over a particularly gnarled branch, Butters lost his footing and tripped, tumbling to the ground. He scrambled up quickly, shaking snow from his coat, and continued moving. His heart raced, and sweat beads formed on his forehead. The adrenaline was pumping in his veins, fueling his urgency.

A flight of stairs loomed before him, with a sign pointing to two routes: the faster, riskier path or the safer, more time-consuming route. Without a second thought, Butters chose the faster route. It was a decision he might soon come to regret.

As he hurtled down the steps, he approached the edge of the staircase. He surveyed the potential drop and made a split-second choice to jump, landing safely on the ground below. Butters had made it past the first obstacle, but the journey was far from over.

A noise drew his attention, and Butters caught sight of a series of footprints leading into the distance. Without a moment's hesitation, he set off in pursuit, noticing a herd of elk in his path. The animals scattered in alarm, and Butters swore under his breath, feeling his heart pounding in his chest.

As he drew nearer to Nichole's location, he reached another fork in the path. He had to choose between following a shadow or a set of footprints, and he made another quick decision. He followed the shadow, racing past the footprints.

Suddenly, Butters saw the outline of a balcony looming ahead, and he leaped, trusting in his instincts. He landed with a thud, and a sharp pain shot through his ankle. Undeterred, he pressed onward, pausing only to use his phone as a makeshift flashlight in the dark.

Butters, with a sense of urgency, crouched down in the snow to grab hold of the totem sticking out. As his slender fingers wrapped around the totem, he felt a sudden rush of energy pass through his entire being, bringing with it visions that flooded his mind. He tried to make sense of the jumbled up pictures flashing before his eyes, but they whisked past him too quickly, like butterflies flitting in the sun. Suddenly, amidst the chaos, he saw a crystal-clear image that left him shaken to the core.

It was him and Nichole, falling weightlessly through a void, their screams echoing through the emptiness. It was a devastating sight that shook Butters to his very core. Gasping for air, he muttered in disbelief, "Huh? Nichole!, What is this?" There was a moment of silence, a lull that tricked Butters into thinking everything was over, but then a sudden movement made him jump out of his skin.

Unhooking his eyes from the totem, Butters scanned his surroundings, worried that something was watching him. Something he couldn't see. A few seconds later, he crouched down again to assess the totem, but in the back of his mind, the warning bell began to ring. As he hesitated, lost in thought, he heard the familiar sound of human voices.

It was Nichole, who had been traversing the snowy terrain behind him, and sensing his unease, came running to his location. "Butters, what's happening?," she asked, unperturbed by the chill that had crept into her bones. Butters, still dazed by the vision he had seen, looked up to see Nichole staring at him with expectant eyes.

Panic written all over his face, he felt a gust of wind hit him squarely in the face. It was then that he realized that he was freezing cold, and probably on the verge of hypothermia. Nichole, sensing the same, looked at him quizzically. "What was it?" she asked, but before Butters could answer, he said, almost instinctively, "Take my coat, you need it more than I do."

Nichole, sensing the gravity of their situation, took the coat wordlessly, draping it around herself, and thanking Butters wordlessly. And as they looked at each other, Butters couldn't help but feel a sense of unease settling over him. "We need to get out of here," he said, holding his hand out to pull Nichole to her feet.

They trudged on in silence, the cold enveloping them like a cocoon as they walked, changing everything around them into a strange, almost timeless place. It was as if they had entered another realm, where time worked differently, and the rules were different.

Nichole broke the silence. "I'm such an idiot! I'm so dumb..."

Butters, sensing her insecurity, looked at her and smiled. "No, you're not," he said, a sense of compassion warming his voice. "We just got unlucky. But we'll be fine, we'll get out of here soon."

Nichole looked at Butters, feeling a sense of hope settle over her. She knew she was lucky to have him by her side, no matter how things turned out.

As the view switches into a predator-like vision, the once peaceful environment transforms into a place where danger lurks in every corner. The view scans the area, searching for any heat signatures that signify prey. Suddenly, the vision locks onto Butters and Nichole, who are running for their lives from an unknown entity. The two friends are completely unaware of what is pursuing them until they hear a blood-curdling screech ring out in the night air.

The sound sends shivers down their spines and a sense of pure adrenaline kicks in, forcing them to run even faster. Butters and Nichole race towards a nearby bridge, desperate to escape their invisible attacker. However, as they make their way across the rickety old structure, Nichole trips and falls, almost immediately halting their efforts to escape.

Butters rushes to her side and helps her stand up again, but as they hurriedly continue running towards safety, he accidentally drops his phone through the floorboards. Undeterred, they keep moving forward, only to find themselves at a dead end with nowhere left to run.

Butters curses under his breath, his fear-fueled mind racing as they look out over the cliff at the thing that's now getting closer and closer. Both of them grasp onto each other's hands tightly, willing each other to be strong.

Butters desperately pleads with the entity, hoping that somehow it will understand and leave them alone. The unknown creature continues to approach, its sight fixed on the vulnerable prey before it. Butters is almost beside himself with terror, screaming, "Get back!"

The view switches to Nichole, her eyes wide, her breathing ragged. She knows she's in mortal danger, and she's acutely aware of how fragile their situation is. There's no way out, and they're both rapidly running out of time.

Suddenly, both of them fall, Butters barely managing to grab onto a branch underneath the cliff as Nichole tumbles towards the edge. With all the strength he can muster, he holds onto the branch but looks on helplessly as his friend falls over the cliff.

All of Butters' hopes and dreams flash before his eyes, realizing that saving himself is impossible. He turns to the unknown man who has finally appeared to help, with only two choices in front of him, neither of which he wants to make. With tears streaming down his face, Butters makes the agonizing decision to let go of Nichole.

As he looks over at Nichole, his body racked with sobs, he reaches out hopelessly for the man's hand. In the next moment, the branch snaps, and Butters plummets down into the dark abyss of the mines below.

His back slams against an unforgiving rock, killing him instantly. Butters' body tumbles and tumbles, a mere rag doll who has been entirely defeated by the events of the night. When at last his limp form comes to a rest, it's right next to Nichole's body.

The once beautiful night has been transformed into a dark and terrifying nightmare, with loss and death the only outcomes. This impossible situation will stay with anyone who witnessed it for years to come, the memory of Butters' and Nichole's tragic ending etched on their minds forever.

#wasted affairs series #stan marsh x reader #south park x reader #stan marsh

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emsylcatac · 3 years

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What the future holds, we'll never know

Summary

Marinette didn't know what the future was made of—but the glimpse of the one featuring her akumatised partner she had seen taught her one thing: she and Chat Noir should never be together.

Which currently wasn't really a problem considering that she was in love with Adrien, and that they had been getting closer lately.

Read it on AO3

Hiiii @ladynoirist Lisa gemini bro ♥♥♥ I was soooo happy to be your totally secret (yes pretend you never guessed it was me okay I was so subtle) santaaaa for the @mlsecretsanta !!! (also pretend we're totally in December and not in May ho ho ho! Reindeers are still roaming!)

I'm so sorry for how late I am, but I hope you'll enjoy this fic 😄

───※ ·❆· ※───

21st of January, 1h after the reveal

Marinette stood in front of the bistro door, pacing. Pretending to look at the menu, pretending to think of what to choose, pretending that everything was absolutely normal and fine and this was just a perfectly normal day.

It was, however, not normal nor fine inside her head.

She had to push that door. She was already a good half an hour late and it wouldn’t do good to make her friends wait longer—excuses were harder and harder to explain the more she shied away.

Please, don’t be here. She never thought she would hope for that. Please have your bodyguard bring you home. Your father forcing you to go home.

Please, go home by yourself and find some stupid excuse.

She would feel bad for having all these unfair hopes if she hadn't been feeling completely panicked inside.

Her phone vibrated in her pocket. Gulping, she chanced a glance at it.

Alya girl where are u?? we’re waiting to order!

Well. She couldn’t delay for much longer. Taking a deep breath, Marinette pushed the door open and scanned the room.

Please, please don’t be inside.

She wasn’t being fair, she knew that—it wasn’t his fault if she didn’t feel like facing him.

“Marinette!”

She turned in the direction of her name where Alya was waving at her, hand held up high, while Nino was grinning and—he was there.

Swallowing—though her mouth had been dry for a while now—Marinette headed towards them despite her legs screaming at her to turn around and run as fast as possible away from here.

“H-hey,” she stuttered, “sorry for...for being late.”

She sat next to Adrien (because of course she had to be seated next to him). Their eyes met for a split second and he gave her a timid smile that she couldn’t return.

“It’s fine,” Alya waved off, “the most important thing is that you’re here now! But quick, choose what you want to eat, I’m staaarving!”

She, for one, clearly wasn’t.

Adrien was giving her quick glances and she tried her best to ignore him.

It was him, it was him, it was him.

And it was oh so unfair. She picked up her menu to hide her face as tears threatened to escape the corners of her eyes.

───※ ·❆· ※───

5th of October, 108 days before the reveal

“Try that.”

Marinette turned around, abandoning the search for her size amongst the many red skirts on the clothes rail.

Adrien was holding a tacky glittery dress, reflecting the light of a multitude of disharmonious colours, supporting two red fabric-flowers on each shoulder straps. It was positively horrendous, the kind of clothes you wonder who would ever buy when passing in front of it in the store.

She looked up to Adrien’s innocent smile and had to bite down the disgusted expression she suspected she must have shown for a split second. She hoped he hadn’t noticed—the last thing she wanted was to offend him. Growing-up in the fashion industry didn’t make him a good judge in the field, it seemed.

“I… You want me to...to try that on?” she stammered.

He gave her a nod, humming enthusiastically.

Maybe it was the kind of dress Adrien saw on girls at fashion shows, and she just hadn't seen it before. Maybe he liked it on them.

Maybe he would find her pretty in it.

Against her better judgement (because her judgement was always lost when it came to him, wasn’t it?), Marinette stretched a hand towards the piece of clothing, gulping. She raised her eyes to his, offering a tight smile.

Adrien’s mouth twitched, and his eyes held a new mischievous glint that hadn’t been there a few seconds ago.

“You...you’re pulling my leg, aren’t you?” she said, deflating.

He burst out laughing, a genuine, happy laugh that reminded her of a certain day in the rain, and she couldn’t help but smile despite herself.

“You should have seen your face!”

He hadn't made fun of her in a while—in fact, he hadn’t laughed at her since that day, in the rain. The thought of him being comfortable enough with her to allow himself to do it again made her cheeks heat up.

“I could...I could call your bodyguard or...or your dad! Yes! I could call your dad and out you, you know!” she threatened, fighting back the nerves that always messed up her words when she spoke to him.

She wouldn’t mess up today.

It stopped Adrien momentarily and suddenly he was pleading her, begging with joined hands.

“Marinette,” he said, and he did sound serious—she would have been convinced had his eyes not looked a tad too much like a kicked puppy’s, “please, you can’t do that. Please please please please, I’m sorry for ruining your shopping day and running into you and insisting to tag along and—”

Marinette giggled. “I’ll wear it,” she said, snatching the terrible (terrible!!) dress from his hands, careful to not brush his fingers and make it awkward. “Because unlike you who’s trying to hide, I’m no coward.”

Adrien straightened up. “I’m no coward either!”

She could feel her heart beating erratically in her chest. She wasn’t nervous. She wasn’t gonna be nervous when talking to Adrien. Not again. Not this time. She could banter with him—this was known territory. Not with him though, never with him, but…

“Okay,” she crossed her arms. Her eyes scanned the different clothing items before landing on a pink plastic fur dress on a mannequin. “Prove it.”

He choked on a laugh before grinning at her. “Oh, you’re so on.”

───※ ·❆· ※───

16th of November, 66 days before the reveal

Adrien opened his diary, ready to write down the homework of the day Mrs Bustier was dictating.

The sound of ruffling papers and rummaging in bags filled the classroom, but he tried to focus on one sound in particular, resisting the urge to smile.

Any moment now.

Just a little longer before—

A loud groan resonated from behind him, and this time he let the grin slip onto his face, thankful that she couldn’t see it.

“What’s wrong?” Alya’s whisper made its way to his ears.

“Someone drew me with a towel on the head, swimming glasses and an ugly party dress!”

Adrien couldn’t help the snort that escaped him.

Teasing Marinette, he found, was very entertaining. He didn’t know exactly when he started to feel comfortable enough to do it. Didn’t know what exactly it was that was making it deliciously familiar yet all so new—and above all, warm.

Her reaction had been worth the wait. He silently delighted in the way she battled between raging against him and finding him hilarious (because with the way she giggled, or stammered, or even bit her lips the few times he had joked with her, before getting ahold of herself and teasing back, she had to find him hilarious, right?).

He guessed he deserved the ruler slap he received on the head.

Yes, Adrien liked her reactions, he thought while rubbing his head. He liked that new, teasing dynamic he’d been having with her for a couple of weeks now. He liked it.

But above all, he loved—

Adrien let a soft fond smile pull at his lips when he opened his diary that evening, once seated at his desk. A drawing quickly scribbled in the margin lit up by his many computer screens welcomed him of what he assumed was a new Gabriel ad featuring him in an atrocious fur dress coloured in fluro pink highlighter.

Above all, he loved her witty and sneaky comebacks.

───※ ·❆· ※───

8th of December, 44 days before the reveal

“What are you thinking about?”

Ladybug saw a smile stretch across her partner’s lips. He let out a fond chuckle, throwing his head up towards the sky. His eyes were closed, but she could tell that he was seeing more stars that way than if they had been opened looking up at the Parisian sky. She envied him a little.

“I’m thinking,” he simply said.

And didn’t say anything after that.

She waited a little, just in case, but he remained silent. His feet dangled above the edge of the roof and he started gently swinging his legs one after the other. He let out a breathless giggle, as if he couldn’t control it, and hummed a song her ears caught only because of the wind blowing towards her.

Her heart did a somersault in her chest at the sight. She felt a weird mix of emotions, not unpleasant but not entirely enjoyable either, bittersweetness and happiness mingling together.

He did look happy—but tonight it felt like she wasn’t a part of it. That he was in his own bubble of joy, a bubble she once had complete control over but, in that instant, was slipping through her fingers. If she was being honest, it had been slowly and subtly escaping her for a while now.

He was in love, she realised. Her gaze on him softened, before she turned away from him to look towards the sky, too, and exhaled a puff of hot air that dissipated in the cold and continued to grow as she joined him in his humming, closing her eyes.

If she wasn’t the one he was shining for tonight, she would still share that moment of exhilaration with him.

Besides, she had reasons to feel giddy herself too.

───※ ·❆· ※───

29th of December, 23 days before the reveal

“Hey.” Plagg’s voice wasn’t loud enough to pull Adrien out of his reverie completely, but enough to bring the cloud he was on a little bit back down to Earth. “You’ve been staring at the ceiling for the past twenty minutes now. What’s up?”

Adrien let the thread of his lucky charm pass through his fingers, feeling the beads between them rolling from one to another. “I have?”

Plagg stayed silent for a few seconds. “Yes. Are you alright?”

Adrien chuckled. “Yeah. Yeah, I think I am.” I have been for a little while now, he didn’t say.

Suddenly, he got up, walked towards his computer, picked up his phone from his desk and opened Instagram. His fingers quickly found Marinette’s name and pressed her icon to see her latest story. He smiled as a selfie of her and Alya appeared, and played it again once it was over.

“Ah. I see.” Adrien hadn’t noticed Plagg flying above his shoulder but he couldn’t care less. “You like her?”

“I love her,” he simply corrected.

“Really?! Planning on asking her out? Sweeping her off her feet?”

Adrien shook his head, chuckling. He put his phone back on his desk and let himself fall further in his seat, pushing his feet against the desk leg to propel himself back.

Marinette, Marinette, Marinette.

“We’ll see,” he stretched his arms above his head. “We’ll see what happens and when I feel that the time is right. I don’t want to mess it up. Not this time.”

Not with her.

───※ ·❆· ※───

11th of January, 10 days before the reveal

When she found Adrien waiting for her at the bottom of the stairs that morning, blushing, a hand rubbing the back of his neck, the other holding a yellow rose with red tips on the petals and stammering a simple yet powerful “I think I love you”, Marinette was glad she had been on time for school for once.

───※ ·❆· ※───

21st of January, 1h before the reveal

“I can’t believe you made me wake up at eight o’clock on a Saturday morning,” Marinette shook her head.

Adrien laughed and held her hand tighter as he pulled her along with him, striding alongside the Seine. “But you have to admit that it was worth it.”

Spending time with you is worth the world, she thought. I could wake up at five if that’s what you wanted. She didn’t say any of that out loud. They had only barely started dating, after all. It could scare him off.

Instead, she let half a smile pull at her lips. “I suppose.”

Adrien stopped in his tracks and turned to her. “It was worth it! It just snowed during the night—for once! It’s so rare, we have to enjoy it! And the sunrise was beautiful!”

She crossed her arms, pretending to think about it and evaluate her morning.

“It was,” Adrien insisted, pleaded for her to agree.

“Fine,” she conceded, giggling. “It was beautiful. I’m glad you forced me out of bed.”

She was rewarded by a brilliant smile, that melted her heart despite the cold January air on her cheeks, and a kiss on her forehead (that melted her whole).

A giddy laugh escaped her and she couldn’t help but kiss his nose, making him giggle, the sound sweeter than the glockenspiel a busker was playing a few meters away.

Adrien’s cheeks were red when she pulled away—from the cold or from her kiss, she didn’t know, but she hoped for the latter. She decided to grab his winter hat, leaving his hair all messy on top and wide eyes of outraged shock on his face. Adrien, she had realised, really liked when she was messing with him and she berated herself for never having dared to do such a thing before.

In retaliation, he grabbed her own hat and put it on his head. “Jokes on you,” he said, “now I have a pink pompom while you have a lame black one!”

She laughed as she put his hat on her own head. He likes me, she chanted in her head. He loves me even. He loves me, he loves me, and I love him. All was well that day. All was perfect.

“When are we meeting up with Alya and Nino for lunch, again?”

“I think we still have an hour,” Adrien replied.

It felt like nothing could disrupt their date, their day, them, really.

───※ ·❆· ※───

21st of January, the reveal

Accidents were stupid, most of the time. One second of miscalculation, one careless mistake and every neatly protected secret could be disrupted forever.

Detransforming in the same alleway was probably the stupidest, lamest and most careless way to reveal their identities, Marinette and Adrien thought, as they faced each other with wide eyes and heart beating too fast in their rib cages with their kwamis hanging incriminatingly at their side.

Marinette didn’t think. She ran.

───※ ·❆· ※───

21st of January, 1h30 after the reveal

To say the atmosphere was awkward was an understatement. They were barely glancing at each other, passing each other the salt without brushing a finger or looking where they handed it.

Marinette overfilled Adrien’s glass when pouring him some water; Adrien startled when Marinette’s hand accidentally brushed his arm while trying to clean his table up.

They were a mess.

In a way, Marinette was glad that Alya and Nino were here to provide distraction.

She just hoped they wouldn’t notice the tension between her and Adrien.

“So, how have you two lovebirds been doing? Still in the chummy-chummy phase?”

So much for that. There was an awkward silence, none of them knowing what to really say.

“Sure,” she decided to take the plunge and ate a mouthful of fries so she wouldn’t have to explain further.

Alya and Nino said nothing, looking between the two of them.

“We’ve been, uh…we went walking around the Seine this morning,” Adrien mumbled. “To see the snow and, uh…”

“Oh, that reminds me,” Marinette cut. She couldn’t believe she was managing to talk to him. “Y-your...your winter hat.”

She handed it to him and Adrien looked at it for a few seconds before taking it back, his face crumbling and disheartened.

“...Thanks. Um, here is yours, I suppose.”

Marinette closed her eyes tight as she snatched her hat from his hands, feeling nauseous all of a sudden.

Where did they stand, now? They had barely even started dating. Could they brush off the massive new developments that were their identities? Could superheroes even date?

White flashed before her eyes. Her heart did a somersault, and the nausea intensified, making her head spin.

Stupid. Idiot, superheroes couldn’t date, least of all her and Adrien.

It was unfair that she was having these thoughts now, when she still didn’t know what was going on in her head—Adrien, Chat Noir, her partner. The same… so similar yet so different.

He had given her a rose when he had confessed. It was such a Chat Noir thing to do...she should have known.

They were the same person and it was awkward and she needed time she didn’t get the luxury to have. The second she thought she had acknowledged this information, it would all come back the next with the panic accompanying it.

The silence following must have been long and heavy because Alya took in a sharp breath. “Okay. What’s going on between you two? You’ve been acting awkward since we’ve got here.”

───※ ·❆· ※───

23rd of January, 2 days after the reveal

“So, this is it?”

Adrien felt the knot in his throat tighten a little more and more as Marinette kept looking to the side, silent, avoiding his gaze. He didn’t know why he asked; he knew the answer. And he knew that hearing it would cut like a knife, but maybe that’s what he needed instead of foolishly pretending there was hope.

“This...this is it,” she finally said in a breath.

He swallowed. “Okay.”

“Okay,” she repeated.

“I… okay.” Okay. Because what could he say? It wasn’t like he could decide for her.

If it was only on him, of course he wouldn’t want anything to end. Of course he would fight for them, and try and see where they’d go, identities be damned because...well, it was still them, wasn’t it? Wasn’t it?

