#none of this is meant to be aggressive or angry sounding so i hope it didnt come off that way ;0;
Note
Steve is fundamentally a fan-service character. That is why he is given no depth, and that the majority of his situation is portrayed from a comedic relief angle, meme-able moments, and stuff like ''being a babysitter''. Is it enjoyable enough? I mean, sure, Steve fills that fanservice character role and people enjoy him being charming and funny, so the show portrays him that way. But he does not provide anything else other than that in the story. And just because he is given screentime does not make him an important part of the show either. He is a lovable, cool, and charming character that captured fans' hearts, and he receives screen time and fan service moments based on that. But I just do not get why people expect the writers to give Steve an actual storyline or real connection to the supernatural plot when his character was never meant to be given one, and his character is largely portrayed as a comedic relief or a fanservice funny character.
im going to challenge this because i think it's a bad writing practice to partition one character off as the designated Fan Service Character and think that absolves you, the writer, of giving them depth or realism. when we're thinking about characters...idk my personal belief is that they should feel like real people. saying "oh well that's just the comedic relief so we don't have to acknowledge that it's the fourth year in a row of him coming face to face with supernatural horrors in a way that either physically or mentally alters him" is just a cop-out and an excuse for lazy writing imo. and steve isn't some random side character who barely gets screen time either, like he isn't angela or tommy or mr. clarke, he's Heavily featured every season. he had the 2nd most lines in season two. idk i think if i, the viewer, am gonna be spending that much time watching a character, i'd like for them to have some semblance of a relevant plot or connection to the main storyline.
people expect steve to get a storyline or a connection to the supernatural plot because it's straight up bizarre for him to be in the middle of an enormous catastrophic supernatural event that always effects him personally, and yet somehow the show never acknowledges it. in season one a classmate dies in his pool and he discovers monsters exist, then fights one in close proximity. in season two another one of his classmates almost murders him. in season three he's tied up and tortured and drugged. in season four he's eaten alive by monsters. again if the duffers want their characters to feel like real people who exist within this story, at least one of those things should be important to steve's story! they should be acknowledged!
also i would argue that steve wasn't created To Be Fanservice. i won't argue that he's become a fanservice-centric character, but that wasn't like his only purpose in the story throughout the series. i think people have a recency bias when they look at steve's storyline, but he really didn't become such a heavily comedic character until season three. in season one he's a villain, like he serves to antagonize jonathan and represent this normalcy and stability in nancy's life that she rapidly moves away from as she searches for barb. and in season two, steve has a beautiful and like genuinely meaningful storyline. he starts off the season envisioning his future with nancy, he gets his heart broken, he gets roped into investigating supernatural happenings with this random kid who he could easily just ditch or dump on someone else but he stays, gives the kid advice based off his current emotional state, then continues to protect the others from the demodogs and billy and it gives him this obvious fulfillment and increased emotional maturity that allows him to finally let go of the relationship and future he was picturing. it was amazing and steve felt real and people loved it not because like "haha funny babysitter" but because it was very genuinely sweet to watch a disillusioned teenage boy form a bond with this dorky kid that benefitted both of them emotionally. it wasnt until seasons 3 & 4 that steve's potential storylines became sidelined for the sake of throwaway funny moments or like.... unrealistic healing abilities
idk i just think people connect with steve based off what we saw in seasons 1 & 2 and they're interested in his full potential if the writers would just utilize it. but because the duffers can't seem to balance an ensemble cast and because steve is easy to market he has become (game show audience voices) abandoned! by! the! narrative! but it doesn't have to be this way and it shouldn't, if stranger things wants to be recognized as a well written show with good character work
#none of this is meant to be aggressive or angry sounding so i hope it didnt come off that way ;0;#i just love my boy#anon#answered
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Innocent Possession
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Time Written - 11:52 p.m.
Arkham Knight/fem!reader smut
Tags: Smut, possessive, breeding/innocence kink. Jason might be a meanie. (Not Proofread. Have to work on a Saturday AND I BROKE MY NAIL 🫠)
This man is such a slut it’s not even funny anymore. LOOK AT THAT.👇 THIS WAS INSPIRED BY THAT 👆
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His lush, heavy breathing fans along your exposed, maroon muddled neck. Sharp teeth dimpling your skin in harsh punctures, not enough to draw blood quite yet.
Hands that once cradled your neck like porcelain art in the distance of the past, now grasped your throat like a damn vice, pairing with his grip on your shoulder to force you back against him with each deep, aching thrust.
One of the major accomplishments of his new identity, his new life, was to find the innocence of his past. The highlight of his life for many years was brought to him, bound and gagged as Gotham was in the midst of evacuation. Your clothes were torn and rustled from aggressive attempts to subdue you, enough to leave bruises along your supple, upper arms as you thrashed and screamed.
Now those bastards of men lay dead outside the hall. Scattered corpses slumped along the floors, dreadfully bland decor that meant nothing to the Knight that holstered his gun after his short pursuit.
Your first greeting from the armored man was terrifyingly quiet, towering over you like a beast after approaching where you cowered.
His hands grasp hold of his helmet before you could beg for your life, only trying to make it towards the Evac buses before you were hauled off by those bastards. All words died on your tongue when steel cut blue eyes meet yours, brows faintly furrowed, his jaw taunt with incredibly strong tension.
You’re his ex, but not by choice. None of this was by choice. He vanished for a year, only to be presumed dead the next.
You never hated him enough to put that label on him. Any attempt to begin your list of a million questions abruptly halts before it even began, as his lips instantly assault yours.
“That’s a good girl. My fucked out little whore.” He grunts, squeezing your hips closer to his pelvis, bullying his fat cock deeper into your tight walls.
The ropes that kept you bound now uselessly dangled from your wrists like cheap bracelets, the skin of your knuckles lightening as you helplessly plant them along the wall. Skin grew sticky with milky cum in between both your bodies, loud and wet, seeping down in between your bare thighs.
Watching and feeling your juices dampen the front of his red tactical pants was a punishment in itself, one he was feeling kind enough to save for later.
Maybe fucking your mouth would make for good punishment, listening to you choke as he grinds against your face, a pool of your combined mess seeping along your dirty knees on the ground.
“You better hope I never learn if any other guy fucked what’s mine, Princess,” He huffs against your kiss bruised lips, barely taking breaks to let you breathe. “Woulda’ rather had you cryin’ on fuckin’ toys than another man.”
Your whimper sounded like a cry, making Jason believe he could do so here right now, in this dingy room, underneath a dusty headlight. He hovers more over your back, tilting your head just enough to crash his lips against yours.
Feverishly responding to such a heavy, messy kiss, you moan fully against his rough, scar lined lips, amplifying when his tongue promptly invades. He licks with feverish hunger as a hand slips under your waist, huffing at your jolt at the sudden, angry assault on your nub, forcing your walls to deliciously clench towards a third orgasm.
The sounds he could pull from his sweet girl never ceases to amaze him. Even before his death, you were nothing but kind, the epitome of polite and heartwarming sweetness. What the hell were you thinking, choosing to date a guy like him?
Doesn’t matter if he died. No man is ever gonna take what’s been his for a very, very long time.
You won’t have to tell him now, but he’ll know. He has the capability to learn all your deepest secrets, knowing he could drag them out of you so easily.
“You miss me, pretty girl?” His hot rasp rumbles richly along the shell of your ear, sparking an uproar of your over sensitive nerves.
“You miss cryin’ on my dick, Princess? Missed how good it made you feel, how perfect you’d behave just to get bred? Tell me,” he grunts after relinquishing from the kiss. “Tell me you did. Say it loud, tell me you missed me.”
“I did-“ You spew out from quivering lips, ripples of tears trailing down your cheeks.
“I did, Jay. M-Missed you so much—“
Your voice draws out an empty whine towards your last word, hearing the collision of hot skin get louder as he gets harsher, brutal, eagerly desperate to make up for all the time he’s lost.
His sweet, innocent girl resorted to a jittery, babbling fleshlight. You could say anything he wanted, his guarded ego crumbling from the truth laced in your words.
You missed him, grieved for him, loved him. Yet, all he saw you as right now is his babbling whore, his whining little baby who never got used to the size of him driving deep into your cunt.
Honestly, he hopes you never will.
Your front further gets pressed flat against the wall, hot skin shivering from the harshness of the cold surface. Thick, precisely detailed armor digs deep into your back when he leans over you, keeping his persistent grip along your jaw, keeping you suspended just enough to breathe when he fucks you.
“S’been hell without ya, sweetheart,” He lowers his tone, whispering with a kiss of taunt as he rocks himself against your plush ass, keeping you cock drunk per his amusement.
“My baby wanna prove how much she missed me?” He cooes along your ear, smirking sadistically to your complete unawareness. “My baby wanna have a baby? She wanna have her pussy filled to prove she always loved me?”
You whine out ‘yes’ over and over, your back arching heavily from his relentless pace. The more space you involuntarily create, the closer Jason leans into you, the harder the plating digs into your back. The harsher the head of his cock endlessly strikes your cervix, making you just about lose it.
A series of curses spewed from your lips, resulting in three thick fingers shoved into your mouth, tasting yourself prior when he assaulted your soaked core.
“Language, babygirl,” Jason sneers against your cheek, despising the foul words that left those pretty lips. “Don’t badmouth me like a cheap whore. You’re my good girl. Fucking act like it.”
His other hand promptly pressed against your abdomen, forcing your lower half closer towards his waist. With his overwhelming free reign on your body, Jason bullies your sore, abused pussy with a series of sharp slaps, your clit stinging from repeated impacts.
You jolt out, sobbing out a series of apologies laced in short begs in the midst of various squeals.
In another life, he was your gentle giant. Now, he was a monster lusting after much more than blood. Jason was a simple man; wanting nothing more than the death of his mentor, and his ex’s warm cunt until he’s fully satisfied.
You whine out something that sounded like a mix between a cry and a moan. He clicks his tongue, tilting your head back just a little more while halting his hand, catching sight of those teary, bubbly eyes and quivering lip.
“Speak up, baby.”
“I-I’m sorry!” You hiccup, your nails scraping along the wall from overstimulation.
“I’m sorry Ja-Jason, please—“
You stumble over words. A pure miracle over how flustered you were to say your desire after being his sex doll.
“Please what?” He demands, losing what patience he never had.
“A baby,” you whine out, purposely leaning into his palm, fluttering your teary lashes. “Give me your baby, Jason. I want it. Please.”
His brows raise in surprise, slowly rocking his hips whilst holding back a grunt. Yes, he said it, desiring it, but hearing you beg for this. To ruin your beautiful body with his tainted seed.
“M’Not gonna stop, y’know. Even when it takes.” His voice dribbled with lustful possession while his hips stutter back into an uproar, nibbling along your lobe with sharp teeth. “That what you want? You ready for that?”
You moan out an easy agreement with more eagerness than before, allowing your body to relax against his chest.
“Y’hear me, Princess?” Jason braced a hand along the wall, clutching hold of your hand in his grasp, keeping your fingers safe in his fist. “I’m gonna make you a mama by the end of tonight.”
The Bats can wait, for now. Once he’s dead, once he’s been dealt with, then he’ll have much more opportunity to celebrate.
#jason todd#jason todd x reader#jason todd x you#jason todd x fem!reader#jason todd x y/n#Jason Todd smut#dc jason todd#arkham knight#I went from fluff to this#idk 🧍🏽♀️#it’s so short but I’m also hella tired from this week
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millennium bug – e. sohn
pairing: eric sohn x fem! reader
genre: 90s au, twenty-five twenty-one au, brother's best friend au, childhood friends au, fluff, slice of life, coming of age. older brother! sunwoo. essentially just eric being baek yijin. oct-nov scenes inspired by weak hero class 1. no plot just vibes im sorry
warnings: minimal swearing and thats all lol
word count: 19k
a/n: posting a fic for a new fandom is always so scary pls be nice to me deobiblr bc im literally abt to cry. also yes i am calling this a 2521 au bc the plot is so heavily inspired it might just be one. a special thank you goes out to @csenke for dragging me into stanning this group i am enjoying myself 🤞
there are some pros and cons to not having friends growing up. cons: you're always forced to tag along with your brother and his group wherever he goes. pros: his childhood best friend is kind of hot.
JUNE OF 1999
Being Kim Sunwoo’s younger sister is no bed of roses sometimes.
Sure, you get the occasional excitement of having him bring you rollerskating with you down the hill or the ever so rare moments of him defending you in front of your mother when you two have done something wrong (while never saying he was in on the bad act as well, of course), but more than often, you are met with his disgusted looks and insults whenever the two years older boy passes by your room and casually bangs at the door just to spite you.
His snarky looks are especially ones to remember. Maybe it’s because he offers them to you often– much like in this very moment, completely unprovoked, and completely not by your fault.
“But mum–”
“I already told you, Sunwoo,” your mother looks at him with a stern look in her eye, the one that makes chills run down your spine, “you can go if you take Y/N with you.”
“But nobody’s bringing their sister! Mum, come on–”
“Take it or leave it, young man.”
And see, your brother may be 19 years old, but he’s still in need of getting permission to leave the house if it includes an overnight stay. It’s an unspoken rule he always follows, since he’s usually granted the right to leave, but the result of his conversation was different than what he expected this time. And see, you may be just two years younger than him (one year left until you are an adult), but even though your mother is too busy to take care of you and entertain your slowly adultling self on most days because of her highly demanding job, she always makes sure that you don’t stay alone for long, and that’s exactly why (you realize, contrary to your brother) she insists on making you tag along on Sunwoo’s trip to the beach house with his friends.
The male grunts and turns on his heel, not giving your mother another response– and with this, you know she won. And that means you’ll have to pack your bag soon, because you know that there’s no way Sunwoo would miss going to the beach house with his friends– even if it meant making his little sister tag along.
And sure enough, Lee Juyeon’s minivan pulls up into your driveway only a few hours later, and the sound of the honking outside is enough for your older brother to aggressively drag you outside of the house, shutting the door behind you and hollering an angry “Bye mum!” to your mother. Your figure is handled with the least amount of care possible as you’re thrown towards the white van, the door opened and 5 heads already peeking out with expecting eyes, waiting for your brother’s arrival.
“My mum made my stupid sister go with me, so I hope we have space for one more,” Sunwoo huffs as he throws his bag into the trunk, slamming it with more force than was necessary (boy does he know how to throw a scene), an encouraging voice of none other than Juyeon– the driver himself– landing in your ear.
“Sure, just hop in!”
With that, your feet finally unglue themselves off the ground and bring you into the vehicle. You’re familiar with his friends– since a scenario like this hasn’t happened for the first time and you had to spend your fair time with Sunwoo’s circle growing up, mainly because you never really had many friends yourself. You’re not close with any of them, though, and you’re sure you haven’t seen half of them for ages.
Lee Juyeon is the responsible one of the group. You’re comfortable with the fact that he’s the driver, since you’re not entirely sure if you’d trust any of the other men in this space behind the wheel (you fear the day your brother gets a driver’s license. You'd bet a million dollars that he’ll die while driving recklessly one day). Next to him on the passenger’s seat is Choi Chanhee, his best friend, carrying a map in his hands and twirling it in all possible directions to get his friend on the right track. In the three-seat behind those two is Ju Haknyeon, Ji Changmin and your brother himself, and in the very back of the whole van, almost in the trunk, you’re sat next to Eric Sohn– your brother’s childhood best friend.
“Hi guys,” you offer a greeting to all of them, settling into the uncomfortable leather seat (that’s peeling off, just by the way), watching as the rest of the men pay you no mind and ignore your voice, falling into a comfortable conversation with each other.
Sighing, because this always happens– your brother gets too annoyed because he has to bring you with him all the time, and you imagine his friends aren’t fond of the fact either– you settle deeper into the seat and cross your hands on your chest, looking outside of the window. You can’t imagine enjoying your trip now, since you feel like you’re a nuisance, a child they have to take care of (yes, it embarrasses you just the tiniest bit, you have to admit. Although, you do enjoy getting out of the house from time to time), and the fact that your feelings were probably more than justified and also true has you pouting, an unsatisfied feeling weighing at your lungs.
“Hi,” a voice resonates from your side, the sight of a smiling Eric peering at you taking you off guard. You didn’t expect anyone to react to your greeting– not so delayed anyway– and the sight of your brother’s best friend carrying on in the conversation with you has you shocked beyond belief. “Excited?”
Finding yourself hum in agreement– how much you are still excited for the pool and for the sun, you’re not really sure– and although you are upset, something about his open and nice demeanor has you visibly relaxing, the sparkles inviting themselves back into your eyes. “I’ve never been to the beach,” you admit, seeing Eric gasp at you in surprise.
“Really?” he asks. “I go every year with my parents.”
“Well,” you hum, “you know how my mother is…” you sigh, chewing on the inside of your cheek. It’s easier to joke about it than to actually let the fact get to you– with your mother being the main news anchor, she is too busy to actually go on trips and form bonds with her own children sometimes. That’s why you spent most of your childhood at Eric’s family’s house in the first place– this is what made you the closest with Sunwoo’s same aged friend. His parents were nice enough to let you stay over and have sleepovers whenever your mum had to leave suddenly and take week-long trips abroad, or have emergency shifts during late evenings.
Eric hums, sympathizing with you. “Well, at least you get to experience it now!”
“Yeah,” you awkwardly nod, playing with the hem of your jean shorts. It’s the shorts you made yourself by cutting the legs off your favorite pants after you grew out of them and they got too short, and they’re starting to look a little worn-out now. Maybe you should beg your mum to get you some new clothing.
The conversation between the boys grows in volume, doing nothing to help you to relax in the crowded vehicle. You can’t really find a place to fit yourself in and talk, the topics too unfamiliar for you and the feeling of not even being welcome in the discussion sitting heavy on your chest, when a finger bears itself to the flesh of your thigh, making you snap your head around to gape at the source of the contact. Eric looks at you with a boyish grin, sparkles evident in his eyes.
“Wanna see something?” he asks.
“Sure.”
The male digs around his backpack, hands searching through the contents of his bag for only a couple of seconds– since he’s the neat one, contrary to your messy brother– before he takes out a small gadget: a square with a little screen on top, a silver, circular button space sitting big in the very middle of the device. Eric throws the thing into your lap, smiling when you take it into your hands and examine it with curious eyes.
“Have you seen one before? My dad got it for me last week,” he boosts, satisfied with your reaction to it.
Your mother’s job pays quite well– meaning that you usually have the latest gadgets, the latest trends– but if you’re being honest, you haven’t seen one of these in real life before. Yes, you caught a glimpse of an ad for it in the town center, on one of the big billboards while passing by to get to school in the morning, so you know that it’s an MP3 player, but still; this was your first time touching one and examining it in real life.
“How does it work?” you ask, watching as the boy scoots from his seat to the middle one, so he is now sitting directly next to you, before he takes out wired headphones from the first department of his backpack and turns the little square over in his hands, finding where the jack goes.
“You put those in,” he says, plugging in the headphones, “and then you press this…” he explains, taking the device out of your hand and pushing on the power button for a few seconds, “and then it should play.”
Watching him with expecting eyes, the boy finally puts the MP3 player back into your hold. Then, his fingers swiftly put the respective earphones into your ears– like you’d do to a little kid that has no idea how they work, making you a little flushed at the action– and after that, you’re left with the sound of an unfamiliar song playing in your ears, making the sound of the chatter in the van completely tune out. Eric keeps on watching you, a sense of pride in his eyes as you nod at him, all excited with the new explory, before he takes one of the earphones out of your ear, grinning.
“Cool, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” you nod. “The song is good,” you dumbly say, watching as the boy next to you pridefully nods at the compliment, resting his back against the car seat.
“It’s the H.O.T album. My dad says they’re good,” he mumbles, moving the headphone he took from you and placing it into his ear, making you nod at him in acknowledgement. The action has your insides bubble with disappointment, thinking that the fun is over as you reach for the other earphone as well, offering it to the male.
Eric looks at you with a shocked pout, shaking his head. “No, we can share!” he says, pointing towards your ear. “If you want, of course.”
The action has you smiling, a shy nod escaping out of you as you reach and put the earphone back into your ear, letting yourself fall deeper into the car seat, listening to the song from Eric’s MP3 player. You’re grateful for his presence– he didn’t have to keep up a conversation with you. He could ignore you, just like the rest of his friend group always has. Maybe it was something about the two of you growing up together that always made the boy at least a bit more affectionate towards you than the rest.
You spend the car ride to the beach house with Eric leaning on your side, listening to music and his occasional blabbering about how his previous days went.
Somehow, you're glad the seat beside him was the only vacant one when you arrived to the vehicle.
YOUR SEVENTH BIRTHDAY, 1989
You don't quite remember when you met Eric for the first time, if you’re being completely honest. The first memory you have of him is of your seventh birthday party, although you’re almost certain the boy’s been present at some point of your life before– at one point, you think you saw a picture of him and Sunwoo, two chubby toddlers, watching you as you laid on a blanket on the ground somewhere in your photo album. As far as you’re concerned, he may as well have been there when your mother brought you back from the hospital– although you think he must have been too young for that back then.
The first memory you have of Eric Sohn is the day you turned seven– a gloomy, sad day that in the moment, you prayed you wouldn’t have to remember in the first place.
It was already established that while your brother is the social butterfly, you don’t have a big friend group. Actually, you could count the number of your friends on one hand, and since the amount wasn’t as big, your mother allowed you to invite them all over to your house to celebrate your birthday with you.
She baked a cake, she decorated the living room, hell, she even took a day off from work– something you deemed special, for it doesn’t happen often– and as you sat on the floor of your living room, the cake standing proud on the small coffee table, waiting for your friends to arrive, you hummed a song under your breath, the clock slowly passing the time you agreed for them to come over and celebrate.
At first, you didn’t mind it– everybody gets late sometimes, it’s okay. It was just a birthday party, and you had a lot of time. Not everything had to be set on schedule.
But the closer the clock moved to being one hour, than two after the time your friends were supposed to come, you grew worried. Your mother’s nervous pacing around the living room and her heavy sighs as she sat next to you on the floor, smiling at you in what you can only explain as sad way made you more and more anxious about the fact that you only had three friends, but all three of them seemed to not care enough to come celebrate your birthday with you. And as your mother finally took the final bow in the form of a soft hand on your inner thigh, her tone gentle as she called your name– “Y/N, I think we should light the candles,” you began to tear up.
