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wife-of-all-dilfs · 19 days

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the five stages | f. odair

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summary: a journey back to a golden period of time of polaroid pictures, white knitted sweaters, and lively sea-green eyes. why? because in the present, those same pair of eyes are ruthlessly unrelenting and you have no other chance of their escape.

pairing: finnick odair x fem!reader

warnings: heavy angst, vomiting, implied smut, depression, maggots, hallucinations, relieving fluff, mild horror. I don’t want to spoil the story too much, so I won’t be adding any more warnings, sorry y’all. this could be very triggering so please read at your own discretion. some descriptions are quite graphic!

notes: I’m super proud of this one—it’s sorta based off “little talks” by of monsters and men and “on the nature of daylight” by max richer. this fic probably won’t get many views, so I’ll be incredibly grateful for any—if any at all—type of engagement! <33

word count: 8k

The bedroom was cold; dark; empty. Empty even though I still resided in it.

My alarm had gone off two hours ago, yet I hadn’t moved an inch. When I finally turned my head to the side, I found that the space beside me was vacant. Cold; dark; empty—I reached out my hand anyway.

Thirty minutes passed before I wrestled myself out of bed and started making breakfast downstairs. The otherwise warm and flavourful plate of fruit-filled yoghurt and scrambled eggs on toast left my mouth feeling dry and my throat lodged.

It used to be one of my favourite meals. At least, when he was around.

Dishes were piled in the sink, dirty and untouched. I sat on the couch, pondering whether today was the day I would finally get to cleaning them. It wasn’t. I couldn’t. We always did that together. I wondered—if I left them in the sink long enough, would he return? Even just for five minutes to help me put them away? One month and seventeen days had passed, and yet I still entertained this thought religiously.

I wasted an hour running circles round the same contemplations before deciding fresh air, as cliché as it was, might do me some good.

Grey clouds concealed the sun’s warm golden light when I stepped outside, but that was fine—I didn’t like anything golden anymore. But he would want me to leave the house at least once a day, so that’s what I would do. I would go down to the beach beside our—my house and feel the sand collect between my toes as I walked to the water’s edge.

But wasn’t that where he was when it happened? Wasn’t he in water? Didn’t those things pile on top of him? Didn’t they sink their fangs into his neck and tear at his flesh until he was blown to…

Bits of egg, yoghurt and stomach bile sat at my feet. My legs buckled, and I collapsed to the ground in a sandy, tear-stricken heap. Since my lower body had refused to cooperate any longer, it took me until midday to crawl back up the dune and to my front doorstep.

Fuck. I needed to rest.

“I need you to rest, sweetheart.”

“I told you, I’m fine,” I whined. “I’m not sick.”

Finnick placed a bucket on the ground beside the bed. The room smelled of lemon disinfectant—a joy I often found in being sick… That is, if I were sick, which I was not. I must have drunk spoiled milk or eaten something bad during breakfast. Nevertheless, Finnick was not having it.

“You’re throwing up everything you manage to get down, and you’re shivering like it’s the middle of winter,” he said adamantly, tucking the comforter up to my chest. “It’s summer, and you’re very much not fine.”

I sat up, ready to heatedly debate the subject, but the room began swirling, and my ears were hissing like a staticky television channel without a signal. A quiet whimper buzzed in my throat as I hunched forward. Damn him, I was sick.

The mattress dipped as Finnick sat beside me. His hand was on my back, rubbing it soothingly as he used his other hand to tuck away the curtain of hair concealing my face. I huffed, half in annoyance, half in an attempt to suppress the nausea rising in my throat, and then sunk back against the pillows.

“Not sick, she says,” he jested, smiling down at me. I rolled my eyes, though unable to hide the weak, betraying smile creeping across my lips. “Close your eyes, sweetheart,” he said, a gentle command. “I’ll see you when you fall asleep.”

The wooden flooring welcomed me with hard, cold arms as I hauled my sandy body through the front door. Images of fangs, bloody flesh, and panicked sea-green eyes flooded my mind.

More breakfast, more bile. No lemon disinfectant.

My knees were folded beneath my body; my body was hunched over my knees. I was sobbing now, so hard that I threw up again (was there even anything left in my stomach at this point?), creating a thick puddle of vomit and tears beneath me. Cries and gasps for air bounced around the house. To call me a mess would be an understatement. I was a disaster. A disaster wrapped up in an unmendable tragedy with a ragged, threadbare ribbon barely holding me together.

And in case I wasn’t aware of this fact, the floorboards were so shiny that they mirrored a reflection of myself. My hair was a being of its own, all wild and unkempt, and my face was another story entirely—a red, blotchy thing I wasn’t too interested in delving into.

But the most unsettling aspect had nothing to do with me, it was that there was someone else in the reflection. Two green balls of light were glowing above my head.

Dishevelled golden hair…

Dimpled cheeks…

My forehead was pressed to the floor as I screamed.

“I don’t want to make you sick as well,” I said, contrarily enjoying the feeling of Finnick’s skin warm against mine, hot blood flowing through his veins.

A day had passed since I first became unwell, and the sickness had continued to wreak havoc inside me.

We were both under the thick covers, our limbs tangled together as he held me atop his chest. (my body didn’t register the scorching summer temperatures. I actually felt as though my core temperature was a few degrees below freezing. Meanwhile, Finnick was characteristically toasty warm. It was perfect for me, but not so much for him, evident in the beads of sweat collecting on his forehead. Nevertheless, he made no complaints).

My body rose and fell with each breath he took. I was trying to inhale whenever he exhaled in a weak attempt to prevent the festering sickness in my body from entering his, and though it was a futile gesture, I did it anyway.

“In sickness and health, remember?” he said.

I smiled. “We’re not even married.”

“Yet, you mean,” he countered. “I plan on spending the rest of my life with you, sweetheart. You know that.”

My heart fluttered at the thought of spending an entire lifetime with him—waking up in each other’s embrace each morning, the warm sunlight peeking through the blinds of our bedroom; Finnick calling me “Mrs. Odair” or “My wife” at every opportunity because doing so made us both giggle like two moronic, love-struck teenagers; and being unable to prevent the deep smile lines on both our cheeks as we age, a constant display of our perpetual happiness.

“Sixty more years of having and holding you,” he continued with a gentle musing in his tone. “For better or for worse... For richer or for poorer.” He then stroked the side of my face and brushed away the sweaty strands of hair sticking to my forehead. “In sickness and in health…”

“…Until death do us part,” I finished, my voice slow with fatigue.

Two fingers sat beneath my chin and tilted my head upward. My eyes connected with Finnick’s. They were soft. Heartfelt.

“Not even then. I’ll love you beyond the grave,” he murmured. Then his lips were slowly curving into a pensive smile. “When we’re both ghosts and haunting the next owners of this house.”

I was now smiling, too. “I’d hoped you would say something like that.”

How could he lie like that? There was no we. There were no next owners. There was only me, alive and alone in a comatose house. And mind you, I was sane enough to know that it wasn’t actually his ghost haunting me, though I wish I weren’t because having that knowledge was even worse. It meant he was truly erased from existence.

“Go away,” I whispered to the reflection on the floor.

He didn’t. His vacant green eyes kept staring down at my crumpled figure.

I shot off the floor and spun around, hot tears streaming down my face. “Go away!” His face remained expressionless. He looked like himself, only colder. “You said sixty more years! You said we’d be together!” I mindlessly picked up and flung a small picture frame at him, only for it to pass through his body and shatter on the floor behind him. “Why did you lie to me?!” My voice was frayed with fury, though underlined with grief.

He said nothing, did nothing. All he did was watch.

My legs buckled, and I was on the floor again. I was whispering, half-sobbing, the same question over and over until the words slurred together. “Why’d you lie? Why’d y’lie?” The only time I stopped was when my tongue grew too heavy to move anymore.

To my surprise, he eventually came and sat beside me, remaining cold and silent—as I too had become.

Glass fragments from the picture frame were scattered across the floorboards. The photo within had fallen out and, ironically, drifted towards me. I didn’t bother acknowledging him as I moved onto my hands and knees and began crawling forward—my palms slicing open and blood seeping out—until the photo was in my hands. My shins had granules of glass pricking into them, but I couldn’t feel the pain; all I could do was stare at the memory in my hands.

The picture had been taken in District Thirteen, a day before he signed up for… the mission.

I was drifting in and out of sleep when a sudden bright flash lit up my eyelids.

“Oops.”

Heavy eyes fluttering open, I was met with a small camera pointing down at me, which was being held up by a lengthy muscular arm, which was connected to an even more muscular and broad shoulder, which was connected to—okay, sorry, I think you get it.

“Finnick!” I shrieked, pulling the covers over my naked figure.

He laughed, the vibrations rumbling deep within his chest, beneath my ear. A soft whirring sound accompanied the polaroid sliding out of the camera, its black film hiding the doubtless embarrassing picture beneath. He placed the film on the sheets beside him, letting the photo develop in darkness.

“I was supposed to cover the flash,” he said, still chuckling.

I rubbed my eyes, which were twinkling with little sparkles of light. “I think you blinded me.”

“Lucky you,” he jested. “You’re finally free from my repulsive exterior.”

I started to reach for the picture beside him—“You’re an idiot”—but then he was rolling us over until his arms were pillared on either side of my head and he was hovering above me.

His hair was a mess, a testament to the night before (and very early hours of the morning), and he was sporting a beautiful, lazy grin. “Yeah? Well, you’re engaged to an idiot,” he said, tilting his head in an arrogant manner. “So what does that make you?”

The sea-glass ring hugging my finger gleamed in the lamp’s dull light as I reached out to touch his face, my fingertips brushing along the edges of his pronounced jawline. Tangled strands of hair and a beaming smile were reflecting back at me in his eyes. No one had ever loved anyone as much as I loved Finnick—disregarding the one exception that was staring down at me.

“Blinded by love,” I whispered.

Brief yet poignant emotion trickled through his features, his eyes. Then, like a flick of a switch, he covered it up and lowered his face into my neck, groaning the words, “So corny.”

My fingers were tangled in his hair, holding him close to me. “Liar,” I laughed. “You loved it.”

“I love you, which is why I put up with your corniness,” he murmured into my skin.

Even after all this time, my heart still leapt whenever he said those three words, even when he was being a jerk about it. I kissed the top of his head. “I love you, too.”

We laid like this for a short while longer—Finnick keeping his face buried in the warmth of my neck, his arms curled beneath my body; me playing with the golden waves of his hair that were somehow softer than my own. He was so heavy on top of me that it was starting to become difficult to breathe, but in no universe would I ever tell him to get off. It was a blissful sort of suffocation.

A sort anyone would snap a picture of just to keep as a reminder of how beautiful it feels to be smothered with love. With that being said, the picture that lay awaiting beside me was brought back to mind.

“Oh no,” I moaned, picking it up and taking a short glance at the developed photo. I covered my face with my hands, repeating the words, “Oh no.”

The photo was plucked from my fingers, and Finnick began humming contentedly to himself.

In the photo, my face had been nuzzled into his bare, muscular chest, eyes closed in sleep-drunken serenity, hair thrown over my shoulder and spilling across the pillow. My hand rested on his contoured stomach with just enough of my upper arm and low light to conceal my breasts. Finnick had a delicate hand draped over my waist. He was gazing down at me with a smile that was just… full of pure love.

I had to admit—it was a beautiful picture. Despite my initial disapproval.

“Beautiful,” I heard him echo my thoughts, his eyes still scanning the photo. Then his brows furrowed, and his head slightly inched forward as though he had just noticed something peculiar in the picture. “Oh, and you are too, I guess.”

My head tilted back against the pillow with an abrupt laugh. I shook my head, looking back at him. “I hate you.”

“Liar,” he said, leaning in closer.

His lips were on mine for what must have been the millionth time in the past few hours. The bedside clock announced that breakfast was soon approaching, though it was clear neither of us would make an appearance within the next hour (or two).

“You love me,” he whispered as he slid inside me.

And I did.

I really did.

The muscles in my cheeks were straining due to how hard I was smiling.

It wasn’t my idea to keep a picture of us half-naked in the entryway of our home. He always was a bit unusual like that. Completely unashamed of who he was and how he acted. Sometimes a little too boisterously, but that’s what I loved so much about him—how confident he was in his love for me, so much so that nothing else mattered, no one else’s opinion.

God, I love him so much.

Love…?

Wait.

That’s not right.

Shouldn’t it be “loved”?

And why was I smiling? I didn’t have anything to smile about anymore. He was gone. Our wedding never occurred. Our faces never wrinkled with smile lines. Our clasped hands never weathered with age. He was gone.

The polaroid slipped from between my fingers. My hands were covered in glass and blood, blood that had painted a dark red splotch in the middle of the shiny film. Figures.

After a short while of staring blankly at the scattered debris decorating the floor, I finally found it in myself to start climbing back onto my feet. My straightened legs wobbled and ached beneath me with the little energy I had. That’s what happens when you can barely stomach food anymore: no energy, always sleeping, always swamped by nightmares or bittersweet memories—at this point, they were one and the same.

Not a strand of gold or a fleck of green was in sight when I glanced over my shoulder. For now, at least. He liked making an appearance once or twice a day.

Pieces of glass crunched beneath my bare, stinging feet as I made for the stairwell. A mess for another day, I reasoned. Just like the dishes. Sticky red footprints stamped each wooden step I ascended, growing less prominent as I reached the second floor.

After taking a right down a short hallway, the encompassing walls littered with magnificent seashells and dried ocean flora, I turned the knob to the furthest room and entered. The floor was landscaped with mountains of clothes which drenched the room in a familiar, all-consuming smell. The scent kind of reminded me of receiving a warm hug, albeit from someone you know you should let go of in more ways than one.

His hair, golden and tousled, caught my eye as I passed the wall of string-hung polaroids in our… sorry, my bedroom. His smile was all dimpled and brilliant, and he had his tanned arms wrapped around my middle. Just moments after the picture was taken, he had tackled me into the water and rightfully earned a smack on the back of the head. In turn, he did it again.

But before that, we were both looking into the camera with the most joyful expressions—huge grins, bright eyes. Frozen in time.

I never let myself look too long at that picture anymore. And I never, ever looked into his eyes. Green used to be my favourite colour. I didn’t have a favourite colour anymore. It was safe to say I didn’t have a favourite anything anymore; everything favourable was a reminder of him.

I picked up a white knitted sweater off the ground and tugged it over my head, staining it with splotches of dark red. Knowing him, he would wear it regardless—whatever was mine, was also his, and was equally the same in reverse, even things as grotesque as blood.

Well, he would have worn it, I should have said.

The sweater had been specifically tailored for him. I remembered how the soft sleeves hugged his arms so well that every fluid curve of his biceps was visible, similar to a building wave before it crested. On me, the sleeves swallowed my arms whole, which I liked to think in their own unique way had also been unintentionally tailored for me, like someone out there knew one day I would need some way to drown in him when he was gone.

Finnick’s fingers tugged at the silk ribbons, unwrapping the opulent gift box that sat on our dining table. Capitol devotees would send extravagant parcels weekly, turning up in abundance on our doorstep. Sometimes Finnick didn’t even bother opening them; sometimes we opened them together just to get a good laugh out of whatever ridiculous item was inside.

He never, though, opened the perfume-scented letters marked with lipstick stains.

“Oh,” I said in surprise as he lifted the lid. Inside was a folded piece of fabric, knitted and cream-white and intricate, though still simple. It was soft to the touch; thick enough to retain warmth. I held it up with two hands, admiring the hand-sewed threads of cotton. Whoever’s handiwork this was, it was nothing to laugh at.

