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suddencolds · 2 months

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The Worst Timing | [5/5]

we made it!!! part 5/5 + a mini epilogue (5.6k words) at long last 🥹 (aka the installment in which i remember that h/c has a c in it in addition to the h, haha.) [part 1] is here!

this is an OC fic - here is a list of everything I've written w these two!

Summary: Yves invites Vincent to a wedding, in France, where the rest of his family will be in attendance. It's a very important wedding, so he's definitely not going to let anything—much less the flu—ruin it. (ft. fake dating, an international trip, downplaying illness, sharing a hotel room)

—

The world comes back to him in pieces—first the wooden panels of the ceiling, the sloped wooden beams. The coldness of the room, the slight, monotonous whir of the air circulating through one of the vents overhead.

He’s leaned up against the wall, seated on the floor in the hallway, and Vincent is kneeling beside him, his eyebrows furrowed.

It takes him a moment to realize where he is. He had been about to head back to the courtyard, hadn’t he? He doesn’t have much memory of anything that happened after, but judging by Vincent’s reaction, he thinks he can probably guess.

“Hi,” Yves says, for lack of a better thing to say.

He watches a complicated set of expressions flicker through Vincent’s face—relief, first, before it turns to something distinctly less neutral.

“You’re awake,” Vincent says. He turns away, for a moment. Yves notes the clench of his jaw, the tightness of his grip—his fingers white around Yves’s sleeve.

“Was I out for long?”

“A couple minutes.”

Yves wants to say something. He should say something. Anything to lighten the tension, anything to get the point across that this is all just an unlucky miscalculation, on his part. It really isn’t something Vincent should have to be worried about.

“I’m sorry for making you wait,” he starts. Really, what he means is, I’m sorry for making you worry about me. “I promise I’mb fine.”

The look on Vincent’s face, then, is something that Yves hasn’t seen before.

“Why do you have to—” he starts, frustration rising in his voice. He sighs, his jaw set. “I don’t understand why you—” He drops his hand from Yves’s sleeve, and it’s then when Yves notices the stiffness to his shoulders, the tension in his posture. He runs a hand through his hair, lets out another short, exasperated breath. “You’re not fine.”

It’s strange, Yves thinks, to see him like this—Vincent, who usually never wears his emotions on his face, looks clearly displeased, now.

“Hey,” Yves says, softly. He reaches out to take Vincent’s hand. Vincent goes very still with the contact, but he doesn’t say anything. “I—”

Fuck. His body seems to always pick the worst time for unwanted interjections. He wrenches his hand away just in time to smother a sneeze into his sleeve, though it’s forceful enough to leave him slightly lightheaded.

“Stay here,” Vincent says, getting to his feet. “Lay down if you get dizzy again.”

Yves blinks. “Where are you going?”

“To tell the others that we’re leaving.”

Yves wants to protest. Dinner is already halfway over. It’s not as if the festivities are particularly strenuous. They’ll probably move inside after dinner, where it’s warmer.

But he thinks better of it. Judging by how exhausted he still feels, how much his head aches, it probably wouldn’t be wise to push it.

“Don’t tell them about this,” he says.

Vincent’s eyebrows furrow. “What?”

“Aimee is going to worry if she finds out,” Yves says, dropping his head to his knees. He doesn’t want to look at Vincent, doesn’t want to know what expression is on his face. “Just—let them have this night. It’s—supposed to be perfect.” I really wanted it to be perfect, he almost adds. There’s a strange tightness to his throat as he says it, a strange heaviness to his chest.

He knows what it means. If, after he’s tried so hard to do his part, their evening still ends up ruined on his own accord, he’s not sure if he could live with himself after.

For a moment, Vincent doesn’t say anything at all.

“Okay,” he says, at last. “Just stay here.”

And then he heads down the hallway. The door at the end of the reception hall swings shut behind him. Yves thinks he should be relieved, but he finds that he doesn’t feel much other than exhausted.

—

The ride home on the shuttle is silent. Vincent sits next to him, even though all of the other seats are empty. Yves thinks the proximity is probably inadvisable. He opens his mouth to say as much, and then shuts it.

Vincent sits and stares straight ahead, his posture stiff, and doesn’t say anything for the entirety of the ride. It’s strange. Yves is no stranger to silence—Vincent is, after all, a coworker, and Yves has endured more than a few quiet elevator rides and quiet team lunches at the office, but it’s strange because it’s Vincent.

Vincent, who usually takes care to make conversation with him, whenever it’s just the two of them. Vincent, who stayed up through the lull of antihistamines a couple months ago to talk to Yves, until Yves had given him explicit permission to go to sleep.

Yves tries not to think about it. Through the haze of his fever, everything feels unusually bright—the interior of the shuttle, with its leather seats and metal handrails.

The shuttle stops just outside the main entrance to their hotel. Just before he gets to the doors, he stumbles. Vincent’s hand shoots out, instinctively, to steady him.

“Sorry,” Yves says, a little sheepishly. It’s not that he’s dizzy. The roads are just uneven, and it’s dark. “I can walk.”

But Vincent doesn’t let go—not for the entirety of the walk through the cool, air-conditioned lobby, through the hallways to the hotel elevators. Not when the elevator stops at their floor, not when they pass by the grid of wooden doors leading up to their room.

Before Yves can manage to reach for his keycard, Vincent has already swiped them in, scarily efficient. He slides the card back into his pocket, pushes the door open.

“Thadks for walking me back,” Yves says. “Sorry you couldn’t stay longer. You mbust’ve been halfway through dinner.”

“I already finished eating,” Vincent says.

“Even dessert?” Yves says. “I think Aimee got everyone creme brulee from one of the local bakeries. I was excited to try it. Maybe Leon can save us some.” he muffles a yawn into his hand. It’s too early to be sleeping, but his pull out bed looks very inviting right now.

“Take the bed,” Vincent says.

Yves blinks at him. “What?”

“The bed’s warmer.”

There’s absolutely no way he’s going to let Vincent take the pull-out bed in his place, Yves thinks blearily. He’s spent the past couple nights muffling sneezes into the covers—if there’s anything he’s certain of, it’s that he really, really doesn’t want Vincent to catch this.

“I dod’t think we should switch,” he says, sniffling. “I’ve been sleeping here ever sidce I started coming down with this. I’mb— hHeh-!” He veers away, raising an elbow to his face. “hh—HHEh’IIDZschH’-iEEW! Ugh, I’mb pretty sure I contaminated it.”

“We can both take the bed, if you’d prefer,” Vincent says. As if it’s that simple.

Yves opens his mouth to protest—is Vincent really okay with sharing a bed with him?—but then he thinks about Vincent finding him in the hallway—the stricken expression on his face, then, his eyes wide, his jaw clenched—and thinks better of himself.

Instead, he lets Vincent lead him to the bedroom. The bed is neatly made—the covers drawn, the pillows propped up against the headboard.

“Lay down,” Vincent says, pushing lightly down on his shoulders. Yves sits. He peels off his suit jacket, folds it, and sets it aside on the nightstand.

“Hey, I kdow that was sudden,” he says, in reference to earlier. “I’mb sorry you had to witness it. I… probably shouldn’t have pushed it.”

Vincent says nothing, to that.

Yves lays down, shuts his eyes. “You didn’t have to accompady me home, you know.”

Silence. He exhales, burrowing deeper into the covers. “It’s not as bad as it looks, seriously.”

He opens his mouth to say more. He has to say something, he thinks, to convince Vincent that it’s really not that big of a deal. Anything, to assuage that look on Vincent’s face.

But he’s so tired. He can feel the exhaustion now that he’s finally let himself lay down. The bed is traitorously comfortable, with its soft feather pillows and its fluffy layers of blankets, and Vincent was right—it really is warmer.

He feels the press of a hand on his forehead, feels the cold, unyielding pressure. Feels gentle, calloused fingers brush the hair out of his face.

“Sleep,” Vincent says, firmly.

And Yves—

Yves, already half gone, is powerless, when Vincent says it like that.

—

When he wakes, it’s just barely bright outside. He takes it in—the first few rays of sunlight, streaking through the curtains. The bed, a little more well-cushioned than the pullout bed he’d spent the past few nights on—higher up and decisively sturdier. He blinks.

Beside him, seated on a chair he recognizes as belonging to the desk at the opposite end of the room, is Vincent.

Vincent, awake. Yves isn’t sure if he’s slept at all. He certainly doesn’t look tired, at first glance, but closer inspection reveals a little more. It’s evident in the way he holds his shoulders, stiff, and perhaps a little tired, as if there’s been tension sitting in them all night.

He’s reading a book. Whether he bought it at the convenience store downstairs, or on one of the other days when Yves was busy running errands for the wedding and Vincent was elsewhere, or whether it’d been sitting in his suitcase since the start of the vacation, Yves doesn’t know.

“How’s the book?” Yves says.

His throat is dry, he realizes, for the way it makes him cough, afterwards. Vincent’s eyes meet his, unerringly. He shuts the book, sets it down on the bedside table.

“It’s a little boring,” Vincent says. “How’s the fever?”

Before Yves can answer, Vincent leans forward and presses the back of his hand to Yves’s forehead. His touch is unerringly gentle, and Yves allows himself to look.

Vincent’s eyebrows are furrowed, his eyes narrowed slightly in concentration, and Yves wonders, suddenly, if he’s been this worried for awhile, now. If he’s been this worried ever since he’d walked them both back into the hotel room last night.

“I’m fine,” Yves says.

It has the opposite effect he intends it to.

Vincent’s expression shutters. “The last time you said that, you passed out in front of me,” he says, withdrawing his hand with a frown. “So forgive me if I don’t entirely believe you.”

Yves sighs, rubbing a hand over his face. It’s a fair point. “I’m usually more reliable whed it comes to these things.”

“What things?”

“Kdowing my limits.”

Vincent says, “I think you knew your limits. I think you just didn’t want to honor them, because you decided the wedding took precedence.”

He’s… frustrated, Yves realizes. Still. He’s sure he can guess why. Their fake relationship does not extend to Vincent having to look after him, to Vincent having to drop everything in the middle of a wedding, of all things, to take him home. To Vincent having to worry about all this—the fever Yves knows he has, now, and the bed he’s currently taking up—on top of everything else. As if being in a foreign country, surrounded by people he knows almost exclusively through Yves, who, for the most part, converse in a language he barely speaks, wasn’t already enough work on its own.