You were supposed to eat the cake with your friends. You were supposed to hear them sing the birthday song to you. You were supposed to turn on the radio and dance around with your classmates, eat the sweets and unwrap the cheap, but heartfelt gifts they brought along with them to celebrate your birthday.
But none of these scenarios were happening, and you felt incredibly, incredibly lonely and sad. Forgotten, if you will. Not cared for, definitely.
Hiding your face into your hands, you started to cry. This disappointment was too big for your small heart to take, and you no longer cared about the cake, the candles, the seaweed soup your mother cooked for you to celebrate, the gifts, or the party. All you wanted to do was hide in your room and never come out– something about the whole situation felt deeply embarrassing, and to this day, the moment before the whole day turned around still makes you feel a bit ashamed of yourself.
Too busy crying, you didn’t notice your older brother watching you with big bambi eyes, a worried glance sent your way each time your sobs grew louder and louder. And maybe the boy only wanted to taste the cake (he’s been bugging your mum about it since the very morning, but he was always sent off with a scolding look telling him that he’ll get a slice when everyone arrives), but no matter what his true intentions were, his actions still managed to pull your seventh birthday party together in a way you never imagined.
The sound of the front door faintly resonated in your brain somewhere in the middle of your aimless sobbing, but you paid it no mind, thinking it was just Sunwoo going out to the yard to kick the ball. See, your older brother had never really known what to do when you cried growing up– it didn’t matter if he was the reason for your tears or if anyone else was. If he was the reason for your emotional outbursts, he tried to shut you up with his palm and get you to stop crying before his mother found out and gave him a scolding, but if someone else was, the small boy sometimes turned angry at the source. Kicking his classmate that once made a snarky comment about you and made you tear up or punching his friend when he was too harsh with you was all he knew to do in these situations, so he wasn’t the one to comfort you with words or hugs. It was only natural for him to escape in this situation.
You were brought to a state of shock and surprise when a hand landed on your shoulder, a familiar voice breaking you from your emotional turmoil.
“Why are you crying? We have to eat the cake!” you heard, your big, sad eyes meeting the small figure of the boy living next door, your brother nervously stepping from one side to the other right behind his best friend. “Can you light the candles, Mrs?” Eric politely asked your mum, pointing towards the cake waiting sadly at the coffee table, the figure of your mother leaving your side only shortly to get the matches from the kitchen and illuminate your face with the small flames.
Confusion mirrored your features as you watched your brother and his best friend sing the birthday song to you while your mum lit your candles, both boys clapping and dancing around, acting silly just to get a laugh from you. You didn't know how Eric got there, but you guessed there are some good sides to having him as your neighbor. The energetic boy did his best to brighten up your mood a bit, and when you blew out the candle, making a wish, Sunwoo even went as far as smashing your face into the cake to bring in the full birthday authenticity.
That got him a slap to the back of his head from your mother, as well as made you stand up from your position– no longer making you look like a disappointed bulk of pity– and chase him around the room, icing falling off your nose to the laminated floor. You got your revenge and smeared the chocolate all over his forehead (he let you chase him down only because it was your birthday and he really, really hated to see his sister cry, but he won’t ever tell you that) and as the three of you sat back down to the floor, watching your mother slice the cake and offer it to you on small white plates, you realized you suddenly weren't as sad anymore.
“What did you wish for?” Eric asked you, mouth full of cake and face messy with chocolate.
“I can’t tell you,” you hummed, eyebrows furrowed. “Then it won’t come true.”
“You probably wished for that doll you saw in the store the other day,” Sunwoo snickered as he swallowed, having you glare at him and send a sharp kick to his shin, unwatched by your mother (thankfully), as the boy fought you back, having no mercy.
Music suddenly filled the room as Eric stood up and put the radio on, his 9 year old brain smart enough to know how the device worked, his small figure dancing away to the songs playing on the single radio station you could play without carefully sorting out the antenna so it faced the north, and truly, you didn’t know how it happened, but it had you standing up and dancing around, exactly how you'd imagined doing with your friends from school.
The day wasn’t ruined– quite the opposite, really. It was one of your favorite birthday parties, and ever since then, Eric was invited to every single one you had after. And while Sunwoo may act like he doesn’t hate anything more in this world than having a younger sister, every time you feel like a burden to him, you remember this very afternoon.
You will never tell anyone what you wished for that day– but just to let everyone in on the secret,
it was to somehow, just like Sunwoo, find someone like Eric for yourself as well.
JUNE OF 1999
Standing at the side of the pool, eyes squinting from the inevitable force of the sun, you’re starting to regret your decision of coming along just a little. See, you usually don’t protest whenever Sunwoo aggressively drags you around and brings you everywhere he’s supposed to, because even though you love to see your brother angry (especially when you’re the reason behind the emotion), you’d also hate to see him miss out, but now, as the scorching hot sun is having no mercy on every exposed inch of skin– and believe me, there’s a lot of it, since you’re wearing your swimming trunks– and the sweat on your forehead is no longer culminating in beads, but rolling painfully slowly down your forehead, you do admit you’d be a little bit happier in the shade of your little room than here, watching the guys play volleyball in the comfort of the freezing cold pool.
And as the only female around the house, you settle with the patriarchy and bring out a small folding chair and a camping table alongside with a big, sharp knife, struggling to hoist up the giant watermelon you got in a grocery store on your way to the beach house, with the intention of cutting it and serving it to the guys later. Who knows, maybe they’ll like you a little more after that.
The knife sinks into the thick green skin of the watermelon easily, and so as you accompany yourself with the excited (and not so excited screams coming from the losing side of the game– mainly your brother himself), you cut up the fruit into halves, then quarters, and as you stare at the moon crescents settled on the camping table, you decide to play nice and cut up the fruit into smaller triangles as well, to really get on everyone’s good side.
The yearning for male validation awakes in a woman pretty early on in life. It’s an inevitable misfortune.
“Told you Sunwoo’s all talk but no game!” you hear Haknyeon yell out as the game seemingly ends, the younger boy lunging at him in the pool, fighting him for the truthful words. Glancing at the commotion, you notice the guys slowly getting out of the pool, making you heave out in victory– you’re finally gonna have your turn in the pool. Well, if they don’t decide to occupy it again before you even get a chance to get in.
“Y/N! You cut up the watermelon?” Eric asks a very obvious question, walking up to you with beads of water all over his half-naked body. His dark hair is damply sitting against his forehead, making him look like a wet puppy, but as the male gets closer to you, he drags his palm through the locks and pushes them back, revealing his forehead– a sight sweet to your eyes, but you refuse to pay it much attention in the heat of the moment. It’s just the sun making you delirious as the idea of finding him attractive flashes through your brain, that’s all.
“I did! Take one,” you smile, watching as the rest of the guys walk over to your little stand– while also obnoxiously swatting out water out of their hair like dogs, refusing to use towels like normal people– and finally, there it comes: appreciative smiles appear on their faces as they each take a piece, biting down on the fruit with delighted sighs.
Sunwoo walks up to you with a surprised look on his face, sighing as he messes with your hair. “If I knew you’d be our servant, I wouldn’t have even minded you going in the first place.”
“You do something nice for people and they jump on the chance to exploit you,” you hum, shaking your head in disbelief. “That’s just like you, Kim Sunwoo.”
“No, that’s just me having older brother privileges.”
“I hope you choke on that, you know,” you bite at him, pointing towards the piece of sweet watermelon in his hands, the smile on his face turning bitter. There’s a satisfied look on your face when your brother does, indeed, choke on a watermelon seed a few seconds later– and they say dreams don’t come true.
“You didn’t have to,” you hear Eric speak up from the other side, your head turning to face the male, his features appreciative and warm. “Thank you,” he beams. There’s redness on the tip of his nose and his forehead, signaling his quickly approaching sunburn, and you can’t help but laugh out at his clueless, Rudolph the red nosed reindeer self.
“What’s so funny?” he asks, furrowing his eyebrows at you in question.
“Nothing,” you peep, “you just look like you forgot to use sunscreen,” you mumble, watching as the male gasps and touches his face, a horrified expression overtaking him when the skin under his fingertips burns to the touch.
“I didn’t forget! It must have rubbed off in the pool,” he mourns, “I must look stupid!”
“Only a little,” you tease, a grin overtaking your features. See, there’s something about the fact that you’ve known Eric for the entirety of your whole life that makes you more prone to teasing him– you’re familiar with your dynamics and just how far you can go, so his next actions startle you just the tiniest bit as the male looks sternly at you, throwing the half-eaten watermelon slice to the camping table. You thought you had the risks calculated– apparently, you didn't.
“What did you say?”
Examining his features, seeing no signs of anger– just the stoic, fakely-offended face of your brother’s childhood best friend– you shrug. “That you look a bit stupid with your face like that.”
“Oh, okay,” he nods, “you’re going down for that.”
“What do you mea–”
Your words are cut short when the male lunges at you, his arms enveloping your thighs and holding you up. The contact of his cold skin from the pool and your heated figure makes goosebumps appear all over your body, your hands instinctively reaching around him to support yourself as he walks closer to the pool– his intentions are suddenly painfully clear and you start to panic.
“This will teach you to respect your elders,” Eric huffs, the turquoise surface of the water slowly coming into your point of view.
“Stop! Stop-stop-stop,” you squirm, kicking your feet and trying to take down the predator, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry, alright?”
The male takes a halt for a split second– making you foolishly believe he’ll let you off– before he breaks out into a devilish grin and continues to walk to the edge of the pool. “Too late.”
“Eric!” you scream, the volume of your voice resonating through the whole beach, your heart thumping wild against your ribcage with the awaiting process. You’re not even sure what you’re scared of anymore– you can swim and you bet the water will feel nice against the scorching sun– but still, you’re absolutely terrified as the male has no mercy on you, carrying you steadily towards the water. “At least let me tie my hair first! You can dump me in after, I promise,” you mourn, trying to buy yourself more time.
“Alright,” he nods, waiting at the very edge of the pool, leaving you to take the purple scrunchie off your wrist and gather your hair together, preparing to tie it into a bun so it doesn’t get in your way when you’re in the pool. The hair tie is just at the tips of your fingertips, the first loop over the hair ready to be done, when a scream cuts out of your throat.
The feeling of falling suddenly overtakes your body, leaving you no time to prepare yourself for the impact of the cold water against your skin and all up in your nose, since you didn’t pluck it when you were dumped into the pool. The fall only lasts a split second until you’re below the water, the force of it resonating in your ears, and when you finally act on your instincts and stand up in the pool (it wasn’t even that deep in the first place, only reaching to your upper stomach), you cough out all the water and pray to gods you don’t throw up chlorine into the freshly cleaned pool. After you’re done catching your breath and getting oxygen into your lungs again, you do your best at getting all the hair out of your face.
There is laughter landing into your ears as soon as you manage to get all the water out of them by leaning your head to the side and violently slapping each one, and when your eyes look up, you see an amused Eric Sohn bending over in his waist at your disheveled appearance.
Grunting and pointing a finger to the criminal that almost made you drown, you huff out. “I’ll kill you! Just you watch.”
Your scrunchie nowhere to be found, forever lost somewhere outside of the beach house, you think, as it flew off your hand in the impact of the attack, shock makes your figure shake alongside of the coldness of the water, making you audibly sigh.
Yes. You do regret coming along just a little.
JULY OF 1999
Somewhere along the way, Eric Sohn starts acting as if he’s your second older brother. Sure, you’ve known the male your whole entire life and he’s seen you grow up, but it took him 17 years of your life to come to a point where he gives you equal amount of attention whenever he’s over at your house than he does to your brother, and even asks Sunwoo if you’re coming along with them whenever they leave to hang out somewhere else. It’s a change that comes naturally and slowly, and you welcome it unknowingly– the revelation shocks you on a hot summer day, though, when the idea finally comes to you in full force.
You would even argue and say Eric acts more like your brother than your actual sibling does– he asks if you’ve eaten and listens to you when you talk (which Sunwoo never does, well, except from when he’s arguing with you). Eric even compliments your outfits sometimes and lets you borrow his MP3 player from time to time– Sunwoo would never share his things with you, no matter how hard you pleaded and threatened to tell your mum. Yes, your brother's an adult and you’re one year away from becoming one– you still resolve your conflicts through your only parent, though. Some things, you never grow out of.
“I wanna try using the skateboard now, Sunwoo,” you order sternly when the boy finally reaches your destination. You’ve been sitting on the sidewalk for quite some time now, since your brother and his friend decided that they’re gonna try out their new skateboards on the hottest day of the year. Your town doesn’t have fancy skateparks and ramps like the ones you’ve seen in the music videos on TV, so you don’t really know what initially made the two buy those things, but you do admit that even driving up and down the road in front of your house does seem a little fun– so much you’d love to try it.
“What a shame we all wish for things we can’t have,” he shrugs ironically, shaking his head at you from his position above. The male reaches down for his bag, taking out a water bottle and putting it against his plush lips, all while you glare at him from below, still seated in your initial position. Eric comes up to you two, squishing at the soft plastic bottle in Sunwoo’s hold, making the water splash your older brother in the face, leaving a winning grin to be shared between you and the shorter boy, an expression that makes you all warm on the inside. See, at least Eric always has your back.
“You can try mine, if you want,” the latter shrugs, offering you a smile.
“Really?”
“Yeah,” he nods, “why not?”
“I don’t know,” you shrug, “I just didn’t expect you to offer, since as you saw, my dear brother just refused when I asked…” you mumble, standing up from the sidewalk and taking the skateboard into your hand. Eric offers it to you with an outstretched arm and watches as you put the board on the floor, squinting at it with much examination.
“Do you know how to ride it?” he asks.
“No,” you shake your head, “but I mean, if Sunwoo can do it, how hard can it really be?” you joke, seeing as the said boy glares at you, finally finishing his water and dropping the bottle to the ground.
“I’ll remind you of that statement when you eat shit on the pavement,” he shushes you, rolling his eyes.
Not paying more attention to the grumpy being that is your own brother, you relocate your attention back to the skateboard on the heated road. You’re lucky you live on a street where cars don’t often drive by, since your neighborhood is on the very edge of the town, so you don’t really fear being run over by a pickup truck. What you do worry about, though, is your lacking sense of balance, which you discovered when you learned how to ride the bike for the first time. While your brother was a professional in no time, it took you weeks to get it right, and so with the idea of riding a board that provides you zero sense of security, you get a bit worried for your own life.
Dragging your hair out of your face and aimlessly trying to tuck it behind your ears– there’s no use in trying though, as the strands slip out just as fast as they found their place– you keep staring at the board only a few centimeters away from your feet, mentally calculating your next move. There’s a noise of a backpack being opened and rustling around in the background of your miserable thoughts, and when you look up to see what’s going on, you notice Eric offering you a small, purple bundle of fabric.
“What’s that?” you ask, even though the answer is clear as the day– you recognise your own scrunchie with no problem. You’re just surprised to see it in his hold. You thought it was forever buried somewhere in the beach house, since you weren’t able to find it after you got out of the pool, no matter how hard you tried.
“Oh,” he shrugs, amidst a little too nonchalantly, “I found it and figured it was yours, but I forgot to give it back to you then… it seems like you need it now, though,” he offers you an explanation, lips pressed into a thin line that slightly signifies a smile.
“Ah,” you gasp, nodding as you take the hair tie out of his outstretched palm, gathering your hair into a bun and tying it up on the crown of your head– the staring contest you’ve been having with the board is much clearer now, when you don’t have your messy strands in the way. The idea of Eric keeping your scrunchie after finding it at the beach house makes your stomach do a weird kind of turn– you guess it made you a bit weirded out, if you’re being honest.
“Want some help with that?” he asks, pointing towards his skateboard.
Nervous, cracking your knuckles as you meet his eyes– he looks a bit amused, but still genuine– you nod, admitting defeat. There’s no way you’re getting on top of that board without help and not falling down. It’s always better to be safe than to be sorry, and so when Eric laughs airly at your composure and takes a few steps closer towards you, you let the male lead you, finding comfort in his secure words and actions.
Eric offers you his arms to hold when you try to get on the skateboard. He is peering at you from under his eyelashes when you put one of your legs onto the wood, his grip on your forearm getting firmer when you try to get your other foot on as well– and you must admit that you suddenly don’t feel like you might die anymore when there’s someone holding you and standing by your side.
“See? It’s not that hard,” Eric mumbles, his voice low and reassuring from the proximity. You notice your hands sweating a little when his palm envelopes yours– damn the sun and its unbearable heat making you embarrass yourself– but he doesn’t mention it as he firmly holds you and meets your eyes. “I’m gonna drag you around a bit so you get used to it before trying yourself,” he says before taking a few steps forward, preparing to be your own type of personal driver.
Having him instruct you and help you around makes you feel more comfortable on the board. Sunwoo would never do such a thing for you– he’d enjoy watching you fall down and break your neck and possibly die– so you’re more than happy to have someone in your life that takes care of you in ways your older brother refuses to.
The skateboard moves forward a little, starting slow, but then picking up speed as Eric jogs a little, making you laugh at the action. He does not have to go above and beyond, but he still does– but you guess it’s good for him to let out his energy somewhere. After a while, he looks back at you and meets your eye with a warm gaze, making you nod at him reassuringly and hold up a thumb of the hand he’s not holding right now, signaling that you’re okay and enjoying yourself. That has the male let go of your hand and let you take the road with the laws of physics, moving forward by yourself with the force he created.
It’s nice. It’s fun.
Yes, you totally understand why Eric and Sunwoo wanted skateboards after seeing them on TV. Hell, you want one now.
“Try it yourself now!” Eric encourages you as the board naturally comes to a stop under you, and his smiling face is enough for you to take initiative and nod, relocating one foot off the wood and placing it on the floor, then kicking it and making yourself move on the simple vehicle.
A moment of surprise envelopes you like a warm hug when you manage to not fall off and keep your balance, the joy of it making you try to go faster on the board, kicking once, twice against the pavement with the sole of your old, beaten up shoe. “I’m doing it!” you yell, glancing back at Eric standing on the sidewalk, watching you with excited eyes. The male offers you a victorious holler, something that makes you break into a laugh, makes your confidence blossom in marvelous ways.
Confidence rises in you so much you try to take a U-turn and go back to your teacher– perhaps showing off that you really got the hang of it now, or something– but as you try to maneuver the board and turn right, there it comes: the moment where you realize that you were, once again, too overly-confident in your abilities that are, sadly, very poor. Your body sways from side to side, your poor balance laughs at you and points an accusing finger at your attempts, and, well, to put it frankly, your whole life flashes in front of your eyes and the moment plays in slow motion as you lose the board from below your feet– the wood flying somewhere to the opposite side of the road, not at all where you meant to go in the first place– and your body inevitably comes crashing to the ground.
Awaiting the hard pavement meeting your nose and breaking it, you brace yourself with palms outstretched in front of you, the last remains of self-perseverance entering the sane parts of your brain in what you think are the last seconds of your miserable life. Another moment of surprise greets you when your yelp is muffled against something soft and your hands don’t hit the hard pavement, your ears filled with a grunt that belongs to another human swiftly chiming in and catching you before you fall.
Firm hands hold your waist– the touch somehow familiar, enveloping you in a strange sense of deja vu– and even though your body goes limp in terror, the male has you back on your feet in no time, his palms on the exposed skin of your stomach. The realization has you burning up as you look up and meet Eric’s eyes, gasping at the closeness of his face to yours.
“You okay over there?” he asks as you unconsciously study his face– you never noticed his nose looked this nice up close– before you wake out of it and nod urgently, breaking away from his hold. You’re not gonna try to calculate the effort he must have put in just to chime in and catch you from where he was standing in such a short moment, but something about the passing thought of it has you weak in your knees from gratefulness.
“Uhm- yeah,” you nod, kicking the pavement with your stained shoes, “I just… miscalculated my skills, that’s all,” you sheepishly hum, hearing the boy snicker at your shaken-up composure.
Watching him take off and retrieve his skateboard from where it wandered off against the curb– much to his golden retriever energy– you sigh and prepare to go sit back on the sidewalk, having enough of new experiences from the shock still lingering in your fingertips. You take a glance down the road, seeing your older brother cruising on the street– when and how he got there, you truly have no idea– when you hear Eric, who seemingly has different ideas for your next actions, call at you from the middle of the pavement.
“Where are you going? Come back!” he asks, having you look at him in surprise, mouth agape and eyes big, staring at him. He now has the board under his shoulder, but puts it back on the road and points at it, shrugging to himself. “I’ll push you down the road, it’s gonna be fun!”
“Eric, I’m literally going to die–”
“No, you’re not. Come on, I promise,” he says, but still, he doesn’t have you convinced. Your feet move against your best conclusions, though, and when you come to a halt right in front of your companion, he offers you a boyish grin. “Sit down on it, that way you’re more balanced. I swear you’re not gonna fall off, okay? I got you.”
“You promise?”
“Yes,” he nods, determined.
“Pinky swear,” you mumble, holding up your pinky finger– all thoughts of seeming childish pushed to the side in the desperate moment– and the male in front of you shakes his head in disbelief, breaking into a laugh.
“Cute,” he huffs, “yeah, okay. Pinky swear,” he nods, interlacing your pinky with his and bumping his thumb against yours, the seal foolishly making you feel more secure as you follow his order and take a seat on the skateboard, your hands gripping the bottom of the wood so hard your knuckles turn white.
“Okay, ready? 3, 2, 1–” he chants as he pushes you, two steady hands coming in contact with your shoulder blades, force making you move on the board, wheels taking you down with gravity. The sound of Eric’s shoes hitting the pavement fills your ears as you go faster, and as you finally get to the part of the hill that takes a downwards slope, he offers you a final push, sending you down the road.
Wind makes your hair fly back, your surroundings blurring as you yelp and scream, but you can’t say you’re not enjoying the ride. Eric was right– it was fun, you liked it, and something about the gesture had you all warm on the inside. The breeze has you cool down a little in the summer heat, and the board continues to move even as you pass your older brother standing at the bottom of the slope, away from your trajectory.
Body relaxing when the skateboard finally slows down, you let out a heartfelt laughter. Turning back and seeing Eric jog down the road with a humongous grin on his face, you offer him two thumbs up above your head, watching as he returns the gesture and makes his way back to the two of you on the bottom of the small hill.