“I’m sorry. I...I really am. It’s just… It’s…” Marinette sighed. “It’s just that it’s a lot to take in, you know?”

She had finally raised her eyes to his, and Adrien had to fight back tears; maybe it would have been better if she had continued to avoid him.

So he was the one to turn his eyes away this time.

“I guess,” he couldn’t help the bitterness in his voice to show through. “I just...I didn’t know it would be so bad.”

“It’s not! It’s not that! It’s just that… we still...we still need to get used to this,” she gestured between them, “and… superheroes ca—”

“—can’t date, I know. I understand. I mean—not completely, but... I get it.”

And he did; really, he did get it.

It was selfish of him, probably, to not want things to stop. He found that it was also maybe a little selfish of her to want them to.

None of them had decided to be heroes—and yet they had to bear the consequences of such a responsibility.

Looking back at her, she had now dropped down her eyes and wasn’t watching him anymore. A strong gust of wind blew on the balcony, making Marinette’s hair wave with it.

“It’s getting late,” Adrien spoke. “And you’re freezing out here. I should get going. We’ll see each other tomorrow at school.”

He extended his baton.

“Adri—Chat Noir! Wait!”

She grabbed his tail, stopping him in his tracks. He turned around. She was fidgeting, and looked tentatively into his eyes.

“I’m sorry. I hope it’s not...I hope it’s not too hard but…”

He sighed. “I’m not gonna lie and pretend it doesn’t hurt. It...it does. A lot. It’s like…” he sighed. “It’s like we had everything, and then…” He paused. “But I guess… none of us can control the way we feel, right?”

She nodded numbly. He attempted to give a smile, but he knew he wasn’t doing a good job at it.

“I just wished I knew what’s wrong with me, “ he murmured, voice barely above a whisper.

“I… it’s not… I don’t think there’s anything wrong with you,” Marinette tried. He could hear her voice trembling. I don’t think there’s anything right with me either, he didn’t say—and she didn’t say either, he noted with a bitter smile. “We’re just a mess right now.”

She bit her lip and he had to force to keep his eyes on hers. He felt terrible. Worse than all those times she had rejected him, because—well, because now he knew just how much he was losing.

“That we are.”

“We’re still...we’re still friends, right?” she asked after a few seconds of awkward silence.

“It’s you and me against the world, so… of course.” He shrugged.

And with that, he left, finally letting the tears blur his vision on his way home.

Tonight, their old promise sounded more bitter than comforting. Them against the world, the heroes fighting for the city, forced together by their duty and pulled apart at the same time.

───※ ·❆· ※───

23rd of January, 2 days after the reveal

Marinette rushed back inside her bedroom as soon as Adrien had left and threw her head in her pillow, crying her heart out. Screaming to Tikki how unfair it was to have to be responsible, at Master Fu for choosing this life for her, at herself for following it, at Adrien and Chat Noir for being the same people.

Shouting at Adrien again, at another Adrien she hadn’t even really known that it was all his fault. His fault, his fault, his fault, all his fault. She knew it was unfair of her—but she needed to put the blame on someone, and Chat Blanc, who didn’t exist anymore, seemed like a good candidate, no matter how wrong she knew it was.

───※ ·❆· ※───

24th of January, 3 days after the reveal

“...My father wanted us to break up.”

Marinette shrunk on herself. She wished she had been able to come up with a better excuse on the spot. Anything that would have avoided Adrien’s cold and numb tone when he repeated her flimsily excuse.

But nothing sounded plausible enough; nothing else could explain this sudden change in their dynamic.

“It...it was a surprise, really, we weren’t expecting it,” she tried, hoping he would follow her lead.

Adrien clicked his tongue. “A surprise, indeed.”

“Aaaand you didn’t think of dating in secret becaaause…?” Alya drawled, the cease in her brow increasing the longer she looked between the two of them.

“Because… well… because…” Marinette fumbled, trying to think of a way out because Alya wasn’t wrong and it was a flaw in her carelessly crafted plan.

“Because Marinette didn’t want to,” Adrien supplied curtly.

Alya and Nino’s heads snapped towards her with incredulous looks in their eyes, making her involuntarily shrink on herself even more.

“She said it wasn’t worth a try,” he shrugged and sat down, his back now to her.

Alya looked between the two with a mix of worry, incomprehension and a hint of pity. Marinette didn’t dare look at Nino to see what emotions would flicker in his eyes.

“That’s not it, it’s…” she struggled, took a deep breath, and tried again. She had to roll with what he came up with. “If he were to find out we...we’d be in trouble. You’d be in trouble… and I don’t want that,” she whispered the last words.

“Like I said,” Adrien said coolly, half turning towards them. “Not even worth a try.”

Her heart crumpled.

───※ ·❆· ※───

26th of january, 5 days after the reveal

“Chat Noir, you’re here!” Marinette exclaimed, relieved.

He twirled his baton, deflecting a spurt of gooey green liquid she could only dread to know the composition of—some akumas truly were more disgusting than others to deal with. “As for every akuma.” He raised a brow. “Don’t act so surprised.”

She startled. In the midst of all the action, in the hope and wait for his arrival—because she always felt bolder and stronger once her partner was by her side—she had forgotten.

This was Adrien, her ex-boyfriend with whom she had broken up and had upsetted. And who still wasn’t talking to her much. Thinking about him as ‘ex’ suddenly hurt as she realised it was the first time she was referring to him as such in her head.

Marinette blinked back remorseful tears and tried ignoring the tightness in her chest to focus on the akuma again. She still needed to find where the akumatised object was, and she couldn’t let her emotions get in the way of her job.

She decided to pretend things were fine. “His name is Snowtty, we don’t know the victim but it’s a kid who was made fun of for having a runny nose after receiving a snowball in his face. Try to avoid his green spurts, they would freeze you on the spot!”

Adrien barely nodded before jumping into action, without so much as a word of acknowledgement like he would usually do. It hurt more than she would care to admit.

She knew they hadn’t talked since that evening on her balcony, but she had hoped he just needed time to process and that it wasn’t deeper than that. He had said they were still friends, hadn’t he?

Trying to ignore the sting in her eyes, she jumped after him into the fight.

“Ladybug! I see your pet has arrived to the scene as well,” Snowtty sneered. “All the better for me, I need both your miraculous after all!”

“I’m my own person, thank you very much,” Chat Noir said, none of his usual teasing in his voice. “And you won’t be getting any miraculous. Why don’t you give us your akuma instead and save everyone’s time? You’re just gonna lose like the others do, anyway.”

The akuma let out a growl of frustration and double-fired in their direction. Marinette ran for cover using her yoyo as a deflecting shield, Adrien using his baton.

He didn’t take cover with her.

She called him and was almost relieved when he picked up.

“Okay, he’s angrier than I thought he was. Any idea where the akuma could be?”

“You’re telling me you don’t?” he raised a brow. “He’s throwing his substance from that bracelet he has on his left wrist, and there aren’t any other objects.”

It seemed obvious now. But she wasn’t at the top of her game and was far too focused on her relationship with her partner than she was on the fight at hand, and she realised how detrimental it could be—not letting her personal life interfere with her duties as Ladybug was one of the rules she had promised herself to never break, yet here she was.

“Right,” she said, voice wavering. “I… Right. You’re right. Good job, Kitty.”

She regretted the nickname as soon as it left her mouth.

“‘tis nothing, Ladybug,” he shrugged. “Guess you cast your lucky charm and I distract him as usual.”

“Not yet, I need to first figure ou—” She let out a sigh as he ended the call, and turned to see him heading back straight for the akuma.

Well. The message was clear.

Throwing her yoyo angrily in the air, she called on her lucky charm. And was rewarded for her effort with an umbrella.

She wanted to scream.

She glanced up and closed her eyes, temporarily blinded by the brightness of the sun. “And it’s not even raining,” she grumbled.

She stomped away from her hiding place, only to be thrown on the ground a second after.

“Wha—”

Adrien was hovering over her and spared a glance behind towards Snowtty before standing and helping her up.

“Thank you,” she mumbled.

But he ran back towards the akuma without so much as a glance in her direction. The momentary relief she felt when he saved her evaporated right away. She ran after him.

She hated how he could be upset with her in the middle of an akuma fight but still be able to focus on the task at hand. Because he was paying great care to the akuma and his surroundings and was trying to actively find a solution to put an end to the fight—something she had a harder time doing when her personal feelings were getting overwhelming. She couldn’t reproach him for that. It was just incredibly infuriating.

“Adri—Chat Noir, will you please talk to me and stop ignoring me?” Marinette exploded, frustrated. “It’s been two days and now is not the time!”

“Bold words from someone who ran away and avoided me for two days after discovering my identity,” Adrien snapped back, avoiding another blast of green.

Her heart stuttered painfully. He was right, but it made it no less hurtful to hear. She and Chat Noir had argued in the past, and while it had never been pleasant, it was something they knew how to navigate through — how to come out stronger from. She and Adrien, however? Never. She hadn’t even fathom the possibility of it ever coming up one day. Any comebacks she could have had died on her tongue, and Ladybug found herself speechless.

They both ran for cover once again behind the safety of a rooftop chimney, leaving Snowtty growling at having lost their track.

She swallowed painfully. “Listen. I know you’re hurt, I understand and you have every right to be. But we need to work together right now.”

He kicked some of the remaining snow from the roof, fidgeting with his hands. “I don’t know. I don’t think my father would approve of that.”

She frowned. “Of what?”

“Us working togeth—” he sighed, closing his eyes and shaking his head. “Sorry. Forget I said anything, that was rude. Let’s...let’s just get back to the fight. I’ll behave.”

She grabbed his hand before he could vault away. “Wait.”

“Ladybug, I don’t think we have the time to talk or—”

“And I think it’s important that we talk now,” she said, giving him a pleading look. “Please.”

He kept eye contact with her for a few seconds before glancing hesitantly towards the city, nibbling at his lower lip. “Okay,” he finally murmured.

She involuntarily squeezed his hand in relief. He didn’t squeeze back, but he didn’t take it away either.

She hadn’t taken the time to focus on her feelings for him in the midst of her freakout about his identity; the warmth of his hand and the tips of his claws barely grazing hers and enhancing its delicacy made her realise that if anything, they had only gotten stronger.

It was painfully heartwarming.

“Are you...are you still… upset, about us, um… about me… you know…” she gestured between them.

“Breaking up with me?” He shook his head. “No. I’m hurt, yes. But that’s your right. That’s not what I’m angry about.”

“Then what…” she trailed off.

He sighed. “I thought I had made it clear, but I guess not.” He paused and kicked some more snow. “I didn’t like you telling everyone that my father forced us to break up,” he mumbled, and she had to listen carefully to pick up every word.

She blinked. “That’s… it?” She threw her hands in front of her at the glare he sent her. “I mean, don’t get me wrong… I agree it wasn’t my best excuse, but we had to find one that sounded plausible and…”

“That’s the thing, Marinette,” he said. “You decided to use my father as your excuse without asking me first.” He wrapped his arms around himself and looked to the ground. “I know my father isn’t… isn’t the best and that he can be… a little strict, but… He wouldn’t do that.”

There was a beat of silence.

“He wouldn’t do that,” he repeated more quietly.

She didn’t know if he was trying to convince himself or her; but she didn’t know Gabriel Agreste much and thus couldn’t confirm nor refute his words.

He shook his head. “But the thing is… How would you have felt if I had told everyone that...that your parents had forced us to break up?” He lifted his gaze towards her, green eyes piercing through her.

“Oh,” she said, understanding dawning on her. “Oh. I see.”

“Yeah.”

“I hadn;t...I hadn’t thought about that,” Marinette admitted.

“Well.”He sniffed, angrily wiping at his eyes. “You should have.”

She hadn’t noticed that he was on the verge of crying, but she instantly felt shame coursing through her.

He kicked the snow harder. “And the worst part is… the worst part is that… it workedI he almost spat. “They...they believed your excuse. They didn’t even doubt it, they just….” He gestured with his hands .“...Bought it as if it was obvious and that...that hurt.”

She stayed quiet for a few seconds, taking it in. She didn’t want to start the conversation now as to why it had been that easy for their friends to believe his father would do such a thing—it was something that they would have to discuss another day. A day on which he’d be more ready.

“I’m sorry,” she finally whispered. “I panicked because I...I realised I hadn’t thought of a reason for our breakup. My mind was busy with something else.” She chuckled dryly with a hand gesture in the air. “But you’re right, I crossed a line and that’s not an excuse. I probably would have killed you if you had told them my parents were the reason for our breakup.”

A timid smile appeared on his lips. “Good thing it was just me, then.”

She giggled tearily. “Yeah, good thing. But still. I hope you can forgive me. I promise I’ll be more careful.”

He sighed. “You know I can’t stay mad at you for very long, Marinette. Thank you. And I apologise too. I… I probably overreacted. And I should have known better than to snap during a fight.”

She smiled. “It’s okay. But maybe now, don’t wait until there’s an akuma to talk to me. Now that we know each other’s identities, you don’t need to.”

“I think I needed time to… digest that. But you’re right, will do.”

They looked at each other, smiling shyly as an awkward silence settled between them.

“So, Ladybug,” Adrien spoke with a wobbly smile, glancing towards the lucky charm in her hands, “shall we go back to the fight so you can play Mary Poppins?”

It still wasn’t a ‘my Lady’ or a ‘Buguinette’, and there was no wink to accompany his teasing, but he was back to joking. She would take it.

“Of course.” She smiled. “But let me recharge first.”

───※ ·❆· ※───

15th of February, 25 days after the reveal

“Psssst, come here, kitty kitty! I just want to be your frien—”

Marinette groaned as the ginger cat ran away, joining a tabby cat further up the alleway.

A chuckle from behind her startled her. “Looks like you’re having cat troubles.”

She turned around to meet her partner’s cat-like eyes, and yes, she was having cat troubles, indeed.

“They don’t like me,” she just said.

Adrien seemed to search her eyes for a second or two, his expression unreadable. “You know that’s not true.”

She didn’t know if the conversation was about the cats in the street anymore, and she wasn’t sure whose fault it was. But soon after, Adrien shook his head, blond hair softly sweeping against his cheeks, and let a smile pull at his lips.

He crouched down, grabbed his belt tail and slowly moved it around.

“You need to let them come to you.”

Marinette watched the tail slither, half hypnotised by the movement, until she heard the soft tapping of his claws on the ground. His fingers drummed in a steady rhythm, and she couldn’t help but marvel at how delicate the motion was.

It seemed that some cats around agreed because, soon enough, one advanced towards him, while another had laid down and began wiggling his butt and tail, ready to pounce.

She looked back at Adrien and he was smiling widely at them, anticipating their every move and excited to see their reactions. He looked so happy, so carefree and her heart did a somersault at the sight — she knew that she shouldn’t think like this, but she wished she had been the one he was looking at. She wished she could be one of these kittens, ready to tackle him to the ground, so they could fall in a heap of laughter together. So they could suddenly stop, and gaze into each other’s eyes, getting lost in each other, and maybe, just maybe, lean a little bit closer and ki—

“Wow.” Adrien’s loud laughter shook her out of her reverie. “No need to bite me, little one!”

While a small grey cat had attacked his tail and was nibbling at it, rolling on the floor, another one was more focused on his hand.

The white one with blue eyes.

“Careful,” she told him, “that one’s nasty.”

Adrien continued to play with the cat, moving a finger around and hovering it above his nose that the kitten tried to take a mouthful of.

“What? Why do you say that?”

“Well, he bit you. And earlier, he scratched me. Good thing my suit could protect me or my arms would have been covered in blood,” she informed.

Adrien smiled. “That doesn’t make him nasty.”

She spluttered. “Wha—? How—of course it does! He’s a mean cat, trust me on this! All white cats with blue eyes are!”

He chuckled, giving him a fond look the kitten didn’t deserve. “Good thing I’m a black cat, then.”

She shuddered.

“And he’s not mean,” he went on, “he’s broken.”

Marinette frowned. “What do you mean, ‘broken’?”

Somehow, Adrien had managed to pet the cat on the head, making him let out a contented meow. “Cats who have been abandoned or rejected by their mother too young tend to be more aggressive,” he explained, a pained smile she wasn’t quite sure how to interpret. “They scratch and bite a lot because in a way, they’re kind of lost.”

He took him in his arms and kissed his nose, to which the cat answered with a small ‘meow’. Staying close to his face, he scratched under his chin that the cat was exposing happily to him as a sign of complete trust. Adrien’s smile melted when a purr rumbled out of the kitten, and Marinette hung on it with both fascination and envy.

He let out a breathy chuckle. “See? He just needs someone to show him they care.”

“Show him they care,” she repeated dumbly. She could do that. She coul— “What if...what if it still doesn’t change anything?”

Adrien’s gaze left the kitten to turn to her. “What do you mean?”

“What if...What if even if someone cares about him, and cares about him so much they would sacrifice their own happiness for him if it came to it, and shows him everyday and tells him everyday but he still…” She stopped, fumbling with her words for a second. “...He still keeps biting and scratching and feeling lost and alone a-and no one can save him?” She lifted her eyes to his, only to find her vision blurry.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, what are you talking about?” Adrien breathed.

“M-maybe, this cat is doomed from the start. Maybe he’ll be like that forever, no matter what and maybe they’ll all be like that and—”

“My Lady,” a hand landed on her shoulder, stopping her from spiralling further—and here it was, the ‘my Lady ‘she’d been craving for so much, at the most unexpected time. “That’s stupid. I’m not sure if it’s about cats anymore,” he chuckled, “but I’ll pretend it is.”

She blinked back tears. He kept on, “Yes, some of these hurt cats never change. But not all of them! You can never really know what will happen, how they’ll evolve, because they’re all different, and they’ll all live different lives.”

He smiled at her, his delicate hand never leaving her shoulder, while the other continued petting the purring white kitten. “We can’t guess what will happen to them. All we can do is try, and take the risk. And maybe the owners of this lovely kitty will be lucky and have a loving ball of fur”— he bopped the cat’s nose who in turn let out a small ‘meow’— “or they’ll be less lucky and have a little monster that—ouch,” he said, as the cat chased his bopping finger to bite it, “bite them from time to time but still would be worth caring for.” He sighed a chuckle.

Marinette swallowed, taking it in. “So you mean that… the future of this cat isn’t… set in stone?” she asked carefully.

“Of course not! No one can know what he’ll grow into now, it will depend on a lot of factors.” He took his hand off her shoulder to lift the cat off his lap and nuzzle his nose with his. “Isn’t that right, little one? You’ll be a good kitty, won’t you?”

She let a smile pull at her lips at the sight. Adrien turned to face her with a big goofy grin on his face.

“If our future was written in our DNA, we’d have known all about our futures a long time ago,” he chuckled.

She let his words sink in, closing her eyes. What if...what if.

What if their love wouldn’t destroy the world, this time.

But what if it did again.

...But what if it didn’t?

She heaved a sigh, releasing some of the tension that had been weighing down on her. When she opened her eyes, it was to see that Adrien was back to playing with the kitten.

“And what are we gonna call you, hm? Ooooh, I know! See, I’m Chat Noir, so that would make you Chat Bla—”

“—FLOCON!” Marinette interrupted him.

He blinked at her. “Chat Flocon?”

“No, just...just Flocon. He’s white as snow, and fluffy like a snowflake, so it makes sense. And,” she added after a beat, “it’s cute.”

And it reminded her of that date they shared, just before revealing their identities, strolling through a snowy Paris. It was a memory she cherished, even if it didn’t end quite well.

Adrien grinned. “Okay. Flocon it is.” He scratched the cat’s chin, who purred in turn and tried to bite his finger again. “No,” he told him, “I said no biting, you thickhead.”

She could watch him bicker with a kitten for hours, she thought.

“Hey, Buguinette,” he called out to her, pulling her out of her momentary reverie, “you wanna hold Flocon?”

She blinked. “Errr… I don’t know if that's a good idea or…”

He laughed. “He’s not that aggressive. It’s up to you; but if you want to try befriending him again…” He held a half-wiggling and meowing Flocon in the air towards her.

Marinette bit her lip, and took a deep breath. Maybe it was a bad idea to cave, but... “Okay,” she finally said. “I’ll give him a try.”

───※ ·❆· ※───

26th of April, 95 days after the reveal

“Adrien, aren’t you gonna snap her in half?” Alya asked with incredulous eyes.

It made both him and Marinette giggle. “It’s like she doesn’t know that you’re usually the one snapping me in half between the two of us,” Adrien whispered in her ear, which made her laugh harder. “She said she wanted to!” he told Alya louder.

“Yes, Alya,” Marinette added, “I’m a strong girl and I can carry him! Right, Adrien?”

“Right!” he replied enthusiastically, clinging harder on her back.

He wasn’t sure it was a good idea, but he was too busy feeling lighthearted and free on this spring afternoon. It was the first warm day of the year, with only a slightly chilly breeze coming to ruffle his hair at times that only contributed in increasing his giddiness. For the fifth time this day, he thanked the star that made his father allow him to go out to the temporary funfair with his friends—though he thought they were studiously working on a school project.

“It’s not because you can carry him that you should,” Nino said, shaking his head fondly.

“You’re just jealous because Alya isn’t carrying you.” She stuck her tongue out at him. “Let’s ride to the moon and back!”

“To the moon and back!” Adrien repeated, one hand raised in the air.