Holding it up to Finnick’s torso, I smiled and said, “Try it on.”

“What?” He shook his head and smiled quizzically. “No.”

“Yes. I think it will look good on you.” I pressed it further against him with conviction. “Try it on.”

He tilted his head and exhaled deeply through his nose, giving me a begrudging, squinty-eyed look. From that, I already knew I had won him over, and watched as he snatched the sweater from my grasp and tugged his shirt off with one hand. I averted my eyes, feeling the tips of my ears flush with heat—we’d been together for over a year now; you would think I’d have grown accustomed to seeing him shirtless.

His head slipped through the neckline and he pulled the sweater down his body. I was right. It looked really good on him. Perfect, actually. The measurements were so precise that the fabric sloped off his shoulders like a compact mountain of snow. The thick-knitted collar dipped into a deep, uneven neckline that partly revealed his chest and made his neck look like a strong, contoured pillar. He looked at me expectantly, as though to ask, “Well?”

“It makes your neck and shoulders look really nice,” I blurted out, instantly cringing inside.

His expression contorted into something of amusement and surprise as he took a slow step towards me. “My neck and shoulders, huh?” he said, grinning devilishly. Oh, now I’d done it. Leave it to me to rocket Finnick Odair’s already atmospheric ego. “Anything else?”

I began backing away, but his prowling strides were so long that the space between us only shortened. When my backside hit the edge of the dining table, I knew I was done for.

“You know,” I began, avoiding his unrelenting stare. “I think it was just a momentary lapse of judgement.” He was closing in now, placing his hands on either side of my body to trap me in place. “It—It actually looks terrible on you,” I said, feigning sincerity and adding a little nod to help further my case.

His eyelids drooped as he gazed down at me, lips curving into that seductive smirk he had mastered long ago. “No takebacks,” he purred, voice low and gravelly. Dear God, I could only pray I wasn’t going to melt into a puddle on the floor. He always did this—took every opportunity to flirt and render me a stuttering, bashful mess. It was his favourite game to play. “This is now my new favourite shirt. All thanks to you, sweetheart.”

But, given the right timing and ever-wavering amount of confidence, I liked to play too.

I inhaled deeply, hoping my voice wouldn’t betray me. “Maybe you should take it off then,” I said, cocking my head to the side. “So you don’t ruin it.”

His mischievous expression revealed his next words before he even spoke them. “Maybe I will,” he said, and then he was tugging his sweater over his head, and I was tearing off my own. As his hands slipped beneath my thighs and lifted me onto our dining table, I prayed the wooden legs wouldn’t collapse under the weight of our next actions.

My fingertips ran over the soft, rippling patterns on the knitted sleeves, my arms crossed in a self-soothing manner. After that day, the sweater had become a sort of good luck charm—or so we agreed upon as we lay panting on the tabletop. He started wearing it to a multitude of events and parties in the Capitol (basically any place in which he needed a pick-me-up, a reminder of what he had to come home to, who he had to come home to).

He even wore it the day we got engaged.

So many happy memories were associated with this one white sweater. So many times, those cloud-soft sleeves were wrapped around my body, suffocating me in the scent of him—if nothing else, at least that remained.

The last time he had worn it was the day of the Reaping for the Quarter Quell; the last time our lives were ever semi-normal. I had fought tooth and nail to reach him before he was escorted onto the train, despite being ordered, “No goodbyes,” by one of the Peacekeepers. In modest terms, I had significantly decreased his chances of reproduction.

When I reached Finnick, he had brought me into a kiss so harsh and fervent that my lips were bruised the next day. He then yanked off his sweater, leaving his upper body completely exposed to everyone around us in complete disregard for his trauma-induced fear of doing so, and shoved it into my hands.

I had just stood there frozen in bewilderment, watching as he called out, “I love you, sweetheart!” Two Peacekeepers were forcing him onto the train, but he too fought for the last word. “Don’t forget—I’m always with you!”

That statement had never been truer than it was now. For better or for worse.

My vision unblurred as I returned to reality. Dismal, grey light was peeking through the shutters that formed the balcony doors, the daylight hours seeming to tick away at a snail’s pace. I used to wish for the days to be longer, for time to move slower, so I could savour the moments I had of happiness and sunlight which used to be plentiful.

Why do wishes only come true when you grow to desire nothing but the opposite?

Slothfully, I crawled onto the unmade king-size bed, my limbs crumpling and balling to my chest as the side of my head hit the pillow. The imprint on the mattress beneath my body didn’t match my own. It was much larger and broader. How long would it take for the springs to forget his body weight and recoil back into place as though he never existed at all?

I inhaled the sweater’s scent with every breath I took (and I tried not to wonder how long it would take for his scent to disappear as well) and hugged my arms around my waist. No pain was worse than the fleeting moments I forgot the embrace was my own and not his.

Hours passed, and so did the evening. A beautiful orange sunset hadn’t slipped through the shutter’s cracks because the clouds never dissipated. Night-time brought no consolation either. Not even the stars or moon made an appearance. Everything that once gave me a shred of optimism was hidden behind a veil of gloom.

I knew tomorrow wouldn’t be any different—the weather, my mood, his absence. Because the end of autumn was closing in, and the days were becoming bleaker. Trees would start shedding their leaves; the leaves would start to die.

I hoped I would too.

I was still curled up on my side, my body aching with stiffness, when my face began scrunching into this ugly, twisted mess of despair. My tears were slow yet heavy, synonymous with the day I had incurred.

But then something strange happened.

Someone called my name.

No. That couldn’t be right. I was the only one who occupied a house in the Victor’s Village; the others had either relocated after the war or were… dead.

But there it was again—my name, distant and eerie, yet spoken with a tone people often used to beckon over and aid a frightened, injured animal. My vision blurred, both from tears and concentration on the voice.

“Hey.”

I couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment my surroundings transformed into a kitchen, just that they had and that I was no longer in my bed but standing upright.

Ahead of me, in the distance, the sun was beating down on the crystalline water, and white frothy waves were cresting on the smooth, golden sand. It was a perfect day; not a cloud was in sight. The only blemish that smeared the blue sky was the reflection staring back at me from the window I gazed out of.

In my hands was a soup bowl and a damp dishrag.

“Sweetheart?” That once distant voice, concerned and beckoning, was standing right beside me.

Blinking, I snapped out of my daze and turned away from the window.

He stood tall beside me, despite being half hunched over the kitchen sink and scrubbing the last of the few dirty dishes stacked neatly on the bench top. His head was turned towards me, his enamoured sea-green eyes peering into my own as though he was searching behind them for what troubled me.

“Hey,” he spoke softly, standing up straight. His touch was warm and gentle as he reached for my hand, leaving soapy bubbles on my palm and fingers. “Where’d you go?”

Three odd things seemed to occur at once: first, I flinched away from his touch, overwhelmed by its paradoxical unfamiliar familiarity; second, I felt an inexpressible relief from seeing him standing before me, seeing his cheeks painted with a soft pink hue as though blood-red roses were hidden just beneath his skin.

The third was an onset of disorientation. I couldn’t tell you why I felt disorientated standing in my own kitchen with the love of my life, just, simply, that I did. There was an answer—it was close by, right under my nose, yet unreachable. We did this every day, didn’t we? We would eat meals together and then wash up together. So, why did I feel so unsettled?

I shook my head, dispelling the confusion that muddled my brain. “Sorry,” I whispered. “I don’t know what happened.” I laughed uneasily, without a hint of mirth.

He laughed too, not to poke fun or because he found my obvious turmoil amusing, but rather to comfort me, so I would feel less alone in my unease. “It’s alright,” he said gently.

Neither of us addressed what had happened; we simply resumed our routine of washing and drying in domestic silence. And as seconds turned to minutes, and as the sky remained sunny, I found myself smiling. All that mattered was that he was standing beside me and that the sun was beaming in the sky. So, I kept smiling.

After I finished drying the last dish, we began placing the plates, bowls, and an abundance of cutlery in their assigned drawers and cupboards, weaving past each other and giggling anytime we got in one another’s path. I was carrying a stack of white plates, eyeing the high cupboard they needed to go in, but before I could even attempt straining onto my toes, the plates were out of my hands and taken into another much larger pair.

The smell of sea salt and expensive cologne wafted from behind me as he towered over my shorter frame and placed the plates in the cupboard.

“I could have done that,” I said, smiling as I turned around to face him.

He had a playful glint in his eye. “Yeah, right. What are you, like, four feet tall?” he joked.

It was an extreme exaggeration since I was no way near that height, but I suppose everyone was miniature in comparison to him, being over six feet tall and all. I feigned open-mouthed offence, to which he gave the side of my head a quick, playful kiss of apology.

He then leaned against the counter with crossed arms. “Plus, when was the last time you actually put these dishes away? I’m surprised you even remember where they go.” He was grinning at me in a teasing manner, but every ounce of humour had drained from my body.

My eyes drifted to the floor.

Well, that was the question, wasn’t it—when was the last time I put the dishes away?

I couldn’t remember. In fact, I couldn’t remember what had happened this morning or the day before. Hell, I couldn’t even remember what we were doing before the dishes.

To be standing in a room, in a place you call home, and have a sense that nothing is in its right place, even though that is where everything has always been, is a disconcerting feeling beyond belief. To be perplexed by your own state of being—your existence—is even worse. I could almost describe it as a nauseating bout of vertigo.

My hands found the counter’s edge behind me, and I exhaled a shaky breath.

He stepped in front of me, one large and gentle hand reaching up to cup my jaw. “Are you okay?” he asked, his forehead wrinkling with shallow worry lines as he inspected my face. I hated that. I hated that I worried him so much. Sure, partners were supposed to lean on each other for support in a relationship (as he too did with me when needed), but I always felt so guilty doing so. Hadn’t he already suffered enough… pain in his lifetime? Who was I to cause him any more?

A sunbeam suffused the room, oozing across his face. The illumination lightened his eyes into a refreshing mint green, though, in contradiction, unearthed a pain that had been previously been concealed. Pain from what, I wasn’t sure. From concern regarding my unusual behaviour? Maybe a thought that was troubling him? Or perhaps he too was enduring a spell of confusion and had an inexplicable feeling that he was out of place.

Whatever his pain regarded, seeing it had rattled the deepest structures in which held my mind together.

It was then that I suddenly realised I hadn’t answered his question, so I gave him a wan “I’m-not-too-sure-myself” smile and then began slinking back to the sink window.

He followed behind me. I could feel him staring into the back of my head, could feel his brows draw together and his lips pull into a tight line, patiently waiting for a further explanation, though I wasn’t sure I could offer him one.

I hadn’t noticed before, but on the windowsill was a small picture frame containing a polaroid picture of us in bed—I was lying on his chest, half-naked and asleep, and he was looking down at me, smiling fondly yet with a sort of mischievous knowability. Running down the middle of the protective glass was a small, jagged crack.

I plucked the frame from the windowsill, inspecting the picture in my two hands. It seemed to uncover a place in my mind—once clouded by disorientation—I’d forgotten. Whether this place was real or imaginary was beyond me, but the fear I felt upon its recollection was incandescently genuine.

“Do you think,” I spoke tentatively, “people can have nightmares while they’re wide awake?” My thumb ran over the crack.

I might have heard him inhale a quiet, sharp breath, but it also could have just been the waves breaking on the distant shore. “Like a flashback?” he asked, an unidentifiable unease in his tone.

“No, not exactly.” I searched my brain for the right words, the right way to tell him how I was feeling, but it was difficult when I could only conjure vague fragments. And it was all I could do to tell it to him elliptically, as I knew saying the words in any other manner would shatter my heart.

“I had this vision,” I began, my words apprehensively staccato, “where I was somewhere else.” My eyes flickered over the picture. “Somewhere… bad. Everything was grey and heavy, and I was alone. Sometimes you were there, but you—you weren’t really you anymore.” I paused and looked up to find him staring at me in the reflection of the window. He looked pained; it was then suddenly hard to recollect a time when he didn’t. My throat started to constrict. “You were gone and…” my voice quietened to a broken wisp of wind, “you were haunting me.”

The room was silent.

He said nothing in response

The transparency of his reflection in the glass was so familiar—so haunting—and it was like another forgotten matter had been dredged from the depths of my mind. Stinging tears brimmed my waterline, and, due to my inability to bear the sight of his translucent appearance, I forced myself to turn around.

I glanced up at him, smiling weakly as I whispered, “I’m sorry.”

He shook his head as if my need to apologise was nonsensical (even I was unsure of what I was apologising for), and he then pulled me into a tight embrace. His chin rested atop my head; my face was buried in his chest, and his arms held me like I was some dilapidated structure that relied on his support to remain upright. Part of me knew this sentiment was correct.

I expected his next words to be ones of consolation or reassurance, maybe an “I’m right here, sweetheart” or an “I’ll never leave you”. Instead, I felt his head turn and heard him say, “Think it’s going to storm?”

With a sniffle, I turned my head towards the window. The arms wrapped around my body tightened as if he somehow knew I would need the extra support. Because when I saw the wall of dark, opaque clouds rolling through the sky towards us, an unshakeable dread zapped through my heart.

My hands clung to the fabric of his cream-white sweater, which then brought to my attention that an inexplicable tingling sensation was spreading down the fingers of my right hand, numbing them.

Lightning flashed on the horizon, and the once serene waves began cresting violently on the shoreline. The dread grew.

Before my attention could drift too far, my name was called again.

I looked up to find those green eyes gazing down at me, swelling with tears. He was crying. Why was he crying? And why was his hair wet? His usually golden strands had darkened to a deep brown and were drenched with cold water that dripped onto my cheeks, and his hair was swept haphazardly across his forehead, a reflection of someone who had just endured an intense storm or had just been fighting for his life against a swarm of—of—

No.

My own eyes began to burn.

“It’s killing me to see you this way,” he spoke, every second word breaking and wavering in volume.

The world seemed to tilt on an axis. Return did the disorientation, ravaging my mind more violently now. “What do you”—My chest was rising and falling with heavy breaths—“What? What do you mean?” My lower lip was quivering, and my eyebrows were scrunched together in confusion. His words replayed in my head: It’s killing me to see you this way.

It’s killing me.

His hair was dripping—no longer with water, but with a thick, red substance that both dripped down and clotted on his skin. He didn’t look pained anymore; he looked like he was in pain.

It’s killing me.

But that can’t be right, can it?

It’s killing me.

Why?

It’s killing me.

Becausemy Finnickwas already dead.

I staggered backwards and out of his, no, this imposter’s arms. He stared at me as blood streamed down his forehead, pouring over his eyelashes and down his cheeks. I was going to be sick. This had to be some sort of cruel joke, a newly invented punishment from Snow. But that wasn’t right either: Snow was dead too.

“F…Fi…” I tried saying his name, my top teeth prodding the inside of my bottom lip, but I couldn’t make a sound.

He took a step towards me, and I almost stumbled onto the floor. “Remember what I told you?” he asked, though it sounded more like an urge.

I frantically shook my head. No, I didn’t remember. I didn’t want to remember anything.

Something dark and mountainous appeared in my peripheral vision, and an odious smell singed my nostrils. My head snapped to the left. Stacks upon stacks of plates and bowls mounded the kitchen sink, each crawling with maggots that were falling to the floor in white, wriggling heaps.

Nausea boiled in my stomach; horror brimmed my eyes.