The truth is, this was the day you realized Eric Sohn has always found his way to make you feel included and safe.
You can’t help but feel grateful.
AUGUST OF 1999
“Sunwoo, you have to tie a knot here and then– no, you dumbass, you’re doing it completely wrong,” you mourn as you watch your older brother with a mess of thread in his lap, a focused scowl on his face. There’s a fan standing across from you, blowing cold air into your face, but you still feel yourself grow heated with frustration as Sunwoo just can’t help but not understand the art of making friendship bracelets. It’s not like you’re forcing him to do them– he was the one that asked you to show him how to, muttering something about offering one to his classmate Yeji once he’s back in school– so in theory, he should be putting in effort, no?
Or maybe he is. Maybe he’s just… incompetent.
“I don’t get it,” Sunwoo hums under his breath, sighing as he leans against the sofa in your living room, the two of you sitting on the floor accompanied by his best friend squinting at you from the opposite side, a comic book in the latter's hand. The myth of men not being able to multi-task is quickly thrown into the bin as you watch Eric pay equal amount of attention to the comic book and the dialogue between you and your brother, and when Sunwoo seems to give up on the art of making friendship bracelets, his best friend can’t help but laugh.
“You’re giving up already? This is how you want to get a girlfriend?” you poke your brother to his side and take the threads off his lap, examining the mess of a safety pin and meters of yarn, all knotted up and not coming along in the shape you taught him to at all.
“It’s not to get a girlfriend, I just-”
“Sure,” you roll your eyes, huffing as you roll his poor attempt at friendship bracelet into a ball and throw it to the corner of the room, making a mental note to pick it up and throw it to the bin later. “You know what, just give her this one and pretend you made it,” you mutter, taking a bracelet you'd already made to demonstrate in between your fingers and throw it into Sunwoo’s lap, the older one catching it and examining it under his nose.
“That looks pretty good,” he hums, making you snort at his appreciative comment. The bracelet is pink and red, the colors just screaming romance and cute energy, which is exactly what a girl needs to be swayed by your brother. You can’t really believe a bracelet will make her swoop into his arms, because truthfully, with your brother’s face and manners, every living thing is keeping a fair distance, but hey, it doesn’t hurt to try, does it? Maybe his classmate is… majorly blind? That might do it?
“Of course it looks good,” you scoff, “that’s because I made it,” you nod, averting your gaze towards your lap, threading your fingers through the yarn you attached to a safety pin on your sweatpants to keep the growing friendship bracelet in place.
“Then why is the one you’re making right now so ugly?” Eric asks, pointing towards the creation.
Glancing up at the male slowly, mentally throwing all different kinds of curses at him for daring to talk badly about your craft, you huff. “What do you mean, ugly?”
“The colors… they don’t… they don’t really go together,” Eric sheepishly admits, scratching the back of his neck, quickly averting his gaze from you and gluing it back into his comic book. You think that if he doesn’t stop being a smart-ass and throw jabs at your artistic choices, he’s gonna have to protect his comic book with his own body– and you bet he’d do that, because he borrowed it from the library. The fees for damage are high.
“That’s just… not true at all,” you muse, but groggily take a look at the creation once again, but now, thanks to the remark, seeing it in a completely different way. Shades of orange, brown and purple stare back at you amidst a little disappointedly, and as you thread the yarn and make a couple of knots to end the bracelet, you can’t help but feel a pout growing on your face from the realization. Eric might be right. It does look a little bad…
“Whatever. Your taste is just bad,” you snap as you finish off the craft piece, unclasping the safety pin and sliding the bracelet off the inside, freeing it from the hold. Eric laughs a little at your frustrated state– similarly to what you do when you manage to get Sunwoo upset– and with that, you sigh and put the bracelet on the coffee table.
“I’m going out to the store to get some chocolates,” you say as you stand up, goal clear in your mind, “have fun, losers.”
“You’re still collecting the stickers from these?” Sunwoo asks, a mischievous smile growing on his lips. The teasing is inevitable and coming very soon, and there’s nothing you can do about it– you’re fully aware, which only further makes you want to escape the situation more quickly. Rolling your eyes at your brother’s antics, you move towards the door.
“Yes, Sunwoo, I am. They’re cute and make me happy, do you have a problem with that?” you point an accusing finger at the male, having him shrug, tongue poking the inside of his cheek.
“You’re such a kid,” he huffs, averting his gaze from you when he lands the comment, the jab coming straight at your fragile heart.
“Okay, then,” you note, “I’ll just have my pretty and cute bracelet back, and you can get your girlfriend something else-”
The male quickly regains his previous composure, swatting his hands in hurry just to make you halt in your sentence. His eyes are big and his mouth is a little agape in terror as he tries to save his ass, plea written all over his face. “I was just joking! Don’t be so petulant… go get your cute stickers, they’re so fun!”
Humming to yourself, your face is tugged up into a victorious smile. “That's what I thought. So, as I was saying, have fun, losers.”
“Wait!” Eric suddenly calls for you, making you turn on your heel in the middle of your escape, eyes peering at the male. “Don’t I get a bracelet too?”
The request catches you off guard. There’s a certain kind of spark in Eric Sohn’s eyes as he asks the question, and you can’t really place it in any category, but it has you nervously shrugging at the preposition. You’re not really sure why Eric would want a bracelet from you, but to avoid confrontation and also the weird leap of your heart surely leading you into cardiac arrest, you only shrug and move back inside of the living room, chewing on the inside of your cheek as you scan the surroundings, searching for something.
“Sure,” you nod, taking the ugly bracelet off the table and offering it to him, “you can have that one.”
You hold a staring contest with the older boy for a couple of seconds, his head undoubtedly swirling with arguments and comments about the apparel of the friendship bracelet, but he’s smart– he must know the survival of his beloved comic book must be at stake. So, he only nods and smiles at you, outstretching his hand to you and nudging his head in its direction.
“Okay,” he hums, “tie it for me?”
A second comes by– a heartbeat, really– in which you chew on your bottom lip and gasp at the request, but still, you nod and come closer, crouching down to be at his level and taking the thread into your fingers. You wrap the bracelet around his wrist, making sure to leave a bit of wiggle room before you tie a knot, bringing the ends together, all while feeling the eyes of Eric glued to your face, watching every micro expression flash through your unsettling composure.
When you’re done, making a move to hide your hands behind your back and standing up, your limbs bump into each other and send an unspoken sense of electricity all through your body. The sensation is so strange you don’t meet anyone’s eye before you leave the room, yelling out a goodbye as you hurriedly open the front door and run out to get fresh air (it’s August, though. The air is humid and only makes your head spin more).
You clear your throat before you take off to the grocery store. It's only when you're halfway there that you realize you'd forgotten to bring your wallet with you. It's okay, though– you take this chance to walk around, regaining your casualty.
You bet Eric will take the bracelet off in a matter of a week.
SEPTEMBER OF 1999
The leaves start turning orange and the weather a bit colder when you become hyper-aware of your shifting composure whenever Eric Sohn is around. The way you feel heat rushing to your cheeks whenever he calls you cutie, a nickname he’s had reserved for you since you two were little kids, the way you feel weak in your knees whenever he casually brings his arm around your shoulders or when he bends down to tie your shoelace in the middle of the sidewalk. You don’t really know what those sudden changes are, yet, you feel a bit embarrassed by them whenever they take place. You don’t think it’s normal to feel this way around your brother’s best friend, and the more you hang out with him, the more you wish you read less books as a child– because now, you’re also hyper-aware of the title those feelings may have.
Still, it only comes to you on one September afternoon– you wake up from blissful unawareness and jolt with the quickly opening pit in your stomach at the strange revelation.
“Eric! Sunwoo isn’t home, though?” you mumble, confused as you notice the boy standing on your doorway, a plastic bag in his hand and a red Nike jacket enveloping his frame.
“I know, he said he’s hanging out with Juyeon hyung today,” he nods, “I brought you something, though,” he says, holding up the bag and making sure you get a chance to see it, offering you a boyish grin.
“Oh?” you gasp, furrowing your eyebrows at the male. When you do nothing to invite him inside, he does so himself– slightly nudging you in your side as he passes your figure and enters your house. He acts like he owns the place, and by the amount of time he’s spent in your home, you’d think he does– he doesn’t, though. The only thing he owns is just a lot of audacity.
The male takes off his shoes in the entryway and walks his way over to your room– a surprising act, considering he’s spent the least amount of time in this very place– and when he’s sure you’re following his every move, he empties the contents of the bag to the middle of your freshly made bed. Watching as approximately ten items fall out of the plastic, your eyes widen with surprise as you recognise your favorite chocolate– the mini bars with stickers inside, the ones you collect and stick into your journal and look at in the middle of the night, giggling to yourself and kicking your feet at the adorable pictures in your make-shift collect book.
“Woah,” you gasp when the male looks at you, seemingly awaiting your response, and when he gets the wished outcome, pride overtakes his features, shrugging to himself.
“My mum got some for free because she bought a lot of cabbage for kimchi yesterday,” he explains, “I thought of you when I saw them, so I bought you some more.”
“I- you-” you stutter, emotions too big for your own good swelling all inside your fragile, little self, hands running into your hair and tugging at the roots to wake yourself up from the dream. “You didn’t have to!”
“We got them anyway, and I know you like the stickers,” Eric shrugs, scratching the back of his neck, completely ignoring the fact that he said he bought you some more, your heart skipping a beat at the sentiment. Clearing your throat, you tentatively take a step closer to your bed, gathering a bar of chocolate into your hand and opening it, taking a bite.
“You can have the stickers if you give me some chocolate,” Eric says close to your ear, almost as if he was creating a masterplan, to which you eagerly nod and plop onto your bed, moving the bars of sweets into one pile. As you continue to munch on the first one, you unwrap the sticker and look at it, praying to yourself as if you were checking if your lottery ticket was worth any cent– hoping you get a sticker you don’t own yet.
The image of a cute panda would cheer anyone up even in their darkest moments– not you, though, as you mourn and sigh, disappointment clear in your features.
“What?” Eric asks, eyes big pools of worry.
“I already got that one.”
“Ah,” he nods, seemingly understanding– much to your surprise, “well, we got 9 more tries, let’s get to eating.”
Wrappers are rustling in your bed sheets as you and Eric eat the concerning amount of chocolate, gathering the stickers in a little pile on top of your notebook, promising each other to not look at the stickers as you go and just make a grand reveal at the end. Eric’s full cheeks are a sight you enjoy, telling him he looks like a squirrel– to which he sends a light flick to your forehead, telling you you don’t look much different– and soon enough, the nine bars left disappear from your plain sight (you only had 3 and Eric ate the remaining 5. He’s a growing boy, though, so you understand. He needs to get his undying energy from somewhere.).
“Ready for the reveal?” you ask, locking your gaze with Eric.
“Ready as I’ll ever be.”
With that, you get to the pile of stickers in the middle of your bedsheets. Looking at the first one, there’s a happy squeal cutting out of your throat, the image of an adorable yellow duck warming you up with euphoria.
“You don’t have that one yet?”
“I don’t,” you nod, “this is just perfect.”
Eric nods and watches you with a certain kind of warmth in his gaze as you open up your notebook and stick the newest addition to your little sticker farm– or a ZOO, however you wanna call it. The next sticker from the pile is added as well– a brown, big bear– and the next one too, the most adorable colorful parrot slapped to the corner of your page.
The rest of your stickers are the ones you already own, though– a displeased look takes over your features at the knowledge, but still, you can’t help but beam at the fact that you have 3 new additions to your collection, and they were a gift from Eric Sohn himself. Someone who doesn’t make fun of your childish habit. Someone who feeds your little interest, watches you with excitement in his eyes as you indulge. Someone not like your brother.
Someone you could never see the way you see your brother.
“What do you do with the duplicates?” Eric asks, pointing to the sad pile on the top of your notebook. His figure is closer to you now, since he wanted to watch you stick the animals into your notebook, his crossed legs almost pressed against yours on the small bed.
“Well, usually, I just throw them out,” you shrug, “but since you’re here…” you muse, the idea plopping into your head like the newest discovery you should probably patent, peeling the back of one of the dog stickers off and swiftly turning towards your companion, mischief sparkling in your eyes.
You put the sticker on his left cheek, making the boy jump. “Hey!”
Giggling, taking another one of the stickers and pressing it to the middle of his forehead, Eric starts to fight you, your bodies wrestling on the bed. You don’t think he puts much effort into getting you off him– that, or he’s insanely weak– and in no time, his face is adorned with all different kinds of animals, his hair messy from tussling in your bedsheets. The image has you laughing before you realize you’re basically straddling him on your bed, his big eyes gaping at you from below, his appearance enough to make something in your brain short-circuit and make you leap off him, clearing your throat.
Heat rushes into your cheeks as you take a seat next to him, playing with your fingers. You pray for anything to come and ease the awkwardness you caused, and sure enough, today must be your lucky day. “Hey, look here!”
You call for the boy as you swiftly take your polaroid camera off your bedside table– the one that belonged to your dad, the one you fought with Sunwoo about, the one your mum said was yours because Sunwoo is too careless with his things to keep it safe– and snap a picture of the puppy-like boy, laughing at the fact that now, you have the image of him looking dumb and covered in stickers forever. Or at least until he doesn't take it away from you– which he attempts quickly.
“Hey!” he yelps again, huffing as he lunges at you, trying to take the picture out of your grasp as you drop the camera into your soft sheets. Your feet take you to the living room, navigating through furniture, and when you don’t hear footsteps follow you, you think you’re safe– Eric does have a lot of energy, but chasing you around gets tiring for him quickly when he knows you'll never let him win.
Entering your room once again, prepared to find him on your bed like before, you’re taken by surprise as a shutter sound goes off right after you open the door, a polaroid picture taken of your face making you temporarily blind at the flash.
“Eric!” you whine, hating that there’s a picture of you standing shocked at your doorway now forever in the universe– not really caring that the boy just got you back with the exact stunt you pulled on him just a few minutes ago. Before you get a chance to blink out the blind spots in your vision caused by the flash and run after him, though, you feel him gently press you out of the doorway and slip outside, the sound of the front door opening and closing after him resonating along his slowly disappearing, amused laughter.
Serves you right, doesn’t it?
Sighing, you shake your head and take a seat on your bed, the picture of the boy still in between your fingertips. You only take a look at it when your vision comes back to normal, and as the image of Eric covered in stickers, hair messy and cheeks rosy below the animal print comes into your sight, the revelation arrives the same second a starstruck smile plays with your features.
And with that, you’re absolutely terrified.
Throwing the polaroid picture onto the bedside table and lunging yourself into the sheets, you scream into your pillow and wish for the feelings to disappear– because in what world does a crush on your brother’s best friend ever come to a happy ending?
OCTOBER OF 1999
Once October hits, you find yourself home alone more often than you’d like. Sure, you don’t mind having some me time to read comic books or watch the TV uninterrupted in the living room, but still– alone turns lonely pretty quickly, and somehow, you start to regret the fact that you’ve been relying on your older brother and his friends for so long instead of making some connections on your own.
Sunwoo started to play soccer at school– something is telling you that he might go far if he keeps it up– and that’s why he’s been stuck at practice every single day, coming home late in the evening all tired, but happy, so you’re not really complaining. Eric works in the little bistro downtown now, since he wanted to make some money and not rely on the allowance Mrs. Sohn gives him every month, and it’s not like you were that close to begin with, but the fact that the boy is now too busy to meet you is making your spirit fall just the tiniest bit. And with your mother always being at work, you find yourself alone in your room, laying in your bed and staring at the ceiling.
Sometimes, you journal. About anything and everything, really. You don’t really think you’re ever gonna read back the entries once you’re older, since they would just be a reminder of how miserable and boring your teenage years really were, and that’s why you allow yourself to be authentic. On most days, you write about your assignments for school. Sometimes you bad mouth a classmate or two– gossiping with the diary pages, because you don’t really have any human beings to do so in real life– and seldom, you allow yourself to get into topics that evoke the slightest bits of existential crisis in you.
Topics like college. Growing up. Your lack of hobbies and social interaction with the outer world. The newly found crush on Eric Sohn…
Okay, maybe you do write about the boy with brown hair and dark eyes a little too often. You can’t help it, though– when he’s not giving you any new interactions to dwell on, you have to just pick apart the old ones. You think it’s a natural reaction.
And that’s exactly what you’re doing one October afternoon, the lamp in your room on, since the evening comes faster when the weather is colder, as you’re laying in your bed and kicking your feet back and forth, chewing on the end of your pencil. The sound of your doorbell resonates through the house suddenly and startles you, making you jump awake from your delirious delusions.
Mentally going through the list of possible visitors you could have– because it can’t be your mother or your brother, since they never forget to carry their house keys– you’re lost, not really finding any fitting candidates. Furrowing your brows, lost in thought and frankly, a bit confused, you plant your socked feet onto the wooden floor and walk over to the front door just in time for the bell to ring again. Scratching the back of your neck in nerves, thinking of precautions you could take for your own safety– since your front door doesn’t have a peep hole and you don’t want to open the door to a complete stranger– you clear your throat and yell over the door.
“Who is it?” you ask.
“Delivery!” a voice calls through the door, making you huff.
“I didn’t order any food?” you yell back, confused. “Sir, there’s another house behind ours, sometimes the mailmen get confused and we get their mail. Maybe try there?”
“The address is right, though?” the voice calls again, and somehow, it sounds kind of familiar… no, it can’t be, you dumb goose. You’re just imagining things because you’ve spent the last 20 minutes writing about the curve of his nose into your diary.
“There must be a mistake-”
“Come on, Y/N, open the door,” the voice on the other side mourns, the mention of your name making you jump, completely startled. The tone the man says it in is sweet like honey, though, so familiar in your ears, that you mentally want to slap yourself– so you weren’t dreaming. It is him.
Dragging your hand through your hair to smooth it down, praying you look at least a little presentable– although in your stained sweatpants and the Pokémon shirt you inherited from Sunwoo when he grew out of it, you doubt that’s even possible– you open the door and try to offer Eric a warm smile. “What are you doing here?”
“Food delivery,” Eric shrugs, pointing with his thumb in the direction behind his back, where his bike undoubtedly stands up against your gate.
“Oh…. but I already told you I didn’t order anything,” you mumble, confused. Studying his face– because a girl can indulge when she has the opportunity, am I right? – you notice his hair has grown a little longer, falling into his eyes. You bet it’s hard for him to see, but you must admit it looks nice, and you almost tell him, before you catch yourself and break away from the sentiment.
The male snickers. “I know, I was just joking,” he says, “I did bring you food, though.”
“Why?” you ask, confused when he bends over and picks up a plastic bag off the ground, a container of food inside, the warmth of the contents making condensation appear all over the red sack.
“We made this by mistake and it was just gonna be thrown out if nobody took it,” he shrugs, “and I figured you haven’t eaten yet– or if you did, you just had those cold kimbap rolls from the store– and I wanted to get some warm food into your stomach.”
“Ah,” you gasp, nodding at the explanation. It does explain the source of the food really well, but truthfully, it explains nothing about the fact why Eric thought of bringing you the food instead of taking it home with himself– he’s a foodie if you’ve ever seen one. The idea of him worrying about if you were fed or not is equally as strange and interesting in your head– still, you clasp your hand around the bag and take it, the smell making you involuntarily hungry. “Thank you.”
Eric only nods at you, a smile beaming at his face. “Well,” he sighs, “I’d love to stay longer and hang out, but I’m still on the clock, so…” he mumbles, taking a hesitant step backwards towards his bike, eyes never breaking contact with yours.
“Oh, right,” you nod, “that’s okay. Have a fun day at work!” you muse, watching him as he grins and finally retrieves back his bike, opening up the gate to your property and escaping, waving at you as he gets on.
“I’ll see you soon!” he calls as he rides off, your eyes following him until his figure disappears behind a corner, your ears buzzing with excitement and your lower lip trapped between your teeth with the innocent promise.
Walking back into the house, you grin as you close the front door behind you and carry the food into the kitchen. You quickly get the containers out of the damp bag, putting them onto the wooden table, and gasp when you find a sticky note on the very top one, a messy handwriting scribbled in a rush, but stuck to the food with care.
Eat well and don’t skip meals, Y/N-ie!! – Eric x
Not being able to battle your smile anymore, you decide to open up the containers and stuff your mouth with the food instead– only to find your favorite dish inside, staring back at you in what seems to be a dream that’s too good to wake up from.
And sure, you are delusional, but are you delusional enough to believe that this wasn’t all a coincidence? You’re not so sure.
Still, you eat the food with feet kicking back and forth as you sit in the silent kitchen, the empty house no longer feeling so lonely. When you’re done, you throw the trash out– everything but the sticky note, which you glue into your diary a few minutes later, hoping to keep the memory forever.
NOVEMBER OF 1999
The world around you is dark as you step outside of cram school, your eyes are tired and your skin is prickled with goosebumps in the chilly air. You despise going to cram school, but your mother told you you have to– since you didn’t have any athletic features that could get you far in life like Sunwoo, you had to be good at studying, or else you won’t get into university. There was a lot of work ahead of you, but since you didn’t really have anything else to do in the day, you didn’t protest and went anyway.
The days are usually very long and you get off very late, resulting in you being tired almost all the time. When you get home, you undress yourself and change into your sleep clothes and doze off until the morning, when you have to wake up and go to school again– it’s an exhausting cycle, but you know you have to endure it for your own sake.
Walking down the steps that lead out the cram school building, you stretch your body and huff, cursing at yourself for the fact that you didn’t bring a jacket– you forgot that evenings get really chilly, and frankly speaking, you didn’t have much time to think when you were rushing to get ready in the morning. You’ll just have to get through it, you think to yourself as you walk in the direction of your house– the last bus to your neighborhood already left an hour ago, when you were in the middle of revising division– your sneakers kicking the stray rocks below your feet as you tug the sleeves of your hoodie lower, desperately trying to feel more heat.
“Do you never watch where you’re going? That’s gonna get you in trouble one day, you know,” you hear a familiar voice say, the joking tone making your heart skip a few beats as you place the owner of the saccharine voice to its face. Looking up, slightly alarmed at being caught in such a distressed state, you gasp.
“I was… watching my step, I guess,” you shrug as you come into a halt in front of him, shivering both under Eric’s gaze and the cold weather at once. “What are you doing here? Deliveries?”
