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hrtbreakanniversary · 9 months

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Secret Love Song | Sung Hanbin

And nobody knows I'm in love with someone's baby I don't wanna hide us away Tell the world about the love we making I'm living for that day, someday

summary: afraid of having attention on herself from dating the school's most beloved, y/n y/l/n hides her relationship with sung hanbin. pressured to keep this act up, she begins to reap the consequences of doing so.

pairing: sung hanbin x fem! reader

word count: 12k

playlist: secret love song - little mix, cornelia street - taylor swift, shadow - seventeen

warnings: jealousy, suggestive, both of their thinking gets a bit toxic imo, lots of miscommunication, y/n has trust issues, hanbin is a little insecure, anxiety, profanity (lmk if i missed any!)

The cafeteria was busy with everyone rushing to get a meal in the small period between classes. Friends talk about the outrageous amount of homework that teachers assigned or the crazy things that they were taught because they forget that the people they are teaching are just young high school students. Failed whispers gossiping about what happened over the weekend.

A topic being on the school's basketball team's pointing guard, Sung Hanbin, being tied down to cheer captain, Yoo Jimin. Witnesses talking about how they caught them underneath the bleachers outside near the football field during the halftime of last week's game. His lips on hers and their hands where they shouldn't be in public.

This could be rumors. This could be the truth. It's up to the recipient if they choose to believe it or not.

Y/N knew it wasn’t true because they have been dating for about 6 months now.

"Honestly they're pretty cute. It's nothing surprising if they are a thing." Zhanghao's voice muffled behind the straw as he took a sip out of his drink.

"Dude." Yunjin whacked the male on the arm. She quickly reassured Y/N," Don't listen to him. Everyone knows that they're just close friends."

"You're acting like Y/N is going to do anything about her crush. Don't give her that toxic positivity."

With a roll of her eyes, Y/N scoffed out," Thanks for believing in me, Hao. I appreciate the hope you have for me."

"I'm just stating the facts. You've liked him for how long? And I have not seen you guys talk at all."

"Yeah, they have!" Yunjin tried to recollect exactly when but blanked out.

"Like once? When he asked for the answers to the science homework? I’m sorry. He and his whole posse are totally out of our leagues."

"I hope you fail tryouts tonight."

"Yunjin." Y/N sighed," Too far."

"He's pissing me off."

Zhangho mocked Yunjin, flicking her off in the process. In response, the girl whacked him on his head. While her best friends bickered, she couldn't help looking over at the table in the middle of the room. Zhanghao was right. Despite them already dating, she still struggled to believe that she was. And the way that Zhanghao talked about it like it would be something atrocious, this is why she preferred to keep their relationship under wraps and away from the public’s eye. If her own best friend couldn’t see them together, how could anybody else? And she knew the comments from people who didn’t know her would be more harsh.

Y/N eyed how Jimin was sitting so close to him. With every movement, their arms and shoulders would touch.

Jimin rose her arm to hang off his shoulder, leaning into his ear to whisper into his ear that made his lips raise into a smile. Just as Hanbin was about to reply to whatever the girl had to say, another body came into her view and blocked away the school's new "couple". Letting out a breath that she didn't know she was holding, she looked up to find Matthew. He was a year younger, a grade below, but she had American literature with him. They didn't really talk much except when they would get paired during class but then again, Y/N didn't really talk to people outside of her circle.

"H-Hey, Y/N."

"Hi."

Matthew gleamed at the simple response, his fingers playing with the strap of his backpack. As he remained silent, she looked around the table before looking back up at him," Is there something you need?" "Oh… uhm…" he stumbled to take his bag. Placing it roughly on the table that had the three of them grasping at their trays so that their food didn't jump too far out of their plates. Digging deep into the trenches of his bag, he spared each of them a bright smile before pulling out a crumpled-up flower. A single white rose and he shyly began to hand it to Y/N.

More like shoved it into her hands.

"I was wondering… if you would like to go to the winter formal with me. I mean I know that you don't know me too well and I don't know you too well but I've always thought you were pretty. And maybe we could get to know each other through this. So be my date?" In the corner of her eyes, she saw his friends huddled at the door. One of them filming the whole interaction.

“Matthew, I’m sorry.", His face fell in disappointment. Y/N quickly shook her head, attempting to stop him from crying but she could see the tears already beginning to fall," It's just I wasn't planning to go is all! I'll have to figure it out with my parents and I don't have money to go. I’ll get back to you, yeah?"

Blinking away the rest of his tears, he let out a sigh of relief, "Oh. Okay. Well, I'll see you later."

Before Y/N could even say anything, he scurried away. Pushing past his group of friends that ran after him, slapping him on his shoulder and back as they made a commotion.

"That wasn't easy to watch," Yunjin spoke through clenched teeth. Zhanghao picked up the rose from Y/N's lap who was still staring at the empty door in complete guilt.

"Well… this is how you can tell someone likes you." He rose it in the air as if he were examining an exotic flora. "So start living in reality. The both of you. Because Sung Hanbin has never spared more than a glance at Y/N in the past four years”

Funny enough, Hanbin himself had not been able to take his eyes off the girl for more than a minute since the second she walked in. _ Right foot. Left foot. Deep breath in. Deep breath out.

She couldn’t take it anymore.

Y/N let out a dry heave, crouching over her knees. Having physical education right after lunch was pure evil. She could feel today’s lunch. Maybe chugging the banana milk before coming out was a bad idea too. It was beneficial for the people in sports that had to leave early to compete at other schools but she wasn’t a part of any sports so they could’ve put her during any other part of the day. Her body was pulled forward by Yunjin who kept her speed at a slow jog. Huffing through each breath,” The faster we get this done, the more we can hide from Coach Kim.”.

“Left!.” A crowd of male voices exclaimed, running past her in a speed that mocked her. Damn basketball team. Their heights offended her too. The grimace on her face stayed until that familiar flop of hair running in the back appeared. Of course, Sung Hanbin being the captain of the basketball team had to lead an example to other players and make sure all his teammates were accounted for. So despite possibly being the fastest, he stayed towards the end to make sure that the players who weren’t able to keep up and no one was left behind.

Suddenly, Hanbin turned around and began to run backward. Raising an eyebrow in question, Y/N continued to jog. He looked around the area, especially on Yunjin who was still beside her before his eye fell down into a wink at her before turning back around and catching up with the rest of his team.

All prior complaints dissipated into the air. She struggled to hide her blush from his flirtatious attempts but that failed when Yunjin stopped them and held her cheeks together. Worried that she was going to faint from the way her cheeks were turning so red.

After everyone had finished the two laps, Coach Kim lined everyone up along the white lines. “Alright, before I send off half of you, we’re going to play a little game of dodgeball.”

Coach Kim earned boos from the tough crowd but he waved them off and began to read down his roster.

“Coach, why don’t we play it a little differently? Couple dodgeball? Girl as striker and boy as the defender?”

“That’s so boring too! You all take too long to get each other out!” A girl shouted from the other side of the line.

“How about we change that up too and have the boy as the striker and the girl as the defender?” A girl with pig tails asked.

Coach Kim obviously thought that was a good idea since he didn't wait for a vote from the class as he immediately divided the class up in half using the method of giving a person a number between 1 and 2.

Y/N looked around at everyone frantically picking their partners. During this game, she always partnered with Yunjin. They always purposely got out so that they could run off and hide somewhere away from everyone’s view to watch episodes of this anime named Bluelock. But now that Yunjin was split apart from her and on the other team, she didn’t know who to choose as her partner and if anybody even wanted to be her partner.

“1?” A familiar voice came out from the chaos of the crowd, their hand reaching to grab her wrist. Hanbin smirked down at Y/N’s look of surprise, her eyebrows raised and lips ajar. His hand slowly trailed down to interlock their fingers together.

Oh he’s getting quite brave. The fight to hide her blush failed once again. But reality hit when she heard other people in their team complaining about how they wanted to be Hanbin’s partner. The ones reminding her why they were in this position in the first place as they questioned who she was and how in any way she was special enough to have Hanbin choose her so quickly. She began to try to pry her fingers out of his,” Hanbin, we can’t.”

“What? Be partners? I don’t see why now.”

” Yeah but partners don’t hold hands like we are.”

Almost like he wasn’t paying attention to a single thing he was saying, Hanbin used his thumb to rub out the crease between her eyebrow created by the pout on her face. Y/N turned her head from side to side to shake his hand off, “Hanbin!” She whisper screamed.

“I don’t know who that is. I only go by one name.”

“Whatever.”

“Whose Hanbin?”

“Shut up, dude.”

“Dude? Hanbin? What are these names?”

Binnie was just on the tip of her tongue but the sound of the whistle brought everyone’s attention to the middle. Using this distraction, she snuck her hand from Hanbin's grasp before any more questioning glances made their way.

All while Coach Kim was trying to give instructions on how to play the game, she could feel his hand linger near hers. The feeling of his fingertips on her palms, close to interlocking their fingers but never doing it. She loved him. Loved how he respected her space and despite pestering her so much about it, listened and didn’t continue actions that made her uncomfortable.

She ached to hold his hand in public.

Wished she didn’t care too much about the retributions.

The whistle rang through the air again to commence the beginning of the game. Everybody rushing into their sports and grabbing a ball from the middle of the court.

Y/N knew it wasn’t going to be normal. She also knew that they were going to be one of the first ones to get out.

Normal partners, they held onto their partners by their shirts or by holding them on their shoulders.

But Hanbin’s arms were around Y/N’s waist, holding her tightly to his chest. It was honestly a little hard to maneuver around with the limitations of space.

The sound of the ball rushing through the air buzzed in Y/N's ear as she flinched away to avoid getting hit all while pushing Hanbin behind her who felt like a 3 potato sacks that she was dragging. The boy was much too happy while playing a game of dodgeball, his grip only tightening as he tucked his chin into her neck.

"Binnie, you're going to have to move if you want there to any chance of us winning."

Longing the vowels in each word, he whispered into her ear," I don't caree~".

To everyone’s surprise except hers, they were the second pair to get out. Gasps of how Hanbin usually lasts until the end. Walking off to the side, they stood and watched the remaining teams. After few minutes and nobody else getting out after them, Hanbin leaned down to whisper in her ear,” Do you want to get out of here?"

She rose her eyebrow," And how would we do that?"

Hanbin looked over at the game and examined the game. More like he was checking to see how Yunjin and her partner was doing. The duo were pretty still very much into the game and it seemed like they weren't going to get out anytime soon. Y/N watched as his arm shot up to garner Coach Kim's attention who stared over at them in question.

"Do you need more balls from the storage, sir? Y/N and I would have no problem grabbing some."

Coach Kim eyed the balls that went off the distance. He shrugged and nodded, honestly not really caring.

Hanbin wasted no time and walked in front to guide them toward the storage. His long legs allowed for their trip to be shorter and faster despite Y/N’s little complaints from her struggling to catch up, practically jogging. He kicked away the rock that held the door open in a comical way that almost fostered a giggle out of her. With a gentle smile on his face, he held the door open with his one hand. Y/N shook her head at his antics, rushing to get inside so he wouldn't have to hold it any longer for her.

Once the both of them were inside, the door was shut between them. Only the light from the windows shining in for them. Luckily the balls were in an easy find because they were in a visible place. Y/N being the one who found it decided to grab it especially since Hanbin was doing who knows what behind her with the jump ropes.

The only con is that it was a high place tucked besides two boxes.

But it was doable. Getting up onto her tippy toes, she reached up. Stretching out her body to grow tall to grab it but to her avail, it failed. So she tried again, jumping with more force each time. It took the fifth try for the bag to finally budge, it slowly sliding down. What she didn't know was that as she moved the bag, it was moving the box to the right forward.

"Cmon." She muttered underneath her breath, grabbing a handful of the net to pull it forward.

In the corner of her eye, she saw the box tipping forward. Quickly, she reached her other arm out to catch it but a body came up behind her to help catch it as well.

Once she turned her head, Y/N's mind was going haywire. She could not focus with how close he stood to her. You'd think she would be used to it by now. But each time, she got a close glimpse of his face. Starstruck is what could be used to describe; her heartbeat pounding in her ears and her breath picking up a pace. Looking over the details of his face from the curvature of his nose to his soft lips, she couldn't look away.

"You know… usually, people say thank you for their life rather than just checking them out."

Her face scrunched up in disgust," I was not checking you out!"

Hanbin ruffled her hair with one hand and pushed the box back into place. He then helped Y/N pull down the rest of the bag. Y/N pulled the bag up to her chest to distribute the weight better. She tried to back up of the little corner she was in but Hanbin's body blocked her from doing so.

"What are you doing?"

Hanbin quickly motioned to her to be quiet with a finger to his lips before cupping a hand behind his ear. Y/N turned around so she was now facing him with an raised eyebrow.

"Doesn't sound like anybody got out."

A smirk grew on his face, her cheek crinkling up to look like cat whiskers. Like muscle memory, her thumb ran over the lines of one of his most beloved features.

"If you keep looking at me like that, I might just kiss you."

Y/N snapped out of her trance, her hand falling onto his shoulder and resting there. She leaned forward so that her face was under his. She tilted her head up, looking him straight the eyes. "Would you?" A loud shriek escaped from her mouth as her feet were suddenly off the floor and she was placed on a tower of mats. His arms caging her between them, slitting himself between her legs. He leaned in so close that the tips of their noses brushed against hers, his lips barely hovering over hers.

Like a game, she leaned back against the wall to run from him. His lips chasing hers, desperate for even the slightly touch. A small peck given by her. Hanbin groaned in annoyance.

He moved one hand to rest against her bare thigh while the other wrapped around her waist to pull her closer to him.

Like magnets, they stuck to one another. The space between them now closed as their bodies mushed together like a perfect puzzle piece.

The white noise of the fan mixing together with the sound of their heavy breathing. Y/N could feel the butterflies going crazy in her stomach when his hand that was previously on her waist slip underneath her school t-shirt.

The way his hands slowly moved and brushed against her a sensitive spot that evoked a giggle. Hanbin couldn't help the smile at the sound. "Come on, babe. I'm losing it here."

"I don't know. It doesn't feel right snogging another women's man."

With his forehead against hers, Hanbin frowned in confusion, " What do you mean?"

"Last I heard, you were dating Jimin."

"Jimin, huh?" Hanbin dramatically leaned away from Y/N, his arm still secured around her waist. He let out a deep sigh," You're right. I shouldn't be having such thoughts about another man's woman."

This time, Y/N rose her eyebrow up in confusion.

"With that junior."

"Oh, Matthew?" "What was going on there anyways?"

"He asked me to the formal."

"Oh is that right?" Hanbin wiggled his eyebrows," How cute is that?"

"Shut up." She pushed at his shoulder that didn't budge at the movement.

"Did he give you flowers?" A peck on her forehead," Balloons?" A peck on her cheek, " What color are you two wearing?," A kiss on her lips.

"You're soooo annoying. I said no to him."

He tucked a strand hair behind her ear, " Good. Because you're mine."

"Yours? I'd be surprised. Everyone is saying you're Jimin's."

"Would I be in your arms if I was hers? I wouldn't want to be anywhere else than here." He ran his thumb over cheek," I'd go anywhere to be with you." Pulling her back in for a tight hug as he wrapped around of his arms around her waist.

Y/N couldn't help the way her cheeks burned. To hide her reaction, she tucked her face between the crack of his neck and returned the hug back to him.

The moment was interuppted by a rapid knock at the door that had her immediately push Hanbin off of her. His hand quickly grabbed onto hers when he stumbled back against the cushions behind him. Yunjin's voice could be heard outside of the room, asking Y/N if she was in there.

"Crap." Y/N started to push her hair back into place, adjusting her clothes back into place. "Dude, hide."

"What, why?" He whispered in a hush tone.

"Don't you think she'll find it odd if we're just chilling in here together?"

"And what's wrong with that?". It was as if he couldn't see the seriousness of the situation. A boy and a girl in a room alone was strange and questionable in so many ways. Especially with how he was leaning his body into hers again, squeezing her hand, "I think it's about time she found out."

"Binnie, just-" The door opened before she could finish her sentence, the doors were open and Yunjin was in the room with them. Luckily she was looking around the room first since they were tucked away in the corner. That quick second allowed Y/N to realize that their hands were still interlocked together and yanked her hand out of his grip. She had unintentionally done it so fast and rough, failing to see how Hanbin's eyebrow began to furrow.

"Yunjin~" She called out to the lost girl, grabbing the bag of extra balls beside her. Yunjin's head quickly snapped over in their direction, her eyes immediately looking Y/N in hers and widening at the sight and thought of the two being alone in a room together.

Y/N rose her hand up to show the bag of balls in her hands, " You came just in time. Can't find anything in this junk yard."

"Right…" Yunjin only moved only because Y/N dragged her out of the small, congested room. She frantically waved goodbye to Hanbin whose gaze were directed to the floor. Yunjin herself wasn't able to figure what emotion he was showing but couldn't help but see that he resembled a kicked puppy on the side of the road.

Finally breathing in some fresh air of outside, Y/N threw the bag over her shoulder and began walking back to the game that wasn't even halfway done yet.

Behind her, she could Yunjin jogging to catch up to her. Whispering yelling underneath the breath that she couldn't wait to tell Zhanghao about how Y/N got to spend time with her "crush". _ Yunjin has been Y/N's best friend since kindergarten. There is no Y/N without Yunjin and there is no Yunjin without Y/N.

So maybe it wouldn't hurt for Y/N to tell about Yunjin about the fact that she isn't single and has a boyfriend that she's been with for six months now. Also that the boyfriend is Sung Hanbin who she has been gushing over and slightly obsessed with since middle school. Yunjin rambled on and on that she was happy that Y/N was able to interact with Hanbin especially after all these years and that she totally thinks that Hanbin is into her despite the fact that in the two minutes that Yunjin saw them together, Y/N tried her best to not look over at him in fear that she would reveal things just by the way that she looked at him.

Maybe it wouldn't be too bad if they went public.

Jimin and Hanbin's friendship never bothered her especially since she knows Jimin views as a brother. But maybe going public would also put a halt to all the rumors about Jimin and him that irked every time she thought about it.

Y/N pulled her shirt over her head to put on her button up instead. Currently she was in one of the empty shower stalls. While she's known most of the people out there for long as she has been attending public school, she preferred to have privacy while changing.

While clasping the buttons together, she got a big whiff of cigarette smoke.

The shower stalls had a vent that was just placed perfectly on a wall that has an alley on the other side where all students that smoke hid to have their daily dose of those nicotine sticks.

She opted to ignore it as it was none of her business and all she had left to do was to tuck her shirt into her skirt. As she pushed the bunched cloth into the hem, her movements halted when she heard the mumble of her name.

"Yeah, she was with him most of the time."

"Damn that sucks! Weren't you trying to be his partner in the game? Isn't that why you brought it up to Coach Kim?"

Y/N inched closer to the wall, keeping up onto her tippy toes as the vent was so far high up on the wall.

"And he partnered up with Y/N instead?"

The girl let out a long and heavy sigh, seemingly taking a drag of her cigarette before continuing her rant," Partner up? More like she leeched herself onto him. So annoying. Then they were the first to get out."

"Oh my gosh. Hanbin must've been so annoyed. He's literally the best at any sports he plays."

"Right? Then they disappeared off and I never got to talk to him because by the time I found him, he was already with his friends."

"What? Didn't you get out right after Hanbin and Y/N?" The other girl let out an horrendous cackle," And way to make it so obvious. I'm so surprised that Coach didn't say shit about that. "

"That old man is tired. I was doing him a favor by making the game shorter. But anyways, I couldn't find him. Gosh it was so annoying."

"Oh well. The time will come."

"I could've gotten it over with if Y/N wasn't in the way."

"Hey… at least you know she isn't any competition."

"Right? In no way would Hanbin ever go for someone like Y/N."

"You're like 10 times prettier than she is, hands down."

"Girl, I already know that. Like literally he is way too good for her and if she confessed like anyone else would, let's just pray for her because that wouldn't end well."

Having enough of this conversation, Y/N threw on the rest of her outfit and snatched her backpack out of the ground. Pushing past half of the girls, she rubbed at the tears that were fighting to come out. She couldn't believe she was crying because of a gossip. She couldn't believe she was running away from Yunjin who would be the one to comfort in times like this.

She couldn't believe she was dumb enough to even think that the world would accept them. _

A kiss on her neck distracted her from the spam of messages coming from Yunjin about how Matthew asked about her after school. The culprit’s hand pulled the cellular device away from her and placed it on the night stand. Hanbin’s warm hand coming back down to run over the exposed skin of her midriff. A giggle escaped from her lips as he began to lay multiple pecks running down to her collar bone.

Pushing him off slightly, “What are you doing?”

“Trying to get your attention.” He pouted,” I’m so tired and all I want to do is cuddle with the hottest girl in school.”

“Hottest girl?”

He hushed her, bringing up his index finger to her lips.

“But she’s too busy talking to her friends that she spends 24/7 with.” He dramatically sighed, allowing his body to fall on top of hers. Tucking his face into the crook of her neck.

“Oh shut up. I know you chose me as your partner on purpose during that game. I don’t want to place blame on anybody but if you weren’t too hyperfocused on hugging me the whole time, we could’ve won.” No snarky response was heard. Instead, she could feel him breathing in her scent that had her scrunching her neck in response.

“Dude, I probably smell like sweat.”

“No, you smell so good.” His voice muffled,” Like cheese.”

Pushing him off again, she mumbled underneath her breath,” Idiot.”

“I wanted to get out first so I could spend time with you. Don’t act like I don’t know yours and Yunjin’s secrets. But she just had to get out so soon.”

“Well you have me all to yourself now.” Y/N pushed back his hair out of his face. Like a puppy, Hanbin gleamed at the gesture and words that came out her mouth.

"By the way, what's your favorite number?"

"_" She raised her eyebrow up," Why?"

"No reason."

"You sound very guilty right now."

He pulled his phone out and began typing hurriedly on his phone. Y/N propped herself up into a 45 degree angle, trying to get a peek of his screen but Hanbin quickly hid the screen with a devilish smile.

"Heyy…" She began poking his shoulder, hoping to annoy him enough to get him to give in. But instead, Hanbin took the opportunity to roll over and lay his head on her stomach. He grabbed her hand that was poking at his shoulder and began to nibble at her finger.

“Stoooop, you little vampire.”

Hanbin placed her hand onto his chest, bringing his phone up high enough so the both of them could look at his screen.

"You're going to put that number on your jersey?"

"Yeah, I want to show that I'm yours somehow."

"That's pretty smart."

"Told you I was."

"Mhm and that's why this was suppose to be tutoring session for your D on your latest Stats test." Hanbin shushed her before pulling up his Instagram and successfully distracting them again from changing their cuddle session to what it was suppose to be before which was a study session.Occasionally they would laugh at the reels that would pop up but his feed was full of a lot of people she didn’t really know or talk to. So Y/N resorted to playing with the strings of his hoodie. Suddenly the loud commotion of earlier today caught her attention. Looking up, she saw an angle of Matthew’s proposal. Someone had sent a video to the school’s instagram account to post for the Assuming where the camera was, it was his friend that was recording earlier today.

She could feel herself physically cringe at watching it all go down again. Expecting Hanbin to laugh about it, she quickly covered his mouth to intercept any sort of teasing that may come to his head. But instead his face remained stoic and he sat up, her hand falling down to her side. He was hunched over as he rewatched the video again.

To get jealous was rare for Hanbin. In the time frame of their whole relationship, which isn’t long but isn’t too short, Hanbin has never showed any signs of jealousy except for one incident before they started dating. He was pretty confident in himself and the two of them always reassured one another that they were the only ones that had each other’s eyes.

“Wait, what’s wrong?”

“You didn’t say no.”

She sat up fully as well, scooching closer to the end of the bed where he sat. “Well, I’m planning to.”

“Why didn’t you say no right then and there? You told me that you did.”

“I just didn’t want to embarrass him in front of his friends.”

“It seems like you’re going to say yes to the guy.” He pointed at his phone.

“But I’m not. I’m planning to say no.”

“He doesn’t seem to think so.”

“I’m going to tell him no!” And while they were on this subject, she couldn’t help but bring up something that’s been bothering her as well,” Why aren’t you denying the rumors about Jimin?”

“What rumors?”

“There’s rumors that the two of you were behind the bleachers and that the two of you are together.”

“Well first of all, the girl I was behind the bleachers with was you. And those rumors have been around since the minute people realized that we’re friends and hang out in the same friend group. It’d be weird if I deny them now if I never acknowledged them before. Besides, those rumors have never bothered you until now. Why are they bothering you now?”

“Then why are you so bothered that I’m planning to say no later? You know I wouldn’t go to the dance with somebody else.”

“I asked you last week and you straight up told me no. He asks you and he gets a, “I’ll have to see. ”

Y/N ran her hand through her hair in frustration. “You know why I said no to you.”

Hanbin returned his gaze back to the dark screen of his phone,” Yeah… yeah… I know. Everyone is going to have something to say about you and me and it’s just too much attention.”

“If I told Matthew no right away, I wouldn’t hear the end of it, especially since he did it in front of so many people.”

The two in silence. Both coming to their conclusion. Y/N came to the conclusion that the both of them were in the wrong and getting a little too jealous. But it didn’t feel like everything was said as Hanbin stayed perched at the end of his bed, his phone back on and scrolling through the comments underneath the video. She reached out an arm out to him but he abruptly stood up. He was quick to grab his duffle bag which was tucked away beside her closet.

“I’ve got tryouts.”

“Binnie…” Getting up onto her knees and was about to get up off the bed to walk over to him but he stopped her ,” Cmon..”

Using his hand on her shoulder to guide her back down into her bed, Hanbin leaned a placed a kiss on her forehead, “I'm sorry." He brought his hand up to cut her cheek, running his thumb along her cheek," I overreacted. I'll see you later?" Even though he looked her in the eyes and said that. She struggled to believe him. Reluctantly, she nodded her head slowly. Before she could even utter another word, he was out of the door and down the stairs.

Despite facetiming later that night, Y/N still felt there was something on Hanbin’s mind. Like he still had something to say. That morning too, she didn’t receive a message from him telling her to have a good morning.

Not that she wanted him to always send it but it was so out of character for him not to.

So she couldn’t help the pain in her chest when he walked past with her friends like she didn’t exist. But this was something that was a regular occurrence. She was the one who told him to do that. So why did she want him to look at her?

A tap of her shoulder shook her out of her shoulder. Turning again, she found Matthew with another flower in his hand. He motioned for Y/N to take it. The girl slowly took it from his hand. Honestly, she was trying to avoid him until after the dance so that the whole proposal would be useless and forgotten but she already knew that was impossible.

“So?”

“Matthew… I’m sorry. I can’t go.”

“Didn’t you say it was about money? I could pay for your ticket!”

For some reason, even though Matthew was in front of her, she couldn’t help but look over at Hanbin who was leaning up against a locker, talking animatedly to his teammates every so often.

“No… No.. it’s something else. I just can’t go with you.”

“Do you mind me asking why? I mean I know we don’t know each other all that well so I think that this would be a great time for us to get to know each other.”

“You’re quite persistent, you know?”

“I’m just curious, that’s all.”

“Okay, Matthew, it’s not something else. It’s someone else.” Feeling apologetic, she held his hands in hers ,”It doesn’t feel right for me to go to the dance with someone when I’m completely and utterly in love with someone else.”

“Is it Hanbin?”

She looked back at him in shock, “Woah, how’d you figure that out so quickly?”

“I mean, minus the fact that you won’t stop looking over at him, I think the bruise on my leg is clear evidence. He was super nice when everyone first got there and he was even giving me tips but then I mentioned my proposal to other players to make myself look cooler because they were all calling me kid because how short I am and he started getting rough.”

She knew it. She knew he was still bothered about the proposal.

“You used me to make yourself look better?”

“ I’m sorry for that. I honestly deserved getting roughed up.”

“Yeah and for also thinking that I could up your game in any way.” Y/N laughed at the thought but Matthew looking at her with an incredulous look as if she were insane halted her from continuing on.

“What do you mean? You’re one of the coolest and sweetest girls I’ve ever met. Anybody that could have you would be lucky to have you.” He shrugged as if it were the most obvious thing. “ I just don’t understand why I never see you two together.”

“Well he’s him. And I’m me. People would just look at us weird and question how someone like me could be with someone like him. Like he could do better, you know?” She didn’t know why she was spilling her feelings out to someone she barely knew. But it felt so good to say it aloud.

“Who cares about what everyone else says?”

“Me. Because I will have to hear the disapproval from everyone and how strange it is that we’re even together.”

“What matters is that the two of you like each other and that’s all that matters. Anybody else that cares and has something to say needs to get a life. And to stop watching so many movies because this is real life and those “status quos” don’t exist.”

The first bell rang signaling that their first class was about to start in 5 minutes and they needed to go now. Matthew leaned in and kissed Y/N on her cheek before she could deny it. “I truly wish you will take in what I say. Don’t hide your relationships for the sake of people you shouldn’t care about.”

The younger boy walked away before she could even say anything, leaving her dumbstruck.

Someone colliding into her shoulder snapped her out of her thoughts.

Matthew's word ran over and over again in her head like a broken record. The way he tells her like it's so easy to do so.

Maybe it is if she learned to not care so much.

The second bell warning pulled her out of her mind. The teacher from her calculus was beginning to notice that she was starting to come late to class a lot more than she should be. She bound to pull her aside to talk about it soon. Pivoting around, she rushed up the stairs to her first class.