I quickly turned away, my eyes meeting green again. His face was no longer stained with blood, and his hair was dry, shiny, and golden with life. I was as speechless as my face was drained of blood.

He took one more step toward me, but this time I didn’t back away, either frozen with fear or desperation for one last experience of closeness with him. My heart thrummed as he reached out to cup my face. It isn’t him, it isn’t him, it isn’t him, I repeated madly in my head. Oh, but it felt so much like him when his warm hand met my skin.

“I told you I’m always with you, sweetheart,” he murmured. And I knew engaging with him, in whatever form he took, affirmed my mental unwellness, but I couldn’t stop from leaning into his touch anyway. “Remember that.”

My cheeks were wet with tears. “I love—”

A bolt of lightning flashed, and thunder boomed throughout the house.

I was back in my bed.

My eyelids were heavy with sleep as they fluttered open. I felt detached, destabilised, and unsure of my existence in the world for I wasn’t sure which of the twoI was currently in. Real or fake?

A few minutes went by before I managed to get a grip on reality, which, in fact, was the real one. The Somewhere Bad. I pinched the corners of my eyes, not only finding them damp with fresh tears but also realising that my right hand—previously tucked beneath my head—was numb.

None of it had been real…

The entire time, my body was trying to alert me, to save me from the inescapable heartache I would feel upon waking. He hadn’t held me in his arms. He hadn’t cupped my cheek nor helped me wash the dishes. He wasn’t here. He wasn’t anywhere (not even in his own marked grave because there was nothing left of him to be buried).

Even despite seeing the familiar tall outline standing in the doorway, his features illuminated with each flash of lightning, I knew it wasn’t really him.

Rain was pummelling the roof, almost loud enough to subdue the perpetual rumbling of thunder (apart from the one sky-splitting thunderclap that had woken me). In another time, I would’ve been scared—of the raging storm, of my phantom lover who was watching from the shadows of our bedroom. But not now.

In recent months, I had found that no emotion, not even fear, surpassed the soul-crushing realisation that you have irretrievably lost the one thing you lived for.

On a defeated whim, and for the first time since his death, I let the singular, weighted word breeze past my lips.

“Finnick.”

It was a trembling plea, a desperate beckon.

And he indulged.

His footsteps were silent as he walked towards the bed. I couldn’t see his legs from my position, prompting me to wonder if he even had legs at all. Or did he only have legs when I could see them? That would then insinuate that if I couldn’t see him at all, he didn’t exist.

If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound? In my case, the answer was simple: no, it didn’t.

It wasn’t really Finnick. It wasn’t even his ghost. It was my mind.

He reached the bed’s edge, and I scooted over to my side of the mattress, allowing him enough space to lie down on his. His weight neither dipped nor shook the bed as he laid down and turned on his side to face me. His eyes were sad, and I’m sure mine were too. We stared at each other for a long, long time, long enough for my fatigued body to start playing tricks on me.

If I focused hard enough, I thought I could hear the sound of his breathing (the wind was picking up outside), feel the warmth of his skin spreading onto the sheets (the remnants of my own body heat were left behind each time I moved), and smell the musky scent of cologne and sea-salted hair (the sleeves of his sweater were tucked beneath my nose).

Maybe for a moment—just one sickly, self-indulgent moment—I could pretend it was really him.

I inhaled deeply through my nose. “You really weren’t kidding when you said you would haunt the next owner of this house,” I whispered as light-heartedly as I could, my voice obscured by the heavy rain pouring onto the roof.

He smiled, and it was one of the most heart-wrenchingly beautiful things I had ever seen. I think I might have given him one in return, though I couldn’t be too sure because the concept of smiling had become so foreign. The last time I was truly happy was… the last night we spent together. In each other’s arms, safe and warm and together.

And then he was gone. Just like that.

Cressida, whom I had only spoken to once in Thirteen when the war ended, was the one to tell me how it happened. Katniss was too personal, too close to him; Peeta’s instability rendered conversation futile. So, I had asked Cressida to tell me every detail—every expression on his face, every word he screamed. I don’t know why. Maybe it was so I could cling onto those last few minutes where he was still alive and breathing, despite dying and bleeding; or so I could replay the moment over and over in my head, as if somehow, someway, I could change his fate.

“He talked about you all the time,” she had told me. “Actually, I don’t think he ever spoke of anything but you. No one minded, though. While we were out there, no one ever really smiled, but every time your name was mentioned, Finnick would get this great big grin on his face, and it was impossible not to look at him and start smiling as well.

So, we all started asking questions about you: ‘What colour is her hair? Her eyes? Where did you meet? What are her hobbies?’—just to see him smile… A week passed, and it was like we all knew you inside out. It was all we could do to hang on to some shred of happiness, even if it meant talking about a girl who, to all of us, was a stranger.”

I was inconsolable after that.

She kept talking, but my sobs had drowned out most of her words, so much that I had asked her to retell me everything later in the day, despite inducing the same outcome. So, she told it to me again, just as she did the day after that and the day after that and so on until I returned home to District Four.

“He also spoke about how you never felt comfortable living in the Victors Village. He had this idea that the two of you would move somewhere far away, outside the borders of District Four, though he emphasised remaining by the sea was very important—something about how you looked while swimming during sunset and the water was all sparkly around you.”

At this point, she had been holding my hand, knowing full well how debilitating it was for me to hear. Then she had spoken with a quiet incredulity and a facial expression to match, as though she’d never encountered a love like ours before. “He wanted to build a house for you…”

He wanted to build a house for you.

And now he never would. Our love was too ephemeral for that to happen; destined to remain history; to be a memory.

Finnick's eyes stared into mine, the green hue now a dark grey from the overshadowing dimness of the room.

“I would’ve gone anywhere with you,” I whispered to him, placing my hand on the sheets between us. “I would’ve travelled thousands of miles away from this place. Would’ve lived in solitary, just the two of us, for the rest of our lives.” A warm tear tickled the bridge of my nose. His eyebrows scrunched together in shared anguish. “God, Finn, I miss you,” my voice broke. “I miss you so much.”

I contemplated crying, sobbing, screaming, or begging for him to come back, but I was just too tired. All my energy had been spent on grievance throughout the following day, and my eyes were growing heavier by the second as my body was sinking further into a state of relaxation.

Between slow blinks, I watched Finnick’s large hand move to rest atop my own, and at that point, I knew sleep would soon catch me because I swear I could feel his warm touch.

Images flashed through my mind—incomprehensible and melting together, yet somehow still graspable.

Sky blue water rippling with calm waves, the surface glittering in the setting sun. A white stonewall cottage fronted by soft, white sand and tall palm trees. Two plates of fruit-filled yoghurt and scrambled eggs on toast. Three pairs of footprints in the sand, one larger, one smaller, and another between them so delicately tiny I could fit them into the palm of my hand.

Sea-green eyes above me. Golden hair tangled between my fingers. Finnick standing in the wooden doorway of our white stonewall cottage wearing a cream-white sweater and rolled-up slacks. Finnick grinning deeply and then throwing his head back with laughter. Finnick standing in front of our bed, taking my hand in his and guiding me towards him. Finnick. Finnick. Finnick. Finnick. Finnick.

Finnick holding our child.

I was between worlds now, both indistinguishable from the other. My eyelids were drooping, and I was quickly growing insensate. Just before my eyes closed completely, I saw Finnick’s—he who wasn’t really my Finnick—lips move. It wasn’t in my bleak reality in which I heard him speak, but rather in my mind, and God, did his words offer the sweetest relief.

“I’ll see you when you fall asleep.”

292 notes · View notes

thegnomelord · 4 months

Note

omg yes for the Ghost fic request you can do prompt 3 instead that would be great, thank you. some angst with a happy ending please

Sure thing dude, sorry this took so long, but a happy xmas to you lol My hyperfixation hyperfixated on this so it's a bit long and expositiony but I'm actually really happy with how this turned out :D Play the game HERE

Prompt: "Tell me how I’m supposed to un-love you, then. Tell me. Spare me.”

CW: NSFW, subbot Ghost, domtop Mreader, angst, misunderstandings, gentle sex, making up kinda, confessions, fwb turned lovers, idiots in love,

Simon's apartment is a picture of painful domesticity; your muddy boots sit neatly next to his by the door, two mugs set next to the coffee maker, two toothbrushes left on the sink only a foot away from different shower products that have long since mixed together into one giant pile, and a dozen more little things that tell anyone with a cursory glance — 'yeah, two people live here'.

When people wonder why you practically live together when you're just casual, you both just say it's convenient (and ignore how fake your answers sound).

After all; Why leave after he's ridden you to both of your completions when you can just settle on the couch and share a drink over a movie? Why should you waste money on a cab to get back to your own flat when you two can just tumble into bed? Why should Simon wake up to an empty and cold flat when he can do so in your arms, your steady heartbeat remind him you're both alive? Why leave in the morning and miss one of the few times Simon's fully relaxed when you can have a lazy morning, laying in bed and enjoying each other's company until the sun's high in the sky?

Why leave at all?

. . . Simon treasures every moment with you as much as he hates it, every second in your presence like a pretty hummingbird singing sweetly in his ear while it drills holes into his skull. Absolute Hell. Utter bliss.

He knows he doesn't deserve you. Knows you don't deserve to have a living corpse crawl back into your arms every night, nothing but a stranger with Simon's face. But you two have known each other so long it's impossible to let you go.

You met as toddlers when you'd nicked his toy, refusing to give it back until he agreed to play with you, and you've been stuck at the hip since. You two were each other's first kiss, fumbling behind the school bleachers, eager and sloppy like inexperienced lads are. First set of blooming hickeys along his collarbones, Simon's ma giving him a knowing look when she'd noticed it amongst the other bruises her no good husband had left on him. First fuck, quick and rough in a dark janitor closet during basic training, burning with need and heat. First—

. . . Simon doesn't know when the word 'Love' first registered in his brain. Maybe when you tore up heaven and hell looking for him. Maybe when you stuck by him when he did his best to scare you off, all rough words and teeth, unable to form one nice word when violence and revenge was all that was left in his head.

He doesn't know when he registered the word. Only that he looks at you whenever you do something mundane and thinks 'yeah. Love. That fits.'

But love has no place in. . . whatever this is. Hell, he's the one who'd set the ground rule when you two were young and dumb, reaffirming it after he'd come back as Ghost. And you'd never fought against it, agreeing to just be fucking casual, there's no way you want anything more than this. He doesn't want to cock it up, doesn't want to take more from you than he's already done, so he swallows all he feels and ignores how it burns his throat, going day by day like nothing's changed.

He wakes in your arms, deeply ingrained training waking him before dawn but the heat of your body keeps him rooted in place. Distantly he can still feel the cold tight confines of that coffin, of maggots wriggling on his skin, but memories of that nightmare float away before his traitorous mind can latch on to them. He lays in bed, head firmly on your chest so he can hear you, see you breathe. Morning comes too soon and you rouse awake, laying a sweet kiss on his forehead before getting out of bed to set the kettle on.

It's domestic.

It's painful.

. . .

You love how Simon looks. You especially love how he looks in his civies, freed of his armor and no longer needing to be guarded at all times, shoulders relaxed and mindlessly looking around as you talk while you browse the store. He's still gruff, and sarcastic, but you love that about him. You loved him long before he said not to tangle emotions in your meaningless bliss and long after he'd come back as Ghost, each unknown scar on his body taking a chip out of your heart.

And you respect his choice. You'll take what you can get and won't give it up even after your corpse has grown cold, hoping that will be enough to drown out the neediness of your heart. You lost him once and it had nearly killed you, you can't lose him again. . .

God, you're pathetic for him.

You meet miss Betty on your way back from the shop. She's your neighbor a few doors down, a sweet old lady who waters your plants when you and Simon are called back into action. You see her struggling with her bags so you hand your own to Simon so you can help her, "Hold this, please?"

"Only because you asked nicely." Simon huffs, but takes the bag without further complaint, walking behind you as you help miss Betty with her shopping, content to listen to you two talk about who knows what. It still amazes him how you've managed to charm all the neighbors Simon rarely spoke to.

"Oh, thank you deary." Miss Betty says as you put her shopping next to her door, holding onto your arm for support. "It's so nice to have a helpful person around here."

"It's not a problem ma'am." You say with a small smile, and fuck if Simon's heart doesn't beat a bit faster at the sight.

"You know," Miss Betty begins. "My grandson's been eyeing you up. And I can see why, you're such a strapping young man."

You feel Simon's gaze fall on you like a dagger, cold, hard, expectant. You try to think of what to say but your words fail you, because while you and Simon aren't in a relationship you can't picture yourself be with anyone else. "I-"

"Oh don't worry deary, I told him he was barking up the wrong tree." Miss Betty cuts you off by giggling like a school girl, "I wouldn't want to separate you two love birds."

The words burning on your tongue escape you before you can filter them. "Yeah, I doubt I could love anyone other than Simon." You clear your throat after, feeling his eyes on you.

Miss Betty just coos. "Oh, to be young and in love." Then she turns, waving her walking stick at Simon like he's an annoying pigeon that flew into her house. "You better treat him properly you big oaf, he's good for you."

Oh, Simon knows. Knows you're too good for him. But all he lets out is a small grunt, and you can't help the surprised laugh that escapes you.

You don't think of what you say next, so far away from a warzone your defenses are lowered. "No need to worry ma'am, he's the love of my life and I can assure you he treats me very well."

There's that word again, and the way it leaves your lips has Simon's heart skipping a beat. Fuck, Simon wants to hear you say it until he's deaf. Wants to hold your jaw closed so you don't speak again and stop making him feel this. Wants to pull you close and throw you out of the window at the same time. Wants— . . . he doesn't know what he wants.

"Oh, well I won't hold you up any more dears." Miss Betty says, patting you on the arm before shuffling back to her apartment with her shopping.

There's an uncomfortable silence between you two while you get back to Simon's flat, neither one of you sure what to say about the damn elephant in the room. You take the bags you'd given him, your back to him as you put them on the counter.

Acting like nothing's wrong. Nothing's changed.

But it has.

"An' you say my heart's rotten." Simon grunts, gruff and harsh, too many thoughts brewing in his head to properly say what he's thinking.

You turn to him, surprise obvious on your face. "What?"

"Lyin' to old ladies." His jaw is tense behind his face mask, which you note he hadn't taken off when the front door had closed, back to being guarded around you, something between Simon and Ghost. "Granted, it was convincing. What, did you take some creative writing lessons from Laswell?"

You stare at him for a few seconds, then you feel your jaw tense as well. "Christ, Simon, what are you on about?" You growl, stomping over to him.

His shoulders tense as you approach, but the scent of your cologne calms his body without his mind's input. "Can't love anyone but me?" He asks, something cold and slimy settling in your stomach when you realize he's repeating your words. "Love of your life am I?" Simon scoffs, the skin around his eyes moving in a sardonic smirk. "You're full of shite."

He doesn't know who he's trying to convince here.

You know you should brush it off, go along and say it was just a joke. Say anything that won't clue him in to your real feelings. Hell, not even saying a thing would be good.

But you just have to open your mouth.

"I wasn't lying about that Simon." You say suddenly, open, honest, your eyes meeting his.

Silence stretches long enough to have your nerves crackle with static, your body needing something instead of the nothing he gives you. Then Simon lets out a short, dry laugh, like your words are just a joke.

"Quit it." He huffs, doesn't meet your eyes because looking at you and entertaining the idea that he could have something more with you fucking hurts. "'m not up for your focking jokes." He grows, turning to leave,

Something inside you makes you move before your mind can comprehend it, grabbing his hand to stop him, "Simon I love you damn it!"