“I just got off,” he says, “so I figured I could stop by. Sunwoo said you’re going to cram school, I thought you might enjoy some company on your way home.”
Gaping at his explanation, you nod, completely startled. The idea of your brother talking about you in front of Eric, the boy you have a very embarrassing, very big crush on scares you, to say the least. See, it doesn’t really matter that the boy grew up with you, pretty much seeing you at your lowest whenever he was around over at your house when you were both just little kids– the image of Sunwoo telling Eric about finding you sobbing at your comic book (the scene got too sad, nobody can really blame you) or about how your favorite jeans ripped right before you had to go to school one morning is terrifying. You don’t really want him to know about these things. He may act like your brother sometimes, but you never really saw him in that light in the first place.
“Well, then,” you clear your throat, “it’s… it’s good to see you,” you say. Eric shows you his boyish grin as your lips utter out the words, and you can’t help but mirror it, your eyes locking with the male. As if you just took a step back, your eyes see him in a light you’ve never seen him before– as if this was your first time meeting your brother’s best friend– and something about the sentiment has your stomach feeling all uneasy, heat rushing to your face. His hair is styled in a way that tells you that he didn’t really style it (or if he did, it looked truly effortless in your eyes, so props to him), pushed back a little and revealing his forehead, a few of the strands carelessly falling into his eyes. His jawline is sharper than how it was when you first met the boy, and with the realization of a foolish teenage girl, you have to admit that Eric Sohn grew up to be a very attractive, attentive man.
“You’re cold?” he says, although the sentence sounds more like a statement rather than a question, before he shakes his head at your antics and heaves out a sigh. “You should’ve taken a jacket with you when you went, you know it gets cold in the evening,” he scolds you. In those times, he reminds you the most of your brother– because although you and Sunwoo act like you hate each other sometimes, you know the older male still cares about you. He just hates showing it, which translates in his scolding tone whenever you do something wrong or against his wishes.
In those times, Eric reminds you the most of the way your brother treats you, and you somehow hate it. You despise the fact, because that means he must only see you as someone like his younger sister– he never had one, so maybe he just likes to compensate for it by taking care of you all the time. Maybe he feels responsible to do so because of Sunwoo. The thought makes you equally as nauseous– you’d never want him to hang out with you just because he feels like he has to.
“I didn’t have time in the morning,” you grunt, rolling your eyes at him. You avert your gaze from the male, for it makes you slightly uncomfortable after your previous thoughts, so when the noise of a zipper being pulled down and the weight of fabric on your shoulders brings you back to reality, you snap your head around at him all alarmed.
“What? Wear it,” he says, head shrugging towards the direction of his jacket on your figure. “You’re gonna catch a cold if you don’t.”
Trying to wrestle out of the red material, you squirm in the hold of the windbreaker– Eric’s hands gripping each side of the jacket, as if predicting your next moves, making sure it stays on you and doesn’t fall down. His strong arms tug you closer to him to make your fight more difficult– and he’s successful with his efforts, because the proximity of him and his smell engulfs you and unarms you, heat rushing to your cheeks as you halt in your movements.
“Stop,” you mourn, “I don’t need it.”
“Yes you do,” he insists, “so stop being a baby about it and wear it.”
Staring into his eyes, as if to mentally tell him to stop what he’s doing– to stop how he’s treating you, how he’s making you all weak in your knees and sleepless at nights because of how much you think of him and hope he’s doing well each day, to stop being so gentle with you and taking care of you, because it brings all sorts of both doubts and delusions into your head– but he doesn’t back down. You’ve known him for quite some time, you should already be aware of just how stubborn he can be.
“Arms in,” he hums, holding on to the jacket and waiting for you to wear it properly. One thing about you– you can always admit your defeat. So, with a sigh, you put your arms through the sleeves of Eric’s red windbreaker, shrinking a little under his firm gaze. He looks at you with a look full of something you can’t decipher, and it’s all making you so, so insanely lost in the many thoughts and feelings swirling around your head, not helping your current state.
“I already have a brother, y’know,” you mumble in a moment of weakness, looking at your feet– your dirty white sneakers almost touching his from how close you are standing right now, “so you should stop treating me like one.”
A moment of silence overtakes you two, and you suddenly feel like you’ve done something wrong. Still, Eric’s hands are holding on to the sides of the opened jacket, keeping you close to him. “Hm?”
Clearing your throat and shaking your head, you snicker to yourself. “Forget it.”
“No- I mean,” he blurts out, tone of voice a little nervous, “do you see me as your brother figure?” he asks, tone of voice more quiet now, more gentle.
Breathing in the crispy air, taking a moment before you reply, you shake your head in disapproval. “No,” you say, “no, I don’t. I- I don’t think I do,” you say, scared of what your answer will bring out of him. You don’t really know why, but at this moment, you feel insanely fragile– as if any bad move could make you break in his hands, waiting for him to glue you back together.
Metaphorically, he does just that. “Good,” he nods, leaning down towards you, hands gripping the zipper of his jacket and zipping it together, making sure no cold can get to your bones as his fingers tug it up towards the very top, under your chin. “Because I’ve never seen you as my sister either.”
His answer once again startles you– but when you take a step back from the situation, you think it was in a good way. His hands grip your shoulders for a second as his eyes meet yours and he offers you a warm smile. “Come on, let’s get you home,” he says, tugging you towards the fence where you find his bike, his motions guiding you like a rag doll sucked out of all life.
“Hop in,” he motions towards the back of the bike, where the basket would usually be– Eric moved it towards the front, though, leaving enough room for you to sit at– and as you do, he takes a seat in front of you and looks back at you over his shoulder. “Hold on tight so you don’t fall.”
Like in a trance, your arms sneak around his middle– this was the first time you had this kind of physical touch with him, and just the thought of it makes you want to scream your throat out– before the male takes off on the bike, riding towards your neighborhood. With the cold wind slapping your face, you foolishly rest your cheek on his shoulder blade and close your eyes, enjoying the closeness of his body keeping you warm.
If anyone asked you about the action, you’d tell them you were just tired.
DECEMBER OF 1999
Socked feet make their way through the room, the sound of footsteps resonating on the laminated floor, as the short male comes up to you with a bowl of potato chips in his right hand and a bottle of soda under his left arm. Eric Sohn sighs at you, shaking his head in disbelief, before he places the items onto the coffee table and takes a seat next to you on the floor, opening up the bottle and pouring the three of you drinks.
“Can’t believe I’m spending New Year’s Eve with you losers, of all people,” Eric snickers, having you roll your eyes at the male and grumpily furrow your eyebrows at his sentence.
“No one’s stopping you if you wanna go, y’know,” you grunt as you take the filled glass off the table, taking a sip of the sweet drink and sighing at him. If he’s gonna take a leap into the new year with you while making you annoyed, he may as well leave now and do whatever his initial plan was– once again, no one’s stopping him if that’s what he wants to do.
“I’m just saying,” he shrugs, “it would’ve been so much more fun if we all went to Juyeon hyung’s. Everyone’s there celebrating, but we’re stuck here in your room.”
“Well, Eric,” your brother smiles ironically at him, shrugging to himself, “it’s not like it’s my fault you’re not over at Juyeon hyung’s right now. You chose to spend the new years here with me. My mother prohibited me from going there, not yours.”
The argument has the male shrug, his eyes averting your brother’s gaze once his comment gets a bit too honest and realistic. It’s true and he’s right– it’s not like Eric’s mum told him he can’t go celebrate with his friends, because she didn’t. Eric’s mum trusts him and wants him to have fun and do what all the kids his age are doing. Your mum, on the other hand, is making you and Sunwoo stay home for New Year’s Eve to celebrate with your family, because, as she quoted, New Year’s Eve the only time she gets time off work, and she wants to spend it with her kids– forget the fact that you’re currently sitting locked in your room with your friend, protesting the family time just because you can– and when Sunwoo told her she has to stop treating him like a little kid, she told him she has all the right to do so, because he is her kid. And that’s how the party he was supposed to attend with Eric (the party you foolishly thought you’re gonna have to tag along to, not hating the sentiment as much as before now) got canceled from your brother’s plans.
“Well,” Eric chews on the inside of his cheek, “I did it for you two. Be grateful.”
“Whatever,” you hum, “let’s turn on the TV. I bet there’s some variety show on.”
Eric heaves out a sigh as he reaches for the TV remote, clicking the power button and making the boxy device in front of you light up. Your mum got you a TV in your room when you complained about being too bored one November day, and although the box of entertainment didn’t really help like you imagined it to, you’re glad it’s of service at least today. Instead of the expected variety show, though, there’s news on– the face of the old announcer looking at you with a serious look on his face, the professional tone making chills run down your spine, for he reminds you a bit of your mother when she scolds you. You think that’s a common news announcer trait.
“As the year 2000 approaches, computer programmers realize that computers might not interpret the 00 in the software as 2000, but 1900. The softwares currently running only use a two-digit code for the year, excluding the 19. The data was excluded because the data storage is costly and takes up too much space. Activities that were planned on a daily basis could be damaged or flawed,” the announcer says, making the three of you look at the screen with interest. Maybe it’s true that when you get older, you get more interested in news– you think it’s good to know what’s going on around you, although the topic discussed right now might not even concern you in the slightest.
“Banks, which calculate the interest rates on a daily basis, could face real problems. Interest rates are the amount of money a lender, such as a bank, charges a customer, such as an individual or business, for a loan. Instead of the rate of interest for one day, the computer could calculate a rate of interest for minus almost 100 years!”
“Oops,” Eric lets out next to you, a reaction so far away from what a real adult would think of the situation. See, you are all just kids, after all.
“Centers of technology, such as power plants, are also threatened by this issue. Power plants depend on routine computer maintenance for safety checks, such as water pressure or radiation levels. Not having the correct date could throw off these calculations and possibly put nearby residents at risk,” the announcer continues, the information coming out of his mouth suddenly making you hyper aware of the reality you’re experiencing right now.
“Do we have a nuclear power plant nearby?” you ask in a hushed whisper, watching as the men next to you almost comically widen their eyes, shrugging.
“I’m not sure,” Sunwoo peeps.
“The worst of all, this software and hardware issue could cause such a big problem in nuclear energy facilities, where nuclear bombs and missiles could be set off, causing the world to go into utter chaos, or worse, an end,” the announcer concludes, the last word making you gasp in terror.
“An end?” you chirp, sitting up straight in your seat as you look at the two men, now equally as terrified. There’s something in Sunwoo’s gaze that makes chills run down your spine, the reality crushing down on you with heavy measures.
“I knew I shouldn’t have fought with mum. What if the last words the two of us exchanged before we die are the harsh words I had said yesterday?” your brother mourns, seeing as his best friend chews on his bottom lip, lost in thought.
“What did you say to your mum?”
“That- that I’ll never forgive her for ruining this for me,” he mumbles, his voice breaking at the end, “and… other things,” he adds, the hint of incoming panic making his best friend frantically wave his hands around and try to make your brother relax before he has to deal with the breakdown. If the world is ending, this is not how any of you want to go.
“It’s okay, don’t worry,” Eric says, clearing his throat and pointing to the TV, “look! The show is on, we should watch before the year ends,” he proposes, taking the remote into his hand and turning the volume up to hopefully drown out Sunwoo’s thoughts and have him focus on something else. And it works– noting that your brother has an attention span of a 5 year old– he can hardly remember what he was worrying about just 30 seconds ago.
Still, the thought keeps bouncing around your head like a child in a bouncy castle. The words of the news anchor keep repeating in your brain, making your ears ring as you look at Eric from the corner of your eye, watching his angelic face. Oh how you hate disturbing the peace now that you’ve all calmed down– but still, you can’t deal with the worries alone. Checking the clock hung above the TV, noticing there’s at least 5 minutes left before midnight, you clear your throat, feeling your whole body on fire.
“Do you really think the world is gonna end?” you ask, cracking your knuckles in a nervous manner. Looking at Eric, pupils shaking, you find your brother’s best friend seemingly lost in thought. The music of the variety show program serves you three as a background sound now, none of you paying attention to the TV anymore, instead, focusing on all the things you've done wrong in your life and how somehow, this feels like karma for all of it.
“I dunno,” Sunwoo shrugs, “I mean- they said it’s possible! It was on the news, and they wouldn’t lie on the news…” he nervously mumbles, scratching the back of his head.
“That’s what’s worrying me,” you sigh, “we shouldn’t have turned on the TV.”
“It was your idea in the first place!”
“And I’ll carry the burden into my grave,” you admit, gulping as you press a forced smile onto your lips.
Momentarily looking back at the TV, you desperately want to keep the thought of the world being over out of your head before you spend your last minutes on this earth going crazy– but now that you started, you can’t keep thinking about it. “Man, the world can’t end yet. There’s so many things I haven’t tried yet! I’m too young to die!”
The men don't reply to that– you presume they’re too busy trying to find other things to occupy themselves with instead of the inevitable– which has you dissatisfied as you throw your body back into the sofa, heaving out a sigh. Seconds go by painfully slow but also painfully fast at the same time, given the circumstances, as you listen to the cheerful song playing in the background and nudge your friend into his upper arm with your pointer finger, feeling his arm encircle your shoulders and pull you closer to him. The contact of his fingers on your upper arm makes you squirm and break out into a smile, feeling a particular lightness in your stomach at the action, a sensation that has you in shock.
“I’m gonna talk with mum before we die,” Sunwoo suddenly calls as he stands up from his seat on the floor, sighing to himself, “I can’t go with the thought of her being upset with me,” he sentimentally adds before he’s out of the door, rushing towards the living room.
The space falls into momentary silence now that your brother is gone, having you chew on your bottom lip with nerves. You think now is the time to beg for forgiveness with the higher forces– I'm sorry for not studying well. I'm sorry for being rude and ungrateful towards my mum. I'm sorry for being greedy– when the sound of Eric’s voice resonates through the place as he speaks up again, waking you up from the anxious slumber, the clock now striking 2 minutes before midnight. “What would you wanna do before you die?” he asks.
The question is simple. You presume he wants simple answers– things like getting into college, getting a good job and making a lot of money, growing old– but as you lean away from him and get back to your place on his left, your eyes locked with his, you’re left clueless. There are so many things you have yet to achieve, and the idea of not being able to pushes a burden to your chest, but at this very moment, you can’t really name one.
Shrugging, you chew on the inside of your cheek as your eyes scan his face. His firm eye contact has you a bit flustered, making you shrivel in your seat, and as the sound of the TV morphs from the song into a countdown from 55, you’re overwhelmed with the thought that your friend is insanely pretty– and he always has been, you just hated admitting it to yourself for the past few months, despite still being fully aware– and that now, when the world ends, you’re dying unkissed and alone.
Well, not completely alone, since Eric’s here. And he’s always been here– your whole life, since you can remember, and he’s here now as well, even though he should’ve been at Juyeon’s house. As the clock strikes 30 seconds away from midnight, your eyes involuntarily travel down to his chapped lips, all air knocked out of your lungs, the thoughts in your brain picking up on speed the closer you come to the end.
You’re dying soon. You’re dying in 30- now 29 seconds, and you’ve never kissed anyone before. You’re dying before you get a chance to hold hands with someone and have a partner, and you’re dying before you get a chance to tell Eric how you feel about him. There’s 28 seconds left until the end and you’re just staring at him like a coward, because you don’t really let yourself indulge in the silly warmth of your heart whenever you’re around your friend, but god, you can at least admit it to yourself before you die.
And as the clock gets closer and closer to midnight, now only giving you 20 seconds before it all ends and a missile lands on the top of your house, blowing up the whole town and making you all disappear, Eric’s question repeats itself in your brain. What would you want to do before you die?
The answer is suddenly painfully clear as you take action– leaning towards the boy on your right, face closer to his than it’s ever been before, your eyes counting all his eyelashes and focusing on his surprised, yet unmoving face– and as you hear the countdown reach 15, you close your eyes and press your lips against his.
The contact makes you weak in your knees as your hands reach to his face to steady him, your own firework show erupting in your stomach, and suddenly you’re completely content with dying tonight– because at least you’re with Eric, at least you did something. You kiss your friend with something close to an unsaid confession, your lips staying on his throughout the rest of the countdown, the taste of soda you’ve both been drinking the whole evening mixing in the contact of your skin. You’re not sure you’re even doing this right– again, you’ve never kissed anyone before– but it doesn’t matter to you much as you let go of your worries, aware of the fact that in a few seconds, nothing will matter anymore when neither of you are going to be around to say anything to each other after the kiss is over.
The countdown rings in your ears– coming down from 5 as you scoot yourself closer to Eric, 4 as you run the pads of your thumbs along his cheekbones, 3 as you still in your movements, 2 as you notice your knees bumping into each other on the ground and finally, 1 as you get ready to die, kissing your first and only love– when the sound of cheers and fireworks from the TV fills your ears instead, the world around you stilling and completely unchanged.
Your kiss started in 1999 and ended in 2000. Your love for him passed a century.
Eyes fluttering open and your mouth letting go of his, the image of the boy with his lips slightly parted, eyes closed and cheeks rosy comes to you in the yellow light of your room, making your heart fall down to your stomach. He looks absolutely angelic, his hair slightly messy and the fabric of his shirt a little disheveled in the front, and even though you’d love to indulge in your foolish desires and kiss him some more, you’re quickly taken aback with the noise of the door to your room opening and making you jump away from Eric, your brother appearing out of thin air in the presence of your room. It serves you like a weird kind of reality check, Eric’s eyes opening and looking at your brother, and even though you two haven’t been caught, the male clears his throat and bites down on his lower lip, looking almost guilty.
Oh no. What have you done?
Suddenly, you feel insanely silly.
JANUARY OF 2000
“You’ve been awfully quiet the whole day,” Sunwoo mumbles from beside you, his whole body engulfed in a pile of snow, “not that I care, but are you okay?”
“I thought you liked it when I don’t talk,” you mutter, playing with the frozen white all around you, seated on the red plastic sled at the top of the hill. You got tired after dragging it up from the bottom, and when you noticed that the rest of Sunwoo’s friends– Eric included– are still on their way up, you figured you could use up the time to relax and sit around for a while. It’s been quite some time since all of Sunwoo’s friends gathered to hang out at the same time, which made you surprised to see that your own brother invited you to tag along with them as they decided to go sledding on the second day of January, using up their break to best of their abilities. Which is also why you didn’t say no to the invitation– you thought sitting at home and moping around wouldn’t help you much.
“I do,” he says, nodding, “that’s why I’m asking what’s up– so I know what to do when I need to shut you up later,” Sunwoo hums, making you roll your eyes at the masked worry.
Shaking your head in disbelief, you scoff. “It’s nothing.”
“Sure,” he shrugs, “so you’re just going through puberty?” he teases, to which you take a handful of snow into your palm and lunge the white at him, satisfaction running through your veins when the snowball lands into his unsuspecting face, the male coughing and swatting his arms around to defend himself.
“Hey!” your brother screams at you once he gets the ice out of his eyes and his mouth, his body jumping into a standing position before he chases you around, the bubble of a laugh escaping your throat for the first time these days– they’re not wrong when they say malicious joy is the best kind of joy.
Running at the top of the hill, not really looking where you’re going– instead looking over your shoulder to see Sunwoo’s actions, preparing yourself to duck if he decides to turn your small quarrel into a snow fight– your legs get tangled with the red sled you left before you started a war with the angered man, a yelp cutting out of your throat as you get prepared to fall over and knock your teeth out.
Your body comes in contact with something half-firm, half-soft, and as your feet slip and the snow-covered ground disappears from below your legs, two arms wrap around your waist and steady you, making sure you don’t get hurt.
Turns out Eric Sohn is there to catch you every time you are about to eat shit. You hate this kind of deja vu.
As you open your eyes (that you had closed on instinct, not wanting to see your own death) once you’re sure you’re safe and sound, the world around you invites itself into your ears in an overwhelming noise. The laughter of Sunwoo’s friends– some hollering at your fall, some at the redness and last remains of snow covering your brother’s face– and the hushed arguments over who’s going down first– with Haknyeon screaming that he’s stealing Sunwoo’s (yours) sled and Juyeon following him. After all those happening in the matter of a few seconds, you realize you’re left on the top of the hill alone with the male, terror shaking through your insides.
Clearing your throat and taking a step back from him, you tuck your hands into your pockets and avert your gaze from Eric. You two haven’t spoken since you decided to kiss him on New Year’s Eve, and with the awkward tension in the air, you don’t feel like doing so ever again in your whole entire life.
“Thanks,” still, you hum.
Eric seems a little more light-hearted than you, shrugging as he replies to you. “Haven’t I told you to start watching where you’re going?”
“I’m not good with listening sometimes,” you mutter, huffing. Taking a look around yourself– noticing that there are no sleds left on the top of the hill, therefore, if you wanted to escape the situation, the only way down would be to roll around like a human version of a snowman, you once again admit your defeat, standing around nervously and shifting your weight from one foot to the other.
The silence is uncomfortable. It makes you want to dig a hole in the snow and bury yourself alive, to suffocate under the weight of the icy cold and never see Eric’s face again. You know that you ruined whatever friendship you had with the male– by being stupid and foolish, not really thinking about consequences (because there were supposed to be none and you were supposed to be dead), and the weight of the guilt makes you want to puke and hide away.
Still, Eric comes out of his way to talk to you. Honestly, you’re kind of surprised– he should be disgusted with you. Realistically, he should be the one avoiding you, not the other way around.“They’re gonna take long to walk back up,” he notes, “wanna get hot chocolate with me?”
“I’m good, thanks,” you shake your head, not once breaking eye contact with the overwhelming white of the hill.
“Come on,” he sighs, “it’s just around the corner. They built a hot chocolate stand because they knew kids would come sledding here. Honestly, it’s an astute business tactic, but I promise the hot chocolate actually tastes nice,” he says, nudging you slightly with his arm, as if to make you look at him and change your mind.
“Thanks, but no,” you definitely say, chewing on the inside of your cheek.
“Are you avoiding me?” he asks, tone of voice casual– as if it was the most normal thing in the world, as if nothing ever happened and he was genuinely curious about the reasoning behind your actions.
“I’m not, I just don’t really like hot chocolate,” you sheepishly mutter, trying hard to avoid the topic.