And Yves gets it. He hadn’t wanted this to happen, either. He’d told himself that if this—this pretend relationship, this pretense—is contingent upon both of them playing their part, the least he can do is be self-sufficient outside of it.

But now—because Vincent is here with him, and because they share a hotel room—all of this is now Vincent’s problem, too, by extension.

“Did you sleep at all last night?” he asks.

Vincent smiles at him, a little wryly, as if the answer is evident.

“You gave up your bed just for me to steal it,” Yves says, in an attempt to lighten the mood. “It’s really comfortable, and all, but I’mb pretty sure they make these kinds of beds for two.”

“Is that a proposition?” Vincent says.

“Maybe.” Yves thinks it through. “Realistically, probably ndot, until I have a chance to shower.” He’s still dressed in his dress shirt and slacks from yesterday, a little embarrassingly—he should probably get changed. “Speaking of which, I should do that soon, so you don’t feel the need to stay up all night reading—” Yves leans forward, squints at the book cover on the nightstand. “—Hemingway? Somehow, I didn’t expect you to be the type.”

“I’m not,” Vincent says. “Victoire lent it to me.”

“Oh,” Yves says, trying to think of when Vincent would’ve had time to ask her for a recommendation. “Yeah. She’s—” He twists aside, ducking into his elbow. “hHEH’IIDzschh-EEW! snf-! She’s quite the literary reader. Is it really that boring?”

“I can see why people think the transparency of his prose is appealing,” Vincent says. “But I’m fifty pages in, and nothing has happened.”

“Isd’t that the sort of thing Hemingway can get away with, since he’s straightforward about it?”

“In a short story, maybe,” Vincent says. Then: “You are trying to make me feel better.”

Ah.

Yves laughs. “Where in the world did you get that idea?”

Vincent just sighs. “I would be exceptionally unobservant not to notice when I’ve seen you do the same thing all this week.”

“What?”

“Telling people that you’re fine,” Vincent says. “And distracting them when they don’t believe you.”

Yves doesn’t think that’s entirely accurate. It’s not like he was trying to be dishonest. It’s just that it was never the most important thing to address.

“Distracting is a bit disingenuous.”

“I don’t get it,” Vincent says, with a frown. “You’re so insistent on putting yourself last, even when you were obviously—” He sighs. There it is—that expression again, the one that makes itself evident through the furrowed eyebrows, the tense set of his jaw—frustration, and maybe something else. “You’re surrounded by people who care about you, so why not just—”

“There are plenty of things more important than how I’mb feeling,” Yves says.

“I don’t think that’s true.”

But of course it is, Yves thinks. A wedding is a once in a lifetime occurrence. An illness is nothing, in the face of that.

“I promised I’d be there,” he says, because when it really comes down to it, it’s true. He had no intention of going back on his word. “I didn’t want to be the one to let them down. Is that so hard to believe?” He reaches up with a hand to massage his temples. His head aches, even though he’s slept for long enough that he feels like it ought to feel a little better, by now. “It’s already bad enough that I had to drag you into this.”

“You didn’t drag me into this,” Vincent says. “I came on my own volition.”

Yves tries a laugh, but it’s humorless. “I made you leave halfway through the wedding dinner.”

“I’d already finished eating.”

“Ndot to mention, you practically had to carry me upstairs.”

“Because you’re ill.”

“That’s no excuse.” Yves wants to say more, but he finds himself beholden to a tickle in the back of his throat—irritatingly present, until he concedes to it by ducking into his elbow to cough, and cough.

When he looks up, blinking tears out of his vision, Vincent isn’t looking at him.

“You should get some rest,” he says, simply.

Yves can tell—just by the way he says it—that there is no argument to him, anymore. Just like that, Vincent is back to being closed off—poised and perfectly, infuriatingly unreadable, just like he is at work, his face so carefully a mask of indifference, even in the most stressful presentations, the most frustrating disagreements. Yves wants none of it.

“Hey,” he says. A part of him itches to crack a joke, to change the subject—anything to take away this air of seriousness. A part of him wants to reach out, again—to take Vincent’s hand, entwine their fingers; to reassure him, again, that he’s really fine.

“I’m sorry,” he says, instead. Maybe it’s the fever that loosens his tongue. Maybe it’s just a combination of everything.

He can feel Vincent’s eyes on him, still. Vincent has always held a sort of intensity to him, a quiet sort of perceptiveness. “I’m not sure I follow,” Vincent says.

“This visit was supposed to be fun for you,” he says. “And now you’re here, stuck in the hotel room because of me, even though today was supposed to be for sightseeing.”

It doesn’t feel like enough. What can he say to make it enough? There’s a strange ache in his chest, a strange, crushing pressure. Yves is horrified to find his eyes stinging. He’s held it together for so long, he thinks. Why now? Why, when Vincent is right here?

But a part of him knows, too. Of course traveling to a different country would be more involved than going to a party, or spending an evening at a stranger’s house. But there was a time when he thought this could really just be a fun excursion for the both of them—half a week in his family’s home country, with someone who he thoroughly enjoys spending time with.

And now, because of this untimely illness—or because of his own short-sightedness in managing it—it isn’t. He didn’t get to stay through dinner, didn’t get to wish Aimee and Genevieve a good rest of their night, like he’d planned to. He has no idea if things went smoothly in his absence. To make matters worse, Vincent is here, having endured a sleepless night, instead of anywhere else.

And really, when he thinks about it, who does have to blame for all of this, except himself?

“I didn’t mean for it to turn out like this,” he says. “So I’m sorry.” He resists the urge to swipe a hand over his eyes—surely, he thinks, that would give him away.

He turns away. It’s convenient, he thinks, that the embarrassing sniffle that follows could be attributed to something else.

“You’ve been nothing but accommodating to me, this whole visit,” Vincent says. “If anything, I should’ve insisted that you take the bed earlier. You haven’t been sleeping well, have you?”

He says it with such certainty. Yves opens his mouth to protest this—or to apologize, for all the times he must’ve kept Vincent up, including but not limited to last night—but Vincent presses on.

“You spent all of yesterday morning helping everyone get ready, and when I got back, you apologized for not being around—as if the reason why you weren’t around wasn’t that you were so busy making sure everything was fine for everyone else.” Vincent pauses, takes in a slow, measured breath. Yves is surprised to hear that he sounds… distinctly angry, in a way that Yves is not used to hearing.

“And then you showed up to the rehearsal and the wedding, even though you weren’t feeling well. And you still think you have something to apologize for? Are you even hearing yourself?” Yves hears the creak of the chair as he stands, the sound of quiet footsteps. Feels the dip of the bed as Vincent takes a seat at the edge of it.

“You know, after you left the dinner table, Genevieve was talking about how much she liked your speech? Do you know that yesterday morning, Solaine told me how grateful she was that you helped her with fixing her dress? Do you know that when I got lunch with Leon and Victoire, they told me how much time you spent preparing for everything—the speech, and the wedding, both?”

Oh. Yves hadn’t known any of those things, and he knows Vincent isn’t the kind of person who would lie about this sort of thing.

“I don’t get it,” Vincent says, sounding distinctly pained to say it. “How could you possibly think that you haven’t done enough?”

Yves finds himself taken aback—by the frustration in his voice, by the fact that Vincent has noticed these things in the first place, by the fact that he’s deemed them important enough to take stock of. He makes it sound so simple.

“I don’t know,” Yves says, at last. He shuts his eyes. “If it was enough.”

“I’m telling you that it was,” Vincent says.

But Yves knows that he could have done more, if the circumstances were different. If he hadn’t been so out of it during the wedding. If he’d taken the necessary precautions to avoid coming down with this in the first place. If he’d been able to stay through dinner, at least; if he hadn’t needed Vincent to accompany him home.

“You don’t believe me,” Vincent says, with a sigh.

Yves doesn’t say anything, to that.

“I can’t speak for anyone else,” Vincent says. There’s the slight rustling of the covers as he shifts, rearranging one of the pillows at the headboard. “But I had fun.”

Yves’s heart twists.

It’s sweet, unexpectedly. “You don’t have to say that just to make me feel better,” Yves says.

“When have I ever said anything just to make you feel better?” Vincent says, with a short laugh. When Yves chances a look at him, he’s smiling down at himself. “I mean it. Meeting your family has been a lot of fun. It’s not often that I get the chance to be a part of something like this.”

Whether he’s referring to France, or the wedding and the festivities, or being surrounded by Yves’s large extended family, Yves isn’t sure. But if Vincent is trying to cheer him up, it’s working.

“I can see why you like France so much,” he says, turning his gaze out the window, though the view outside is filtered through the semi-translucent curtains. “It’s beautiful.”

“Today was supposed to be the last day for sightseeing,” Yves says, a little regretful. “But you’re stuck here.”

“In a sunny, luxurious hotel room, with a view of the pool and the garden?” Vincent says, with a scoff. “I could think of worse places to be.”

Staying up all night, just to check up on Yves, more accurately. Vincent must be tired, too—yesterday was already tiring enough. And now it’s morning already, and he hasn’t gotten any sleep.

“Reading Hemingway,” Yves adds.

Vincent looks a little surprised. Then he laughs. “Yes. I guess you’re right. Perhaps it’s an agonizing experience after all.”

The yawn he stifles into his hand, after that isn’t half as subtle as he tries to make it.

Yves feels his eyebrows creep up. “Are you sure you don’t want to get some sleep? There’s plenty of room.” He scoots a little closer to the edge of the bed, just to make a point.

Vincent peers down at the space beside him, a little hesitant. “At 10am?”

“It’d be, what, 4am, back in Eastern time?” Yves says. “By Ndew York standards, you’re supposed to already be asleep.”

“That’s not how it works,” Vincent says, but he dutifully moves a little closer to Yves anyways. He’s changed out of yesterday’s wedding attire, more sensibly, but now he’s wearing a knitted cardigan which Yves thinks looks unfairly, terribly good on him. Yves finds himself marveling at the unfairness of it all. How can someone look so good wearing something so casual?

Vincent smells good, up close. When he lays down next to Yves, pulling the covers gingerly over himself—leaving a careful amount of room between them, but still dangerously, intoxicatingly close—Yves feels his breath catch in his throat.

Vincent is right there, less than an arm’s length away from him, closer than he’s ever been, and Yves—Yves is—

“See,” Yves says, as evenly as he can manage to, in his current state, as if his heart isn’t practically beating out of his chest. He swallows. His throat feels dry. “This bed definitely fits two.”