Your words are like a slap to the face for him. Simon freezes like a cornered deer, thousands of thoughts darkening his eyes, brows furrowed like he doesn't know whether to be angry or not. "But we—'

"—we agreed, I know. I fucking know." You hiss and damn it you can feel tears prickle your eyes like needles, "But I fucking love you, been in love with you for years and I know we agreed not to but—" You're babbling now, each word leaving your chest feeling raw like an open wound, the weight on your shoulders lessening but it only draws the noose tighter. "—just tell me how I'm supposed to un-love you, then. Tell me. Spare me."

Silence greets you as you stare into his eyes, that same static gnawing on your nerves the longer he just looks at you without a word, searching for something in your eyes he expects not to find.

But he does.

He spares you, pulls you by the clothes so his lips can crash onto yours, holding you close like you'll disappear. The kiss is sloppy and desperate just as it had been when you'd been hiding behind the school bleachers, all teeth and tongue and care.

Eventually the need for air breaks you two apart, but Simon refuses to let you go far. His rough hands hug you close as he rests his forehead against yours, pupils blown wide. ". . .love me, huh?" He says under his breath, as if he can't believe it.

"Yeah." You breathe out and wrap your own arms around him till there's not an inch of space between your chests, hearts beating fast like war drums but in such a rhythm you'd be fooled to think you share one. "Do you?"

Simon swallows, his throat dry, but the words slide smoothly off his tongue. "Yeah." He says, letting you pull him back into a kiss. It's sweeter this time, calmer, no longer rushing to feel the other. He melts against you, a low sound building in his throat as the sensations of you wrap his mind in silk, the taste, the feel, the scent, all of it making his mind fuzzy. All his now.

You lose track of time, stealing gulps of air between kisses as your minds drown in the other, your bodies moving on their own. You don't know how you end up in the bed but you do, your skin prickling with goosebumps as Simon's body presses against your own.

You part to catch your breath, Simon's head falling back on the pillow with your name leaving his lips like a prayer. He's underneath you, eyes hooded and short hair ruffled, and while usually he'd push you back and wrestle for control, this time he just melts into the sheets, lets you do as you want.

"Fuck-" Simon growls as you kiss down his neck, his blunt nails scratching your scalp as reward for the little hickeys you leave on his throat. Your hands roam across his body, leaving lingering trails of burning heat. "Love, please hurry up." He breathes out, cock already rock hard from just a few kisses and heavy touches.

"Right," You say, because that's all your brain can conjure up at the moment. Blindly reaching for the lube you trail kisses down his front, your lips tracing every scar along the way, his legs easily parting so you can settle between them. You can't help but look him over again, all relaxed and eager for you, chest rising and falling like he's a racehorse. "God you're fucking pretty."

A deep flush spreads from Simon's ears down to his hickey marked shoulders, a little smile tugging on the corner of his lip. "Just pretty?"

"Beautiful." You breathe out against his abdomen, rubbing your fingers together to warm the lube. "So handsome." You don't miss how his cock twitches, your lips following his happy trail. "Charming." You hum against the tip of his cock, tongue lolling out to lick at his slit. "Bloody bewitching." His hips buck into your mouth as your fingers slowly circle his puckered rim, putting just a bit of pressure at first. "Irresistible." His body yields, the tense muscles of his rim going lax and letting you slide a finger in.

A low and long groan escapes his chest, eyes fluttering shut as he savors the stretch, tight walls clenching in the rhythm of his breaths. "Read a dictionary, did you?" Simon smirks, heart warm and floaty at the way you wait for him to relax after the intrusion before you move, at the way you look at him when your exploring finger brushes his prostate and makes him moan. "Such a focking charmer."

"Just for you." You chuckle, lightly sucking on his cockhead to make him forget about the lingering pain, your ears pricked to hear every little groan and unabashed moan leaving his lips. "Can you handle two?" You ask, your second finger resting against his rim without trying to push in.

He growls like an animal and pushes his hips down on your hand, "You're sleeping on the couch if you don't hurry up." He warns at your question, his harsh glare softened by the heavy flush across his face and his hooded eyes.

"Not the dog house." You say in mock fear, swallowing his leaking cock a third of the way down in one go as you push your second finger in, your thumb rubbing the space between his balls and ass so his prostate is trapped on both ends.

"Shite-" Simon's hips twitch up, beads of precum painting your tongue as his legs spread open more. "-you wanker." His insult is light, head rolling back as he grounds his hips down in an attempt to chase after that spine numbing pleasure your fingers bring.

Pulling back enough to murmur "Love you too." against his tip you take him into your mouth again. You can't measure how good it feels to say those words honestly instead of sarcastically, your own arousal forgotten as you work him open on your fingers, the constant pressure on his prostate making a small stream of precum bead down your throat.

Simon floats in heaven for, he doesn't know how long, the pleasure making his brain melt through his dick, unable to stop the soft sounds escaping his throat. He cracks an eye open when the tightness in his stomach becomes apparent, barely able to stave off his orgasm when he sees his cock throbbing between your lips.

Your name comes out slurred as he tugs on your hair, "Need you. Now." A little bit of his usual demanding nature comes out, but even then it's born out of desperation to feel you rather than the need to be in control.

You let him pull you off his cock, placing gentle kisses on his thick thighs as you pull your fingers out of his stretched hole. "You have me."

You go to grab a condom but he stops you, too aroused to be embarrassed by his eagerness. "You don't- my physical, I'm clean. If you want, I mean-"

You furrow your brows, your chest tight with how big your heart feels. You could never hide how sick you'd feel at the thought of Simon being intimate with someone else, even when you'd never agreed to be exclusive. "We did physicals nearly three months ago, you haven't. . .?"

He shakes his head, "No," Suddenly he tenses up, his jaw tight like he's expecting bad news. "Have you?" His tone isn't judgmental, but you can hear the edge of hurt.

"No. No. No!" Quick to dispel his thoughts you lean over to kiss him like he's a bout of fresh air and you've been drowning for years. It's not too far from the truth. "You're the only one I've ever. . .done that with." You murmur against his lips, earning yourself another kiss as he pulls down by a hand on the back of your neck.

"Good." Simon tuts, proud, hiking one leg around your waist to pull you closer, your cocks rubbing together. "Fuck me already." He grumbles, his strong arms wrapped around your neck.

"Right, yeah." Despite how many times you've done this suddenly you feel like a fucking virgin, your hands trembling slightly as you lube up your cock. You press the tip against his slick hole, forcing you to bite your lip as you start to push your hips. "Just relax, yeah?"

"Yeah." Simon breathes out, feeling pressure of your cockhead against his hole. You both groan when your cockhead pops inside him, your lips on his making him forget about the lingering sting. "Shite, so good for me." Simon hums, looking at you with hooded eyes. Usually he relishes the sting and burn sex with you brings, but he's so loose and lubed the pain is barely a prickle at the back of his skull and he finds himself getting addicted to the unfiltered pressure and weight of your cock inside him.

"Simon," You say, clenching your teeth as you try to keep still so he can get used to you, holding his hips for dear life. "Can I- please I need."

"Focking move it," He nods his head, his head rolling back from the sensation of you moving inside him, your cock brushing against his walls as you push inside him inch by inch until you're fully inside him.

Your nerves a live wire from how tight and hot his hole is, forcing you to rest your head on the pillow next to his as you try to gather your self-control; you'll be damned if you cum before him.

"I'm good." Simon tugs on your scalp, your lips meeting in a lopsided kiss. You pull away to rest your forehead against his, his eyes blown wide and hooded, something about this position so intimate it melts your heart. "Hurry up, 'm not going to last long." He confesses, his walls clenching down on your length.

Words escape you so you just nod your head, slowly pulling your hips back before pushing back in, Simon meeting you half way so your cock can lay consistent pressure on his prostate. You two move like one, your senses full of sex and heat, your ears ringing with Simon's low moans and groans. Moving your hand down you stroke him in time with your thrusts, earning yourself even more moans. Usually Simon's so quiet in bed, but now he lets it all out so freely, low growls and huffs and small 'ah, ah, ah's breathed into your ear with every small movement of your hips.

Your pace picks up as your orgasm approaches, your cock bashing against his prostate with all the subtlety of a tank. "Shite-" Simon throws his head back to moan, leaving his throat open for your teeth to lay even more hickeys. "-I, fuck, yeah, that's the spot- just- I need-" His voice turns higher pitched and needy, his body moving with the force of your thrusts, powerful arms pulling you even closer so his teeth can clamp down on your shoulder.

Simon cums with a shout that's muffled into the meat of your shoulder, whole body shaking like a leaf in the wind as he paints both of your stomach's white with his cum, his hole clenching down and pulling you along with him. You cum inside him and moan, collapsing on top of him, completely exhausted.

The silence of the bedroom is broken up by your haggard breathing, both of your bodies sweaty and hot. You tilt your head just enough to catch the way Simon looks at you, like a content cat that knows he's safe, and shit if that doesn't melt your heart, nothing will.

"God, that was something else." You say to break the silence, trying to pull out when you feel yourself soften but your attempts are stopped quickly, Simon grumbling something under his breath as he hugs you closer. "What?" You ask.

He throws a light glare your way, but his eyelids droop with exhaustion. "Don't." He says, relaxing when you stop what you're doing. "Want to feel you." He says; it's the most intelligent thing his mind can conjure up right now.

A gentle smile tugs on your lips. "Right." You lean down to share another kiss with him, this one sweet and slow, his tongue gently liking your lips as a way to ask for entrance— why rush when you've got all the time in the world?

The exhaustion weighing on your bones and Simon saccharine kisses lull you to sleep soon enough, your body like a weighted blanket on top of him. "Love you," You mumble just before your eyes close.

Simon fights against his own fatigue for a few more minutes, relishing the feeling of being connected in such a primal way, with you in him and around him. He takes in your sleeping face with blurry eyes.

Yeah. Love. That fits.

#Gnome's Prompt Game #gnome correspondence #cod mw2 #trinkets from the hoard #male reader #top male reader #x reader #simon ghost riley #simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley x reader #simon ghost riley x male reader #dom male reader #ghost x reader #cod modern warfare #cod x male reader #cod smut

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jar-of-something-else · 1 year

Text

sleeping w/ the mercs [IT IS LIKE THAT]

these are so badddddd bro literally ignore this i just need practice and the mercs are my victims pinky promise i'll get better

yeah the title is the exact same as the tf2 headcanons from my main SO WHAT

if ur under 16 please don't interact 👍🏻

afab reader i’m sorry guys :( gender is totally neutral though

obviously this is under a cut

warnings/includes: MENTIONS OF SYRINGES/NEEDLES, SCALPELS, AND MEDICAL STUFF IN MEDIC'S SECTION!!!!!! AND KNIVES AND BLOOD IN SNIPER'S!!!! these are so bad, pyro is insane, medic is also insane, sniper is depraved, actually everybody's depraved, i'm depraved and also so so sorry

mostly what they're into/how they behave, nothing super reader specific in these ones

Scout:

-he’s got enough experience but he isn’t as good as he says he is, he’s got the spirit though and that’s what matters

-really good with his fingers but he can't find the clit half the time so help him out a bit

-absolutely an ass man but isn’t into anal

-scout usually likes positions where he can easily see/touch your ass (doggy, reverse cowgirl, etc)

-definitely says cringe shit in the bedroom, 100% refers to himself as daddy (which is canon i think?? i remember him having a voice line where he does that, could be wrong tho)

-has tried (and failed) to call you kitten on the regular but reverted back to the usual (still cringy) nicknames he calls you after demo made fun of him

-he never shuts up so the dirty talk is CRAZYYYY

-calls you stuff like doll, baby, babe, and uses pretty girl/boy/baby and babygirl/boy/doll when he's close

-even though he’s a little clumsy with it, he really does like giving oral, just give him a little direction; BUT likes receiving oral even more, sorry abt ur knees babe 💔

-definitely into semi-public sex, he won’t do anything in front of people but you bet your ass he’s finding some alleyway or storage closet to get freaky in

-does get jealous pretty easy and even though he’s usually not too rough with you he is not above manhandling when he sees fit

-the dog tags stay on, do with that what you will

Soldier:

-good GAWD

-literally so mean but mean in a hot way so that makes it okay

-absolutely nickname crazy; most of them aren't very cute or sexy (i.e. cadet, maggot, etc) but cupcake always makes an appearance

-very much into verbal degradation because of course he is, is also very into manhandling and just kinda tossing you around but he doesn't wanna hurt you too bad

-rarely ever fucks on an actual bed, usually it's the nearest wall/table/chair/couch, any surface you could lay/sit on really

-no the helmet is not coming off but that adds to it

-the honey IS going on though, maybe not his full body but it will make an appearance (he’s def into foodplay)

-tiny bit of a size kink, i think soldier is one of the taller, bulkier mercs so there's a very good chance he's much bigger than you in one way or another

-would absolutely be interested in a threesome with demo let's get real here

-very attracted to body hair bc i say so

-likes positions where he's very obviously the one in control/with the power; very into restraint either with some device (handcuffs, rope, etc) or with his own hands

-VERY loud, so good luck with that lmao

Pyro:

-man,,,,

-obviously into temperature and wax play

-the mask and suit do not come off, but pyro has a plethora of toys to use on you instead 😊

-gets off on the idea that he's some faceless person you can't really understand that has complete control over you and your body

-does occasionally lift the mask up just above his nostrils to kiss you, though, scarred lips be damned

-does babble a lot, even though it's all muffled; the nicknames he uses are surprisingly cute, he'll call you stuff like sugarplum, marshmallow, firefly, sugar cube, and other sickly-sweet names

-doesn't like showing you his bare skin/body because of their burn scars, but pyro does enjoy grinding if you wanna help him out that bad

-derives most of his pleasure from making you feel good, though, so he isn't really looking for any type of physical release on his end

-pyro's are kinda short i just can't think of any more rn i apologize 💔

Demo:

-WHAT A MAN 😍😍😍

-#1 lover out of all the mercs get fucked spy

-i think his build is very similar to soldiers, maybe an inch or two taller, so he definitely has the same lowkey size kink

-is also open to a threesome with soldier

-absolutely a service dom but he teases so much

-FAKE SYMPATHY!!!! FAKE SYMPATHY!!!!!!!

-likes when you call him by his name more than any of the cheesy titles dudes usually want their significant other to call them but he is always referring to you by any nickname he can think of; the most popular ones are lamb, sweetheart, lass/lad, my girl/boy/baby and "poor, sweet thing"

-loves talking to you and making you talk back to him even when you're literally on a different planet; makes you tell him what you want him to do even though he knows exactly what you're gonna say

-also slightly into dumbification (not to the extent medic or engineer are, though, he just thinks it's hot)

-very much into face and thigh riding

-foreplay alone could last as long as an hour if he's feeling "mean" at that particular time

-THIGH MAN!!!!!! LET'S GO!!!!!!!!!!

-makes you hold eye contact with him, sometimes the eyepatch comes off 🥴

-likes giving a whole lot more than receiving but he isn't about to turn down a blowjob if you offer

-waking you up with oral, it's his version of breakfast in bed

Heavy:

-and you thought demo was a service dom 🙄

-literally will do whatever you ask him to he does not care, as long as you feel good he's content

-very obvious size kink and it's very easy to exploit, but heavy doesn't take too kindly to teasing (he isn't about to stop you, though)

-speaks mostly in russian so unless you're fluent you can't really understand him but you get the gist of what he's saying by the tone in his voice

-outside of whatever russian bullshit he's spouting out, he calls you his "leetle bunny"

-tries to be gentle with you because of how big he is, but if he's provoked he can and will get wild

-as stated above, he can and will get wild, which includes his dirty talk; russian praise will turn into demeaning english muttered in your ear

-BREEDING KINK !!!!!!!!!!