“So you are avoiding me,” he hums, as if it wasn’t obvious before– and not only because you’re a bad liar. Plus, you love hot chocolate. Somehow, you think Eric knows.
“Look, Eric,” you sigh, running your hand through your hair, “can’t you just drop it?”
“No,” he shrugs, shaking his head, “and that’s why we’re talking about the reason why you’re avoiding me over a cup of hot chocolate. Let’s go.”
His persistence is terribly overwhelming sometimes. You wonder how the male does it. “I already told you-”
“You owe me for the stickers and the meal and everything,” he corners you, and you know you can’t argue with that. He’s kind of right, you suppose– you never paid him back for all the chocolates or for the free meal he brought you that one evening. And that’s exactly why you find yourself sighing as you follow him, mentally preparing yourself for the talk.
You hate how he can always get his way. Walking up to the stand, you crack your knuckles in the pocket of your jacket, nervously coming up with possible arguments to tell him. I didn’t kiss you on purpose, it was an accident. I only did it to know how it feels. We are both supposed to be dead, it’s not my fault the world didn’t end like it was supposed to! Each sentence sounds more stupid than the previous one, and so with that, you shake your head, wiping the thoughts away, smiling at the elderly lady in the stand. You’re just gonna have to be honest, you figure.
“Two hot chocolates, please.”
Rummaging through your pockets to find your wallet– you do owe Eric, so it’s only natural for you to pay– you’re caught off guard as the male next to you swiftly takes out his own and unzips it, preparing to pay for you.
“I thought I owed you?” you mumble, hand reaching to tug at his forearm to stop him, to which Eric only grins at you and sighs.
“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean you have to pay,” he says.
“I think that’s exactly what that means.”
“Just take it,” he huffs as he brings out a note from his wallet, the force making something else fly out and fall to the ground with it, having the boy swiftly crouch down and pick the item up, attempting to hide it before you get a chance to see. And now, you don’t have 20/20 vision, but you recognise your face when you see it– that, and you also recognize the small white sheet to be a polaroid picture, and as far as you’re aware, you’re the only one who has a camera in his circle.
The boy hands you the drink with red-tinted cheeks. The idea of him carrying a picture of you that he took back in September makes you flush as well, and when your gloved fingers accidentally meet as you take the cup from him, he forces out a laugh. “We can talk about that after you tell me why you’re avoiding me.”
His nonchalance has you relaxing only for a few seconds. The boy walks with you as you try to heat up your cold hands on the boiling surface of the cup, and when you see a bench a few meters away from you two, you instinctively take a seat.
“So?” he becomes you, eyebrows rising as he takes a sip from the melted sweetness.
Sighing, you try to come up with the best way to go around this. Do you apologize? Do you promise to never do it again– and you won’t, even though you want to so badly and his lips look surprisingly soft today? Furrowing your brows at the war in your head, you place the cup on the bench next to you and put your head into your hands, hiding away from him when you realize the only way to do this is to be completely, utterly honest.
“I’m just so embarrassed, Eric.”
The only noise meeting your eardrums in the moment is the faint yelling of the crowd sledding in the background, your companion remaining quiet for a bit. When he sees you won’t explain yourself, he goes ahead and asks the question. “Why?”
“Do I really have to spell it out for you?” you sigh, not believing his so casual composure.
“Maybe,” he laughs, the airy sound taking all breath away from your lungs.
Well, not all of it, since you have enough oxygen to go on a tangent, it seems. “Because I kissed you, goddamnit. And- and I don’t even know why I did it, honestly, I’ve never thought of kissing you before! It’s just- when I heard the world is ending, I realized I hadn’t had my first kiss yet, and that just felt like such a miserable way to die, and then you asked what I wanted to do before I die and I couldn’t think of anything else,” you say, progressively taking out your head from your hands and facing the male, big eyes staring into his soul.
To your surprise, he doesn’t seem mad. Or disgusted. Or any of the reactions you expected, really. Eric stares at you with a soft, but amidst a little star-struck look in his eyes, and you’re suddenly painfully aware of every slight shift in his composure.
“Did you kiss me because you wanted to kiss me, or because you thought the world was gonna end?” he asks, awaiting your answer.
And if you’re being honest, 2 days after New Year’s Eve, you do admit the thought of the world actually ending sounds a bit stupid. Why did you even believe that theory? Why did they talk about it so seriously on the news? They tricked you into ruining your own life.
But still, nothing can be done about it now. “Both,” you admit, shrugging, “I… I kissed you because I really didn’t want to die unkissed, but also… I wanted it to be you, y’know? Like… I thought we were really going to die, and so I thought kissing you might be a nice way to go. I really wanted to spend my last moments with you, I guess,” you sheepishly say, averting your gaze from the male.
Eric offers you his silence again after you’re done explaining. While you do admit you feel a little tense to hear what he has to say, you also realize you feel lighter now that it’s out in the universe and out of your system. A major weight was taken off your shoulders with the confession, and suddenly, you’re kind of glad that your friend was so assertive and insistent on talking about this– who knows how long you’d go before managing to face him. You think you could honestly go on… forever.
Taking a sip of the luscious liquid, you feel your body warm up once the anxiousness slips away from your bones. The boy next to you hums, making you face him with expecting eyes. “Then why were you avoiding me?”
Sighing, you shake your head. “I just told you. I’m starting to think you’re the one that’s bad at listening.”
“No,” he laughs, “that’s still you. Because if you were good at listening, you’d remember me telling you that I’ve never once seen you as my younger sister.”
Shrugging, kicking the pile of snow in front of you with the tip of your winter boots, you’re not quite following. “So?”
“So you should’ve realized that I’m not doing all of this,” he theatrically swings his arms around, “for nothing, you know?”
“All of what?”
“Taking care of you. Feeding you, helping you collect those stupid animal stickers, walking you home…” he mumbles, sighing. “Keeping your picture in my wallet,” he adds with a playful tone, making you smile.
“I thought you were just being a good friend,” you shrug.
“I don’t keep a picture of your brother on me at all times,” he says, tugging off his gloves. The sleeve of his jacket rides up a little as you watch him take his cup of hot chocolate off the bench, surprised (and flooded with warmth) to see the ugly friendship bracelet you made still adorning his wrist.
Grinning to yourself, excitement welcoming itself into the tips of your fingertips, you shrug. “So?” you mirror your own question from a little while ago, wanting him to say it to you instead of relying on your own brain– you think there’s still a possibility of you just being too delusional to see the reality for what it really is. You need to make sure you’re not imagining things.
“So,” he starts, sighing to himself as he turns a little in his seat to face you, “you should stop avoiding me, because I liked the kiss. And you. And we should probably do it again, because I didn’t get the chance to kiss you back the first time,” he says, once again taking all oxygen out of your lungs with the casualty of his preposition.
Locking his eyes with you, having you two staring at each other like two rays of sunshine warming up the cold January, he grins. “How does that sound?”
“Good,” you breathe out, “very good.”
The male takes it as an invitation as he scoots himself closer to you on the bench, his body turning a bit to face you. His free hand cups your cheek, leaning closer to lock his lips with you like he asked you to, your eyes fluttering close at the proximity, the fuzzy feeling in your stomach already expecting to kiss him again. The situation feels a little too idyllic to be real, though– you should’ve expected it to get ruined again.
Something cold and wet comes into contact with the side of your face, and when you sharply open your eyes, you see Eric staring at you with shock and terror in his eyes, the snow dripping down the side of his face as well. Whoever threw the snowball has good aim, you think– managing to target two people at once (even though your faces were that close to each other that it probably wasn’t even that hard), and before you get a chance to look around and see who cut off your kiss, there’s a scream coming from the left side of the two of you, the sound of feet quickly darting in the snow landing into your ears.
“Eric Sohn, what the fuck do you think you’re doing with my sister?” the voice hollers, and before you get a chance to react, the said male fastly stands up from the bench and runs to the other direction, laughter resonating all throughout the place as Sunwoo and his friends chase their shortest friend down.
Snow starts falling as you watch your brother tail his childhood friend, and with a foreign sense of warmth, you get reminded of the birthday wish you made while blowing out the candles on your seventh birthday.
You wished for someone just like Eric. You didn’t know the universe would be so kind to give you him instead.
#bjnet#the boyz#eric sohn#the boyz x reader#tbz x reader#tbz fluff#eric sohn fluff#eric fluff#eric x reader#eric sohn x reader#tbz scenario#tbz fic#the boyz scenario#the boyz fluff#the boyz imagines#sohn youngjae#youngjae x reader
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Falloutober Day 4- Broken Glass
For this prompt (by @falloutober), we have Hawke and Danse having a conversation immediately after Blind Betrayal. Hawke was never the biggest fan of the Brotherhood of Steel, and she definitely didn’t trust them. But Danse became a close friend and a brother. So when everything went down, there was no question what she’d do.
Warnings- none
Length- just under 800 words
(Here’s Hawke and Danse at Nuka World. Just chilling, as one does.)
***
Hawke found him sitting in one of the booths, staring out of what had once been a plate-glass window. Now, only a few large shards remained in the frame, sticking out like angry teeth. The rest of the glass lay on the floor, crushed under the feet of untold travellers who had passed through over the years. His posture wasn’t its normal ramrod-straight, but slumped over the table in front of him. He seemed so small like that, especially out of his ubiquitous power armor.
Slipping into the seat across from him, she gave him a small smile. “Hey Danse. What’s going on?”
He sighed, not looking at her. Instead, he pointed outward at the window. “This is going to sound stupid, but that’s how I feel. Like, if you could put it into a picture, that would be it.”
“What is?”
He motioned to the broken glass on the floor. “Like that. I’m sure when the window was whole, it looked impressive. It would’ve looked strong. But now look at it. Broken. Useless. That’s how I feel.”
The admission crushed her. She grabbed his hands, squeezing them firmly. “You are not useless! I know it hurts right now, I know you feel broken…”
“My whole life has been a lie!” He interrupted. “I’ve lost everything! Everything I was, is gone. Elder Maxson…”
“Fuck Maxson!” The venom in her voice made Danse’s eyes widen. She modulated her tone to softer again, but still with conviction. “He was wrong. He can’t see past all the narrow-minded, bigoted brainwashing of the Brotherhood. You are a good man. You are strong, and honorable, and I am privileged to call you my friend and brother.”
“You… are…?”
“Yeah. You know I only joined the Brotherhood to keep an eye on you lot. I didn’t know what you meant for the Commonwealth, what your plans were. I still worry about it. But there are good people among them. And you’re the best one of them all. Of all you tin cans that floated up here, you’re the one I actually trust. You’re the one I care about. If Maxson doesn’t like that, he can go eat a tato-flavored dick.”
This made Danse burst into sputtering laughter. “You’re spending too much time with that foul-mouthed ghoul.”
“Actually, that was one of MacCready’s. Look, I know you feel broken, all busted up inside. You’ve had everything ripped away from you. But you know what? You’re still here. And I know you, you’ll keep fighting. You aren’t glass, Danse. You’re steel.” She squeezed his hands again. “Besides, you’ve got someone to talk to that knows what you’re going through. And I will always have your back.”
“Thank you, Sister.” He sighed. “I’m glad you’re here. That I’m not alone. It… it makes it easier.”
“You’re never alone. You’ve got all of us. The whole ragtag lot of us. You’re a part of our community, too. Sanctuary Hills will always have a place for you, a home for you.”
“The Brotherhood won’t like that. They might see it as an act of aggression.”
“Fuck ‘em.” Hawke repeated, even more flippantly. “If Maxson’s got a problem with that, he can come talk to me, leader to leader. I’m the General of the Minutemen, remember. And unofficial leader of whatever we’ve got going at Sanctuary Hills. I’ve done a hell of a lot more for the Commonwealth than he has, and if he starts shit, he might just find that out. But he won’t. Maxson’s a dick, but he’s not dumb enough to upset the balance like that. Not after we talked at the bunker. He’s washed his hands of it.”
“I hope you’re right.”
“Me, too. Hey, why don’t we head out? We can make it home before dark. And when we do, I’ve got a little something for you that I think you’ll like.” She stood, thinking about the set of X-01 power armor at home in her shop. It would only need a little bit more work to be up and running, and she knew he’d enjoy the tinkering. Ideally, they could work on it together.
They left the shell of the diner and headed northwest. Each unslung their rifles without a word. The roads were a lot safer now, but one still couldn’t be too careful. Hawke looked over at Danse. His posture had straightened, almost to normal. The weight of it all was still dragging on him, but now he knew he wasn’t alone. That she would always be there for him. And that was worth more than anything the Brotherhood could have offered either of them.
They shared a smile as they walked. It was good to be going home, and even better that Danse was coming, too.
#falloutober2022#falloutober#fallout 4#sole survivor#sole survivor of vault 111#fallout danse#paladin danse#arthur maxson#blind betrayal#conversation#brotherhood of steel#writing prompt
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Hey, can you do a poly marauders x fem reader where they get jealous because a slytherin boy is flirting with her because she has a snake ring ? Sorry if that was oddly specific, also you can decide if it’s fluff or smut ☺️
The snake ring and the snake [poly Marauders]
A/N: I loved this idea! Thank you so much for the request! I decided not to do smut since I haven’t written a non-smut poly Marauders fic before, but I hope you still enjoy it.
Pairings: Poly! Marauders x Fem! Non-Slytherin! Reader
Words: 1.5k
Warnings: Fluff, polyamorous relationship, flirty Slytherin boy… Idk, but let me know if I missed anything.
_____________________________________
The sound of pages being turned and voices speaking lowly filled the large library. The book in front of you had long lost its appeal and the words were all blending together as your mind wandered. You were daydreaming of the boys that occupied your thoughts, as they so often did. Your elbows were resting on the table, your fingers mindlessly fiddling with the golden snake ring placed on your right pointer finger. You loved your ring; it never left your finger and you never intended it to. It had been a gift from your three boyfriends when you had celebrated six months of being together.
The three boys were sitting a couple of tables away from you, having been shooed away as they often were the cause for your lack of concertation.
They often spared glances in your direction, not actually paying attention to their own work, as they were just waiting for you to be done so you all could head back to their dorm.
You were so caught up in your little daydream that you hadn’t noticed the boy with the green tie taking a seat beside you, a small smirk adorning his face.
“I like your ring,” he said causing your gaze to snap to his face.
“Thank you, I like it a lot as well,” you said with a smile.
“A pretty ring for a pretty girl… it would be even more perfect if you were in Slytherin,” he said moving a bit closer to you. You figured he did so just to observe your ring better, you were painfully blind whenever someone was flirting with you, and it often got you in trouble.
You laughed a little, “I don’t think I would fit in very well with you lot, but it would be fun to try to be a Slytherin just for a day.”
“I could show you our common room someday,” he offered, scooting even closer, your shoulders practically touching.
“I would love to see it! I want to see all the common rooms before we’re done with school… I’ve already seen the other three, so I’m only missing yours,” you said excitedly, completely missing the flirty suggestion that the boy had insinuated. You were just excited, hoping you could bring your boys with you, so you all could see the dark common room in the dungeons.
It was at this moment Sirius decided to look in your direction; his jaw almost hit the floor when he saw you sitting shoulder to shoulder with another boy, not just any boy but a Slytherin boy.
“Oi lads, look!” Sirius said while pointing to you.
The two other boys looked up from their books and were equally as shocked when they took in the sight before them.
They all saw you laughing at something the boy had said and none of them missed the sly smirk that had taken over his face.
The jealousy was growing in each of them, a frown taking over their faces as they observed you, blissfully unaware of the Slytherin boy’s intention.
You were just too nice for your own good and loved making new friends, especially from other houses, which your boyfriends often admired you for, but right at this moment, they wished you would just be less nice.
“I can’t handle this,” Sirius seethed, angry jealousy churning in his gut.
“She’s just being nice,” James tried, even though all he wanted to do was to shove that boy as far away from you as possible.
They watched as you tipped your head back, letting out another laugh. They were all memorized by the sound of your pretty laugh, but anger boiled in all three of the boys at the fact that someone else was causing such pretty laughs to leave your mouth.
Sirius’ eyes rolled up in his skull so many times, you would think they wouldn’t come down again.
“Well since she’s no longer studying, we can go join them,” Remus suggested, to which both boys nodded and quickly gathered their stuff and bolted towards your table.
“You can come by later tonight,” the Slytherin boy, whose name you had learned was Harry, suggested.
“Wouldn’t it be more fun to see it in the daytime? Then I could see the lake as well from the windows,” you said, still not picking up on his intentions.
“We could do it both during the day and during the night,” Harry said with a wink.
“That would be so fun,” you smiled, very excited to finally be able to see the Slytherin common room.
“What would be fun, Bunny?” Remus asked, your three boys now standing by your table.
“Oh hi! Harry here has invited me to see the Slytherin common room, so I’m finally going to have seen all four common rooms,” you said with a happy clap of your hands.
Remus, James, and Sirius all mentally facepalmed at how completely gullible you were.
James and Remus moved to sit on the other side of you, while Sirius went with the more territorial approach.
He stood beside your chair lifting you from it, “Up you get, pup.”
He then, not so gracefully, sat on the chair pulling you onto his lap hugging you close to his body.
Harry sat beside you, moving his chair away, so he wouldn’t be sitting so close to Sirius.
“And who might this be,” Harry asked, slightly annoyed and confused.
“Oh yeah, sorry… these are my boyfriends, James, Remus, and Sirius… and this is Harry,” you answered, also introducing Harry.
“I was hoping they could come to see the common room as well since they haven’t seen it either.”
“Uhm, I thought it would just be us… Uhm, but I guess,” Harry answered clearly confused, causing your three boyfriends to smirk.
“That would be so great, so we’ll come later this evening if your offers still on the table?” you asked hopefully.
“Uhm, yeah, sure…” Harry answered awkwardly.
“Yeah, it’s gonna be so fun, isn’t it Harry?” Sirius said, not really looking for an answer.
“And how nice of you to invite our girl to see your common room, wouldn’t have expected such niceties from a Slytherin,” Sirius added in a passive-aggressive tone, seeing right through Harry’s offer.
“Yeah… no problem, mate.”
“But we’ll all see you later then… bye,” Remus said and waved goodbye, a not-so-subtle hint for Harry to leave.
“Uhm bye,” Harry quickly scurried off, not wanting to agitate the boys any further.
You moved so you could sit sideways on Sirius’ lap, so you could see all three of their faces when you talked to them.
“What was that all about, pup?” Sirius asked, trying not to seem jealous or angry.
“What do you mean?” you said with a slight tilt of your head, not understanding what he meant.
“You were going to go to the Slytherin common room with him?” Sirius clarified.
“Yeah...? I mean, I was going to ask if you could join right before you came over, but then you came and he said you could come as well,” you were utterly lost, not understanding why they all seemed so angry.
“Oh, darling, you are absolutely adorable,” James laughed, causing Remus and Sirius to do the same.
A frown pulled at your lips, you weren’t very happy with being the bud of the joke and you were even less happy with not understanding it.
“I don’t understand what’s so funny,” you pouted.
“Aww, puppy,” Sirius smirked and kissed your pouting lips.
“Harry was flirting with you, he didn’t actually want to show you his common room, he did want to show you his dorm room though,” Remus explained causing your frown to deepen.
“Oh… I thought he was being friendly,” you mumbled in a small voice fidgeting with your fingers in your lap.
“You’re just our sweet girl, being nice to everyone, even when you shouldn’t,” Sirius said kissing your cheek and rubbing soothing circles on your back.
Your face turned red with embarrassment, and you buried your face in the crook of Sirius’ neck inhaling his masculine scent.
“I just wanted a new friend, and I made him think that I was going to hook up with him,” you said sadly, your voice muffled by Sirius’ clavicle.
“It’s okay, Bunny, you’re just bad at reading when people are flirting with you,” Remus said, trying to suppress his urge to laugh.
“Yeah, just think about how long it took before you realized we were flirting with you,” James said with a small laugh.
You let out a small laugh at that, thinking back to before you got together and how absolutely oblivious you had been.
“But I would never purposely flirt with anyone else, I didn’t mean to give him the wrong idea,” you said lifting your head, wanting to make your point very clear.
“We know, pretty girl, we just want other guys to understand that they shouldn’t flirt with what clearly doesn’t belong to them,” James said, reaching for your hand across the table and squeezing it.
“But do you still want to go see the Slytherin common room?” you said jokingly.
“If we really want to see it, I could just force good old Reggie to give us the password,” Sirius said with a slight laugh.
#poly marauders#marauders#marauders x you#marauders x reader#sirius black#marauders fluff#remus lupin#james potter#marauders fanfiction
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Draco Malfoy x Reader •lemon/smut• Jealousy
TRIGGER WARNING: adult content
A cup of Smut, a tsp of swear words and a pinch of violence
"Where the fuck do you think you're going, (L/n)?", Draco said loudly as you were about to leave his room.
"None of your business.", you answered in a cold tone and kept walking towards the door.
He caught your wrist and twirled you around, pushing you harshly against the wall behind you.
"How stupid do you think I am?", he hissed angrily, his face only inches away from yours.
"Very.", you spat back with a grimace and Draco's eyes darkened dangerously.
His cold hand found your throat: "You should watch your mouth, (y/n)."
More annoyed than scared you crossed your arms in front of your chest: "Or what?"
You winced as his grip tightened, making it hard for you to breathe.
"Would be better for you if you don't find out."
However angry you were at him, you couldn't deny the fact that the way he acted turned you on.
After all these weeks where he didn't even glimpse at you, it felt like heaven to finally have his full attention again.
Draco noticed you struggling for breath and pulled his hand away, placing it next to your head at the wall.
"I don't remember the part where I agreed on letting you flirt with other men."
A huff escaped your mouth: "And I don't remember the part, that a relationship with you meant to get ignored for weeks."
Slowly it dawned on Draco that you had only flirted with Potter to make him jealous.
And oh boy, how that had worked.
Every time he saw you around the brunette, how you laughed at his jokes or laid your hand on his shoulder, he wanted to Avada Kedavra him.
A deep chuckle rumbled through his chest and he slowly shook his head in disbelief.
Puzzled you narrowed your eyebrows.
"You're a little bitch, you know that?", amusement sounded in his voice which irritated you even more.
"Says the one who forgot he had a girlfriend."
You pouted, still angry at him.