Hanbin stood by himself at his locker now. His hands tucked into his jeans as he watched Matthew walk away. His jaw clenched tight as the loud slam of his locker echoed through the empty hall.

Apologies spilled from her mouth every millisecond as she hovered through the crowd to get to the entrance of the tunnel where the basketball team gathered.

The pep rally was about to begin in 10 minutes and she managed to escape from Yunjin and Zhanghao to be able to talk to Hanbin. To talk about their argument last night and their relationship. Because Matthew was right. Why do other people’s opinions matter? But there was still that fear and that voice in her head that told her that wasn’t a good idea.

Finally reaching an area that had some elbow room, she maneuvered past the associated student body to where a large group of boys in the school’s basketball uniform circled around who knows what. Not seeing the face she wanted to, she decided to see if he was more towards the front.

“Excuse me.” She squished past the sweaty boys and landed at the front where she found the cheerleaders putting face paint on students and athletes. The boy she was looking for had his legs spread out so he could be the same height as the girl in front of him. The girl dangerously close as she held onto his shoulder, her head leaned in to ensure that the lines she was painting on his face were perfect.

When she leaned back to laugh at something Hanbin said, Y/N realized then and there that it was Jimin.

She had to think about what she was going to do next. If she was going to do something that she regretted because of that green feeling that was currently bubbling in her chest. First, she knew that Jimin was a sweet girl that would never take another person’s boyfriend and she never cared about her friendship with Hanbin because what she had with him was so secure. Second, she wasn’t so sure how secure they were anymore and it wasn’t like Jimin knew that Hanbin was tied down, it seems like all her actions were definitely advances to something more.

So now here Hanbin and her in a janitor’s closet where she pulled him away from a confused Jimin. Y/N muttered something along the lines that she had to talk about something from Chemistry despite that class being one that took two years ago in their sophomore year. As she walked away, she could hear people asking questions such as, “ who is that?” or “If I was Jimin, I’d be upset if someone was touching my man like that.”

“You expect me to be okay with dating rumors when you’re going around, acting like that?”

"Y/N, she was just putting face paint on me." His eyes remained away from you and on something in the background. Trying to avoid her glare.

“She’s all over you and it annoys the hell out of me. Yeah, I didn’t care before but I care now.” She couldn’t believe the words that were going to come out next,” If you want her, then go ahead and go for it. But you have to let go of me first.” She didn’t mean a single word.

“Did I actually ever have you?”

Y/N stopped her prancing in the small room and turned her body to look at Hanbin who was already looking at her.”What do you mean by that?”

“Sometimes I'm just here for fun. For the pleasure of it all. Our dates consist of hanging out in our houses and occasional dates outside of the city because you are scared to be seen by anybody else. Here, I have to act like you don’t exist and you act like I don’t exist. I want to brag about you to my friends but I can’t. I even have to remind my mom not to say anything about you to them even though she absolutely is in love with you. And I assume you never told yours about me because of how you hid me away from Yunjin. Are you that ashamed to be with me?"

“Binnie-”

“I want to hold your hand when I want to. I want to kiss you when I want to.” And he too could feel that green monster building up again at the memory from earlier today. .

He saw that? Y/N waved her hands and shook her head,”It’s not what it looks. I didn’t know he was going to do that and I wouldn’t have wanted him to do it if I had known. I’ve told you multiple times that Matthew and I have nothing going on.”

“ Then why aren’t you believing me when I say that Jimin and I aren’t as well. You’re asking why I care so much about Matthew? It’s not Matthew that I care about. It’s the fact you have never been so open to talking to me in public and you didn’t even push him away when he kissed you even if it was a simple one on the cheek. You didn’t say no to his proposal so now I have to hear whispers about things I know that aren’t true. And I get why you did it so people wouldn’t talk but there is inevitability some. Why can’t you let there be whispers about us?”

She watched as his face scrunched up, his fingers running along his forehead to massage the tension headache forming. “Y/N, I’m just tired. I’m so tired. Of running around. Of acting like I don’t care that we have to hide.” The pain in the chest made it hard for her to breathe as she could feel the three words threatening to come out of his lips.

Wanting to cut him off to tell him that she didn’t hide them anymore, his phone rang frantically. They let it go to voicemail but right after, it rang again.

Though the both of them didn't budge a single movement for what felt like the longest time, his phone went off again after the other one finished. Hanbin pulled the device out of his pocket, letting out a sharp exhale. “I’ll just tell them to go on without me.”

Before he could lift up the screen to see who it was, Y/N shook her head, “ It’s fine, just go.”

“No, I’m not leaving us like this again. It’s just a pep rally. I don’t have to be there.”

“And if you go missing, the whole school will freak out. Personally, I don’t want to be the reason that the school star player is missing.”

“Y/N, this is it. This is what’s wrong. Who cares about what anybody thinks? Do you not have anything to say about this?”

“I’m trying, Hanbin! I’m trying. But everyone you miss a basket or the team is having a off day, I have to listen to the crowd talk and assume things about you guys. And most of them talk about you being distracted and having a girlfriend. I don’t want to be blamed for that and have everyone scrutinize me. It’s also the fact that no one could ever imagine you with me. It’s always Jimin. It’s always who the heck is that? whenever they see me with me. Shit, even Zhanghao can’t imagine us together.”

“But we are. And people are going to have to accept that.” Hanbin hung his head back. “And I’m trying my best to just do what we’ve been doing. Keep our relationship a secret but I can’t find the strength to go on anymore. Because sometimes I feel like I love you more than you love me. And I honestly don’t know if I can stay any longer, feeling that.”

Her heart thumped at the three words. They haven’t said I love you to one another yet. Always dangerously on the tip of their tongues but never finding the right times to do so.

And this wasn’t the context in which he was hoping he was going to say it.

Her attention shot back into the room when Hanbin’s phone rang again. He cursed under his breath, seeing his Coach’s contact name on the screen this time. “I’ve got to go.”

A silence granted permisssion to end the converstion. Hanbin slowly grabbing his backpack and throwing it over his shoulder. Y/N let out a shaky breath as he began to pass her, their shoulders brushing against each other.

“I love you, Hanbin.”

The sounds of his shoes signaled that he halted in his steps. She could hear him let out a breath of air before starting to speak.

Then the door slammed open. The short, stubby janitor shouting out,” What are you two doing in here?”

(a/n: i meant to put sports, not spots! so sorry for the typo)

After the janitor caught them, his screaming caught the attention of the basketball coach who was searching the hallways from Hanbin. The star basketball player was pulled away from her before he could even reply to her declaration. Though he could see Hanbin struggling to get out of the older man’s grip, looking back at her every so often until they turned the corner to the gym.

It was true she wasn’t feeling all that well. The dizziness from nervousness and the bile rising up her throat, trying to imagine how it would be if they changed the premise of their relationship. Truely, she needed to lay down before she fell to the cold, dirty ground of the hallways.

She hoped that he saw it to be true and not said out of desperation to fix their falling relationship. Checking the clock in the corner of the room, she wished the time would go by faster so they could finish their conversation and she could tell him how much he means to her.

Multiple buzzes from her phone prompted her phone to check whatever her friends had to say now. She could feel her heart drop to her stomach and bile rising up her throat again. This time there was no way to stop it from coming out.

Opening the notification from her friends and repeated tweets from the school's gossip account. The recent headline highlighting Yoo Jimin asks Sung Hanbin to WakeOne's annual winter formal! He says yes! The photos showing different angles of the proposal. A clear look of surprise on Hanbin's face as flowers handed to him from left and right from other cheerleaders. The last photo shocked her gave her a sharp pain in her chest as Chaewon's arms were wrapped Hanbin's neck, his eyes only simply looking down at her face. His hands nowhere near to pushing him off.

Covering her mouth to control her impending sobs, Y/N quickly stood up to run over to the trash can to empty the contents of her stomach. Though Hanbin hadn’t outright said it, she could feel him putting that pause or ending their relationship in the last sentence that he had spoke to her.

He was going to be with someone that treated him right and was perfect for him.

She had her chance and she lost him.

Turning to look at the school’s nurse, she raised the question if she could stay for the rest of the day to avoid and hide her problems outside of this room but she was already scribbling down a note, shaking her head at the disgusting smell.

As the last bell rang, Y/N apologized to the nurse who told her that was nothing and to rest as it seemed like she was sick from stress. And the stress was beginning to take a toll on her body.

Y/N could only imagine if the nurse knew what type of stress she was going through. She would shake her head at the teenage girl.

The nurse began prepping the word and just as Y/N was about to sit down to wait, the door bursted open. A disheveled Yunjin appeared. She slapped a hand against her forehead and shook her head,” No fever.” She grabbed Y/N's face by the chin and twisted it around to check if there was anything abnormal but nothing. “Girl, you look and feel fine. So you left me alone to those heathens for nothing?”

"Tell that to the three times I've thrown up in the past hour. Guess I should’ve trusted you and just threw away that 6 dollar boba.”

"I could always buy you a new one. Are you feeling better now?”

“Yeah kinda..”

Yunjin linked arms with hers,” Great, then, let’s go meet up Zhanghao to check if he made the team or not.”

“I’m actually going to head home right now. I’ll catch the two of you tomorrow at the game-”

“Oh my gosh, noo! He’d kill us if we forget the promise we made with him. We have to be there for him to either congratulate him or console him with a dinner.”

“I know but I still don’t feel all that good.”

Yunjin hummed in response. Although not completely convinced to let Y/N go home. While Y/N waited for the nurse to complete the last of the paperwork, she saw in the corner of her eye a familiar tall figure.

Maybe it was her nerves that prompted her to do so but she grabbed Yunjin who was completely thrown off by the change of energy in the environment. Y/N quickly pulled them both behind a curtain just in time for the door to open again.

"What are you doing-"

Y/N covered the brunette's mouth, peeking through the small slit of the curtain.

Hanbin stood inside of the nurse's office, fiddling with the strap of his backpack. "Hello, by any chance, did a Y/N Y/L/N come by today? I heard some of her friends saying she would be here."

"Oh uhm..." The nurse stumbled over her words. Crossing her fingers behind her back, Y/N hoped that she could read the room and understand what Y/N wanted. "She just left."

"Oh..." Hanbin sighed. "Do you mind if I asking what's wrong with her?"

"Hanbin, you know I can't disclose other student's health with you."

A soft chuckle filled the air and Y/N feel her heart warm at the sound. But it was still heavy with the news she read only two hours before.

"I get that. Can you just let me know if she's okay?"

"She's alright."

She could see him slowly nod and tuck his hands behind his back before bowing. "Thank you. Have a good rest of your day, I'll see you at the game tomorrow."

"Good luck tomorrow, Hanbin."

She waited for sound of the door clicking close before taking her hand off of Yunjin's mouth. Thanking the nurse profusely for lying for her despite not knowing the situation, she could feel a tug on her sweater. Turning to look at Yunjin whose face was decorated in so much shock that it was almost comical, " Why are you acting so weird? And was that Hanbin just looking for you?"

"I can explain."

"Wait, then why did he say yes to Jimin?" Yunjin scoffed, shaking her head.

Y/N hugged her pillow close to her chest. The tears beginning to fall again. She managed to hold herself together as she confessed about the secret relationship between Hanbin and her but the reminder that they were potentially over clouded her mind. She shrugged in response.

"That makes no sense though. Because he never actually broke up with you."

Zhanghao sighed and grabbed tissues from her desk, handing them over to her.

"I'm sorry."

The two girls looked up at him in confusion. In the years that they've all been friends, they have never heard those two words come out of Zhanghao's mouth. He was very unashamed of his actions and if he was ever sorry for something, he would show it through his actions.

"That I was pushing Matthew on you. That I kept saying that Hanbin wouldn't look your way."

"You're not wrong though, Hao. He wouldn't have paid attention to me if it wasn't for us having the same part time job during summer."

"Y/N, don't say that." Yunjin nudged her with her shoulder.

"You’re absolutely gorgeous. You both are. And I kept making comments like you were less than what you are."

"It's fine, Hao."

"Yeah but still I was such a dick."

"You were just trying to help me get over him. Nothing wrong with that."

Zhanghao fell back into the plethora of stuffed animals tucked in the corner. Though all was forgiven, the male couldn't stop the feeling of embarrassment and shamefulness he felt from how he acted in the last week.

Yunjin all of a sudden began giggling which earned confused looks from the other two poeple in the room. "He was so jealous then."

A smile perked up on Zhanghao's pout, " That's right! He was going so hard on Matthew that one day at tryouts. I feared for his life."

Yunjin tickled Y/N's side, her tongue sticking out," Look at you having two boys fighting over you."

"Dude, it was making me so sick. I can't even act like I could brag about it because it was stressing me out so much."

"That explains why he was asking the nurse about you. Aw, Y/N, he was looking for you!"

"Yeah... after he said yes to Jimin during the pep rally."

"I don't know if he even said yes to her. Everything happened so quick and he didn't even smile or do anything through the whole thing." Zhanghao tapped his chin," He was just... in shock."

A sudden knock on her door silenced them all. Peeking in was her mother. "Honey... Hanbin is downstairs."

Plushies flew each side of the room as her two friends scrambled to leave the room through the window but Y/N stopped them. She kneeled to the end of her bed," Can you tell him I'm sleeping already? That I'm still sick from earlier today?"

Her mother frowned before nodding, shutting the door behind her.

"Why are you avoiding him?" Zhanghao questioned, crossing his arms together," And are you not getting his texts or calls?"

"I... blocked him."

"What? Why?"

"Hao, I just don't want to deal with all of this right now. It's too overwhelming."

"If you avoid your problems, they only get worse."

"I just need some time to think about everything, okay? I feel like I got the ultimatum that I have to choose having our relationship public or losing him. Then I also think that Jimin is so much better for him because if he's with her, it'd be so much easier because she's used to the attention. "

"But he doesn't like her, he wants you." Zhanghao waved his hands from left to right," Hence why he was crying over a photo of you and him."

Y/N covered her face with the pillow that was still in her arms," I know... I know... but if he was with her, he wouldn't have to even deal with this bullshit."

Yunjin wrapped her arm around Y/N's shoulder, "I get what you're thinking but he seems like he's all in for you."

"I know... I know... I just don't know if I'm ready. I thought I was. And what if I just disappear from his life. Act like I never in it like I was before. Then he could get over him."

"So you're just going to avoid him until when?"

"Not forever. I just need a moment to think to myself. I've already heard what he has to say."

"So you're just going to let Jimin swoop up and take your man like that?"

"What? No? Yes? I don't know." Y/N abruptly stood up, shocking both of her friends. "You guys are suppose to be helping me but instead you're making me want to throw up some more." Speaking of which, she could her stomach beginning to rumble and the feeling of something up her throat. Stumbling over sheets and pillows to the bathroom, she shut the door behind her. Praying that the fan would cover the noise.

Zhanghao huffed and pulled out his phone. Yunjin decided to keep quiet and watch the show that was put on before Zhanghao came over. When he becomes stressed or annoyed, he tended to find comfort in his phone especially when he's trying to calm down and not blow up on the person he was talking to.

But at that moment, he was currently texting Hanbin to tell him the truth. For two reasons he did so. One, so he didn't have to watch his friend mope around. He disliked seeing Y/N upset especially when she begins to self deflect herself. Two, so he doesn't want to have his teammate mope around when their first scrimmage is tomorrow. While it wasn't a real game, it was still a pretty big deal.

After Zhanghao and Yunjin left, Y/N went downstairs to wash and put away the dishes that they used. Sitting on the couch was her mother, catching up on the shows she missed while at work. In front of her on the coffee table was a white pharmacy bag and bento boxes that were opened up. She walked over to see Mrs.Sung's infamous rolled egg omelette.

She always mentioned to the older lady that she makes the best.

"What's this?"

"Hanbin brought this earlier when he came by. He told me you went to the nurse's earlier that day?"

Y/N sat down and nodded. "Wasn't feeling too well."

"Well, he brought you medicine. Mrs.Sung made you congee. It's on the stove."

Using her finger, she took a peek into the bags and boxes. She could her heart melting at the sight, a note at the bottom of the bag from Hanbin. The message was short with the simple words of Get Well Soon but it meant so much more. The way he went home after practice and still came by her house to drop all of these things off despite it being a bunch of back and forth.

She could feel her mom side eyeing her and honestly, she would too.

The words replaying in her head of how he felt like he was more in love with her than she was with him. Which simply just wasn't the truth and it pained her heart to ever think that he thought that way because her actions are what prompted him to believe so.

She pulled out her phone to text Yunjin and Zhanghao if they could help her for what she was conjuring up in her head. She passed Hanbin's contact in her favorites. Debating if she should unblock him or not. Scared of what's to come next. But in order to get to the next step, she had to. Quickly, she unblocked his contact.

Soon, a spam of notifications appeared. Stating that she had 6 new notifications from messages.

As she read through the messages he sent her, her vision began to blur from the tears brimming her eyes. Hearing those words written out so beautifully by him.

Cursing herself for realizing it too late. Through every comment she's heard that upset or scared her, she was given the constant reassurance by him that she'll be safe with him. Through everytime she considered that they should break up, she always told herself that Hanbin is worth it all.

Hanbin will always be worth the pain.

Though she tried to talk to Hanbin earlier in the day so that it wouldn't seem like she was ignoring his texts from the night prior, it seemed like the world wasn't against her today.

Because of the game tonight, the basketball team was able to leave during PE so she missed him in their last two classes that they shared together. She was able to conjure the confidence to walk up to him during lunch but she pulled away from the planning committee to help plan for the class floats that were going to come out during halftime.

At least he knew that she was going to talk to him and wasn't planning to ignore him until the school year was over. His wide eyes and the clear shout from down the hall, telling her to come to the game tonight, an indiction of so.

It was better this way especially since she wanted to surprise him tonight and she knew she could never hide anything as big as this from him. So this no talking period between them both pained and relived her.

It also gave her more time to sneak around and plan her surprise for him in the period that she was waiting for the game to start with Yunjin. They had planned to grab some hotpot to fill their stomachs but Zhanghao forgot his shoes because of first game jitters so they had to go to his house and grab them. And while they did this task for him, he also complained that he needed it before the warmups started and told them not to take so long. Text messages rushing in every other minute to check up on where they are. He was unknowingly rushing them but they let it slide this time because they will never understand men's weird obsession with smelly clothes being their good luck charm and that it was his first game.

After giving the princess his stinky shoes, the two girls went to a nearby dollar tree to get the materials she needed for what she wanted to prepare for Hanbin. Yunjin dropped Y/N back at home so that the two of them could get some rest before heading out to the game. Yunjin asked Y/N if she wanted her to pick her up but being the person she is that didn't want to inconvenience anybody, Y/N insisted that she would walk there especially since it was still going to be light out when the game started.

She had so much running around today so who could blame her for falling asleep on the couch while watching reruns of Grey's Anatomy?

Maybe then if she took Yunjin up on the offer, she wouldn't have woken up to about 35 missed calls and 60 unread texts combined from both of her best friends. She wouldn't be frantically trying to grab everything and pay for an uber to school so she could get there before the game ended.

She slept through three and half quarters. With only 10 minutes remaining in the game.

Surprisingly with how fast she threw everything together and rushed out of the house to get into the car, she didn't trip over her foot once as she stumbled out of the uber. Leaving a hefty tip for the middle aged man who had to deal with her asking if he could drive any faster despite there being traffic to the school.

Struggling to catch her breath, she saw a large crowd of people exiting the gym. Confirming the worst possibility of all the possibilities.

The game ended on her and Hanbin was left thinking that she flaked on him.

Running towards the entrance, she immediately found Yunjin who grabbed the girl by her shoulder and pushed her away the crowd that stampeding out.

"Y/N! I tried calling and texting you. Where were you?"

"For the life of me, I could not wake up."

Yunjin sighed and began to rub her forehead in frustration," The balloons are still in my car and they should still be inflated. The game just ended and they should still be getting ready to go home."

"Then we have enough time."

"We have enough time."

Y/N took a deep breath, a shaky one that was filled so much anxiety.

"Hey, you don't have to do this. A man's love is not worth risking it all for something that you are not yet comfortable to do."

Y/N quickly shook her head," No, I want to. This is for him and for me."

Yunjin gave her a tight, warm hug," You'll do great. If all goes wrong, I'm just a phone call away and Hao will be nearby." And a quick second, the soft Yunjin was gone. A strict look on her face as she pointed her head towards the large tree at the side of the school," Let's get to work."

Y/N nervously tapped her foot against the pavement, crossing her arms together to gather warmth as a strong gust of wind flew by.

The sound of boys yelping and clammering of the locker room gained her attention, turning her head to find Hanbin in the crowd.

Because they are teenage boys, everyone looked the same especially after taking a shower. There were no differences in hair to tell them apart. Ignoring the side eyes and quick glances, she stepped closer to the entrance just to make sure she didn't miss.

Accidentally bumping into strong frame that immediately caught her.

"Y/N!" Matthew cheered, a wide smile at her appearance. " I didn't know you were coming tonight!"

"Oh... yeahh..." Y/N smiled softly back, her eyes darting from his face to whoever was coming up behind him.

"Did you see the basket I got? It was so intense because all of the guys from the other team were like ganging up on me and honestly I kinda rushed to throw the ball and it actually got in."

Y/N's mouth dropped down in shock," Dang, that's some real talent. But I'm sorry, I didn't get to see it. I... missed like the whole game."

"Wait then why are you here?"

Y/N leaned down to whisper," I'm actually going to ask Hanbin to homecoming."

Matthew's gasp came out louder than Y/N expected, his hands clasping down together with hers. "Dude no way!" He quickly pushed her into his arms and wrapped her into a hug as he swung their bodies left to right," I'm so proud of you. It's going to be great. I can't wait for you guys to-"

Y/N quickly pushed Matthew off when she opened her eyes and found Hanbin standing at the entrance, only a few feet away from them. He was already focused in the position the two were in, his eyes wide. When he finally snapped out of it, the emotions ran dry from his face as he cleared his throat.

"By all means, do not let me interrupt."

"Crap." Y/N and Matthew mumbled underneath their breaths as Hanbin began to storm off in the direction of the parking lot.

Without bidding a goodbye to Matthew, Y/N ran after the boy. His long legs benefitting him as whenever she thought she was caught up to him, she wasn't.

"Hanbin!" She yelled, her voice cracking as she never really spoke that loud unless she really needed to.

He stopped in his steps but continuing on.

Groaning out of frustration, she quickly ran again to grab his arm and made him face her. "Hanbin, please."

"No!" He threw her hand of his arm," You didn't text me back all night. And then I see you with Matthew. Y/N, you could've just told me what you wanted and spared me the shock because I'm already heartbroken as is."

Not finding the right words to say in the heat of the moment, Y/N pulled him in the direction of the soccer field.

Hanbin didn't resist but questions spurred out every second, telling her to say something or asking where she was taking him.

As they reached closer to the tree, she couldn't find which one it was as she couldn't seem to find the decorations that Yunjin and her rushed to do in 10 minutes. Curses sprang from her mouth when she finally found the sign. Only the sign. That wrote out Wanna Dance? in Zhanghao's chicken writing.

She immediately dropped Hanbin's hand, looking at the bare trees that no longer had his favorite colored balloons tied to them. And the lights that were scattered throughout the grass with the flowers all over the place. It looked like a tornado had blew through this place.

This was suppose to be perfect.

But it was all ruined because they didn't read the wind advisory warnings or tie down everything tight enough so that it would stay.

Tears quickly brimmed her eyes, turning back to look at Hanbin who still hadn't said anything or gave any type of reaction which worried her more.

"Binnie... I swear there was so much more. I wouldn't... I wouldn't do something as basic as this. I had everything planned and it was so pretty when I finished setting it up with Yunjin." The salty tears ran down to her mouth, causing her to involuntarily bring her hand up to rub at her eyes. Between sobs, she whispered underneath her breath," I had it all planned. I wanted it to be perfect for you because you've done so much me and I love you so much. I wanted to prove to show you that I love you just as much, if not more, as you do."

She kept rambling on and on how everything was ruined.

She would've jolted if not for the fact that his warm touch was comforting on her skin. His hands pulling her arms down so that her hands were off his face.

"Binnie... I'm so sorry. I understand if you don't want to get-"

Lips halted her mid-apology. Hanbin's cupping her cheek as he moved his lips against hers. He pushed in harder, encouraging her to join him which she did. Her arms wrapped around his neck, eyes fluttering close as their lips fought eagerly against each other.

"Don't finish that sentence." His lips connecting against hers before he pulled away to catch his breath," You know I'll always want you. I love you."

BONUS:

The group's instagram stories after Y/N and Hanbin made their relationship public.

(a/n: hello, this fic is heavily unedited so plz lmk if any part seems funky or sounds weird. i also slightly rushed the end so i apologize if it seems like that. thank you for reading. i love and appreciate you! <3)

#zerobaseone #zb1 #zerobaseone imagines #zerobaseone scenarios #zerobaseone fluff #zb1 imagines #zb1 scenarios #zb1 fluff #zb1 x reader #zb1 hanbin x reader #sung hanbin #kpop imagines #kpop scenarios #kpop fluff

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justsomekpopstuff · 3 months

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seventeen as a baseball team - part 2

A/N: I have had so many thoughts recently, I just had to share!

part 1 | current masterlist | fic recs

team colors are white and serenity blue, and every now and again they get ones with rose quartz accents (its my au i'll do what I want)

their team mascot is something whimsical that has a cloud and diamond theme along with it

the whole team goes absolutely nuts the first time that center fielder!Dino gets voted into the All-Star Game

When they find out, they throw an absolute rager of a party in the locker room complete with champagne showers. When the All-Star game actually happens, instead of taking vacations, the entire team shows up to the game. All of them are wearing Dino's jersey, have their faces painted, and come equipped with horns and signs all cheering for him. It is the worlds most perfect Embarrassing Dad Cheering Section™️. Dino is bright red for the entire game because he can hear them from all the way across the stadium every time he takes the field.

third baseman!Wonwoo, on the other hand, despite being incredibly good, BEGS the fans to not vote him into the All-Star Game and Home Run Derby

He just really enjoys his time off...but alas, one year the fans absolutely do not listen, and he gets voted in with flying colors. He is, unfortunately, forced to go by catcher!Seungcheol. Despite not wanting to be there at all and tired all the time, Wonwoo ends up completely blowing the competition out of the water. In his final interview after winning the All-Star Game and receiving the MVP award, he begs the fans to never do it again.

the whole team holds a fun exhibition game every year during spring training where they all scrimmage against each other

The whole game gives major Savannah Bananas vibes, as well as that one kickball episode of GoSe. They have ridiculous rules like when the other team scores a point, the team on the field has to endure a "punishment" chosen by the fans. Inflatable costumes ARE used. Synchronized rehearsed dances are a must-have and they put their whole CHESTS into it. The fans love it and look forward to it every season.

right fielder!Joshua can always be seen playing catch in the outfield with some of the younger kid fans in the stands during warm-ups

He is very sweet with all of the younger fans, and has a reputation for always taking time to sign autographs and take silly selfies. He is, also, a chaos creator. He has absolutely stolen Red Vines from a child after making a catch that almost went into the stands.

starting pitcher!Woozi will deny it until his dying day, but he absolutely did cry the first time he threw a no-hitter

The whole team went absolutely nuts for him and stormed the field. Hoshi 1000% took pictures of Woozi crying. Woozi found out and threatened to absolutely kick Hoshi's ass if he ever showed those photos to another living soul. Hoshi listened.

first baseman!Mingyu has tripped running around second base more than anyone on the team...probably more than anyone in the league

There are multiple compilations each season of him tripping over second. He swears its an accident every time and that he does not trip over the base intentionally. The team places bets at the start of the official season for how many times he does it during the regular season. Winner gets all the cash pool and first pick of dugout snacks next season.

closing pitcher!Jeonghan has always been secretive about the reason why he wanted to become a closing pitcher

He will always say he wanted to be a closing pitcher because he loves the idea of being able to hold down the lead for the team, or give them opportunities to win. Jeonghan will swear that he likes being relied on and is good under pressure (which, to his credit, is technically true). However, the actual real reason he wanted to be a closing pitcher is so he wouldn’t have to run as much.

despite being injured, catcher!Seungcheol still attends every home game

He is usually sitting in the same place in the dugout, close to where the manager usually stands. Seungcheol, despite not being the manager, is absolutely yelling directions from his crutches in the dugout. The team will often listen to him better than their actual manager. The whole team is taking bets on whether or not Seungcheol will become a coach when he retires.

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corinthianism · 6 months

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last kiss | sam winchester (4)

pairing: sam winchester/f!reader additional tags: best friends to lovers (?), fluff, angst

masterlist | previous chapter | next chapter | ao3

CHAPTER FOUR: SOMEWHERE IN DETROIT

You sat on Bobby’s porch, sipping on coffee that had more espresso shots than what was healthy. You had all four of the Horsemen’s rings, and all you had to do now was to get Lucifer in Sam’s body. The problem was figuring out where Lucifer would be.

You rubbed your eyes, trying to shake off the exhaustion that’s been building up in your bones over the past few days. Weeks. Years. If someone asked you how you were doing right now and you had to say the truth, you’d say you felt like you were thrown around like a ragdoll by a bunch of super-powered toddlers.

The brothers were out in the yard, probably making some tiny repairs to maintain Baby. If you had to guess, they were probably having the Big Conversation about Sam’s plan. Your head hung low, and for the umpteenth time this week, someone joined your little pity party.

At least they never left you alone.