-doesn't tease you on purpose, but he goes slow enough to where you think he's fucking with you (no pun intended)

-begging is never necessary but it is a guilty pleasure of his

-doesn't ask to receive oral often but watching you struggle with it does kinda turn him on even more

-face sitting extraordinaire, yes he does make the stupid eating sounds like in the game and yes he does it on purpose to try to make you laugh

-LET HEAVY FUCK NASTY GOD DAMN IT!!!

Engineer:

-WHAT A MIGHTY GOOD MAN 😍😍😍

-much stronger than you'd think he is and he does use that to his advantage

-slight temperature play when the gunslinger is involved, it's just a little colder than room temperature but it's a very stark contrast

-loves conflicting his speech with his actions; he'll sweet talk and praise you while he's railing you into next week

-speaking of, he'll call you anything but your name. honeybee, honey, darlin', sweet girl/boy/baby, baby girl/boy/doll, any nickname that sounds hot in a southern accent he's callin you

-he absolutely has a daddy kink but won't tell you unless you have one too and approach him first, chances are you're younger than he is and he doesn't wanna make you think he's a weirdo

-all in all, the dirty talk is INSANEEEEEEEE

-absolutely into dumbification, he knows he's smart and he gets off on the power imbalance when you're babbling about nothing and he's still perfectly present

-also slightly into dacryphilia? it's not attractive when you're crying from pain, sadness, frustration, etc but he likes making you feel so good you're overwhelmed and all you can do is cry for him

-might forget to take the helmet and goggles off, but if you want him to keep them on then by all means he will

-would absolutely abide by the cowboy hat rule (if you don't know what that is, basically if a cowboy puts his hat on your head y'all are fuckin' later on)

-very much into bigger people, the extra chub around the thighs, chest, cheek, and stomach areas are a weakness of his

MEDIC!

-the moment we've all been waiting for

-kinda like soldier in the fact that he's mean in a hot way, but it's less bully-mean and more absolutely deranged mean

-of course he's into degradation and medical play, definitely dacryphilia and dumbification (for similar reasons engineer is), another merc with a slight size kink cause medic is big as hell

-likes to get you on the operation table and trace a syringe or scalpel (or both if he's feeling patient [haha get it]) along your body purely for the fear it evokes from you

-wants to get you scared/vulnerable and that's how he starts his foreplay; totally into the whole predator/prey thing but not in the same way sniper is, medic is more into metaphorical or psychological hunting rather than the actual thing

-FAKE SYMPATHY!!!!!! FAKE SYMPATHY!!!!! FAKE SYMPATHY!!!

-teases, edges, and overstimulates you to the point of tears and gets this stupid smug look on his face while cooing at you

-calls you demeaning names, like pet, but he's got some cute ones he uses too; täubchen, maus, schatz, and liebling (dove, mouse, sweetheart, and darling) are very prevalent in and outside of the bedroom

-if you're okay with it, medic does like to use you as a bit of stress relief when everybody else is getting on his nerves

-is 100% down for a doctor/nurse or doctor/patient roleplay let's get real here

-also into semi-public sex, sometimes he'll leave the medbay door unlocked and slightly ajar purpose just to mess with you

-though he is very rough with you most of the time, he likes to save his more tender moments for when the two of you are in an actual bedroom and not his workspace

Sniper:

-wild. like genuinely doesn't know what to do with himself when he's horny he just goes fucking crazy.

-even though he gets crazy insane, he doesn’t really know what all to do and it frustrates him; he doesn't have much experience when it comes to sexual acts with another person involved so please give him some pointers

-absolutely into knife play come on

-if you have a period, he'd also be down for period sex he does not care about blood in the slightest

-isn't all that nickname-heavy like some of the other mercs here, but he does sprinkle them into his dirty talk. it's usually the same things he calls you outside of the bedroom, like 'roo, darl', and love

-into body worship, giving or receiving. he likes making you feel beautiful and he likes feeling good about himself too

-would definitely want you to suck him off while he does target practice and i know this is such a popular headcanon but come on guys

-another popular headcanon is sniper being into predator/prey dynamics which like,,,come on. it's literally perfect. you're telling me this nutcase dude wouldn't be into scaring the shit out of you by physically hunting you down. it's basically canon idc

-likes biting and leaving marks on your neck/shoulders in very visible areas because he's kind of a possessive guy ngl

-as much as he likes people seeing the aftermath of what he does to you, sniper is a very private person so he really wouldn't be all that into sneaky sex. the closest you'll get is his sniper nest while he does target practice on cease-fire days

Spy:

-despite being an asshole on the regular, he's a very attentive lover

-into body worship but only giving, he already knows he's fine and he wants to make sure you're never insecure about yourself

-bilingual babe 😍 speaks in french so much you can't really understand what he's talking about but he's more than happy to give you a translation

-also has a daddy kink let's get real here

-KNIFE PLAY!!!!!!!!!!

-heavily into power play as well, similar to pyro because he'll keep his clothes (including the mask and gloves) on while you're completely bare to him

-likes buying you lingerie

-likes getting and giving head the same amount, he has no real preference cause it's gonna end in sex every time anyway 🤷‍♀️

-french nicknames ONLY!!!! mon cher (my dear), ma chérie/mon chéri (my darling), amour/mon amour (love/my love), gentille fille/garçon/bébé (sweet girl/boy/baby), mon ange (my angel) [currently using my basic understanding of the french language for evil]

-semi-public and public sex spy does not give a fuck he has a cloaking device for a reason 🙄🙄

-if you don't already have one he will give you an accent kink

#i'm so SORRYYYYY #tf2 fans please don't beat me over the head #i just need practice </3 #yeah i included some salt n peppa references too i couldn't help myself #tf2 headcanons #tf2 x reader #tf2 smut #scout x reader #soldier x reader #pyro x reader #demoman x reader #heavy x reader #engineer x reader #medic x reader #sniper x reader #spy x reader #smut headcanons #god i am so sorry

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hp-hcs · 5 months

Note

mattheo with sick! reader? idk something fluffy about mattheo taking care reader or angsty about reader trying to hide some sorta sickness or maybe mattheo's the sick one you ask for mattheo I shall deliver - yxdls

‼️WARNING: hella gross‼️ like, it goes into genuinely nauseating detail! i’m in a weird mood right now! i don’t know!

fine (chapter one of phoenix tears) — ex-death eater! injured! mattheo riddle x gn! reader

GRAPHIC GORE WARNING

seriously, don’t read if you’re easily grossed out. or eating. actually, just don’t read this at all. it’s pretty poorly written. i’m so sorry yxdls, for whatever this is 😭

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

“…and for which scenario would each of the following listed Charms work bes-”

Mattheo was cut off by another of his loud coughing bouts, hacking into his elbow.

Your brow furrowed. “Baby, that’s like, the seventh time you’ve coughed in the last five minutes. Are you sure you’re okay?”

He waved a hand in your direction. “I’m fine. Just a little cough.”

You set down your flashcards, leaning across your bed to lay the back of your hand against his forehead. “You’re burning up, baby.”

“So you think I’m hot?” He asks with a cheeky grin, waggling his eyebrows.

You roll your eyes and lightly smack his arm with the sleeve of your hoodie. “Yes, you idiot. But you also have a helluva fever.”

He grimaced. “It’s fine, don’t worry about it.”

~~~

It was, in fact, Not Fine™. It looked horrible. The skin was sunken in, to a worryingly deep degree, and the edges were blistered and raw, slowly leaking pus and refusing to scab over. Mattheo grimaced as he peeled off the old bandages, biting his bottom lip to keep from screaming when the gauze got caught on part of the torn edge. He was forced to look away as he hastily rewrapped his forearm, trying desperately not to vomit.

The minute he had deserted his father, his Dark Mark had begun to burn, to brand itself into his flesh. The tattoo sank deep into his skin, into his muscles, and into his tendons; Mattheo was convinced that at this point, it was entirely carved into the bone.

It would never go away.

The skin over the tattoo had first erupted with bright red blisters and a sickening rash, which sent Mattheo into a feverish daze for two days. Despite his friends’ protests, he refused to go to the hospital wing.

Nobody could see the Mark. They’d know. They’d know he had been a coward and a fool.

But then, his skin had begun to rot. It was unsettling. Not to mention that the Mark wriggled still, now more furiously than it ever had when he’d been a follower of his father. Combined with the state of his arm, the odd frantic movements of the tattoo felt like phantom maggots, crawling all over him, crawling under his skin, into his eyes, his mouth, Merlin-

~~~

“Riddle, man, you good?” Theodore nudged him and spoke quietly.

Mattheo startled, his eyes flying open from where he had begun to drift off standing up.

Sleep had become impossible. His arm was now constantly afflicted with burning, never-ending pain. Occasionally, random bursts of an even sharper agony would grate up his bones and make his teeth rattle. It felt like being Crucioed, but with no forewarning, no nothing.

“Mattheo!”

He startled again, not even aware that he’d started falling asleep again.

Theo put his hand on Mattheo’s shoulder, even just that small touch sending stomach-churning zaps of fresh pain down his arm. He bit his tongue to keep from crying out, squeezing his eyes shut as he did so.

Theo glanced around the room, waiting for the Herbology professor to turn her back before talking to Mattheo again.

“Dude, you seriously look like you’re about to keel over any second. You should go to the infirmary.”

“‘m fine,” Mattheo rubbed his eyes, his words slurred with feverish delirium. “Don’ need’a go anywhere.”

“Matty, dude, you look like a dead man walking.”

He opened his mouth to protest, when the worst pain he’d ever felt in his entire life struck him out of nowhere. It felt like what Mattheo imagined being beat with a baseball bat, run over by a semi-truck, and being Crucioed at the same time would feel like.