Marinette let out a warrior cry before attempting to run, albeit slowly because of his weight, and he could tell they wouldn’t go far as he already felt himself slide down and her grip on his legs slacken.

He should have known they’d fall face first before she got too exhausted. If he had, maybe he’d have had the time to react and avoid it.

As it was, he just found himself on top of Marinette on the ground. He lifted himself up and sat down, Marinette soon doing the same.

Distantly, he heard Alya and Nino running towards them shouting “are you okay”s and “are you hurt”s at profusion, but he didn’t pay them any mind as Marinette looked up at him with eyes glinting with mirth and they both fell in a heap of laughters.

Some passersby looked at them funnily while others whispered some “that must hurt”s or “everything alright?”s to them.

“It’s okay,” Adrien told them. “We’ve had it worse!”

“Yes,” Marinette chimed in. “One time we were thrown by an akuma—”

“—A big tuna," he quickly corrected.

“—a big tuna, he’s right,” she repeated, “and we both fell right into a moving bus, and we survived!”

“And you find that funny,” Nino deadpanned, putting his hands on his hips as Adrien helped Marinette up.

Adrien just grinned at him. “Yup! We’re the survivors.”

“And we’re gonna make it!” Marinette sang.

“You’re insufferable,” Alya chuckled. “The both of you. I don’t know how you two can be more unhinged than me with Marinette, but—”

“—That’s because we’re exes besties,” Adrien chirped. Despite the months that had passed, it always hurt a little to call each other “exes”. But he had long since learned that laughing at his suffering was better than crying over it. He just wondered when and if he’ll ever be over her one day. He probably never really would.

“Hey,” Nino said indignantly. “But you’re my best friend!”

“Maybe, but are you also exes, hm?” Marinette asked him. “Because we are, and it makes us the unstoppable exes besties! And now, our next stop will be…” She jumped on Adrien’s back without warning and he caught her with a ‘oof’. “...to that splashing boat attraction over there!”

“Dudes, you already fell once, what are you doing?”

“We’re getting back up, Nino, and we try again,” she announced proudly, raising her fist up. “Let’s go to the boat, Adrien, and may our ship sail! Go, go, go!”

Adrien faintly heard a ‘they’re beyond help’ from Alya as he ran towards the attraction, both his and Marinette’s laughters echoing in the wind.

───※ ·❆· ※───

28th of May, 127 days after the reveal

Adrien landed with a grunt on the pavement. The suit was a good protector, but it didn’t stop his back from hurting from the impact with the ground. This akuma — Firebender as he called himself — truly was more violent than usual.

“Wow,” he managed to breath between two gasps, “you’re on fire today!”

He tried to push himself up with an arm, and raised his head towards Firebender with a half-closed eye. The fireball he saw coming towards him arrived so fast that he didn’t even have the time to do so much as widening his eyes. An anguish cry was the last thing he heard before it faded and he saw nothing at all.

───※ ·❆· ※───

28th of May, 127 days after the reveal

Marinette realised she was screaming when she felt her lungs were empty.

Usually, when an akuma took lives, the victims just disappeared into thin air, as if they had never been. They weren’t lying there, unmoving on the pavement like Adrien was. Somehow, seeing was worse than not.

She felt dizzy, as if everything around her was moving in slow motion. She staggered, trying to turn her head away from the sight of her unresponsive partner who was becoming blurrier and blurrier the longer she looked at him. She needed to breathe, she needed to—

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO,” she screeched instead, the sound reverberating into the street, bouncing from building to building.

She took a ragged breath, and another, closing her eyes as she took in the dead silence that greeted her scream.

She swallowed her first sob and squeezed her eyes tight shut, taking yet another heavy breath. She turned towards the akuma before opening her eyes, otherwise she knew she wouldn’t be able to tear her gaze away from Adrien’s dead form. She gritted her teeth as soon as the thought of him being gone entered her mind again.

“You’re a monster,” she spat, low and cold, the last word echoing through the silence and carrying her voice to Firebender’s ears — to Hawkmoth’s.

All these days worrying over the possibility of a devastating future she had seen, all this time doing everything she could to avoid it no matter how little she knew of it, and she hadn’t considered the possibilities she hadn’t been a witness of. All these days flirting with the line between caving and resisting only for her regretful indecision to hit her in the most cruel way.

“Give up, Ladybug,” Hawkmoth spoke through Firebender, “you no longer have your pet. All you have to do is surrender your miracu—”

“And what?” she spat. “Let my partner die? Listen to me, Hawkmoth. I have a chance to save him, and for that I need to defeat you. You think I’m stupid? I’m not giving up on Paris. I’m not giving up on him!”

And I’m not giving up on us, she told herself.

“Lucky charm!” she roared, rage and determination coursing through her veins.

She knew nothing about how Chat Blanc had really happened, she realised, catching the spotted chain falling from above. Nothing about her current future, as she scanned her surroundings for a solution. Nothing but the crushing weight of the present and her fear of the unknown, as she opened her yoyo to retrieve the dragon miraculous and put it around her neck.

“Tikki, Longg, unify!”

As she surrounded herself with water and ran towards Firebender with only one goal in mind, she promised herself to never let the gifts the present gives her slide in favour of hypothetical futuristic tragedies. She was finally done running away and sacrificing her life to her fears.

───※ ·❆· ※───

28th of May, 127 days after the reveal

Light suddenly flooded Adrien’s vision as he took a sharp and deep intake of breath. His lungs were burning with the sudden air filling them up, and he squinted his eyes, trying to make sense of his surroundings. He groggily lifted himself up on his elbows when—

“Chaton!”

—a red blur threw herself at him. He caught her, her hair in his nose and her warm breath and hot tears in his neck.

He let her sob and squeeze him as understanding washed over him. He gently threaded his clawed fingers through her hair and massaged her scalp, noticing absent-mindedly that she was also wearing the dragon miraculous.

She slowly detangled herself from him but stayed close, looking into his eyes through her wet ones and caressing his cheek with her thumb.

“Kitty,” she whispered, her voice hoarse, “my Kitty.”

He didn’t have the time to react before her lips were on his and she took her time to savour him before ever so slowly pulling away. He let her do.

She didn’t stop there. Gently cradling his face in her trembling hands, she kissed his cheek. And his other cheek. And his forehead. His nose. His jaw. Puncturing each of her kisses with whispers of “mon Chaton”, or “Kitty”, or “my love”, to which his heart made a somersault at, before diving for his neck.

Each time he kept on letting her do, keeping her close to him as she sobbed through her kisses and yet another nickname for him.

He could feel her breathing him in; so, with his nose in her hair, he inhaled her scent too. Her hot breath left his neck once again, and she came back for his lips.

This time, he kissed her back, and as soon as his lips moved against hers, she choked on a sobbed whine and pushed her mouth closer to his, if that was even possible

He hadn’t forgotten the taste of her lips on his, even after all these months; but he also knew their kisses had never burnt so intensely, driven by despair, the need to memorise the present and the aroma of being alive.

───※ ·❆· ※───

1st of June, 131 days after the reveal

“I’m sorry.”

“What for?”

Marinette smiled sadly. “Oh, I don’t know. Hurting you. Putting us through this mess. Not telling you about Chat Blanc. Take your pick.”

She let her arms rest on the railing of the bridge, looking across the Seine. The clouds were getting darker and darker, though a sunray pierced through one of them, lighting up a few buildings on the shore in a powerful atmosphere. Her eyes followed a barge floating further and further away, waiting for the moment it would cross the ray of light.

“You’ve been hurting too,” Adrien said after a few seconds. “You’ve been shouldering it all on your own. Don’t be too hard on yourself.”

His hand slid into hers and she welcomed it, intertwining her fingers timidly with his. She glanced at him with a tentative smile and he smiled back, looking at her with soft eyes. She looked back towards the Seine just in time to see the barge slicing through the sunbeam.

“Still. Maybe, if I had told you… if I hadn’t let my fears get the best of me…” She trailed off, not knowing what else to say.

“And maybe,” Adrien spoke when it was clear she wouldn’t add something more, squeezing her hand once, “if you had told me earlier, I would have given up Chat Noir.”

She gasped and turned to him, but he was looking at the Seine with saddened eyes.

“What do you mean?” she breathed.

“I’m not sure I’d have been able to handle hearing that I could destroy the world as an akuma,” he whispered, caressing the back of her hand with his thumb as if to reassure her. “It’s… really hard already, but I feel like it would’ve been worse before.”

He turned his head towards her again and she held his gaze, gripping his hand harder as if to dare him to leave.

“You said it yourself,” he went on, “just like we have no idea about what the future can really hold, we can’t know how things would have played out if we had done things differently. What really matters right now is what you want us to be from now on.”

She searched his expectant eyes for a few seconds before looking back at the Seine. A tourist boat coming towards them had replaced the barge in the sunspot before the window of clouds closed on the light, leaving only a dark atmosphere in its place. The clouds grew darker and a warm gust had picked up, making their hair fly in every direction and their clothes ruffling in a frenzy. Marinette felt her emotions growing with the wind, begging to be said and to explode.

She took a deep breath, closing her eyes and feeling the wind coursing through her as she gathered her thoughts, and opened them again.

“I love you, Adrien,” she spoke, her declaration followed by a distant rumble in the sky. “I love you so, so much. Discovering that you were Chat Noir, once I took it all in… it was the best thing in the world, but also the worst.”

She faced away from the Seine to face him instead and take both his hands in hers, gripping them as tight as she could to ground herself as she felt a flow of tears coming in.

“It made me fall in love with you so much more it hurt, but I knew I couldn’t be with you or I knew I shouldn’t because…” She paused, taking ragged breaths. “...Because it wouldn’t be responsible. Because we’re superheroes and because I had this warning with Chat Blanc, and as the guardian it’s my role to keep us grounded and to do the right thing.”

A lighting bolt pierced through the sky, accompanied by a loud thunderstrike a few seconds later. Adrien was looking at her with a pain in his eyes that she knew meant he was hurting for her and not him.

“But I don’t want to do the right thing this time,” she murmured, as she felt a first drop of water slide down her cheek. “I’m tired of doing what’s supposedly right. Not when...not when we’re both hurting so much that it feels like it’s more dangerous to stay this way instead of just… giving in.”

At this point, she didn’t know who out of her and Adrien were gripping the other’s hands the tightest. She felt more and more raindrops falling on her face and clothes. She didn’t know if the water in his eyes were because he was tearing up or not.

“So maybe our love destroyed the world, once,” she continued, “but I think there’s enough far more damaging hate in this world; and ever since these akuma attacks started, what saved it is our love — for Paris, for our family and friends… and for each other.”

Adrien’s eyes now held a glint of adoration. His now damped hair was sticking to his face while some strands curled with the water. She supposed hers wasn’t faring much better.

“So to answer your question,” she swallowed a sob, “I want us to be together… if you’ll have me.”

Lightning ripped through the sky accompanied by deafening thunder as Adrien pulled her into a crushing hug. She put her arms around his neck to pull him even closer to her and let the flow of her tears finally mix with the rain on her cheeks.

“Marinette,” he whispered, voice wavering and lips barely touching her ear, “I love you, of course I’ll have you. I’ll always have you.”

The rain fell even harder as they hugged closer and cried, soaking them, yet they couldn’t care less. Their clothes were sticking to their bodies, growing more and more uncomfortable, which was worsened by them being in each other’s arms, but Marinette hadn’t felt so good in a long time.

She suddenly pulled away from the hug and cradled his head between her hands. He took her face in his and they stayed closed, forehead against forehead, breathing each other in. Another rumbled resounded and Marinette’s last resolve snapped with it—she brought her lips to his and kissed him.

He responded in kind, and she drank him in and pressed her mouth closer as she felt him doing the same. She should care about the rain falling and the thunder rumbling, but the battering of the elements were just making her feel freer, finally allowing her to get away from all her self restraints.

She sighed against Adrien’s lips as they kept coming back for more. They kissed their reunion, the relief of finding each other again, at last—unlike when he had come back from the dead earlier, these kisses tasted of the promise of more to come, because they knew they would stay together this time.

───※ ·❆· ※───

21st of January, 1h45 after the reveal

“Okay. What’s going on between you two? You’ve been acting awkward since we’ve got here.”

What was going on. What was going on.

“We’re fine,” the lie rolled out of her tongue easily. “Really.”

Alya raised a brow. “Adrien?”

She saw him smiling from the corner of her eyes. He was a much better actor than her—always had been.

“It’s nothing. It’s… we just… we’re working on it.”

...And much more honest than she was, be it with his feelings or with his heart. Always had been.

“Well,” Nino said, “I hope it’s not too big of a deal and that you’ll get over it soon. You guys are the cutest out there.”

Marinette smiled painfully. She glanced at Adrien who was looking at her with soft eyes that she didn’t deserve considering her reaction, and she felt his warm hand timidly covering hers.

“Yeah,” he whispered. “I have hopes we will. We always do.”

───※ ·❆· ※───

21st of January, one year after the reveal

“You’re heavy,” Adrien gasped.

“That’s a rude thing to say to a lady,” Marinette commented from atop him, head resting on the arms she had folded on his chest. “And even more so to your girlfriend.”

He groaned and attempted to lift himself up. Fail. She was grinning at him and he pouted in fake-annoyance. “Not when said girlfriend is purposefully putting all her weight on you! I can’t breath!”

Marinette giggled and pressed herself further on him to which he let out a choked whimper, before pushing away from him after a few seconds, ending his suffocation.

“I could report you for attempting murder, you know,” he threatened with a finger. “‘Ladybug slips into teenage model Adrien Agreste’s room and proceeds to suffocate him’, now that would make the newspapers talk for months.”

She laughed and came back to hover over him. “‘And Adrien asked her to do it again’,” she smirked, and she bent down to peck his lips.

He couldn’t even argue with that.

He discreetly brought his hand close to where his head was lying to grab a pillow. When she pushed herself up and sat next to him, he quickly hit her head with it.

She gasped, betrayed and that sent him into a fit of laughter. She glared at him playfully, grabbed his other pillow, and swatted him way harder than he had.

“You’re dead, Kitty! You hear me?” she said, trying and failing not to laugh. “You’ve just signed your death contract!”

“No, my Lady, please I’m just a defenseless citizen!”

“I’ll knock you out with my yo-yo!” she threatened.

They fought again for a few minutes before stopping, Adrien breathless but Marinette only slightly out of breath due to being transformed.

“I hope your father won’t come in,” Marinette said.

“Don’t worry, if he or Nathalie come, you’ll just say you’re investigating here because, uh...because you suspect me of being Hawkmoth!”

She laughed. “Kitty, that’s such a stupid idea.”

“Why not?” Adrien wiggled his eyebrows. “After all, I do disappear during every akuma attack.”

Marinette smiled and crawled into his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck as he steadied her with his hands on her hips. They lost themselves into each other’s eyes, faces close but not close enough to exactly touch.

“Then,” she murmured against his lips, and he felt his cheeks heating up. “I’ve come to seduce my enemy. Is it working?”

“I’d rather be your partner if that’s okay,” he whispered.

“Yes, but is it working Adrien?”

He chuckled—she didn’t even need to try, he’d always been too far gone when it came to her. “A bit too much.”

He kissed the proud and satisfied giggle from her lips.

#ml fanfic #miraculous #adrinette #ladynoir #identity reveal #pre-reveal post-relationship #but then #post-reveal pre-relationship #yes I made it both okay #breakup & getting back together #angst & fluff #happy ending #mention of chat blanc #hurt/comfort #temporary character death #but like it doesn't last long okay it's just an Akuma thing #myshitwriting

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hookingminor · 4 years

Note

Halloween prompts. Number one “mortal enemies accidentally showing up in matching costumes every year” with Vince Dunn ??

mortal enemies accidentally showing up in matching costumes every fucking year

Un-fucking-believable.

God had some personal vendetta against you or thought this was the funniest running joke in the history of mankind, apparently, because you were about two seconds away from strangling someone.

“No, absolutely not,” you groaned when you saw Vince’s costume, “Go change right now.”

“Hello to you, too, babe,” Vince said cheerily, pulling you in for a side hug and pressed a kiss to your cheek.

“Don’t ‘hello, babe’ me, we did not come together,” you scoffed, pushing him away by the chest before people saw you and presumed you were a couple.

Vince was wearing the complementary Scoops Ahoy costume to your Robin set, and you couldn’t understand how this happened. For the fourth time, you’ve unknowingly showed up in matching costumes with Vince.

The first time was set up by your friends, thinking it would be hilarious because the two of you hated each other.

The second time was accidental. Actually, you had showed up in a different costume, but due to someone spilling their drink on you, you had to shed some layers and slipped on an old NBA jersey the homeowner had. Coincidentally, Vince had worn the same jersey, deciding on a lazy look that year, and once again you were matching.

The third time, it technically wasn’t matching as you two had intended for different looks, but it looked similar enough that everyone just assumed they were matching. You had done your makeup intricately and wore a tattered wedding dress, going as Corpse Bride from the classic Tim Burton movie, and Vince had gone as Abraham Lincoln, though he lost the beard and top hat within twenty minutes and looked like a standard groom.

This year, however, you were so careful. You had told none of your friends your plans. You wanted no possibility of information leaking to Vince somehow about your costume.

God, it seemed, had other plans because here you were again.

“I think the universe is trying to tell us something,” Vince chuckled, following you into the kitchen where you had escaped in an attempt to avoid him.

“That you’re an annoying asshole who will go to, literally, any length to piss me off?” You suggested, pouring yourself an extra strong drink.

“I was thinking more along the lines of ‘maybe we should get together,’” Vince shrugged, and you rolled your eyes.

“Over my dead body,” you snorted, taking a long chug. Vince waited for you to toss your drink back before he spoke again.

“Do you really hate me that much?” He asked, and you swore you saw his face fall just a little bit.

“As much as you hate me,” you replied with a forced smile. Vince gave you a dramatic eye roll to let you know you were being ridiculous.

“I never said I hated you,” he said, and now it was your turn to roll your eyes.

“Your actions say enough,” you muttered.

From the moment you’d met, you’d never gotten along. There wasn’t a definitive reason or instance that made you hate him, but you always clashed at every turn. Every time you suggested dinner, he was never in the mood for that type of food. Every time he wanted to go out and do something, you hated all his ideas. Little disagreements like those just continued to build up and over time, it just got to the point where the two of you refused the other’s suggestions out of spite. You were too proud to admit when he was right and he would never apologize to you so you both let it simmer and stew.

Not wanting to continue conversation with him anymore, you pushed your way past his body and into the party in hopes of disappearing into the crowd.

You’d managed to avoid him for a half hour or so, but even with him somewhere else, he was still with you.

“I saw your boyfriend earlier,” the guy that you thought you’d been flirting with said after a few minutes, “I love your guys’ costumes.”

“Oh, he’s not my boyfriend,” you chuckled awkwardly, “It was purely coincidental.”

“I just talked to him a little while ago, and he definitely insinuated that you were his girlfriend. He was asking people if they’ve seen you. It sounded like he was looking for you,” the stranger explained, but you were already seeing red by the end of his first sentence.

“I’m sorry, you’ll have to excuse me,” you politely excused yourself with a strained smile.

Walking away with purpose, you roamed the house in an angry stomp until you found Vince tucked away near the pong table, clearly caught in the middle of a game.

You strode up to him with furrowed brows and a clenched jaw when you heard him laughing with his friends. You stopped next to him, reached up to grab him by the ear, and dragged him behind you as you searched for a quiet space to kill him in.

You walked all the way to an abandoned bedroom at the furthest corner of the house and, quite literally, threw him in the room before slamming the door behind you.

“What the fuck is your problem, Dunn?” You exclaimed as you turned on him with crossed arms, “Do you think it’s fun to cockblock me all night?”

“What the hell are you talking about?” He asked instead, deciding to play dumb.

“Telling other people we’re together? Is this a joke to you?” As the seconds passed, you were getting progressively more upset.

“It’s kind of funny,” he muttered under his breath with a light laugh, and you swore you never wanted to strangle anyone more in your entire life.

“You’re unbelievable,” you scoffed, “You know what? Do me a favor and ignore me for the rest of the night.... Actually, no, for the rest of your life.” Turning on your heels to leave the room, you reached for the door with one hand, but Vince was leaping forward before you could exit.

“No, wait,” he rushed out quickly, pulling you back around to face him, “I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry? That’s all you have to say?” His cheeks heated instantly, and he averted your gaze.

“Yeah, I’m sorry, okay? It was childish and stupid,” he confessed, but it only confused you more.

“Why?”

Vince took a few seconds to respond, but he still held onto your wrist. You raised your eyebrows as you waited for him to continue.

“Ikindofhaveacrushonyou,” he mumbled quickly.

“What?” You asked, not sure if you’d heard him correctly.

“I have a crush on you,” he admitted, “and I acted like an asshole because of it.”

“What?” You repeated, though this time it was more in disbelief and shock than misunderstanding.

“I know I deserve it, but you don’t have to be a dick about it,” he said timidly. In all your time knowing Vince Dunn, he never got shy. Until now.

“I’m not being a dick, I’m just genuinely confused,” you said softly. Probably the first time you’d ever spoken to Vince with a soft tone.

“I thought you were cute and that we had a good banter going, but at some point I probably took it too far which lead to all of this,” he gestured vaguely between the two of you, “and then the only relationship we had was when we were fighting, so I kept it up.”