Draco stared into your eyes and before you could ask yourself what he had in mind, his lips crashed onto yours.
Taken off guard it took you some moments to kiss back.
You didn't even want to, but it had never been your strength to resist him.
With his left hand, he lifted your hands from your chest and above your head while using his right hand to fiddle with the tie around your neck.
In a swift motion, he opened the knot and tied the silk fabric around your wrists, pulling it tight to make sure that it wouldn't open by itself.
"What are you doing-?", you stammered between kisses, trying to free yourself from his grip but he just pushed you back against the wall with ease.
"Teaching you who you belong to."
A wave of heat rushed through your body and consumed all the anger still left, turning it into lust for the tall blond.
Draco's free hand wandered over your clothes, following the curves of your body, his lips only millimeters away from yours.
He watched every movement on your face, every flinch you did when he touched a sensitive spot, every whimper you tried to hide by biting your lip.
His breath on your lips drove you insane.
You wanted to kiss him, to feel his lips against yours - but he wouldn't let you, always making sure to stay just as far away from you so your lips wouldn't touch.
Slowly Draco opened the buttons of your blouse and bra catch, pushing it aside, dragging his gaze over your exposed skin.
You were covered in a thin film of glistening sweat, your cheeks were flushed red and your legs slightly shaking.
And he hasn't even really touched you yet.
A smirk crawled on his lips and his eyes darkened.
To know that he could crumble you with this little effort made a thrill of ecstasy wash over him.
His free hand slipped under your skirt and caressed your leg.
The slow and light strokes tingled on your skin, making you shiver and wishing that he would finally stop teasing you.
Your arms twitched, wanting to lead his hand between your legs but Draco held them in place over your head.
"Not so eager.", his breath brushed against your ear as he placed soft kisses at your jawline and down your neck.
You shuddered as Draco reached your soft spot on your neck and you could feel him smirk against your skin for a second.
His kisses got rougher, turning into sucks and a long-held back moan escaped your mouth.
He chuckled low:" That's what I want to hear."
Without a warning, Draco dragged you away from the wall and over to his bed, pushing you forcefully back to make you fall backwards onto the mattress.
He followed you shortly after, crawling on top of you.
His cold fingers grazed over your cheeks and lips as he slowly sat up.
Down your neck, and over your chest between your breasts, down your stomach, and over your navel, only stopping his movement because the fabric of your skirt was in his way.
In a fast motion, Draco undressed from his black turtleneck sweater and let it fall beside the bed.
You didn't even have time to admire him as he suddenly grabbed your tights and jerked you closer to him, making you straddle his waist and earning a surprised squeak from you.
Draco leaned forward to kiss you, his lips forcefully moving against yours and his member poking you through his trousers.
His actions were more aggressive than usual.
He didn't want to show you how much he loved you.
He wanted to make sure that you knew you were his.
Only his.
His left hand found your throat, gently grabbing it, making sure to not cross the thin line between pleasure and violence, while he traveled kisses and bites down the inside of your thigh.
Silent whimpers you couldn't control bubbled out your mouth and turned into moans as Draco pushed your underwear to the side and licked over your folds.
His tongue flickered around your clit, circling the little bundle of nerves, making you twitch underneath him.
You covered your face with your still tied together arms and bit your lip, trying to stifle the noises coming out of your mouth.
Draco noticed it and responded by pushing two fingers inside you, hitting your sweet spot as he curved his fingers, breaking your control for good.
You cried out at his sudden action, earning a chuckle from him, which vibrated at your sensitive skin.
His fingers got faster, aiming to hit your G-spot with every curving of his fingers and his tongue kept leaping over your clit, making you a moaning and whimpering mess underneath him.
Your body felt like it was burning up, every bit of skin tingled and your mind was completely blank, too overwhelmed by Draco's teasing to concentrate on anything else.
Or anything at all.
You felt a knot building up inside you, tightening with every hit at your spot, with every suck at your clit.
Breathing heavily your hands found Draco's hair, clenching at it to have something to hold on to-
Abruptly he stopped.
His mouth left your throbbing nerve bundle and his fingers slid out of you, his left hand moved away from your throat and the bed creaked as he stood up.
It took you a moment to realize what just happened, your mind too fuzzy to process his action.
But once the ecstasy inside you died down, a feeling of disappointment consumed you.
Draco had planned on stopping here, leaving you as a frustrated mess in his bed, needy and desiring him.
But looking down at you now, how you laid in front of him, breathing heavy, sweating slightly, flushed red and your skirt halfway up your waist, your bra tugged aside over your breasts, and strains of hair sticking to your face - he just couldn't.
He huffed, thinking that you would probably be his death someday since he just couldn't control himself around you.
With a silent rustle, you heard Draco's pants fall onto the floor, followed by a dull thud of his belt.
His hands grabbed your waist and pulled you to the edge of the bed before he turned you around, making you kneel on the mattress.
A warm shudder crawled under your skin as he positioned himself at your entrance.
With one hard thrust, he completely buried himself inside of you, groaning at the sensation.
You let out a cry, wishing you could slap him for being so rough but the anger quickly faded as his hand grazed over your back, guiding you down into a hollow back and he started to pound inside you.
He was slow at first, gently stroking your back and you nearly thought he might want to apologize like this for being this rough with you but the next second, his hands grabbed your waist firmly, pulling you towards him as he pushed inside you with hard thrusts.
Loud moans and whines escaped your mouth and mixed with his grunts.
You clenched onto the blanket underneath you, burying your face in the silk fabric as he penetrated your sweet spot.
The knot inside you tightened again and your walls contracted around his member, making him speed up which drove you over the edge.
You cried out as your orgasm flooded in waves of heat through your body, limps twitching and your legs feeling numb for a moment.
Draco's thrusts got sloppier and his breathing shorter as he drove himself to his own climax, pounding fastly into you.
His grip at your waist tightened as he released himself with one last thrust, groaning lowly.
Breathing heavily he pulled out of you and you collapsed panting on the mattress, your legs shaking slightly.
"Don't you dare to flirt with Potter ever again.", Draco warned casually while cleaning you both up.
"Got it. I will pick a Weasley next time.", you joked out of breath and got an annoyed grunt from him while he untied your wrists and finally released your hands.
"I hate you."
"I love you too.", you snickered weary, earning an eye roll and a soft smile from him.
"You better do.", he said and placed a sweet kiss on your forehead.
Well, this is probably the longest smut I wrote so far
I don't know if I should feel proud or ashamed 😂
Anyway! I hope you like it, let me know if you did, it would mean a lot to me ❤
My Wattpad: @/lilakudo
#fanfiction#reader insert#x reader#draco imagine#draco lucius malfoy#draco malfoy#draco smut#draco x you#draco x reader#draco malfoy x reader#lemon fanfic#smut fanfiction#harry potter smut#tom felton
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Cool your back.
I have a very cute LawLu prompt
Where Law is still a pirate some how becomes (little doses he know)the Fiance of the Goda kingdom's Cat God of freedom named Luffy(much to the world nobles dismay) and all of the high jinx that come along with it. And Luffy keeps popping up whenever Law doesn't/needs him. Good thing he's cute.
Thank youuu! Glad to be back :D though still super slow I’m sorry
I might have taken some liberties there with Luffy but I hope you like it! :)
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A Divine ball of fluff
[Read on AO3 | Request info | Ko-fi]
Law startled awake at the sound of gunfire and cannons somewhere above his head. Stepping over the lamp on the floor, he only briefly wondered just how it had managed to fall from his nightstand before he forced himself to focus. He only grabbed Kikoku, then ran out of his room to join his crew on deck, ready to murder whoever had come to disturb his sorely needed nap.
“Hand over Luffy and I might just let you go alive, Trafalgar Law!”
With the angry shout being the first thing Law had heard upon opening the door leading to the Tang’s deck, Law could only groan. Not again. “I keep telling you, old man—” Law slammed the door shut behind himself maybe more aggressively than strictly necessary before quickly striding over to the side of the ship to glare at Vice Admiral Garp— “none of this was my choice! And your stupid grandson isn’t even here!”
“Uhm, about that, Captain…” Bepo trailed off, quiet and apologetic.
Law took in a sharp breath, closing his eyes momentarily and praying for patience. “Don’t say it. I don’t want to hear it.”
“Sorry,” Bepo mumbled, dropping his head as if it was somehow his fault their regular ‘guest’ had invited himself over without any warning again.
Shaking his head, Law slowly looked at Garp again. The old man was fuming and not for the first time, Law marveled at the stubbornness of this entire family. No matter how many times he said ‘no’ to either one of them, they just kept coming back like a bad rash. Sometimes, Law couldn’t believe neither of the three brothers or their grandfather were related by blood. Hell, one of them wasn’t even human. But well… when it came down to it, Law couldn’t say he cared.
“Fine, take him,” he said finally, smirking at the loud crash from behind him that immediately followed.
“Torao~” someone whined before arms wrapped around Law’s waist
On reflex, one of Law’s legs shot forward as he braced for the impact of the entire body crashing into him a split second later. Why, just why did this man insist on lunging at people constantly? Law would never understand. He was lucky Law had managed to train his reactions well enough by now to not face plant into the railing anymore. “What?” he asked, smirk still shamelessly in place as he turned to look at the person who was hanging off of him.
The person—or rather, the god—in question was staring back at him with an unhappy frown and a pout on his lips. Law hated to admit he looked outright adorable then, and not just because of the cat ears sitting proudly on top of his head, alert and facing forward in agitation. Ears which were also covered in black, incredibly soft fur that Law would never get tired of petting.
Giving Law something that was probably supposed to be a glare, Luffy finally huffed before continuing, voice sounding incredibly sulky, “How could you just sell me out to gramps like this?”
“Because he could absolute keep you on his ship even if he did take you. Sure,” Law replied in a tone dripping in sacrasm while he rolled his eyes at the dramatic complaints of the literal embodiement of freedom, the person who could and absolutely did materialize out of nowhere on the Polar Tang whenever he fucking felt like it, without any warning, for the sole purpose of driving Law absolutely crazy with his ideas, only to then disappear into thin air again once he got bored. While on the open sea, with the nearest land two days of sailing away.
“That’s not the point!” Luffy cried, his grip on Law’s waist tightening.
Before Law could say anything back, a canon ball landed a bit too close to the ship, causing a wave of seawater to wash over the both of them. Law cursed loudly at the unexpected and fully unwelcome shower, just as Luffy also hissed loudly; if he was in his full monster cat form, Law could just imagine his fur raising until he looked like a huge, black ball of pure fluff.
…Now Law wanted to see it. He made a mental note to find an opportunity to scare the shit out of him at some point later, when he was in his true form.
“What was that for?!” Luffy demanded when he recovered from the shock.
“A warning shot!” Garp retorted, sounding just as angry as Luffy did. “You get off that pirate ship before I drag you off myself!”
“I’m not going back to Goa! It’s stuffy and tiny and they keep burning down my shrines, I hate it there!”
Garp growled as he grabbed another cannon ball. “As if I care about the idiot king’s orders, I’m not going to give you to those scumbags and I don’t care where you go—” he paused to aim his cannon ball at them threateningly before he continued— “but you’re not becoming a pirate on my watch, you brat!”
Law heard Luffy taking a deep breath behind him, no doubt in preparation to go off on his adoptive grandfather, and he sighed. Before either of these idiots could say anything, Law snapped, “If you’re just going to keep screaming at each other, can I go?”
“No,” Luffy said immediately, digging his claws into Law’s stomach painfully.
At the same time, Garp said, “You stay right where you are, I’m not done with you either!”
Law sighed. Every goddamn time.
“Prepare to submerge,” Law said to Bepo tiredly before raising his hand. “Room. Shambles.”
Appearing back in his room a split second later, Law took a deep breath, giving himself a moment to appreciate the blessed silence—or the alternative of, which meant only muffled rage instead of people screaming right in his ear. Not ideal but he would take it anyway. Honestly, why couldn’t these two ever do anything quietly? This whole thing could be so easily resolved if they had just sat down and talked but no, they just had to go yelling at each other while throwing cannon balls and scratching the other’s face off. And Law never had a say in getting caught in the middle of it every damn time either.
Sometimes, he cursed the day the Tang landed on Dawn Island, the place where all his problems started. But really, he couldn’t with clear conscience say that if he were to relive that day, that he wouldn’t do exactly the same thing; that he wouldn’t stop at the tiny, ancient looking shrine to talk to the young man sitting in front of it. That he wouldn’t answer every question Luffy had about the world beyond his small domain, that he wouldn’t look into those large, excited eyes and invite him to leave with him.
But, as stupid as it was regardless, if he could do it over, at the very least, would now actually know he was accidentally proposing to a literal god; one that was incredibly stuborn, selfish, and bright enough to be the actual sun. A god who also came in a package with a crazy grandfather, two over protective brothers, and the softest, warmest fur Law had ever had the pleasure of touching.
“Thanks for getting me away,” Luffy said after he made himself comfortable on Law’s bed, the anger and raw power that had been radiating off of him only moments ago replaced by his usual happy and carefree attitude.
Law clicked his tongue. “I was getting myself away. Not my fault you were clinging to me like a child.”
“Same thing.” Luffy waved him off.
Law didn’t have the energy to argue. Simply shaking his head at him, he instead bent down to put the lamp he had ignored earlier back on his nightstand.
“Weird how this was on the floor. I distinctly remember it was screwed on tight just yesterday,” Law noted, giving Luffy a pointed stare. Now that he knew this giant, ridiculously strong cat was on the ship, Law had no doubt just how the lamp got knocked off. Briefly, Law wondered whether there was even a point putting it back until Luffy left; he was probably going to knock it off again while staring at it with morbid fascination as it crashed to the floor again and again.
Law watched as Luffy’s eyes veered off to the side, his lips pursing as he mumbled, “Yeah, that’s super weird.”
Huffing out a small laugh, Law crossed the short distance between them, reaching out to ruffle Luffy’s hair. It was almost as soft as his fur was. “I know. A complete mystery,” he said with a smirk before he leaned down, pressing his lips to Luffy’s briefly.
The kiss was easily returned, a wide grin spreading on Luffy’s lips as soon as they separated, and despite himself, Law felt himself smile back. That damn smile would be the death of him. No matter how maddening this man could be, how loud and selfish, the moment he smiled like that, it was like all Law’s problems and frustrations were melting away. Luffy was simply beautiful; adorable and bright, yet absolutely terrifying and Law loved every little bit of it.
It was funny, actually. If someone had told him he would ever say ‘Luffy’ and ‘love’ in the same sentence just half a year ago, Law would have laughed in their face. Back then, Luffy was only some incredibly annoying giant cat who just wouldn’t leave him alone, someone who popped up on the Tang or wherever Law currently was just to ruin any and all of his painstakingly created plans. But now…
Now Law couldn’t remember what life was before him. He had learned to build his plans around Luffy recklessly charging forward, didn’t even bother trying to explain anything to him. He had long since stopped fighting the pull, the warm aura of power and charisma that drew people in and didn’t let go. It took a while but Law had finally accepted that he was not any different from all the other people Luffy had managed to charm without even realizing he was doing it ever since Law had gotten him out of the Goa Kingdom.
There was just something in the stupid divine cat that made people want to join and support him. Maybe it was the sense of absolute freedom that followed him everywhere; be it his own freedom, or the one of whoever Luffy thought deserved it.
“What’s wrong?” Luffy asked after a long while of them just looking at each other.
Law smiled, shaking his head at the cute, worried frown on his face. “Just hoping your grandfather won’t hit us before we sink far enough.”
“He’d never actually hit the ship, he’s a big softie,” Luffy announced, that grin back on his face.
“Good to know.” Law chuckled, finally sitting down on the bed with Luffy. “You know, I was sleeping before you two started fighting,” Law said offhandedly, glancing at Luffy and nearly snorting at the way his ears perked up in excitement.
“Wanna?” the other asked immediately, nearly vibrating in place.
Raising an eyebrow, Law gave Luffy a look. “I was going to say yes but seeing how excited you are, I’m not sure it’s such a good idea.”
“Nah, it’s all good,” Luffy decided, nodding to himself as he hopped off the bed, walking two steps towards the door to Law’s cabin before shifting into his monster cat form, then lied down slowly, watchful as to not break anything while he tried to fit his huge body into the tiny room.
Once Luffy looked back at him expectantly and Law was sure he was fully settled, Law went to join his boyfriend on the floor, careful not to step on any of his limbs or either of his two tails on the way. As he leaned back against the giant cat’s chest, he let his eyes slide shut, already feeling the exhaustion from earlier in the day settling back in. It was just so warm and soft and fluffy and Law would sooner die than admit out loud how much he loved it. It wasn’t like everyone didn’t already know by then anyway. What could he say, Luffy’s fur was impossible to resist. It was worse than Bepo’s in this aspect.
“No licking,” Law reminded, cracking one eye open to shoot Luffy a half-hearted glare when he felt his face come close to his body.
“You’re no fun,” Luffy whined.
Law could only sigh. “I’d just like to keep my skin where it is, thanks.”
“Fine.” Luffy huffed, thankfully keeping his sand-paper tongue where it should be, before he simply nudged Law with his forehead.
A smile pulled on Law’s lips, his hand raising to rest against the side of his little monster’s head. To anyone else, this position would seem incredibly dangerous, yet to Law, it was so very comforting. He had never felt safer than when he lay snuggled into into this god’s side, with the jaw which could fit his entire head inside twice over and then some positioned just inches away from his face.
Right here, Law knew he was home.
And while he gently stroked Luffy’s fur, Law’s eyelids slowly slid shut again.
~ Meanwhile ~
“What do we do?!” Shachi cried in panic, staring with wide eyes at the neptunian who looked like it was about to eat the Tang for an afternoon snack.
“We have to call the captain and Luffy, we can’t do this,” Ikkaku shouted back, trying to shoo away another two of these giant sea kings away together with Jean Bart.
A frustrated groan came from Clione in response, “I tried but they won’t answer and the door won’t open!”
“Why do they always have to sleep with Luffy’s giant furry ass blocking the stupid door! How are we supposed to get them out here?!” Shachi whined, mind slowly slipping into despair. Honestly, these lovesick idiots. What use was having a literal god around when he was never there to actually help when they actually needed him to?
This was why Shachi preferred dogs over cats.
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Dedicated to my cat who has the softest fur and also forces me to keep everything on the fucking floor.
[Request info | Ko-fi]
#one piece#lawlu#trafalgar law#trafalgar d water law#luffy#monkey d luffy#opfanfic#lawlu fanfic#fluff#humor#fluff and humor#tooth rotting fluff#one shot#god!luffy#cat!luffy#heart pirates#monkey d garp#law is suffering#but it's the hearts who are the true victims#katie pretends to fic#drabble requests#i nearly went and did an X hour long research on bakenekos and nekomatas for this#had to physically stop myself because i knew it wouldn't work perfectly either way#garp took luffy in after they burned down one of his main shrines#and then ace and sabo happened#and then law stumbled on him after ace left#couldn't work that into the story without it sounding forced#but yeah
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Can I ask for some angst? Sasara, Samatoki and Ichiro reactions when their s/o is brainwashed for Chuuoku a la Nemu and becomes hostile towards the boys?
Hey hey anon! Needless to say, this one did hurt to write, but I do love the idea so much. I do love me some good ol' angst at times haha. Thank you sm for the request and hope you enjoy 💕
𝗜𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗿𝗼, 𝗦𝗮𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗼𝗸𝗶, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗦𝗮𝘀𝗮𝗿𝗮 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗮 𝘀/𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝗯𝗿𝗮𝗶𝗻𝘄𝗮𝘀𝗵𝗲𝗱 𝗯𝘆 𝗖𝗵𝘂𝗼𝗵𝗸𝘂
-pairings: ichiro yamada x gn!reader, samatoki aohitsugi x gn!reader, sasara nurude x gn!reader
-genre: angst
Ichiro
he immediately notices your shift in demeanor when ichiro visits you the next time, realizing that there were something off about your gaze
you looked so...emotionless, similar to a robot obeying commands. those weren’t your lovestruck eyes that he was used to, the ones filled with endless love and warmth. you looked dead
it was baffling to say the least. he had absolutely no idea what had happened to cause you to snap like that
“babe, are you alright?”
well, he certainly wasn’t expecting you to glare daggers at him. at that moment, ichiro’s mind was racing as he tried to remember if he had unintentionally done anything to hurt you, though he couldn’t recall anything of that sort
so he decides to ask you once more, hoping this time that he’d get a response, though he’d come to regret that
“get lost. i don’t want to see you anymore.”
...what?
immediately, memories from his past fight with kuko resurfaced, taking note of how eerily similar this entire situation was to that. it was playing out word-by-word, right down to the exact emotions he felt: fear coupled with anxiety and nausea
he tried to not get too emotional, tried to hold himself back and take control of the situation, tried to reason with you and calm you down, but you were having none of it
when you walked away, however, shutting the door in his face, he felt defeated. he wasn’t able to talk you out of it. this was a genuine break up, and ichiro didn’t really know how to process it
he knew that what he saw wasn’t the real you, wasn’t the sweet and loving you who loved to pepper him with kisses or tease him. what he saw was an imposter, but he couldn’t do anything about it
no one knew about what had happened; rather, they assumed that the two of you broke up, which was technically the truth in some aspect. nothing his brothers did to try and cheer him up worked however
he did eventually move on from you, though that wouldn’t be after a long time. ichiro had loved you with everything he had, right down to the smallest cell in his body, and it hurt to see you walk away so easily, as if it all meant absolutely nothing to you
the next time he saw you was during the rap battles, and needless to say, he’s surprised when he spotted you adorned in chuohku’s uniform, which made his stomach churn
you had chosen chuohku, and even if ichiro thought he had gotten over you, he felt all those emotions come flooding in again once he saw you standing at the gate
he desperately wanted to go up to you and try to reconcile things, but he knew that it was simply much too late
you decided on chuohku, and even if ichiro absolutely despised that, it was your decision
ichiro really hated to see you so broken, and it was gut wrenching to say the least when he took note of how dead your eyes were
even if you were sad, even if you felt as if the world around you was ending, ichiro felt as if that was better than what had happened to you now. at the very least, the former you had emotion, and he had no doubt that he could help you through it
but now, it kinda felt hopeless, as much as he hated to admit. you were nothing but a shell of your former self, so how could he help you feel better when you couldn’t feel at all?