He dropped like a rock, the unrelenting pain forcing the edges of his vision to darken and then fully go black.

~~~ Mattheo woke up to quiet.

His eyes slowly creaked open, and he was greeted with unfamiliar white walls. He blinked quickly to rid the sleep from his eyes, before surveying the room.

It didn’t look like the hospital wing at Hogwarts, but it was definitely a place of medicine, if the bleach-heavy air was anything to go by. Maybe St. Mungo’s?

The overhead lights were off, thank Merlin, leaving the room lit only by the overcast afternoon sky peeking through the window.

But he started to panic when he saw that his arm lay across his chest, freshly wrapped and sore as all hell.

Someone saw.

Somebody saw the Mark of his cowardice.

Of his yearning for his father’s approval.

Fat tears started to roll down Mattheo’s cheeks. His sobs became louder when he saw that you were there.

You probably knew. You probably saw.

Merlin damn it. Why wasn’t there a magical version of HIPAA?

You’d pulled up the visiting chair all the way to the side of Mattheo’s hospital bed, your crossed arms lying on top of the mattress, and your head resting on your arms as a sort of makeshift pillow.

At least you were asleep. Mattheo couldn’t even fathom what he’d have done if you’d been awake.

You surely must hate him now.

How couldn’t you?

He started to raise his right arm, his only currently working one, to wipe away his tears, but the movement was held back.

He had the fleeting but terrifying thought of those cliché leather restraints on hospital beds in horror movies. Honestly, it wasn’t even that far-fetched. He was a criminal. A traitor. A psycho.

Mattheo looked down, expecting the worst.

Instead, he saw your fingers interlaced with his, your thumb slowly skating over his knuckles in a soothing back and forth pattern.

You were holding his hand. Asleep still, yes, but you were actively holding his hand. You were choosing to be near him.

Mattheo burst into tears again, but this time in relief.

If you were still by his side, despite everything, then maybe things really were fine.

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

chapter two

#harry potter #fuck jkr #hp #x reader #hp x gn reader #hp x male reader #x male reader #x gender neutral reader #mattheo riddle x reader #mattheoxreader #mattheo riddle #mattheo riddle x male reader #death eaters #x gn reader #gn reader

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dozing-marshmallow · 6 months

Note

Pls i NEED more Chris McLean x reader. I NEED😭🙏 ive read everything of him on here😓

So pretty please something like chris mclean x wife reader and like, the whole tdi cast gets to meet her bc they didnt believe that Chris had a wife at first?😇

TRUST ME WHEN I SAY I feel the exact same way😫 I love Chris so much and it’s such a huge pleasure that I can write for him while having other people who love him enjoy it as welllll. I will be writing him for a very long time so you can always expect something new evolved around him to come up ;)<3

CHRIS MCLEAN X WIFE! READER HEADCANONS

Having your daily hug with Chris, the tender moment reminds you of what he told you earlier.

“Were you being serious when you told me the kids laughed at you when you told them you were married?"

“Mhmm.” he responds from underneath you,“They called it a sick joke and told me that stand up comedy was way in my league.”

“Aw darling.” you kiss his forehead,“I’m guessing you’re gonna ask a favour for me to stop by to prove them wrong?”

He raises an eyebrow,“What do you mean? Stand up comedy is in my pursuit. I just don’t prefer it, doesn’t mean I’m not good at it.”

He can be so silly sometimes,“I meant your marital status, baby.”

“Oh, yeah...” he holds onto your wrists,“Please?”

You let your body relax completely on top of his, still smiling,“Your wish is my command.”

“Aw what’s the matter, McLean? Couldn’t your wife make it?” Duncan was the first to pick up on ridiculing Chris, eyes still puffy from his chronic cries of laughter from last night. On another circumstance, Chris would’ve been fuming, had he not have reason to smirk.

“How sweet of you to worry, Duncan!” the host begins off, clasping his hands,“But she’s made it in one piece!”

On cue, you walk into the mess hall, linking your arm with Chris’,“Hii everyone! So happy to finally see you all in person!”

All conversation died.

Everyone turns to you.

This woman they’ve never seen before...

His... His wife?

Were they hearing that right?

No way... He was being serious?

Chris was rolling on the inside at the shared alike look of being slapped spread across the contestants, especially of the mocking kind.

“I...didn’t know you had enough space in your heart to love someone else!” Beth’s the first to break out of her ice of shock to chirp.

“Surprised?” Chris chuckled, allowing you to introduce yourself, which was not what you guys decided.

“Yeah, I’m (Y/N)! This hot mess’ wife...” turns out improvising in front of teenagers wasn’t as fun as it sounded,“Sorry, I’m...not too good with words, so...help yourself to these cupcakes I made for you guys. I made them as a way to say how huge of a pleasure it is to meet you all!”

As you turn around to unwrap the trays, Leshawna clears her throat to privately address the cohort,"One of two things are gonna happen. One, those cupcakes are filled with maggots and hair. Or two, it's the first actual food we're gettin’ on this set."

Everybody nods in agreement.

They were right to inspect the wrapping and texture with their noses and eyes.

Yet didn’t expect to have the flavour of delicate buttermilk crumble on their tongues.

Oh my God...

Maybe they were deprived from having treats so long on the show, but it was unanimously categorised as a whole new delicious nonetheless.

The punk delinquent scoffs over,“Yeah... I’m not buying that’s his wife.”

“That evil maniac with a permanent smile is probably holding her hostage!” The ginger geek dramatically pinpoints.

“I can see why, these are too die for!” Owen squeaks, scoffing down an entire cupcake, wrapping included, not comprehending what situation it would mean for you if you really were abducted.

“Hm... Maybe he’s paying her.” Gwen suggests alternatively after taking another glance at you: it was your arm around him. Too touchy to be forced...

“I’d understand if he was hot like me, but he’s not even halfway there! Where would he find someone willing to do all that for him? No amount of money should convince anyone to ever lose their dignity for the likes of him." Justin criticises out of his internal debate of skipping the cupcakes or not.

“You’d be shocked if you’ve seen the fansite.” Noah opposes like it was the most known thing.

Speaking of which,"Sierra.” Heather directs, taking sudden control of the situation and everyone’s eyes to peel towards the superfan whose mouth was staining in the same dye as her magenta hair, perking up from her snacking at the mention of her name,“You know everything about everybody. Say, is Chris paying that woman to pretend to be married to him for laughs?"

The girl whose lifeline was Total Drama quickly swallows the last portion of her cupcake to appease her idols with a packed answer,“Oh, no! It’s all true! Unfortunately. Those two got married way before Total Drama was aired. A lot happened’s... My mom waited years for Chris to propose to her and there he goes, chasing after that nobody! Do you have any idea how painful it is to see my mom’s husband having an affair? (Y/N) is nothing but a block of concrete, blinding Chris from seeing his true soulmate! A.k.a my mom!” The last few sentences gradually grazed with personal prejudice, but not enough to throw the next cupcake away.

“Wait, but if Chris did get married to your mother... Wouldn’t that make you his stepdaughter-?“ Alejandro posited, already having a hard time imagining Chris take that role biologically.

"So Chris,” Cody interrupts the impending awkward ambient Alejandro’s phrasing would bring, steering the conversation back, still bewildered,“...really does have a wife."

Bridgette takes her slo mo time in grabbing another frosted vanilla good, rethinking, the same man that laughed at their pain,"I...honestly don't know how to feel about that."

"Huuu... I feel like I went overboard with cupcakes, Chris!” you freak out to your husband, fidgeting with the sleeves of your turtleneck,“Why did I pick to make something so childish? I should've picked something more formal... Like a dish from my home country..."

"Relaaaaax, no one else is thinking about that." Chris assured, biting into one of your delicacies.

You continued to murmur on,“I wanted to make something universal, a collection of sweets so in case one likes a certain flavour more than others... I thought teenagers around here liked cupcakes... I feel like such a fool... I hope they don’t think I see them as childish...”

He grabs one and holds it horizontally to your lips, painting them yellow,“It’s not just teenagers that like them, (Y/N). Besides, they are children. Children like things that are childish.”

That’s true... Your paranoia’s sunk,“Well... They seem to be enjoying themselves. I’ve been worrying for nothing.” you smile, drawing your finger on his stubble to take for licking,“You had some icing there.”

Turns out, you were really nice.

The angel to Chris’ devil.

The sun to Chris' moon.

The calm to Chris’ energetic.

“So (Y/N)... I just...have a quick question on behalf of everyone else.” The CIT girl shields her mouth with her hand, like she didn’t want anyone else to hear.

“Of course, Courtney. Whatever would you like to know?” you welcome her, all kinds of possible questions cloud your mind.

She tightens your shoulders in her palms,“What the hell do you see in Chris?”

...You expected that one,“Why, I see a strong, handsome, hilarious man. A goal-driven, deep down caring, loving, in need of love man.”

Now the only true thing she heard was “goal-driven”- to kill them as spiritually as possible. Maybe even physically.

"You're not brainwashed, are you?" Her eyes widened like your answer had tossed her deeper in her horror.

"Get her to blink two times in a row if she needs help!" Tyler shouts, unintentionally defeating the purpose of being discreet from his clean intention.

"Hm?” Teenagers are so funny!,“It's not brainwash when it's love! After all, wouldn't you say you've found yourself in love with someone you never thought you'd be with?" You smile warmly at the type A when the butterflies fluttered an external reaction across her freckled face.

"Th-That's different!” she impulsively shrieked before closing her mouth in embarrassment. She looks around, and after making sure no one was judging her, she continues speaking, back to her whispering voice,“That’s Duncan. This is Chris.”

“Well, we both seem to have a type for the ones that went to jail, don’t we?” you wittily mention, giving her a wink to the similar parallel.

Leaving Courtney to her common dynamics contemplation, there was no better timing for Owen to ask if you had any more cupcakes to give.

“I’m so happy you liked them! I’ll tell you what, I can make more and send them to you."

“Don’t get too flattered. Bed crusher there would eat anything, even things you can’t call food.” The overruling antagonist scornfully gestures, her hair as black as her heart.

“...Ah, right.” you shouldn't have thought so highly of yourself over baking. To Owen, they probably weren’t good, just something to give his appetite.

“Well... That's not entirely true...” The foodie looks to the side uncomfortably for a moment from Heather’s harsh perspective,“Having eaten a lot of things gives me a solid judgement on a variety of tastes. With that said, I’d specifically be really happy to eat (Y/N)’s baked cupcakes again. You can't buy that kind of quality!"

Aw! “Thanks, Owen!” it’s no mystery why everyone was in his support back first season!

“You didn’t use any store bought cake mix, did you?” DJ asks, his naturally kind pitch of voice crunching up an otherwise accusing delivery his words may have played.

“Nope! If I was gonna have half of the ingredients already done for me, I may as well have just ordered the finish product.” the truth radiates through your magnetism, not as magnetizing as your husband, smothering you away in his arms.

For some reason, no one said anything right away. Like taking an exam, silence had scattered among these group of teenagers.

"I'm convinced she has Stockholm syndrome."

Up till Harold breaks it.

"Stockholm syndrome?! Come onn, you know that’s not a real thing!” Lindsay asserted, turning to Beth,“Is it a real thing?"

The nice-hearted nerd smacks a hand to her forehead. Rather than finding humor in uninformed Lindsay, Trent finds his eyes trapped on the sight of Chris’ hand holding onto yours, fingers locked, palms resting. Above all his faults, Chris...still had you.

That kind of love...hard to find, lucky to have.

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the-laughing-lunatic · 3 days

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All 9 mercs w/ a reader who got them flowers! (PLATONIC OR ROMANTIC)

(I recently got to 20 followers on this blog! :D I wanted to do a little something to celebrate that, so I grinded and wrote headcanons for all nine of the mercs. It, uh, took a while so I hope you enjoy!)

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

☆Scout - Daisies☆

Legitimately starts tearing up

Tries to blame it on the flowers

“I ain’t cryin’ I- I’m just allergic to flowers.”

“Oh, sorry, I could just return them then—”

“What? You’d hafta take ‘em out of my dead hands, I’m keepin’ em.”

Isn’t a huge flower guy but the fact you went out of your way to get them for him makes him feel all warm inside

Reminds him of when his mom would pick flowers to give to him after his Little League games

☆Soldier - Poppies☆

Would aggressively compliment you

“THESE ARE DAMN BEAUTIFUL FLOWERS MAGGOT!! I FEEL IMMENSELY LOVED AND APPRECIATED!!!”

Seriously though, he does

Since he was never allowed in the military he always felt jealous of the soldiers who got special flowers

But he wasn’t now, because you respected him

And if you did, that was enough

☆Pyro - Sunflowers☆

ABSOLUTELY LOVES THEM

Well, you can’t hear what they’re saying but the flappy hands and excited noises give you a decent idea

Will just spend hours holding them in their hands and looking at the flowers like they’re the most beautiful thing in the world

Draws sunflowers in all their drawings now

If they accidentally burned them they would get so sad and give you flowers back as a form of apology

Make flower crowns with them. Do it.

☆Demoman - Bluebells☆

Like most of the mercs, he’s never gotten flowers before

And he has no clue how to take care of them

“Thank ye, but, would ye consider showin’ me how to take care of them?”

Help this man out

Please

He would probably put them just on a table with no vase or water without you

Y’all would put the flowers in an empty bottle of scrumpy <3

☆Heavy - Violas☆

“Little merc has present for Heavy?”

Surprised, but not so much as Sniper

Honestly the most chill about it out of all the mercs

He has sisters so he knows how to take care of flowers but he’s never been the one to receive them

Would press the flowers once the start to wilt and make bookmarks so he can keep them forever (sap)

And if he’s more protective of you during matches, who's to say the reason why?

☆Engineer - Bluebonnets☆

He sticks to the practical side of things, so when you give him a bouquet of flowers he’s utterly perplexed

He’s flattered of course, and thanks you greatly for the gift because he’s a Texas boy raised with manners

But he’s not used to pretty things and…doesn’t quite know what to do with them

He puts them in a vase with water but he finds himself stopping his work to look at them

They didn’t solve a problem, they didn’t hold a purpose yet people–including him now–seemed to love them

Eventually gives up trying to find a reason for it and just accepts it as they’re just pretty

Even though solving questions like “what is beauty” was never his forte, he’d somehow found an answer for it

And it was…well, you.

(He’d also 100% make you a flower out of scrap metal for you bc he’s a gentleman)

☆Medic - Cornflowers/Drosera Spatulata Sundew☆

There’s two flowers that he’d like

Cornflowers are one of his favorites, specifically the white ones (they remind him of Archimedes)

Not just because they are national flowers of Germany, but he also appreciates their medicinal properties

But if you somehow got your hands on a Drosera Spatulata Sundew he’d be pocketing you for months afterwards

Is absolutely fascinated with carnivorous plants and you get him carnivorous flowers???

The most romantic (or just super cool if platonic) thing in the world to him

Isn’t a botanist but he’ll be in the medbay all the time now just observing it and its reactions

He’s not sleeping for a while

He’d try to create a serum for whatever flowers you got him so they’d stay as beautiful as they are forever :)

☆Sniper - Wildflowers☆

No one has ever gotten him flowers before so when you show up at his camper van with hand picked flowers wrapped in twine he’s surprised, to say the least

Finds it interesting how he walked past those same flowers everyday and never cared

But when you gave them to him they felt…special.

Awkwardly mumbles a ‘thanks mate’ to you

Keeps them in an (UNUSED I REPEAT UNUSED) jar in his van

Smiles everytime he sees them

☆Spy - Roses☆

We all know this man is an old-fashioned lover boy so ofc he loves roses

But he’s never on the receiving end of them

So none are ever good enough for his high standards

“Eugh, where did you buy these, the gas station?”

Similar to Scout that if you say you could return them he’d absolutely refuse

Secretly thinks it’s really sweet

Doesn’t act any differently towards you afterwards when he’s with you

But you find multiple bouquets of roses in your room and a note that says “if you ever consider buying me flowers again, buy roses from these boutiques instead of the trash you had before.”

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

(Putting in all the tags is another reason why I don't normally do all nine of them holy shit)

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contentloadingandstuff · 9 months

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Comfort After A Nightmare - Male!Reader x Lumine

CW: None.

Her steps echo through the damp, dark hallways.

A maze. She always hated those. Dirty, rotting, forgotten with little to no treasure to be found. This time, her pursuit was not motivated by any prize however.

Her eyes follow the trace of white pages, trampled into the muddy floor by undiscernable footsteps. On them, the sketches you showed her countless times. Her face, drawn with the most meticulous of details covering them. Always smiling, always kind. A sparkle in her eyes, the only colored part of the image was mocking her, and the small heart on the corner of the page laughed at her efforts. At how stupid, worthless, idiotic she is.

She lost you. First it was Aether, then it was you. Two of the most important men in her life, gone. She can't help the tears. How pathetic. She can't hold even her dearest ones close.

The filth stains her stocking, the mud sucks her feet deeper in, making her lose her balance. She trips, her hands doing nothing to break the fall. Her face lands in the black, maggot filled grime.

Where she belongs.

"Stupid… S-stupid! Worthless! Dumb! D-dumb…!"

She raises to her feet, without her shoes. She doesn't have time to go back for them. The trail of ripped pages is dragging on, but the paper grows more… yellow by the second. Tattered, old. Sharp rocks cut her feet, blood mixing with the puddle water, but she powers through the pain and speeds up.