“How you holdin’ up?” Bobby asked you, taking off his cap as he sat beside you. The wooden boards creaked under the added weight. The older man grunted as he bent his knees to get to your level.

“How’re your knees holding up?” you grinned at your father figure. He shook his head and ruffled your hair.

“Answer the question, young lady.”

“I’m barely holding up, Bobby,” you tried to joke, only to be met with a serious expression on his face. “Hey, don’t look at me like that. You don’t get to do that.”

“It’s about Sam, isn’t it?” he questioned softly.

You took a long, deep breath and set your mug down, “Yes! Yes, it is. It always is. There. You happy?”

“Well, you don’t have to get all snippy with me. We’re all worried about him. I’m just worried about you,” he paused for a moment. “Because everyone knows what you have with him is special.”

Your jaw clenched, feeling a strong urge to just up and leave. No one, especially you, wanted to hear about how their relationship with someone they love was so special, only to be reminded of how they’d lose it all in the span of a week. There was only so much a person could take and as patient as you were, even you had a limit.

When you didn’t respond, Bobby continued, “If I know anything about love, sweetheart, it’s that losing it could be the worst thing to happen to you.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

He shot you a look, his way of telling you to let him keep going, “It’s scary. You’ll have everything to lose. Love makes you do crazy, insane things, but you found something not a lot people have. People spend their whole lives looking for this sort of thing, and here you are, what? Sixteen, seventeen years strong?”

“Eighteen.”

He chuckled, “Eighteen. All I’m saying is, I’m sorry that this has to happen. I know you love him, and let me tell you, that boy looks at you like you’re his whole world. Sam was always the soft one. You took care of him in ways John and Dean couldn’t… but it’s time to let him go.”

Hot tears were spilling now, and you wanted to curse Bobby for hitting you with the cold hard truth, even if you knew deep down that you needed to hear it.

“I don’t think I can,” your voice trembled, a vulnerability you rarely showed in all your years of hunting. “I can’t lose him too, Bobby. Not him.”

“Listen to me,” he wiped away your tears. “When all of this is over, you’re the one who’ll be left here. You’re the one who’ll live. If I know anything about Sam, it’s that he’d want you to live your life as best as you can, even if he can’t say it to you straight.”

“Get to the point, Bobby,” you answer tiredly despite the caffeine rushing in your veins.

“Sam won’t be here,” you tried to steel yourself when these words left Bobby’s mouth. “But you will. I’m willing to bet a big part of why he’s so willing to jump in the first place was because he knew you’d be okay. So be okay for him, even if you aren’t.”

You didn’t notice how tight your grip was on the sleeve of your jacket, and you hated yourself just a little bit more in that moment because you felt like a child dealing with feelings she’s never had to face before. You were a hunter, you had to be above this.

Sam would’ve said otherwise. You were always more than that to him: more than a hunter. More than a friend.

You and Bobby eventually went back inside to prepare everything you needed for this final trip, which included gallons of demon blood for Sam to consume. You’d never say it to his face because it’d make him feel worse than he already felt, but it was disgusting. Perhaps you wouldn’t be in this predicament right now if you were a little bit more firm in keeping him away from hunting when Dean was in hell, maybe he would’ve been away from Ruby. With the help of Castiel, the work was finished much quicker.

Sam joined you and Cas in filling up the trunk of the Impala with the jugs while Bobby and Dean talked about Lucifer’s possible whereabouts. The work was silent between the three of you; it wasn’t the best time to discuss what-if’s when Cas was right there but then again, there was never a right time.

Dean came back to get Sam and Cas, after pinpointing where Lucifer was likely to be: Detroit. Sam looked at you one last time, and you felt his gaze on you. When you turned around, you knew then that everything Bobby told you earlier in the day was true. Sam’s arm rested on the car door, taking a moment to just look at you before he went into the Impala and marched right into the Death Star. He did look at you like you were his whole world, and it took your breath away.

It was, of course, Dean and Bobby that broke you out of your little moment, urging the both of you to hurry up so you could all get going. You hopped into the passenger seat of Bobby’s van so that you could tail the Impala all the way to Detroit.

“Here goes nothing,” you thought.

▼△▼△▼△▼△▼

“Aw, ain’t he a little angel?” Dean grinned. Cas was sleeping in the backseat, probably beat from all the work they’ve had to do over the past few weeks. The brothers could only imagine what it must’ve been like to spend thousands of years following orders, and then suddenly breaking free from all of it.

Sam only chuckled, muttering about how angels didn’t really sleep, and the car ride is silent for a while.

“Sam, I gotta bad feeling about this,” the older Winchester admitted.

“Well, you’d be nuts to have a good feeling about it.”

Dean frowned, “You know what I mean. Detroit. He always said he’d jump your bones in Detroit. Here we are.”

“Here we are.”

There was nothing Sam could say that would calm Dean’s worries. Not that anything could, since they were quite literally about to meet the Devil. Instead, the two talked about the possibilities; how Lucifer might’ve known something they didn’t. Sam was quick to point out how he probably did, hoping that at the very least, the fallen archangel didn’t know about the Horsemen’s rings.

Another bout of silence.

Sam shifted in his seat to face Dean, “Hey, um… on the subject, there’s something I gotta talk to you about.”

“What?”

“This thing goes our way and… I Triple Lindy into that box… you know I’m not coming back.”

“Yeah, I’m aware,” Dean’s answer was automatic. He barely looked away from the road.

Sam took a more serious tone, “So you gotta promise me something.”

“Okay, yeah. Anything.”

“You gotta promise not to try and bring me back.”

Dean very nearly stopped the car right then and there, “What? No! I didn’t sign up for that. Your hell is gonna make my tour look like Graceland. You want me to just sit by and do nothing?”

“Once the Cage is shut, you can’t go poking at it, Dean,” Sam stayed firm. “It’s too risky.”

“You can’t ask me to do this,” Dean pleaded with his baby brother. He wasn’t always one for thinking ahead, but he couldn’t fathom not trying to save his brother.

“I’m sorry, Dean. You have to.”

“So then what am I supposed to do?” Dean pressed.

“You go find Lisa,” Dean stiffened at the mention of her name, but Sam continued. “You pray to God that she’s dumb enough to take you in and you… you have barbecues and go to football games. You go live some normal, apple pie life, Dean. Promise me.”

“And what about her?”

This time, it was Sam that froze.

“What about her?” Sam’s words had a dangerous edge to them, a stark contrast to the gentleness he exhibited just moments prior.

“Did you give her this whole speech too? Because what is she supposed to do, Sammy? You tell me to go have a normal, apple pie life, but what does she have to come back to when this is all over?”

“She’ll live her life,” Sam answered softly. “She’ll have to.”

“For someone so smart, you’re goddamn stupid, you know that?” Dean grunted.

“What is there to talk about, Dean? There’s no other way to get rid of Lucifer, and I’m doing this to keep her safe,” Sam tried to defend himself, unable to face the truth that he’d been trying to avoid ever since this plan was formulated all those nights ago.

“She loves you so damn much,” Dean tried to make his brother see the other side of things; how his death will echo through the lives of everyone that cared for him. How it’ll echo through your life. “Even when you’re being a dumbass, she fought tooth and nail to keep you safe. Now you’re asking, not just me, but her, to let you die?”

Sam stayed quiet for a while before answering his brother, “At least she’ll be alive, and that’s all that matters to me.”

The car ride was silent for the last time.

Sam craned his head to look out the window, even if there wasn’t anything particularly interesting to be seen outside. In a few short hours, Lucifer would possess him, and there was just no telling how that would go. He hoped he was strong enough, because once Lucifer got inside his head, he was scared that Lucifer would make it his mission to ruin you just to destroy Sam even further. It would’ve been the most effective way to do so.

He closed his eyes and tried to calm himself. His fear and his anger weren’t gonna help him beat the devil. Sam tried his best, his damn hardest, to go to places in his mind that he cherished. He kept these memories close to his heart. They were sacred.

He remembered being thirteen, and reading lore books with you.

He remembered being seventeen, and dancing to Whitney Houston with you with nothing but a streetlight as your disco ball.

In between all those memories, there were feelings that only ever grew stronger with time. He doesn’t remember if he ever told you, maybe he has. Maybe after a couple of drinks, maybe at his lowest point.

Still, all Sam knew, and all he needed to know, was that as long as you were alive and breathing, it was worth whatever price he had to pay. He owed you that much.

▼△▼△▼△▼△▼

In Detroit, there was a chill in the air that gave you goosebumps. The guys were unloading the gallon jugs of blood from the car. Bobby confirmed that there were at least two dozen demons inside one of the buildings. This had to be it.

You stayed back, making small talk with Castiel while Sam drank the demon blood in some faraway corner.

“You are anxious.”

You gave him an amused smile, “That would be the understatement of the century.”

He simply nodded in acknowledgment and placed his hand on your shoulder.

“Sam is strong. He’ll conquer Lucifer.”

“I hope you’re right, Cas.”

Sam and Dean walked back over to your little group. Sam wiped away the remnants of blood that threatened to trickle down his chin. One by one, Sam talked to each of you. It was goodbye. A hug from Bobby, some awkward chatting with Cas. Then, he reached you. The whole world stopped.

“I wish you knew how much I don’t want you to do this,” you looked up at him, your arms were crossed in an attempt to both shield yourself from the cold and from him.

“Believe me, I know,” he sighed, before taking one of your hands into his own and bringing it up to his face. “I wouldn’t if I didn’t have to.”

“I know,” your answer was laced with something that was barely acceptance and more like defeat.

“I’m sorry,” he squeezed your hand. “I wish it didn’t have to be like this.”

“It’s okay,” you wrapped your arms around him, letting his warmth and his scent and everything that was his just completely overwhelm you. “I’ll see you soon, won’t I?”

He buried his face into the crook of your neck, hugging you even tighter. It wasn’t often that you saw Sam cry, but you could feel the shakiness of his breath that he tried to hide as he clung onto you.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’ll see you soon.”

“Hey, don’t get all soft on me now, Sammy,” you joked, rubbing his back as you did so.

“I’m pretty sure I always was.”

It took him a while to pull away, not caring if Dean was waiting for him to catch up. This would be the last time he’d get to hold you like this, and he wanted to savor every second he could get before he was gone. He took a deep breath and pressed a kiss to your temple, then to your cheek, then finally, your lips.

It was everything you both hoped it would be and for a moment, you could ignore the sadness growing inside of you.

The kiss was soft. Tender. You moved in a way only two people whose souls were intertwined forever would. He wasn’t shaking anymore. If anything, this kiss flooded him with an overwhelming sense of clarity.

He had to keep you safe, so he forced himself to walk away from you, even if every fiber of his being told him to say those three little words… but he couldn’t hurt you anymore than he was about to, so he stayed silent.

You watched as the distance between you grew. The kiss lingered on your lips like a ghost. It was the calm before the storm because as soon as Sam was out of your sight, the sorrow pierced through you. This life always left you in pieces, but this was the first time in a long time, that you felt pain like this. It was precise; meant to target where it hurt the most.

Bobby and Cas approached you with solemn looks on their faces; they both knew that there was nothing they could say that would ease the pain you were feeling. You wanted to share your grief with them, you really did, in hopes that you wouldn’t be crushed by the weight of it.

But you couldn’t. Just like what Bobby said: what you had with Sam was special, perhaps a once-in-a-lifetime kind of connection, and that meant your grief was a cross only you could bear. No one else could possibly hope to understand what it was like.

After about twenty minutes, a white flash of light erupted from the windows of the building where Sam was and you knew that the worst had come to pass. Lucifer was inside of him. Without thinking, you ran inside the building with nothing but the pistol you had strapped to your leg and a dagger tucked under your belt. You ignored the cold fear that seeped into your bones, no matter how much it tried to weaken your resolve. You ignored the shouts of Bobby and Cas from behind you, telling you to stop.

You thought of Sam, now possessed by Lucifer and no doubt revelling in taunting Dean.

Dean. He was still inside, and if he was still alive, you owed it to him to try and get him out of there.

As you made your way up the building, bodies were strewn about. Blood was spilled on the floor and splattered on the walls. You grit your teeth, and tightened the grip on your gun. Finally, you reached the fourth floor. A blast of cold air hit your face and standing in the middle of the room was Sam. Dean was backed up against a wall.

“Ah, you’re just in time,” Sam— no, Lucifer, exclaimed. “I was wondering when Sammy’s little girlfriend would come in to save the day. I didn’t see you before. You know, when these two tried to kill me with the Colt? It was so sad. For them, I mean. But let me tell you, you do not disappoint, honey. Prettier in person if I do say so myself.”

“Get the hell away from her!” Dean yelled, trying his best to fight against the force of Lucifer’s power.

“No, I don’t think so,” Lucifer cocked his head mockingly at Dean. He approached you, smirking when he noticed you were too terrified and confused to even take a step back. “Little Sammy certainly had taste. You’re just exquisite, aren’t you? I think… I’ll keep you.”

He brushed his fingers against your hair, taking a big whiff of your scent in an overdramatic and freakish show of dominance. He knew you wouldn’t and couldn’t do anything, not as long as he was wearing Sam’s face.

Humans were so simple.

“Well,” he turned to face Dean one last time with a malicious smile. “Bye-bye, big brother.”

With a snap of his fingers, both you and Lucifer were gone in a cloud of black smoke. Dean was all alone.

#sam winchester #sam winchester x reader #supernatural #supernatural fanfiction #jared padalecki #dean winchester #spn fanfiction #reader insert #sam winchester fanfic

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veeluvss · 11 months

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My Girl, Lily Prentiss (2)

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆

"Lily Addams," Emily said, clicking the remote. The entire team sat around the round table, concern clear in their faces and expressions. Prentiss could hardly get her words out. Lily was gone. Gone. "Seventeen," Emily said again, clicking on another picture of her. She couldn't tear her eyes away from her, seeing her all grown up. Her smile hadn't changed one bit. The apples of her cheeks kept the pink colour and her eyes still gleamed with happy tears in the situation. Her hair, a mousey brown now, was beautifully waved over her shoulders. Emily could see she kept active, knowing she loved the outdoors. Being deprived of it for so long meant Lily would do anything to be outside all the time. "Prentiss," Morgan said, voice breaking the silence. Emily nodded, tearing her eyes away from the picture. "Yes, of course." She mumbled, shaking her head. "Lily Addams, seventeen. Her parents came to me this morning to report her missing. She's been gone two days, no word, no sign, nothing. We need to hit the ground running and find out what happened." Emily knew she was making no sense and the team were only growing more and more worried. "Emily, what's going on?" JJ asked, sitting up in her chair. There was more silence as Emily tried to find the words.

"She was in protective custody," Emily whispered, taking a seat. She couldn't trust her legs to hold her weight. "Her parents, they, they were con artists. I went undercover to catch them. Lily - she was their daughter. They exploited her, kept her locked up, and hidden and used her whenever they could. They'd lure these women in and use them, rape them, do all sorts and Lily - she would love them with her whole innocent self because she had no idea what they were doing to them. They'd look after her, watch her, care for her. I did too. "I've always had her on my mind, she was like mine. My little girl in the darkest times. She was far too innocent for everything that happened to her," Emily explained. "I've stayed close by to her, following her family around the world. They knew. Every year, I'd send Lily a birthday and Christmas present. But now, she's gone." "And we need to find her," Rossi said. Emily nodded, still not daring to look at anyone. "We need to find her," Emily repeated. "I - I can't live knowing she's hurt and I couldn't help her."

The team jumped into action. Garcia did her tech stuff, trying to find what she could on her last known whereabouts. Emily and JJ spoke to her parents, trying to get to know them as much as they could. Rossi and Morgan and Reid went to the house, trying to find evidence there. Tara headed to her high school to talk to her little sister and Lily's teachers.

"What... what was she like?" Emily asked the parents, Gale and Tori. "Naughty," Gale sighed. JJ frowned. "What do you mean by that?" "She never listened," Tori said. "She was always pushing the boundaries, arguing." Emily could feel the anger in the pit of her stomach. "How was she at school?" "She never went to school. Didn't even know the meaning of the word," Gale scoffed. "Did you help her?" Emily asked. "We did everything we could," Gale said, nodding. "Honestly, Prentiss. If it wasn't for the technicalities of her childhood, we wouldn't have come. We think it's just drugs. Bad crowd," Gale shrugged. Emily walked out then, unable to control her anger. How dare they?

Morgan's eyes were furrowed as he moved around the girl's bedroom. "I don't know about you but if this was my bedroom, I don't think I'd want to stay either." "There's absolutely no personality here," Reid agreed, pulling back the covers of her bed. Then, he saw it. There was a ragged, grey, small baby's blanket tucked under her pillow. Reid pulled it up, inspecting it. It looked old. "Apart from this." He said. Morgan turned around and took it from his hands before quickly pocketing it. "You can't take that from a crime scene-" Reid said quickly, looking between Morgan and Rossi. "It's for Emily," he said simply, pulling back the girls' pillows but then he saw the picture. Under Lily's pillow was an old, faded picture. Morgan recognised Emily immediately, smiling, holding the girl close to her. The blonde hair leaned over and she was kissing Emily's cheek. Morgan had never, ever seen Emily so happy. Rossi looked over his shoulder, sighing. "She hasn't smiled like that with us, ever," Spencer said, looking at it too. "We have to find whoever the fuck took this kid. It'll destroy Prentisss if anything happens to her." Morgan said. He put the picture back and headed out of the room, dialling Garcia's number.

"Hey my chocolate milkshake," she smirked down the phone. "Please tell me you have some sort of lead," Morgan said, all he could feel was hurt for his best friend. Emily may have been his boss but since her first day, she and morgan had been the best brother-sister duo the team had ever seen. Their humour and personalities went together like the north and south end of magnets and Derek knew that without Lily in her life, Prentiss had been missing a big part of herself. He knew she had her secrets, everyone did. But one this close to her, one this personal, meant Emily had never cared about anything more. "I've managed to track some of her online whereabouts and Morgan, it's not pretty." She told him honestly. "Tell me." "She was very, erm, sexual online," Garcia said. "Porn sites, selling her pictures, exchanging messages. She didn't even try to keep it a secret Derek." "Could that be tied to it? Maybe a fan got freaky?" "I'm not sure. She managed to keep her identity pretty covered up. She was good at that, fake identities, and lives. She has whole documents with alternative lives for different people she spoke to. Hannah. Tina. Josie. All with different types of pictures too, different underwear, different roleplays. Derek, as painful as it is for me to say this, she was good at what she did." "Have you spoken to Prentiss?" "Not yet. I don't know how to tell her," Garcia sighed. "She's hurting." "She's just worried baby girl, don't... don't fret. We'll find Lily and get her help."

"What was your sister like?" Tara asked Skyla, Gale and Tori's biological child. "Private," Skyla whispered. "She never spoke to any of us unless it was arguing. She was always in her room, or out. She'd come home early morning and leave again only hours later. I hardly ever saw her." "So you weren't close?" "Not at all. I can hardly even call her my sister," Skyla shrugged. However, she kept her eyes down, avoiding looking up or around the room. "What's life like at home?" Tara asked, probing more. "Normal," she shrugged. "What's normal to you?" "Just," Skyla sighed. "You know, normal." "Your mum told us that Lily misbehaved, and argued," Tara said. Skyla nodded, agreeing. "Did she argue with you?" "No. Only mum." "What did they argue about?" "How quiet she was. Mum used to say she wasn't even part of the family. She.. she said that if they weren't tied by a contract, she'd be gone." Tara nodded. "Lily used to tell Mum that no one loved her, that she was alone." Skyla sighed, feeling bad for speaking badly about her mum. "Mum loved me, Dad did too. I think it hurt Lily, to see the difference. I tried to be mean too, to them to see what they would do but they didn't do what they did to Lily. I don't know why they hated her."

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆ table of contents

#criminal minds #criminal minds evolution #my girl lily prentiss #lily prentiss #emily prentiss #emily prentiss head canons #emily prentiss x reader #emily #prentiss #emily prentiss x y/n #emily prentiss x daughter

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flamboyantly-incompetent · 5 months

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OoTP, Chapter 6 - Brooms at Christmas

Draco Malfoy x Hufflepuff!Reader

Warnings: none?

Masterlist

Word Count: ~4,100

Note: a soft, friendly chapter for the Christmas season

The last day of term before Christmas holiday trudged on miserably, refusing to end. A few lucky, older students who had no classes on Fridays had been permitted to leave early, filtering out in waves. There was no such luck for fourth year Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors, as the last class they had to suffer through was possibly the worst imaginable.

You got to Defense Against the Dark Arts early, having skipped breakfast to write your mum. The excitement from the previous DA meeting had worn off, but you still took the opportunity to chat with other students before Umbridge got a chance to dampen the holiday spirit. Colin Creevey had arrived early as well, but his mouth was set into a hard line, suggesting something had already gotten to him.

"Happy Christmas, Colin," you said. "Any plans for the holiday?" He didn't answer, clearly lost in thought. Behind you, Donna, Yvette and Herbert trailed in. "Colin?"

Herbert clapped him on the back on his way to his seat across the aisle from you. "Hey, Creevey. You walk through a ghost on the way here?"

"Huh?"

"Everything ok?"

"You didn't hear?"

Yvette frowned. "Hear what?"

Colin looked around at the otherwise empty room. "All the Weasleys and Harry Potter left yesterday. Ginny's dad's at St. Mungo's."

"What?"

He nodded. "They didn't say much, but it sounds bad. They said he was attacked by something."

"Some thing?"

He nodded again. More people filed into the classroom to take their seats. Colin refused to say any more, which was lucky because Umbridge herself was even earlier than usual, lips pursed like she had an acid pop stuck under her tongue. The horrendous pink bow on top of her head jiggled as she strutted up the aisle to her desk. She didn't make eye contact with anyone, but rather sat down, pulled a compact mirror from her handbag, and began primping her hair.

The bell rang and she stood, face still sour, and said, "Good afternoon, wands away."

"Good afternoon, Professor Umbridge," the class chanted back, devoid of enthusiasm. Not that anyone had held out any hope since the second week of term.

The corners of her mouth pulled up tightly, apparently satisfied, and she sat back down to keep a watchful eye. "Today we'll be reading chapter seventeen. There will be no need to talk."

Your eyes skimmed the pages absent mindedly, wondering what could have happened to Mr. Weasley. And what Harry Potter had to do with it. Eventually, your thoughts drifted to how you were going to spend break - all your friends were going home for the holiday, so the only person you knew would be staying was Draco Malfoy. You were skeptical as to whether he’d even talk to you, but you were resolved to try. At worst, you might convince Professor Sprout to let you check in on her aquaponics setup while she was gone, or maybe Hagrid would let you hang out with those tiny dragons again.

Mercifully, the bell rang and before Professor Umbridge could say anything, the whole class swept their books into their bags and pockets in unison and fled.

Donna and Yvette were already all packed, so you sat in the almost empty common room by the fire, listening and laughing at the thumping and random curses coming from the boy’s dorm. Ten minutes later, Herbert emerged with a barely closed trunk, the toe of an argyle sock hanging out the bottom. You followed them to the front of the castle where they waited on the great stone steps with a band of other students for the last round of carriages to take them down the path to the Hogwarts Express.

“Are you sure you wanna stay?” Donna asked, “I’m sure my mum would be fine with you coming home with me.”

You shook your head. “No, it’s alright, I’m looking forward to having so much of the castle to myself. I’m going to see Professor Sprout once you’re all off.”

“You’d better go now, I think her last class ended a while ago,” Yvette said.

The three of them pulled you and each other in for a hug, mumbling holiday wishes into the nearest shoulder. They promised to write and made you swear you would actually get around to it, then you trotted into the castle and up the stairs to Professor Sprout’s office.

“Professor Sprout? Oh!” Warm air wafted out to meet you as the door to her office swung open to reveal your head of house struggling to close a gigantic trunk filled with all her potted plants, giving breathless instructions to Draco Malfoy. They both stopped and looked at you. “Sorry,” you said sheepishly.

“No, no,” Professor Sprout said, turning her back on the trunk, but leaning on it to keep it closed. “I was just telling Mr. Malfoy about an extra credit assignment for over the holiday. I don’t suppose you’re staying for Christmas as well?”

Draco’s expression was unreadable as he waited for your response. “Yeah, I am. I came by to see if you would let me look in on your aquaponics while you were gone. I can look after those too?”

She sighed in relief, the trunk popping open behind her. “Oh, thank heavens. Off you go, back to your places. Now where, aha.” With a wave of her wand, the pots and hanging baskets bobbed out of her trunk and scattered themselves over the room in their typical order; the enchanted watering can came out last, immediately resuming duty. She sat down at her desk, her hair more awry than usual, and gestured at the chair next to Draco. You sat hesitantly. “The puffapods are set to go to seed in about a week, and I think, given how much he’s improved, Mr. Malfoy has proven himself capable to tend to them on his own.” He smiled thinly at the praise. “This is a solo project, though I’m sure Miss Y/L/N would be happy to advise should you get stuck.” She patted the pockets of her robes, muttering quietly, then pulled out the key to her office which she handed to you. “Happy Christmas, don’t kill my koi.” She winked, then shooed you both out the door so she could finish packing.

Without saying a word or even looking at you again, Draco sped back down the stairs and out of sight. You huffed at his retreating frame, but you weren’t quite sure whether you were annoyed with him or yourself for caring. After all, it wasn’t like you really liked him in the first place. Right? What was there to like? To your estimation, he was arrogant, prideful, selfish, and full of derision for just about everything.

You huffed again and stomped off to the common room to mourn your poor choices. A few members of your house were settling in around the fire; Wanda was showing a first year how to knit, and both waved as you passed. Wilbur was basking in enchanted sunlight on your bed, so you flopped onto it next to him and buried your face in his fur.

Sometime just before dinner, you woke up. Wilbur had moved to the foot of the bed, and began purring when he noticed you were awake. You absentmindedly scratched his chin while feeling around under the bed for his treats. The smell of oven-roasted turkey and potatoes lured you out of bed.

Wilbur followed you into the great hall, tail held aloft, hoping to maybe also get some turkey. Draco Malfoy was nowhere to be seen, but Luna Lovegood was sitting alone at the Ravenclaw table, eating dessert first over a pile of books.

“Mind if I join you?” you asked her, holding up your own book - Dragons in the Wild - and grinning widely.

She looked up dreamily from the page and smiled back. “I don’t mind at all, please.” You sat and shooed Wilbur away from the turkey drumstick he had been reaching towards greedily; he sat down on the bench next to you and proceeded to twitch his tail around.

You waited to see if she’d continue reading. When she did not, you asked, “You aren’t going home for Christmas?”

She shook her head. “My father has been busy interviewing a number of goblins in secret for the Quibbler.” She closed her book and you managed to read Lion, Goat, and Dragon - Beast or Experiment Gone Wrong before she set it aside with the others.

“You’re studying chimeras?” you asked, shoveling roast potatoes and Yorkshire pudding onto your plate.

Luna smiled happily. “Yes. I hope to meet one someday, and I’d like to be prepared. What’ve you got?”

Chewing, you held up your book silently, so that she could see the title. She smiled wider.

After a rousing conversation, as rousing as a conversation with Luna could be, on rare and interesting magical creatures, proven and suspected, the topic strayed into Care of Magical Creatures. Luna was not yet convinced Hagrid was the best choice to teach the subject.

“I admit, he certainly has a practical approach,” she said, finally getting to the pile of Brussels sprouts on her plate. A pair of ghosts floated past you, singing carols in their ethereal tone. She continued, “But I preferred Grubbly-Plank’s curriculum structure. Professor Hagrid seems to hop from one topic to the next.”

You frowned. That was true. “Sure, I suppose, I guess it’s more about your learning style than anything else.”

Her eyes twinkled. “My point exactly.” She yawned dreamily and began to gather her books. “Well, Y/N, I’d better be off. I’ve been up reading all night. Do let me know if you’d like to have supper again, I do enjoy our conversations. Happy Christmas!”

“Happy Christmas, Luna.”

Wilbur had curled up next to you and fallen asleep with one eye open; you waved a bit of turkey over his nose and he woke right up to snatch it from your hand. You scooped him up into your arms and he began purring.

“C’mon, you. It’s time to pretend to read by the fire and then go to bed.”

Christmas morning came, and you got up before dawn to trudge through the frigid wind to the owlery to send your mum’s gift. You’d also picked up some odds and ends at Zonkos for Julien, which you sent with a separate owl in the hopes your mum wouldn’t notice.

When you arrived at breakfast, Luna was not there, but Draco Malfoy was. He was still refusing to look at you. The decorated trees lining the Great Hall twinkled in the firelight, and the candles floating above you had been adorned with small ringed garlands. You joined Wanda and the first year at the Hufflepuff table, and piled your plate with eggs, sausages, and beans.

The rustle of wings was heard not long after, and far fewer owls than usual glided in to drop Christmas cards and crackers on the students around you. Your mother’s owl, Bertha, passed over you and dropped a package in your lap. You grinned - inside were several wrapped cauldron cakes, pumpkin pasties, and a couple liquorice whips, as well as a new pair of rain boots.

Then, you made the mistake of glancing across the room to the Slytherin table. Draco, the only Slytherin at the table, was glancing up at the whirlwind of owls hopefully, then, when they all left as quickly as they’d come, his shoulders slumped ever so slightly. You rolled your eyes and sighed, then excused yourself and carried the box over. He did not look at you, and you did not look at him, as you sat the box of treats, sans boots, on the table between you and sat down.