“That’s the worst way to show a girl you like her,” you replied in a monotone voice. If it weren’t for the slight smile that quirked at the corners of your lips, Vince would’ve thought you were about to kick him.

“I know, it was dumb,” he chuckled, “but then some guys were talking about you, so I acted before I could think.”

“Did you plan all this? All these years?” You questioned.

Vince gave you a slight shrug, “The first two times, no. The third time, yeah a little bit.”

“And tonight?”

“I may have asked your roommate to find out. She only agreed because she knows I’ve been after you for a while now.”

“You know if you had just asked me out like a regular person, I probably would have said yes,” you replied, “I thought you were cute when I first saw you too.”

He lifted his eyes to meet yours.

“And then you opened your mouth.”

Vince laughed heartily at that, the tension in the room dissipating as you joined in with him. Taking a tentative step closer, you took the hand that was still holding your wrist to grip your waist as you felt your way up his shoulders. His eyes widened at your close proximity, and you could see him take a deep breath in.

“Ask me now,” you stated, curling your hand around his neck.

He released the breath he was holding in.

“Y/N, would you like to go on a date with me?” Vince asked.

You pretended to ponder your answer for a moment before you finally replied.

“Yeah, I guess. I have nothing better to do.”

“God, you’re insufferable,” Vince groaned, dropping his head against your shoulder in defeat. You let out a small chuckle, and you felt his lips smiling against your skin.

Pulling his head back up to eye level, you gave him a warm smile.

“I’d love to go on a date with you, Vince.”

#vince dunn #vince dunn imagine #hockey imagines #nhl imagine #my writing #requests #blurbs #blues29

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marie-in-the-hallway · 3 years

Text

Watermelon Sugar pt 1

wc: 2.3k

warnings: minor sexual content, swearing

...

Jenna doesn't know how her life came to be like this.

She was a good person; she had partied hard in uni, yes, but she studied hard enough to make up for it. She's nice enough to leave at least a twenty percent tip every time she gets the check, and certainly nice enough to drop coins in the tip jars of the baristas who make her coffee. She calls her mum a lot and she loves her sisters and she takes good care of her plant, a cactus she'd named Steve. She’s hilarious and witty, her friends love her, and she makes a decent enough living.

So it doesn't explain why she's lying on the floor, with Harry Styles, of all people, planking on top of her.

As in, seventeenth most influential person in London, pop-star-turned-rock-star Harry Styles. The same Harry Styles who has had countless model girlfriends, left, right and centre. One right now, in fact: Camille Rowe. Also the same Harry Styles who has been the subject of Jenna’s sex dreams since she was about eighteen.

(What can she say, she's consistent. The kid might change her look every few years but the libido wants what it wants. Or something.)

Anyway, the point is that, currently, Jenna is looking straight into Harry's gorgeous green eyes and she can feel the heat of Harry's body radiating onto hers. She can also feel one of Harry's soft curls brushing against her forehead, and she knows that if she looked down, she'd see Harry's pink lips, quirked amusedly, like Jenna is something of a particularly endearing animal.

In summary, Harry looks like something straight out of Jenna’s masterbating vault, and Jenna is especially thankful at this moment that she does not have a cock because it would be hard as a rod at this very moment.

"Do you, uh, work out a lot?" She blurts out, her mouth temporarily disconnecting from her brain, and she watches as Harry blinks, his long lashes brushing the tops of her cheekbones.

There's a pause, and then she hears a snort.

"Is this a dating show, mate?" Nick Grimshaw, the twat, says, half-laughing from his seat at the radio console. He raises his voice in a poor imitation of Jenna, stuttering out a ‘do you, uh, work out a lot’ in between his giggles.

Jenna turns her head to look at him and scowls. "Shut up," she says, trying to ignore the cute way Harry is giggling on top of her. It doesn't really work, but at least she tried.

Nick raises his hands defensively. "Hey, I'm bringing us back on track. You're supposed to be asking him questions about his new album, not asking him if he works out. You're tiring out the little pop star there."

"Nah," Jenna hears Harry's low voice drawl from above her, and she turns her attention back to the hot boy on top of him. "`m not tired yet. Besides, I'm kind of enjoying the view." He shoots Jenna a cheeky wink, and Jenna feels her face flush.

"Okay," she says loudly, mostly for the benefit of herself. She vaguely wonders how red she looks on camera, and whether or not she can get the ground to swallow her whole right about now. Maybe she should retire after this. Radio 1 would just have to look for another person who won't choke in the vicinity of Nick's hairspray fumes.

Every day at one to four pm, Nick and Jenna host "The Future is Now", a radio programme where they play music, talk about celebrity gossip and tease each other. It's supposedly nothing special, just two childhood friends making fun of each other and making fun of celebrities and their drama and occasionally talking about football, but apparently their banter has made it the most popular rated programme on BBC Radio 1. So popular that a few months ago, their producer sat them down and told them to "come up with more shenanigans", an order Jenna was happy to comply with. Her and Nick have then proceeded to do almost everything, from innuendo bingo with a twist to organizing a huge water fight in Radio 1.

Their latest shenanigan is interviewing their celebrity guests in the weirdest way they can, and last time Nick had interviewed Taylor Swift through trying to interpret her answers through drawing. It was massively funny, a huge failure, and also very exhausting, according to Nick, because who knew that Taylor was such a terrible artist?

Which is also why it's Jenna’s turn to do the interviewing this time.

However, she's ninety-nine point nine percent sure that Nick did this on purpose. Drunk Jenna might have let it slip a few weeks back that she has a not-so-small crush on a certain very famous Harry Styles, and Nick, because he was apparently close friends with Harry, invited him to plank over Jenna.

Jenna’s going to light a match near his hair and watch his twatty quiff burn down.

"Okay," Jenna says again, because no matter how much she wants to go back in time and ensure Nick was never born, Harry Styles with his hair and his dimples is still above her, smiling like it takes no effort to plank like this at all. He's the most attractive man Jenna has ever seen in her entire life. "We're going to have a quickie--" and she resolutely ignores Nick's sniggers from the console and the way his face heats up, "--which is like a lightning round of questions, until you feel you need to lower yourself down or until the timer runs out. Alright?"

Harry nods at her, grinning even wider, and Jenna decides to pin her focus on Harry's left dimple so as not to be distracted by the rest of his face.

"Nachos or Tacos?" She asks, starting the game immediately.

"Tacos."

"Red or Blue?"

"Blue."

"Favorite emoji to use in a text message?"

"The tongue and the peach." Jenna ignores the almost-obscene way Harry says it. She also ignores Nick's snorts from the table. She can do this. She just needs to ignore the way she’s wet from this small interaction and get this done like the professional she is, before she can go home and masterbate herself away to oblivion.

"Favorite song from your new album?"

"Um," Harry says, and Jenna feels his forearms shift from where it's beside her head. "Watermelon Sugar?"

"Are you asking me or telling me?" Jenna asks Harry's left dimple. See, she can be normal.

"Watermelon Sugar." Harry repeats, much firmer. "It's about oral sex."

Jenna’s eyes fly off Harry's left dimple and into his eyes. "I don't think you can say that on radio."

Harry just shrugs, a mischievous smile playing on his lips. "Sorry."

"Cheeky," Jenna mutters, before plunging on. "Most important feature of your ideal girlfriend?"

"I don't know if I can say it on radio," Harry shoots back almost immediately, his smile widening.

Somewhere from his place on the radio console, Nick cackles. Jenna hopes he chokes on his own saliva.

"Something radio friendly, then," Jenna answers, keeping her voice level.

"Well," Harry drawls out, seemingly lost in thought, "I'm much more of a bum kind of guy," and Nick's cackles get louder and louder. "I like a nice, firm, handful of bum. But if it has to be radio friendly, maybe the smile."

"I'm going to get suspended because of you," Jenna deadpans.

"`s the truth." Harry smiles innocently. He shifts on his forearms again, and his long curl brushes over Jenna’s eye. His cross necklace also falls out of his shirt, brushing against the hollow of Jenna’s throat. "Do you like bums, Jenna?"

"I like mums? I like my mum," Jenna says absently, half blinded by Harry's curl. She feels more than hears Harry laugh from above her, his abs quivering from above her body. Which, hey. Why is Harry laughing at her? She’s just trying to keep this show together, for the sake of her job and her listeners and because Nick is a useless idiot.

She clears her throat. "Ideal date?" She asks, blinking her eye against Harry's rogue curl. She focuses on it, tries to get it off her eye with just the power of her blinks and her eye lid muscles. It doesn't really work.

Harry wiggles his eyebrows above her, and Jenna feels a slight sense of dread settle against him.

"A walk on the beach, then a candlelit dinner, then back to my place--"

"Favorite hobby?" Jenna interrupts, because she cannot do this. She can't. She’s two innuendos away from being soaked through her pants, and she’s positive there will be a wet spot if Harry continues to imply vaguely sexual things.

"I like to bake," Harry answers easily, as if he wasn't on the verge of saying obscene things a few seconds before. Jenna hates him. Jenna also kind of wants to suck his dick.

"Last thing that made you cry?"

"Um," Harry furrows his brow and bites at his bottom lip. Jenna can't stop staring. "I...fell?"

"Fell where?" Jenna asks.

"I was getting out of the shower," Harry answers slowly, still seeming deep in thought. Jenna tries not to imagine a naked Harry, with little droplets sliding down his skin. She mostly fails. "Then I, like, slipped and fell. There were a few tears."

Jenna makes a noise of sympathy, her eyes glued to Harry's lips. "What did you hurt?"

"My bum."

That makes Jenna tear her eyes away from Harry's lips and into his green eyes, which are already shining with mirth. "What is it with you and bums?"

"I told you, I'm a bum man." Harry winks. He shifts on his forearms, and Jenna realizes that the planking must already be taking a toll on him. He doesn't seem close to giving up though, and Jenna admires his determination. Her sex drive admires the rippling of the muscles in Harry's forearms and the strength of his core.

"You seem to be a little bum crazy to me."

"Heyyy," Harry says, a cute little pout making its way onto his face. "Only for certain bums. The nice ones."

Jenna doesn't answer. "Favorite app on your phone?"

"Instagram."

"Last photo you took?"

"It was, like, a photo of my sister's dog in, um, space buns."

"Space bums, nice," Jenna says, because she can. She might get suspended from radio for a few days, but she's already aroused on camera and they've been talking bums since a while ago, so.

"Yep," Harry says, playing along. "They were out of this world."

Jenna opens her mouth to ask another question when her phone starts ringing, signalling the end of their quickie. Harry unceremoniously drops himself down, his entire body now in contact with Jenna’s own. Jenna can feel her skin heat up from where Harry's touching her, their entire lower half aligned. She shifts in surprise, discovering Harry’s (not so) little problem, so Jenna just. Speaks.

“Did you know the average whale penis is ten feet long?”

She wonders if she can probably retire gracefully and run away to Guam.

Nick is still cackling like a madman but ten times harder. Jenna doesn't think he's even stopped to take a breath since he started.

Good, she thinks viciously. Maybe he'll run out of oxygen.

"I did not," she hears Harry whisper to her, his voice almost drowned out by Nick's laughter.

"Fuck," Jenna whispers, without opening her eyes. "Leave me here to die." She can't believe she ended up here, embarrassed and horny in front of the guy she's been wanking to since she was eighteen. She doesn't think life can get much worse than this.

"It's okay, you know, I blurt out things all the time" Harry whispers, his breath ghosting over Jenna’s face. "Also, you're not allowed to say ‘cock’ on radio."

Oh, so now he's concerned about radio content. What is Harry Styles.

"Please do not try to make me feel better about this," Jenna says through her teeth, ignoring his second statement. They're going to get taken off air because of this interview, anyway. She raises an arm to cover her eyes. "Just....ignore it. Please."

Harry, because he's nice, doesn't say anything anymore, instead pulls himself off of Jenna, so that he's sitting on his knees beside Jenna on the carpeted floor. Jenna takes three deep breaths before she opens her eyes, sits up, and runs to the radio console, where Nick is still cackling obnoxiously. She lets Nick take care of the goodbyes, shakes Harry's hand once and refuses to meet his eyes, and doesn't say anything until Harry has left the room and Watermelon Sugar is playing on air.

"So?" Nick hedges, nudging Louis with an elbow. "That was fun right?"

"I'm going to murder you in your sleep," Jenna answers, glaring. "That was fucking humiliating."

"Oh come on, it wasn't that bad," Nick says, dismissively, wrapping an arm around Jenna’s shoulder. Jenna wants to saw it off his arm.

"You're not the one who started talking about whale cock in front of like, three cameras," Jenna hisses back at him.

"You could barely hear it anyway," Nick says, rolling his eyes. He pinches Jenna’s shoulder, waggling his eyebrows . "But Harry, eh? That was some intense flirting you had going on there."

"Nick," Jenna says, deadpan. "He's not single. You should know this, he's one of your best friends."

Nick frowns, but before he can open his mouth to say something, Jenna beats him to it. "Never mind him. He's probably going to get us suspended anyway, with all his obscene answers and talk about bums."

Nick cackles again, with his head thrown back. "That was pretty funny."

"Yeah, well let's see how funny it is when we get taken off air for a week straight," Jenna answers, rolling her eyes, before reaching over to queue up the next song.

Nick, the twat, just keeps laughing.

#harry styles #harry styles fanfic #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles fic #harry styles smut #harry styles x oc #harry styles writing #watermelon sugar

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love-little-lotte · 3 years

Text

Ranking the Bridgerton Books

I know I should write this in my book blog, but frankly, I have no idea how to make another section for it, and I'm too lazy to research. So, I'm writing here. Please bear with me.

Recently, I read the Bridgerton books by Julia Quinn. You might be familiar with the first book since it was adapted into a popular Netflix series by Shonda Rhimes. I binge-watched it back in December, and I have to say... not a fan. I guess I just find it too cheesy and annoying. Plus, the actors who portrayed Daphne and Simon had no romantic chemistry whatsoever.

But I'm not here to talk about the TV show. I'm here to talk about the novels! This is actually not my first time reading the books. Well, not exactly. I've read six out of the eight novels when I was in high school, I believe. I found the books when I was in high school as it was in the library (please don't ask me why my high school library has smutty novels in it, I have no idea who's in charge - they had Fifty Shades of Grey for a week but they eventually removed it from the catalog when they learned what's it about, but I digress). As a fifteen-year-old girl, the series hooked me.

If you're not familiar with the books or the Netflix series, here's a short synopsis: Set in the Regency era, the Bridgertons are one of the most influential families of the ton. The books follow the love stories of the eight Bridgerton siblings, alphabetically named Anthony, Benedict, Colin, Daphne, Eloise, Francesca, Gregory, and Hyacinth.

I didn't read it in chronological order back then, though. I just borrowed any available Bridgerton book in the library if there's one. You might think I was too young to read a romantic novel like that, but I guess I was mature enough to understand it.

Rereading it now that I'm twenty-two (cue Taylor Swift!), my heart's not in the same place. I was more skeptical with the writing, the story, and, most especially, the characters. But, really, I'm not that heartless, so I will cut the author some slack. Quinn wrote this at a different time for a different audience. It's not that long ago, but you'd be surprised how fast things change.

However, even though I have major criticisms, I cannot stop reading them. There's something about the novels that put me in a chokehold. Despite everything, I was able to enjoy it overall. This series is the definition of "guilty pleasure."

Anyway, here's my ranking of the Bridgerton books! I only read the eight main ones, which means I didn't include novellas of any kind. Also, as a fair warning, I might discuss spoilers and whatnot, so please beware. And do keep in mind that I'm writing my opinion, so if you don't agree, well... tough. I'd like to hear your comments, though, if you have any.

#8 - An Offer From A Gentleman (Book 3)

Honestly, this was probably one of my favorite Bridgerton books when I was younger. A Cinderella retelling? Come on! As someone who loves fairytales and forbidden romances, this was supposed to be heaven. However... it was not.

Benedict may be my least favorite Bridgerton brother. No, scratch that - he is my least favorite Bridgerton out of all of them. He's whiny and creepy and I was plainly annoyed with how he keeps asking Sophie to be his mistress in the novel. This was not the gentleman I imagined when I was younger. I might have liked him more in the first few parts, but as the story progressed, he became too childish and obsessive. Sophie, on the other hand, was all right. She's definitely one of my favorite Bridgerton heroines. She was tough but kind in her own way. I wish she had a better partner than Benedict, but I guess they suit each other in the end.

I just detest the climax and the ending of this book. It was too comical - and not in a hilarious way. I guess the same could be said for the entire novel. This was so, so different from the rest, to be honest.

Overall Rating: 3/10

#7 - On The Way To The Wedding (Book 8)

Fun fact: this is the first Bridgerton novel I read. And even then, I wasn't a huge fan of it. Just like An Offer From A Gentleman, the climax was a bit silly but more in a soap opera level than comical.

The biggest factor why I didn't like this was the characters. They were all so bland. Especially our hero and heroine. Gregory is the least featured Bridgerton in the novel, so I don't really know what to make of him at the beginning of the novel. In his book, I learned that he was a good guy - and that's all. Maybe he's too young and naive when it comes to romance (which is endearing, I have to admit), but he has no interesting personality whatsoever. Lucy, the heroine in this novel, was the same. She was described as pragmatic and sensible, which perfectly sums her up. Also, she's a great friend to Hermione (whose last name is Watson, by the way, and you can't tell me otherwise that this isn't a Harry Potter reference - Hermione Granger and Emma Watson? If that's not a reference, well, that's a very crazy coincidence, but I digress again). Gregory and Lucy's story was average - not bad, not good, just so incredibly dull.

The fun parts started way too early. It was difficult to find intrigue in the middle and end bits. The second main conflict, which happened near the end of the book, was truthfully not that good and was just obviously a ploy to keep things longer. You'd think that the Bridgerton novels would end the series with a bang. Alas, it did not.

Overall Rating: 4/10

#6 - To Sir Phillip, With Love (Book 5)

Eloise finally gets her turn in her own love story. She used to be one of my favorite Bridgertons, but when she got her own story, she was reduced into a plain girl. Gone was the feisty and outspoken Eloise we knew from the previous books.

Maybe it's because she's paired up with one of the most insufferable Bridgerton heroes, Sir Phillip. Just an inch away from Benedict, Sir Phillip maybe my next least favorite character. And it annoys me so much that Eloise gets to fall in love with someone like him.

It actually started pretty well. Before the events in the book started, Eloise and Phillip had already been corresponding for a year through letters. Phillip was on the lookout for - not a wife - but a mother for his two unruly children, and he thought Eloise was perfect for the role. He's a terrible father, but the book tries to convince us that it's not his fault because he had a bad upbringing by his own father (a recurring theme in the Bridgerton books - four heroes are plagued with different daddy issues). Eloise tried her best to turn things around, and of course, she eventually did, but I just really hate Phillip's initial intentions for seeking out a wife. He gets better in the end, sure, but I still really don't like him. At least the book wasn't short of excitement, else it would've been rated a bit lower.

Obviously, my favorite part in this book was when the Bridgerton brothers stormed into Phillip's house. He got what he deserved, truly.

Overall Rating: 4/10

#5 - The Duke and I (Book 1)

Now, this is the most well-known story in the Bridgerton literary universe, thanks to the Netflix series. I know I've said that I wasn't a fan of the series, but really, the Netflix writers and producers deserve all the gold in the world because they managed to transform this novel into something exciting.

Daphne and Simon had their moments, that's for sure, but as a couple, they were just so... meh. I liked their relationship at the start when they were still pretending to be courting. But as soon as they got married, everything interesting about the two of them sizzled out. And please don't get me started with how Daphne "took advantage" of drunk Simon. Thank God the show fixed that.

Despite my mixed feelings, this was a decent start to the Bridgerton books. There's really nothing majorly wrong about this novel (except for the aforementioned "taking advantage.") It laid out the future characters well. Lady Whistledown was also great. Thinking about her made me miss her because she wasn't featured in the later novels (you'll soon find out why).

Overall Rating: 5/10

#4 - It's In His Kiss (Book 7)

Since Eloise was stripped away from her feistiness when she got her own love story, I was obviously worried for Hyacinth. Thankfully, she didn't change! She was still the same tactless girl in the previous books. And for that, she gets to be my champion as my favorite Bridgerton.

This is the first time I've read this book, and oh, I'm surprised with how exciting it was. Hyacinth's hero, Gareth, perfectly suited her. Gareth was able to tame her impulsiveness, while also proving to be a good romantic partner for her. I loved that he could match her intellectually, too. It was never a bore whenever they have one of their silly banters. Lady Danbury was also featured more in this novel. She's one of my favorite side characters. As Gareth's grandmother, she was determined to bring him and Hyacinth together.

Maybe the only criticism I have in this novel is Gareth's issues with his father. I find it really weird that most of the heroes' problems are with their fathers. It just seemed lazy writing, in my opinion. But oh well, Gareth was interesting in his own way and that's perfectly fine.

Overall Rating: 6/10

#3 - Romancing Mister Bridgerton (Book 4)

I have a feeling that this is Quinn's favorite Bridgerton book. In this book, it's Colin's turn to find love. Colin is featured in several of his siblings' stories - in fact, in almost all of the books, he had an important role to play.