“I suppose it does,” Vincent says. “Now you can tell me if I’m a terrible person to share a bed with.”

“After everything I’ve put you through,” Yves says, “I think I’d honestly feel reassured if you were.”

Vincent smiles, again, as if he finds this humorous. “Are you sure you’re going to be fine?”

“Positive,” Yves says. “You should sleep. I’ll wake you if I ndeed anything.”

“Okay. If you’re sure.” Vincent shuts his eyes.

It’s not long before his breathing evens out, not long before he goes perfectly still. He must really be tired, Yves thinks, with a pang.

Yves, for some reason, finds that he can’t get to sleep. He stares up at the ceiling for what feels like minutes on end, shuts his eyes, all to no avail. Maybe it’s because he’s already slept far more than his usual share. Maybe it’s the jetlag. Maybe it’s merely Vincent’s unusual presence—the strangeness of having him so close, in an environment so intimate.

But when he allows himself to look, he sees—

Vincent, his eyes shut, his eyelashes fanning out over his cheeks. From the window, the filtered light gleams unevenly across the crown of dark hair on his head. There’s almost no movement to him at all, aside from the even rise and fall of his shoulders.

And Yves knows what the feeling in his chest is. He’s regrettably, intimately familiar with it.

He just isn’t sure he likes what it means.

—

Vincent—despite falling asleep so quickly—is up before him. When Yves wakes, next, it’s to a hand to his forehead.

“Hey,” Vincent is saying, softly. “Yves. You have a visitor.”

Yves opens his eyes.

He’s feeling—a little better, remarkably. Still feverish, still a little unsteady, but leagues better as compared to yesterday. When he looks over, he sees—

He doesn’t jolt upright, but it’s a close thing. “Aimee!”

He barely has a chance to ask before she’s crashing into him, encircling him in a tight hug. “Yves!” she exclaims, pulling back from him. “How are you feeling? Oh my gosh, when I heard you left early because you were unwell, I was so worried…”

Yves grimaces, turning away. “Sorry, I had every idtention of staying until the end—”

“You came all the way out with the flu!” she says. “I honestly can’t believe you. The fact that you still took the trouble to attend with a fever—”

“It—” Yves starts, but he finds himself twisting away, lifting an arm to his face. “hhEH-! HEEhD’TTSCHH-iiiEEw! Snf-! It’s fide, snf-! I’mb practically recovered already.”

“I should’ve told you not to push yourself when you told me you were coming down with something,” Aimee says, shaking her head. “And you stayed and gave such a lovely speech, even though you weren’t feeling well? When I was talking to Victoire after, she mentioned that you’ve been sick for days and Genevieve—you should’ve said something.”

“I’ll say somethidg next time,” Yves says, a little sheepishly. “Did the wedding go okay?”

Aimee visibly brightens, at this. “It was more than okay,” she says, her eyes gleaming. “It blew every expectation that I had out of the water.”

Aimee fills him in on everything that happened after he left, last night—dessert, the first dance, the cake-cutting; her favorites out of the photos they’d taken after the ceremony (a shot of Genevieve braiding her hair during the cocktail hour; a shot of them leaning in close, for the dance, tired but smiling; a shot of the cake with its multiple tiers, the frosting strung like banners across it; another where both of them are holding onto the cutting knife together and Genevieve looks like she is trying not to laugh; a shot of the bouquet toss, the flowers suspended in mid-air). She tells him about the conversations she and Genevieve had with others about marriage and their futures and their plans for their honeymoon.

Then she lectures him on how he should worry about his health first, next time. She tells him, in no uncertain terms, that she’s fully prepared to give him a piece of her mind the next time he tries to pull something like this. She insists that his health is more important than anything. Vincent stands off to the side the entire time, his arms crossed, passively listening in, but when Yves looks over helplessly, mid-lecture, he definitely looks a little smug.

All in all, she doesn’t seem disappointed in him at all. And, more importantly, she seems happy. Yves finds himself relieved, at this.

Genevieve stops by, too, a little later, to thank him for the advice he’d given her the day before the wedding. She hugs him too, and she leaves him a bag of tea that she promises “is practically a cure to anything—I hope it makes your flight home tomorrow a little more tolerable.” Victoire stops by, with Leon, and Yves resigns himself to more lecturing from the both of them. It’s humbling, a little, to be lectured by his younger sister and his younger brother, though he concedes that perhaps this time, it might be at least partially warranted.

Then Leon opens their hotel fridge to show him the two creme brulees he and Vincent had missed out on, packaged nicely in small paper containers. (“Vincent told me you were interested in these,” he says, and Yves finds himself slightly mortified—but perhaps also a little endeared—that whatever it was that he’d said last night, offhandedly, Vincent had deemed it important enough to text Leon about.)

Later, after Yves showers and gets changed—when he and Vincent eat the creme brulees at the table in the living room, and Vincent tells him that he’s finished the book, perhaps a little masochistically (“it doesn’t get any better,” he says, sounding a little spiteful)—Yves finds himself smiling.

He’s happy, he realizes, despite everything that’s happened. Even with the slight headache, and the lingering congestion, the fever that hasn’t quite gone away entirely. The revelation comes as a surprise to him, at first. But when he thinks about the people he’s surrounded with, he thinks perhaps it isn’t all that surprising.

—

EPILOGUE

“Are you sure you’re feeling alright?” Vincent asks.

“Yes,” Yves says. It’s not a lie.

This time, he’s seated right next to the window, and Vincent is in the middle seat. Yves had offered to take the middle seat instead, but Vincent had insisted(“If you wanted to sleep, you could lean against the window,” he’d said, and Yves had accepted only because it would be better to fall asleep against the window than do something embarrassing, like fall asleep on Vincent’s shoulder).

“It’s just the annoyidg residual symptoms, now,” he says. “I—”

God. He always has the worst timing. He veers away, muffling a tightly contained sneeze into his shoulder.

“hHEH-’IIDDZschH-yyEW! Snf-! I’mb — hHhEHh’DjjsSHH-iEW! Ugh, I’m fine. I feel better thad I sound.”

“Bless you,” Vincent says, leaning over to press his hand against Yves’s forehead. “No fever,” he says. “That’s good. But you should take another day off when we get back.”

Yves doesn’t think taking another day off is necessary. “I spedt the entirety of yesterday sleeping,” he says. “I think I’ve rested enough.”

Vincent just raises an eyebrow at him. “Need I remind you that someone very wise told you to take it easy?”

“Since when has Aimee been your spokesperson?”

“She made a lot of good points,” Vincent says, deceptively unassuming. “I think you should consider taking notes.”

Yves looks at him for a moment. “You’re laughing at me.”

This time, Vincent smiles. “Maybe.”

Yves leans back in his seat, reaching up with one hand to massage his temples. The changing cabin pressure is not exactly comfortable—his head still hurts a little, but he’s flown enough times to know that it won’t be as much of a problem once they finish their ascent.

“Thadks again for coming,” he says, unwrapping one of the small, packaged pillows the airline has left on their seats.

“You invited me,” Vincent says, blinking. “All I did was show up.”

But that isn’t true at all, Yves thinks. Vincent is the one who spent time learning basic French, who met Yves’s family and who spoke with everyone with genuine interest, who bought Yves medicine and water, all while being careful to not be overbearing. Vincent is the one who left the wedding early to walk Yves back to the hotel, who stayed with him the entire day afterwards.

“That’s such a huge understatement I don’t even kdow where to get started,” Yves says. “Thanks for meetidg my family—they love you, by the way. They’re going to be askidg about you every summer from now on, I just know it.”

He can already picture it—June, this year, after busy season is over, if their fake relationship lasts that long. Another flight where they’re next to each other. Another dozen conversations about how they’d met, about what it’s like dating a coworker, about what their plans for the future are.

Perhaps it’s wishful thinking. This was never meant to be a long-term arrangement in the first place. But something about this—about being here with Vincent—just feels so unthinkingly easy.

“It’s no problem,” Vincent says. “The feeling is mutual. I’m glad I got to meet them.”

“Thanks for looking after me, too,” Yves says, with another apologetic smile. “I’mb sure being stuck in a hotel room all day wasn’t how you were planning on spending your last day of vacation.”

“I don’t mind,” Vincent says, sounding strangely like he means it. “I like spending time with you.”

Yves nearly drops the pillow he’s holding.

When he looks back at Vincent, Vincent looks faintly amused. “Is that so surprising? I think I’d be a terrible fake boyfriend if I didn’t.”

“You make a really good one, as it stands,” Yves tells him, sincerely, and Vincent smiles.

Yves looks out the window—where the city beneath them begins to resolve itself into miniature, where the sky stretches where he can see Vincent reflected faintly back at him, from the glass—and finds that he feels impossibly light.

#sneeze fic #snz fic #sneeze kink #snz kink #snzfic #when i set off to write a slow burn h/c fic i don't think i expected it to be 28k words #this was a journey for me... thank you sincerely to everyone who's joined me for the ride 😭#i am not sure if this specific chapter feels rushed? or if it's too short? (if it does i'm very sorry 🙇‍♀️)#some thoughts... (spoilers ahead; pls read the chapter before proceeding)#1) this installment in particular is something of a turning point in their relationship development (and i hope that's not too subtle)#2) vincent not being like a traditionally 'soft' caretaker and having his frustration show a little more openly is something i've had in my #head for awhile :') it was fun to let that crystallize this chapter #yvverse #my fic

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kibblz-n-bitz · 6 months

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You Called?

Summary: You're sunbathing on the deck as you notice your boyfriend, the sniper of the strawhat pirates, having fun with your crewmates. An idea forms in your mind. He's more than happy to indulge you.

Warnings: Y/N being a tease, also Y/N lowkey domming Usopp, AFAB Y/N, riding, creampie, implied cum-eating at the end lol

Usopp's hands shakily hold onto your waist as you bounce on his cock. His eyes are squeezed shut, and sweat beads from his forehead from where he's trying not to cum. The two of you had just started!

Earlier, you had watched him mess around with your captain while you were sunbathing on the deck. You laid on your stomach as you watched the boys pelt each other with water balloons, biting your lip at the sight of your boyfriend's abs dripping with water. A spark lit deep in your stomach. You smirked.

"Hey Usopp, could you c'mere a sec!" You whistled him over. He paused and turn to you and Luffy and Chopped took the opportunity to pelt him with as much water as they could. He shouted at theem before grumpily stalking over to you, sopping wet. You giggled.