You waited a moment, then pushed the box towards him. He waited another moment, then pointed his pointed nose inside.

“Thanks,” he mumbled, unwrapping a cauldron cake. “These are my favorite.”

You grinned and unwrapped one for yourself. “Mine too.”

The corner of his mouth twitched before he sank his teeth into the chocolate. His eyes fluttered. “Wow,” he said, turning over the wrapping, “are these Honeydukes’?”

“No, this is my step-father’s recipe. Good, right?” He nodded in silent satisfaction. “Got anything interesting going on today?”

He gave you a sidelong glance, then dropped the facade. “No, not at all. Why?”

You shrugged. “I was thinking of flying a little. While the snow’s still fresh and pretty. If you’d like to join me.”

He frowned. “I suppose that could be enjoyable.”

“Good.” You took two more cauldron cakes, a pumpkin pastie and a liquorice whip out of the box and pushed them into his hands. “Meet me on the pitch in an hour. And you may want to wear something warmer than this.”

He smirked at you, but nodded and took the baked goods with another quiet, “Thanks,” and left for the Slytherin dormitory.

The fireplaces you passed on the way back to the Hufflepuff common room did nothing to quell the tingling in your fingertips. That had gone much better than expected. You took your own advice and layered a winter coat over two Christmas jumpers, along with a ridiculous wool hat with a bauble and fingerless gloves.

Draco was already on the pitch when you arrived with your Cleansweep 7, wearing a very fashionable tweed coat with large brass buttons. He laughed when he saw your hat.

“What died on your head?”

“The same thing that’ll keep me alive when you freeze to death,” you shot back. “What kind of broom is that anyway?”

“A Nimbus 2001, still the broom with the most class. I think you forgot we were meant to be flying with these broomsticks, not sweeping.”

You grinned and mounted your broom. “Enough talk, now we race. First one around the pitch three times wins!” You took off into the sky, wind biting at your face.

“What?” he said, and leapt onto his broom. He barely caught up to you; his broom sat level to yours in the wind. “That wasn’t fair!” he shouted.

“You’d know all about that wouldn’t you?”

He grumbled and pressed himself deeper into his broom, so he began to pull forward. You swore and did the same, practically giving the broom a very loving embrace, but it worked. You circled the pitch, weaving around the tall seats and taking turns trying to distract each other. At the very end, you won by a hair, only because you’d pointed and shouted, “what is he doing?” when there was no one there. You dismounted your broom, laughing. “Good game. How are you not freezing?”

Draco landed next to you, scowling. “Dragon hide lining, of course. And this was too easy. I demand a rematch.”

“What do you mean?”

“Race me across the lake.”

“We’re not supposed to fly anywhere else on school grounds.”

He pointed to his prefect badge. “Come on, who’s going to catch us?”

You looked around nervously, but he was right. The only sign of life from the castle was the smoke rising from its numerous chimneys, which was always there. Smiling, you prepared to take off without warning again, but he was ready for you this time, and launched himself into the air before you had a chance to react.

Draco flew whooping and hollering across the grounds, staying low to the snow-covered earth, and you followed in a similar fashion. The air stung your eyes and the wind nearly whipped the hat from your head, but then the snow gave way to choppy black water, which turned more and more glassy the further you flew across the lake.

The spray from the water froze to your eyelashes and clothes, and the scene before you made your breath catch. The shore across the lake was perfect, untouched snow before rows and rows of ice encrusted pine trees that sat still even in the wind.

Draco had flown upwards and was doing loops in the sky. You shouted, “Stop showing off! I could still win, you know!”

“Doubtful!” he shouted back before shooting towards the shore.

He beat you, again by a hair, and fell off his broom into the snow, laughing. “Now, that was fun.”

You flopped into the snow next to him, the cold striking a line across the back of your neck. “Only because you won that time. If we were on the same model broom I’d’ve had that one too.”

Draco snorted and sat up. “Big talk for someone who didn’t even make their Quidditch team.”

“I’d have made it just fine if you and your goons hadn’t intruded on our tryouts,” you snapped, remembering in anger his words months ago. You sat up when he didn’t reply. “It doesn’t matter anyway, I don’t think I even wanted to be on the team. You were being kind of an arse then, though.”

He said nothing, but didn’t disagree.

Across the lake, the castle stood still in a kind of quiet that can only be achieved when everything in sight is covered in a foot of sound absorbing snow. No rustle of wind or bird song, only the gentle lap of waves across the stony shore disturbed the peace. The flurries around you became bigger and thicker, until great globs of snow were falling heavily down as far as you could see. They landed on the snow from the day before with perhaps your favorite sound - a soft and continuous, breathy tinkling. You flopped back down onto your back to look up at the grey sky, letting the snow pile itself on your still form.

You wondered how the giant squid was spending its Christmas, and smiled. “Have you seen the giant squid? That lives in the lake?”

“Yes. All the time,” Draco said, confused.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, our common room is right under the lake. There are a few portholes it swims by everyday.”

You sat up again. “What? That’s so cool. We talked about it in Care of Magical Creatures. I had kind of assumed it was a myth.”

He pursed his lips and shook some snow out of his silvery hair. “We should get back across the lake before this snow gets worse.”

“You’re not going to try and convince me to take a stroll through the Forbidden Forest, while we’re at it? There’s no other school rule you’d like to break today?”

“No, not the Forbidden Forest.” He stood up, brushing more snow off his clothes. “You’ll see, come on.”

“Wait.” You sat up. “You do want to break another rule?”

“Yeah. Come on.”

You stood nervously, gripping your broomstick. “Draco…”

“Y/N. It’ll be fun, and we won’t get caught. You’ll like it, I swear.”

Nonplussed, you mounted your broom and followed him wide-eyed back across the lake, wondering what in the world had sparked such sincerity. Inside the castle, Draco led you down staircase after staircase, checking vigilantly around corners. The deeper into the dungeons you went, the more the chill seeped from the stone into your bones. You passed the Potions classroom, and it suddenly dawned on you.

“Draco,” you groaned, stopping in your tracks. He stopped and turned to look at you quizzically. “We’ll get into so much trouble.”

He once again tapped on the prefect badge glistening on his chest.

“You don’t think that’s an abuse of power?”

He rolled his eyes, “An abuse to who? I guarantee the common room is empty, and I’m offering you the chance to see something no one but a Slytherin has ever seen.” He let you consider for a moment. “Isn’t that the least bit tempting?”

“Of course it is.” You crossed your arms. “But if we get caught this was your idea.”

He smirked and led you down another couple hallways, before stopping before an imposing stone door. The frame was made up of dozens of stone carved snakes writhing around each other to form a twisted rope; a snakes head with emeralds for eyes held a great knocker in its fangs. Draco squared his shoulders and said proudly, “Pureblood.”

A note of unease rang through your gut, and the great stone door swung open, ominously quiet. The common room itself was similar in layout to your own, though everything, from the fireplace to the throw pillows, was austere. Cold green light filtered in through the porthole windows along the far wall. As you stepped in, the fireplace ignited into black flame that provided no light.

“See?” Draco said, “Empty.”

You gestured back towards the door. “A bit on the nose, don’t you think?”

He shrugged, “That’s what it’s always been.”

“Hmm,” you conceded. The light from the portholes drew you closer and closer, until you had your nose almost pressed against one to peer out into the murky lake. You could only see about a hundred feet out into the Black Lake until it truly lived up to its name. Scattered kelp stipes swayed gently in the current. You took a sharp breath in, eyes wide.

Draco shifted behind you, checking an ornate pocket watch. “Should be any minute now. C’mon old blighty.” He stepped up to the porthole next to yours and peered out as well.

“Hagrid calls him Squish.”

Draco scoffed and began, “Like I care what that oaf-”

But he was cut off as one by one, the portholes grew dim. Something gargantuan was blocking them. You danced nervously from foot to foot in your spot. At first, it just looked like a black curtain falling over the window; there was no texture to make out, only a sweeping black material spreading from left to right. Then, you took a startled step back as the squid’s giant eye filled the width of the porthole. It winked at you, or maybe blinked? And then as quickly as it came, it moved on. You laughed abruptly and ran to the next porthole to see its eye come and go, then the next, and the next, until finally you watched its epically long tentacles drift past you, and off into deeper reaches of the lake.

Still laughing you turned to Draco. “That was, I mean, he’s bigger than I thought! So cool!” You fell onto a sofa.

Draco, smirking, raised an eyebrow. “So I was right then.”

“Yeah, I guess.” You sighed and leaned back against the tough leather.

He shook his head. “I’ll need you to say it.”

You rolled your eyes. “You were right.”

“How hard was that?”

“Very.”

“Mr. Malfoy. Miss Y/L/N. What a surprise.” The both of you froze. Oh no. You turned slowly. Professor Dumbledore stood just across the room, hands folded lightly in front of him. He didn’t look particularly angry, which surprised you. “I wonder if you’re aware, Y/N, that you are in the wrong common room?”

You stood shakily and tried to sputter out a response, cheeks burning, but Draco interrupted, “We were just watching the squid. Professor. It… was my idea.”

“I see. I’m afraid I’ll still have to dock points from each of you. Ten I think should do, and I trust this won’t happen again?”

“Yes, Professor,” you said.

“No, Professor,” Draco said.

Professor Dumbledore smiled warmly. “I’ll take that to mean the same thing. Come along, Miss Y/L/N, I’ll escort you back to your dormitory. And I’ll expect you both to stay until supper. Yes? Good.”

You followed the headmaster out of the Slytherin common room, but not before turning back to Draco to wave and mouth a quick and silent “Thanks!” He had a hand on his hip and another in his hair, which he removed to wave back weakly. Then the door shut. Professor Dumbledore didn’t speak for a few minutes, seemingly content to accompany you through the maze-like dungeons of the castle.

Finally, he said, “Please understand, I am always pleased when a student makes a friend with another outside their house. However, rules are rules.” He gave you a warm, sidelong smile. He winked.

“Y-yes, Professor. I understand.” You did not. If Professor Snape had been the one to catch you, ten points would’ve been a drop in the bucket of what you’d have lost your house, you were sure of it. Bringing this up seemed unwise.

You both stopped outside the giant round door to the Hufflepuff common room. The headmaster turned towards you and said cheerily, “Happy Christmas, Miss Y/L/N,” before tapping out the rhythm for you. The door eased open, welcoming you back.

“Happy Christmas, Professor.”