Samatoki
he feels the tension in the air the moment you walk into his office, and samatoki isn’t exactly sure why you seemed off at that moment
though, his instincts were telling him to prepare for the worst. this was likely to be one hell of an interaction
“huh? what’s the matter with you? did someone hurt you?”
at that moment, samatoki felt himself fill with rage at the thought of someone having dare lay a hand on you. if that was the problem, then he really wouldn’t even hesitate to kick the guy’s ass
“i’ve only come to tell you that i don’t want to see you anymore. you’re a pain”
upon your last word, this man is immediately on fight or flight mode. there was absolutely no way that this was you; it simply couldn’t be. the entire time the two of you were together, not once did you sound or look this heartless
he’s right by your side, grabbing you by the shoulders and shaking you (rather aggressively might i add) as if that’d help snap you out of your stupor
“y/n, what the hell is up with you?! cut the bullshit”
samatoki didn’t believe one bit of what you were saying. for one, the you he knew would never speak like that, not so cold anyway. secondly, your entire mannerisms were off. there was no way in hell that you even knew what you were saying
but when you reiterate that you’re serious, pushing him off of you, samatoki’s temper gets the better of him, and he immediately switches to defensive mode
he’s already lost quite a few people he loved in his life, and samatoki wasn’t about to add another one to that list
you were much too important for him to simply let you go. you made him feel things he hadn’t felt in a long time, and samatoki would be damned if he let you walk out that door
he bickers with you for quite a while, his voice getting a bit higher each time. it’s not like samatoki had meant to yell at you, though; his temper and anxiety was merely getting the best of him at that moment
but he knew that he had lost the moment you stated that you were joining chuuoku. this entire situation was the exact same as with nemu a few years prior. he couldn’t stop her then, and samatoki knew that there was no way he could stop you now
the moment you walk out that door, samatoki feels powerless and quite frustrated, taking out his anger by punching objects that were in his way. he had stupidly believed that things were looking up with you, with the situation with nemu, with everything, but he was dead wrong
at that moment, samatoki swears that he’ll get you back
(quite frankly, he still didn’t believe that was you that he had talked to)
his teammates have no idea what had happened given that samatoki doesn’t really outwardly show it, though they do have a hint of an idea based off of his heartbroken and angry gaze he had every time you were mentioned
the next time he meets you, it felt as if the world was laughing at him. not only had samatoki spotted you in chuohku, but you were alongside his beloved sister as well, and he couldn’t even run up to the two of you and drag you both home (his teammates somehow managed to hold him back)
he hadn’t the faintest clue of what had happened to make you flip so quick, but all samatoki knew was that he was never going to give up on you
make no mistake, he will bring both you and nemu back home, no matter what it cost
Sasara
he couldn’t quite lay his finger on it, but sasara could sense that something was off about you the moment you came to his apartment
well, his instincts were telling him that, but sasara didn’t listen to that at all. instead, he decided to brush it off and treated it as if it was another normal day
but then the bombshell dropped
in a blank and rather aggressive tone, you casually mentioned how you never wanted to see him again, and you had simply dropped by to let him know that
at first, sasara really couldn’t believe what he was hearing. surely he must’ve misheard you, right? there was no way you actually felt that way, at least, not that he knew of
“aww come on y/n, you know a joke must have a punchline.”
didn’t really take it seriously at first, though it was more like sasara didn’t have the heart to confront it, so he did what he was best at: distract with jokes
it was always effective, but not so much this time
needless to say, he’s pretty much speechless when you repeat it, this time your tone practically dripping with poison. sasara had no idea what had gotten into you or what had happened for you to be so cold
you were always so sweet and loving to him, cracking jokes left and right as well as playing along with his shenanigans. there was never a dull moment with you
but now, everything was falling apart. had you always felt this way? did you simply hate him but simply put up with it? was his love really one sided this entire time? sasara began to doubt your guys’ entire relationship
sure, there was no possible way that the person standing in front of him was you, but sasara also didn’t know what had happened. perhaps a person or an event made you feel this way towards him, but with no way of knowing, he assumed that this was how you truly felt
even though you seemed more robotic than usual, even though there was not a single hint of emotion in your eyes, sasara took your words to heart
and he really did want to try and change your mind, to try and reconcile with you, but anytime he uttered a single word, you were at his throat. you didn’t seem to want to try and understand
sasara really wasn’t too keen on fighting. it was such a horrible feeling and brought up a few memories that he’d rather have buried away. he’d rather not hurt both you and himself, even if it was all accidental
arguments never got anywhere, and there seemed to be nothing that could change your mind, so all sasara could do was stand and watch as you walked away. it was your decision after all, and he had no choice but to accept
sasara fell into a bit of a depression right after, always catching himself thinking of you and wishing that things hadn’t turned out this way
nothing seemed to make him happy anymore, not even his favorite comedy shows or drinks. even if he didn’t outwardly show it, it was pretty clear to everyone that knew him well that sasara was indeed hurting
eventually, he did move on, but there was a scar on his heart that’d never heal
when he saw you at chuohku, wearing the same blank expression as before and dressed up in their uniform, his first thought was that he was grateful that you were alive and healthy
but that was soon followed by heartbreak and hopelessness. it hurt him to see you again, and it hurt even more to know that you had sided with chuohku
he couldn’t help but ruminate on what could’ve been
#asks#requests#hypmic#hypnosis mic#ichiro yamada#ichiro x reader#samatoki aohitsugi#samatoki x reader#sasara nurude#sasara x reader#angst#headcanons#gender neutral reader
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Hi!! Could you do "It was a hospital bed, and A slipped in carefully to lie beside B all night" for a Royai fic from that prompt list? Thank you!! ❤️❤️
hello anon!! thanks for the prompt aaaah I had a lot of fun toying with it in between work and the other shenanigans that have been cropping up this week <3 I hope you don't mind the somewhat unusual ending ahaha I dimly recall writing a few other fics indirectly responding to this prompt (here and here!) so I wanted to try something slightly different from my usual fare 👉🏻👈🏻 part of this was also originally from a two-shot I'm working on, tweaked to fit the prompt hehe. I hope you enjoy!!! 🥰
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Riza can think of a million reasons why hospitals are awful.
First, the food. She’s not sure if it’s as nutritious as they make it out to be; there are times when she wonders if it’s even edible. She’s had worse, of course - hospital food isn’t as bad as ration bars - but she’s quickly getting tired of eating plain yoghurt and bland porridge every day, for every single meal.
Second, the stench. Riza hates that every inch of the place smells like a victim of obsessive cleanliness; she has to resist the urge to upchuck every time the door opens and the smell of chemicals and antiseptic filters in like an unwanted guest.
Third, the fact that she’s sharing a room with a man who, at this point, is behaving more like a cat on hot bricks than a disciplined soldier is quickly driving her insane. She’d readily agreed to be his caretaker, of course; Riza doubts there’s anyone else capable of dealing with his antics and ever-growing anxiety. But after hearing him sigh and toss and turn in his bed for the fifty-eighth time that night (she’d counted, because she was bored out of her wits, and there was nothing else she could do other than sleep or stare at the ceiling, per doctor’s orders), Riza decides she’s just about had enough.
She looks at him from her bed. He’s presently engaged with twiddling his thumbs, thinking out loud.
Riza sighs and rises from her bed quietly. She brings the IV stand along with her - an unnecessary inconvenience - and carefully slips into his bed once she’s made sure that the tubes and wires connected to them are tangle-free.
“I never pegged you as an opportunist, Lieutenant,” he murmurs, despite her best efforts to be discreet. “Sleeping with your commanding officer while he’s blind?”
“You could always court martial me later, sir,” Riza deadpans. “Now scoot over.”
Luckily, he obliges without much retort.
“Your wish is my command.”
Riza huffs. She adjusts the thin, scraggly piece of linen that the hospital justifies as a blanket - another downside of this shitty place - and makes sure he’s probably covered, warm.
“Three words,” she mutters.
“Eight letters?”
“Twelve, actually.”
Roy raises a brow. “What could it be?”
“Would you like to wager a guess, sir?”
“Not really.”
“You’re an idiot,” she says. Roy laughs, and it’s a tiny little sound that is so discordant with his current mood, but it’s at least genuine. “Now go to sleep.”
“Alright, alright.”
He stops fidgeting, for a while. Riza closes her eyes and attempts to fall asleep - and she actually does, for a while - at least until she hears the sheets rustling again, the movement and tension coming from beside her. She groans softly.
“You should sleep, sir.”
She feels him stiffen. Roy smiles sheepishly, looking right through her like she’s not there. It still unnerves her how this is probably going to be their new normal: him without his sight. Her as his eyes.
“Sorry.”
Riza frowns. An apology is not the answer she wants. What she wants is for him - or them both, actually - to sleep and rest and properly recuperate so that they can have a speedy recovery, so that they can get out of here as soon as possible.
“Bad dreams?” she asks, because it’s the exact same thing that’s been haunting her. (She’s lucky her throat makes it impossible for her to scream or kick up a fuss; she’d hate for Roy to stumble blindly through the room in what he probably thinks is an act of chivalry and/or heroism.)
He shrugs.
“Then and now,” he offers. His smile fades, and he lapses into an unexpected moment of vulnerability. “Hard to differentiate between day and night nowadays, too.”
And because Riza doesn’t know what to say, she simply brushes her knuckles against his.
Roy returns the gesture, drawing indiscernible patterns on the back of her hand with his bandaged one.
“Well, it’s almost midnight now, sir.”
He lets out a small laugh, but it’s painfully hollow.
Riza shifts slightly. It’s a bit of a tight squeeze - hospital beds are clearly not meant for two persons (or anything inappropriate) - but it doesn’t bother her all that much. She just wishes there’s more she can do, to comfort him. Make him feel a little less gloomy.
“It feels like I’ve been sleeping for years.”
“If it helps reduce the incidents of you falling asleep during office hours, then you should get more sleep now, while you can.”
Roy turns, like he’s searching for her, even though there’s not much closer she can be at this point. He exhales shakily. She feels his hand trembling against hers, and responds with a gentle caress. (She knows he’s still feeling guilty, probably berating himself internally about their predicament, about what transpired beforehand. And to be fair, there’s a part of her that’s still angry about all that's happened underground. They’ll probably have to talk about it, at some point, but probably not now — not when they’re both still drugged up and only half-lucid.)
“Humour me, Lieutenant.”
“What?”
“I can’t sleep,” he confesses. Dimly, Riza notes that his voice has taken on a somewhat petulant edge — like a child complaining about their bedtime, but she doesn’t comment on it. Being nearly bedridden for a week is enough to drive her nuts, too. “I’ve tried counting sheep and all that shit, and it’s just — it’s not working.”
Riza sighs. She’s tired, yes, but she’s also aware that she’s probably not going to get any sleep at this rate. She tries to think of ways to stave off his restlessness. Reading is one — she can probably bore him into sleep with a Xingese recitation (she’s gotten pretty good at that lately), but she’s technically not supposed to be talking much. Alcohol is another, but neither of them are supposed to be drinking (and besides, the only form of alcohol available in hospitals isn’t meant for human consumption). Maybe chess, then. She’s not particularly keen on playing a game of chess, now (because she just wants to sleep), but she thinks it’ll help exhaust some of his boundless energy.
“We could play a game of chess, if you want. Breda was kind enough to drop a vinyl board here in the afternoon.”
“I can’t see —“
“I’ll tell you where I move my pieces.”
He frowns, clearly not liking the idea. “You’re not supposed to be talking much, Lieutenant.”
“I’m fine,” she insists, turning to pour a cup of water for herself before continuing. “I won’t have to speak much — unless you’re being a nuisance or a cheat or a fraud.”
He laughs. “I’ll be none of those things, Lieutenant.”
“Good.”
She sets up the board on his bed and helps him sit up. Riza lets him play white.
“It’s your move, sir.”
“You’ve made yours?”
“No. You’re playing white.”
“Tough. It’ll be more embarrassing if I end up losing.”
Riza smiles. “Well, we don’t know that yet, sir.”
He opens with pawn to e4. She helps him move his pieces and parrots her movements back to him. Pawn to e4, too. Pawn to d4. Same here. A closed game, not quite like his usual aggressive style of playing.
Riza watches as he frowns with intensity. It’s probably more a test of memory than strategy for him at this point. She wonders if there’s a way he can adapt to chess, to the military’s utilitarian (and frankly unsympathetic) demands now that his sight’s impaired.
(Life is so unlike chess, Riza thinks, in spite of Roy’s silly metaphors that postulate otherwise. The rules are never fixed, and the universe is always rife with uncertainty. It’s not like chess, where you can predict your opponents’ moves if you get good enough. Neither of them had expected that he’d be here right now, losing sleep and contemplating life over a chessboard while blind.)
He clucks his tongue, reciting a series of movements from memory. The Blackmar-Diemer. Riza smiles indulgently.
Still as aggressive as ever, sir.
Of course.
The game quickly becomes a round of blitz, and though he manages to open his lines and mount a rather decent attack, it’s clear that he has trouble recalling after the eighteenth move. It's still an impressive feat, though. Better than the average layperson.
“Check,” Riza announces, conversationally. Technically, she’d had the advantage, both on the board (and in real life). It shouldn’t really count, and besides, checkmate isn’t her objective — it’s to get her commanding office to sleep.
“Well-played,” Roy hums. He’s strangely still in his bed as he closes his eyes, rubbing at his temples — presumably to ease off an oncoming migraine. It happens a lot, when he’s in deep thought, when he’s over thinking. Thinking too much for his own good. “I need to work on my recall, I think.”
“I think so too, sir.”
He laughs, but the sound is again empty, foreign. It is so at odds with his usual smirks and unbridled laughter (when he’s laughing at someone else, or a joke made at somebody’s expense), like there’s an ache beneath the surface that she cannot reach.
Roy turns slightly, bumping into his dethroned king as he adjusts himself on the bed.
She blames the sudden, uncharacteristic urge to cry on her drugged-up system.
(Riza doesn’t think she’ll ever get used to how uncommunicative his eyes are. He’s always regarded each and every one of his subordinates with respect and meaning and gratitude, but he’d simply looked over the unit as if taking inventory when they had come by earlier.
But she’ll make do, Riza thinks. She has to. She’s always known him in a way nobody else has, in a deeply intimate way, like a book she’s memorised by heart.)
They fall silent for a few minutes. His lips part a little - she knows he’s about to say something - but it snaps shut again, like he can’t bring himself to say the words.
Riza simply waits for him, like she always has; holding onto his held breath like it's the last thread of hope. She leans into his touch a little closer than necessary.
I’m right here, even if you can’t see me.
Roy smiles.
“I hope I won’t forget your face, Riza.”
#royai#royai fanfic#royai fic#sorry my lunch break is almost over so I gotta go back to work LOL but I will come back and edit this later AHAHAHAH#my new brand is 'excessive usage of chess metaphors' and man. it shows.......#lovely anon <3#have a great week anon!!! mwahmwahmwah!!!!!!#reblogs and comments are always appreciated :")
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The 24th of December
Cw: yandere, kidnapping, obsessive behaviour, implied murder
Ding dong, ding dong
The sounds of the island bell tune rang through the air as the clock struck 6 pm. You were out on a small stroll around the island, trying to calm your nerves as anxiety and tension festered in your stomach. Soon it was time, time for you to go home and get ready. Get ready for what? The dinner with the Nook family. Mr Tom Nook himself had invited you to celebrate toy day with him and his boys. Now this wouldn’t have been a problem a couple of months ago, you had been to their house multiple times and had eaten dinner with them as well. It wasn’t unexpected since you and Tom had an unspoken thing going on. Tom was a little old fashioned when it came to labels, he didn’t need to put any label on most of the factors in his life. His sexuality? Who cares, he's attracted to whoever he’s attracted to. His relationship to Timmy and Tommy? If they wanted to see him as a mentor then that’s fine, if they wanted to see him as a dad then that’s also fine. His relationship with you? Partners, soulmates, whatever you wanted to call it. He didn’t really care too much, he just knew what was there was real, and it very much was not just platonic. None of you had really acknowledged it, it all started as mutual admiration and trust from both sides, as any good relationship should. You watered it down to you wanting comfort and encouragement in your life, which Tom was very good at providing. But then it slowly turned into a sort of attraction, attraction that you were not ready to face. So you ignored it. But then came turkey day. You, just like toy day, were invited to eat dinner with Tom, Timmy and Tommy. And you did, and you had so much fun. The four of you ate food, watched movies, played games, and at the end of the day, after Tom put Timmy and Tommy to bed, you and him hung out together. You two just sat and talked while, admittedly, having a couple of glasses of wine. But that didn't matter, what mattered was what you said during your little chat. Tom had started talking about him and Redds past relationship. Which hadn't been new, Tom had talked about him before, mainly about how horrible he was and how he had hurt him, so this isn't exactly new territory for you. And yet, everytime you heard Tom speak about Redd, you still felt just as angry. Redd had no right treating Tom the way he did. The way he scammed poor Tom as if he was nothing more than a gullible fool, it made your blood boil. Tom deserved to be treated like the wonderful person he was, he deserved someone that loved and cared about him, someone like… You might have gotten a bit too overzealous as you told Tom what a bastard the fox was and how he deserved better. And you might have slipped up and accidentally told him something you probably shouldn't have.
You don't remember much from that evening, maybe because of the alcohol, maybe because of repression. You only remembered small glimpses here and there, some laughter, some crying, at one point you swore you two watched a movie. But beyond that, nothing, nothing but darkness. You had woken up that morning next to Tom, quite literally. It had seemed you two slept in the same bed, his bed. And it would appear that he might have clung onto you during the night because as you woke up, Tom had his arms wrapped around you. You had tried to get up carefully, not wanting to wake him up. But when you did so, Tom pulled you back down rather aggressively. And so, you just laid there for about 20 minutes before Tom finally got up.
Ever since Turkey day, Tom's behavior had started getting weirder and weirder. Anytime you entered the residential service he would stare at you with the same eerie smile as if he was a bear staring at an injured little rabbit. It made you increasingly more uncomfortable, the only reason you felt a little better was the fact that Isabelle was there with you. You remembered one time when you were discussing a resident that had been bothering you with Isabelle. Jacques, the blue bird that simply would not leave you alone. He’d been the cause of much of your disturbance and stress during the upcoming holidays. But during your conversation, you felt a pair of eyes practically drilling themselves into your perimeter. You looked over to Tom only to see he was, like usual, staring at you two. But his gaze seemed more out of it, almost unfocused, and yet, there seemed to be spite in his eyes. As soon as he noticed that YOU noticed him he immediately looked away for a few seconds before rising out of his seat and walking towards you and Isabelle.
"Hi Tom, how’s it going?" You greeted him, giving your construction consultant a half-baked smile. He smiled in return, face going from a slight frown into more of a tired smile. "I’m doing quite alright Y/N. I apologize for intervening but it would appear that O’hare is still bothering you?" Tom said as he gave you a pondering look. "Well... no. He hadn’t really been respectful of my boundaries or left me alone even when I and Isabelle have told him off several times." You told the tanuki, you could see his tail twitch slightly as you told him this. "Ah, I see. Well, I’m terribly sorry to hear that. Maybe it’s my time to step in then? No offense to your methods or anything Isabelle, but they don’t seem to be working. I know you don’t want me to intervene but I feel like I need to do something if it’s getting this bad." Tom said, turning to his coworker and giving her a look of sympathy. He knew Isabelle struggled with her appearance since not a lot of people took her as seriously as they should be, but he couldn’t just stand back while he watched you get harassed by this bird. Isabelle let out a small sigh and a slight frown. "I suppose you're right about that Tom. I think you would be a little bit more effective than I am." She looked back at you. "I’m sorry we let this get so out of hand Y/N." Before you could respond, Tom jumped in and said something, something that might not have meant to sound as hostile as it did, but nevertheless still did. "It’s simply unacceptable." Something about the way he said it, the way his eyes trailed off, the way his eyes narrowed. The initial phrase might not have been so bad, but the way he said it, it sent shivers up your spine, which Tom immediately reacted to. "Hmm? Are you cold Y/N? Or sick?" His eyes turned from minacious to gentle like a light switch being turned on. "N-No no! It’s fine. Just a random shiver. Don’t worry Tom." You said with a smile. A genuine smile. Even if Tom could be a little obstinate and overprotective, you knew it came from a good place. He cared for you, and you appreciated that. "Nonsense, if you’re feeling under the weather then you should go home Y/N dear." Tom insisted as he stroked your arm gently. You knew there was no fighting him once he made his mind up, guess you’re sick now.
That evening when you left the residential services you could feel Tom staring at you through his window as you left. You knew he meant well but sometimes he could be a little overwhelming. You just hoped he didn’t do anything to harsh with Jacques
You let out a deep sigh, a cloud of fog exiting your mouth as you did so. Cold air filled your lungs as you took yet another breath in. It was almost time, you should probably head home. As you walked across the shoreline of the island, on your way to your house, you felt a clump form in your stomach. You felt strange, almost uneasy. You didn’t want to say that you felt anxious about the dinner, but that was probably the closest expression that would describe how you felt. You knew it wouldn’t be a problem at first. Timmy and Tommy would be present until it was their bedtime, it was after that bedtime that you were worried about. You hadn’t been alone with Tom since Turkey day, and you were worried about what would happen once you were. But at the same time, you needed to talk to him, a talk which could not happen if anyone else was present during the conversation. Your thoughts came to a close as you neared your house. It didn’t matter if you felt weird about the whole thing, you needed to talk to him. And this might be the only chance to do so.
You took a deep breath, building yourself up to do such a simple task as knocking on a door. It was time. Ignoring all the feelings brewing up in your stomach and head you took one last breath, mist once more flowing out as you did so. And then, you knocked. It only took a couple of seconds before the door practically threw itself up to reveal two small, and very excited, tanukis.