"Hey, Y/N! You called?" The sniper smiled at you. You sat up a little, untying the top of your bikini. You giggled at his reaction, the way his eyes widened and the way his adam's apple bobbed as he gulped. "W-what are you-"

"I need your help reapplying this sun tan lotion, my love." You purred as you laid yourself back down. Resting your head on your crossed arms, you looked back at him coyly and nodded to the bottle of lotion beside you.

"O-of course! Lemme J-just..." Usopp stammered as he fumbled with the slippery bottle before getting it open and applying some lotion to his hands. He rubbed his hands together before pressing both palms to your back, gasping at how soft you felt.

Usopp's hands glided over your back ass he applied the lotion. He's given you a few massages before, and you really did love the way his skilled hands would work out the tension in your back. The boy fell into a routine of sorts as he kneaded at your shoulders before rubbing his hands back downward. It was sweet, but...

Gentle sighs escaped your mouth as his hands worked lower. When Usopp's hands pressed on a specific spot near your tailbone you let out a moan. You smirked as you felt him freeze, hands twitching from where they were on your back. He lets out a shaky breath but when his hands continue their movements the return is stilted, too forced like he was dragging himself back to attention.

"Hmmh~... Usopp..." You breathily sigh his name. Your boyfriend grips you from your sides. He pulls away and you startle a bit, kind of worried. What if you'd pushed him too far and made him uncomfortable? You sit up a little, turning around "Hey Usopp, are you ok-" Usopp is staring down at you, and one look at his crotch told you what he was thinking about.

"Y/N, Can we..." He trailed off. A playful smile worked its way onto your face.

"Can we what, my love?" You sat up, tying your bikini quickly (so you were covered) and taking his hands into yours. He was forced to look into your eyes. He gulped as you spoke again, "Tell me what you want."

"C-can we... go to y-your room?" His hands trembled in yours, he was being such a good boy. You smiled and hummed as you nodded, placing a chaste kiss to his lips. With a giggle, you drag him to his feet and the two of you run to your room.

Nami, who was sitting nearby, watched this whole thing go down. She rolled her eyes with a fond smile before laying back on the deck.

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

When you reached your room, you pushed him against the door as soon as it closed. Usopp grunted into your mouth, hands gripping your waist. It helped that you were in a bikini and he was shirtless. The feeling of his skin against yours made you whine into his mouth, and you pulled him backwards towards the bed.

Usopp let you take the lead, letting out a chuckle when you pushed him onto the bed. He sat up a bit on his elbows and you looked down down at him hungrily, hand on your hip. He laughed nervously.

"Strip." You ordered and he obeyed, rapidly hard cock springing forward. You untied your bikini, letting your tits bounce as you pulled it off of you. Turning around, you put your ass on display as you pull the rest of your swimwear off. You giggle at the way his cock twitches as you climb on top of him

"You ready hon?" You purr as you swipe some fingers through your soaked pussy with a pleased sigh. He nods and you tsk. "Use your words, Usopp."

"Y-yes, Y/N." The sniper shakily whispers. He's so hard it hurts. He loves the feeling of you taking control over him, of you using him like a toy. You're so sexy and soft in his lap.

A shudder travels up his spine as you line yourself up and sink down onto his thick cock. With a hum, you swivel your hips. Usopp sucks in a breath and his hands fly up to grip your waist. You lift yourself up and start to bounce and sway on his cock.

It takes everything in Usopp's power to not cum. To lose himself in the feeling of your velvety walls squeezing his cock like it's trying to milk it for all it's worth. His head tilts back and he moans, fuck you feel so good.

"Y'like me bouncing on your cock baby?" You coo as you bring one of his hands to hold onto one of your bouncing tits. Usopp sucks in a breath, hand squeezing your breast. "Tell me, Usopp."

"F-fuuck, you f- nghh haa- feel so.. gooddngh," Usopp whines and squirms underneath you. He starts to fuck into you, gripping your hips and meeting your thrusts downwards. "'M cl-ah! Close."

Upon hearing this, you clamp down on him, swiveling your hips and reveling in the moan bubbling out of your boyfriend. You whined, cradling Usopp's face in your hands, "C'mon baby... Give it t'me..."

His pace stutters before he stills inside of you, bitten out gasps and whines escaping his mouth. The base of your spine tingles as you feel his cock lurching and pumping inside of you, causing you to moan. Thick, warm cum dripped out of you after Usopp pulls out of ou, slumping against the mattress. The boy gasps for breath as you lay on top of him, giggling. You trace shapes onto his chest as you wait for him to find his voice.

"S...Sorry I came so fast..." The sniper pants after a moment. "You felt really... really good."

You giggle, placing a gentle kiss to his cheek. "It's okay Usopp." You reposition yourself so you're now sitting on his stomach. "You are gonna have to put that mouth to good use, though."

Usopp laughs before gripping your thighs, dragging you forward. You're hovering over him as he licks his lips, eyeing your pussy still dripping with his seed.

"Glad you didn't think I was done with you yet, Y/N. I'm just getting started."

Tags: @pileofmush @usopp-enjoyer

#This one feels rushed i am so sorry #I also HATE the summary but i'm too lazy to come up w anything else #but i really wanted to write sumn abt usopp #because i want to fuck him so bad #anyways enjoy!#I'm gonna ride the shit outta this guy #usopp smut #usopp x reader #also this is NOT beta read

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zabiume · 3 months

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I get sad thinking about how during ichigo and grimmjows fight in hm. Particularly the moment when he see sees orihime's terrified reaction to his mask. I think he considered her previous trauma with acid wire ofc, but how must he have felt when orihime looked at him like that? She was the girl who managed to make friends with everyone and empathized so deeply with even her enemies, let alone her closer friends. And she was looking at him, completely frozen with fear, and he hated being the source of it. It just makes my feelers hurt so bad for some reason :(

i think the great thing about this fight is that it lets you empathize with both ichigo and orihime without diminishing either of their feelings, which is just. good writing. i'd go so far as to say this fight is also superb because of how it manages to address many overarching themes at once: a) ichigo's human-hollow struggle that keeps rearing its head every now and then b) orihime's complicated relationship with violence c) grimmjow's twisted desire to feel validated by ichigo, who he sees as his own mirror d) ichigo & orihime's long-term struggle to cross the chasm that separates them and meet in the middle.

a lot of people focus on orihime's fear here, but the truth is, ichigo himself was afraid of his hollow and was NOT confident about his ability to control it. when he tells orihime not to be afraid without his mask on, he looks at her and smiles. with the mask, he doesn't even make eye contact. when he accidentally does make eye contact later on in the fight, it crushes him, and the beauty of this fight is that it's all carried out through body language. his heart sinks, and so does yours, if you're invested in the fight. ichigo's entire arc so far has been about mastering this side of himself that he's desperately afraid of losing to, and now the person he's protecting is afraid of him, too. he begins doubting himself: what if grimmjow is right? what if he really did just come here to fight?

if you look at orihime's side of things, she's not wrong either. orihime's entire arc was about self-doubt at this time. she was never really sure of her worth to others, so how could she be sure that ichigo, who's reiatsu is rougher and darker than usual (just like her dead brother) was fighting for her? she does eventually realize her effect on him with a little help from nel. but in the end, nel's testimony doesn't matter much either because orihime realizes she would love ichigo even if he wasn't fighting for her. she just doesn't want him to get hurt.

lucky for us, grimmjow isn't right and it's obvious that ichigo did indeed come to fight him—if only to protect everyone and take orihime back home. fighting is ichigo's means to an end. his reaction to orihime is our indicator of that. the great thing about this fight is what it tells us—that if ichigo was this affected by orihime's face, then it means he truly didn't come here just to fight. that nel's cheers did nothing to grab ichigo's attention, but orihime's first broken whisper did. that having orihime nearby reminds him of what he's fighting for, which is something that literally saves his human life when he's in vasto lorde form. he left his heart with her, just as she did with him before she left. if we began this journey with rangiku saying ichigo needs orihime, this arc shows us how. this fight shows us how. yes, orihime's fear caused him some pain, but none of us can deny how cocky he got when she cheered for him, either, so it goes both ways :D

#i loved this volume very much & now that we have lust & horn of salvation their arc is complete :))))#each ichihime moment has got to be seen as a conversation with other ichihime moments #and that's when you realize how nicely their romantic subplot has been fleshed out over arcs #personal biases aside i dont really understand calling IH rushed when they're the one part of the story that WASN'T rushed #every arc gave them a new status quo to navigate and among all the canon married couples #they're the one we spent the longest time with - even compared to ren&rukia #like sorry for waxing poetic about it i'm sure everyone feels this way about their favorite ships but i loooove IH <3 they're so good #asks #ichihime

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pumpkinrootbeer · 4 months

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Eugene was truly the best boyfriend. saw his girlfriend get broken up with, and immediately had a revenge glow up. Imagine being Cassandra seeing your ex girlfriend's boyfriend and he's wearing a golden choker with the just deepest v neck known to man, the world's sluttiest gloves, and a thigh garter. I'd have to give up then and there.

#Eugenes season 3 outfit you will always be famous #eugene fitzherbert #tangled the series #:v #He saw cass's hot catsuit and knew what he had to do #Also just to scream abt the series bc I just finished #absolutely crazy to me that they have set up since s1 that Eugene has pretty strong identity issues and it's never really addressed?#like s3 was low-key a mess I wish they just let cass be a villain don't have her be manipulated the entire time let her choose it at least #or like I'm fine with her being manipulated but I just felt like they didn't want to go to far with her character #and it made her feel kinda weak narratively #a lot just felt rushed #and I think we should have gotten a biiit more with eugenes identity issues #bc a lot of it in that episode was just a running joke #will say.#euegene/Rapunzel really carried that series they're relationship was the best written part #I would like cass more if they let her be a bit more unhinged #Her best moment was ''will you fight for him?''#Like yess queen expand on that more #Need a whole episode of her kidnapping Eugene to fuck with Rapunzel #Also sorry you were worth fighting for is downright one of the most romantic lines in the whole show #Also it's so funny to me bc Rapunzel is so protective over Eugene like cass touches him and she's just #SHES MIIINE GET AWAY FROM HER IT'S NOT HER TIIIIME

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justewil · 1 month

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i had to Really rush this because i was afraid that boops Might be removed while i was making it

he would love the evil boops

#inspired by me #me sending evil boops to anyone i come across #professor layton #jean descole #professor layton fanart #art #fanart #april fools day #boop #arts #this one is So rushed i'm sorry #i still dont get how to draw him .which is mostly why i didnt do the capes #ignore the text looking like That i didnt feel like looking for a better font

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neoyi · 2 months

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*takes a deep breath*

Okay, game, I'm ready to be proven wrong and that this game isn't the Man of Action energy vibe that I felt it was giving me, thus supporting my initial hesitations to play when it originally came out.