I love Colin and Penelope's story. Long before this book, they already knew each other. Penelope was Eloise's best friend, and she's almost always in the Bridgerton household. Colin has been forced by his mother for God knows how long to dance with Penelope every time there's a party. But it was only now that they became closer. Unbeknownst to Colin, Penelope had been in love with him for half her life, even though he didn't particularly care for her. Penelope speaks for all of us who know about unrequited love all too well.

Furthermore, this is the novel where they finally reveal who was behind the Lady Whistledown column. Yes, viewers of the Netflix series who are not familiar with the books. This is the part - and not in the first book! I'm so mad that they revealed Penelope as Lady Whistledown in the first season of the series, when in fact it's much later than that.

However, that's also one of the lowest points of this novel for me. Lady Whistledown's identity reveal was a bit anti-climactic. A little bit laughable, even. Also, also, also: I hated Colin's reaction to Penelope's secret. He didn't have to be angry and jealous of her, but ah well, whatever makes for conflict. Nevertheless, I love both Colin and Penelope because they had so much character and depth. Quinn was certainly biased when she wrote this.

Overall Rating: 8/10

#2 - The Viscount Who Loved Me (Book 2)

Remember earlier when I said that I cannot stop reading the books because even though I knew it wasn't that good, it was still highly enjoyable? Well, I'm really talking more about this book, to be specific. I think I've read it in less than 24 hours because of how much I love it. And yes, Anthony and Kate had their obvious flaws, but oh God, they were so perfect together. I can't help but imagine Jonathan Bailey from the Netflix series as Anthony when I was reading it. I swoon, all the time.

This used to be my favorite Bridgerton novel, but that's only because I haven't read my new favorite until recently. Anthony and Kate's story was just oh-so good and intimate and romantic. Kate's also my favorite heroine in the entire Bridgerton literary universe. She was headstrong and loving. She's unafraid to put the happiness of her family first.

In so many ways, Anthony was the same. He assumed the role of Viscount Bridgerton when he was only eighteen when his father unexpectedly died. Since then, he overlooks the family's estates and well-being. Yes, this is one of those "daddy issues" stories I mentioned earlier, but this one was kind of done tastefully. He didn't wish to fall in love but everything changed when he encountered Kate. He didn't mean to be attracted to her, but here we are.

Anthony and Kate had so much understanding between them. I agree Anthony was a bit of a dick when Kate asked if they could have one week to get to know each other before consummating the marriage (worse things have been said by Benedict and Phillip, though), but in the end, I can't deny that I truly love them together.

Overall Rating: 8/10

#1 - When He Was Wicked (Book 6)

*blushing furiously* So what if I put the smuttiest and steamiest novel as my top choice?! What about it? Oh, but really, though, I can't stop reading this. Francesca is one of the least known Bridgertons in the books, just like Gregory. I didn't know anything about her, except that she's quieter than most of her siblings. It was also first mentioned in Romancing Mister Bridgerton that she had already married but was sadly widowed after two years.

Michael was Francesca's late husband's cousin and best friend, which makes him her best friend, too. He has been secretly in love with Francesca since the first moment he laid eyes on her but was unable to pursue her because she's with his cousin John. In addition, I'd like to say that Michael is my favorite hero in the Bridgerton books. He's very charming and wicked, and really, my knees buckle at the thought of him.

Long after John passed away, Francesca and Michael reunited. Francesca was looking for a new husband because she desperately wants a family, while Michael... well, Michael was still in love with her. There was undeniable passion and intimacy between them, and it was hard to stay away from each other. I seriously have a thing for men secretly pining over women they love. That's got to be one of my favorite tropes.

However, the book itself was a bit longer than necessary. While I understand Francesca's hesitations in marrying Michael, it could've been shortened because it felt draggy by the end. Her constant changing of minds was a bit annoying, and yeah, it was probably a ploy to lengthen the novel.

Additionally, I was a bit skeptical at first of how they're going to treat their relationship, especially since Francesca was truly in love with her first husband. But it was done so nicely. Francesca and Michael never forget about John, even in the end. I loved what John's mother said to Michael in a letter at the end, "Thank you, Michael, for letting my son love her first."

I guess I love their story more than the other couples because both were already mature and experienced. Just like everyone else in this romantic series, Francesca and Michael belonged together. The entirety of Chapter 19 is proof of that.

Overall Rating: 9/10

***

Overall, the Bridgerton books are quite entertaining, despite being a cheesy and sappy series. I admit that I feel quite lonely and bored now that I've finished all eight of them. Ah well, there's always the possibility of rereading them!

#books #bridgerton #bridgerton books #julia quinn #novels #reading #book ranking #romance #romantic books #historical fiction

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just-jordie-things · 4 years

Note

Meeting JJ at the midsummer party and slipping and falling into his arms?

You lived on the Figure Eight, much to your dismay. It wasn’t as luxurious as literally anyone made it out to be. You hated it here, every part of it.

You hated the yachting, you hated spending all day on a boat sitting around or playing cards. You hated golfing, you once even hit your own foot as hard as you could manage with a club just to get out of it. but most of all, you hated your poser of a family, and their poser friends.

Everything was always about appearances. Appearing wealthy. Appearing happy. Appearing well mannered. It was all bullshit.

And right now, you hated the Midsummer Party.

You hated it every year it came around. Nothing made you more uncomfortable than this stupid fucking party.

You’d spend all day getting ready, prettying yourself up to your parents standards. Caked on makeup, hours of perfecting the braided crown around your head, and even making sure every loose curl that fell around your face was perfectly bouncy.

You’d wear a dress that wasn’t your style, even if it did kinda accentuate your curves...

And then you’d sit around all night, dying of boredom.

Your parents would mingle with their fake friends, brag about you where they could, and you’d wish that you could drink yourself to death.

This year however, you had the privilege of watching a certain blonde waiter make his rounds with drinks and hors d’oeuvres. You didn’t know he was a server, usually you knew all the servers because you’d spend more time talking to them than any of the Kooks.

But it was a pleasant surprise.

You'd maybe had a crush on JJ Maybank since grade school. Even though he was a Pogue and pretty well known for hating Kooks. You couldn’t help it.

He was so cute. And he was funny. And you’ve had this dumb crush on him for the longest time.

You spent most of the night just watching him with heart eyes. He looked good in a vest and slacks. Real good. It made the night a little easier.

However your legs were stating to fall asleep from sitting around all night, and it wouldn’t kill you to do a lap around the party.

Of course as soon as you caught the attention of Rafe Cameron, your mindset changed.

He let out a low whistle, his hand grabbing onto your wrist before you could keep walking.

“(y/n) (y/l/n),” He greeted, eyes raking over your body.

You couldn’t help the scoff that escaped your throat.

“You look good. Have you been here the whole night? I haven’t seen you around”

“Yeah, that’s cause I don’t like you” You reminded him, and snatched your hand out of his hold.

You often had to remind Rafe of that fact, but it never seemed to do the trick.

“You want a drink?” He asked, already taking a glass off of a passing server’s tray, handing it out to her.

“No, thanks” You shook your head, and turned to head off in any other direction.

He stopped you again, this time his grip on your wrist tighter than before.

“Rafe cut it out-”

“You know, I don’t get why you don’t just chill out and give me a chance” He said, like it annoyed him. Your brows furrowed, and you rugged on your hand again.

“Rafe, listen to me when I say this, never in a million years” You said as seriously as you could.

“Jesus Christ! Why do you have to be such a bitch all the time!” He yelled loud enough that he was gaining the attention of Kooks around them.

However, instead of realizing something shady was going on, they all juts walked away in embarrassment.

“Rafe, let me go,” You told him, trying to pull out of his grip again. “You’re acting like a crazy person” You hissed.

“And you’re acting like a stuck up bitch! Can’t you see that I just like you?”

Yeah right! You thought, and kicked him in the shin so you could finally yank your arm out out of his slightly threatening grip.

You were successful, for about two seconds.

Because you put too much force into shoving him away from him, you tripped over your heels, and next thing you know you were being sent full force into a server behind you.

Lucky enough for you, that server was quick to react, and suddenly you’re not crashing onto the floor, but you’re being held in the arms of- of course- JJ Maybank himself.

You think this might be more embarrassing than falling on your ass.

“That did not just happen” You mumbled, in shock that you even fell, but that your crush of six years is literally holding you in his very strong arms.

He chuckled, mistaking your comment as a compliment of his grace and swiftness.

“Charmed?” He asked teasingly, and then helped you back to your feet.

You were speechless as you adjusted your dress, and still a bit embarrassed by the whole thing. JJ didn't seem to mind though.

“Are you alright, though?” He asked, now glancing over to Rafe, who had stupidly stuck around, probably to bother you some more.

“She’s fine, she just tripped” Rafe answered for her, again, stupidly.

JJ already had a bone to pick with Rafe Cameron, but to see him hassling some poor girl who clearly had no interest in him would have been icing on the fucking cake. So he glared at the Kook before looking back at you.

“Are you alright?” He asked you again, his hand resting on the small of your back.

You could only manage a small nod, because he had very beautiful and very distracting blue eyes.

But when you turned back to Race, you swore you could have swung at him right then and there.

“You son of a bitch-!” You shot forward, about to slap him, or maybe grab him by the neck, you weren’t sure. But before you could decide, two hands wrapped around your hips and pulled you away.

“Woah there firecracker,” JJ laughed at your outburst, then a bit by surprise. “Let’s not make a scene”

You ignored him, for once, trying again to lunge at Rafe, but two arms wrapped around your middle, pretty much trapping you in place.

And then you were being dragged away completely, because JJ was starting to get the feeling that you were more of a fighter than you seemed

“I swear to god Rafe, if you ever touch me again I will hit you with my car!” You screamed after him, despite JJ dragging your ass away from him. “If you even look at me again I’ll do it! I will!”

“Okay, calm down princess,” JJ hushed once he got you around a corner, away from the prying eyes of the Kooks.

He finally released his hold on you, and despite really wanting to, you didn’t make a break to finish what Race started. You stayed put in front of him.

“The hell was that about? He bother you often?” He asked, his hands on his hips like he was scolding you.

Well, he was scolding you.

“Often? Try every day. It’s Rafe. You know Rafe, right?” You scoffed.

It dawned on JJ that he didn’t know you all that well, which was odd, because your personality was bursting at the seams, and so far you seemed pretty cool. For a Kook.

“Right,” He chuckled. “Something tells me though that you’ve never tried to kill him before”

He was still laughing, and your brows furrowed, before you crossed your arms.

“Are you making fun of me?” You asked, making him laugh more.

“I mean, you’re kinda hilarious”

“Hilarious? You think I wouldn’t hit that asshole with my car? Because I will- I’ll run him down-”

“I believe you, I believe you,” JJ cut you off before you could say anything too incriminating. “You’re just, a Kook, is all”

That didn’t seem to help, as now you were leaning back against the wall you were standing at, and your brow raised.

“And what makes you think that makes me any less murderous, hm?”

He laughed, and was about to say something stupid, probably. Some off handed flirty remark that usually worked on the girls around The Cut, but before he could pick one of the lines, a security guard was grabbing him by the back of his vest.

“You’re not a server here, are you?” The large man asked.

“Ooh, tough question. Am I serving the people? Yes. Am I being paid? Unfortunately not. I’d like to have a discussion about a raise though!”

“Alright, can it Maybank” The guard muttered, not amused one bit by JJ’s clever banter.

You watched with great amusement as JJ was dragged away, similar to the way he’d just dragged you away from Rafe.

“Doesn’t feel too good, does it?” You called with a shit eating grin, following next to the guard.

Darryl was his name, he always worked the Midsummer Party.

“I like you. We should hang out” JJ replied smoothly.

You giggled, and tapped Darryl on the shoulder.

“You can let him go, he’s with me” You said in your sweet Kook voice.

“This guy?” Darryl asked, looking down at JJ unsurely. “Thornton and Cameron just told me he was causing some trouble-”

“Don’t pay them any mind Darryl, they’re just jealous,” You replied, and wrapped your arm through JJ’s as casually as you could manage. “You know they’re always up to no good” You added for good measure.

The guard still seemed unsure, eyes sliding between you and JJ. Something didn’t add up.

But he wasn’t paid enough for this.

“He’s your date now?” He asked, mostly because that’s what he would say when inevitably some high ranking Kook got upset at the presence of a Pogue at their party.

“Sure is” You replied confidently.

And just like that, he was heading off, not bothering to ask any other questions.

You grinned, and pulled your arm out of JJ’s.

“So, you want to hang out now?”

___

a/n this was longer than I planned but I like it :3

#outer banks #outer banks fanfiction #jj maybank #jj maybank x reader #jj maybank scenario #jj maybank imagine

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shijiujun · 3 years

Note

thirst follow au for chuyao? (i dunno if you still take prompt requests for chuyao but i just discovered the prompt list you posted and if you do still take prompts i'd love read your version for chuyao of this!!)

new celebrity lu yao + ceo of the company lu yao is signed under qiao chusheng

---

The first thing that Lu Yao does once he’s alone these days is open his Weibo app and scroll to a particular account to look for updates. It doesn’t matter if he’s just started break after his filming sequence, or when he gets home after a day of long activities, before he does anything, Lu Yao is on his phone and checking through @/乔楚生mmc.

“Yao Yao, are you checking through Qiao-zong’s Weibo again?” his manager sighs as she enters the waiting room that has been allocated to Lu Yao for the duration of this period drama shoot.

“... Jie,” Lu Yao grins suddenly, showing her his phone, “Look at him at the ELLE Fashion event, he’s not wearing an inside shirt! It’s just a blazer over, I saw his fans yelling about this earlier but I didn’t have time to check, he just-”

Man Man-jie, his manager, tries not to be exasperated with him, but it has honestly been two months since Lu Yao discovered Qiao Chusheng, the CEO of Qing Long Ying Shi, the largest entertainment and media company in the country, after he visited one of Lu Yao’s shoots.

Not for Lu Yao of course, but for the world-renowned director that Lu Yao and every other crew and cast member in this production is working with - suffice to say, Lu Yao laid eyes on their company’s CEO for the first time since he signed on a year ago, and he hasn’t been able to keep away from him since.

It makes him wonder why Qiao Chusheng did not become a star himself, but Man Man said that the man has always had a knack for business development, and the company has only grown stronger after Boss Bai, the man who founded it and who is also Qiao Chusheng’s adoptive father, relinquished the position to him.

“How did you not know Qiao Chusheng is the CEO of this company?! Your paychecks are getting signed by him!”

“Aiya.... Jie, it’s not like I come across him at all... And I thought our CEO was some old man...”

Lu Yao immediately followed Qiao-zong on all his social media accounts because the man is certified exceptional in looks and body. He won’t admit it, but the best thing he likes about Qiao Chusheng aside from his arms, his muscles, his chiseled jaw, those sharp eyes, that hot body, is definitely the man’s smile.

It’s too embarrassing to say though, so Lu Yao stalks him online instead, on his private account that no one knows about. And because it’s a private and almost empty account, Lu Yao dares to leave emoji responses and some comments from time to time.

Today, Lu Yao replied Qiao Chusheng’s post with five thumbs-ups and five fire emojis. On second thought, he adds:

“哥哥帅爆了! 哥哥看我一下~”*

Man Man looks over his shoulder to glance at the comment and rolls her eyes so hard that she almost pulls something in her neck.

“You know, one of these days, if anyone finds out, you’re dead,” she shakes her head. “When that time comes, you’re on your own. Don’t expect me to clean up on your behalf. Also, Qiao-zong is only a year older than you are, and you’re calling him gege?”

“Hey!” Lu Yao exclaims, indignant, “I have to present myself as one of his young girl fans right? If anyone ever finds out about my account, i can at least roll my eyes and ask if I would ever sound this disgusting, and then people will think twice.”

“Okay, if not that, then could you please change your Weibo name? You’re embarrassing me!”

Lu Yao frowns, confused. He thinks @/三土葱油饼 is a great handle for a social media account.

The best thing is, Qiao-zong has been oddly responsive to social media post comments recently, and he banters hilariously with fans when he has the time. Lu Yao hasn’t gotten that privilege yet, but Qiao-zong seems to be liking a lot of his fans’ posts as well, at least for those who post in the first hour of his new post, and those get likes.

Recently, it has also been Lu Yao’s personal mission to leave a comment and get a like by his Qiao-zong.

“Yao Yao, you’re so stupid, you know that? Not every single fangirl has the opportunity that you do. You literally have an excuse to go see him, you actually have access to him, his office floor? Company events? What game are you playing, stalking him on Weibo?”

Lu Yao tunes her out a little. It’s pretty fun to him, to be able to openly appreciate all these hot and amazing photos of Qiao-zong. Here, he can stare to his heart’s content, and he doesn’t have to hold back when he makes his comments. If he met Qiao Chusheng in person...

Well, of course he wants that too, but would he be more disappointed if Qiao Chusheng barely looks at him, or ignores him? Lu Yao isn’t a small artiste by any measure, and he did win the newcomer award two years ago, but there are so many experienced and legendary colleagues in his company too.

It is, after all, the country’s media and entertainment industry behemoth, and Lu Yao doesn’t have a complex - he knows what he’s worth right now, and it ain’t a whole damn lot.

When he comes out of the shower two hours later at home, he sees a notification on Weibo, and it says that @/乔楚生mmc has liked his comment!

His day made, Lu Yao flops back onto his bed and conks out for the next 24 hours.

===

Lu Yao can only thank his lucky stars because someone up there must really be looking out for him. If not, how can anyone explain Qiao Chusheng turning up at his shoot so frequently the week after?

Before this, Lu Yao had literally never seen the man even once aside from that very first meeting that began this whole thirst journey for him, and this week, Qiao-zong has visited every single day.

Of course, it’s not like he’s here for Lu Yao. According to some of his cast mates, Qiao Chusheng’s younger sister Bai Youning wrote the script for the last stage of their filming before the production wraps up, and asked her brother to stay on set to watch every scene being filmed.

The scriptwriter is usually on set for the parts she writes, but this particular segment of filming happened to clash with her honeymoon period with her new husband, but did that stop her from being involved? Not at all, and so busy Qiao Chusheng has to sit his ass down, note down what’s happening, and report back to his adopted sister at the end of each day.

Sadly, this segment will only take five days or less to complete, which means Lu Yao won’t be able to stare at Qiao-zong for much longer.

When will he shine brightly enough to catch Qiao-zong’s attention?

At the thought, Lu Yao slaps his own cheeks.

He only thinks of Qiao Chusheng as eye candy. He’s after a visual feast whenever he logs onto Weibo to catch the man’s updates. Qiao Chusheng is a pillar of strength for him mentally.

Lu Yao has no other untoward fantasy or goals when it comes to Qiao Chusheng.

None at all.

===

Somehow, Lu Yao ends up all drunk and boneless in Qiao-zong’s laps at the end of the week. As they expected, filming wrapped up officially earlier in the evening after Lu Yao filmed his very last scene, and since the CEO was present, there was no reason not to treat everyone on the production to a good meal.

Man Man temporarily left ten minutes ago to take on a call for another possible role for Lu Yao, and the room was cleared when Qiao Chusheng offered to book three huge karaoke rooms upstairs for the crew and cast to continue their party at after their dinner.

Lu Yao has had a bit too much to drink, and Man Man isn’t around to direct him elsewhere, so when the room has emptied, he is still seated, staring at his empty glass of wine.

Suddenly, he thinks of something, and immediately pats at his pockets for his phone.

“... Lu-xiansheng,” a voice sounds, “You’re not going to join them upstairs?”

“Mmm,” Lu Yao nods, trying to focus on his phone screen. “Going home.”

A nice-sounding chuckle echoes through the room then, “Can you get home like this?”

“I’m going on Weibo. Man-jie will send me home,” Lu Yao responds, almost sulking a little as he tries to find his favourite Weibo account.

There’s a bit of silence after that, and before Lu Yao can even scroll through today’s updates, a hand closes over the screen.

“You’re drunk, Lu Yao,” the same person says again. “You really shouldn’t be on Weibo. What if you post something by accident?”

Lu Yao pauses, and then he shakes his head, “I’m not posting anything.”

He turns and shows his ‘friend’ his phone screen, “See? It’s a private account, and... and... and I’m just... going to check on my favourite account.”

“Even then,” the man says again, exceedingly gentle and patient, “You should only look at Weibo when you’re sober.”

“No!” Lu Yao protests. “I have to check. I check this account everyday. See? See?”

There’s a long, long moment of silence as Lu Yao scrolls his way down the account, detailing which are his favourite photos. The man lets him go on, and because he’s cold, Lu Yao inches even closer to him.

The last thing he remembers is his new friend taking his phone from him.

===

It’s painfully bright when he wakes up, the light triggering a headache even before he opens his eyes. When he does, however, Lu Yao has to take a long, long moment to figure out just where the fuck he is.

He’s trying to massage the headache away with his fingers, seated up in bed but having zero energy to get out of it just yet, so when Qiao Chusheng walks through the door with a smile, Lu Yao just stares.

“You’re awake. Great, I got you some fried buns for breakfast, you okay with that? Man Man didn’t say you were on any sort of diet,” the man says casually, as if they are friends.

Lu Yao looks down at himself, and nearly jolts when he realizes he’s in nothing else but a bathrobe.

Before he can panic, Qiao Chusheng adds, “I thought you looked a little uncomfortable sleeping in your jeans and shirt yesterday.”