Two second years played Wizard’s Chess sprawled out by the fire; they hardly noticed your entrance.

~~~ Taglist ~~~

@jemomgershippingco

@snickersmee

@lafrone

@cillshot

#draco x hufflepuff!reader #draco malfoy #harry potter #draco x reader #order of the phoenix #christmas fic

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notsowrites · 2 years

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you were there

a 4x08 malex coda

this is absolutely the fault of @haloud and @im-the-punk-who 💜

[AO3 Link]

--------

He promises Max and Maria he's not going to jump through the quicksand. Max almost tried to take the truck keys, but taking the keys won't do a thing when he can just hotwire the car. Maria offers to stay, in case Alex tries to reach out again. It's tempting, but he sends her on her way instead.

The house feels too big, too empty now that he has a lead on where Alex is. On what may have happened to him.

He falls onto the sofa, dropping his face into his hands. How could he have been so blind? How could he have not sensed that something was wrong? Alex left almost a week ago. Has he been trapped wherever Maria had seen this whole time?

Why had he allowed himself to become so tangled up in the promises of Oasis? Of traveling back to a planet galaxies away. What was there for him, he began to wonder. Without Clyde and Bonnie speaking about its wonders, suddenly it didn't feel so important anymore. Not next to this home he was sitting in. Not the home he was building with Alex.

A real tangible future in front of him. That he was living right now. The dream he'd had at seventeen when he and Alex had first began this tumultuous path they've been on for the last fifteen years.

In the closet in the bedroom, is a guitar. He's never asked Alex why it's in here, why he doesn't keep it in the living room with the others. But it's a familiar soft case with an even more familiar sticker, worn and peeling on the outside. For the first time since he'd returned it after Alex had tried to leave it for him in his trailer, Michael picks it up, gripping the neck and heading out the front door.

He's not going to be able to sleep, he already knows.

Just outside city limits is the place they'd been earlier. The quicksand that had almost pulled Maria down under, the closest to Alex he's going to get for right now.

He pulls the tailgate down, takes the guitar out of it's case, and sits down.

"I don't know if you can hear me when Maria isn't around," he starts, letting his fingertip roll over the strings. "But I'm sorry, Alex. I should have - you needed me and I wasn't listening. I'm sorry."

There's a sleeping bag rolled up that he's kept in the truck for ages. An old habit left over from those days when he was a homeless teenager. Tonight though, it'll come in handy. Not because he doesn't have a home these days. But because tonight, it'll keep him warm as he tries to work out how he's going to get Alex back. To the one person who once offered him up a warm place to sleep during the chilly spring nights.

The necklace around his neck starts to glow, a weak pulsing that disappears too quickly. But it's enough for tonight.

I'm listening now, Michael thinks as he wraps his fingers around the glass.

#roswell new mexico #malex #malex fic #notso writes fanfic

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sesquipadalian-in-a-jar · 3 days

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Gallavich Oneshot- Seventeen Going Under

One shot featuring Mickey’s internal monologue a few days after his and Ian’s first time. This is my first fic, so i hope you enjoy! The title is from a song by Sam Fender, which i would very much recommend listening to! (can also be read here on my ao3 if you prefer)

Mickey gave him the fucking gun back.

It was a few days later, and Mickey was starting to feel a bit stupid for it. Made the whole thing feel a bit transactional, but what was he supposed to do? Stand up after the best shag of his life, turn to the guy in question and jumble out something along the lines of “Nice dick Gallagher, thanks for shoving it up my ass. No, you can’t have your bosses gun back, even though what was the only reason you came here anyway. Bye!”. Even in his head that sounded worse than what he did, which was grab the gun from his drawer, shove it into the redhead’s hands gesture to the door, all without making eye contact.

Mickey was still reeling a little, to be honest. Everything had happened so fast, but confusingly enough also in slow-motion, like mickey had blinked and it was over but at the same time millions of galaxies had been born and died in the seconds it had taken him to reach out and touch Ian for the first time.

Maybe it was best it came off as transactional. Scratch that. Of course it was best, because that’s what it was, right? Wasnt like Mickey wanted anything more from the guy than a quick fuck, not like a tiny tiny part of him regretted declining Ian’s kiss, because that would be pathetic. And ridiculous. And gay.

And mickey was NOT gay. Couldn’t be gay. The implications of any part of Mickey actually liking men were far greater than he was willing face up to just then. His father would fucking kill him, for one, but not before beating the shit out of him and possibly cutting off his fucking fingers or some shit like that.

And yet he found himself standing opposite the crappy little supermarket where Ian worked, frozen in place, still trying in vain to stop his mind from spinning desperately through half-glimpses of freckles and red hair and stupidly large hands, even though that was all it had been doing for the past week anyways.

Fuck. He was so fucked. One way or another, Mickey Milkovich was fucking doomed.

He took a deep breath, and a step forwards, because despite it all, Mickey was anything but a fucking coward.

#mickey milkovich #ian gallagher #gallavich #Lian writes #oneshot #shamless #gallavich fic #ian x mickey #shameless fanfiction #gallavich fanfic #ian and mickey

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a-moth-to-the-light · 1 year

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i hope for a comfortable night at the end of your day (jan 07, 2022)

According to the Tumblr Year in Review thingie, I posted 236 times in 2022--and I didn't even make my account until March-ish! I should either celebrate or go touch grass. Joke's on you, though, because I pet plants all the time when I age-regress. Don't ask about the cactus experiences, please! /lh

OMGOMG LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT

My recent music obsession has been "La Loto" by Tini, Becky G, and Anitta! I can always trust Tini to come out with weirdly replayable songs, (ex: "Fantasi" and "22") and this is no exception. Becky G, especially, sounds great--her flow is a last-minute energy boost, full of unexpected vitriol, that makes me want to go back and see what she's been doing since "Shower" (which was THE middle school song btw). The beat squeaks under the pressure of their dominating presences, and I just feel so good about myself while listening to this one (and maybe, just maybe, pretending I could perform this track the way these three do).

Ily:1, my rookies of the year for 2022, just had a comeback! I did not know it was going to happen, but Spotify let me know the day of. Right now, "Secret Recipe" is taking up most of my attention--I don't mind their hyper-cutesy affectations here, because the chorus is just so precious. I'm sure I'll get around to listening to the title track, "Twinkle, Twinkle," again at some point, though!

I'm only two songs into the Moonbin & Sanha album (I KEEP TELLING Y'ALL I'M SLOW AND THIS IS WHAT I MEAN), but they're both fantastic, sleek and midnight-black in tone. The prechorus of "Madness" inexplicably reminds me of that one song, "Timber," that used to play at every middle school party, and, even more inexplicably, that makes "Madness" quite appealing to me. (Better than "Timber," anyway. That song could use a whole lot less Pitbull.)

Okay, I'll be done with talking about music for now--I'm mostly just catching up on 2021 songs right now, anyway! My brother got me to watch the recent Coffeezilla videos about Jake Paul, which were my introduction to the channel, so my recent YouTube life has mostly been a spiral into the depths of Coffeezilla's videography--I'm learning more than I ever wanted to know about manipulative sales tactics (the "Save the Kids" series, in particular, is fascinating)!

I'm also in the middle of Taejiu's "HIT is the best song you forgot about," only because I was reminded of "Miroh" by Stray Kids while watching and stopped to go listen to that and then couldn't stop listening to "Miroh" and then forgot to come back to finish the video. (Stray Kids does that to a guy!) As someone who has been trying to get into Seventeen for forever, this video is an exciting place to start--maybe I'll be able to check off the "get into astro and/or svt" bingo square only a few days into the new year!

Will I Do Anything Interesting Tomorrow?

I'm taking my youngest sibling out for ice cream--there's a place in our neighborhood that we used to visit all the time back when I lived at home, so I wanted to take them once before I leave the state again for college! Otherwise, I'll just be resting (hoping to get a nap in, since I missed out on naps for both Friday & today) from all the social events I've had in the past few days. I'm so happy to be able to see my friends from home after months of only texts and calls, but it's a lot of pressure for my already-not-great physical state :( I'll plan to spend most of the day curled up in bed, listening to audiobooks, to make up for all the energy expended!

Quote of the Day

Are you sure they're speaking German? Because I could have sworn I just heard them say "hamburger."

-- me

BUT UPDATE HAMBURGER IS ACTUALLY A WORD IN GERMAN

BUT ALSO THAT PERSON WAS JUST SPEAKING GIBBERISH IT WAS NOT ACTUALLY GERMAN

AND ALSO HAMBURGER IN GERMAN DOESN'T MEAN THE SAME THING AS HAMBURGER IN ENGLISH

IDK THAT'S IT

photo journal excerpts

First, we have a pink sky through my car window! Pink is my favorite color :) Second is my cat in his little nest of toys, and third is a snake ring my family bought for me!

#title is a quote from txt's sweet dreams on youtube!#six keeps on running #tini #ily:1 #astro #coffeezilla #taejiu

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whereareroo · 1 year

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IT’S THE GUNS

WF THOUGHTS (12/14/22).

Today is the 10th anniversary of the tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut. A 20-year-old got his hands on a military assault rifle and he killed 26 people at the school. Twenty of the victims were either six or seven years old. The other six were adults who tried to protect the young students.

I remember the day vividly. Our youngest child had just finished a semester at college in Pennsylvania, and we were driving her home to Connecticut for Christmas. The drive home took about 4 hours. For me, it was a drive filled with mixed emotions. I was delighted that my youngest child was safely ensconced in the back seat. My joy was punctuated with pangs of guilt. How could I be so happy when dozens of parents were collapsing under the weight of monumental grief? It was a tough and somber drive.

Our route home took us right pass Sandy Hook. The shooting had occurred during the morning. It was dark when we passed that area in the early evening. To keep gawkers away, the highway exit to Sandy Hook was closed. Even from the highway, I could see flashing lights everywhere. The whole scene was sickening.

For a few days after Sandy Hook, politicians made noise about passing strong gun control legislation. It never happened. The bloodshed continued. One of the recent horror stories unfolded last May at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. Nineteen students died, two teachers died, and seventeen people were wounded.

Since Sandy Hook, there have been 189 school shootings in America that resulted in at least one death. That fact comes from the K-12 School Shooting Database research group. Isn't it sad that such a group even exists in America?

Overall, 279 people have been killed in the 189 shootings. Most of them were children. Sandy Hook was ten years ago. Do the math. We average more than 18 school shootings a year. On average, more than 27 people die in school shootings every year. Every American should be embarrassed--and heartbroken--that our country has done nothing to stop these senseless shootings. We are the only country on earth with this problem.

I follow a blog that frequently addresses America's failure to stop school shootings. As the Sandy Hook anniversary approached, a Canadian posted this comment:

"Canadian here, your neighbor with cold winters and sensible gun laws. Did you know that we've had 11 school shooting deaths? Not this month or this year, but total, in history. And absolutely no deaths in elementary schools. Why? Because gun laws save lives.

Listen. It's the guns."

When are we going to wake up? This is a solvable problem. As the Canadian said: "ITS THE GUNS." Please use your political voice, and your political contributions, to end gun violence. Blood should not be flowing through the hallways of American schools. School shootings should not be accepted as a "normal" part of American life. What a stain on America.

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flowers-and-fichte · 1 year

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NINE - KÜNZLE

Warnings: sadness, Künzle's angsty backstory part 2

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I don't know how long I'd been sleeping for. All I know is that I remained in the store for the entire night without the Gestapo thinking that I was avoiding my supposed duties. I guess Stöller must have told them.

I awaken to find myself sprawled across the cold floor of the grain section, the half-torn flour bag just inches away from my face. I slowly get to my legs, yawning and stretching, rubbing my eyes with the back of my hand before finding my uniform cap and placing it on my head. Cursed thing.

Wandering around the store, I look for any sign of the other two men. They're not there. It's just me, alone with nothing but my thoughts and those keeping silent under the floors, behind the walls, and in the back rooms.

I know I can't leave these poor people alone without a way to get food or water, so I stay in the store until either Rabe or Stöller comes back. Leaning against a wall, I let myself slide back to the floor until I'm sitting. All I can do is think about my past, before and after my mother's death.

Memories flash before my eyes like a film:

There's me, five years old, playing in a field with my cousins, then aged six and eight respectively, at my grandparents' house in Hesse, my aunt and mother watching us from the second floor window.

Age seven, with my parents in Berlin one particularly crisp autumn. I caught a cold two days later and could not go to school.

Another memory of me at seven, this time seated contently on my father's shoulders as he walked through the Berlin Zoo, with me excitedly pointing out every animal we saw. I especially liked the elephants. I made my father go past them again when we left so I could wave goodbye.

This time, the memory is from when I was eight years old, and my family went on summer vacation to Eichstätt, in the south. My father taught me how to climb trees - he was still a good tree-climber back then - and my mother grew so worried thinking that I had been kidnapped that she organized a search party with three strangers she had met while trying to look for us.

The next memory is that of my ninth birthday, when every boy in our neighborhood came to our house, and one had even brought his sister. My mother had bought me a small radio, and the other children and I spent the whole afternoon up in my bedroom listening to broadcasts until my mother called us down for dinner.

Four months after the death of my mother, I made my only friend in the Hitler Youth when I was eleven. His name was August, and he was ten years old. He was, like all other boys in the group, blonde-haired and blue-eyed, with freckles sprinkled across his nose and cheeks. He was built like a stick but was very fast and almost always outran me. I remember the day we tried to climb the flagpole, and just as I was about to beat him to the top, our leader, a boy of about nineteen or so, called us down.

Age twelve: I caught whooping cough and was bedridden for three weeks.

Age fourteen: My father took me to Nuremberg to watch a Nazi rally. It was not interesting, and I was forced to Heil.

Age fifteen: I continued secretly defying the Reich, at one point making friends with a Jewish boy, who actually liked me. Then one day, he was gone. I don't know what happened to him.

Age seventeen: I met a seemingly friendly Gestapo officer named Josef while I was walking home from school. He also read novels by the Romantic writers, and we spent almost an hour and a half talking about Goethe. Josef was a nice young man, only twenty-two. I still think about him.

Age eighteen: Hitler had invaded Poland. It was war.

I am pulled out of my daze when the door opens, and Reinhard Rabe enters, carrying two young children on either hip. He doesn't even bother to say hello.

I stand up and follow him into one of the back rooms, an empty supply cabinet with ample room inside. A family of four is eating bread and apples. Once Rabe leaves the children with them, he turns to me and smiles.

"How was your day?"

I chuckle. "Uneventful."

"Mine was stressful. These two little kids were being herded onto trucks by the SS. They got separated from their parents and I didn't have the time to find them. I lied that they were my cousins and brought them here."

"And the SS bought it?"

"Yes." He looks up at me and gives a half-smile.

"Good. I don't know how much longer we can hold this act up."

#historical fiction #part 10 #novalis writes

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dycefic · 3 years

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Have An Evil Day

No prompt this time, just a sequel to ‘Welcome To Evil-Mart’

Working at Evil-Mart is usually… well, it’s retail. It’s physically exhausting, you have to deal with a lot of idiots without being overtly rude, and your feet hurt. Even though the hours and pay are very good, the benefits are great, and our bosses treat us well compared to most retail employees, it’s still not what I’d call a fun job.

But it’s not what I’d call dull, either. Especially not on days like today.

I was promoted to supervisor after the Food Poisoning Incident, so I have a little more authority and a little less obligation to be pleasant and I got issued a weighted cosh because sometimes Evil-Mart customers get… feisty. I’d never had to use it, though, because those who hadn’t seen what I did to Majority Rules, either in person or on one of the cell-phone videos that circulated afterwards, had at least heard about it. They didn’t give me any trouble.

I was halfway through my shift, and the worst things that’d happened had been running out of croissants and a machine oil spill in Aisle Seven, when our greeter pressed the alarm button, which sent an alert to my handset. As front-end supervisor, that meant me, so I went over. Sam, who is unusual in the henching community for having actually aged out rather than ‘being retired’ jerked his chin in the direction of a tall, swaggering figure. “He just came in,” he whispered.

I did a full double-take before I took it in. Superdyne. Fucking Superdyne.

We’d all heard about his dramatic heel-turn a couple of months ago. The whole world had heard about it. Superdyne, who’d skated closer and closer to the line for years, had decided to cross it in a blaze of bloodshed. He was a villain now, he said. There’d been a whole speech about how ingratitude had driven him to it blah blah blah.

I work at Evil-Mart. I’m from a hench family. If someone becomes a supervillain because they hate Mondays or want to turn us all into dinosaurs or whatever, I don’t judge. I will sell depth-charges and laser guns to anyone who can prove they’re over eighteen without hesitation. But even we get kind of grossed out by the ‘I am forced to turn evil because I haven’t been given enough love’ thing. People who are actually so fucked up by emotional abuse or neglect or some superhero killing their family, we’re fine with them. But they don’t say that’s why they do it, and most of them need a lot of therapy to even realize it. People who actually say that’s why are entitled dickwads.

And now the dickwad had walked into Evil-Mart like he was entitled. Like he thought he was one of us.

“Lockdown protocols,” I told Sam quietly. “On my authorisation.” That takes a minute or two, though, so I went over to talk to Superdyne. “Sir, I have to ask how you even knew where to find this place.”

He smirked at me. “I have my ways,” he said smugly. He’d either bribed or beaten someone, that was my guess. “So this is where the villains shop? We all thought you went to Wal-Mart.” He laughed, like he thought it was clever.

“Yes, so you all say,” I said dryly. I didn’t feel like pretending he was the first person to make the bad joke. “My next question, sir, is what made you think it was a good idea to come in here.”

He spread his hands. “I’m one of you now!” he said happily. “I’m a bad guy! So now I guess I shop where the bad guys shop!” He looked around, frowning a little. “Although I was expecting more weapons and explosives. A… more villainous atmosphere. I didn’t know Evil-Mart had fresh produce.”

“I don’t advise buying herbs here unless you’re a magical practitioner. Some of them have… unusual effects.” A lot of our produce is normal stuff, but some of it not only isn’t legal, it doesn’t exist anywhere else.

“Oh. Well, that makes sense. But the bright lights and the bakery?”

“We have excellent gluten-free breads. In many ways, Superdyne, this is just another store. We have sales, we mark down the breads in the afternoon, we even have a PA system.” I pulled out my handset, and thumbed the button that tied it to the PA. “Attention, shoppers,” I said in my most soothing Customer Service voice, which made him grin. “Evil-Mart wishes to inform you – “ The countdown on my handset reached zero, and I turned to look at the entrance as a huge blast door thudded down. That was the last part of the sequence – staff outside the area were already in lockdown and security were on their way. I smiled, and continued almost without a pause. “- That we are in lockdown at this time, due to the presence of Superdyne in the store. Please remain calm, and be advised that security are on their way to deal with the problem. If you have a personal grudge that you wish to address with Superdyne at this time, he is standing near Register Six with a stupid expression on his face.”

He was staring at me, stunned. “But… but…” he stammered, and damned if he didn’t look puzzled. “But I’m one of you now!”

“No,” I said flatly. “You were always evil, that’s true, but you’ll never be one of us. And for the record, I’m one of the people with a personal grudge. All those henchmen you’ve killed and maimed had families, asshole… and they all shop here.”

He swung at me, then, but I spent years in hench training. Even someone super-strong can be dodged, and once I slammed my cosh into his groin a few times his punches got a lot more aimless. Around then, Tiger Ty came over the register, claws out and snarling, and I figured I should stand out of the way.

About ten minutes later, I turned on the PA again. “Clean-up to Register Six,” I called, in the same special voice. “Category 7, class three. Shoppers, please be advised that lockdown is now lifted but Register Six will be closed until clean-up is completed.”

Hunter, who’d been working Register Six, came out from underneath it. He looked a little green. Well, he was still in his teens, this was probably his first fatal mobbing. “What’s Category 7?” he asked in a shaky voice. “I haven’t heard that before.”

“Biohazard.”

“Oh. Class three?”

“Send three people. He was a juicy one.” I stepped away from a spreading puddle of blood. “Run and get a couple of caution signs we can put around this mess.” I eyed it measuringly. “And one of those fifteen-gallon plastic tubs with a lid, I’ll damage it out.”

He eyed the mess. “Are you sure that’s big enough?”

“Yeah, the average human is only about seventeen gallons by volume, and I’m not going to put all the blood and mush in there, just the big pieces.”

He gulped. “Ah. Yes, ma’am.”

I called after him when he ran off. “One of the black tubs, not a clear one!” Which honestly should only be common sense, but you can’t count on a flustered teenager to have common sense.

We frown on killing customers at Evil-Mart, up to a point… but when a particularly murderous super-hero walks into our store, well, that’s something else. I’d have to fill out a ton of paperwork, though.

I had to chase off one of Doctor Malign’s minons and two members of the Genetic Reign before the clean-up crew arrived, both of whom urgently wanted samples. In the end I scraped a few pieces of liver and unidentified organ into two of the bags we use for possibly-contaminated money just to make them go away. (They’re good customers, and it was just going to go in the trash anyway.)

By the time the clean-up was done, all the big pieces were boxed up, and I’d finished the paperwork, my shift had been over for twenty minutes, and I’d been asked to come up to the boss’s office.

“Listen, I have no issues with how you handled the situation, I want you to know that.” Mr Trent leaned back in his chair, tapping his fingertips together. “It was quick, it was efficient, and… given your personal history with Superdyne, not to mention mine and that of half of our customer base… richly deserved.”

“Yes, sir,” I said. It came out too meek, and I cleared my throat and straightened up. It’s hard not to be intimidated by Mr Trent, when you’re in the same room with him. It’s not his fault, and he does his best, but even under the strictest control his fear-inducing powers tend to unsettle anyone who gets too close. We all know he’s not doing it on purpose and we try not to show our reactions. “Do you have any orders regarding the remains?”

“Doctor Order wants them.” He rubbed his chin. “Get someone from the pharmacy to prepare samples for him, please, including brain tissue. He’s our primary supplier, and we can’t offend him. As for the rest… as you know, I’m retired, and I don’t usually participate in the Endless War.” One of his hands dropped to his left thigh. His prosthetic leg is some of Doctor Order’s best work, but the injury that led to his retirement had been brutal even by our standards. “But this is different. Superdyne came here. To our place of safety. We need to make sure that doesn’t happen again.”

I nodded. “Do you want the remains dumped somewhere public? Some kind of dramatic display?”

“No. Something more direct.” He rubbed his chin again, then tapped the intercom on his desk. “Iris, please send up Miss Fedorova from Marketing and Mr Levy from the warehouse.”

“Yes, sir,” Iris responded, and he clicked off the intercom again.

“The three of you worked together very well, during the food poisoning incident,” he explained. “And I believe they can assist us in a satisfactory conclusion.” He hesitated, then smiled ruefully. “Perhaps you should wait outside until they get here. I can tell I’m unsettling you.”

“Sir, I know you’re not – “

“Not doing it on purpose.” He sighed. “I do appreciate how hard you all work to make me feel… accepted, I really do. But I’m very annoyed right now, which makes control more difficult for me, so I think we’d both be more relaxed if you waited outside while I do my meditation exercises.”

I waited outside. When the three of us went into his office again, the miasma of low-level fear was definitely a bit lighter, and he smiled. “All right. Now, this conversation is going to be very confidential, and I will remind you all of the agreements you signed when you were employed.” We all chorused agreement, and he nodded. “Good. Now, this is very much a secret, even among Evil-Mart staff, but we do have a few online clients who are… ah… on the other side of the fence.”

Ms Fedorova blinked. “What?”

Knuckles sighed. “We ship to a few heroes,” he explained. “The ones who are… less homo than sapiens, if you get my drift.”

I didn’t, and from her expression Ms Fedorova didn’t either. Mr Trent spread his hands, drawing our eyes to his fingers. Which as a rule nobody looks at, because there’s fourteen of them, with four joints in each finger, and we know he’s self-conscious about it. “The less… purely human ones,” he said quietly. “One of the reasons I created Evil-Mart was to give those who can’t pass for human, like me, a place to be… people. To have dignity. So that the obligate carnivores weren’t reduced to living on pet-food or scavenging for scraps, so that those with complex metabolisms could get the supplements they need so that people who are still people, for all their outward differences, could shop in safety. There are a great many more monsters, demigods, abominations of science and other non-standard persons among our set than among the heroes, and I wanted to meet their needs, as well as selling weapons and Lair-away-from-home sets and so on.”

“And there are a few heroes who order from us for that reason,” Knuckles added. “The ones who can’t get medications to suit their metabolism, or need to eat things that you can’t get easily anywhere else.”

I nodded, because that much I understood. We have some very esoteric ‘dietary supplies’ that start with fresh, healthy, well-treated and disease-free prey animals frozen whole (from mouse up to calf and goat kept in stock, larger sizes by pre-order, halal and kosher certified where possible) and end with human blood (rejected blood bank stock mostly, we have an arrangement), and human flesh and organs (sourced from hospitals, morgues and crematoriums, guaranteed no murder, at least not by us). “Well, I suppose that makes sense. I’m surprised we ship to them, though.”

“Oh, they don’t know we know. It’s all assumed names and secret bank accounts.” Knuckles grinned. “But Mr Trent has all our online customers identified before we ship. And for the ones who don’t have any other options, well… we let it slide.”

“I can see why you don’t want that to get out.” Ms Fedorova tapped her chin. “What does this have to do with disposing of the body? I was planning to set up a really ghoulish display in a public place somewhere, I already have some sketches.” Marketing for Evil-Mart is… well, it includes more than designing our sale flyers.

“No. We’re going to deliver them to a hero… one of the ones who owes us… and make it very clear that just because someone decides to admit he’s a villain, that doesn’t make him one of us and it doesn’t entitle him to union services,” Mr Trent said flatly. “I want to make it crystal clear to all of them that a heel turn does not mean their sins are forgiven, or that we will accept them as anything other than a very brief amusement.”

Late that night – we were all on overtime, but it couldn’t be done in daylight – we wheeled a cart down the run-down hallway of a shoddy apartment building. “This is a terrible address for a hero,” Ms Fedorova muttered. “Are we sure he lives here?”

“I deliver here a couple of times a month.” Knuckles was pushing the cart. “I’m sure.”

“Okay.” Ms Fedorova cleared her throat, coughed once or twice, and suddenly her voice was deeper and her very faint Russian accent was as thick as pea soup. “This is intimidation tactic,” she said, grinning toothily. “Do not act surprised.”

I knocked on the door, but let Knuckles do the talking. “Delivery, Mr West,” he called, using the fake name the guy had been giving.

It worked… the door was unlocked and opened almost immediately. “I scheduled the order for next – “ the mark said, and then we were pushing inside, slamming the door behind us.

“Do not be alarmed, Mr… Dinoid, is it?” Ms Fedorova said, folding her arms. “Evil-Mart is knowing all along your real identity. But you are needing to eat, and we are not turning down regular business, so we make no trouble.”

Knuckles rolled his eyes behind her back at how much she was hamming it up, but I waved a hand. Let her have her fun. So Knuckles started unloading the boxes onto the table while she talked. “First, your Budget Bunny Box. Your favourite, da?” The next box, smaller, plunked down. “Two fresh chickens, halal certified, healthy and having lived good life, gift for good customer.” Knuckles dumped the plastic tub on the floor. “And mortal remains of Superdyne, with note.”

Dinoid was staring at us, but that made him shift into a combat stance, his long claws spread. “The… Superdyne’s dead? And in there?”

“Well. Most of him. The big pieces.” Ms Fedorova shrugged an impressively Russian shrug. I hadn’t even known that was a thing, but when she did it, it was obvious. “You must understand, when a mob tears a man apart, it is hard to find every little piece.”

“I’m pretty sure Doctor Malign and the Genetic Reign took off with doggy bags,” I said, as if I hadn’t handed them over myself. “And Doctor Order probably has some of him too, by now. So looking out for clones would be a good idea, I don’t know if that’s in the note.”

Insofar as that reptilian face could show readable expressions, he looked shocked. “Why on earth would… why? He changed sides? And why did you bring him to me?”

“We know your address, we know you don’t want to turn us in because we’re the only ones who can supply your meals, and our boss wanted us to make this very clear.” I indicated the note. Since Ms Fedorova was hamming up her Sexy Russian Supervillain act, and Knuckles was very obvious Muscle, I figured it was on me to be the Reasonable One. “He might have stopped being a hero, but that didn’t make him one of us. That didn’t make him acceptable to us. Our boss wants it made very clear that your failures shouldn’t expect to be accepted by us… or even spared by us.”

He shifted slowly, the tip of his tail twitching. “I… see. I understand why you would reject Superdyne. He was notorious for killing and maiming people on… your side. But I know other defectors have been accepted. Philomel, for example.”

“Philomel was child of villains. She is young, she is rebellious, she sides with heroes for a while.” Ms Fedorova shrugged. “Is understandable, da? The young do foolish things. She comes home, all is forgiven.”

He nodded slowly. “Tenebrous?”

“That story I don’t know.” Ms Fedorova glanced at me.

I nodded. “Tenebrous was just a kid. He was twelve when Varide recruited him. Nineteen when he broke with the guy. Varide put a kid into combat, left him with massive PTSD, then ditched him when he had a breakdown and went too far. Mx Frantique at least made sure he had a safe place to stay and some therapy.”

“It’s happened a few times.” Knuckles rested his elbows on the cart’s handles, his inhumanly big, strong hands dangling. “But there’s a process. A system. If someone’s sponsored by a villain in good standing, like Frantique sponsoring Tenbrous, they can be accepted. Nobody gets to just choose to join. Especially not a smug, entitled prick like Superdyne.”

Ms Fedorova suddenly leaned forward, scowling. “And why are you called Dinoid? You are not dinosaur. You are clearly monitor lizard. Golden monitor, I think.” She reached out and prodded his arm. “And not healthy, either. Look at colouration! You do not keep environment humid enough. Are having trouble with shedding, da?”

Now we were all staring at her. “You’re a lizard expert now?” Knuckles asked.

She shrugged. “What? Is hobby. Mamma’s little Varanus Acanthurus are pride and joy. Sadly, cannot keep larger monitors in city. Is unkind.”

Dinoid ran a hand over his head slowly. “Not many people realize,” he said slowly. “That’s why I order from you guys. I used to get frozen… food… from a pet supplier, but then I got contacted by someone who told me there was another option.”

“Is good thing. Those pet suppliers, they are rogues. They do not keep animals healthy, can get diseases or mites from those things.” Ms Fedorova sniffed. “I would never buy from them. My babies would get sick.”

He actually chuckled, then, seeming to relax a bit. “You’re not wrong. After… this happened… I got really sick a couple of times before I figured out what to eat, and where to get it. And even the reputable suppliers don’t always have the healthiest stock.” He opened his mouth wide, making a gagging noise. “You have no idea how bad that ‘reptile food’ is. Eating whole animals may be a little disgusting, but it’s nothing to some of that stuff.”

“I believe it,” I said emphatically. “There’s a reason Evil-Mart has such an extensive pet-food line. The horror stories we hear from some of our customers… well, you’d believe it, I bet, but most humans just look confused.”

Knuckles nodded, and spread his hands. “People who can’t pass for regular humans… or even for people, the way most normies see it… are a lot more common on our side of the fence than yours. That’s why we delivered to you. We figured you really needed it.”

“Does he order from the pharmacy?” Ms Fedorova was around behind him now, examining his back. “He is having calcium deficiency, am betting. He needs nutritional supplement.”

“I take a nutritional supplement,” he said defensively.

“The one for normal-sized lizards is not enough for man-sized monitor/human hybrid,” she said firmly. “Check pharmacy section next time. We are having excellent selection of supplements for hybrids, and chart to tell you how much to take for body-mass.”

He looked back and forth between the three of us. “You people are… not what I would have expected from an evil supermarket.”

“We may be… morally challenged,” I said, shrugging, “but we’re not heartless.” I looked around his tiny, shabby apartment. “Unlike some of your lot. I thought you were on a team. Why are you living here?”

He ducked his head. “I couldn’t live at the base,” he said, his tail drooping. “My… I made people uncomfortable. And the stipend isn’t much.”

“Isn’t much? With the merchandising deals they have?” Ms Fedorova sounded shocked, and the accent had dropped back a lot. “I know for a fact that if the accountants ever got hold of their books they’d owe more in back taxes than… well, than Evil-Mart would if our illegal product arm ever got discovered. And we pay our taxes on the legitimate stuff scrupulously.”

Dinoid blinked rapidly, though I couldn’t tell whether he was more surprised by her suddenly dropping her act or the idea that Evil-Mart pays taxes. “You do?”

“Of course. Not under that name, of course, there’s a shell company.” She sniffed. “All villains do. Al Capone, you know. We’re not getting caught that way again.”

Knuckles and I both nodded when he looked at us, and he shook his head. “Huh. Makes sense, I guess.”

“It does.” I looked around again. The place really was crappy. “I know it’s a personal question, Mr… West, but under the circumstances I’d like to know… how much is that stipend?”

He looked down at the floor for a while, then cleared his throat. “Uh. $1100 a month.”

We all stared at him. Ms Fedorova’s mouth fell open. Knuckles looked shocked, and I was horrified. “$1100 a month?!” I asked, my voice coming out louder than I’d intended. “For risking your life on a superhero team?! I have teenaged cashiers working part-time who make more than that!”

He looked almost as startled as we did. “For working a cash register?!”

“Evil-Mart pays pretty good.” Knuckles shrugged. “But that stipend is disgusting.”

“You are being exploited,” Ms Fedorova said, sounding really aghast. “That is terrible. Why, baseline henchman pay is twice that, and there are danger bonuses and…” Her voice dropped suddenly. “You don’t have a union, do you?”

“A union? Of course we don’t have a…” He trailed off. “You mean you do?”

“Of course we do. An extremely well-armed one.” Ms Fedorova folded her arms. “Henchmen And Allied Industries has represented us for generations. The last time a supervillain executed a union henchman for failure, he was boiled in oil… literally. On camera. Oh, of course some of the less reputable villains just pick up small-time trash from the streets, untrained rabble from the gangs and so on, so they can treat them as disposable, but we union members are skilled workers, with rights and protections. I bet you don’t even get overtime.”

“Of course not. Crime happens when it happens, and we have to…” He trailed off. “You guys get overtime?”

“We’re getting double time and a half for this conversation. And an extra day off.”