#hi-fi rush #I'm sorry the main character and the tone based on the trailer feels like ben 10 and generator rex's love child #but I am aching for a good platformer rhythm game and I hope this hits in a way Harmoknight could not #neoyi talks #still hilarious to me that bethasda published this

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scribe-of-elysium · 2 months

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Quietus: Status Update

Hello, Tumblr followers. I've started working on the next chapter of Quietus. I'm aiming to write up until Sakura's Rebirth, which will be covered in the next 2-3 chapters, depending on whether I split the content. So there will be a few more updates until we get to that point.

After that, I'll be formally Discontinuing the story because I sadly have no time, inspiration, or motivation to keep working on this project as things stand. It's a commitment I can't make; I have too many responsibilities, too little free time and can't be as active as I used to be, unfortunately.

This is not an easy decision for me to make, and has been on my mind for the last year. I'd been wanting to stop sooner, but I pushed on, hoping I could continue it, but it's now becoming really difficult to find the time and effort the story requires to maintain its quality.

Placing the fic on hiatus indefinitely as I have in the past pressures me to keep thinking about it knowing updates are anticipated and is counter-productive. It also feels unfair, like I'm constantly leaving readers hanging and waiting with the regular starting and stopping, and I'd rather just be honest that I've been struggling with it at this point.

I can't force myself to write something rushed, either I give 100% or nothing. If my circumstances ever change and I can pick it up again, I'll return to announce that, otherwise, I want to sincerely thank everyone who was still following and reading up to this point, everyone who patiently waited for updates all these years, and everyone who took the time to interact, comment, share, recommend, make art or commission it. I appreciate my readers and their support more than I can express on here.

#Quietus #Fanfiction #SasuSaku #Writing #Never wanted to label the fic as discontinued #But it's become nearly impossible to find the time for it #It isn't fair to keep stopping and restarting with it #Either I finish it with 100% commitment or I don't #Sorry to my readers #Posting this makes me feel like a failure #But writing can't be forced or rushed #Thanks to everyone who followed it over the years #I'm grateful #I feel awful #But needed to be honest

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heckling-hydrena · 30 days

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THANK YOUUUU GOD🙏

#I feel like staff is in way over their heads wrt the lore like it has always been stilted and rushed I'm sorry.#we still don't even have the beastclan rewrites!!!#hoping and praying we see an increase in quality with whatever lore they release next

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cindersfireplace · 3 months

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4town Valentine's Day 💘

Jesse, Taeyoung, Aaron T, and Aaron Z walk through the hallway to their hotel room after taking a stroll around the neighborhood:

Taeyoung: There's nothing like bird watching on a calm afternoon.

Aaron T: I'm just glad there was an ice cream truck. That was one of the best chocolate cones I've ever had. Thanks for helping me chase it down Z.

Aaron Z: *walks behind him exhausted* Anything for you buddy 😊

Jesse: You good Z?

Aaron Z: *gasping * Yeah when I catch my breath next week I'll be able to function again 😮‍💨

Jesse: I wish Robaire came with us. It's good to get outside once in a while.

Taeyoung: I'm sure he has his reasons.

*Jesse opens the hotel room door*

Jesse: Yeah probab- sweet cheese and crackers! What's all this!?

*The room is decorated with heart, banners, balloons, pillows, roses, and LOTS of candles*

❤️🌹🕯️🕯️🕯️

Robaire: Welcome home my friends! I thought I would put up some decorations for Valentine's Day. *Sigh* Love is in the air.

Aaron Z: I didn't know love smelt like *sniffs* vanilla and *picks up a candle* … Late winter breeze. Whatever the heck that smells like.

Jesse: We were gone for like an hour? How?

Robaire: I'm very efficient when I'm passionate about something.

Taeyoung: So that's why Jess is always yelling at you to do your taxes.

Aaron Z: Were you not efficient enough to get any cookies or candy?

Robaire: That will be for the gift exchange.

Aaron T: Why can't we just buy cards?

Robaire: Because first of all the 4town best friend Valentine's super special gift yearly extravaganza exchange -

Aaron Z: I still say we should shorten the name.

Robaire: -is a time to appreciate each other's gifts and is a testament to how well we know each other. I love giving gifts and I put a lot of thought into them.

Jesse: And I very much still appreciate those custom ‘Art Dad’ oven mitts, but shouldn't we be focusing on our gig that day? The 4townies are so excited to see us perform One True Love live for the first time next week, and after the show I want to go to bed.

Robaire: Then go right to bed on another day of the year but you have to be there for the opening of gifts. Besides we've already drawn names for it so no going back now.

Jesse: Fiiiine if I must.

Robaire: That's the spirit.

Jesse: Uh I think a spirit is what we'll be if all of these candles stay lit. This is most definitely a fire hazard. I'm only agreeing if I get to put half of them out.

Robaire: Fiiiine. If I must.

Aaron T: We've known each other for a while shopping for each other should be easier. Right Z?

Aaron Z: Totally….

*Skip to the day before Valentine's Day at the mall*

Aaron Z: …Not.

Jesse: Come on Z it'll be fine.

Aaron Z: Not when I'm shopping for Robaire it won't. I don't know what to buy and he's definitely gonna try to one up us with his amazing gift.

Jesse: Does anything else in this world motivate you quite like your need to be better than Robaire?

Aaron Z: Absolutely, this is just a continuous priority of mine.

Jesse: So no then. Got it.

Aaron Z: I will search through every isle of this mall if it kills me. I will be victorious.

Jesse: Or you could breathe and let it go…and he's gone. Valentine's is gonna be fun.

*The next day*

Taeyoung: That must have been our best performance yet! Everybody was so excited, and despite my mild fear of heights trying to convince me otherwise, the rising heart platforms weren't so bad after all.

Robaire: Told you it would be incredible!

Jesse: Anyways now that that's over we can open gifts now.

Aaron T: Yeah guys the sooner we get this over with the sooner old man Jesse can take his nap.

Jesse: I'm not ol-

Aaron Z (whispering to Aaron T) You just want to get candy from your gift don't you?

Aaron T (whispering back): Shhhh I just care about Jesse's health…and my blood sugar.

Robaire: Anyways, who wants to go first?

Taeyoung: Me! I got T! Here you go! *Shoves present box into his hands*

Aaron T: YESSS! *Opens package* *gasp* It's a book of skateboard tricks! These are some of the most advanced out there and….a box of chocolate. Thankyou *hugs Taeyoung and whispers* This is why your my favorite.

Taeyoung: No problem at all.

Aaron T: So I guess it's my turn to give and I got Jesse *gives him a very messily wrapped package with 50 bows on it*

Jesse: Geez this looks interesting *opens the box* *gasp* ITS THE SUPER SMOOTH 3000! I've been trying to find this blender for months! My fruit smoothies will be so much better now! Thank you *lifts Aaron T off the ground in a hug*

Aaron T: Your *cough cough* welcome. Could you please put me down now?

Jesse: *Drops Aaron T* I'm next and I got Taeyoung. So here you go?

Taeyoung: *Carefully takes the box from his hand and opens it* Woah! Bird watching goggles! They even have little doves on them! Thanks Jess. I'm gonna have so much fun taking these to the park.

Jesse: I'm so glad you like them. They were some of the best I could find.

Aaron Z: I guess Robaire and I are last. You can go first Ro 😊

Robaire: No, I insist. You go first 😁

Aaron Z: Well this day means the most to you so you should go 😊

Robaire: And I like to share that joy with my friends so you should go 😁

Aaron Z: You.

Robaire: You.

Aaron Z: YOU.

Robaire: YOU!

*While these two keep going back and forth Taeyoung and Aaron T give each other a look and then open the presents themselves (whilst Jesse has too little sleep in him to deal with this)*

Taeyoung: Wow Robaire this is a really nice Destiny ‘s Child record.

Robaire: That's the exact one we listened to when we first met 🫢

Aaron T: Dang Z you got this cool basketball trophy. It even says ‘best basketball player I know ‘. Nice Sentiment.

Aaron Z: That was one of the first things I told you that I dreamed of receiving 😯

*They hold the gifts in their hands for a moment appreciating them*

Aaron Z: *clearly struggling* Th-th-th-

Robaire: Are you trying to say thank you?

Aaron Z: Nah I'm trying to say ‘That's all folks’. Yes I'm trying to say thankyou. Anyways thank you … for … this.

Robaire: Then I guess I want to say thank you too…I guess.

Jesse: Awww this is too sweet.

Aaron T: Maybe it wasn't about who got the best present after all?

Robaire: Mhm. Even though we all know it was me.

Aaron Z: Wh- if anything it was me!

Robaire: No you didn't!

Aaron Z: I got you the record that you sorry self was too BROKE for when we first met!

Robaire: I got you a CUSTOM TROPHY 🏆! Do you know how much that is in this economy?!

Aaron Z: But did I ask-

Robaire: But my-

Aaron Z: No but Robaire answer the question. Answer the question! Did I ask though? Did I?

Robaire: No but you can't just throw that in my face when I'm trying to be nice.

Aaron Z: Clearly not nice enough to admit I'm better…

*Senseless arguing continues in the background*

Jesse: T! They were this 🤏🏻 close to having a nice moment.

Aaron T: Sorry, I was just trying to bring some positivity.

Taeyoung: I'm positively sure they will be arguing for a while so I'm just gonna go now.

Jesse: Agreed. *yawn* 🥱 I'm going to sleep.

Aaron T: And I shall consume all this chocolate within the hour. I love Valentine's Day!

*Later that night Aaron Z and Robaire go to bed setting their gifts down on their night stands smiling at them and then turning the lights out to sleep*

❤️

#Happy Valentine's Day 4townies #Hope this is a nice and remember to love yourselves #(Seriously Robaire has a problem he lit like 48 separate candles)#I guess this could also serve as a Christmas special if you change the holiday a bit #Sorry if it feels rushed (which could just be a flaw in my writing) I made this literally the day before Valentine's Day #Anyways I'm gonna go eat candy now #4town #4townie #4town aaron t #4town aaron z #4town jesse #4town robaire #4town taeyoung

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that-was-anticlimactic · 5 months

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if i loved you like i'm capable of

Chuuya stared at him, eyes wide before bursting into laughter. “Phah! Dazai was right—you are high-strung!” they cackled, slapping their knee with their hand.