Lumine makes a turn, and comes face to face with a wall. She steps back in disbelief, but quickly turns back. Her eyes land on cold, unmoving stone. She snaps around in every direction, but all she can see is the same barrier. Surrounded by her shortcoming, walls she can't climb over.

"No, no, no…" Her cold prison has no compassion for her, only silent mocking.

Everything goes dark, making Lumine jump. She lifts her bruised and soaked hands to feel her surroundings. Much to her confusion, she doesn't feel the walls anymore - just lightless void. She makes a few hesitant steps forward, careful to maintain her balance. Out of the darkness, the pages emerge, forming a steady trail. Lumine follows it without hesitation, stepping over the more and more frequent yellowed pages.

Until she sees you.

You’re lying there, amidst a pile of your drawings, back turned towards her. She disregards her safety and rushes to kneel beside you. Your outfit, so ingrained in her mind, is stained with dark, red blood.

“Y/N? P-please…”

Lumine gently grabs your shoulder and tilts you sideways. Your eyes, once full of light, full of life, are now white, as is your skin. She chokes back a sob. The blood on your hands and cheeks is long dry.

If only she would have been faster.

“Y/N…” She grips your lifeless body tighter, cradling it in her arms. Hot tears stream down her cheeks, washing little bits of dry mud from her skin. “I’m s-sorry…”

Failure. Failure. Failure. That’s what she is, a failure. She barely even spent time with you. She wasn’t there to ease your worries, to hug and cuddle you when you were struggling. And yet you were always beside her, ready to help. And she?

She wasn’t even there to comfort you during your last moments.

Your body blackens, durning with a red flame - just like those of the many monsters she killed throughout her travels. This time too she is the murderer, the perpetrator. A failed partner, a disappointing lover.

Lumine sits among your ashes and weeps.

“Lumine.”

She jolts awake, instantly sitting up. Her heart is racing, her arms shooting out to assess her surroundings. Lumine is breathing rapidly, the remnants of the dark maze still clouding her mind. She quickly registers your hands on her shoulders, warm and firm. Safe, secure, real.

“Y-Y/N…”

She drops her head on your chest, sobbing quietly. You pull her body closer to yours.

“It’s okay. It’s okay. I’m here.” Gently, you rub circles into her back. “That was just a dream.”

She embraces you, nuzzling her head into your frame. “I’m sorry… I’m s-sorry… I… I s-should spend more time with you, I should b-be home m-more.. I should b-be…”

She tries her best to explain, to promise that she won’t fail you. That she won’t let you down, she won’t fail, she won’t be such a pathetic excuse of a girlfriend.

“Please, Lumine. Don’t say such things.” You keep your voice as gentle as you can, and lean back on the bed with her.

“B-but…”

You turn her tear-soaked head to look at yours. Her golden eyes are filled with sorrow. “No buts. I love you, Lumine. Nothing will change that.”

She sniffles. “I… I can’t lose you too, p-please… stay…”

You pull her closer into your embrace, caressing her blonde hair with your fingers.

“I’m not going anywhere, Lumine. I’ll be here. For as long as I can, I will support you, no matter where your journey will take us.”

“C-could you… promise me? P-please…”

You smile. “I promise.”

Thanks for reading!

#genshin impact #genshin #genshin x reader #genshin impact x reader #genshin x male reader #genshin impact x male reader #genshin impact hurt/comfort #genshin hurt/comfort #hurt/comfort #genshin impact lumine #lumine #lumine x reader #lumine x male reader #lumine x you #lumine x y/n #lumine hurt/comfort

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justafewsmallsteps · 11 months

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Day 3 of @inukag-week 2023: Safe

Clutching at the red fabric and taking a big inhale, Kagome felt the tight tangle of anxiety come undone. She was fine now. Everything was going to be okay.

Inuyasha was here.

She didn’t know when it first began, because it happened so quickly and so naturally. She hadn’t thought about it the first time she jumped to the shelter of his arms—couldn’t remember when it became her instinct. Perhaps it began even on the first day they ever met.

When Kagome found herself in Sengoku that fateful day, lost beyond worlds, she’d run to Goshinboku to find her home, and there he’d been (her real home, though she’d never have guessed it back then). Sure enough, he saved her from the Mistress Centipede. Despite their rocky start, time and time again he’d prove his capabilities. Learning to depend on Inuyasha’s strength came fast by necessity. If she were in trouble, she believed that Inuyasha could and ultimately would deal with it—if only to ensure his Jewel Shard detector could fulfill her duties (at first).

Then they became friends, and she knew in her heart the way that he’d call for her, “Kagome!” had to mean he cared beyond her usefulness. Not because he had to save her, but because he wanted her to live.

She trusted him to defend her, to protect her, to find her—time and space and rules of the universe be damned.

She believed in Inuyasha. She put her whole heart into her faith in him.

And now, in her newest moment of terror, he was here.

“Kagome, would you quit being a baby already?” her husband admonished.

She was too horrified to be offended, and instead shouted, “No!” before smushing herself further into his arms. Okay, so maybe she was being melodramatic, but she couldn’t help it.

Inuyasha sighed over her antics. It was her weak spot after all.

Maggots. In their home.

Kagome hated bugs. She turned into such a sissy over them despite having faced far worse in her life.

With her body essentially glued onto him, Inuyasha warned, “I have to get closer to them to get rid of them, you know.”

She squealed, “No! Just use Tessaiga! You took out a wall in our house’s kitchen over a cockroach. Remember? I’m sorry I got mad before, just do the same thing now!”

He winced at the memory. It’d been years ago, but he still recalled the way she had screeched so loud that he had overreacted at the time. It’d been a lot of damage after all. He’d like to think he had a little more sense than he did back then.

“I’m not rebuilding our home because of some bugs.” Gross as the rotten heap of fruit was. The smell bothered him most, but even Inuyasha had to admit that the wriggling creatures were disturbing.

“Please, please, please just get rid of them,” she sobbed pathetically, this time burying her face into his chest and practically clawing up his torso to get off the ground. He doubted there were any near them, though she acted as if there was a huge infestation threatening to crawl up her legs any second.

Blowing his bangs up, Inuyasha relented to his wife and unsheathed his sword, which automatically transformed to its full size. Thankfully their home could accommodate it, but the contrast of the weapon compared to the compact pile of mush was comical.

Now, how to deal with this?

Not used to making such minuscule movements, Inuyasha did his best to scoop the mushy peaches onto the end of his sword. It wasn’t the worst idea. After all, he wasn’t keen on getting closer to the rancid smell. Unfortunately the resulting squelching sound made his wife let out a string of, “Ew, ew, ew!” before letting out a short scream.

His ear twitched. “You’re okay.”

She shook her head, gripping at him.

It didn’t seem like she was going to let go of him any time soon, and while he was used to carrying her around, the tight space and task made it cumbersome. But maybe he enjoyed, just a little, how close she was. He could do without her having a meltdown though.

“Okay, let’s go.” He held her to him with one arm, doing his best to navigate their way out the door along with the sword. Once out the door he carefully flung the offending pile of nastiness as far away as he could.

“Are they gone?” Kagome asked. She didn’t dare to pull away just yet.

He gave Tessaiga a good thwack to rid it of any remaining peach liquid. Then he sheathed it. “Most of ‘em. I’ll go back inside to take a look. You oughta get off me unless you wanna deal with them.”

A muffled sigh came from his chest. Kagome peeled herself off him sheepishly.

“Okay…” she replied as she stepped away.

“You wait out here.”

She nodded, and he disappeared behind the screen door only to emerge two minutes later. He chucked something once more as far away as possible, wiped his hands on his pants, and turned to her.

Kagome shoved herself back in his arms, this time hugging him with relief. “You got them all?”

“Uh-huh.”

“You checked near the sleeping mats?”

“Mhmm. You’re safe now.” His affirmations were tinged with affectionate mockery.

She didn’t care. “Thank you,” she mumbled as she clung to him. “You’re my hero.” Quickly (because they were outside) she kissed his lips to show her gratitude.

He stroked her back comfortingly. “Damn right.”

#inukag #inuyasha #kagome higurashi #inukag week 2023 #inukag week #jelly art #jelly fic #justafewsmallsteps #omg the stupid app got rid of all my formatting

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b0nten · 9 months

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MIGHT AS WELL

[SYNOPSIS] ˚⁀➷｡ a love like yours was hard to come across. one like you he’ll never find, nor does he wish for. he only wants you, had only the stars aligned.

[NOTES] ˚⁀➷｡ angst, mentions of vomiting, rindou calls reader some very nasty words!

rindou was good at doing splits. he was good at fighting. he was good at surviving in juvie. there were plenty of things rindou was skilled at, except one. and it just so happened to be gentle, loving, and funny. it happened to have h/c luscious hair and striking e/c eyes. it so happened to be you.

rindou had had his fair share of relationships and hook-ups, but never had the thought of falling in love crossed his mind. he was of the simple hit-and-quit type, a curse he loved to blame on his older brother, and therefore got along with the idea of never settling down.

one windy september afternoon, though, the stars finally had mercy on him and faith guided him to you. it would’ve been a normal day, another fight, another drink, another stroll through the streets but that particular tuesday it so happened to be special.

unlike after most fights, that day he was pissed. he had not found his correct footing and ended up slipping, falling face-first into a pile of rocks, inviting some maggots to take their chance to kick at him. although still coming out victoriously, rindou couldn’t contain his anger, but he couldn’t let it out anymore either, since there was nobody standing anymore, so he just bid his farewell, and with a purple face took a long walk.

that also ended up not working, so he rushed into the nearest convenience store he could find, thanking the universe he knew roppongi like the back of his hand, and sliding past every rack, he bolted for the refrigerators and took ahold of the biggest beer he could find.

he wasn’t even out of the store by the time he took his first sip. once out the door he moved to the right, leaning against the tempered glass, closing his eyes.

“are those hickeys or did you get beat up real’ good?”

“fuck you want from me?” he said, not even opening his eyes.

“you could at least look me in the eyes when you’re being an asshole, plum face.” you spat back, this time just as angry as rindou.

when he opened his eyes, cupid’s arrow struck him.

“i’m sorry, uh..”

“y/n.”

“i’m sorry, y/n, i’m having a bad day.”

“should’ve guessed, i’m sorry for the joke.” you apologized in return, and a faint blush spread across his cheeks.

“it’s alright, don’t worry.” rindou reassured, “rindou, by the way.”

“so, rindou, why are you drinking cheap 7-11 beer at 4 in the afternoon?” you couldn’t help but ask, since his purple face was too intriguing.

“wouldn’t wanna bore you with it, it’s alright.” the blonde said in return, taking another sip, “and the beer’s actually good.”

“i’ve got a feeling you wouldn’t bore me. still skeptical about the beer tho. come on, talk, it might actually help you.”

and as corny as the encounter may have been, that is how you two became the closest friends ever and, finally, started dating.

there was never a dull moment with rindou, from amusement park dates to museum visits to shopping or cooking together, everything was exciting. he made your heart pump faster every time you saw him, and his heart was ready to jump out of his chest every time he even thought about you.

through patching him up after fights and curling his hair, you were always there for him. in confessions of heartache and fears, you were each others’ shoulder to cry on. and one says that in order to love, one has to let live, so what was happening with him in front of you right now?

his hair was messy and his voice tried not to tremble or break, but the guilt was eating him alive since he had come to this decision. in those two years he had finally learned how to live and love because of you, you had never seen him like this, he is sure of that.

but still, how can he bring himself to just shoo away the love of his life, but how can he keep you with him when it’s just so dangerous? his heart is torn apart in two, and his mind blank. should he be selfish or selfless, whichever way the words may fit to what he wants to do? should you live and hate him or possibly die while loving him?

was it actually selfless to let you go and selfish to keep you? or the other way around?

“we’re done, y/n.”

his eyes are glued to a painting to his left. his eyes burn, trying not to let out any tears at all.

you feel like you can’t breathe anymore. their penthouse feels like a small metal box and the air around is thick. you think you can hear you heart break or maybe it’s the construction work being done outside. the first time he said it you thought you had misheard him, but he really wants to break up.

“rindou, what? are you for real?”

he doesn’t say anything, he just nods, this time just looking at the floor.

“speak to me, rindou, at least have some decency!” you half-yell, not being able to call him names.

“i’ve gotten bored,” he says, “two years was way too much to work and i’ve gotten tired.” he wants to bite his face off but he knows he has to stay still.

“bored? of what? of us, of me? what the hell are you on about, rin?” he almost breaks down when he hears you call him by his nickname, and the sweet memories it holds are just excruciating.

“yes. and don’t call me that, you cheap whore… i-i know you only used me for money and drugs so it’s hight time you go and find another one to screw.”

you’re left dumbfounded at his words.

“what has gotten into you? are you alright?” you step closer but he takes a step back. it shatters your heart even more, and here you were thinking it was already down to zero.

“wake up, y/n! i’m not in love! i don’t love you, i never have, you dumb, foreign, ugly slut! you were one of my many whores, what did you think was so special about you?”

he feels a lump build up in his stomach, and his mouth is drenched in saliva, he feels the need to throw up immediately.

he finds the silence strange, creepy, obnoxious, why aren’t you talking anymore? he musters up the courage to look up and he wishes he hadn’t. you’re there, or is it actually you? he can’t tell. he sees your figure, he sees your eyes.

your eyes. they’re empty. they’re nothing anymore. they look like they’re hollow. he’s scared, he’s disappointed in him, he’s even sicker in his stomach.

he turns around to go anywhere, and before he reaches the door you speak up.

“you might as well have beat me purple like how you were the day we met. it would’ve been easier to get over.”

upon you ending the sentence, he swings the door open and goes out, the impact with the wall closing it shut again. he finds the nearest hollow or almost hallow object — a plant — and throws up in there. he cries as he lets all of the built up anger, regret and sadness fill the flower pot. he curses himself out and curses bonten even more, but thank god you’re still in there.

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monstersandmaw · 9 months

Text

Female knight x lady - part one?

Disclaimer which I’m including in all my works after plagiarism and theft has taken place: I do not give my consent for my works to be used, copied, published, or posted anywhere. They are copyrighted and belong to me.

I've had this knocking around for ages, and I don't know if I'll continue it, but I fell in love with all the characters anyway and figured someone might enjoy it. It was based on a prompt that I can't find now, but ran along the lines of: "Female knight looking for a Lady to serve. Experienced in monster slaying."

Wordcount: 4149 Contents: Buff, tough, butch knight seeks employment from a local lady, featuring the ugliest horse in all the land, a dog named Muffin, and a brother who just wants his sister to be happy and safe... Fleetingly suggestive moments, but nothing super nsfw.

“Here goes nothing,” she sighed as she drove the nail into the village noticeboard with the pommel of her dagger and stepped back to look at her chicken-scratch writing. “Fuck,” she added as she glowered at it and saw the way her hand had smudged the bottom of it.

“Female knight looking for a Lady to serve. Experienced in monster slaying. Find me at the Bleeding Goat until the day after the Spring Equinox.” At least, if she squinted it still looked like ‘Spring Equinox’. If she didn’t, it looked like ‘Stink Jurybox’ or even ‘String Fairyfox’.

“Fuck,” she said again, and turned away. It would have to do. She didn’t have any more paper anyway.

And with that, she led her enormous war horse down the road towards the Bleeding Goat inn. Maggot was a vile mare by anyone’s estimation, but Vika loved her dearly. Built like a brick shithouse, with a shaggy, yellow-ish white coat, pink eyes, and a propensity for biting anyone who came within a three yard radius of her, the mare wouldn’t have won an equine beauty contest if she was the last horse in the land, but she was loyal to Vika, and could keep up a steady trot for days without breaking a sweat. She made a great windbreak too, if the need called for it, and her hooves were the size of a large buckler shield. Once iron-shod, they were lethal when she reared up or lashed out.

The ostler at The Bleeding Goat almost didn’t take her.

“Size of that beast,” he muttered as Vika led her into the fresh stall. “Looks like it might eat one of my donkeys whole if I turn my back!”

“She won’t trouble the others if they don’t trouble her,” Vika growled down at him.

“If you say so,” he said, giving her the once-over too as he looked back over his shoulder at her.

At six foot three, with broad shoulders, thick, wild, dark brown hair that resisted almost every attempt at combing, a jaw like an anvil and a glare to make a dragon nervous, Vika was only distantly aware of the little man, the way a lion might briefly take note of a mouse in the grass.

“Like horse, like rider,” he muttered as he shut the door on Maggot’s stall. He reeled backwards and tripped over his own heels when Maggot lunged for him, teeth bared, red eyes rolled to show the whites and her lopsided, wolf-bitten ears pulled right back against her matted mane. “Fucking hell,” the ostler yelped as he scrabbled to his feet. “Look after it yourself!”

“Suits me,” she said with a shrug. “You never gave me the chance to offer.”

“Bitch,” he spat as he slunk out of the stable yard, nursing a bruised backside and a wet patch where he’d fallen on the muddy ground.

“That’s ‘Dame’ to you!” Vika yelled after him. When he stopped and lurched back around to goggle openly at her, she offered him a cold, feral grin and tapped the pattern of embroidered lilies and swords on her padded brigandine with her thumb. “Dame Vika of Sharkshoal Point.”