His eyes widened again. “Really? Wow, that’s… even when I was working a regular job, before this, I didn’t get pay like that.” He looked down at his hands and bared his teeth in what looked like an unhappy expression. “And now I can’t work anything but this kind of job. People don’t like having a scary dinosaur in their restaurant.”

There was a long pause.

“You can cook?” Ms Fedorova asked carefully.

“Yeah. I worked in my parents’ restaurant before… this.” He gestured at himself. “They were killed when we were attacked, and I was… changed.”

We all looked at each other. “After you’ve returned Superdyne’s remains to whoever you consider appropriate,” I said, grabbing a notepad and scribbling down my number, “I’d like you to give me a call. Evil-Mart is always hiring in the bakery and deli, and I mean always. Most bad guys aren’t great cooks. We don’t know why, it just seems to be one of those things.”

“You want me to join the bad guys?”

“I want you to work in a bakery. Villains and henchmen need to eat, and so do their families. Nobody’s going to ask you to rip superheroes in half, just maybe make a sandwich that won’t give anyone food poisoning.”

“That’s a regular concern?”

“Six months ago the three of us ran Evil-Mart’s physical store completely unassisted for most of a day because the only people who weren’t down with food poisoning were the ones who’d had the vegetarian and kosher meals.” I shuddered at the recollection. “Trust me. Someone who can cater staff functions without a major disaster would never have to live in an apartment like this working for us.”

“And we get full benefits, including dental.” Knuckles was shaking his head. “I bet you don’t even get hospital.”

“What hospital would take me? I always figured I’d go to the zoo and talk to the vet if – “

Ms Fedorova actually put her arms around him. “You,” she told him firmly, “are going to resign your terrible exploitative job, and then I will personally sponsor you to the union immediately. I have a spare room. You will like it. Humidity and temperature can be set just how you like, and Mamma Yelena will take you to real doctor expert in health of hybrids.”

“Those exist?” he asked, sounding a bit overwhelmed.

“Yeah, the Genetic Reign has like three of them,” I said sympathetically. “Listen, you can take some time to think it over, but you don’t have to put up with this kind of exploitation just because you don’t look human. Nearly a third of Evil-Mart’s staff can’t pass, and they’re treated just like everyone else.”

Superdyne’s dramatic demise got a lot of news coverage. Apparently it came as a real shock to the ‘good guys’ that there were some monsters even the superest villains wouldn’t embrace.

Dinoid no longer exists. Ismail Jameel works at Evil-Mart, and has expanded our fresh food lines a lot already. He’s a nice guy, and after Ms Fedorova told everyone how disgustingly he’d been exploited by those so-called ‘heroes’, he was welcomed with open arms. Literally, in at least one case – he’s dating someone from the warehouse, I’ve heard, though I don’t know who. He says we should rename the store, because we suck at being evil.

But evil is a really relative term. It can mean the blackest depravity, or a moment of viciousness, or even just ‘people on the other side’. Evil-Mart is called that because everyone, at least everyone on our side, is welcome. Plus, we all think it’s funny that the least-evil megacorporation is called ‘Evil-Mart’. What can we say? Bad guys have a sense of humour too.

Have an evil day!

#welcome to Evil Mart #good is not just good #evil is not just evil #people are complicated #and so is retail #tw graphic #tw gore #tw violence #tw murder #it's a supervillain story #supervillain shit happens #you are now warned

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whimsicallyreading · 3 years

Text

You Don’t Even Go Here

Day Two for Rowaelin Month

A college AU

Aelin grins mischievously as she walks up the stairs of the men's dorm at Terresan University. The teal-blue waffle iron clutched under her arm.

Aedion didn't really need it. It had been on the fifty-percent-off rack at the supermarket, and he'd simply thrown it in the cart for good measure. Yet, when Aelin saw the box for it laying the hall, she'd seen opportunity.

It had hit her harder than she'd thought. Aedion leaving. They'd been raised like siblings but grew up something closer to best friends. It wasn't fair that he was nearly three years older and ready to leave when she wasn't prepared for him to go.

Aelin had cried the whole car ride home. Then when they finally got back to the house, she'd called him right away. He could hear how teary she was and happily obliged her call. Narrating his actions as he went about setting up his dorm room. He teased her about missing him, but she could tell that he missed her too.

So, armed with an excuse to visit him, Aelin made the hour-long drive to visit her cousin.

Aelin was halfway up the stairs but not paying too much attention to her surroundings. She was too busy repeating Aedion's room number over in her head because no matter how many times she checked her phone, it just wouldn't stick in her head. Maybe if she'd focused a little more on the things happening around her, she wouldn't have crashed into a half-naked man.

A solid and calloused hand darts out and grips her shoulder before she can go tumbling down the stairs. Its twin desperately clutching the towel wrapped around his waist.

Aelin looks up apologetically, and her jaw nearly falls to the floor. His white hair was still damp from the shower and swooped over the top of his head, and his biceps were too large for Aelin to wrap both hands around. An intricate tattoo coils elegantly from a cheekbone and down the length of his body.

He was a man indeed. Nothing like Chaol or Dorian or any of her junior friends. This was a new breed of man. The apex kind. Aelin is pretty sure she looks like a deer in the headlights, and she's too busy ogling him to understand the words he'd been repeating to her.

"Are you okay?" His eyebrows are furrowed as if he's afraid he'd literally struck her stupid. Aelin felt that wasn't far from the truth.

"Yes, sorry," she apologizes as she steps back, suddenly very aware of how in his personal space she was. "I wasn't paying attention. You just caught me by surprise."

Aelin was definitely panicking. Where was her swagger when she needed it most? Why would it choose now to abandon her?

By some miracle, he doesn't seem off-put by her awkwardness. In fact, a smile curls the edges of his lips, revealing a set of dimples that made her heart stumble.

Gods he had dimples.

"No, I ran into you. It's my fault. My name is Rowan.”

He holds out a hand, and Aelin shakes it clumsily. "I'm Aelin."

"Aelin." She loves the way her name rolls off his tongue. "I haven't seen you around before. Are you a freshman?"

Oh no. Aelin's eyes widen, but she recovers swiftly and smooths her features out. Rowan thinks she's a student. Not some crazy high schooler too emotionally dependent on her cousin.

"I'm actually a junior," Aelin laughs at his perplexed expression. "I don't go here, though. I'm just stopping by to drop off some things my cousin forgot."

White lies. What was a white lie worth? Aelin likely wouldn't ever see him again, and is it so wrong for a girl to enjoy some harmless attention? If Aelin spent more time thinking about it, she probably wouldn't like the answers she'd come up with, but that was neither here nor there.

"Is that a waffle maker?" Rowan's green eyes glint with amusement.

"My cousin loves to eat. What year are you?" Aelin crosses her fingers that he's the same age as Aedion and not a senior or something. Her cousin would murder her if he found out she flirted with a man five years older.

"Don't we all? I'm a sophomore, a bit younger than you, I suppose." Rowan drags a hand through his hair. "Listen, I know you came to see your cousin, but maybe I could get your number, and we could get a cup of coffee before you head out?"

Was this really happening? Aelin inwardly squealed with excitement. Lysandra would die when she recounted this story later. "Sure."

Just as she pulled her phone from her pocket, an all too familiar voice materialized behind her. "Aelin?"

Aedion smiles as he lays eyes on his beloved cousin. He takes a couple steps down the stairs, and that grin quickly fades as he sees the naked man.

Oops, she'd forgotten that detail.

"Rowan?" Aedion's eyes harden as they lock on Rowan. "Why the hell are you ogling my cousin with no clothes on?"

"You know him?" Aelin swears under her breath. She cannot believe her luck.

Aedion laughs coldly as he sizes up Rowan, "He's my roommate, but he's about to be a corpse. Why are you perving on my seventeen-year-old cousin?"

Rowan's looks between the bewildered. "You said you were a junior?"

Aedion laughs harshly as Aelin blushes. "I am...just in highschool. Not college. I told you I didn't go here."

"I didn't realize I was rooming with a pedophile," Aedion grabs Aelin and pulls her to his chest. "Was he bothering you?"

"Pedophile?" Rowan's dimples have disappeared, and he looks at Aedion disturbed. "I'm only nineteen!"

Aelin shoves away from Aedion's boorish grip. "The only one bothering me is you."

Rowan's cheeks are flushed red as the full impact of the situation they were found in dawns on him. Damn it if Aelin didn't find his blush endearing. He is a solid chunk of muscle. How is everything he does so cute?

"Look, I just got out of the shower, and I bumped into Aelin. It was an accident. She was just on her way to give you your waffle maker-"

"You brought my waffle maker?" Aedion cuts Rowan off, eyeing the box under her arm.

That's when Aelin sees it. The twinkle of mischief in his eye and the forced concern. Aedion was playing her. He obviously knew Rowan wasn't a creep and saw the perfect opportunity to cause chaos. Aelin scowls at him, and that spark grows brighter. It's moments like this she wonders why she ever missed her cousin in the first place.

Aedion tugs the box out of her grasp and smiles. "Wow. This is perfect timing. Vaughn and Fen were just talking about making breakfast for dinner." He looks at Aelin and forces a frown. "If I'd known you were coming, I would have invited you, but it would kind of be rude to bring a guest now."

"What?" Aelin sputters. She drove all this way, and he was really going to ditch her? It was embarrassing, but tears prickled at the edges of her eyes. He was an ass, but she obviously came because she missed him, and he didn't even care? She really thought they were closer than that.

"Yeah. Sorry, Lin." Aedion points at Rowan, who was just standing to the side, thoroughly uncomfortable. Yet, despite the awkwardness, he hadn't left. "Hey, you owe me one for creeping on my little cousin. Earn my trust back and see that she has something for dinner and gets to her car safely? She has my phone number, one bad text, and your ass is grass."

Aedion tosses her a wink, and it's all Aelin can do to keep from outright gaping. Rowan looks stunned, his eyes darting between the two Ashryvver's. They settle on Aelin for a moment too long. Some of the tension eases from his shoulders, and he smiles. "I think I can manage that."

"Good." Aedion turns back up the stairs pats the box. "Thanks for bringing it to me, Lin. I'll call you tomorrow, don't send me to voicemail."

Just like that, her cousin, a walking, talking agent-of-chaos, disappears back to wherever he came from.

"So," Rowan starts, "If you want, I know a perfect Italian place we could swing by, my treat seeing as I plowed into you."

Aelin frowns and fiddles with the end of her necklace. "You aren't upset that I lied?"

"You didn't lie." Rowan chuckles, a deep sound that sends a shiver of delight down Aelin's spine. "You don't go here."

Aelin tilts her head as if she's deeply considering the offer. "I suppose it couldn't hurt. What's good there?"

"They have an awesome kabob." Rowan tugs his towel tighter. "It's my favorite."

It's Aelin's turn to laugh. "Isn't that just meat on a stick?"

"Let's go, and I can show you how profoundly wrong you are," he moves to take a step down, but Aelin stops him with a hand to the shoulder. "What is it?"

Aelin points to his towel, "I don't think they will serve guests without pants."

The flush that Aelin loves his back full force as he scrambles the other direction up the stairs. "Shit. Give me five minutes. I'll be right back. Aedion better have not locked out or I swear-"

Rowan's embarrassed tirade quiets as he charges up to his dorm to change. Aelin smiling as he goes. She can't believe she's going out to dinner with a guy like that.

Opening her phone, she sends a quick heart emoji to her cousin. He instantly replies back with one of his own. Aedion may have moved to college, but he still had her back at the end of the day. Even if it wasn't in the most ideal way.

Rowan comes back down the stairs moments later, and she's not disappointed by what she sees. He took the time to put on a flannel shirt and comb some gel through his hair. While the view without clothes had been pleasant, Aelin could definitely appreciate this look too.

"I'm ready if you are," Rowan extends an arm to help her down the stairs.

It's such a fussy, old-man move, and she loves it.

"Let's go."

#rowaelinmonth #rowaelin month #throne of glass #rowaelin #fanfic #rowan whitethorn #aelin galathynius #tog #fluff #college au #day two

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kindapinkskies · 4 years

Text

i know | jj maybank

hellooooo i've risen from the dead and its with a fic about outer banks... i've fallen in love with jj... thats my baby

this was supposed to be a 5+1 concept and it still kinda is but i got really really carried away. as my new friend @captainpogue calls it the too much gene. so buckle up and grab a snack this is 21k words lmaoooo i hope you enjoy

i love you already

warnings: nothing more than what is mentioned in the show

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You were laying on your stomach, on your bed, flipping through a book. It didn’t have your full attention as your mind was elsewhere. Music filtered in through your headphones but you weren’t really listening to it, either. It was almost dark outside and with the power still out, the few candles lit in your room did little to help you focus on the words in front of you.

It was also extremely hot. You were sweating just laying there. Your shirt was stuck to you and your shorts felt uncomfortable even if they were cloth sleeping shorts. Letting out a frustrated groan, you drop your head down to the book but immediately wince when you feel it get stuck to your forehead. You have to slowly lift your head and peel the page off with your fingers. Gross.

Moving the book, you lay your head down again and just try to breathe. The events of the day are finally catching up to you, making you a bit tired. Your mind is racing as the memories flash through like a movie playing behind your eyelids. Walking down the street and hearing a distressed, “Just shut up, Pope!” You recognized the voice like it was your own and rushed across the street where you came face to face with your group. JJ had looked at you, guilt shining in his eyes as he looked back at Shoupe, “Yeah, it was all me.”

A distressed sigh -one that matched the one you let out as you helplessly watched JJ get pushed into the back of the cop car- leaves your body in a rush and it makes your bed bounce just a little with the force of it. Kiara had moved up to you as you watched Pope let out a scream and storm off, his dad following him angrily with the hat Pope had thrown to the ground. She explained what she knew and all you could do was close your eyes and let out a breath. You knew JJ getting arrested, again, wouldn’t be good for him. He’s seventeen now, still a minor, but he’s so close to being tried as an adult and that scares you.

“Hey, you want to go to the police station, see if we can do something?” Kie had offered when she noticed that you’d done nothing but stare off in the direction the cop car had gone.

“No, his dad will most likely show up.” you stated and winced at your own words. “I’m just going to go home. I’d say text me but you know, towers are down. And my phone might even be dead with the whole no power thing.”

Kie laughed at your tone and it pulled a laugh out of you as well.

Rolling onto your back, you cover your face with your hands and try really hard to keep your frustrations at bay. You know JJ didn’t do shit this time around. You know what he’s covering for and why he’s doing it but god damn it you wished he had a little bit more common sense sometimes. You wish he wouldn’t put others before himself sometimes, even though that wasn’t in his nature. You wish he didn’t have such a temper sometimes, or the need to prove himself, because then that’d help him stay under the radar a bit easier. But you knew that JJ would never lose those parts of himself, that’s just who he was. Someone who cared about others too much because he didn’t want them to feel what he’s felt his whole life but had a temper like no other.

The temper is something you’ve tried working on with him for as long as you’ve known him. Since the first time you saw him lose it at the age of twelve. It was an unhealthy coping mechanism, to fly off the handles as soon as someone upset him enough. You guessed it was because he knew nothing else. Growing up around that kind of behavior, it just kind of sticks. He tries though, tries to keep it under control for as long as possible though, hating that he gets so angry so easily but people just make him so mad. You’ve told him that he gets that way because he bottles up everything he’s feeling when he’s feeling it and it just keeps building until he snaps. And when he snaps, it’s because he filled himself up with so much rage it has nowhere else to go than through his fists, or yelling, or apparently holding someone at gunpoint.

Tears of frustration for JJ start to build behind your eyelids and your nose starts to tingle but you just can’t help it. JJ doesn’t deserve the things he’s been put through, he really doesn’t. He’s a good person. He has good intentions behind most of the crazy shit he does. It’s just that he doesn’t think of the consequences before he goes through with his impulses. His snap judgement choices weigh out any other rational thought in his head.

Like he clearly didn’t think of what would happen to him when taking the blame for a felony charge and you really hope he’s okay. You kinda hope his dad didn’t show up to get him from the police station and that he’s still there because you know the outcome of the scenario. You’ve been on the comforting end of those scenarios more often than not and each time it breaks your heart. To see the boy cut up and bruised by the hand of his own father. He brushes it off every time, ‘It’s nothing I can’t handle’ but you see the pain there. The shine in his eyes and the deep breaths to keep himself from crying. You see it. Every. Time.

You can only hope that today won’t be one of those days where JJ will be littered with dark bruises and deep cuts. Your heart hammers in your chest at the thought of JJ not even making it out of his house today. That’s he’s too hurt to move and that makes a breath stutter out of you in the force of a sob. You press the heels of your hands harder to your closed eyelids in hopes to stop the tears from falling when you feel a weight drop down around your legs. You let out a yelp as your eyes fly open and you sit up in the process.

JJ stands there, at the end of your bed, with his hands on either side of your knees. Your heart nearly drops to your toes when you take in his appearance. Your hopes of him coming out of today unscathed were just that, hopes. The left side of his face is nearly purple, there’s cuts on his eyebrow, cheek, jaw, and a few around his neck line. His eyes are red rimmed and the tip of his nose is just as red. Jaw clenched and breathing ragged, you can tell he’s doing everything he can to hold back his tears. Some have already fallen, you know that, but that was when he was alone. Now he’s trying to act like everything’s fine when you know it’s not. When you both know it’s not.

“JJ,” you breathe out, removing your headphones and tossing your phone to the floor. His face crumples at your voice and you’re a bit relieved. He’s not going to hide how he feels and that just makes you whisper his name again, “JJ.”

That’s all it takes before JJ removes his backpack and climbs up the length of your body, pushing you to lay back down as he settles on top of you. He shakes against you as you wrap yourself around him. One hand goes up the back of his shirt and the other knocks off his hat so you can run your fingers through his hair. He lets out a shaky breath against your neck and then he’s crying. He shoves his face into your neck and you move a little to the side to let him get more comfortable, wanting to give him all the comfort in the world.

“Shh, it’s okay. You’re okay. You’re safe.” You repeat the words over and over again, hoping that they’ll sink in and bounce around in his head so he’ll believe them. “I was so worried about you. That’s why I was crying when you showed up. You worry me, JJ. You always do.”

He starts to settle down after that and you let out a breath, moving one of your hands to quickly remove the tears from your own cheeks before moving back to running your fingers through his hair. “It’s not a bad thing that you worry me. I only worry because I care about you. I care about you more than I care about anyone else.”

Stuttering breaths still fan over the skin of your neck and you just continue to run your hands over him. Your hand on his back is lightly scratching at the skin there, your fingernails leaving a trail of goosebumps. Your other hand is playing with the strands of his hair, untangling them and smoothing them over. “You’ll be okay, JJ.”

When you feel him nod, you know you got him back down to earth. “I’ll be okay.”

“Okay then, let’s go check out those cuts.”

You both get off the bed, JJ focusing too hard on the ground but nonetheless let’s you take his hand and guide him down the hall and into the bathroom. Once he’s seated, on the closed lid of the toilet, you move in between his legs to get close enough to inspect his face. His hands trail up the backs of your legs and wrap around your thighs. It’s a subconscious move on his part, it always is when you’re in this position. For some reason it brings him comfort, it grounds him, keeps him aware that you’re there and in front of him. His thumbs trace up and down on the outsides of your thighs as he tilts his head back for you.

You clean up the dry blood around his eyebrow, cheek, and lip. He hisses at the pressure to get it all off and whines when you clean the cuts with an antiseptic. You apologize by placing delicate kisses over the broken skin. A sigh escapes through his parted lips and his hands move up to the point where his fingers graze the bottom of your shorts.

“Hi, baby,” you whisper against his lips, ghosting yours over his to try and soothe the sting out of the cut. You’re not too sure how good it works but JJ relaxes a bit more under your touch.

A small smile pulls at JJ’s lips as his eyes meet yours, “Hi, baby,” he echoes and his lips brush against yours.

Running your fingers through his hair, you tug a little at the strands and his eyes fall closed once again. You take the opportunity to run your fingers carefully over the bruises littering his delicate skin. There’s nothing you wish for more than for your fingertips to magically heal the darkened, painful, skin of his face.

Another sigh leaves through his parted lips and this time he sounds a bit watery. You grab onto his face with both hands and push your thumbs up under his closed eyelids to see if tears will leak through. And when they do, you swipe them away. “I owe 30 grand in restitution for sinking the boat. My dad didn’t like that.”

The question of what happened would always sit there on the tip of your tongue but you always knew what happened so you would never ask. It was always the same, it was just the reason that changed. And JJ would tell you it every time, once he calmed enough to talk about it.

“You didn’t do it, JJ.”

JJ sighs, “Yeah, I know. But Pope doesn’t deserve that charge. He has so much to look forward to. A way to get out of here and I couldn’t let him throw that away.”

Your hands move his face to a position that when he opens his eyes, he’ll be looking right at you. He knows that so he does and when he does, tears slide down his cheeks before your thumbs have a chance to stop them. “Yeah, but what about you?”

“We all know where I come from. There’s no way I’ll ever be more than that.”

“Don’t-“

He cuts you off, “No, it’s true. Look at me? Look at the shit I’m in. I have nothing going for me. I have nothing to lose. I might as well start now, the life I’m destined to live.”

Your nose starts to tingle once again, the tears resurfacing, “JJ, stop.”

“What?” he scoffs, “You want me to stop telling the truth? When will you realize that I’m correct? That I’m not good for anyone.”

“You’re nothing like him, JJ. You never have been and that’s something you need to realize.” You tug on his hair again, to make sure you have his attention. “The way you care about those you love. I mean, today was a bit reckless but you protected your friend. You protect the entire friend group. You’d never hurt anyone just for the hell of it, just because you felt like it, that’s not you, JJ. “

Looking him in the eyes, you try your best to convey the severity of your words, “You say you have nothing to lose but you do. You have me for one, then there's John B, Kie, Pope. If you keep doing reckless shit you’ll lose us. We need you JJ, you’re the biggest support system in our little group.”

JJ doesn’t say anything, just closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. He taps on your thigh, signaling for you to move and when you do he just walks out of the bathroom. You let out a sigh and drop your head, leaving it to hang for a few moments while you steady your breathing to make sure you don’t cry. Everything you said was true and you wished he believed it. The group is full of strong personalities but JJ is the one that keeps everyone a bit sane. He stops people from bickering, he keeps the mood light when it gets to be heavy, he listens to everyone so intently that he knows every detail about anyone. He’s the first to speak up when others are talking down to your group, he's the first to throw a punch in defense. He’s the one, specifically, that brings light to your life every day.

You clean up the bathroom slowly, distracting yourself so you don’t cry. Now is not the time to be emotional, not when JJ’s headspace is so low. This isn’t the first time this has happened and you know it won’t be the last. The amount of self loathing that boy has for himself will stick around no matter what people tell him. It gets better at times but his dad has a way of making it come to the forefront of his brain more often than not.

It’s about fifteen minutes later, stalling as much as possible, before you make your way back to your room. You have a glass of water and some pain killers now because you know that JJ didn’t leave, that he wouldn’t leave. He never does.

“Here,” you murmur, handing over the glass and two pills. “Lay down and go to sleep.”

He has his shirt off and he watches as you move around the room. His gaze is heavy and it makes you feel even warmer than you’re already feeling. You pick up things around the room, dirty clothes, cups, pieces of trash, anything to keep you busy. It’s not something you want to do but you also want to give JJ some space. You won’t admit it but it upsets you every time he starts talking like that and you know he knows that. He always lasts about 13 minutes before he breaks down.

And right on the dot, as you have an armful of dirty clothes to drop in the hamper, he speaks up. “Will you come lay down?”

“I’m going to take a shower. I feel gross.”

JJ lets out a tired sigh, “I’ve calmed down, please come here.”

“I feel gross,” you argue. He may have calmed down but you’re still hurt at his words. You know he doesn’t do it on purpose but it hurts to know that he believes he’s not worth anything, that he’s not afraid of losing you or anyone else that cares about him.

“There’s no point in showering, if I’m not going to shower and we end up pressed against each other anyway. We’ll be sweaty regardless.” He reasons, his voice on the verge of despair and you know that he needs you close right now. That he needs the comfort he seeks. “Please?”

Your heart softens at the tone of his voice and you cave. Dropping the clothes into the hamper you shuffle over to the empty side of your bed. JJ turns his back to you and you settle in behind him, shoving one arm under his neck and wrapping the other one around his waist. You pull him close to you, both palms flat against his chest, molding your body against his. JJ brings a hand to the top of yours and laces his fingers with yours. He lets out a stuttering breath when you place your lips to the back of his neck.

“I have one thing to lose,” he breathes out, “and it’s you.” You press another kiss to the back of his neck before digging your nose to the skin there. “I love you, you know”

“Yeah, I know.” You squeeze his hand and he squeezes back. “I love you, you know.”

JJ sighs and relaxes completely, like he’d been waiting for you to say those exact words, “I know.”

He falls asleep a few minutes later.

It’s about three days later when you’re walking down the street when you notice a familiar looking jeep coming towards you. Your hopes for it to just keep driving die before they’re fully even there because it stops next to you, making you stumble a bit at the closeness.

“Pogue.”

“Topper.” you sigh, stepping up to his driver window. “I have a name.”

“Yeah, but I don’t really care.” He looks you up and down before smirking, “But I could.”

You roll your eyes, “Hm, in your dreams. What do you want?”

“Just wanted to see how your little group of Pogues are doing with your precious Pope in the slammer?” He raises an eyebrow in question.

You cross your arms over your chest and step closer. You’re not above fighting. You know how to, you were taught how to fight correctly, your dad teaching you at a young age. He felt the need to, with where you live and the stability you have in such an area.

“Yeah, see, JJ was the one that ended up there.”

Topper’s face falls and his skin turns a bit pale at your words. He won’t ever admit it, but you know that he’s secretly scared of JJ. Him and his friends, they all are. Never once have you seen them go to him one on one. They always have 2 or more and it always fills you with pride because JJ does know how to fight but it’s never fair because he’s just one and they gang up on him.

“Why?” he questions.

“Well, Top, that’s because he’s a good person. Unlike you.” you sneer, not backing down. He’s bigger than you, probably stronger than you but you’re not scared of him. You never have been.

“I didn’t want to press the charges, it wasn’t me!” His cocky demeanor falls quickly at the newfound information and it makes you laugh. “It was my mom, I swear.”

“Right, so you couldn’t have stopped her? Couldn’t have done anything when you know the reason it was done in the first place was because you jumped someone who was just trying to do their job. Someone who works for their money. Does someone working to keep themselves afloat scare you? What is it! Huh? You don’t like it?” You can’t help yourself. The force in which your voice is coming out startles you just as much as it does Topper.

“Oh please,” Topper scoffs, rolling his eyes in the process, “don’t act like they’re all innocent. I had a gun held to my head.”

“Yeah, true, but you were about to kill one of our friends! You’re no better than any of us. Oh! And should I mention how you almost killed another one the other night at the outdoor movie? Should I bring that up to someone? Hm? Maybe your mom or maybe the police?” You tilt your head to the side, taunting him a bit.

“Like anyone would believe someone like you,” Topper laughs.

You laugh right back, “Do you forget that I’m actually right under you, status wise? That my family just chooses to live where we do because we’re not a bunch of prissy snobs. People would believe me.”

“Do your Pogues know about you?”

“Of course they do. Do you think that me having money changes anything?” You question, rolling your eyes. “Actually, this conversation is going nowhere. I’m done. I have somewhere I need to be.”

When you step back and start walking, Topper gets out and follows you. “Come back here!”

“For what! What do you want?”

“You need to be knocked down a peg or two. Remind you where you are and who you hang out with,” He steps up to you, trying to seem threatening.

You look up at him bored, “Okay, Topper. Why don’t you get back in your car and drive away. Go do some drugs or beat up on someone working.”

He grabs at your arm and pulls you chest to chest with him, getting in your face in the process. “You don’t know me!”

“And I don’t want to. Now, let me go.”

When you fight against his grip he just holds on tighter. You wince and you know it’ll bruise, “I’m not above hitting a girl. Especially when she’s asking for it.”

“Do it, I dare you.” you challenge, stepping up to nearly pressing your nose to his. You’re not too sure how you didn’t see it coming, probably because you were really challenging him. But he didn’t seem to think the same thing because he surges forward to press his lips to yours. You back away as far as possible but his grip on you doesn’t let you go far and his lips make contact with yours. “Get off of me!”

You stomp on his foot and knee him in the stomach and that gets him to let go. “You bitch!” he grumbles out and reaches for your leg, pulling it out from under you. You land on the ground with a groan and kick at him when he grabs your ankle and bends down to punch you across the face, “Fucking stop!”

“You’re the one that grabbed me, now let go!” You kick at him again and get him in the groin this time. And when he bends over you get enough momentum to deliver a punch to the side of his face. He lands on his side and you push him around until he’s on his back and punch him again before standing up. You stick your boot up under his chin and step on his neck just enough to make it harder for him to breathe. “Don’t ever fucking touch me again.”

“You bitch!” He exclaims again, trying to lunge up at you again but when it doesn’t work he scratches down your leg, cutting into the skin. You push into his neck more when he doesn’t stop. “You do belong with the Pogues.”

“I know,” you smirk, leaning down. “You get your mom to drop the charges against JJ and I’ll make sure he doesn’t come after you for what you just pulled.”

“You think I’m scared of him!” He yells out, choking a bit when your foot slips against his movement.

“I know that you are. And after he finds out it was you that did this to me, it’ll be a whole other type of anger from him.” you whisper, shoving against his throat again. “Drop the charges and I’ll keep him away from you, for this.”

Topper gasps and starts to grab at your ankle but you don’t move it and you won’t move it until he agrees. It only takes a few seconds before he caves, “Okay! Okay, I’ll do it!”

“Good,” you smile, pulling back a little and a gasping breath echoes loudly between the two of you. “Do it now.”

Topper groans and tries to fight you once again, punching at your thigh this time around and it makes you stumble back but not enough because you slam your foot down on his chest, knocking the wind out of him. “Do it now.”

He lets out a breath and fumbles around in his pocket before his phone is presented and he puts it to his ear. “On speaker.”

Once Topper hangs up the phone, after spitting out some bullshit excuse, his mom agrees. She sounds reluctant but she agrees nonetheless. Topper punches you in the thigh once again, this time harder, losing your balance and hitting the ground once more. He kicks at you, foot coming in contact with your lower back after you turned away from him.

“You won’t ever do that to me again, you hear me?” Topper yells, standing up above you.

You laugh and turn over onto your back, “What? Your ego hurt after being held down by a girl.” His face turns red and you can tell he’s trying his hardest not to kick you again. It just makes you laugh more as you stand up to your full height once more. “Don’t let the charges being dropped fall through. If they do? I won’t have any control over what happens.”

You start to walk away and another laugh escapes when you hear Topper, from behind you, let out a frustrated scream before his car door slams and he speeds away. He’s too easy. Messing with him is one of your favorite things to do, even if it ends up with you limping a bit and blood trickling down your leg.

When you reach your destination, The Chateau as always, you’re relieved to only see Kie at the dock you’re all supposed to be meeting at. You initially thought you’d be the last one to show up, your run in with Topper added at least 20 extra minutes to your journey, but you’re glad it doesn’t seem that way. Kie looks up when a branch snaps under your foot and you can see a smile outlining her face when she spots you but it quickly turns into a frown when she sees the state you’re in.

“What the hell happened to you?” she screeches, meeting you halfway.

You look around the property, in search of a certain blonde boy because you absolutely had no idea how you were going to explain this to him. JJ was absolutely going to lose it once he saw you and he absolutely isn’t going to let it go until he knows the truth. You thought about lying to him but he knows you better than he knows himself and he’d see through the lie before it would even have a chance to leave your mouth.

“Where are the guys? I thought I’d be late.”

Kie gives you an unimpressed look at your obvious avoidance of the subject, “I don’t know, something about Figure 8 and Sarah Cameron. That’s all I heard on the phone call.”

You nod, not really caring where they are in the slightest, “Cool. Now will you help me clean up a bit. It doesn’t feel as bad as it looks, I promise.”

She runs her eyes down your whole body before meeting your eyes, “That’s a lie. Do you not feel the blood actively running down your leg?”

Looking down, your eyes widen at just how much blood is covering your leg. “Shit,” you mutter, pressing a palm to your forehead.

“What happened?”

“I ran into Topper,” you sigh, the adrenaline quickly leaving your body now that you’re standing still.

Kiara gasps loudly, “By yourself!”

“Yes,” you groan, not really seeing the big deal. “He looks worse.”

Kie looks like she doesn’t believe you and she’s clearly about to question you when the van pulls up and JJ loudly gets out, yelling out to you both, “Yo, guys, someone beat the shit out of Topper and it wasn’t even us!”

He clearly hasn’t taken in the sight of you yet but you turn your attention back to Kie and you can’t help but smirk at the shocked expression on her face. “JJ’s going to lose his shit in about 2 seconds.”

And just as Kiara closes her mouth, JJ’s voice nearly echoes through the trees, “What in the fuck!” You wince at his tone and just how loud it is.

He was still behind you, you purposely kept your eyes locked on Kiara so you don’t have to face him just yet. But that’s clearly not going to stand because JJ steps in front of you, effectively pushing Kie out of the way. “Who did this?”

“I fell?” You raise your voice as if asking a question, scrunching your face up into your shoulders. The deadpan look on your boyfriend's face makes you let out a sigh and drop your shoulders. “I’d like to say for you to see the other guy but you already have.”

Pope’s voice cuts in before JJ even has a chance to process your words, “You did that to Topper!” He sounds impressed and a big smile pulls at your lips as you turn your head to look at him.

“Holy shit,” John B exhales staring at you in complete awe. “He was fucked up.”

A laugh bubbles past your lips and your cheeks heat up at the attention you’re receiving. The admiration on the two boys' faces almost makes you forget about the other boy in your presence. The one that’s been awfully quiet. You turn back to him and the look on his face makes you frown. His pupils are blown and his jaw is clenched so tight you’re positive his teeth hurt. His focus is dead set on the base of your throat.

Waving your hand in front of his face, you snap your fingers as well, trying to bring him back to you, “Earth to JJ. Come back to me.”

“Topper did this to you?” he asks and when you nod, something flashes in his eyes so quick you find yourself trying to chase it. Figure out what’s going through his head. “I’m going to kill him.”