“I am not high-strung!” Kunikida argued. “Unlike you, I actually have a set of ideals and morals that I strive to live by. If that makes me high-strung to the world, then so be it. At least I have those to fall back on.”

“Hm,” Chuuya hummed, all traces of laughter vanishing within seconds. Although their chests were practically touching, they somehow managed to stalk even closer. They hooked a finger around Kunikida’s collar and pulled him down, ignoring his indignant squawk and red skin.

“You seem pretty high-strung to me, even without all your ideals. Looks like you could use a break, pretty boy.”

[or, kenji, chuuya, & kunikida have a sleepover & bad flirting ensues]

🛏 7,045 words | kunichuu & kenji 🛏

a gift for my beloved @zukkaoru because they had to listen to me complain about writer's bock for two months straight, they wanted more kunicuu, their kunichuu spam yesterday inspired this, & bc i'm biased & love them <333

#corey writes:)#bsd #bungou stray dogs #bsd fanfic #kunichuu #kunikida x chuuya #chuuya nakahara #kunikida doppo #kenji miyazawa #this is. so wild.#idk what happened but this is like. all i did today when i prolly should've been grading #oH WELL #i'm just glad that i managed to write something after two months of writer's block :(#never thought it would've been this #would've loved to finish a wip i already have started like the tractor one or the pm pyramid but this works too #i'm so sorry guys i feel like this is so rushed and the pacing is awful but again just recovered from writer's block lol #okay imma stop rambling in the tags lol #also 'if i loved you' is SUCH a kunichuu song btw #and just a bsd thesis in general

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front-facing-pokemon · 1 year

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#ledyba #the dark background signifies that i missed this one. here's ledyba and ledian will come soon after #i feel i don't have a lot to say about this one but that may be because i'm rushing to get these two out. sorry about that‚ anon!#accept four in one day as recompense. i think ledyba is pretty good. the eyes are just… chef's kiss

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spookyxsprinkles · 4 months

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Freezer Burn

todoroki touya × gender neutral and poc friendly reader

not safe for work // 6.3k words // AO3. warnings: angst, break up, arguing, crying, touya has an avoidant attachment style, dialogue heavy, poor communication, nipple biting, oral, possessive, fingering, spooky doesn't know how to write.

"Are you breaking up with me?"

"Don't be so melodramatic. We weren't even dating," Touya said, taking his keys out of his pocket.

"I--I know but... you know what I mean."

"What do you expect me to say?" He scoffed. "That I'm sorry? 'Cause I'm not. I don't want this."

"Liar."

"Whatever helps you sleep at night." He opened the door of your apartment and walked out towards his car.

"You think I don't know you're pushing me away on purpose?" You follow him out, not caring that you had different shoes on. "As much as you like to pretend you don't care, I know you--"

He interrupted you with an angry laugh, before turning to face you as he reached the sidewalk in front of his car. "You must be delusional if you think you have me all figured out. Don't tell me what I feel. You don't fucking know me."

His car's lights flashed as it unlocked and he opened the door, standing there and glaring at you like if you had spit in his face. Maybe, in his mind, you did.

"I don't need to know every little thing about you to know that you're lying to yourself because you're afraid."

"Afraid of what, huh? Afraid that I'll actually start to care about you as more than just a hole I use to get my rocks off, before ghosting you like all the others that came before? Yeah, you're not special, sweetheart," his hands trembled with fury.

You visibly flinched at his words.

You knew he was right. You were acquainted with him through mutual friends for quite some time before getting physically involved with him. You knew of his non-committal self-sabotaging tendencies. You knew, but it didn't make his words hurt any less.

A flash of guilt flickered in his icy eyes but it disappeared just as soon as it came thanks to the scorching heat of his emotions. You swallowed the lump forming in your throat, trying to keep your voice steady as you spoke quietly with stinging eyes.

"Maybe I'm not special, but at least I can be honest with myself. Which is more than you can say about yourself."

He threw his hands up in the air, laughing. "Real cute coming from you. I'm not the one that's so desperate for attention I start writing sappy love stories in my head. Maybe someday you'll find someone who wants to deal with this shit, but it's not gonna be me."

He moved to get in his car, so you took a few steps forward which was enough to catch his attention and stop him from getting in.

"You were just as lonely and desperate for attention as me when we first met, Touya. You parade around all day acting like you don't care about anything, you can't feel anything, but if that was the case you wouldn't come back. You always come back home."

It was a slip up a few months ago. The two of you were out with some friends at a karaoke room and he said he wanted to go home. You never brought it up to him, but he could tell from the way you nearly choked on your food, that you heard him. Since then, every time he heard the word 'home' he'd think about that moment and regret letting himself drink enough to forget his common fucking sense.

And now you had acknowledged that it was a real moment that actually happened when he'd much rather shove the memory away and pretend it was something someone else said. Someone not him.

You stood a few feet in front of him, sniffling and staring down at the tires of his car that he had taught you how to change and fill with air without you asking him to.

"You're the most stubborn person I've ever met. You never do anything you don't want to do, but you kept coming back." You wiped your nose, ignoring the feeling of the hot tears spilling down your cheeks. "Even now, you're still standing here, talking with me instead of leaving. If you didn't care, you would have already left."

He froze as if you had pushed the pause button on his anger. He stared at you intensely. The only sounds breaking the silence was a dog barking at sirens in the distance and your sniffles.

He hated that you were right.

"So what?"

He got in his car, slamming the door in anger and started the engine.

He buckled his seat belt and turned in his seat to look through the rear window as he slowly backed out of the parking space.

You panicked, suddenly shoving your upper body inside his open window.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing!?" He hit the breaks immediately, causing you to flail as you lost your balance and he swiftly grabbed your arms to keep you from slipping and busting your head on asphalt.

"W--We haven't finished talking..!" You gasped, feeling your heartbeat pounding in your chest. "If you leave now, you'll only feel worse later!"

He simply stared at you in disbelief. His mind was screaming at him to get the hell out of there. The only thing stopping him from flooring the gas pedal was the fact that your legs still dangled helplessly outside of the car as you struggled to get inside.

You looked ridiculously stupid as you clung to the window with a tear streaked face. You also seemed so determined…

"Get out of my car," he snapped. "Right now."

He released a hand from you and moved it towards the handle of the door, but you caught his wrist with your hands.

"No," you said as firmly as your grip on his wrist.

His eyes watched as you continued to struggle to balance your body on the door comfortably. He had no idea what your endgame was here.

"You're fucking crazy."

"I love you, Touya," you gasped out. "I'm in love with you and I know you're afraid. I know you've been hurt before. I know you hate everything that's happening right now, but I can't let you leave like this." You tried wiping your eye by rubbing it against your shoulder, before looking back at him.

"I won't force you to stay with me and I won't force you to share things you don't want to share, but I also won't let you run away without us properly talking things through. If we're gonna break up then I don't want to let it end with that as one of our regrets."

He hated that you weren't giving up on him so easily.

Touya stared at you as you spoke. You were so calm and reasonable in spite of the ridiculous position you were in. There was no anger or irritation in your voice, just sincerity and...

He let out a deep breath in an attempt to stay calm.

"That's very big of you," he said defensively. He was always so defensive. "Trust me, it's better this way."

Your eyes studied his face before you decide to take the plunge and vocalize the thoughts that had been swimming around in your head recently. "Is it better or is it just the easiest way to avoid your feelings of inadequacy and fear of rejection?"

You watched as his eyes widened a minuscule amount that likely would've gone unnoticed if you hadn't known him for so long. You could feel the flames of his rage from the way his face contorted, his mouth opening to set you ablaze.

Your hands slipped down from his wrist to hold his hand gently in yours, your thumbs resting on the back of his hand.

Your grip was loose. He could easily pulled himself free if he wanted to.

But he didn't.

And that's all you needed.

"I've seen you be blunt beyond the point of just being rude to others and to yourself. You have standards that make it easy for you to look down on those who don't meet them yet even the ones that do fit them get pushed away. You easily say whatever's on your mind, unless what's on your mind risks leaving you vulnerable."

Your thumbs delicately drew circles into the dark marks on the back of his hand that were uniquely his. A sad smile marred your face as you continued to speak.

"I'm always watching you, always listening." Your eyes looked up into his, persevering through his gaze that scorched anything he deemed a threat. "You'd rather be alone than feel alone."

He was speechless as he watched you speak. You read him like an open book. A book he routinely burned whenever someone poked and prodded in a pathetic attempt to get closer to him. How had he let his fire get extinguished so easily? How did it not burn you like it did everyone else?

Like it burned him.

Even he was unable to escape his own flames unscathed.

The fantasy that played in his mind's eye was one where you patiently stood before him as the smoke cleared. His eyes stung and his breathing hitched at the thought.

He sighed deeply, looking more tired than you'd ever seen him before.

"I was serious," his words and tone contrasting with the heavy look he carried on his face. "You're wasting your time if you expect me to tell me what you wanna hear."

You shook your head, "I'm not asking you to say it back. I don't need words when your actions mean more to me." I bring his knuckles to my lips, pressing a soft kiss before looking into his eyes, "Besides, if it's time you're worried about, I wouldn't mind wasting it together."

His entire body reflexively ached to leave at the display of vulnerability, yet he couldn't tear his eyes away from you.

Words escaped him as he stared back into your eyes with a confusing mix of fear and hope swirling in his icy blues.

He swallowed hard and finally spoke, "So, all this time," he started as he gathered his bearings, "you've been watching me like some kind of weirdo?"

"Of course," you laughed softly. The movement set a jolt of pain to your abdomen that reminded you of your current position. "Can we go back inside and talk? My stomach hurts from hanging out in your car like this..."

You hissed as you tried to remove yourself from the car. It was definitely gonna leave a mark. He waited until you moved back to the sidewalk before he parked and got out.

"I didn't tell you to jump through the window like a maniac. Seriously, what's wrong with you?"

"Desperate times call for--"

"Dumb ass fucking measures?"

"Yes, precisely. Glad we're on the same page."

He rolled his eyes as he wrapped his arm around your shoulders, walking back to the apartment. "Masochist."

"Sadist."

"You know the door was unlocked, right? I was gonna show you 'til you started manhandling me."

"Never let them know your next move."