“I’m sorry,” Lu Yao rasps, trying to wrap his head around why Qiao Chusheng is here, why they’re in a hotel room, and why the fuck the man is even speaking to him in the first place-

He must have inconvenienced the man last night while he was drunk, and instead of throwing him to Man Man, Qiao Chusheng decided to take care of him instead. Maybe Qiao Chusheng could have left him on the streets or something, but he is after all an artist under his company, and if anything strange happened because Lu Yao was drunk, it would be bad for the reputation and image of the company if word got out.

Yes, that’s the only explanation for this.

“I’m sorry for the trouble, Qiao-zong,” Lu Yao says, inching his way out of bed.

“No trouble at all,” Qiao Chusheng replies. “Come and sit, have some breakfast before you go. I called Man Man, she should be here in a bit to pick you up.”

With that said, it isn’t good for Lu Yao to reject him and just run off no matter how much he wants to right now. He sits down opposite the man at the table, and then picks up the buns.

After he’s literally swallowed three whole buns, Qiao Chusheng comments idly, “I thought it was random when you chose your Weibo account handle, but it seems that you really like cong you bings?”

“Mnn,” Lu Yao nods, wolfing the buns down because he’s hungry as hell, and so he doesn’t’ really register the first part of the man’s sentence, not until he’s on the last bite of his bun.

And then he chokes.

“How did you-?!”

At that, Qiao Chusheng raises an eyebrow, “You showed me your phone yesterday, and introduced to me your favourite account.”

Lu Yao blanches, because he knows which account that is, and then Qiao Chusheng continues, amused, “You were telling me how nice his smile looks. How pretty his eyes are. How strong his arms probably are hidden under that suit. And that you guessed right, he actually does have six-pack-”

“Please stop,” Lu Yao croaks, mortified. “I...”

The man takes pity on him and stops as requested. Lu Yao is frozen in his seat, like a deer caught in headlights, wondering what he should say next.

Qiao Chusheng nods, “Would you like to have lunch with me later?”

“Are you firing me?”

“It’s just lunch,” he answers. “I’m technically your boss, so I understand if you’re uncomfortable with the idea but... we could do lunch, and see how it goes from there.”

And then Qiao Chusheng looks away a little, “And.. I may have been visiting the set not to supervise the interpretation of Youning’s script.”

Once again, it takes him a few solid seconds to connect the dots, and when it does, Lu Yao flushes completely red.

“... we could do lunch,” Lu Yao agrees finally. “But I have to go home and change first.”

When he looks up again, it’s that smile he sees.

===

Weeks later, Chusheng makes Lu Yao repeat every single message he’s left on his posts, all the embarrassing ones, refusing to move if he doesn’t. Lu Yao’s hands balls into fists in the sheets, and says no.

He left a lot of messages! How is he supposed to remember every single one of them?!

Chusheng makes a a convincing argument though, towering over him and not giving into Lu Yao’s requests to fuck him properly until Lu Yao says them. It ends with Lu Yao trying to concentrate enough to speak, word after word.

He’s going to unfollow his boyfriend on Weibo after this!

---

Notes:

1. Qiao Chusheng’s Weibo account name is @/乔楚生mmc = Qiao Chusheng MMC, and this is taken directly from Zhang Yunlong’s own Weibo handle, which is 张云龙mmc. MMC, as I recently found out from Hanyi, stands for mao mao chong = caterpillar/worm? HAHAHAHA

2. Lu Yao’s handle is @/三土葱油饼 = San Tu Cong You BIng, which is a combination of the name San Tu and his favourite fried buns HAHAHA that’s how QCS was inspired to buy fried buns for Lu Yao the morning after

3. The comment that Lu Yao left in Chinese above is: “哥哥帅爆了! 哥哥看我一下~” = Gege you’re handsome af, take a look at me please! Something like that, he was definitely kind of joking when he posted that, but you can imagine Lu Yao being a little troublemaker by posting those comments and once QCS realized it was him, it was payback time? Of course, QCS likes to hear his baobei Lu Yao say anything <3

#asks #mriad #my roommate is a detective #民国奇探 #chuyao #fic prompt #hahahhahhha ded

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smokeybrand · 3 years

Text

Reap What You Sow

Finally finished Mass Effect Legendary Edition and gearing up for a second run. Before that, though, i wanted to stop and reflect on how well this game holds up, how ell this story is told. I’ve been playing these games since Mass Effect 2 was released on the PS3 over a decade ago and i haven’t regretted even a second of that time spent. I love these games. I loved these titles. And Legendary gave me an opportunity to experience the entire narrative, on one system, with a gorgeous face lift This makes me want Bioware to take another shot at Andromeda because, holy sh*t, can they deliver when they’re not hindered by corporate bullsh*t and it looks like EA is starting to accept that as fact and policy, rather than just the gripes of fans. I love these games and before i get back to it, i wanted to highlight my favorite companions because Mass Effect is nothing without those who run headfirst into the fire with you.

Urdnot Wrex

I hate the first Mass Effect but that’s because i’m a Sony shill so i started wit the best one of the franchise and had to double back. It was a poor experience by comparison but Wrex was f*cking delight. I loved this dude but his time on the throne in 2 and his limited time with the squad in 3 is what that sealed it for me. Uncle Urdnot is a goddamn joy to play with and even more hilarious as an NPC. If you romance Liara, definitely talk to him during the Cure the Genophage mission in 3. You wont regret it.

Aria T’Loak

I’ve been a fan of Aria since the first time she introduced herself in Afterlife. “Don’t f*ck with Aria.” Yeah, she definitely made an impression. Mostly an NPC in the second game, she really came into her in the third. The extended time we spent with her in the Omega DLC was exceptional. I loved that side of her we got to see and, if you play Paragon, you get to see an interesting evolution in her character. Not as dope as getting that awkward kiss at the end but still just as rewarding.

Javik

Good ol’ Prothy the Prothean. I don’t really bring him on missions in 3 but i make sure to check in after every major battle because dude is a f*cking fountain of snark. I do, however, make sure to take him on the Thessia mission because the banter he and Liara have n that temple is very compelling. Their dynamic is one of the highlights in Mass Effect 3 and i absolutely adore that sh*t. It never gets old and it never disappoints. I’ve played this game dozens of times over the years and i have never once deviated from these two, on that mission, since the first time i took them into that battle together. Plus, Javik in the Citadel is a whole ass delight. Make sure to check your bathroom when you wake up the next day. There’s a surprised in there for you!

EDI

EDI is a ray of sunshine in such ire circumstances. Long before she got Eva’s body, EDI was a full member of the Normandy crew. Her banter after becoming unshackled was brilliant in 2 and even more dynamic in 3. Seeing her becoming more and more “alive, over the course of that last title, was a real pleasure and i hated seeing her name on that board at the end. I almost always pick Destruction because that’s the only one where Shepard survives but it’s always a struggle. Me or EDI? My life or Hers? I hate having to make that choice but the time spent with her until that point, is always so much fun.

Urdnot Grunt

Grunt is MY Wrex. He’s the Krogan i was introduced to first and he’s definitely be the one i have the most love toward. I basically raised this dude in-game during 2 and seeing him finally come into his own in 3, is a big moment for those who are as invested in this series as i am. Not only is he an absolute unit on my squad, but the kid is hilarious. Some of the best banter in 3 comes from Grunt and it makes me wish i got to play with him more. Similar to Jack who is definitely going to make an appearance later down this list, you only get fleeting time with him but that time spent hunting Rachni is one of the funniest missions in all of Mass Effect 3.

Miranda Lawson

My darling Cerberus Cheerleader Princess. Miranda is never my first choice on a mission and was, like, my last romance option originally but, upon running threw these titles a decade later, she’s a lot stronger a character than i remember. Seriously, the growth she shows throughout Mass Effect 2 is real and is presented with a proper focus in her driven resolve during her solo mission in 3. Miranda Lawson is one of the most complete, best written characters in the entire franchise and I'm frustrated with myself that it took a whole ass decade to finally see that. Plus, i mean, she got a fat ass, too, so...

Mordin Solus

Listen, I'm going to keep this one short and sweet. Mordin is amazing and if you didn’t feel something when he did what he did in 3, f*ck you.

Kasumi Goto

Oh, Ms. Goto, i do enjoy you so very, very, much. Kasumi is like the mascot of my squad, the ship cat who keeps knocking sh*t of the table. She is an absolute disaster but i still love her anyway. She has some of the best lines in the entire franchise and i dearly missed her snark on my ship in 3. Tat lone mission with the Hanar was not enough time with the galaxy’s best thief but it had to be because Kasumi is nobody’s fool. She was like, “No galactic war with eldritch space horrors for me, sir.” but she made up for it in the Citadel DLC.

Liara T’Soni

Now we’re getting into the meat. Liara is a mainstay in my squad during Mass Effect 3. She is dub overpowered, especially with that Singularity, and i rarely go into a boss fight without it. Beyond her fighting abilities, Liara just has such a sweet relationship with Shepard that spans the entire trilogy. She opted not to be an official part of the team in 2, later taking up the mantle of the Shadow Broker, but more than makes up for that in 3. Liara is a principal character in Mass Effect 3 and her relationship with Shepard in that game, specifically, is fantastic to experience. If you romance her, it’s even more rewarding.

Garrus Vakarian

Garrus is one third of my Death Lineup. He and Tali stay in my squad in 2 and alternate with Liara in 3. Dude is, for lack of a better term, a straight up killer. I’ve only played mShep so i never actually romances Garrus but dude is easily one of the best companions in the entire game. The relation he has with Shepard and the way it develops over those three games, is only topped by one other character and she’s the premier on this list. Garrus is hilarious and a real force in the game but, more than that, he’s arguably Shepards’ best friend and a solid foundation they can rely on as dude shapes the history of an entire galaxy.

Jack

Oh, my darling Jacqueline Night. You were SO close to the top spot on this list and only missed it because you were introduced in the second game. That’s it. Jack is dope, one of the most complete characters in the entire franchise, and definitely a great romance option. I adore this chick for all of the reasons but mostly because of how realized she becomes by the end of 3. Her growth from “Psychotic Biotic” into maternal teacher for a bunch of biotic kids, was a turn i didn’t expect but loved to see. I love Mass Effect 2′s version of Jack, for sure, but her appearance in Mass Effect 3 is head-and-shoulders better than her initial introduction. It hurts we never got to actually got to play with her in an actual fight but her appearances were still outstanding.

Tali’Zorah vas Normandy

Tali is the best f*cking thing about this franchise and I'll fight you to the death over it. Listen, Tali, for me, is best girl, best character, best development, best everything! I adore Tali. She made that first game bearable but really came into her own in the second. By the third, she was the premier supporting character in the entire franchise for me. Literally her and Garrus stay in my party and for good reason. Tali’s romance is so goddamn saccharine that it gave me diabetes but her maturation as that narrative continues is exceptionally written. Being one of two squad mates who has ridden with Shep through the entire trilogy really gives Tali room to grow and it shows. She is the best companion in the game and i almost never leave her behind.

Look, all of the squadmates hold a special place in my heart but these twelve, specifically, always seem to find their way into my onsite shenanigans more often than not. Obviously, just because you didn’t make this list, doesn’t mean you didn’t have your moments and Aria being on here instead of, say, Thane, is not a knock against him at all. Aria was just hilarious and i enjoyed what little time we shared. Everyone on the Normandy is dope and i cannot wait until my next mission to save the galaxy from the Reapers with them. Not Kaidan, though. Never Kaidan. F*ck that guy, specifically.

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silke-doomflare · 3 years

Text

Meet the character: Ainu

BASICS

► Name ➔ “Ainu”, the tiny lalafell answers politely and bows. “Ainu Wanyuudo. Pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

► Are you single ➔ “What an odd question.” She eyes you up and down, her eyes slightly narrowed. “Why are you asking? Are you up to something?”

► Are you happy ➔ She rolls her eyes. “’Happy...’ One of those words I’ve never truly understood. Oh well, I guess I’m happy enough. I have a job I like and steady income... Actually I’m making the most gil of our family, apart from my mother.”

► Are you angry? ➔ Ainu smiles widely. “Funny that you asked, since I haven’t been this angry in ages. It takes quite a lot to make me angry. This certain thug tried to murder my mother not too long ago, and I’m plotting a vengeance worth of such a deed”, she states casually, like she’d be talking about weather.

► Are your parents still married ➔ “I only have my adoptive mother, and as far as I’ve understood, she prefers to stay alone. Which I, of course, perfectly understand. Romance would only be a risk and hindrance in the criminal underworld.”

EIGHT FACTS

► Birth Place ➔ “Kugane. I stayed there for the first half of my life, and the second half I spent traveling and training around the far east.”

► Hair Color ➔ “Black?” she asks slightly confused, and glances upwards at her bangs. “Yep. So it’d seem.”

► Eye Color ➔ Ainu rolls her eyes again. She marches closer, looks up to you and pulls her lower eyelid slightly downwards, so that you can see the blood red orb clearly.

► Birthday ➔ “I have no clue about the exact date. I only know it’s sometimes around spring.”

► Mood ➔ “...bored. I am so... bored! You see, I was given this interesting assignment a couple of months ago, but my target has done nothing. Nothing! Either he chickened out just because he’s a coward, or somebody told him I was after him, and he chickened out because... well... he’s still a coward.” Ainu lets out a frustrated sigh. “I do know I have quite a reputation, but I wish people wouldn’t back off from the game because of it. How shameful. One should finish what one starts.”

► Gender ➔ Ainu raises her eyebrows. “Seriously, have you considered glasses?”

► Summer or winter ➔ “Summer absolutely. Working is easier in summer. No footprints.”

► Morning or afternoon ➔ “Afternoon. Most of my work consists of night shifts, and I’m more of a night owl anyway.”

EIGHT THINGS ABOUT YOUR LOVE LIFE

► Are you in love ➔ She snorts and looks at you scornfully. “I don’t think I’ve ever experienced any kind of love. I grew up in an environment where such a thing didn’t exist. Besides, as far as I’ve been observing people around me, who are in love, it seems more like a nuisance than something worth pursuing.”

► Do you believe in love at first sight ➔ “I don’t believe in love at all.”

► Who ended your last relationship ➔ Ainu lets out a frustrated sigh. “It should be obvious at this point, but I have never had that kind of relationship. First of all: I would be insane if I let another person that close to me. And secondly: even if such a miracle happened, it would eventually fail, because the other party couldn’t handle everything a pact like that with me would bring with it.”

► Have you ever broken someone’s heart ➔ “I think I... maay have broken my mother’s heart at some point. She’s been trying so hard to save me. Though, I’m not quite sure what she’s trying to save me from. She should know by now that I’m not one of those people who need saving.”

► Are you afraid of commitments ➔ “Commitments? Do you mean my pacts with my customers? No, I’m not afraid of commitments. If I had to name one of those few things in this messed up world I find meaningful, it would be my reputation and bringing honor to the shinobi who trained me.”

► Have you hugged someone within the last week? ➔ “Do hugs received from others count as me hugging them? They do? Then I’ve been hugged, yes.”

► Have you ever had a secret admirer ➔ “If I have, I’m not aware of it. However, in theory it could be entirely possible. People - well, mostly my family - keeps telling me how cute I am, so I wouldn’t be surprised if others would’ve noticed my charm as well.”

► Have you ever broken your own heart? ➔ “Hm. You nosy little cockroach just had to remind me, just for the sake of some interview? ...yes, I have broken my own heart. By believing that if I just was a good girl, she’d love me. If I just tried hard enough, I’d eventually gain her acceptance. And after she had left, I kept believing she’d come back for me. I wasted too many years telling lies to myself. Should’ve realized sooner the only living thing you can trust is yourself.”

SIX CHOICES

► Love or lust ➔ "Lust. Not that I’d be interested in it, but definitely lust rather than love. I think I already made my opinion about love clear earlier, yes?”

► Lemonade or iced tea ➔ “Iced tea, absolutely. I don’t know about you people here, but we drink quite a lot of tea in the east - both hot and cold.”

► Cats or Dogs ➔ “Cats. In general, I don’t like animals, but the less trouble they are the more I could say I like them. Besides, do you have any idea what a pain badly trained dogs can be especially to us smallfolk?”

► A few best friends or many regular friends ➔ Ainu repeats the word ‘friend’ and sneers. “Now there’s another thing I never learned to understand. People talk about friends like they’d be a good thing. I don’t call them friends, but backstabbers. I’d rather not have any of them.”

► Wild night out or romantic night in ➔ “Wild night out - alone.” Ainu smiles charmingly.

► Day or night ➔ “At night I feel most alive. Almost everyone else is asleep, and I’m free to do whatever I want, to whoever I want.”

FOUR HAVE YOU EVERS

► Been caught sneaking out ➔ “In the beginning of my training. I wasn’t used to suddenly having so much different rules to live by, so naturally I rebelled. I couldn’t understand why my mother... - Asagi at this point - would dare to leave me there. Anyhow... I soon realized one couldn’t be a good shinobi without discipline, so I never did it again.”

► Fallen down/up the stairs ➔ “I don’t think I have. My balance is unparalleled.”

► Wanted something/someone so badly it hurt? ➔ “Love”, she answers without thinking. Right after her mouth is twisted into a slightly creepy grin. “But that was before realizing it’s not necessary.”

► Wanted to disappear ➔ “Oh, a couple of times actually, mostly back when I was still in training but had just started practicing with real targets. Not to brag, but nowadays I’m quite good at what I do. Nevertheless, even I can’t completely avoid mistakes. My area of work is one of those were mistakes will likely cost you your life. So, yes... after being sloppy I’ve had angry targets chasing me. Without my training I wouldn’t have had a chance escaping them with these tiny feets of mine.”

FOUR PREFERENCES

► Smile or eyes ➔ “I don’t care about either, but if I had to choose one... smile. To be honest, I don’t like to look people in the eye. From their eyes it’s fairly easy to tell are they lying or not. It annoys me, when people are saying something, but their gaze tells they don’t mean a single word.”

► Shorter or Taller ➔ “Shorter. I hate it when people look down on me like I’d be some piece of shite they accidentally stepped on.” Ainu falls silent for a moment, and after a while, shrugs. “Then again... it’s also quite hilarious when people have to bow or kneel before me, when they want to whisper or give me something. I guess being a stump also has its’ boons...”

► Intelligence or Attraction ➔ “Attraction of course. The more intelligent people are, the more trouble they usually give me. I prefer situations where I’m the smartest one around.”

► Hook-up or Relationship ➔ Ainu’s unimpressed expression hints she’d probably rather watch paint dry or grass grow than talk about this kind of subjects. “Well... if I had to choose... hook-up. That wouldn’t tie me to anyone in any way. The less I have people around me the better.”

FAMILY

► Do you and your family get along ➔ “My current family? We get along just fine. ...Apart from some minor disagreements usually considering work and how it’s supposed to be done. Sometimes it makes me wonder would they listen to me more if I had born roegadyn instead.”

► Would you say you have a “messed up life” ➔ Ainu giggles, but there’s no genuine amusement in her voice. “Well, at least it hasn’t been normal, if that’s what you mean. It... could’ve been better. I admit seeing happy families and people having fun with their friends tend to make me somewhat bitter, even angry. But perhaps those things just weren’t meant for me. I’m capable of things those regular people are not, and I believe the Kami have bigger plans for me than some boring everyday life.”

► Have you ever ran away from home ➔ “No, but I probably should have.”

► Have you ever gotten kicked out ➔ “Yes, and that’s the exact reason why I should’ve ran away. If I had just realized sooner what was going on... But meh... I guess it’s unreasonable to expect a five-year-old or younger to understand your parent is actually a piece of filth you would be better without.”

FRIENDS

► Do you secretly hate one of your friends ➔ Ainu lets out a frustrated sigh. “Since you seem to be unable to grasp the concept of not having friends, I’m just going to answer your friend-related questions by using my family members instead. Does that sound good? Good.”

► Do you consider all of your friends good friends ➔ Ainu pouts while shifting her hands behind her back. “Mostly. My adoptive sisters are both as... tolerable as siblings can be, I think. I’m not so sure about Bella, though, and what she’s going to do with her life. Same with my aunt, Silke. Those two are the only law-abiding citizens of our family - as far as I know at least - so that kind of forces me to keep my eye on them. If a betrayal were to happen, they’d be my main suspects.”

► Who is your best friend ➔ “Aya”, Ainu answers without a moment of hesitation. “If I had to name one thing I truly appreciate in people - besides not stabbing me in the back, obviously - it would be their ability to return my friendly bantering and not get offended by it.”

► Who knows everything about you ➔ Ainu smiles sunnily, before answering: “No one. Though mother is probably quite close to it.”

#ffxiv #ffxivrp #ffxiv rp #final fantasy xiv #dunesfolk lalafell #meet the character #ainu wanyuudo #character info

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marshmallowprotection · 3 years

Note

I read your tag about what if lila was shipped with saeyoung instead and it was so cute. i want to see him dressed like a lolita too! do you have any more headcanons on how it would go? 👁️ And what if Saeran was with Minji and Judas. What would that be like? I feel like Minji and Saeran would have a fun time cooking together. But its hard to imagine how Judas and Saeran bonding looks like.

I think I’ve talked about it before, but it’s definitely been a while since I’ve had the thought on my mind. So, let’s consider the possibility here and play around with the timeline and see what would happen if we swapped around the MCs in their relationships.