You’re stunned at the way his voice sounds, deep and raspy, filled with so much hatred. You’re almost positive his voice has never been so low before and it sends chills down your spine. You blink at him but when you open your eyes he’s not in front of you anymore. He’s only a few steps away but you can’t really move as the pain in your leg finally settled in.

“JJ,” you cry out, half out of pain and half to get his attention. “Don’t do anything! Come back here.”

You swivel in your spot and watch him as he continues to stomp into the house. A few things crash around before he comes back out, shoving what you assume is the gun into the back of his pants. “JB, give me the keys.”

“No, don’t give them to him!” You yell out. You need to get his attention.

“What are you thinking? Do you really think I’m just going to sit here and do nothing when that piece of shit put his hands on you?” JJ shouts, standing a few feet away from you now.

Pope comes up behind JJ and puts both hands to his shoulder, “Calm down, man,” he says but JJ roughly shrugs his shoulder and pushes Pope off of him. He puts his hands up in surrender but stays close. “You can’t just go pull a gun out on him and kill him.” He reasons.

“Oh yeah?” He challenges. “Watch me.”

“JJ, stop it,” Kie cries out now.

“Yeah man, you saw what Topper looked like. You should be happy that she’s the one who did it.” John B points out, gesturing to you and JJ follows the movement of his hand and he looks to you again.

He looks at you with his brows furrowed, a storm swirling around in his eyes as he stares you down. The eye contact isn’t something you normally back down from but the intensity in his eyes right now throws you off. It feels like you’re being chastised. You know he’s trying to figure out why you fought Topper. He knows that you don’t just out right fight someone, even if they start it first. He knows that the only time you ever fight is in self defense or to defend someone you care about.

“What did you do?” JJ asks because he knows you did this for a reason. Something more than just for yourself because you don’t personally care for Topper, you’d never give him the time of day and that includes fighting him. “Why’d you fight him?”

“Well,” you shrug, looking down to your feet. Your leg was still bleeding. You should probably do something about that. “He made me mad.”

JJ scoffs, “Your temper is not as bad as mine. There’s more to it. Tell me, now, or I will go kill him.”

You hesitate some more, fixated on your feet and the way they look in your boots. They’re a bit scuffed but they still look good. You focus on that and not the four sets of eyes burning into your frame. Telling them, telling JJ why you fought would result in JJ feeling like shit. You really don’t want him to feel like shit because you did what you did to help him. But he’ll feel like shit because you got hurt and you got hurt on his behalf. There’s nothing he hates more than someone standing up for him and getting hurt because of it.

“Today, please.” JJ snaps and you look up at him to see the anger plastered on his face.

“I was walking here when he pulled up beside me. He wanted to taunt me about Pope being in jail for the whole boat thing and I told him that it was you that took the blame for it. He tried arguing with me but when I started to walk away he grabbed me,” you take a breath when you see JJ step forward like he’s ready to protect you from the words you’re about to say. “And well, when I was challenging him to hit me he kissed me but I -“

“He did what now?” JJ cuts in, his voice so deep and slow your eyes widen at him. Kiara and Pope’s jaw drops at the same time and John B looks taken aback at the way his best friend sounds. Never have they ever heard him sound so angry. You’ve never even heard him so angry before.

Everyone, but you and JJ, glances at each other in confusion but you don’t even dare to look away from JJ. They don’t know what’s going on or why JJ would get so mad at the idea of someone else kissing you. Kiara had a suspicion long ago that the two of you were dating but you shot it down even though she was right. That was almost a year ago and as far as you know they don’t know you’re actually together. At this point you’re not too sure why they don’t even know or why you haven’t told them but you have a feeling they’re about to be real surprised here soon. The look in JJ’s eyes is possessive, it’s down right a claim that you’re his and no one has the right to kiss you.

“Let me finish,” you put a hand up. “I kicked him, shoved him down to the ground, punched him, then held him by the throat with my foot-“

“My god,” John B breathes out, once again looking in awe. Pope just nods in agreement, almost in a daze. Kiara, well she just looks impressed.

“While I slightly choked him with my foot,” you pause for a second, preparing yourself for the worst reaction from JJ, “I got him to drop the charges on the boat.”

It goes deathly quiet for a few moments before three voices come at you all at one, “What?”

You ignore them, still looking at JJ, “By the end of the day your name should be cleared. You won’t be held responsible for the boat anymore.”

JJ doesn’t say anything, he just continues to stare but you watch him carefully. His breaths are deep and calculated, his jaw is clenching and unclenching, his fists loosen and he rests his palms against his thighs. You can practically see the wheels inside his brain working through the information, processing the fact that you did this for him. He’s not used to someone caring for him this way, no matter how long you’ve been there for him, he’s still not used to the love you have for him. He went so long without it, it takes him a while to process it.

But you see the moment it finally settles in his brain, the second that he fully processed the information you’d given him. His chest stutters briefly and you know the tears are going to come next. He breathes in a long breath, and holds it in his lungs before it rushes out through his nose. He’s trying to keep up his tough front, but he’s failing. His eyes finally soften and they go back to the normal light they usually are.

Then, in the blink of an eye he’s in front of you. His hands cradle your face before his body collides with yours, hard, and his lips are on yours. The kiss is hard, it’s possessive, passionate, sincere but hasty, fervent, needy, desperate. It’s overwhelming and so full of emotion that it takes you a second to respond but when you do, JJ sighs into it and pulls you impossibly closer. One hand moves to your lower back and the other one stays on your jaw where his thumb pushes against your face to open your mouth even more. He is absolutely, unquestionably claiming you right here, right now. Not that you need to be claimed but you don’t mind. You’ve never felt so alive before.

The love JJ is conveying through this kiss is everything you’ve ever needed and you reciprocate the best that you can. You want him to know that you’re his and he’s yours. Just how it should be.

JJ whines when you pull away and he chases after you but you need to breathe, “Jesus, J.”

“I’ll say,” Kiara agrees, a little out of breath herself at what she just witnessed. Two seventeen year olds should not know how to share such a passionate looking kiss.

“I didn’t know friends kiss like that,” John B jokes, nudging Pope when he laughs.

“That’s because they don’t.” he continues laughing.

JJ ignores everything they say, “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know, but I did.” You shrug, shifting on your feet and wincing at the pain that shoots through your leg and JJ notices that. “But like can we go get me cleaned up or something, I need to sit down.”

“Yeah,” JJ nods hastily, “you guys go ahead and go out without us,” he looks at the other three, that still look like they’re in complete shock, and doesn’t wait for their response before he looks back to you, “can you walk?”

You nod but he doesn’t listen. JJ swiftly throws you over his shoulder and starts walking towards the house. “I love you, you know,” he says once he’s far enough away from everyone.

“I know.”

It’s the next day when you and JJ make an appearance after staying inside all day the day before. Once you had showered and iced down the parts of your body that hurt, you fell asleep and stayed asleep until it was dark. The adrenaline in your system was completely gone and you were in a lot of pain so sleep came naturally.

You met John B, Pope, Kie, and even Sarah, at the beach. It was around 11am when you and JJ walked up to them as they were sitting there in the sand. As you approached, they went quiet and watched as JJ helped you sit, hand you a bottle of water before sitting down behind you. His legs press against yours on either side of your body and his hands rest on top of your thighs. You can feel four sets of eyes on you and you give it about 3 more seconds before someone breaks the quiet.

“How are you feeling?” Kie is the one to break it. You glance at her and give her a smile, one that she returns.

“Sore but I’ll be fine.”

John B laughs a bit of a disbelieving laugh, “What you explained yesterday was pretty badass.”

“Hell yeah it was,” Pope excitedly cuts in. “I should say thank you, as well.”

You just shrug, “I would’ve done it for any of you.”

“Did Topper really do that to you?” Sarah questions you, quizzically looking you up and down. Your face bruised and so did your leg. The scratches down your leg are scabbed and also bruised.

The hands on your thighs tighten and dig into the skin there. You gently place your hands on his, soothing the anger that still sits there. He calmed down yesterday, barely, but he did enough to listen to what happened when you explained it again. Adding in the details you knew would calm him down. He tried to argue with you a few times but you finally got through to him, made him accept the fact that you did what you did and there’s no turning back now.

“What a dick. I can’t believe I dated him,” Sarah continues when you nod at her.

As everyone laughs and starts to pick on Sarah for her choices, you shift your upper body enough to twist around and look at JJ. His eyes are dark and his jaw is clenched tight, pushing out the muscles in his neck. You let out a sigh and bring a hand up to his cheek, soothing your fingers over his jaw to get him to unclench. He’s angry, that much you can tell, but he’s trying his best to keep a wraps on it. It’s been very difficult to keep him steady. Every time he looks at you, he tenses and his breathing gets all deep. It’ll be like that for a few days.

“JJ, calm down,” you whisper to him. The fingers digging into your thighs tighten some more before he relaxes, his eyes meeting yours and the dark anger in them fizzling away slowly. “Hey, there you are.”

“I still can’t believe you won’t let me go kick his ass,” JJ scoffs, moving to lean back on his hands. The movement makes you sway a little, having not realized how much you were relying on him to keep you upright. “I just want to kick his ass.”

He always wants to kick his ass but you know the underlying anger in him would take it further than that and that’s not something you want. Also, “If you kick his ass the charges will come back,” you remind him.

JJ closes his eyes and takes a breath. You move around between his legs and sit sideways, your legs bent over one of his now so you don’t have to be so twisted to look at him. Your back hurts a bit too much for that. He pulls up the leg that’s against your back and presses it into you, giving you something to lean on. You place a hand on his thigh, up by his hip, and lean into him a bit, “I’m sure you’ll get the chance to kick his ass again but just not for this, okay? I hit him just as much as he hit me.”

That brings a smirk to his face, “You know, I wouldn’t mind seeing you choke someone out with those boots you wear. I’m a bit mad I missed it, I’m sure it was hot as fuck.”

And that catches the attention of everyone else and you turn your head when John B speaks up, “Fuck, I was thinking the same thing,” he laughs and laughs even harder when Sarah gasps. “I’m just saying.”

“Actually,” Kie shrugs, “I wouldn’t mind picking a fight with Topper just to see that.”

You let out a loud laugh, your head thrown back at the sheer force in which it comes out, “Can we wait a few days maybe, I hurt.”

JJ immediately brings a hand up to soothe over your leg. It does look bad and honestly it does hurt as bad as it looks. It only takes a few seconds for his other hand to brush over the nasty looking bruise on your back too. Four sets of eyes track the movements, “Does it hurt that bad?”

“Yeah, actually. The cuts sting the worst and the sun makes them feel like they’re burning.” Your answer makes JJ frown. His eyes flicker with anger once more, “Stay calm,” you state a bit forcefully.

You can tell that the group wants to question the movements between you and JJ. The kiss you shared in front of them yesterday was anything but the friendly kisses that you share with the group most days and it’s been on the forefront of their brains ever since. Sarah is the only one that doesn’t track the movements for more than what they are, she didn’t see the kiss and the closeness is no different than what it usually is for the both of you.

The good thing about being with JJ is that nothing really changed between the two of you when you started dating. As kids, you were alway closer than with anyone else. JJ trusted you, protected you, cared deeply for you from the beginning. The touchiness started when you were 15, feelings between you a little too strong to ignore so you went from the friendly hugs and touches to a bit more. Hands would rest in more intimate places, no longer would they rest on knees but now on thighs. No longer on the waist but more on the curve of hips or high up on the rib cage near the chest. Everything was taken in stride, the older everyone got the more common it was and no one questioned a thing about it. It was mostly friendly, being so used to being near JJ for years that the change in touches barely registered in your head, it was all normal.

It changed almost a year ago. The feelings you held for JJ getting to be too much to control, you felt they were getting more and more noticeable every day. JJ was getting closer and closer, lingering longer than usual, snapping quicker when someone offended you, acting a bit more possessive and it was a lot to process. One night, after a particularly large fight with the Kooks, you and JJ were alone on the hammock outside The Chateau when he kissed you. It was a real kiss, one with emotion and fervor, not just a friendly peck that you’d gotten so used to sharing.

You guys have been dating ever since. Keeping it to yourself. You share everything else with the group, nothing was ever private but this was something you wanted to yourselves. To enjoy with no pressure. It was only supposed to be that way for a few months, while you got used to the change in relationship, but you got so comfortable with the way you guys got to have each other in private, you just never mentioned it.

But with how deeply you loved each other, it was obviously getting harder to hide. Not that it’s really that important.

“I’m cal-“

“Are you guy-“

“What the fuck!”

JJ, Pope, and Sarah all speak at the same time but everyone focuses on Sarah’s distressed, ‘what the fuck,’ and looks to her. Everyone then follows her line of sight and what’s caught her attention. JJ immediately tenses and he sits back, ready to jump up. You tense yourself, pushing harder into your hold on him.

“Rafe, what the fuck are you doing here?” Sarah screeches standing up. John B follows her. Kie and Pope stand too, standing more in front of you and JJ.

“Let me go,” JJ whispers, his voice coming out harsh, especially when Topper pops up from behind Rafe.

“No.”

JJ huffs, an annoyed sigh heaving through his nose. His vision is locked on the two boys approaching your group. “We just wanted to check up on our favorite people,” Rafe jokes, the sarcasm rolling off of him in waves. You move completely around in front of JJ when you feel his body start to shake a bit at his continued words, “Especially the one who beat up my boy here.”

Wrapping your legs around JJ’s waist, you pull him closer to you before grasping his face in your hands. “Hey baby, how are you today?” you question, whispering to not gain the attention of everyone else. Pope and Kie are doing a decent job of keeping you hidden but JJ’s eyes are still locked on where Rafe and Topper are standing.

“Which one of you did it? He won’t tell me and I’d like to have a word.”

A twitch goes through JJ’s body, like he’s about to get up but you hold him tighter. Stroking your fingers through his hair, you tug on it a bit to get his attention. It works. “It’s okay.”

“None of you look like you got your asses handed to them, so I ask again. Who did it?” Rafe hums, clicking his tongue as you assume he looks around at everyone. You know that you and JJ aren’t completely covered and he’s bound to finally see you two.

“Rafe, just leave.” Sarah intervenes.

“Oh, Daddy’s little princess, I don’t think so. Not until someone steps up. I might even hang out with you today. I think it would be fun.”

“No, leave them alone. You come for them enough without reason. Go home!” Her voice is stern but Rafe is off the walls, you highly doubt he’ll listen. “Topper deserved what happened to him anyway.”

“Ah,” Rafe lets out, “So you know who did it? You think she’ll own up to it any time soon, I’m tired.”

You wince when JJ roughly grabs you and shoves you away from him. The movement makes you tumble into the back of Kie’s legs and she helps you up as JJ pushes to the front of the group, in the blink of an eye. You let out a groan as you get steady on your feet, your back burning with pain.

John B slaps a hand down on JJ’s shoulder as he steps in front of him, to keep him from attacking. You let out a sigh and shake your head as JJ puffs out his chest, making himself seem bigger. “Why don’t you leave her out of this,” his tone is menacing.

“Oh! You know who did it too?” Rafe exclaims, feigning ignorance.

“Rafe, I told you it’s not a big deal. Let’s go.” Topper interjects.

“No, man. Look at the bruise on your neck. Someone just doesn’t get away with that. Even if they’re a girl,” Rafe finishes, looking directly at you. You stare back, unimpressed, arms crossed over your chest.

JJ lunges for Rafe, “Keep her out of it!”

Rafe laughs as John B and Pope hold JJ back, “But it’s her fault!”

“Not when he’s all over her first! Come on, Top, be a big man and admit it was your fault!” JJ taunts, struggling against the hold JB and Pope have on him.

You sigh once more before stepping out of Kie’s grip, she squeezes you for a second but let’s you go when you keep walking. Stepping in between JJ and Rafe, your chest brushes his, and you challenge him. You want to protect JJ in this moment because you know if a fight was to break out, JJ wouldn’t have it fair because looking past Rafe’s shoulder you spot the rest of their little gang.

“Get out of the way,” JJ yells, placing a hand to your waist. His fingers squeeze into your side but you don’t back down.

“No, JJ!” you yell back, “this is something you can’t fight over. I told you that!”

JJ presses his chest to your back, trying to get as close as possible to the situation but you push back. “Damn it, let me do something!”

You ignore him, turning to Rafe who has a smug expression on his face from the exchange, “Leave. This has nothing to do with you!”

Sarah steps you beside you and shoves at her brother, making him stumble. “Go home.”

“Sarah, this has nothing to do with you.”

You take a step forward, “And it doesn’t with you, either. I’d leave before you end up like your buddy.” Your temper is rising very quickly. The continuous smug look on his face from not listening to you or his own sister making your skin crawl. Your blood is hot and you can feel yourself vibrating in JJ’s hold, the taunting of his words and the way he speaks them as if he’s demeaning you.

“Like you co-“ you don’t even let him finish before you’re throwing a punch across his face, hard. He falls to the ground with the force of it and you’re about to lurch forward to continue throwing punches but arms wrap around your waist and pull you back. Your legs kick up in the air as you fight against the hold, “You bitch!”

Sarah jumps in between you and her brother, knowing he wouldn’t hit her. “Rafe, leave,” but he just shoved her aside and tried to get to you. You’re still fighting in JJ’s hold, yelling at him to let you go but he just continues to pull you away. Topper jumps in to keep Rafe back, desperately trying to get him to listen. For once Topper is doing something smart.

“Let me fight him!” You scream, tired of him and all his friends constantly looking down at you like you’re no more than a piece of garbage on the ground. It’s tiring, frustrating, and you’re absolutely sick of it. You’re tired of having to constantly be on alert, wondering if you’re going to get attacked again just because you’re hanging out somewhere or walking down the street. “Let me go!”

“No!” JJ yells back, “if you won’t let me fight, you’re not going to either!”

“I’m not letting you fight because I don’t want you in jail, asshole!” You’re still struggling against him but his hold is too tight and you’re losing air. “I’m just trying to protect you, god damn it, let me do something for you!”

In your fit of rage you don’t even notice that JJ has dragged you both a few feet away from everyone else until he’s in front of you, hands grasping at your face, “Hey hey hey, will you calm down? Breathe, calm down, baby.”

“JJ, let me go!” You exclaim, still trying to pull away from his grasp. It bothers the bruise on your face but you ignore it. You just want to fight, to attack anything that puts JJ in danger. You’re not too sure where this sudden wave of protectiveness came from, granted you always want to protect him, but it’s a really strong urge these past few days.

“No, calm down. I’m not letting you go until you’re breathing properly again.” JJ argues. He soothes his thumbs over your cheeks but you’re barely registering them there. Your mind is still reeling, wanting to do anything to fight, to keep JJ safe and with you. “What is going on with you? Why do you want to fight so bad? You’re not one to fight.”

The questions seem to drain the fight right out of you, the adrenaline running through your system leaving your body in a single breath. It makes you sag against JJ, his hands on your cheeks the main thing keeping you up. “I don’t know.”

“Come on, dig a little. I need an answer so we can work on moving forward.” JJ throws your own words back at you. You smile a little at him, happy that he’s grasping onto the tactics you use to get him to open up about what he’s going through. JJ notices you smile and chuckles, “Yeah, yeah I listen to you after all.”

That makes you full on laugh, your whole body shaking as the laugh rips through you. Reaching up, you rest a hand to his cheek, “You’re so stubborn, I’m a bit surprised.” He leans into your touch a bit, eyes closing as he takes in a deep breath. Your laughter dies down and you just smile at him. “The idea of you not being with me, scares me.”

JJ frowns and steps closer, as if either of you would disappear if he wasn’t close enough. “I just-“ you breathe out when he places your free hand on his ribs, your place of comfort, your grounding place. “I just want to do something for you. I want you to be safe. I want to protect you.”

“Have you not realized that’s what you’ve been doing for me since we were like 9?” JJ laughs, shaking his head. “Baby, you’ve been the one protecting me for years. How many times have you taken the blame for something when you weren’t even there? How many times have you hid me in your closet so your parents don’t find out I’ve sneaked in after a particularly bad day with my dad? How many times have you patched me up and held me when things got too bad? It’s too many to count. You do things for me every day. You smiling at me, holding my hand, sitting beside me, sharing food with me, looking at me, hell just being in the same room as me; gets me through any day.”

The four others stare on in a bit of a daze. Rafe and his followers long gone so their attention has been solely on the two of you. But there’s no way either of you could’ve known. Emotions are running high between you and JJ that there’s no way you’d pay attention to anything other than him until you knew his mind was steady. You knew JJ was going through the same thing.

“Are they like.... together?” Sarah questions, to no one in particular. She always just assumed the two of you were just closer. That your friendship was just that, a friendship. She’s noticed that the entire group of Pogues were close and touchy, but it was always a bit more between the two of you.

“Yeah,” Pope answers.

Sarah gasps, “Why didn’t I know!”

“Because we don’t even know,” John B answers.

“What do you mean?” Sarah’s brows furrow. That has got to be one of the most confusing things she’s ever been told. “That doesn’t make sense.”

“They haven’t told us,” Kie shrugs, “But, I mean, it’s obvious. I figured it out like six months ago maybe?”

“Really?” Pope, raises an eyebrow. “I figured it out like 3 months ago.”

“Mmm,” John B hums, “I’m pretty sure I witnessed their first official kiss. You know how she kisses all of us?” he asks, looking around to the others. Kie and Pope nod while Sarah just watches on. “Well, one night, like last year some time. I saw them kiss and it wasn’t like the ones she gives all of us. Their dynamic changed the next day.”

Sarah looks around completely baffled. She feels like she should’ve known, should’ve realized but she just assumed because no one acted like you two were dating. But she didn’t grow up with you all, she hasn’t seen how the two of you dating wouldn’t be a shock. And the newfound information still doesn’t stop Sarah from letting out a gasp when you surge forward to kiss JJ.

The kiss is like the one you shared yesterday but this time it’s you pouring everything you’ve got into it. Pouring in every ounce of love your body has to offer. It’s deep and warm and all things good. It’s needy and greedy, needing to have his attention and wanting to take it all. He reciprocates with just as much fervor, hastily kissing back like his life depended on it. His hands are tight on your waist as he pulls you impossibly closer, always closer, and your arms wrap around his neck. Hands shoved in his hair, you kiss him with unrelenting fury. It’s a kiss that could easily turn into something more if you weren’t in public so you try to tone it down but JJ is having none of that. He just wraps both arms around your back and holds you to him when you try to pull away.

You step back though, breathing heavily against JJ’s lips. Your breaths mix with his and your lips desperately brush as you both just breathe, trying to come back to earth. You place a quick kiss to his lips and one to his nose, “I love you, you know.”

“I know,” he responds with a quick kiss to your lips and your nose.

The van is entirely too tense for your liking. The atmosphere is so thick, it makes it feel like you can’t breathe. John B is yelling profusely at JJ as he drives, like he’s part of a car chase, through the back roads of The Cut to get to where his brain has focused on.

It was a pretty normal day up until about 26 minutes ago.

You were the last one to be picked up for the day, JJ greeting you at the sliding door of the van with a quick hello kiss to your lips before grabbing your hand and helping you in. Kisses got placed on everyone, even Sarah -who was pleasantly surprised, because even if she won’t admit it, she was upset to find out that you’ve kissed everyone but her- before sitting down on the floor in front of the bench. JJ sat behind you and you wrapped your arms around his legs. All of you were going to head out to the boat, spend the day on the water and soak up some sun. Just hang out like teenagers are supposed to do.

That was until a supposed cop car pulled up behind the van out of nowhere and ordered for you to pull over. John B does as told but in the blink of an eye, there’s a shot gun being aimed in his face and orders are being thrown for everyone to get out. Orders thrown for us to lay down flat in the ditch.

Something about knowing Rafe and how he’s going after people to collect money he owes. JJ was constantly telling him that you’re all a bunch of Pogues, that he won’t find anything but of course he found the cash you keep in your backpack, along with the weed you hold for JJ. There were a few other things he found that he deemed good enough to steal but you didn’t get enough of a look to see what he found. It’s like he noticed every time one of you moved because he’d be quick to aim the gun at any of you who moved and threaten to shoot.

Which is why it was so surprising when JB was able to get into the car without the guy noticing. After that, it was amazing how fast the guy ended up on the ground, wheezing and groaning in pain.

“Oh, I know this guy! He sells coke to my dad!” JJ yelled before he kicked him in the stomach.

“No wonder he was talking about Rafe.” Sarah interjected, scoffing in disbelief.

JJ punched the guy across the face once more before reaching into his pocket and taking the guys wallet. “We have one more stop to make!” he laughs menacingly.

So, that leads you up to where you are now. Pacing the front lawn of a run down drug house. Crashes are coming from inside, along with the yells and screams from JJ and John B. Every time something hits the ground, you startle, completely on edge by the whole situation. JJ has damn near lost his mind, his eyes too wide and too unfocused. If you didn’t know any better you’d say he did a line of coke for breakfast this morning.

Deep down, you know this behavior is only fueled by the way he’s been treated his whole life. That he’s reached his limit at how much he can actually take. That he’s fed up with his life and what he feels like he’s worth. He’s snapped, something you’ve been trying to prevent for years, and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it. You’re not scared of him, you know that you’d be able to calm him down but you know there’d be a fight before that happened. A fight you don’t want to go through. It’s only been four days since your fight with Topper and you’re still exhausted from it. You’re not ready to handle a fight with JJ.

“God, they sound like they’re killing each other in there,” Kie groans, pacing just as much as you. She looks worried.

Pope stands completely still, an anxious look on his face as he stares at the front door of the house. It looks like he believes he’ll summon them out with just his gaze in the door.

And Sarah, well, she just looks out of place.

You continue to pace, anxiously waiting, not daring to look at the door. You don’t want to know what’s going on. You wish you couldn’t hear what was going on either. You honestly feel like you’re going to wear a path down in the dead grass with all your back and forth.

“Now!” you jump at the sudden voice before the screen door to the house slams open. JJ steps out with a wad of cash in his hands. “We can all have, let’s see-“ he pauses for a second as he sorts through the stack, “5 grand each!”

John B looks aggravated, like he’s talking to a child that keeps asking ‘why’ for absolutely no reason, as he follows closely behind JJ.

“What are we doing! Stealing from drug dealers now?” Kiara exclaims.

JJ stares at her, throwing his arms around. “Aren’t you guys tired of this? We got a gun! A gun pulled on us today. We were robbed! Us!” JJ exclaims, face red. “I don’t know about you but I’m tired! I’m tired of being treated like absolute shit just because of where we live!”

You stare on in complete shock. JJ’s lips are parted and his eyes are wide, breathing ragged. This is a whole other type of anger that you’ve never seen out of JJ before. You’re not too sure how to handle this.

“Relax, JJ,” John B continues after him, his anger showing through as well. He starts pushing up against JJ, getting in his face.

“How’d you feel, huh? That shit was right there in your face,” JJ argues back.

“I’m putting it back,” John B moves to snatch the bag JJ has in his grasp and that leads to JJ shoving JB up against the van, hard. The impact of it echoes around the small area you’re in.

“You feel like a tough guy, huh?” John B snaps, not even trying to fight against the hold JJ has on him. He knows that JJ would never lay a hand on him, no matter how mad he got. “What will you do when he comes for us?”

“We punch him, in the throat,” JJ retorts, his voice coming out low and threatening. It does fit with JJ, he shouldn’t be capable of getting his voice to sound like that.

JB scoffs, “Oh, good fuckin’ idea, JJ.”

JJ steps back, a relieving sigh coming from you as he does, “I’m not putting it back,” he mutters and shoves past JB and gets into the van. From your vantage point, you can’t see him inside. You’re still so shocked to the spot, you can’t move. It’s only a few seconds of everyone just standing around before he gets back out. “What!?” he snaps.

“We’re sick of your shit.”

That seems to get you to snap out of whatever trance you’re in. You finally look away from JJ and look at everyone else. The worried look on Pope’s face, at his best friend's obvious breakdown. The indifference Sarah radiates because she doesn’t know JJ enough to feel any other way. The anger in John B’s stance as he looks at his best friend and the recklessness he’s showing. The disbelief on Kiara’s face as she looks at JJ like she’s never seen him before, “Yeah, you’re pulling guns out on people shit.”

“JJ come on man, put it back,” Pope tries to reason but JJ just snaps.

“Pope, come on! I took the fall for you, I owed 30k in restitution. The charges may drop but they can still sue me for that money. Might as well be ahead of the game!”

“I didn’t ask you to do that!” Pope exclaims.

“Yeah, well I did. Sorry for caring.” JJ mutters, looking around to everyone. He misses your frame, like he forgot you were even with them. “You know what? I’m just going to go by myself.”

All you do is watch as JJ starts to walk away, his head is down and you can see the hurt in his face as he walks by. The mask he holds up every day, faltering as soon as he can’t be seen anymore. He meets your eye and the wild anger that was there seconds ago is gone, all that’s left is watery eyes and disappointment. You take a step towards him, to give him the comfort he needs to get through this but he just shakes his head and keeps walking.

“JJ!” Pope hell’s out but it falls on deaf ears, JJ continuing his trek out of the area.

“Just let him go.” JB sighs, “let him do his thing.”

It’s quiet, so quiet you can hear the wind in the trees rustling each leaf, as JJ walks out of sight. It doesn’t take long for the last few minutes to settle into your brain and leave your blood running hot. When you turn away from where JJ had gone, you see everyone looking to you for some sort of guidance. They know you’re the only one that can successfully bring JJ back to earth, back to the present and out of his head. It’s been that way for years now. They just look at you helplessly, like you have all the answers. And you don’t.

It makes you angrier. It angers you that JJ did this. That he snapped and decided it would be a good idea to rob someone, a drug dealer at that. You would’ve much rather dealt with him getting into another fight with someone over having to deal with stolen money.

And it makes you angry that his best friends are apparently sick of him. It doesn’t sit right with you in the slightest.

“I can believe you guys,” you shake your head at them.

John B looks taken aback by your words, “Us!?”

“You can’t sit here and tell us you support him for what he just did!” Kie yells at you, stepping forward.

“Of course not!” You shake your head, “but I’m not going to sit here and shit on someone who is already down. JJ doesn’t deserve you guys to be talking to him like that, like you’re sick of him. That boy does everything he can to get things right with you guys. You mean so much to him and you’re just going to shit on him for it?”

“He’s robbing drug dealers, y/n.” Pope tries to reason but you just shake your head at him.

“One that just threatened to kill, each and every one of you.” You argue back, “Yes, stealing probably wasn’t the best thing he could’ve done and I’ll try and get it back so we don’t get into anymore fucking trouble. But, for you guys to turn on him the second he does something you don’t agree with is a bit fucked.”

You step towards them again, not realizing you were so far away from the group to begin with, “Pope, I know you didn’t ask him to, but he just took the fall for you so you wouldn’t lose your scholarship opportunity. He told me it’s because he’s not worth more than jail time, that you have so much more to look forward to than him.”

“Kie, who was the first person to accept you back into the group after you wanted to experience life as a kook? It was JJ. He sat there multiple nights, telling us that you haven’t changed, that you’d still be the same Kiara you were before. The one that’s understanding and supportive of everyone’s reckless behavior.”

“And John B,” you frown, “JJ was the one that was there for you when your dad went missing. He held you through the nights, made you eat and drink water. Did everything in his power to bring you out of your pain, while he was going through his own set of pain. He made sure you didn’t lose yourself when you lost your dad.”

“And for me? He’s been there for me through so much shit, quick to smile just so I would smile back. He could be in so much physical and emotional pain but he’s the first person to smile. The first person to crack a joke. The first person to offer comfort just because he doesn’t want people to feel what he feels from someone who is supposed to care for him. He may act like a jackass or someone who is tough and happy but he’s not. He’s really not.”

“You guys don’t see the way that mask falls off as soon as he’s alone. You don’t see how he beats himself up over the tiny details of his life. How he views himself as nothing more than a piece of trash for not being able to stand up to his dad. How he thinks he’s going to end up just like him. He’s scared, terrified of losing us. It’s why he’s so quick to fight, to protect, to make sure we’re happy. We’re literally the only thing, the only good thing, he has in his life. And you hurt him today.”

You hang your head after your rant, the weight of your words leaving you feeling empty after having said them. Your shoulders ache a bit but it’s still quiet. “I know, none of us agree with the stealing of the money. It was stupid and dangerous. But you didn’t have to tell him that you’re tired of him. You could’ve let Pope follow him like he wanted, to show him that he’s not alone.”

“Well, you didn’t follow him either.” Sarah steps in.

“He told me not to. I respect him for that. He knows what he did was a bit much. He wants to calm down, he was just mad that we all could’ve just died.” You shrug, looking around to everyone. They all look a bit guilty, realizing what it is that they just insinuated to their best friend.

“We didn’t mean it in a bad way,” John B says, running his hands through his hair like he’s stressed. And he is.

“Yeah, but do you think he’ll take it that way?” You question, eyebrow raised.

“We just want him to calm down.”

You nod, “I get that but you could’ve gone at it another way. That’s just me though. I’m gonna go home though. Be there just in case.”

Before they have a chance to say anything you walk away, in the opposite direction of JJ because you live in opposite directions. And that sudden thought makes your heart drop at the realization that JJ might try and go home. To show his dad that he can do something right, that he can get the money to pay off his debts.

You don’t hear from JJ for the rest of the day. Just your unread message of I know, to his I love you, you know, that he sent a few minutes after he left the group in the afternoon.

You didn’t see JJ until the following night. And when you did you kinda wished you hadn’t. You wish he hadn’t gone missing for over 24 hours. You wish you’d seen him all day and that this wasn’t the first time you were seeing him. As soon as your eyes landed on him, you knew something was wrong. Something went terribly wrong.

You and Kie had been together all day, running errands and shopping, picking up things for the movie night, dinner, at the Chateau. The Pogues all decided it would be a good idea because you knew that JJ would show up and they wanted to apologize to him. Everyone was worried about him, having not been able to locate him since he’d gone off the walls. But you knew him, you knew no matter how upset he gets about his friend, he’ll always come back to them. Always.

“I’m really worried about JJ,” Kie had said at one point. The two of you were picking up his favorite candy when she said it, looking forlorn into the shopping cart.