“Right. Sorry, m’lady. Ma’am. Dame…”

She snorted and turned away just as Maggot whickered in a way that meant she was thoroughly amused with her own antics. Vika poked her in the chest and she stepped back from the stable door to let her owner in, and with practised movements that felt almost meditative, she had untacked the horse and rubbed her down with a handful of straw. The bran mash and oats she’d paid for were brought to her by a trembling stable lad who had stared up at her from over the stable door with wide eyes until Maggot had neighed with soft, enquiring interest and he’d practically flung it over the door and bolted for the kitchen door of the inn. Anyone might have thought Maggot was a roaring dragon by the way he’d reacted, but it was a common enough occurrence that neither mare nor knight paid it any mind.

Vika spent three days at the inn.

She took the time to sharpen all her numerous blades, not just the greatsword she usually kept sheathed on Maggot’s tack, and she even managed to acquire a needle and thread to darn up a few slashes in her padded brigandine. Her needlework wouldn’t have passed muster in the house of a lady, but delicate embroidery wasn’t the goal. She could make two pieces of fabric meet and stay together well enough, and that would have to do. She could also sew up a person if push came to shove, and she bore the scars of her own neat stitching in a number of places about her body as proof.

On the fourth day, while the lively little town was setting up for the Spring Equinox celebrations, a man entered the tavern’s common room and looked around, asking for the ‘female knight’ who’d placed the advert on the board.

She tensed but let the scene play out, watching as the cute serving girl flushed and pointed across the room at her.

The man turned and cocked an eyebrow when he looked Vika up and down, but he thanked Ella and wove his way carefully between the tables. He was wearing the practical garments of a labourer, with a long tunic that covered his hips and a belt around the waist, but the fabric was far finer than any Vika had ever clapped eyes on, and his fur-trimmed cloak looked soft enough to swaddle a baby. His boots were worn to the point of comfort, but not falling apart, and at his hip he carried a slender sword with a silver pommel.

“Forgive the intrusion,” he said with a polite incline of his head and an accent that betrayed him as nobility as surely as the gold stitching on his scabbard. “But are you the knight who placed the advertisement on the noticeboard? You’re looking to serve a lady?”

“I am,” she said, blunt and direct as ever. “Vika,” and she stuck out her hand to him.

He shook it without hesitation and revealed a strong, firm grip. “Lord Roland. Brother of the Lady Elayne Drummond,” he added with a friendly twist of his lips.

He was attractive, for a man, with big, brown, puppy-dog eyes and russet brown hair that fell in easy waves around his ears to brush the fur of his cloak. He had a short beard that was well-maintained, and his skin had the healthy glow of one who had never missed a meal a day in his life and spent much of his time out of doors.

“May I sit?” he asked, eyeing the chair opposite hers across the table.

She glanced down at the throwing knife she’d been in the process of sharpening, and at the black grime that coated her fingertips and around her nails from the oil and the whetstone, and felt a touch of shame beside his immaculate appearance, but she nodded all the same. “Sure. Make yourself comfortable. Can I get you something to drink?” she offered.

He smiled at that and nodded. “The ale here is the best in town,” he said, looking over his shoulder and beckoning over the serving girl with dark eyes and curly, black hair.

“M’lord?” Ella chirped and then shot Vika a smile. She’d flashed her the same smile on Vika’s first night, and again when Vika had made it clear in which room she was staying, should the young woman feel like joining her when she’d finished work. Ella had, and she’d fallen apart with the same glorious light in her eyes under Vika’s mouth and with her fingers buried deep inside her. They’d not met since, but they’d been easy in each other’s company ever since.

They ordered their drinks, and Roland turned back to Vika, resting his forearms on the table. “I suppose I should ask the reason you’re placing advertisements on public noticeboards instead of serving with the king, or even the knight who gave you your title to begin with.”

“A fair enough question,” she shrugged. “He died. Of old age, mind you. I served Gwilym of Sevenoaks from the time I was first raised to the order until two years ago. After his death, I decided to travel. Found myself here, and decided it was time to find myself a new place to roost.”

“Your advertisement said you’ve slain monsters…?” he asked just as their tankards arrived.

“Thanks,” Vika murmured to Ella as she slid it across the table to her, and then looked up at Roland and shrugged. “Yeah. But nothing that didn’t deserve it first, you know? There was some sick fuck who was kidnapping maidens to feed to a dragon, so I went to the dragon and found out what was really going on, challenged the fuck to a duel, he ran, I put an axe through his skull before he’d cleared the trees. Then there was a vampire that had gone feral back near Reaver’s Canyon, and she refused to let me chain her up til the bloodlust faded. Went into full shift, came at me, and went for my neck —” she bared the side of her throat to Roland where the skin was puckered. “Near tore me open with her fucking claws, but I staked her and that was that. Cauterised it with my own dagger. Nearly fucked up the temper on it too,” she added as an afterthought.

Roland cleared his throat and shifted in his seat, and she wasn’t sure if he was impressed or uncomfortable. Again, that wasn’t an uncommon reaction for folks to have to her.

“Right. Well, you clearly know what you’re doing…” he said in his clipped, aristocratic tone. “I do have one more question.”

“Ask away,” she said and drained a third of her tankard in one go. “Ah, fuck me, you’re right. That is good.”

“Right,” he chirped again, shuffling slightly in his seat. “My sister is… Well… She’s… She’s a lady… you understand…”

“Sisters of Lords usually are,” Vika growled. “What’s your point?”

“Quite, but… while your… um… your deeds are certainly impressive — and if you say you served with Sir Gwilym, I can’t argue that he knew good character when he saw it — I must say that your language is… uh…”

“Unbecoming of the knightly order?” she said. “Don’t worry. I can hold my tongue when I have to. I’m just tired and a bit run down. I apologise. I can watch my mouth, if it offends the lady.”

Roland blushed. “You know, it probably wouldn’t offend ‘the lady’, if I’m honest,” he sighed. “It’s just… Well, you understand. Decorum and all that.”

“Yeah, I get it. So is there an opening at the castle or not?”

He nodded. “I think you’ll fit in just fine, but as a formality, I’d like to extend a trial period to you.”

“Oh, Roland,” she grinned over the rim of her tankard. “Never give a knight the challenge of a trial.”

His answering smile went all the way to his big brown eyes, and he raised his own tankard to her. “I look forward to meeting you in the lists, Dame Vika.”

She snorted and drained her ale. “Ready when you are. Just need to grab my horse and my gear.” Roland slid two coppers onto the table and she frowned. “Thought I said I’d pay?”

“I’m the one interviewing,” he shrugged as he stood and made his way past Ella to the door. “You can leave a tip if you like.”

“Oh, I already tipped her,” Vika purred, sliding a silver coin into Ella’s palm while the young woman blushed prettily and tried to hide a smirk behind a dip of her head. “Bring my saddlebags down to the stables, love? They’re all packed up in my room,” she asked before following him towards the stables.

A magnificent black palfrey, still wearing his gleaming tack, stood in the stable next to Maggot’s, staring wide-eyed and stock-still at the mare with a look of abject horror on his face so comical that Vika guffawed when she saw him.

“That’s…your horse?” Roland asked as he saw Vika hang her arms over her mare’s stable door and dangle her hands in a ‘come here’ gesture at the mare.

“Yeah,” she sighed. “I know. Before you say it, we’ve heard it all before. But she’s everything to me, alright? Wouldn’t trade her for a high-stepping prancer like that for the world.”

Roland’s horse snorted, offended.

“Fair enough,” he said, and swallowed thickly. “Come on, Lancer.”

Vika rolled her eyes and hefted her own saddle off the rack near the door and slung it over the stable door. She tacked her mare up in silence and led her out into the yard to mount up after Ella brought out her saddlebags and Vika winked at her just to watch her blush again. “Thank you, love,” she said. Damn, but the girl was pretty.

Ella rested her hand boldly on Vika’s thigh as she looked coyly up at her and said, “It’s been a pleasure, m’lady.”

The ride to the castle took twenty minutes, and passed through some of the loveliest countryside Vika had ever seen. Deer scattered from a nearby field into the oak and beech trees on their right, and as they urged their horses into a canter, Maggot threw in a little buck of happiness and Vika laughed, patting her neck as she sat it with familiar ease.

“I don’t mean to be rude,” Roland said as they continued to canter, his palfrey slightly in the lead and looking wary about the lumbering beast a pace or two behind him, “But how did you come by a horse like… that?”

Vika looked down at her mare’s boulder neck and shoulders and sallow, flaxen mane, listening to her dragon snorts as she heaved up the hill. It sounded like a hell of a lot of effort, but she could outlast any fancy racer once the quarter mile marker had been passed. She wasn’t fast, but hell, she had endurance.

“Saved her from a slaughterhouse,” Vika called above the wind in their ears. Her own long hair streamed behind her, probably tangling into an even worse bird’s nest, but she couldn't have cared less after days cooped up in the tavern. She’d expected to have her advertisement ignored, and simply to move on while the town celebrated equinox, but this was infinitely more attractive.

Roland’s horse put on a sudden spurt of speed, nudging from canter to a ground-chewing gallop, but Maggot just ploughed on at the same stubborn canter, pounding her great hooves into the soil until Roland sat back in the saddle and his fancy prancer slowed with a frustrated toss of his head. “A slaughterhouse?” he asked.

“Yeah. They thought she was far too ugly to make a destrier, and too mean to make a carthorse. I took one look at her and bought her. She was a year old at the time, and already built like a siege engine. She could teach mules about being stubborn too.”

“Something I sense you two have in common?” he said, and because he said it not unkindly, Vika laughed.

“You got me there,” she said with another laugh. “So what’s your sister like? And why is she looking for a female knight, specifically?”

He slowed Lancer to a brisk trot, and Vika nudged Maggot up beside him, instinctively tugging the reins to one side when Maggot went to bite the destrier’s glossy, black rump on the way past.

“Ah, none of that,” she barked at the horse, and for once, the mare listened, plodding along like an aged plough horse.

“Elayne is…” Roland began, and then faltered, scrubbing his hand over his face. “She’s beautiful, educated, beloved…” he said, and Vika frowned. When he looked askance at her, he sighed and the weight of it dragged his shoulders down with it. “She’s miserable. Our father… well, he loved her more than anything, but he kept her penned in… like a bird in a cage. She can insult you in about fifteen different languages, but she’s got no experience of any of the places where they speak them. Not even of our own country, really.”

“Sounds lonely,” Vika offered, and not without some sympathy. She’d travelled, and she’d met her fair share of courtly folk before. It wasn’t all it was made out to be.

Roland nodded. “Yes. I think… now that father’s dead, she’d like to see something of the world.”

Vika raised her eyebrows. “And you want someone to go with her?”

“Precisely. We have contacts all across the land,” he said. “She’d never want for a place to stay, but it’s the in-between that worries me. There’s no disguising we’re a wealthy family, and if someone figured out who she is, she could be taken for ransom, or harmed, or… It doesn’t bear thinking about. I can’t go with her because someone would have to run our estates in her absence.”

“She manages that now then?” Vika asked and he nodded.

“Yes. Father taught her everything, and, to my shame, I never had much of a head for it; not the way she does. She’s a natural. I can manage though,” he added, cheeks heating. “It’s not like it’d fall apart completely without her, but… yes. She’s the one who manages the day to day of the castle and the estate finances.”

“I’m surprised she’s not got suitors lining up from the castle gates to Southport,” she snorted.

“Oh, she has,” he laughed.

“None of them good enough?”

Again, Roland barked a laugh. “Seemingly not. Look —” he said, and pointed with his gloved right hand as they rounded a bend in the road and the trees drew back a little way. “That’s Crow’s Nest.”

Vika followed his gesture and spotted the dark castle on the hill easily enough. “Impressive,” she murmured.

“Think your ugly mare can beat my Lancer to the courtyard from here?” he asked.

Maggot was already lurching forwards into a determined canter before Vika had processed the question. “What did I tell you about knights and challenges?” she yelled over her shoulder at him as they took off with an ungainly jolt.

Lancer, of course, was off like a hound after a hare a second later, his silky tail held high as an officer’s plume, but after a mile, he began to slow while Maggot just thundered on like a boulder down a mountain. Vika just sat forward a little in the saddle and gave the mare her head to set her own pace. They overtook Lancer on a corner by an oak on the last stretch and Vika yelled, “I hope they let us in without you, Prancer!”

“You’d just batter down the gates anyway!” he roared back, laughing.

Maggot won by a country mile, though mostly through grim determination and grit than anything else. Her sides heaved by the time she got to the barbican gate, and Vika was forced to sit back and ease her into a trot before the archers on the gate started to shoot at her.

Lancer appeared a few minutes later, his deep, black chest rimed with foam and his nostrils flared wide while Vika was still walking Maggot in a lazy circle just out of bow shot, and Roland shook his head. “Damn,” he laughed. “I’d love to see Maggot race Crocus.”

“Crocus?”

“My sister’s gelding. Don’t ask about the name — something to do with saffron and the fact that he’s probably the most orange horse you’ll ever lay eyes on. Open the gate!” he added in the same breath, and the portcullis rumbled up.

“Bit extreme, isn't it? We’re not exactly at war…” Vika muttered as the ironwood frame ground upwards into the bastion above and Lancer ambled in like he was the lord of the castle, not Roland. Maggot eyed the murder-holes with deep suspicion, and then followed the palfrey inside.

Roland shrugged. “There’s already been one attempt on both my sister’s life and my own since our father’s death,” he said, and all the jollity of the race evaporated from his handsome, boyish features. “Can’t be too careful.”

“Shit,” she hissed. “I can see why you’re not celebrating the Equinox here,” she commented, looking around and finding the castle bailey empty of all the accoutrements of celebration like a mummers’ platform and festive stalls.

“Not this year. We’re funding the festivities in the town though,” he said, “To make up for it. But we’re not hosting anything here. Elayne is devastated,” he added as he sprang lightly down from Lancer’s saddle and loosened the girth while a stable hand strode over to greet them. “And very angry with me.”

“Careful,” Vika advised as a second stable hand approached her. “She’s… not the friendliest.”

“Right…” the young man chirped, faltering. “Uh… you want to lead her in then?”

Vika saw her mare settled and rubbed down, and when the stable hand promised to feed her in an hour’s time, after the strain of the race had faded from her body, Vika relaxed a little. He did know what he was doing after all. “Don’t shut yourself in there with her though,” she advised him while the mare rolled her red eyes at them, and the young man nodded.

She hooked her saddle bags over one arm and strode after Roland to meet him at the castle entrance.

The next few hours passed in a blur, but after she’d bathed and been given a new set of clothes, which not only fitted her but actually suited her, by a tailor who seemed to have magicked them out of thin fucking air, Vika meandered down towards the great hall.

A massive wolfhound lay sprawled across the doorway ahead of her, and just as the sole of her boot touched the marble entrance hall floor at the base of the stairs, a young woman emerged from a doorway on the other side, and the wolfhound looked up. His shaggy, bull whip tail began to wag and he whined and wriggled on the floor like a puppy as the woman approached, unaware of Vika’s presence behind her on the stairs.

“Oh, Muffin!” she giggled, kneeling beside him and playing with his ears and his bearded chin.

Her dress — a silvery, iridescent blue that shifted as Vika stared at it — pooled around her like a cloud on a summer day, and Vika watched as the dog floundered into a sitting position and tried to lick the woman’s face. She leaned back, laughing, and then caught sight of Vika as she turned her face away.

Vika, a woman who rarely found herself without retort or reposte, stood speechless as the young lady looked up at her and parted her lips in a soft ‘oh’ of surprise.

Vika was no stranger to beauty. From milk maids to marquesses, she’d seen it all, but this woman, with her smooth skin and warm, honey-coloured hair coiled up in pearl-studded waves, her flowing silk dress and bright, blue-grey eyes, gave new meaning to the concept of beauty. “Fuck,” she breathed, too quite for the lady to hear.

“Hello,” the lady smiled. The dog had gone still and was staring at Vika as though he was still deciding whether to launch himself at her or let her approach. “I don’t believe we’ve been introduced.” And with that, she rose like a dancer and crossed to her.

Standing in front of her, she was a foot shorter than Vika, but as she looked up into Vika’s face, the urge to kneel, to bow her head and give every shred of her soul to the woman surged so strongly in her chest she almost wept. Swallowing thickly, she managed, “Dame Vika. Of Sharkshoal Point.”

Something cleared in the woman’s face and she smiled so delightedly that Vika felt lightheaded. “You’re the knight my brother found!” she beamed.

Unable to do aught else, Vika bowed her head. “I am, Lady. If you’ll have me.”

“That remains to be seen,” she grinned, bouncing on the balls of her feet. “I hear you beat my brother in a race today,” she added and turned towards the great hall behind her. “Perhaps you’d care to spar with him tomorrow?”

“Will you be there to judge us?” Vika asked before she could stop herself.

“I suppose I should be, shouldn’t I?” Elayne said, pausing and looking back over her bare shoulder. “If you’re to be my knight,” she added, and as her dark eyes raked the length of Vika’s body from boot to crown of head, Vika shivered.

“I’ll be your knight, Lady,” she promised.

Elayne smiled brilliantly, and Vika bit her lip.

___

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