Now, I suppose would be smarter to start with Judas since he is involved with Saeyoung much earlier than Lila meets Unknown, or Ray, it just depends on the timeline. Judas, as we all know, is a former informant and would take power by gaining secrets using his body or his promises to get what he’d wanted. He was fixated on revenge and destroying his ex-boyfriend who was to become the next head of a Mafia ring.

He spiraled wildly out of control until he fucked up one day. He made a mistake and took down the wrong guy, and it landed a hit on his head. They saw him as a nuisance until he proved himself angry and crafty, and he knew he was rightly fucked. He made a deal with Saeyoung’s agency to trade his secrets for some kind of protection, but we all know the agency wanted his secrets and then they were going to kill him.

Judas actually met Minji one evening and escorted her home when she walked int the wrong side of town and that was what helped Saeyoung vet Minji when she appeared in the apartment. Now, if we were to say that instead of making one mistake, he meets Rika at some point and she wants him for his powers of true coercision. She sees his anger and righteous fury and loves it. He could make a good boy who deceives others for the cult. It’s hard to trick him, but I think if he offered to help him kill his Ex, he’d take it, and she’d trick the trickster because of his weakness.

That puts him interacting with Unknown very often. Judas loves to flirt and play around with others for fun. He, like Lila, tends to prefer fashion that is princely in nature and we all know how Unknown feels about fancy clothes and pretty folks. That’s a weakness. I imagine he and Unknown could both bond over revenge in a rather easy way. It’s possible there is tension between the two of them over a lot of power. Trust me, this is the only way that it’d work. They’re both angry and they’re both determined to destroy everyone that hurt them.

I can see them having this love-hate relationship where they argue a lot and it turns into I-hate-you-but-I-want-to-kiss-you tension. However, they both have a lot of vulnerabilities. They both have mother issues. They both want to be seen and noticed. They both craved to be loved. It’s easy for them to use each other to cope. Unknown would give Judas hell over the small height difference that they have and assert himself and Judas would bite back.

Now, if Unknown changed his mind at the last second with what he wanted in an assistant, and he took Minji instead... well, that just means that he’s picked Ms. Sunshine incarnate. Minji has a big heart and she knows nothing of suffering and misery. All she knows is that she wants to keep striving towards her dreams of being a baker. It’s odd with them because Minji is taller than Unknown is but he’d had a way of making her uneasy.

She might have questioned why she was helping him break into an apartment and he got the upper hand on her by surprise. She’s a lot stronger than he is so he didn’t get the slip-on her that’d be messy. She wouldn’t know how to act with him biting and being so patronizing at first. Yet, she’d help him because she can see that she’s got no choice. She decides to get to know him and understand Mint Eye better so she can see why he is the way he is.

I imagine Minji would be forced to spend a lot of time making sure that Unknown ate something other than liquid sugar. She’s hopeless at hacking. That’s what he would settle for. He would tell her what to do and she wouldn’t fight him but she would try to pick him apart piece by piece until Lila because she isn’t entirely in danger of being hurt.

Let’s see, her cheery optimism that doesn’t die bothers Unknown. She would do these kind things to him and he would be so fucking lost, man. His heart would pound wildly for some reason when she ruffled his hair and did things for him with no prompting needed on his end. I imagine that he finds that the longer that he’s around Minji, the more he feels like he has a partner that he can trust. That is until Judas starts pushing in.

Rika wants Unknown to get someone in that apartment right now. So, she pushes Judas to work with him and his new assistant to find out who would be best for this situation. Judas remembers helping Minji and flirts with her quite a bit, and Unknown warns him that she’s his. Judas is going to keep pushing his buttons and he’s going to keep pushing at Minji. It’s going to be tense and Minji is going to find herself working with these two guys, trying to protect the next person that winds up in the apartment she was meant to walk into—

And at the same time, she’s finding more and more that she’s got feelings for the two guys that she’s working with. Unknown is angry but when he has nightmares at night and needs comfort, he shows her that he’s got a heart. Judas helped her in the past and she trusts him, even if she’s lost in his hatred. Her kindness in the face of cruelty is to be admired.

I imagine this relationship is one where all parties have feelings for each other but are pretty torn and confused about how to bring the pieces together. In the end, if they’re able to be saved from Mint Eye, I can imagine that SE Saeran will have the most fun just devoting his time in the kitchen helping Minji and being her assistant, hilariously. She just makes him feel safe and warm. Who wouldn’t feel safe when their tall girlfriend scoops them up and dotes on them? Now, it would be harder with Judas.

I know that they’re going to have sassy banter and they’re going to be snarky, even catty. Their relationship is one where both parties keep pushing the other to their limits, and then they wind up kissing. It just works for some reason that I can’t explain. Judas can be very... high-maintenance but that doesn’t mean that Saeran can’t bite back.

Can you imagine their cuddle pile? Minji is in the middle and both of the guys are curled up next to her and it’s kinda cute, wtf.

Now on the flip side, let’s talk about what would be going on with Lila. We all know that Lila more or less left home after she had a big blow-up with her sister, who misunderstood just how much their mother was bullying Lila after she had moved away. It was a big spat. She left because she needed to... not be near the family anymore. She’s hurt and upset but she just wants to be as far as she can get from home. So, this is the first place her hand landed on the map and she went with it.

She’s insecure, and the only time that she feels like she can be herself is when she’s in Coordinate. If she’s not wearing a cute dress, then she’s looking at the ground and clutching onto the ends of her sleeves. She’s quiet, but she will say things if she has to. She’s also a painter that gets lost in her thoughts, I would call her paintings a blend of Rococo style and Impressionism if that makes any sense. The objects on the canvas feel Rococo but the style itself on the board is Impressionist.

Let’s say that she wasn’t the object of Ray or Unknown’s infatuation in this AU of yours. I think that Judas would pick her from the crowd and Minji would have given the idea to go and pick someone quiet and easy to manipulate, even if she didn’t say it like that, she gave him the idea. Judas takes it upon himself to bug her phone by tricking her and saves Unknown and Minji the trouble of getting her to open some phishing email.

She winds up in the apartment, just as confused as everyone else is and she realizes that she got tricked. She just wanted to help someone because she’s a selfless type. She’s lucky if she doesn’t have a panic attack from that happening, but that aside, I think Seven would realize really fast that she’s just a girl who’s from overseas who got tricked because she didn’t think things through. Her use of Korean is a little messy, too, which sort of helped the fact that it was easy to trick her.

You can Seven felt drawn to her the minute that he started looking into her past and her social media. After all, how can he not find a girl that spends her free time sewing and crafting outfits delightful? He can see that she’s hiding behind a mask just as he is from the start. She’s rather polite to him but he knows that it’s lovely to hear her laugh. She always humors his jokes and pranks for some reason that he can’t understand but it isn’t long before Lila sounds a bit sad whenever she talks to him late at night.

He means to say, how can she be so polite and straightforward on the chat, and yet, he’s got her laughing so hard she’s crying on the phone?

He probably won't get the answer until he’s locked in that apartment with her and there’s nowhere for him to go but the corner. Lila clearly is barely holding herself together but she’s biting her tongue and her fears to make sure that Seven feels like she doesn’t blame him because she doesn’t. She’s kind of blaming Rika for asking for a fucking bomb. Who asks for a fucking bomb?

It isn’t until Lila breaks down in front of him and admits why she feels so happy and at peace with Saeyoung, and it’s because his jokester mask reminds her of her big sister. Her sister is always smiling and laughing, but there’s a pain in her heart that she’s hiding. Whenever Lila talks to Seven now, she thinks about how much she misses her sister but at the same time, she thinks about how much pain Seven must be in. She saw him hear that everyone had lied to him and he had been hiding so much for the sake of everyone around him.

She’s able to confront him about lying about who he is. She tells him that he can’t hide behind a mask. That won’t make anyone happy, and it won’t make him happy. It’s what she failed to say in the past, and now she finally has the power to confront this problem head-on. She cares about Seven because he makes her laugh and forget about everything, but she also cares about those moments they have had where he whispers his fears to her and she listens to him say it all in the dead of night.

Seven has to admit that she’s right. He’s not happy, but he wants to be happy and nobody has ever told him that he has the right to fight for his happiness if he wants it. He tried to break her by saying that she’s hiding behind her own mask of some polite princess, and Seven pushes her outside of her bubble and all of a sudden, she’s been tested. She finds herself standing taller and looking people in the eyes, without fear anymore.

They push each other to bring out the good inside of themselves that they’ve been hiding because they were too scared to be themselves.

I can see Saeyoung and Lila as this couple that tests each other. He pushes her buttons and makes her believe in herself. She pushes him to be himself, and not once fear that. They’re supportive. Saeyoung gets to explore his gender identity more with Lila and boy, does he not mind being called she/her, or they/them, he isn’t picky, but there’s something about being able to dress up and be doted on in this fashion that makes Saeyoung feel good.

I HC him as NB/GenderFluid, have to throw that in there. I just want Lila to playfully call Saeyoung her girlfriend when they’re dressed up together and that redhead to turn into a mushy mess. I think there’s potential with the two of them to get along really well, I just never think of them in a romantic way because I’d fear that people would assume that Lila is projecting onto Saeyoung kind of like Yoosung does with RIka.

Oh, boy. I said too damn much.

#uno reverse #anon #ask #mod kait #long post #poly trio #saeran x judas #saeran x minji #saeyoung x lila #cmc #lila lancelot oc #judas choi oc #minji cho oc #i didn't even say all i wanted

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shipmistress9 · 4 years

Text

Spin The Bottle

(Once more for real)

Hiccstrid - Modern AU - T-rated

Summary: Hiccup and Astrid agree: Their relationship is too fresh to expose it to their overly nosy friends. But when a game of drunk Spin the Bottle presents them with a dare including ice cubes... They might be too distracted to care.

Notes: What can I say? This is just another piece of mindless fluff for my OTP. And I had a lot of fun looking up various dares for this short! 😁

. o O o .

With one fluid motion, Hiccup manoeuvred his car into a free but terrifyingly narrow parking space.

Show-off, Astrid thought to herself, even as she was smiling fondly. Luckily, it was too dark for him to see; in practical tasks like this, her boyfriend was more than confident enough already.

Boyfriend… That word still sounded so strange, at least in regards to Hiccup. Even in her own head.

"So… what's the plan?"

"What plan?" Her hand was already on the handle to open the door, but at the tense tone of his voice, she paused.

Hiccup motioned toward the house in front of them, the Thorston’s home. Through the windows, they could see that most if not all of their friends were already there, getting ready for the twins' monthly meet-up. The times where they’d spent every day together as they’d done in high school or college might be over, but that didn't mean they couldn't stay in touch anymore. Or have ridiculous and silly sleepover parties.

"I mean, what are we, officially?" Hiccup elaborated. "What do we tell them, how do we behave?"

"Oh, that…"

Astrid bit her lip, pondering. After all, it had been only two weeks since her and Hiccup’s years-long friendship had turned into something more. She honestly couldn't be happier about the days filled with joy, about the nights of the previous weekend she’d spent in his arms, or about how his hand in hers felt so incredibly right and the way his easy smile made something in her chest flutter every single time again. And yet...

“I think… I’d rather not tell them,” she eventually replied in a low whisper.

Hiccup audibly exhaled. “All right.” He paused, and Astrid could almost hear the gears in his head turning. “But, uh… Do we really care if they know about us?��

She took a moment to think, shrugging a little insecurely. “I mean… we don’t, I guess,” she said, feeling the heat of a blush on her cheeks. Reflexively, she pushed a strand of hair out of her face to hide it, even though it was too dark for Hiccup to notice anyway. How could she explain how she felt and at the same time reassure him that she wasn’t embarrassed to be with him? “It’s… all so new, you know? For now, I just want to share it with you. Does that make sense?”

Slowly, Hiccup nodded, the outline of his unruly hair moving in the dim light. “I… guess it does.”

He reached for the handle of his door to get out of the car, but Astrid took his hand and pulled him back. She didn’t want him to feel rejected, because that really wasn’t why she wanted to keep their secret a little longer. Awkwardly leaning over to the driver seat, she pressed her lips to his in a sultry kiss. Hiccup grunted in surprise, but only one heartbeat later, his arms wound around her, taking her into one of his embraces she loved so much. Smiling against his lips, Astrid deepened the kiss, opened her mouth to let his tongue slide against her own before she pulled back again.

“We will tell them, tomorrow morning at the lastest, okay? I just want the time to be right. If we tell them right away, they wouldn’t stop teasing and questioning us all evening.”

“Yeah, I see what you mean,” he hummed. “And it’s okay with me, to wait, I mean. You’re right, of course, you are. One of the infamous Thorston parties with drinks and fun and bantering certainly isn’t the best time. Can you imagine the endless ribbing? Although, I bet Snot’s face would be to die for. He’s been bragging about getting you to date him one day since forever.”

Astrid snorted. “As if I’d ever.” She placed another quick peck onto Hiccup’s lips. “I think I choose much better.”

His face lit up, visible even in the dim light. “Alright. Let’s get in there before they start worrying where we are.”

At the door, they were greeted by an already tipsy Ruff – although, with the twins, that wasn't always easy to tell.

"Heeeyyy," she drawled, and pushed glasses filled with colourful cocktails into their hands. "There you are! We thought you two had gotten lost somewhere. Or were making out on Hiccup's backseat." Both Hiccup and Astrid stiffened, but Ruff apparently hadn’t been serious, giggling as if she’d made a great joke. "Come in, come in. We've just been waiting for you before we get started.” Ruff disappeared inside, and Hiccup and Astrid shared a bemused smile before they followed her.

Just good we live so close together, Astrid thought as they took off their coats and shoes and placed their over-night bags by the stairs. That way, nobody wondered why they arrived together; they'd picked each other up ever since Hiccup had gotten his first motorbike so many years ago.

Ruff had been right, everyone else was already there. Snot, Fishlegs, Eret and Dagur, and even Cami had made it in time for once. They were greeted with the usual excitement of not having seen each other in a while, and the first hour or so was spent on eating delivered pizza, drinking cocktails and beer, and filling each other in on their lives. Eret and Dagur had finally started looking into apartments to move in together, Cami had met a girl at a club a few days back and planned to meet her again next week – a good sign after her bad break up three months ago from her noticeably absent ex – and Snot, Fishlegs, and the twins had successfully survived another week of their outdoor experience weeks at the college. When it was Hiccup’s turn, he animatedly talked about the new puppy his parents had gotten a couple of weeks back, even had pictures ready, and Astrid was proud to announce that she’d finally gotten herself a motorcycle.

“Hah!” Dagur exclaimed, clapping once, loudly. “I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist the adrenaline forever. See? We finally rubbed off on her.” He nudged his boyfriend with his elbow.

Eret, however, merely snorted. “You know, Dag… I think it was more Hiccup’s success than ours. With them being friends since forever and all?”

“Yeah,” Astrid quickly jumped in. “Hiccup wouldn’t stop talking about how great motorbikes are, so I got one just to shut up his annoying babbling.”

Eret smirked. “Totally makes sense…”

She wasn’t sure whether she liked the expression on Eret’s face as he looked her and Hiccup over. But he directly changed the topic by downing the rest of his beer and offering to get new drinks, so she didn’t bother wondering further. She did exchange a quick glance with Hiccup, though, just to feel a little more at ease. Was Eret suspecting something?

It felt strange to Astrid to keep this secret, to not tell her friends what was on the forefront of her mind at any given moment. How happy she was that she and Hiccup had made up their mind after so long, how she’d rather move over to the couch or one of the big bean bags where she could cuddle up to him, how she constantly wanted to peck his cheek or his lips, just on a whim.

But at the same time, she really didn’t want to elaborate, not just yet. If they told this news now, the questions would never end. And because she knew her friends and their state of drunkenness, the questions wouldn’t be modest or sensible in any way. And their relationship was just too new, to her and in general, to burden it with this condensed kind of curiosity.

After every piece of pizza was eaten and everyone was at least a little bit tipsy, Ruff and Tuff insisted, as always, on playing a game to pass some time. However, their choice didn’t just let Astrid raised her eyebrows in disbelief.

“Spin the bottle?” Snot asked, incredulously. “Are you serious? What are we, twelve?”

Dagur, totally the grown-up man he was – not – snickered. "If you were twelve, Ret and I would be eighteen already and way too cool to play with toddlers like you."

"Yes, yes, grandpa," Tuff waved Dagur off. "Come, sit down over there and I'll bring you your rheumatic blanket in a minute."

Everyone chuckled at Dagur's grumpy face, until Fishlegs was the first one to sober up again. "Seriously though," he mumbled. "We're not playing the 'seven minutes in Valhalla' version, right?"

To Astrid's relief, Ruff shook her head. "Naw, we're not really twelve, remember? Also, I think there's barely a combination left that we didn’t already have." She looked around, thinking. "Yeah, I at least have been to Valhalla with all of you. No, I've been thinking of something else. I prepared these–" she held up a stack of paper cards, "–with entertaining dares. We pull a card and then spin the bottle to see who's the lucky winner who gets to perform. And I'm telling you, some of these dares…" She trailed off, snickering.

Snorting, Astrid shook her head. At least, there was nothing that would be too embarrassing to perform before her friends. They all know each other for too long to be fazed.

As long as I don't have to kiss Snot or something, she thought, shuddering. It was bad enough that he sat down to her left when they all made themselves comfortable on the cushions lying in a large circle on the ground. Hiccup had a point, after all. Snot still hadn’t stopped trying to hit on her, even though she’d made it clear, more than once, that she wasn’t interested.

She’d managed to have Hiccup sitting at her right, and even though she really wanted to reach over and take his hand or snuggle into his arm, she tried to be content with at least having him close. She just hoped Ruff’s game would provide enough of a distraction to not go crazy with longing.

As it turned out, the game was more than sufficiently distracting. In fact, it was absolutely hilarious and great fun. It started out with something relatively harmless. Not that “Let everyone look through your phone for a minute” couldn’t be embarrassing, but since the bottle had picked Fishlegs as the victim, it wasn’t all that exciting, either.

“Seriously? All you have on your phone are pictures of your dog?”

Snot actually seemed surprised by that fact, which Astrid found almost as amusing as the cute picture of Meatlug sleeping in a highly uncomfortable-looking position.

“Now, I’m mad we didn’t get the chance to look at your phone, Snot,” Cami shot back, smirking. “Although, I bet it’s just full of gross porn.”

“Oh, shut up, Cami,” Snot grumbled. “As if yours would look any different.”

Laughing, Cami stuck her tongue out at Snot, and Astrid couldn’t suppress a grin. If Snot was trying to embarrass Cami then he’d have to do a lot better.

The next dare was honest to the Gods hilarious, making Astrid wonder whether the twins had looked them up somewhere or had come up with them themselves. Generally, she thought they must have looked them up, but ‘having to bend at the waist so that the person was looking through their legs and then run backwards until they were able to tag someone with their butt’ was such a Thorston thing to think of! And, fitting enough, Tuff ended up as the one to do it, stumbling around with everyone laughing as they tried to escape. Being pretty far from sober made it even funnier; Tuff stumbled and landed on his butt at least three times and not colliding with the others was practically impossible as everyone tried to get away from Tuff. And if Astrid enjoyed running into Hiccup and staying in his embrace after they kept each other from falling for a little longer than was necessary? Well, in the general chaos, nobody noticed.

Astrid had to admit that this game idea was definitely one of the best the twins ever had, it was such fun! They got to watch Ruff weeping and wailing her way through five minutes of her begging the person next to her, Dagur, not to leave her for the person on her other side, Cami. The combination alone was hilarious, and Ruff’s acting skills were excellent. By the end, they were all crying with laughter.

They got to watch Cami perform a pole dance without a pole, which she managed surprisingly well, and then Dagur doing a belly dance ‘as if his life depended on it’. As expected, he went all out, earning himself cheering and applause from everyone, and Astrid wouldn’t have been surprised if a similar performance might get repeated in Eret’s and Dagur’s bedroom on another day.

Hiccup got off easily, having to speak in an accent for the following five rounds. Not a difficult challenge, given how well he was able to imitate his father and uncle, but still always entertaining. Almost as entertaining as Eret serenading him – specifically the person to his right. Just like with Dagur, subtlety wasn’t in Eret’s nature, so he went all out, using his best singing voice, falling to his knees, and arms gesturing wildly. It was a fantastic spectacle to watch.

Astrid herself was more than content with her first dare, doing as many push-ups as she could – and then one more. 43 wasn’t exactly a record number for her, but still good enough to show off a little. Fishlegs and Snot were visibly impressed, the twins miming to be bored to death, and Eret and Dagur who were gym-buffs just like her cheered her on right through to the end. The best reaction was certainly Hiccup’s though, his eyes dazed as she stood up again. Other men she’d dated had been intimidated by her strength, but with Hiccup, it was the opposite. He loved how strong she was, had even admitted that it turned him on, and seeing how it affected him now made her blush more than anything else. Gods, he was just perfect, accepting and even loving her just the way she was.

Snot had less luck with his first dare, relatively speaking. To Astrid, it would have been nothing, but ‘posting an embarrassing picture to your social media account’ was clearly something Snot loathed. She half expected him to take the post down again as soon as he could, but the twins would make sure that it never truly vanished.