"So, just dangle like an idiot and hope you don't get run over?"

"I'll admit I'm not good under pressure."

He snorted as you opened the door. He just realized you had chased him out in different shoes. Desperate times, indeed.

"Anyways," you continued as you shut the door behind you and removed your shoes, "You liked it. Thought it was super cool and hot when I was flailing around like an idiot."

"Yeah," he said genuinely, catching you off guard and nearly causing you to trip over the entryway step, but you caught yourself against his arm.

You looked up at him with hopeful eyes. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," he repeated sincerely, his eyes staying on yours. "I did."

You swallowed, feeling your eyes prickle with tears as your mouth gaped at him.

He pinched your cheek.

"C'mon," he said as he walked away from you and further into your home to take a seat on the couch. "Let's do this talking thing. We can watch a movie after or whatever..."

You couldn't see his face as he walked away but you could hear his uncharacteristically breathy inflection and stiff tone when he spoke. Was he feeling nervous? Shy..?

The fact that he was the one trying to get the conversation started rather than avoiding it made your chest bloom with warmth. You had expected him to come up with other things to do first in order to put off the awkward and uncomfortable feelings for a bit longer.

You hopped over to him with a blindingly bright grin, sitting near him on the couch to give him some space for this conversation. However, he pulled your body closer to his so that your sides were pressed up against each other. He wrapped an arm around you while you leaned against his chest.

"So..." he started and you could hear something akin to timidity in his tone so you hugged him, letting your hands affectionately stroke his sides. "I'm shit at feelings."

You wanted to laugh at his blunt word choice but didn't want to come off as mocking and discourage him from speaking. "You are not shit at feelings. You seem to feel things quite strongly. We just need to work on helping you feel more comfortable with letting them out in a healthy way, rather than boxing them up and defaulting to avoidance."

"So, I'm shit at feelings."

"If you say that one more time I am going to bite you."

"I'm shit at-- what the fuck!"

"You were warned."

"My fucking tit--"

"Not my fault it's so chewy."

"I'm shit at-- don't you bite me you fucking animal. Hear me out." He had pinched your cheek again to stop your open mouth from it's impending attack. "I'm shit at this. I know. Don't… laugh at me."

Your eyes softened and you brought your hand up to cup the one he had squeezing your cheek. He released his hold on your skin but you kept it held as you let it slide down to your lap.

"It might feel a bit awkward for you but I promise I won't think less of you for sharing your feelings. I appreciate that you've been trying."

"'Been trying?' I've done jack shit."

"No, you have done 'shit'." You reassured him as your fingers drew circles into the skin of his hand. "You came inside--"

"I always come inside," he smirked.

You bit him again.

"What? No complaint for me this time, Touya?"

"I deserved it."

"Masochist."

"Sadist."

Your lips pursed for a moment as you tried to remember where you were.

"Ah, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted," you glared at him playfully, "You've already shown me that you're trying. You came back inside, initiated our talking time, and you're participating, too. I know emotional stuff feels hard, but I'm really, really proud of you."

He let out a 'tch' in jest, before leaning down to whisper into the side of your head. "In case you forgot, I also listened to you while you tried playing leap frog on my car."

"Very true, but I didn't forget. I didn't want to include it since I was practically holding you hostage at the time."

"Hostage?" He laughed haughtily, "If I really wanted to leave you I would've ran you over."

"Why is that strangely sweet..."

"'Cause you're a damn masochist. Get help."

"This, coming from the sadist..." The room was quiet as I rubbed his chest lightly with one hand. "I was really scared you were going to leave earlier, Touya. Like, for good."

He clenched his jaw but didn't say anything, opting to listen since he knew she probably had more to say on the matter. And she did.

"I was afraid that I scared you off by talking about-- about whatever menial domestic thing it was we were talking about before. I can't even remember what it was." You clutched his shirt without thinking as you struggled to remember what could've been the catalyst to losing the person you loved.

"Toilet paper," he stated after a pause. "You read about some sale at the store and were talking about how we should go before the weekend so we could stock up. Then you mentioned wanting to buy me strawberry ice cream."

Silence.

"It all sounded so permanent, so easy to you." You could feel his body tense as he struggled to force himself to speak. "Seeing a future where we go grocery shopping for toilet paper and you buying me something. Something that'll sit in the freezer waiting for me even when I'm not around. Something just for me." His last words were barely a whisper.

Your mouth felt dry, it made sense. He had a hard time staying in one place for too long if it felt like he was being smothered or expected to do things he didn't want to do. Your apartment was no exception, even if he clearly spent more time here than any other place.

"Yeah, you're not special, sweetheart."

You felt a cold ache in your chest at the thought of his angry words from earlier.

You told yourself they were just that, angry words. If they were true, would he have bothered to come back at all? No. You knew Touya was good at lying and even better at emotional warfare. It's how he protected himself. He hadn't done it to you since before the two of you were friends, back when you were just another random person trying too hard to get to know him. Today was the first time in years he had said something that caused you to feel bad about yourself.

You would need to talk about it with him later. Right now you wanted to hear him out, so you shove the memory away for now. You can worry about it later.

As painful as it was to hear him speak of his troubles with having a place to call home, you were grateful to him for really trying. Really, it was incredible just how far he's come already. You always knew he was a fast learner if he wanted to be and this meant so much to you. He had never let himself get this vulnerable with you before.

You wanted to tell him something in response but why did it have to be now, of all times, that you couldn't find the words to speak?

You forced yourself to swallow and nodded at him in encouragement. You didn't want to cry and risk him getting cold feet about the feelings thing. You didn't want him to think this was a mistake and that you couldn't handle the truth, because you could, you just felt deeply for the inner conflicts that took place inside of his head. His fears, his happiness, his efforts... it all meant the world to you and it was really getting to you.

You quietly cleared your throat and with a hoarse voice said, "I can see how that would have caused you to react the w-way that you did."

You mentally cursed yourself for the way your voice broke pathetically mid-sentence. "Sorry about that." And you were. You knew he got flighty over things like that but in the moment I just wasn't thinking.

"Hey, don't wimp out on me now." He pinched at your cheek again. "If I'm gonna bare my damn soul or whatever the hell, you sure as shit better not hold out on me. If you gotta get weepy, then get weepy. I'll save the laughing for later."

Your lips trembled at his words and you can feel your face crumple as you bury it into his chest and wept.

"I was so scared I lost you, Touya."

He stared down at you, committing the sight to memory.

His carelessness did this.

He pulled you in closer to him and placed his cheek on the crown of your head. A little while later you calmed down, sniffling and apologizing for accidentally turning his shirt into a tissue.

"Sorry, this is really embarrassing," you sniffled out with a stuffy nose.

He took in the sight of your puffy eyes and runny nose, before looking away. "S'whatever. I know you, too, you know. That thing you said earlier? About you always watching and listening? I do the same shit with you. If being a crybaby helps, then do it unless you wanna be shit at feelings, too."

Sniffle. "We're both not the best at handling our own feelings, huh..."

"An understatement, in my case."

"It's good that you're acknowledging the areas where you could use some improvement." You say as you reach up to cup his cheek and kissed the corner of his lip. "You're doing so well, Touya."

The way your thumb gently rubbed the pale skin of his cheek while you looked at him with honey in your eyes made his chest ache.

"You--" he swallowed as he held your gaze, "think so?"

You nodded and leaned in to press another kiss on his lips. "I know so."

He felt that familiar urge to run away when shit got too personal, but he yearned for more of the pure warmth you offered to his cold, sorry existence.

"I can't promise to always be better. I'll fuck up. I know it. Just don't give-- don't give up on me."

Sharing feelings was embarrassing, painfully so. At least, that's what he told himself to explain the lump in his throat when he struggled to say the words out loud. His hand moved to your thigh and squeezed it, "I'm stubborn but I don't want to fuck this up. When I fuck up, I'll need time to get my head out of my ass."

You felt like crying again seeing how desperately he tried to let you know he wasn't going to always be good at the communication, but he wanted to be and he was trying.

"I'll sit in the freezer waiting for you."

"I-- what? The hell?"

You laugh softly at his dumbfounded expression. "I'll be the ice cream sitting in the freezer waiting for you. So, don't worry about having to rush the process. Do your best. I believe in you, Touya."

He stared at your face for a moment.

"You have low iron. The freezer would kill you."

"I'll be fine 'cause you're always warm."

He once again felt that familiar ache in his chest that he usually got around you. "Wait too long and you'll get freezer burn."

"Are you saying a little freezer burn would keep you from eating your favourite ice cream?" You paused when you noticed his amused expression. "Okay, I walked myself into that one."

"Yeah," the corner of his lip twitched as his eyes darkened. "You did."

"Hey, I know that look. We need to finish talking first-- T-Touya!"

He grabbed your legs, flipping you on your back against the couch with him crawling over you.

"Don't you wanna reward me for doing well so far?" He asked in a low voice. You whimpered at the sight of his heavily lidded eyes looking down at you, amused with your flustered face.

"W-Well, positive reinforcement is a good way of encouraging good behavior, so yes we can, but you have to swear we will talk about this right after-"

He expertly rolled his hips against you, making you gasp. "I'm feeling pretty encouraged right now. You can feel it too, I bet."

You definitely felt it.

He kissed your lips as he removed your bottoms, pushing the backs of your knees as far against as he knew you could comfortably take, exposing the entirety of you in your underwear.

"I swear," he licked a slow stripe against the fabric before pushing it to the side and staring hungrily at your flesh, "on my god damn dick, we'll talk right after I make you come at least four times."

"F-Four?" You could feel his thumb teasing you as he swiped up and down your flesh.

"Five now," his lips wrapped around your sweet spot. He sucked while rubbing his tongue against it at the same time, making your body shudder.

He needed to make up for making you cry so much today.

Your hips bucked against his face, then his fingers.

"So fucking eager after all that talking, huh?" He gave a lopsided grin as he licked the taste of you left behind on his lips. "Yeah, we're definitely talking more often."

He soaked his fingers with the bottle of lube he liked leaving between the seat cushions for times like these. You felt one of his slick fingers tease your tight hole.

"Tell me who fucks you better than me."

"N-No one!"

"Weak shit. Say it again."

"You're the only one who fucks me t-this well!"

He slowly pressed his finger in, the stretch making you sing. He took his time prepping you before inserting another finger and moving in and out of you. He lapped you into whines, working his hand at the pace he knew drove you wild. You cried out praises for him, which he liked almost as much as he liked fucking you to tears.