You felt her pain, but you shrugged nonchalant anyway, not wanting to alarm her with just how worried you were. If you were overly -which you were- worried about JJ then everyone knows it’s bad, “Shit happens in friend groups, Kie.”

She looked like she was close to tears, “But we’re not a normal friend group. We’re family.”

You nodded at her and held her in the middle of the market.

Now you felt like you were the one that needed to be held.

The sight in front of you was wrong. It didn’t belong in front of you. It didn’t belong anywhere near here yet, here it was staring you right in the face. You want to close your eyes and when you open them back up, you want it to be gone but you knew that wasn’t going to happen. Your heart is lodged in your throat and it was going to stay there until you knew everything was going to be okay.

“What did you do, JJ?” Pope gasps, in absolute disbelief as the three of you come up on JJ sitting in a hot tub, surrounded by hundreds of Christmas lights.

JJ looks up and scans over you, Kie, and Pope. You can barely see his eyes over the brim of his sunglasses. Why is he wearing sunglasses at night? You’re not too sure. “Oh, good you’re here. Come on, you have to get in right now! I have a jet going in my butt!”

He’s drunk, overly so, but that doesn’t stop him from drinking the champagne in his hands, right out of the bottle. Pope just drops his jaw, “How much did all this cost?”

“Well when you look at it; the generator, petrol, lights.. I don’t know? All of it?”

“All of it!?”

“All of it.”

“You spent all that money in one day?” Pope exclaims, leaning forward in his spot. It sounds like he doesn’t believe it. Like he doesn’t even want to.

“Yeah, burned a whole right through my pocket!” JJ waves his hand flippantly like it’s not a big deal. When it is. “But I mean, like, look, come on guys look at all of this.”

His voice is too high. It’s tight and too pitched to sound normal. To sound like he’s not seconds away from snapping. It brings tears to your eyes as you watch from the sidelines. Watch as your boyfriend crumbles right before you.

“Kie, what?” JJ says, causing you to look to her. She looks pained, absolutely shattered. “I mean,” JJ laughs but it’s anything but joyful. It sounds just as pained as Kiara’s face looks. “Can’t a man have a little luxury in life?”

He waves his hands dramatically. Showing off what he’s done outside of the Chateau, desperately looking for approval. That what he did was the right thing. “All this, scrapin’,” he trails off, as he rips off the sunglasses. “Come on, guys,” he looks around again, his eyes lingering on yours a bit longer before looking to the water. “I mean, like, guys, we-“ his voice cracks and he takes a desperate breath in. You find yourself copying his breath. “You only live once, right?” His hand comes up out of the water as he limply holds up one finger. Like the movement is too much for him.

The look on JJ’s face as he makes eye contact again screams sadness. Screams validation. He wants, so desperately for you to agree with him, for all of you to agree with him. But he doesn’t realize everyone is on the verge of tears, the breakdown too much for anyone to handle. His face wobbles a bit and you can see it pinch up through the steam around him. He’s seconds away from tears.

When no one responds, he does his best to wipe away the emotions. He fails. But he shakes his head and keeps going, “Enough of this emotional shit. Come on, get in.”

“We’re not-“

JJ cuts Kie off in a second, “Come on, get in! I almost forgot! There’s a disco mode.”

Fountains of water spit out across the surface and different colored lights shine through each arch. JJ smiles triumphantly and throws his arms up in the air, leaning back against the side of the hot tub again.

“Are you kidding me!” Pope shouts and your tears fall at how fast JJ’s face paints his disappointment. “You could’ve done anything else with the money.”

“You could’ve given it to charity!” Kie interjects, sounding a bit annoyed now. JJ turns his head to the side and rubs at his eyes. His breathing is calculated and you just know he’s doing whatever he can to stop from crying.

“Better yet,” Pope exclaims, “You could’ve given it back!”

“Ok, well you know what!” JJ yells, “I didn’t-“ he stands up and the ground almost falls out from underneath you at the sight, “I didn’t do that! I got a hot tub!”

Your hands shake against your face, just as much as JJ’s voice shakes. The deep, dark, bruises littering his abdomen and ribs, glues you to the spot. You can’t do anything but gape at him. When did this happen and why hadn’t he come to you, to anyone. Where did he go when he was clearly not okay, mentally and physically. Kie and Pope just stare, clearly not knowing what to do with themselves and most likely thinking the same exact thing. JJ just keeps clambering on, like he didn’t just shake the very ground you stand on.

“For my friends! Actually no, screw friends, for my family. I got a hot tub for my family!” His voice is shaky and still too high pitched. He looks and sounds frantic as he keeps moving back and forth in the hot tub.

“JJ, what the hell?” Kie cries out, trying to interrupt him.

If he hears her, he ignores her, “Look at what I did for us! I did this for us! So we can be a family!”

“JJ,” She tries again.

“No,” JJ holds up a hand, shaking his head desperately. “No, stop. Stop being emotional. It’s fine, okay?”

The way the word okay flies out of his mouth, fast and unsteady. The quiver his lips make around the word, breaks the spell that was put on your body. You work on taking off your shoes as fast as possible. Not once looking away from JJ as he bows his head and sucks in deep breaths through his teeth.

You pull off your last sock as he starts talking again, “It’s sweet? Yeah?”

You crash into him as he cries out, “Just get in.”

Wrapping your arms around him, you pull him into you, like you have many times before, and the movement punches a sob right out of him. He leans his entire body weight onto you and just sobs. It only takes a few seconds before you feel another pair of arms. “I just couldn’t take it!” he sobs.

His body shakes against yours and he holds onto you so tight it knocks the wind out of you a bit, “I can’t take him anymore!” The sobs hit at full force, leaving him breathless. “I almost killed him.”

You hold on a bit tighter, running your hands up and down his back. You’re trying to force every ounce of comfort you have in your body into his. Feed him what he so desperately craves. “I just want to do the right thing.” he cries out, sounding so small and vulnerable it shatters your heart into pieces.

“I know,” you and Kie whisper at the same time. You’re glad she’s here. Pope comes in next, his arms wrapping around everyone. JJ lets out a sigh as three pairs of arms wrap around him before he lets out another sob. His weight being held up by the three of you. “I know.”

You’re not too sure how long you’re there, standing in the middle of the hot tub, just listening to JJ sob but you know it’s more than half an hour before John B walks up, startling everyone a bit. JJ has calmed down enough and is just being held while he sniffles every once in a while. But his sobs come back as soon as John B asks, “What the fuck is all this?”

John B looks alarmed and quickly let’s go of Sarah to climb into the hot tub, immediately wrapping the group up in his arms. Once he’s here, knowing that there’s a stronger force, you let out your cries. It hurts to see JJ in so much pain, to see him suffering so much. You want to protect him from everything. You want to go to his dad and fight him, make him hurt the way your boyfriend does. But doing that would do nothing to help JJ. If you were to get hurt on JJ’s behalf, once again, but by his dad he’d never forgive himself. And that would hurt him even more.

You want to hold the broken boy in your arms until he’s pieced back together and is never in any pain ever again. But you know that’s not possible, that’s not something that can logically happen.

But what you can do is help him get out of physical pain. Help him get comfortable and hold him until he sleeps. Hold him until he receives the love and comfort he wants and needs. And that’s something you will always do.

“We should get out,” you whisper but everyone hears you. Even Sarah, seeing as she rushes forward to start helping you guys out. After a few moments it’s only you and JJ, the rest hovering around the steps to make sure you can get him out. He clutches on a little tighter when you try to step back, “JJ, baby, come on. We’re gonna get out.”

He nods a bit, his lips brushing the skin of your neck briefly, before he pulls away. He doesn’t go very far before he rests his forehead against yours, blinking languidly at you. He looks so tired and it rips your heart to shreds. A deep breath fans out across your face and his eyes close as he pushes his forehead heavier into yours. You stroke his cheeks and place a kiss to the corner of his mouth, running a comforting hand through his hair.

“Come on, baby, let’s go.” He nods his head once more and moves away. You grab his hand and four other hands reach out to help him out. John B gets his free hand first and basically picks him up and out of the hot tub. Once he’s steady on the ground, he immediately turns back to you, watching you get out. He looks so hopeless, young, vulnerable, and seconds away from crumbling to the ground. It only takes you a few seconds to have him in your arms again and moving towards the house.

“I’ll start dinner,” Kie murmurs, nodding towards the bathroom. You smile gratefully at her and shuffle towards the bathroom while the others move into the kitchen. They give you all curious glances before they’re out of sight and you’re alone with JJ.

You sit him down on the toilet and move around to get the shower started. Getting a glass of water from the sink you shove it in his hands and make him drink it. Once he’s done, you fill it up again and give it back with some pain medicine this time. He finishes it quickly and looks up to you. His eyes are watery and red, his bottom lip trembling. You’re not much better, you caught a glance of yourself in the mirror, but you try to hold it in for him. He continues to look at you as you brush your thumbs over his cheekbones, under his eyes, and move a hand through his hair.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, his bottom lip quivering once again. You start to shake your head, shaking it the whole way down as you try to place a shaky kiss to his lips. He doesn’t kiss back. “No, stop it. I don’t deserve it. I fucked up.”

“JJ, no-“

He cuts you off with an abrupt shake to his head. “No! I did. I fucked up. I always fuck up. My anger gets to me and I’m sorry. You don’t deserve someone who is going to fly off the walls every time something goes wrong. I robbed a fucking drug dealer for fucks sake! And I didn’t even give the money to something good, I wasted it all. All of it.”

JJ let’s out a painful cry as his body deflates, his head coming to rest on your stomach. “I can't do anything right.”

“You were scared of us dying, baby, it’s a decent reason to fly off the walls,” you try to reason but he just vehemently shakes his head.

“No, you shouldn’t be with someone like me!”

“JJ, please. We went over this a few days ago!”

“And look at what all has happened since then. You fought Topper and got hurt because of it. You still have the black eye and the limp from your leg being fucked up! We almost got killed, I robbed a drug dealer, I got beat up by my dad and I almost killed him! Can’t you see how fucked up this is. You don’t need to be here with us! With me!”

You let out a choked sob as he stands up, pushing you out of the way. It's getting steamy in the bathroom, too hot, and it’s making it even harder for you to breathe. JJ looks at you with his own tears in his eyes, “I can’t keep putting you through this.”

“No!” you cry out, hiccuping at the force of it. “No, JJ! I have been with you since I was 9! Nothing has fucking changed! We’ve always loved each other, we just kiss now! You’re not going to end this just because you feel like you’re not worth it! If you weren’t worth it, I wouldn’t have stuck around as long as I have!”

Your chest is heaving and you feel like you’re on the verge of a panic attack. You need to get out of here. Shaking your head, you back up to the door, “Shower, JJ. I’ll put fresh clothes on the sink for you.”

JJ’s entire face crumbles and his shoulders slump forward as if you took every ounce of energy out of him. “I-“

“No, shower.

Stumbling out of the bathroom, arms wrap around you as soon as you’re in the hallway. They’re strong and familiar and you break down as soon as they hold you to their chest. Kie is in front of you a few moments later, cupping your face in her hands and trying anything she can to get you to focus on her. Your breathing is too harsh and your vision is spotty. The next thing you know, your legs are barely holding you up and then you’re on the ground. John B holds you to him and he tries to get you to breathe properly.

It’s all too much. The events of the last few days finally catching up to you and breaking through the surface at full force. JJ getting hurt, twice, by his dad. The Pogues almost dying. JJ stealing a large amount of money. JJ trying to end it, twice in the same week, just because he’s feeling so low. It’s all too much and you just don’t know what to do. The love you hold for JJ, for this entire group, outweighs anything in your life. There’s no way in hell you’d ever be without them. No matter what you go through with them. You choose them every day of your life. It’s never been any other way. Ever.

Kie is still in front of you, her hands still holding onto your face. Her thumbs are swiping across your face and she’s trying to say something but you’re not picking up on it. Blood is rushing through your ears and pounding around in your head. Absolutely no other noise is coming through so you just shake your head, anything to let them know you can’t hear them. Kie seems to understand and she places your hands on her chest, keeping them there. It takes you a few seconds but you realize she’s trying to get you to copy her breathing.

It works. You start to follow her. Follow her hand movements and feel her breathing under your hands. Soon, you can hear everything once more. Kie praising you, John B trying to soothe you, Pope’s voice mumbling from somewhere in the distance, Sarah talking a bunch of nonsense but calming nonsense.

“I’m okay. Everything’s fine. Just lost my breathing there for a second.” You mumble, sitting up a bit. Kie reaches out to you quickly when you sway in your spot a bit. You do feel a bit dizzy. “I’m fine. Just tired.”

“Come on, let’s get you some food and water,” John B says, hoisting you up with him as he stands. “You know JJ isn’t going anywhere. He’s not going to break up with you.”

You nod, “I know. It still panics me to hear it.”

Sarah comes up next with the food you and Kie had bought earlier in the day and a glass of water. You smile thankfully at her and sit down at the dining room table, not making any movement to eat it. John B sits down in front of you and places a hand on your knee, “Has this happened before?”

“Mm, remember that time about 5 months ago when I didn’t come around for a few days? Right after the first time JJ’s dad beat on him in months?”

Both Kie and John B nod. “JJ was unbearable to be around,” Kie groans.

An unamused chuckle falls past your lips and you shake your head, “Yeah.....” you trail off. “He told me that he wasn’t worth it. That he was too weak to be with me. That if he couldn’t even defend himself against his father then he wouldn’t be able to handle anything else, even a relationship. I told him to leave and only come back when he came to his senses. It was harsh but I needed him to realize the only thing that changed was that we kissed, now.”

“He’s scared of losing you,” John B states.

“He is,” you agree, “of all of us. He feels if he does it on his own terms, it’ll be ok. That we’ll leave if we think he’s weak. But he doesn’t always think like that, it’s only when he gets into it with his dad.”

It goes silent after that, the words sinking into everyone’s brains. You pick at your food a bit, eating a few bites as Kie puts together plates for everyone else. Sarah sits down beside John B and Kie comes to sit next to you, placing a comforting hand to your leg. Sending her a quick smile, you grab her hand and hold it to you. The conversation starts to pick up around you and you try to listen, you really do but your mind is just quiet. It’s blank to anything other than JJ.

Your heart aches at the thought of JJ being in pain. Physical or emotional pain. He does stupid things but he doesn’t deserve the things he goes through. There’s not much that he hasn’t gone through since the time you’ve met and you’d like to be able to protect him from the bad things of the world. No matter how often he tries to push you away when he feels like he doesn’t deserve the love.

“Okay,” Pope breathes out as he walks into the dining area. “He’s out of the shower,” he comments, resting a hand to your shoulder, “are you okay?”

Glancing around at everyone, they’re all staring at you expectantly. If you could guess, they’ve probably been staring at you long before Pope asked if you were okay. You nod and you’re about to give a more reassuring answer when you hear shuffling behind Pope. He turns around and you get a full few of JJ, he’s wrapped up in a hoodie that’s too big for him, his face is swollen and a bit blotchy. He looks like he would be twelve and it makes your heart clench in your chest, a lump forming in your throat at his glossy eyes.

He looks at you and only you, “Can we go to bed?” You look away and to your hands, to the one that Kie has wrapped firmly in hers. “I’ve calmed down, please?” When you look back up at him, the glossiness of his eyes is now watery with unshed tears. “Please?”

There’s absolutely no way in the world you’d ever be able to say no to such a sad boy. To the boy in general. JJ turns around as soon as you stand up and you don’t even think twice about following him. He gets into bed, turning his back to you and you follow. You wrap yourself around him, shoving an arm under his head and one around his waist. Both hands press flat into his chest as you mold yourself against his back. Knees to knees, chest to back, and JJ lacing your fingers together.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispers, placing a kiss to your fingers, “I know that you wouldn’t be with me unless I was worth it to you. I’m sorry that I get knocked down so much that I feel useless to everyone. Especially you. I never want to be anything less than enough for you.”

You press a kiss to the back of his neck, “You’ve always been enough for me, JJ. Always.” You pull on his shoulder a bit, trying to get him to turn over. When he does, you place a hand on his cheek, soothing over the skin there, “You’ve always been enough for me, JJ. You have nothing to apologize for. You’ve been beaten down your whole life, that is not your fault.”

A tear slips down his cheek and you wipe it away. The motion makes him press a kiss to your wrist. “You’re the person that keeps me going,” JJ whispers. “I’m nothing without you.”

“Don’t say that, JJ.” you shake your head. He’s so much more than that. So much more. “You’re caring, loving, protective, sympathetic, and empathetic. I’m just a perk to your qualities.”

That pulls a giggle out of JJ. A few tears slipping from his eyes at the surprise of laughter. You push forward to place a kiss to his lips. Loving the feeling of him actually kissing you back this time. He pushes in deeper, an arm around your waist, pulling your bodies flush. You kiss with so much intensity, it knocks you on your back and JJ follows, hovering over you as he kisses back with just as much. It makes your blood warm, makes you feel like you’re on fire as his free hand trails down over your waist, over your hip and to the back of your thigh to hitch it over his own hip.

The passion being exchanged is absolutely mind blowing, your brain short circuiting at the overwhelming feeling of love flowing between the two of you. It’s ardent and you want nothing more for it to continue but when you slip a hand over JJ’s ribs, he winces, sucking in a deep breath against your lips.

“I’m sorry,” you breathe out, quickly switching positions with him and pushing up his hoodie, “I forgot.”

“It’s okay. I definitely just forgot about them.” JJ wiggles his eyebrows at you as the hand on your thigh moves to caress the skin. “Let’s continue to forget about them.”

You place three quick, consecutive, sticky kisses to his lips before moving down to place one on his chin, to the base of his neck at his throat. Before placing delicate kisses over the battered skin of his torso. JJ’s breathing hitches in his throat and he lets out a watery sigh when your lips brush over the sensitive skin of his ribs. The hand on your thigh squeezes tightly at your movement, almost as a warning, but you ignore it and continue to sprinkle your love over the bruises on his skin. You know it won’t heal them but you can wish that it will.

A groan is punched out of JJ when your tongue lightly brushes over one of the bruises above his belly button and you chuckle a little bit. He’s turned into a bit of a heaving mess, gasping for air. You know it feels weird, like a mixture of pain and pleasure and JJ has no idea how to react to it. So, he just breathes heavily. He moves one hand to lace his fingers with yours as the other rests at the bottom of your spine.

Placing a few more kisses to the bruise over his right rib, you pull his hoodie back down over his stomach, and move up to place a few kisses on his neck. He moves his head to the side to give you some room and you suck a bruise into the juncture of his neck, right where it meets with his shoulder. A soft moan escapes him as you do. “There,” you kiss over your work when you pull away. “A good bruise to look at. One from love, not hate.”

The breath JJ lets out sounds more like a sob and he pushes into you once again. Wrapping his arms around you and shoving his face into your neck, he’s almost completely settled on top of you once he gets comfortable. He kisses at your skin, where he can reach, a few times and squeezes you as if you’re the only thing keeping him alive. You hold him back tightly, giving him the comfort he needs.

“I love you, you know,” he murmurs.

You kiss at his hairline, “I know.”

He doesn’t fall asleep until he repeats his I know, back to you.

JJ was finally feeling back to normal. The few days after his breakdown in the hot tub, things were a bit tense. A little too quiet for his liking. The day after, he laid in bed all day really only getting up to pee. He didn’t eat until you had come back to the Chateau, after doing something with your parents, and forced him to eat something. You had to basically force feed him to eat the food you made for him. He was grateful for you, you kept him together when all he wanted to do was break down. JJ was positive that there’d never be another person to care for him quite like you do.

Yesterday, the entire Chateau was empty when he woke up and it unsettled him a bit. It was never a good thing when it was quiet around there and he didn’t think he could handle anything else that was bad. He wandered around a bit, pulling on a hoodie because he didn't really want everyone else to stare him down, until he found everyone sitting at the hammocks. It was barely sunrise and he was confused as to why everyone was up already for no reason, and why they hadn’t woken him up either. You looked up from your spot in the hammock as he approached and held your arms out. He climbed in with you immediately and fell asleep only seconds later, to the sound of you quietly talking with Kie. The rest of the day was spent in bed with you, everyone giving him space to regroup. It was nice. He got kisses and other things that made him feel like himself.

Then today, everything is relatively back to how it should be. With loud laughter, stupid jokes, and sarcastic comments. Today is a day out on the HMS Pogue and JJ is absolutely loving it. There’s nothing he loves more than being out with his friends. With the people he loves and cares for the most as you all do stupid shit togeher. It’s his favorite thing. Also, to feel your skin against his, especially when it’s a bit warm and sweaty. That just feels nice. It's a major plus.

You’re currently resting against his side, his arm slung over your shoulder and his hand resting comfortably between your boobs. You’re laughing at something Sarah said and it’s probably the most relaxed he’s seen you in a few weeks. Your head thrown back, nearly resting on his clavicle and your hand slapping against his thigh. He wishes he was paying attention to what was being said, just so he could repeat it to see you laugh like this again. So carefree, the way that you should always be.

The sun is beating down harshly on everyone, making everyone sweat just a bit but no one seems uncomfortable by it. In fact everyone just settles in more, sitting in complete bathing suits and drinking beer.

“Did you guys really start dating? And not tell us?” Pope asks out of nowhere, completely unprompted. But the more he stares at Pope, the more he realizes he was just lazily kissing at the side of your neck where he just so happened to be resting his head.

“Yeah!” John B exclaims, resting back in the drivers seat of the boat, Sarah settling with him, “What the fuck is up with that?”

JJ shrugs, “Wanted to be able to mack on my girl in private.”

“JJ, shut up.” You laugh, sitting up and making him go with you. “We just wanted to make sure it was serious? I guess. Wanted to make sure that it wasn’t just silly feelings from knowing each other for so long. It would’ve felt different if everyone knew.”

“We wouldn’t have judged,” Kie says, leaning in with her elbows on her knees.

“It wasn’t about that,” You shake your head, “it was more like, nothing is really private with us. We share everything with each other. And this was something that needed to be figured out with just the two of us. Nothing really changed between us so then we just kinda forgot to mention it.”

JJ can’t help but wrap an arm around you. Kissing you the night that he did was the best decision he’s ever made in his life. He took a leap of faith and it was the right thing to do. The moment you kissed him back he knew that everything was right, nothing could ever be wrong about his decision. He had a feeling things were changing between the two of you for a few months. Jealousy was shining through when one or the other would end up flirting with someone at a party. Touches were getting more intimate and possessive. The flirting was getting more and more serious.

You have been a constant in his life since he was nine. Always the first person who was willing to listen to his crazy ideas or go on his absurd adventures. You were the first one he went to every time his dad hit him. The only person that ever saw him in that moment of vulnerability. And that’s still to this day. You’re the only person he trusts, truly trusts. He knows that you’d never turn against him with the things he’s told you, shown you. You have years of knowledge on him, and he you, that you could crush him in a heartbeat but he knows you never will. You’ll never betray him. Even if you weren’t in his life anymore, there’s no way you’d ever do that. He just knows.

And he doesn’t even want to think about that possibility. You not being in his life just doesn’t make sense. He doesn’t want to find out what it’d be like.

“You know, we’ve known for months.” Kie laughs, pulling JJ out of his thoughts.

You gasp at her words, “What? How?”

“I saw your guys’ first kiss.” John B smiles, looking all sorts of smug.

“I’m pretty sure you didn’t,” JJ chuckles, taking a sip of his beer. “It was at a party only we went to when we were 14.”

“Wait, what?” You question, turning to look at him.

JJ smirks, “Mhmm, remember the first time you smoked with me?” he looks to you for affirmation. When you nod, he continues, “Remember the game of truth or dare? You were dared to make out with the person you thought was the hottest. It was me.”

Your mouth drops open in shock, “Holy shit. That’s right. How could I forget?” The red suddenly tinting your cheeks is enough to make JJ’s heart skip a beat. To know he has such an affect on you, makes him feel good.

“You can’t handle your shit, baby,” he teases, leaning forward to flick at your forehead. You gasp and try to smack him but he grabs your wrist, leaning in to kiss you instead.

“Who knew they could get more annoying?” Pope groans. “You guys should’ve kept this to yourselves.”

“They were getting sloppy Pope,” Kie shrugs, “they wouldn’t have been able to hide it for much longer. You see the gross amount of love that oozes out of them when they look at each other.”

Everyone starts laughing but you just look at JJ and the look that's shining in your eyes is the same one they’re talking about. He knows the same thing must be reflecting in his own eyes because you lean forward and press a sweet kiss to his lips. On that he greedily accepts and returns. He smirks when he pulls away, placing a kiss to your forehead.

“So, John B what kiss did you see then?”

“One night in the hammock, like last year some time. I saw it and then the next days you guys were just different.” He shrugs, pulling Sarah into him some more.

You move into his side once again and look to Kie, “When did you notice?”

“Like six months ago?” She turns her head from side to side, trying to remember. “It was after breakfast at John B’s one morning. You guys thought you were alone in the kitchen. JJ was the one cleaning the kitchen, oddly, and you were on the counter by the sink. The way you were talking, it was about a date and you said that you loved each other but it was different than the way you’d usually say it. I left after that.”

JJ’s heart is starting to beat a little quicker in his chest. Something about talking about you or your relationship together just makes him excited. He loves it. He loves you.

“Pope?”

“Saw the secret hand holding at The Wreck one afternoon. Thought it was weird, seeing as you held hands all the time. There was no need to hide it but your fingers were doing that soft caress thing, it was obvious.” He says the whole thing like he’s disinterested in the topic. It makes JJ laugh.

“I think it’s amazing how long you’ve all known each other.” Sarah smiles and it makes a smile appear on everyone’s face.

John B then decides it's time to move the boat, to go somewhere to swim. Everyone gets excited, standing up and removing any leftover clothing, while the boat is moving, so once it’s anchored the swimming can begin without any sort of hesitation. It was too hot out now.

But then the boat comes to an abrupt stop and a few high pitched screams fill JJ’s ears before a splash of water. He’s been jolted to the very front of the bow, hitting his head on the seat there. It takes him a moment to connect the dots before he stands up to make sure everyone is okay. Kie and Pope are a couple inches away from him, groaning as they sit back up. John B rubbing his head, clearly hitting it on the window in front of him. And Sarah regains her balance as she stands up from the bench behind John B. You were nowhere in sight.

“Y/n!” He yells out, scrambling to his feet. “Baby! Where’s y/n!”

That seems to knock everyone out of their stupor and scramble to their feet. “JJ!” you groan out just as he spots your hand on the side of the boat. A cry rips through you as JJ and Pope rush to try and pull you up into the boat. You rip yourself away from them before they even get a chance to reach you properly.

“Baby, what’s wrong? Come on, grab onto me!” JJ yells, trying to keep in his panic. He has no idea if you’re hurt or not and the fact that you’re crying isn’t helping settle him at all.

“JJ! Please get me out of this fucking water!” You yell out, reaching up for him once more.

He immediately bends down, the panic in your voice, making him desperate to get you into the boat. He hears everyone else yelling, asking what happened, wondering why you’re having such a hard time getting out on your own, asking if you’re okay. But he ignores them all, finally getting his hand in yours and reaching down below your elbow to haul you up. Pope on the other side doing the same. You crash into him and with the force of his movement to pull you up and over the edge, he falls back into the other side of the boat, you landing on top of him.

You cry out in pain and flinch away from him, “Holy shit,” Pope gapes as he helps sit you up.

“What!” JJ exclaims, sitting up, running his eyes all over your body to find what’s wrong. It doesn’t take long for him to land on the giant red mark covering almost the entirety of your abdomen. “Oh, fuck. A jellyfish got you?”

“What?” You gasp, looking down to where his attention is. Kie shoves a water into your hand and Sarah sits behind you, wrapping her arms across the top of your chest. “Fuck,” you sigh out when you catch sight of it.

“Did you not feel that?” John B asks and JJ looks up to him for a second before back to you, trying to catch your eye. If you didn’t feel that, something else must be wrong.

“No! I think my ankle is broken!” You yell out, startling JJ a bit. He trails his eyes down your body until he reaches your ankle and fuck. Yeah.

“That looks broken,” Pope voices his thoughts perfectly.

“What the fuck happened, John B?” JJ snaps, his anger getting to him quickly. You getting hurt is the quickest way to get him angry. He hates seeing you hurt. In any way.

“The last storm must’ve changed the stream or something. We hit a sand bank. We haven’t been out here since then,” John B explains. “Let’s get back to the Chateau, we have to get y/n to the hospital.

JJ grabs your face in his hands and wipes away the water there. “Are you hurt anywhere else?”

“No, I don’t think so,” you breathe out. It comes out in a harsh breath, like you’re in too much pain and it sends a wave of panic through JJ. You’re never one to show that you were in pain unless it was an unbearable amount.

“Are you sure?”

He watches as you clench your eyes shut, trying to regulate your breathing. You just nod your head, not opening your eyes again. JJ places a kiss to your cheek and moves down in a line until he meets your lips. He lets out a breath when you kiss him back. Anything to keep you distracted. He pulls back and looks around to everyone else, not knowing what else he can do. Kie has a hand gripped tight in hers, Sarah is running her fingers through your hair, and Pope is holding your leg steady from the bouncing of the boat. JJ feels absolutely useless.

And it’s like you can sense his distress because you grab onto one of his hands and squeeze tight. “JJ stop overthinking. Tell me something. Tell me a story.”

So he quickly jumps into recounting one of your many dates. Asking if you remember it. Telling you how you looked in your outfit, how you made him feel. How much he loves going on dates with you. How he likes that you like to go surfing with him, hiking, biking, anything that requires physical activity. You giggle and laugh at parts that are funny, at how he nearly puked before picking you up to go on your first official date. Everyone else joined in on the laughs too. Soaking up the information they’re receiving.

It helps because you stop crying and wincing at every little movement and it helps calm JJ down as well. He picks you up into his arms when the boat docks and everyone rushes to gather the necessities and get you to the van. JJ lays you down and rests your head in his lap as he continues to tell you about how much he just loves doing simple things with you. Grocery shopping. Clothes shopping, the dishes. Eating food. Anything he can think of, he tells you. He just wants you to know how much he loves you. It’s the only thing he can think of doing. He doesn’t know why but it’s the only thing rattling around in his brain.

How much he loves you.

When the van pulls up to the hospital, everyone is still in a mad panic. It startles the nurses and those in the emergency room when 6 teenagers come bursting into the waiting room, in near hysterics. They don’t really handle each other being in pain well.

The nurse forces him to stay in the waiting room, putting a hand to his chest when he tries to follow you back more than once. You look at him and tell him it’s okay, that you’ll be okay, and as soon as it’s fine he can come back. It does nothing to settle him and he just paces back and forth in front of the 4 other Pogues.

“JJ, sit down. She’s going to be fine.”

“I know,” he sighs, stopping. “She just scared the shit out of me. If she had hit her head instead of her ankle on the side of the boat, she could’ve drowned.”

John B stands to bring him into a hug, “But she didn’t. She’s okay and you’ll see her in a bit.”

And he was right. The doctor came out about twenty minutes later and let JJ go back since your parents weren’t there yet. The rest of the Pogues decided to wait in the waiting room no matter what, saying that they would like to see you too but for obvious reasons to let JJ go first. He’s thankful for that because he feels like he’s about to vibrate right out of his skin.

“Hey, tough stuff,” he jokes as he walks into your room. Your eyes open and you smile at him lazily.

“Hi, baby,” you murmur, reaching a hand out for him. You make grabby hands at him until he’s in reach and it makes him laugh.

He grabs onto your hand and leans down to place a kiss to your lips. You’re still in your bikini but it looks like the sting on your stomach has been taken care of and the lower half of your leg is in a black cast. “Hi, baby,” he whispers back once he meets your eyes again. “How’re you feeling?”

“Well now,” you let out a giggle, “I’m feeling absolutely great. The pain medicine they have me on is wonderful.”

JJ lets out a laugh and caresses your cheek, “You’re higher than a kite, my love.”

You let out a laugh, “Damn straight. You should be so jealous.”

“Oh,” JJ nods, “I am. Don’t you worry about that.”

You let out a content hum, nestling into his hand a bit. Closing your eyes, you rest back into your pillow. “I broke my ankle. And the jellyfish sting isn’t as bad as it looks.”

He runs a hand through your matted hair, “You scared the shit out of me.”

“I’m fine, baby,” you mumble, giving him the smile that melts his entire being. And when you open up your eyes he can see that you really mean it. “Did you really think our dates were that good?”

“Everything we do is that amazing,” JJ points out.

Pulling on his hand, you murmur, “Come take a nap with me. Please. I would like to be close to you. Help me relax.”

JJ doesn’t hesitate to slip into the bed next to you, the vibration of his skin is still there and he knows that it won’t go away until he’s close to you. You turn your back to him and he settles in behind you, curving his body around yours. His arm wraps around your middle and his hand comes to rest on your chest, your steading heartbeat calming down the vibration of his body. You melt down against him and he just holds you to him even tighter.

“I would appreciate it if you stopped getting hurt,” he murmurs, moving your hair out of the way to kiss at the back of your shoulder.

“Yeah, so would I.”

“How about we both stop getting hurt,” JJ suggests, his kisses moving up to the side of your neck. His heart rate has calmed down significantly in just the few seconds of laying here.

“I can do that,” you hum, resting further into his front. “You don’t have to promise it, but just know I’ll always be there to help you when you do get hurt.”

JJ feels a lump form in his throat at your words. He knows what you mean, it’s not something you have to explain to him. You turn your head to look at him up and over your shoulder, a smile gracing your face. JJ nearly cries at the sight, the beautiful sight that it is leaves him breathless. When you pucker your lips, JJ obliges, swooping down in no time and pressing a firm kiss to your lips. His skin tingles at the feeling and he wishes you were anywhere else than in a damn hospital.

“I love you, you know.” You smile at him, kissing at his lips once again.

“I know.” he says against your lips.

If there’s one thing he knows. He knows that you love him. That you’ve given him love every day since the day you met. The only person to give him continuous love, love that he needs. And he knows that you know how much he loves you. How much he will always love you.

So, when you finally fall asleep, nestled in his arms, he sleeps. He sleeps comfortably. The only way he can, when you’re with him

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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