They played several rounds with more dares to follow, like opening a bag of chips with nothing but your mouth – Tuff excelled! – and picking someone from the group to give you a spanking. Poor Fishlegs was probably one of the few, if not the only one, who had not wanted that dare, but Astrid assumed that Cami went gentle on her childhood friend. Snot did a surprisingly decent job at doing a magic trick, and Eret had to run around the house three times with a handful of ice cubes shoved down his underwear. A rather unpleasant experience, if his high-pitched yelps and unashamed curses were anything to go by.

“Oh, oh, oh, finally!” Ruff sing-songed when she picked another of her cards, a far-too-innocent grin on her face. “I’ve been waiting for this one! Okay, listen up. Snot, put that glass down, I need you all to be sober enough to get this joke.”

As if Snot drinking one more mouthful would change anything, Astrid thought giddily, clearly not unaffected by the alcohol herself. At least the twins had accepted not to mix too much alcohol into their drinks during these parties, or else nobody would be conscious anymore by now.

“Okay, ready?” Ruff looked around until she had everyone’s attention. “So, here’s what the next vict– erm, participant has to do. Hiccup in between every word for the next five rounds.” She looked around, grinning victoriously.

There was a moment or three of silence before snickering could be heard from all over the room. Oh, how they were all acting like the grown-ups they were supposed to be – not!

Hiccup groaned loudly, his head falling back against the wall behind him with an audible thump! “Seriously? We’re down to nickname jokes again?”

“We never left that level, H,” Tuff replied with clear satisfaction in his voice.

“Oh, come on,” Ruff giggled. “You’ve got to admit, it’s awesome! I just had to include this one when I found it!”

“So, do I get this right?” Dagur threw in, a mischievous grin on his face. “I have to do Hiccup between every word I say? This will be a looong game!” He gestured at the bottle between them. “But okay, I can do that! Spin that thing. I’m so ready for this dare!”

Caught somewhere between exasperation and fits of laughing, Hiccup groaned, “Oh, Gods…”

Astrid bit her lip at that sound. She had to keep herself from blurting out an overly-excited ‘Me too!’. Tipsy as she was, she couldn’t help her thoughts regularly wandering to her right, to Hiccup and to all the things she wanted to do with him to draw more of those groans out of him. But even just putting her hand in his for the tiniest of skin-to-skin contact would draw more attention than they’d agreed upon. So instead, she looked at Dagur, eyebrows raised and with the appropriate amount of amusement on her face.

“You know, Dag,” Eret deadpanned. “Given how much you talk, you’d both die of exhaustion.” There wasn’t the slightest hint of jealousy in his words, just dry amusement and a certain glint in his eyes. Given the boys’ open and relaxed attitude toward their relationship, Eret probably wouldn’t mind watching such a spectacle. “But if you want, I volunteer in case you want to practise first. Though maybe not today.”

Dagur pouted. “Spoilsports...” He took the bottle and gave it a good spin, then actually groaned in disappointment when the top didn’t point at him… but at Snot instead.

All eyes were on him, expectantly waiting for his reaction, but Snot just rolled his eyes. “Yeah, – hic! – I – hic! – won’t – hic! – do – hic! – my – hic! – cousin!”

Everyone burst out laughing and the game continued, with a noticeably quiet Snot for a few minutes.

Another highlight of the evening was certainly Tuff acting like a chicken for a solid ten minutes, and Ruff got off easily by letting her brother shave her legs; everyone knew it wasn’t the first time he did that.

“Okay, the next one can go two ways,” Ruff announced, frowning at the card in her hand. “‘Transfer an ice cube from the mouth of one of the persons next to you to your own.’ Now, the obvious way is a kiss, but we’ve done that so often, it’s getting boring. So I want to suggest a funnier way. One has to spit the ice cube out in a high arc and the other has to catch it with their mouth. Which method you use is up to you.”

“Ew, isn’t that a bit gross?” Fishlegs complained.

Cami snorted. “Not grosser than other things we’ve done. Remember that one time we tried to make the most horrid concoctions to drink we could imagine? Now, that was gross!”

“Uh, don’t remind me.” He shuddered at the memory, and Astrid really couldn’t blame him.

Snot leaned over to her. “I’d still choose the kiss,” he whispered, winking at her.

It made her roll her eyes, made her want to shove it in his face that the only one of those present – no, the only one in general! – she wanted to kiss was Hiccup. Hiccup had been right, seeing Snot’s reaction would be hilarious.

“Okay, on we go,” Ruff announced, spinning the bottle with a flourish. “Here’s hoping to see some ice cubes fly around the room now.”

Only halfway interested in flying ice cubes, Astrid reached for her cocktail standing on a low sideboard behind her. Her head was buzzing pleasantly, and she really rather wanted to keep it that way. She only started to pay attention to the game again when Snot next to her leaned forward.

“Ah, yes!” he exclaimed. “That’s it, slow down, little bottle. I’m right here. Yeah, that’s right, and now stop. No, don’t go further, I’m here, no, wait…”

Astrid stiffened, her eyes on the slowly spinning bottle now, too. Please, don’t pick Snot!, she thought desperately. He would pick her as a partner, that much was clear, and she really did not want that! He could be a great friend, but she wished he'd get rid of his fixation about them dating one day.

"Ahh, so close…" Snot whined as the bottle spun past him and got to a halt just a few moments later.

He slumped back into his bean bag, and Astrid relaxed as well, sighing in relief. Danger averted, for now at least. Her good mood didn't last long, though; only until she noticed that everyone's eyes were lingering on her.

"Well?" Ruff asked, grinning. "Who and how is it going to be?"

Of course!

Astrid groaned inwardly. The bottle spinning past Snot meant that it had landed on her. Somehow, her alcohol-addled brain hadn't made that connection right away.

Grimacing, she accepted the small cooling tank with the ice cube. And now? One of the persons next to her meant either Snot or Hiccup. Well, at least that was a choice easily made. She turned to her right.

"Eh, what? Oh, come on, babe. You can't be serious! Him? Really?"

But Astrid studiously ignoring Snot's complaints behind her as she turned to Hiccup as her partner. Snot had never mattered, now even less than ever before. But what was she supposed to do now?

It should be an easy question, she mused. She wasn't in the mood – or sensible state of balance – for silly acrobatics like catching a flying cube with her mouth. And she really wanted to kiss Hiccup! The question was just… would she be able to hold back and be content with an awkward dare-kiss between friends?

When her eyes found his, she found the same question written there, his cheeks endearingly flushed. The others would assume he was embarrassed, having known about his crush on her for ages when he'd only confessed it to her a couple of weeks ago. But that was good, wasn't it? When they wouldn't expect anything?

She took one smaller ice cube from the tank, her mind whirling. All evening, it had felt weird not to acknowledge their relationship to the people that mattered most to them. But now? Now, it wasn't just about not telling them. It was about actively lying to fool them. And for what? To keep their feelings a secret? As if they were something embarrassing, something dirty or forbidden, something to be ashamed of?

That didn't feel right!

Slowly, her eyes wandered from the cube in her hand to Hiccup's again, and she didn't even need to say or do anything. Hiccup had come to the same conclusion as she had; she could see it in his eyes, clear as crystal.

Without ever looking away from him, she crawled to where Hiccup was sitting and straddled his lap, ignoring the sounds of surprise from their friends. His hands landed on her hips to steady her, the gesture natural and sure. Nothing like it had been in the beginning when he'd been shy and careful. It had been sweet then, but she preferred him like this; bolt, confident, not afraid of her reaction.

She held her gaze locked to his intense eyes, even as she lifted her hand and he obediently opened his mouth to let her place the ice cube on his tongue. However, all obedience was gone a second later and got replaced by mischief when he closed his mouth again and tilted his head in a clear 'come and get it!' motion.

Smirking, she took the challenge. She was dimly aware of the others gaping, but the moment her lips touched his, she couldn’t care less about them. In an instant, they were lost in their own little bubble, just she and Hiccup giving in to the demanding longing that had built itself up all night.

It started as a relatively chaste kiss, just her lips brushing over his. Astrid hummed at the contact, having missed it dearly over the past few hours. Her hands rose to cradle his jaw and his neck, just feeling the heat of his skin and the pleasant scratch of his stubbles, while his were still on her hips, reflexively pulling her closer. His warmth seeped into her even through their clothes, his chest against her own, his legs beneath her. It felt wonderful, and she wouldn’t have minded staying like this forever.

However, she did remember Hiccup’s challenge, the ice in his mouth. Her tongue poked out, gliding over his lips before pushing to demand access. With a rumbling moan from deep within his chest, Hiccup complied. The cold of the ice made her shiver, but not in a bad way. His hands glided up her back, one hauling her closer as the other wandered on to caress her side, her breast. The memory of their watching friends flickered up in Astrid's mind, but only for a heartbeat before it was gone again, pushed aside by her desire to be close to him.

Their kiss became deeper as she tried to somehow get a hold onto the ice. Hiccup was good at pushing it around, always out of reach, and it left their tongues whirling around inside his mouth. Without her help, her body followed, shifting in Hiccup's lap and grinding down, seeking, wanting more.

She couldn't say for how long they made out like this. Endlessly. Not long enough. By the time Astrid pulled back, the ice cube she held victoriously between her teeth was barely more than a tiny shard, only moments away from melting completely.

"Ha! I won!" she stated, grinning.

Chuckling, Hiccup shook his head. "You know, Milady, it was never about winning, right? Besides, I don't feel like I've lost, either."

He leaned in for another kiss, just a quick peck on her lips but it was enough to make her hum pleasantly.

"Mmmh, very true…"

"Okay, did I miss a memo? What just happened?"

Tuff's disbelieving exclamation made the bubble abound them burst. Sheepishly, Astrid turned in Hiccup's lap to look at their friends. Their faces showed expressions of surprise and shock in varying degrees, a little smugness mixed into it in Cami's and Eret's case.

"Uh, well… the thing is–"

Hiccup began, and Astrid went on.

"–We might have something else to tell you."

. o O o .

Kudos, comments, and reactions always welcome! :)

And for those wondering: No, I haven't forgotten For The Love Of A Princess! The next chapter is written and in its final editing stage. :)

* - . - * - . o O o . - * - . - *

If you want to support me you can buy me a coffee. I love coffee 😊 (Ko-Fi)

#Hiccstrid #fanfiction #Hiccup Haddock #Astrid Hofferson #fluff #fun #httyd #Modern AU

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jimjam-lillo · 4 years

Text

Never Lose You

Lily and James meet again after 5 years in a bar. Too much history has happened but too many feelings remain. Loosely inspired by Cornelia Street by Taylor Swift because she is everything. Part 1/2 posted

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13611019/1/Never-Lose-You

A wave of sticky, hot air washed over Lily as she entered the crowded bar. Half of her immediately wanted to turn around, but the promise of alcohol and Marlene’s pushy hand on her back gave her the courage to keep moving through the sweaty people.

Alice had texted that she’d already secured them a table in the far right corner, and LIly could see her waving excitedly at them now from where she stood. She pushed through and jumped into Alice’s open arms for a hug.

Emma was sitting on the other side of the table already and pushed a drink across the table to her.

“Drink up, ladies,” Emma grinned at Lily and Marlene, “Alice and I have been here for an hour already. You’ve got some catching up to do!”

The girls passed the next hour and a half laughing and chatting, catching up on their recent lives, and reminiscing on their Hogwarts years together. They saw each other as often as they could, but it had gotten harder after school and not being around each other constantly. They moved in all together immediately after school but soon enough Alice left them to go move in with her boyfriend, Frank. Emma left soon after to attend grad school, and that left Marlene and Lily. Both worked within a few blocks of their shared apartment, a small, cute, barely in price range 2 bedroom that they decorated with thrifted furniture and empty wine bottles. The bar they were at now, The Griffyn, had become their go to spot to catch up with the girls. Close enough to walk back home on a nice night, with cheap enough drinks, and the most limited amount of creeps to hit on them.

It had been a painful, long day to end a painful, long week at work where the problems just never seemed to end. Usually Lily would refuse to go out or leave her couch after a week like that. She felt the best way to solve those weeks would be to turn on a good Criminal Minds binge and survive off of takeaway for the weekend. Tonight, however, the weather was warm for the first time in weeks, and Lily had missed her friends. She knew she needed to go out so she came home, showered, put her makeup on as if it was her own form of war paint, and headed out, choosing that she would have fun tonight.

It seemed this was even better medicine than Criminal Minds and Derek Morgan's beautiful figure because Lily’s stomach was quickly hurting with how hard she was laughing. Alice was telling a very animated work story about some idiot co worker and causing Lily’s drink to come out through her nose as tears streamed down her face in laughter. She felt light, pure joy, and happiness wash over her, surely from an equal combination of her drinks as well as her company. Noticing now that her cup was empty, Lily insisted on buying the next round and leaping up from their table towards the bar, blowing kisses over her shoulder back at the table as Marlene called out “My hero!” to her.

Lily was still laughing when she got close to the bar. There was a group of four boys, tall and broad shouldered, standing right in her way of accessing the bar. Unsure of how to get around them, Lily quipped out a “S’cuse me, gents'' as she slipped directly in between the two closest ones, cutting under the arm of one with long, black hair. Their conversation seemed to halt at the girl weaving through them, and Lily heard them begin to speak in hushed tones while her back ws to them but she couldn’t convince herself to be bothered. Instead she focused on flagging down the bartender. He was preoccupied down at the other end of the bar with a Bachelorette Party so Lily resigned herself to waiting for a few minutes until he could come deal with her, and leaned up against the bar, twiddling her fingers. She was scanning up and down the others leaning on the bar, seeing if she recognized any other regulars, when she felt a tapping on her shoulder. “Evans?”

Lily whipped around at this mystery stranger knowing her name and she was met with shocked, hazel and sparkling eyes. “Potter?” She whispered back.

“It really is Evans! At a bar! Who would have thought!” The second voice shocked Lily and she tore her eyes off of Potters, to reassess the others with him. Sirius, who turned out to be the second speaker, was standing next to James, eyes filled with mischief and mirth, just as she remembered them. Peter and Remus were there as well, the latter smiling brightly at her.

“Sirius Black, I would say it's been too long but ah… still not sure it's been quite long enough,” Lily shot back at him, with a teasing smile.

“Oh Evans,” Sirius reached out and ruffled her hair, “I have missed you!”

Lily pushed his hand out of her hair with a laugh and leaned around to hug Remus, who she’d always gotten along well with at school, and give an awkward one arm hug to Peter, who she never talked to quite enough at school to properly know. After they unlatched she turned back and James caught her eye. She hadn’t seen him since a week after graduation, at Emmeline Vance’s graduation party. The gold in his eyes brought her right back to that rooftop they sat on and her breath hitched in her throat. She could tell he was there too until he snapped out of it and his eyes turned from molten back to guarded and black. Exactly the guarded look he had that night when she rejected him.

“All right, Evans?” There was her Potter. With his roguish grin that she used to hate and then she didn’t, which scared her more than anything.

“Alright, Potter,” she grinned back at him and walked right into his open arms for a hug.

He smelled good. Like real good. Like manly and home and she resisted the urge to curl her fingers into his shirt and purr like a cat. Letting go of him after a respectable amount of time for a friend hug was hard. She didn’t want to give him friend hugs. She wanted him to hold her and wrap her up like he did when she was shivering from the wind that night. When he would so casually drop a kiss onto the top of her head.

It took them a full year of being heads together and friends to reach that level of comfort and it took months of being that comfortable, for him to convince himself he wasn’t just seeing things, and to work up the courage to kiss her. And for her to kiss him. And then all those days, weeks, months of work came tumbling down because of her and her fears of starting something so new and real when she was just starting her life and leaving.

She knew that James was special, that her and James together would be special and powerful and would be so damn good. But she also knew that if she was going to be with him, it was going to be deep, and real, and probably forever. And as a brand new graduate, forever was far and scary and she was a coward who rejected him without explaining any of her fears. If she just told him, just explained, he would have talked her out of it immediately. But she didn’t. And so he left her on that rooftop and she was too much of a coward to go after him. Or to track him down or keep touch and now here she was five years later, alone, and unable to be with anyone else because nobody else was him.

“You here alone, Evans? Scoping the crowd out for eligible young bachelors?” Sirius waggled his eyebrows at her, scoping out the crowd.

“Mhm yes, Sirius I frequently spend my evenings in bars alone to pick up eligible bachelors. You wanna be my boy for the night?” She teased back, “Just kidding, I haven’t stooped low enough to be interested in you, yet. Marlene, Emma, and Alice are all back there,” she stood on her tiptoes to point at the table. “I’m getting drinks for everyone but you guys should come join us!” she couldn’t help her eyes from sticking to James at the invitation. His cheeks colored when they made eye contact, and his hand immediately went to ruffle his hair as he nodded.

Remus helped her flag down the bartender, being much taller and after collecting their drinks they headed over to the table, the boys carrying her drinks for her, as well as their own. With her hands free and James’ eyes on her she felt extremely aware of where her arms were and how much they were swinging as she walked back to their table.

“Look who I found!” Lily announces to the table, interrupting Alice mid sentence.

The girls all jumped up to hug their newcomers and Alice stole two chairs from a nearby table so they could all squish in. Naturally, Lily ended up right next to James, smushed up all alongside him.

Isn’t this perfect.

Lily spent the next hour sitting there, with her right side pressed up against James, brushing up against him even more every time she lifted her glass to take a drink, pretending she didn’t notice. He should have smelled like sweat, all squashed up as he was, but of course he just smelled like cologne. Cologne that she wanted to bathe in. She also spent that hour pretending that she wasn’t watching his jawline whenever he swallowed, his cheekbones everytime he laughed, his throat everytime a stray drop of beer ran down him. She had to look away when she started to seriously consider leaning over to lick it off.

Marlene and Sirius were hilarious to watch and listen to as they bantered back and forth, barely stopping to let anyone else get a word in. She was sitting there just watching them and laughing when she felt James shift in his seat and couldn't focus on anything else as his head dipped down and leaned closer to her ear.

“So,” he whispered into her ear, hot breath washing over her as she gulped. “How have you been?”

She whipped her head around the table to see if anyone had seen or if there was any chance someone else heard, but saw them all still absorbed in Peter’s missing pet rat story. She chanced a look back at him and saw his face so close to hers, she couldn’t look away. “Good! Busy!” she swallowed hard and looked away. “I started working at a NonProfit a few months after graduation and have been there since.” Work talk was safe. Work talk meant no feelings. “How about you? Did you end up working with your dad?”

“Yeah, eventually. I held out for a little bit, put my accounting degree to use at another firm but he pulled me over to Speakeasy about a year and a half ago to be their in house accountant. It's been good. Better than I thought at least,” he smiled uneasily.

She gripped her drink tightly and smiled softly back at him, “Good. That’s good! I’m happy for you.”

“Yeah, thanks. I’m happy for you too.”

It was awkward and slightly uncomfortable, but it felt like that was the necessary talk to open the floodgates and Lily felt her whole body relax. Maybe that meant they would be ok, they could recover and be like they used to or be even better. They could have their fresh start.

After that Lily joined the group conversation, as did James. They laughed and chatted and teased and filled in the blanks of the years lost but quickly came back to their fun, light banter as if no time had passed. The years apart faded away as each drink was finished and before long he was her James again. It became natural to shove his side when he made a cheeky comment, not at all weird when he grabbed her to give her a noogie, or when she stole his drink to take a drag. They were back and together and one again.

Sirius got the next round, then James, then Remus, each time Lily or Alice fighting them to let them buy it but “we crashed your girls night. It’s only right!” James shot back every time with a wink always directed right at Lily, which she always responded to with a fierce blush. Marlene was smirking at her and Lily was half refusing to make eye contact, half smirking right back as she realized she didn’t care if Marlene teased her when it felt so. damn. good. Sitting with him, laughing with him, just being around him. She felt like she had come back to life without even knowing she had stopped living. Each laugh felt louder, breath deeper, drink stronger. She liked it.

The bar had begun to clear out until they were one of the last remaining tables. “Let’s go, drunkies” Alice had stood from the table and was attempting to pull Sirius up from the bench, as he responded with dead weight refusal to move.

“Aliiiiiiice,” he groaned, face down, “we can’t let the party die already!”

“Who said anything about it dying?” Marlene smirked at him, “Let’s go, Lily and I live a block from here. We can party all night long.” Sirius gave a whoop and leaped up from the table, tackling Alice.

“That okay, Lily? You don’t have to get up early for work or anything, do you?” James looked at her earnestly, rubbing the back of his neck, something that looked a lot like hope or fear glimmering in his eyes.

She smiled softly back. “Of course. Not going to let this night die so easily.” He broke out into a wide grin then and hers quickly matched his, standing at the edge of the table, staring at each other, smiling like idiots.

“Ehm, s’cuse me,” Peter squeaked out from the table Lily was blocking him from leaving. Their little bubble broke as she mumbled out an apology and stepped away to let him out, whole face lighting up in blush.

“C’mon, Evans” James had walked a few tables ahead and stood there waiting for her to catch up. All the others had walked on.

They caught up quickly but stayed a few paces behind the others as they emerged onto the street to have the cold air wash over them. She barely had time to curse herself for forgetting her jacket back at home when his was wrapped around her shoulders.

It smelled just like him. Yep, I’m done for.

#jily #marauders #fanfic #harry potter #james potter #lily evans #fanfiction

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