"And who does this hole belong to? Who owns the rest of this pretty body?"

"Y-You do, it's yours, Touya! It's all yours for you to use as you please!"

You felt your legs trembling as he kept his hands busy with fucking you. The coil inside of you tightening as he vigorously pumped and sucked.

"T-Touya..!" You voice broke as you wailed.

He smirked, feeling satisfied at how fervently your hips bucked against him. You were a needy mess and he hadn't even stretched you with his fat cock yet.

Soon.

"It's mine. You're all fucking mine." His head dived back in and you felt yourself on the precipice of-

"Yeah, you're not special sweetheart."

You shook your head and looked down at him as he looked up at you. He sucked you hard, making your back arch. You were so close.

You stared through half lidded eyes, throat already sore from the sounds he'd easily pulled from you. You tried to focus on the view of him pleasuring you with expertise. Your was mouth open as you shut your eyes and leaned your head back against the couch. You were so close.

"Afraid of what, huh? Afraid that I'll actually start to care about you as more than just a hole I use to get my rocks off, before ghosting you like all the others that came before you?"

You grit your teeth.

Now was not the time for this.

Your eyes shut. You forced the memory away from the forefront of your mind. It doesn't matter right now, you'll tell him how you feel about it later.

Now wasn't the time.

Later.

...

"Fuck!!" You felt Touya pull his body away from you. "Did I not hear you say the safeword!?"

You opened your eyes and Touya's blurry face had moved from in between your legs to kneeling on the floor beside where you laid on the couch. You blinked your eyes and wiped them with your hands. Oh.

You were crying again.

The realization brought more tears and you looked over at Touya who stared down at you fearfully.

"Maybe someday you'll find someone who wants to deal with this shit, but it's not gonna be me."

"Hey, what--" his voice cracked.

Your body shook as you sobbed into your hands.

A sinking feeling had found it's place in his stomach. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I didn't-- I didn't hear you-"

"T-That's not it." Your voice muffled by your hands and your stuffed nose as you continued to sob. "The sex was consensual the w-whole time."

He looked down at you confused. Relieved that he hadn't hurt you in that way, but stressed since he didn't know what happened to you. His chest burned with anxiety and it made him feel restless. He grabbed your throw blanket and pulled it over you, which you used to hide your sloppy face as you tried to calm yourself down.

"Touya," you cried quietly and he stared down at you frozen with fear.

It was him.

"Tell me what I did." He knew he'd fuck up. He just didn't think it'd be this soon.

You didn't want to hurt him. You wanted to protect him but how could you protect him from the very words he spat at you in a desperate rage? Not speaking up about your own feelings fully and pushing them aside for someone else's sake is how you got here in the first place.

You needed to practice what you preached.

"I haven't been able to stop thinking about what you said to me."

The parking lot. He already knew. He hated himself when he said those things and he hated himself now.

It was only a matter of time until he'd ruin things here.

You saw him grab his phone from the floor before standing up and walking across the living room. It must have fallen during your activities.

"I'll text Toga to come by. I'll stay until then."

"Don't go."

"I shouldn't be here."

"Because you hurt my feelings?"

"Yes!" He snapped. "This isn't masochism, it's straight up fucking delusional if you can't see the problem with me staying."

"You hurt my feelings," you sniffled. "It's going hurt whether or not you leave. Stay and talk with me about it."

"This talking shit clearly isn't working. One second you're telling me I fuck you the best then suddenly you're crying in the next. I already ruined whatever we could've had before it even started. We already know how this ends, so don't waste your time."

"If you leave then we will know how this ends." You sat up on the couch, clutching the soft blanket like a lifeline. Your voice was firm, but not enough to cover your soft determination. "You're hurt and so am I. So, sit with me instead of running away. Leaving things the way they are now is the sure-fire way to ruin this."

His jaw tightened as he stayed where he was.

"We talked a little bit earlier, but the issue just now wasn't your fault. It was mine-"

"You're not the one who said all that nasty shit to the person you-" He turned away and glared holes into an innocent plant. "It's over. We're not even fucking dating and it's over." He ran a hand through his hair and laughed.

"You did say horrible things, but I kept brushing off my feelings. We talked a bit earlier, but I still had feelings left unsaid." You stood up, the sound of your feet padding against the floor behind him made him stiffen. You stood in front of him, with your arms loosely crossed on your chest. "How are you supposed to know that stuff was still bothering me? It's not like you can read my mind."

"Don't be fucking dense."

"I seem to recall us wanting to work things out. You told me not to give up on you, remember?"

"Before I realized I traumatized you by saying a bunch of shit!"

"You didn't traumatize me, you hurt my feelings. There's a difference."

"You know the reason you had 'feelings left unsaid' is 'cause I basically mounted you before you could finish saying them, right?"

"No, that's not true and don't demonize yourself like that." You reached for his hand that was balled into a fist at his side, but he pulled it away.

He wasn't worthy of your compassion.

You frowned but didn't let it deter you. "I said it was okay --and before you say anything-- I wasn't coerced into it, either."

His eye twitched at her already knowing what he was going to say before he said it.

"You tease and mock, but you've shown me time and time again that you respect me and my body. You waited until I gave consent and I know that if I didn't give it, you would've let it go and let me talk about my feelings instead. You didn't take advantage of me. I disrespected myself by not prioritizing my own feelings. That's what the main issue was here."

"You said you couldn't stop thinking about what I said. It's my fault, they were my shitty fucking words."

"I'm not trying to say your words weren't a part of it, they definitely were, but I know you were just... saying what you could to put distance in between us."

He sneered, "Is that what you're telling yourself? Doesn't matter why I said it. Intentional or not, lies or not: it still fucking hurt you." His lips curled bitterly as remorse stained the cool blue of his eyes. "It'll be what you think of when you see me from now on."

You took a small step towards him, careful not to invade his personal space but enough to momentarily satisfy your need for physical closeness. Your need for the comfortable heat he offered to you as you both stood together in silence.

"I won't lie..." You started.

He knew that you never lied to him. Your stupidly sincere approach to interactions with him were probably what got him wrapped around your finger in the first place.

He did wonder if you ever lied to yourself about him, though. It'd explain why you let him stick around even while knowing he was a jackass.

He also recognized there wasn't any actual weight to that way of thinking. If anything, the times where your feelings felt so real outweighed those paranoid thoughts of his. Sometimes he'd catch you looking at him. The sweet honey dripping from your eyes at him doing fuck all felt so raw that he'd panic and have to leave for a while.

Whenever you smiled at him, even the soft little ones, you beamed bright enough to burn him to cinders if he let it. Lately, he had found himself simmering under your heat longer and longer, letting himself get singed by you.

Seeing you fidget with the hem of your top snapped him out of his thoughts. You were still in your underwear and it reminded him that he'd burned you. Not with the heat of patience and kindness that you regularly thawed him with, but with flames full of his own agonizingly self-sabotaging wrath.

"I won't lie," you repeated after taking a couple seconds to gather your thoughts. "I'll probably always think about what you said."

He already knew it yet it still made him hate himself more.

"The same way you'll probably always think about it, too."

You sweet, merciful, stupid fucking angel.

"Stop."

"No. You need to hear this."

"Just fucking stop."

"Don't interrupt me, Touya."

He glared at you in irritation as he clenched and unclenched his hands in an attempt to keep himself grounded. Mentally and literally. If he ran away now, you wouldn't be able to share your thoughts. He owed you that and so much more.

"It's something that effected the both of us and it'll change the way we are, but we don't have to let it change us in a bad way. We can use our hurt to help us grow." You said while looking at him with eyes full of hope. "We won't forget it happened and we shouldn't."

"We-- you--," he stammered. He could see the patience in your face and logic, feel the tender touch of your words. He was concurrently immolated by your steadfast mercy and by his venomous wrath. "We need to end this before you get hurt again."

"'Before I get hurt again'? I am going to get hurt again. By you, myself, or some other thing. It's what happens as we live and grow. The difference is learning from it. This is our 'before', and if you let us, we can work on moving on towards our 'after'."

"You know how ridiculously optimistic that sounds, right? Stupidly sappy, too. You really think it's as simple as that?"

"Can I hold your hand?"

He blinked in confusion at the randomness of the question but gave a small nod. You took ahold of it with both of your own.

"We both know it won't be simple. We both have baggage and hurt we'd need to address if we want to be something. It's going to be really hard, but if you stay I know that we'll both put in the work to reach our 'after' and every 'after' after that."

He stayed silent as he took in her words. You really saw--

"--Lots of 'after's, huh?" He quietly spoke as he tried to drown out his nerves with a teasing tone.

He looked at you with hopeful eyes that brought a small smile to your face.

"Lots of 'after's. I am your ice cream sitting in the freezer, remember?"

He'd scoff if he hadn't just gotten the wind knocked from his lungs.

You raise his hand to your lips before pressing a little kiss on the scars on the back of his hand before tugging it gently so he'd follow you to sit back down on the couch.

"I'm not eating freezer burnt ice cream."

"Hey! That's so mean…" you pouted. "And wasteful. You're way too picky of an eater, no wonder you're always grumpy."

"I'm fucking with you."

"Oh, I know. I'm fucking with you, too."

"Sadist..." He affectionately played with the shell of your ear while resting his cheek on your head. The gesture filled her with elation as they sat in comfortable silence.

"Look, I'm..." he started, struggling with his words.

"I know."

"I shouldn't-- I shouldn't have said those things earlier."

"I know."

"You didn't deserve it," his voice was softer.

"I know," you wrapped your arms around his firm torso, squeezing a little tighter.

"You're clingy. What're you thinking? Don't skimp out on me again, I wanna hear all the ugly shit, too." He lightly pinched at your cheek, "This shit ain't gonna work if it's one-sided. Start talking."

You smiled as he pressed his lips to your forehead.

"Okay, Touya."

#dabi x reader #touya x reader #dabi #todoroki touya #touya todoroki #dabi x y/n #dabi x you #toya x reader #i always feel bad for tagging him properly even on my main account so sorry to the ppl who dont wanna see this T.T #happy dabi day i fininished this 20mins b4 it ended i love having adhd and dying #i seriously couldn'tstart writing anything for him until the day before #let me know if it sucks my brain fog was bad with this one #it is so rushed i am sorry #spookyxsprinkles #edit feb 17 2024: edited this so hard and i'll do it again over the summer probably #i'm supposed to be taking a 1 week break from writing so i don't burn myself out and yet.....!

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