"Y/N!...ʸ/ᴺᵎ" The two boys shouted. They were wearing matching christmas sweaters and Santa hats that were way too big for them. Timmy having a red sweater with the words naughty on it and Tommy having a green one with the words nice on it. Timmy grabbed ahold of your hand with his small paw and pulled you inside, all while Tommy enthusiastically bounced up and down. As you were pulled inside an immediate warmth embraced your body, like a thick blanket on a rainy night. Even so, a more prominent scent engulfed you, the aroma of fresh food was almost overbearing as you walked in. "Ohoho. Do my ears deceive me or is that our dear island representative?" You heard Toms voice all the way from the kitchen. You couldn’t help but smile as you could practically hear the grin present on his face. Tommy let out a small giggle as he ran up to the kitchen. "Don’t know! Guess you’ll have to come see for yourself!" You took off your jacket and beanie as Timmy led you over to the couch. But rather than sitting down in it, he sat you down on the big fluffy carpet next to the chimney and the big Christmas tree. Underneath it laid almost a dozen presents, seems like the constant debt that Tom was handing out finally seemed to pay off. Dumb pun aside, you felt yourself smile as you saw the sight before you. Tommy was now pulling Tom out from the kitchen and into the living room. He was wearing a Santa hat and a red christmas sweater that said "worlds best santa". As he and Tommy walked up to you and sat down next to you and Timmy, you crossed your arms and cocked your eyebrows. "I wasn’t informed that this was going to be a sweater party. Could have warned me about that, now I just feel underdressed." Tom chuckled slightly at this as he took off his hat and tossed it to you. "Here you go. Put that on, yes yes."
For the rest of that evening, you and the nooks ate the food that Tom had cooked up, all of which was absolutely delicious. Joking around as the time passed, and you felt more and more comfortable as time went on. So much to the point where you didn’t know why you felt anxious before. Finally, at 8 pm, you all gathered once more around the Christmas tree. Timmy and Tommy started unwrapping their presents in glee, most of which were from Tom, some of them were from Isabelle and Blathers, and some of them from you. Every once in a while, you and Tom would open some presents. Timmy and Tommy had given you a drawing of you and them together, which was certainly a cute gesture. You had brought the two into a big hug after that one. The boys had given Tom a mug that said "#1 dad", which almost brought the tanuki to tears. You had given Tom a custom sweater vest, just like the one he had back in the day
And still, Tom's present was something that you hadn’t quite expected. You had picked up the box which was neatly wrapped with red wrapping paper and some yellow glittery ribbons. "Ooh, what could this be? Is it a puppy?" You joked as you smirked at Tom. He let out a small laugh. "No, not quite, but be careful when unwrapping. I do hope you enjoy it, the boys helped me pick it out." Now you were intrigued. You carefully unwrapped the box and opened its lid only to see... "oh my god..." there, in the box, laid a crown. The one you had seen in the Ables shop plenty of times, the one that you had ranted about to Tom, about how you couldn’t afford it but wanted it so badly. That crown was laying before you, in your hands. "I... I’m... I-I don’t know... what to say I-'' you looked at Tom, his eyes were full of adoration and love, pure unfiltered love. And that frightened you. "Thank you Tom. Thank you." You tried putting on a smile, but it was hard as that huge clump of anxiety started to build up again. "Oh the pleasures all mine, Y/N my dear." Tom said to you as he tilted his head and gave you a gentle smile. Timmy and Tommy had started to giggle as they looked at each other, thinking the exact same thing. Everyone in the room knew what was going on, but only one person, you, knew what was truly going on.
The gift unwrapping continued. Now it was just Timmy and Tommy left that had gifts. They kept going, tearing into the gifts like hungry predators biting into their terrified prey, like... like... you lost your train of thought as you looked over at Tom. His eyes were focused on Timmy and Tommy, carefully watching their reactions to their gifts. But ever so often, Tom would look over at you, and if your eyes ever met, he would smile at you. Maybe he did it to calm you down but it sure didn’t help, not even in the slightest.
Soon, Timmy and Tommy had successfully opened all of their presents and had now shifted to playing with any of the toys they got. But that didn’t last long as Timmy let out a huge yawn and Tommy almost slumped over. Oh no. “Well, looks like it’s time for you two to go to bed, hm?” Tom said as he moved closer to the boys, taking the two in each hand. “N... noo... we’re not...” Tommy couldn’t even finish as he was interrupted by a huge yawn. “No, you’re done. Come on now.” And so, Tom led the two small tanukis up the stairs and into their bedroom. “Goodnight.” You called out to them before returning to your own state of panic. This was it. You were gonna be completely alone with Tom.
“Now then, terribly sorry about that Y/N.” Tom said as he came down the stairs. You tried to calm down but it ultimately failed. Tom was very observant, so it didn’t take long for him to see that something was wrong. “Y/N? Are you alright dear? You look a little pale.” He said as he sat down next to you. “....Tom I.... the crown, it really wasn’t necessary.” You managed to get your first concern out. You looked down in the box once more, you just couldn’t believe he would actually give you something like that. “Tsk, Y/N please. I tell you what, it was nothing really. And when I say that I’m not just being humble. It really is nothing, I assure you. I could buy five of those for you if I wanted to. So please, don’t feel guilty.” You knew he meant to say that as a way to comfort you, but that only made you feel worse. “Y-Yes I understand that it’s not a lot to you but, for me, it’s very much a lot. I know you mean well Tom but really, I just don’t know if I can accept this. I mean, it’s just too expensi-'' Tom interrupted you as he placed a hand on your cheek. You froze up as you looked into his big blue eyes. They were so calm, so gentle, so utterly terrifying. “Trust me my darling, nothing is too expensive when it comes to you.” As he told you this, he leaned in and planted a small peck on your lips. You felt your face turn pink as he let out a chuckle, still holding onto your face. “I’m happy I got to celebrate toy day with you Y/N, my sweet sweet Y/N.” Before you could respond, you felt yourself being picked up bridal style and carried away. Tom carried you to his room, it would seem like he wanted to sleep together again. Which wouldn’t be so much of a problem, the man was built like a giant teddy bear. But right now, there was nothing you wanted less than to be in close contact with Tom. But it would seem like nothing was going to stop him.
As he laid you down carefully, he laid next to you and brought you in close to him, stroking your hair and nuzzling up to you. You were completely quiet, feeling like if you said something you would die on the spot.
“...Tom....” you said quietly, trying to build up the curate to ask him the question that you came here for. “Yes?” His voice was soft and smooth, like honey, and it shook your very being. “... what... what did you say to Jacque?” As soon as the question left your mouth the atmosphere turned cold. Toms eyes trailed off as all the warmth left his eyes. “... I said what needed to be said.” It had been three weeks since Jacques had mysteriously moved out of the island and it wasn’t hard to put two and two together, you were certain that Tom had something to do with it. “I asked you not to go overboard...” You said, looking down and avoiding Tom's gaze, a gaze that was now fixated onto you. “He was harassing you Y/N! What was I supposed to do? Acting nice wasn’t going to work! I was simply-“ Tom cut himself off as he realised he was practically shouting. He let out a deep sigh. “I was simply protecting... what is mine...”
As he said this, he placed a kiss on your forehead. This certainly caught you off guard. “I’m sorry? What did you say?” You asked him, but he didn’t answer, at least not in the way you wanted him to. “You know, when I was a boy, toy day never felt as magical as everyone set it up to be. Me and my family didn’t have too many bells back then, so most I ever got were three broken crayons. Even then, I couldn’t enjoy it without feeling the guilt of pushing more money problems onto my parents. But now...” Tom let out yet another deep chuckle, he looked at you with hungry eyes, eyes that pierced into your soul. “Now, I’ve got all the bells in the world! I could buy anything! Anything and everything! Except for... one thing. One thing that I crave so deeply, yet, can never buy. You don’t understand how many years I have gone through, how many toy days I’ve had to endure. You don’t understand the amount of towns I’ve lived in, the amount of humans who have abandoned me! How do I know that you’re not going to leave me? Just like my previous humans, just like my parents, just like Redd!? I don’t want to lose you Y/N! I can’t lose you Y/N!” Toms outburst made you shrink down in his arms. You felt yourself start to shake slightly as he continued.
“Now, now that I finally have the resources, I’m going to MAKE SURE you never leave me Y/N. My sweet little darling.” You started to struggle in his grasp, hoping to get away from him. But it was no use, he was so much stronger than you in every single way. ”Hey now, hey now.... shhh, shhh. It’s okay. Everything is going to be okay. I’m here, no one is ever going to harass you ever again. Not if I have anything to say about it.” Tom said as he brought you closer once more, this time he started to kiss you a bit more roughly rather than a quick peck on the lips. You knew that struggling was futile, so you simply tried to relax yourself as he enjoyed himself. Once he was done, he looked directly at you. “This toy day, I’ve made sure to get myself something special. Just for me.” What you didn’t know at the time was that he had locked all of the windows and doors. But you would soon find out in the morning.
“I love you Y/N. Maybe you don’t realise it yet. But I do. I’ll show you, soon you will see just how much I love you.”
———————
It feels so weird to say that it’s been 2 months since I last wrote for Tom Nook. Like what? What have I even been doing??? I’ve been feeling the withdrawals and I wanted to make a little Christmas special. So hope y’all enjoy! Merry Christmas and happy holidays!
#yandere#acnh#animal crossing#yandere animal crossing#yandere acnh#animal crossing x reader#ac x reader#animal crossing new horizons#Tom Nook#yandere tom nook#tom nook acnh#timmy and tommy#tw yandere#tw kidnapping#tw obsessive behaviour#tw implied murder#yandere x reader#yandere x darling#yandere acnh x reader#Tom nook x reader#Yandere Tom nook x reader
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children of tragedy (rewrite)
note: heyo, rewriting an old fic of mine. i hope to be able to rewrite all 5 chapters quickly. if you guys don’t like it, i won’t continue because its kinda dark and idk i feel like no ones gonna like it anyways. please leave feedback though, im on my knees begging for validation. also sorry if its ooc, please forgive me.
++ sorry the beginning reveals how rusty my writing is </3
(*** i wrote this as as a fem reader fic because it worked easier with how i wrote things.)
+ please remember that this is purely a way to get out my own feelings/struggles in a healthy way. also i’m sure this works better as a ship fic, but someone asked for this version so yeah :).
** mistakes are mine im too tired and lazy to proofread right now.
warnings: talk of alcohol abuse, slight mention of domestic abuse.
🏷 @peggycarter-steverogers
ch.2 | ch.3
[love, fragility, and the memories that eat us alive.]
meeting wanda changed everything for you. she wasn't like anyone you’d ever known. she was always kind, never quick to lose her temper or scream and yell at you for things you couldn't possibly control. she was warm, tender with everything she did.
your relationship with her was very new to you. it was much different in comparison to your past experiences — and you weren't quite sure what to think of it. there was no doubt that you appreciated her and everything she did for you, but you were still waiting for her to snap. it was almost like a need burning throughout your body. being able to grasp the idea that someone could ever really, truly be gentle with you was out of the question. in turn, you’d push all of her buttons, hoping that she would get mad enough and get it over with.
no one could really fault you for it. the steady stream of abuse was the nearly the entirety of your life, both physical and mental.
lately wanda was having to pick you up from wherever she could find you, most of the time in the alleyways of of bars you’d been kicked from.
once you were drunk enough (anyone really) you weren’t afraid to say the first thing that came to your mind, offensive or not – which meant it was no surprise when you’d been involved in fights. the alcohol numbed a majority of the pain anyway, so didn’t really make much of a difference to you.
with this happening so many times, you figured wanda would be angry with you – perhaps so angry she would find it within her to hit you. but each and every time wanda brought you home, she made sure you were comfortable before tending to your inuries.
what you didn't know was that being so worried for you all the time, every second of everyday, was beginning to take a toll on her. wanda only wanted to fix you, but you were making it more than difficult for her to do that.
she knew very little about your past, simply because you didn't like talking about it and she didn't want to push. but there was no denying the fact that wanda was curious.
sometimes she would ask questions, only between the soft moments the both of you shared. much to her dismay, most of her curiosities were turned down. on the rare occasions you shared brighter memories of your childhood, wanda would bookmark them in the back of her head.
no harm would ever come from her, but you didn’t know that. at least not right now.
too many times had your exes used the trust you’d so politely given against you. to be fair with wanda though, you shared only the brightest parts of your childhood. they were very seldom, but the ones you could remember were the ones you enjoyed talking about the most.
despite her limited knowledge, it wasn’t hard for her to tell that you’d already been hurt plenty of times before. apart from the fact that wanda was overall truly a good person, it made her even more gentle with you than she’d ever been with anyone before.
on top of that, wanda wasn’t stupid. she picked up on every little flinch you tried to hide, or the times you had to ask her if it was okay if you could do something on your own free will, and she definitely didn’t forget about the countless times you berated yourself over small, humanly mistakes. a frown never failed to decorate her face when these things happened.
wanda tried her hardest to make it known how much she loved you, and how she would never intentionally hurt you. she never once lifted a hand on you or raised her voice in the slightest, even when she felt like she’d met a breaking point.
the last few weeks seemed to be putting more stress on her than usual. the gashes on your body seemed to be cutting deeper and the bruises on your jaw and rib cage were beginning to turn a darker shade of indigo as each fight became more aggressive. your knuckles had been swollen, irritated to the point your hands trembled when your palms were held open.
you completely missed how drastically wanda’s mood had changed. she became quiet, seemingly lost in thought most of the time until she needed to take care of you. she grew tired, a purple tint claiming a spot below the lip of her eyes. fifteen pounds of weight had shredded from her body and her head grew dizzy every time she stood up. none of that mattered to wanda though, you were her number one priority.
alcohol was the biggest issue in the way. if wanda could get you to stop drinking for just one night she might be able to reason with you.
the brunette knew that was out of the question though, because she knew no matter how many times she told or expressed her love for you, you wouldn’t stop until you wanted to, not when she wanted you to.
you never allowed yourself to be vulnerable around her, so she never knew how you truly felt about the things going wrong in your life. there was an unbearable amount of pain when it came to confronting what you tried so hard to push away. the idea of allowing yourself to heal, to mourn the things taken away from you caused a lump in the back of your throat. living in denial was the easiest way to cope - that was as long as you could bear the damage it created.
(and whether wanda knew it or not, knowing that you were causing her so much misery was the worst feeling you’d ever faced. all she had ever given you was love and in return she was met with destruction.)
so once again you found yourself walking alone, a slight stagger between steps. it was cold, each breath exhaled from your lips could be seen vaporizing into the air. every movement ripped what balance you thought you’d gained right out from underneath you. the feeling of numbness in your fingertips brought your attention away from the fact that you didn’t know where you were.
the buildings all looked familiar, but everything was hazy. being drunk wasn’t always the fun everyone bragged about. too tired to carry on, you found yourself slumped in the back of an alleyway next to a dirty garbage bin. it reeked of sour, expired food, but you’d given up on caring about anything else other than trying to drink yourself numb.
your mind began to wander. flashes of early mornings with wanda’s hands wrapped around your waist, breath tickling the back of your neck while the sun began to rise started filling your thoughts. the warm feeling wanda gave you outweighed every bad emotion you could possibly think of.
but as you stared at the ground beneath your feet things began to spiral. your throat contracted, the guilt you tried so hard to swallow began clawing its way out of your body.
(and holy fuck you could not deal with this right now.)
you curled your head between your legs in an attempt to shield yourself away from something that was born from the inside.
it was too much.
without a chance to stop what was happening, your stomach began heaving. a mix of bile and alcohol drooled from your mouth as you continued to vomit.
you missed the sound of footsteps coming from behind you. the feeling of a hand on your shoulder caused you to jerk back, slamming your back into the brick wall.
“hey, hey, it’s me. you’re okay. it’s just me, wanda.” she cooed.
through teary eyes, you looked up at the woman in front of you.
she’s your girlfriend.
(but you weren’t sure that you deserved to call her that after everything you’ve put her through.)
“what are you doing here?” your voice wavered as you wiped your mouth free of excess vomit. you sniffled backing away from her.
she tilted her head, desperate to read what your eyes would give away. “i’m here to bring you back home. can you stand up for me?” you shook your head. you were too exhausted and dizzy from the alcohol to even think about standing.
“that’s okay,” she whispered. “here, i’m going to pick you up, okay? wrap your arms around my neck and your legs around my hips.”
“mkay.” your speech was still slurred, but at that point all wanda cared about was getting you home safe.
you didn’t remember the ride home or wanda carrying you out of the car to lay you on the couch. by the time she got the supplies she needed to wrap and tend to your wounds, you were completely passed out.
when you woke up you were greeted with a glass of water and an over the counter pain medication. you swallowed the pills and moved to set the glass on the coffee table, but wanda beat you to it and took it out of your hands. she smiled down at you, taking a seat next to you. she tucked your hair behind your ears, giving your face one last gentle stroke.
thats when you noticed her eyes were red.
you immediately sat up, crossing your legs and moved closer to her. you’d hoped to comfort her somehow, but the shake of her head broke sonething inside you.
you bit your lip, anxiety shooting throughout your body. she sensed your nervousness and took your hands in hers, rubbing circles on the outside of your wrist with her thumbs.
“i love you, you know that. at least i hope you do,” she let out a soft laugh. “but i can’t keep doing this.”
your heart dropped, and you could feel the all too familiar feeling of guilt building its way back up. you tried to speak, but wanda cut you off.
“i need you to hear this.”
when you didn’t respond she took the opportunity to continue saying what she needed to get out.
“i have exhausted myself to a breaking point. i can’t keep worrying about you every single night you’re gone. i can’t be there every time you need saving. i’m losing myself.”
she paused to check and see how you were handling her words. for once you weren’t shutting down. you were genuinely trying to process what she was trying to say.
(and she was so proud of you for that. she almost considered giving you another chance. but she knew for the better, she couldn’t do that. not to you, not to her.)
“i’ve packed your things. you can leave tomorrow morning if you wish, i don’t mind having you for another meal or two.”
she squeezed your hands and got up from the couch, allowing you to take in what she said. it was in that moment when you realized that even when she’d finally drawn the line, had enough, she didn’t yell at you. she wasn’t angry, she was just sad.
you were chasing after something that wasn’t there, and it never would be there.
and now you were able to register just how much you’d fucked up the one good thing in your life.
#wanda maximoff x reader#scarlet witch x reader#wanda maximoff fic#wanda maximoff x you#wanda maximoff imagine#avengers imagine#avengers fanfiction
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RaccoonInnit. (a Rewind one-shot?)
This a ficlet based on the fanfic Rewind by @a-non-ymouswriter, and exploring what if Tommy and Tubbo were hybrids in the Rewind universe. Especially with Tommy being very clingy because of trauma.
TW (Trigger warning) for emotional abuse, manipulation and mention of self-harm.
Wanna read more?
Apologies for any grammar errors, english is not my first language.
—————
Hybrids.
They come in many shapes and sizes, including different abilities that help with survival. But with every advantage comes a disadvantage, or a necessity to keep living.
And for Tommy Innit, there was one necessity that always made him feel ashamed.
He isn’t clingy, at least not all the time. But when spring is over, and the leaves start to fall, holding on to precious things is necessary to feel at ease and ready for the dangerous seasons. It's something that raccoon hybrids often do, hug their family or friends tightly at a young age to feel protected, and then offer protection when they reach adulthood.
If he could change one thing about his life, it would be that.
********
"You too, huh?" Dream asks awkwardly, Theo's head is buried in one of his shoulders with his arms close around his body.
Tobias is in front of him, his eyes look away and he doesn't give him an answer. He only pulls Tommy closer to him, even though the boy is already clutching his left arm very strongly.
Sapnap and George try not to laugh next to him, but the other people around don't find the situation as funny as they do. They are supposed to have a meeting after all. And both Tobias and Dream manage to sit with the two people still clinging to them.
Well, this will be difficult. He thinks as he notices how Theo closes his grip a little more tightly and hears faintly the sound of a growl. But he is not upset by it.
The thing that made him upset was finding out that Theo had hidden that need from them. George had been the first one to notice him a little distant, but by the time they really thought something was wrong, they found the man curled up in his bed around blankets, ears twitching, ringtail bristling, and awfully whimpering.
None of them were animal hybrids, but that doesn't mean they couldn’t have asked, that's why Dream was angrier at himself when he demanded Theo for an explanation.
"I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable." His protege had said with a low gaze and clearly embarrassed.
After hearing that, Dream didn't hesitate to give permission to be hugged.
********
Tobias feels angry.
He is feeling a lot of things actually. Happy being hugged by Tommy, frustrated at the sight of Dream with Theo, and hurt by seeing the aggressive look in the eyes of his old best friend. Unlike Tommy in his arms, who almost seemed to be sleeping with a faint smile.
But I deserve that look, don't I? He remembers one day, very long ago, when Theo asked him with an embarrassed face if he could hug him for the rest of the day. What was his response?
"I don't think that’s a good idea, we have a meeting discussing your situation, remember?" George's house had been burned and Dream had asked for consequences. "Besides, it would look embarrassing."
But by the time he saw the dirt pillar reaching the sky, he wished nothing more than to be able to hold Tommy one more time and never let go. He would've been more clingy than his friend would’ve ever needed.
And then Dream showed up with him. The strike of anger and jealousy that he felt during the winter days after, thinking of how his friend would hug that smug bastard looking for safety.
That mental picture always made him regret so many things.
********
Dream knew exactly what to do when Tommy, face red and looking down, grabbed his hoodie in silence.
In the free time he got between his visits to Logstedshire, he had read a lot of things about raccoon hybrids. How they tend to be aggressive towards people they distrust, how they used to find small places to sleep often away from big groups of people, how needy they could become during cold days.
He hugged the boy, moving himself and Tommy to the small tent to avoid the rain.
Sitting in the bed, he stroked the boy's hair and ears, and he noticed small sobs coming from him.
"Why?" Tommy's voice sounded hurt, but he didn't move away. "Why do I only have you?"
Dream only pulled him closer. "Because I'm your friend, Tommy." and the boy only cried more.
They stayed like that for quite a while, until Tommy's breathing got slower. What started with him clutching Dream's hoodie, ended with him hugging the man during his sleep.
After that, hugging Dream became a habit during the rainy days.
********
Tubbo woke up with a jolt when he heard a clap of thunder. The hard sound made an echo in the presidential office.
It was raining a lot those days. But as he looked at the window, a sudden fear rose up inside him as he remembered something. He almost collided with Ranboo as he exited the room.
"Tubbo? Wha- What's wrong? Are you-"
"I need to go to Tommy." He quickly walked past him.
"Tommy?" Ranboo's voice was close to a whisper. But he hurried up to follow him. "Why do you want to see him?"
Tubbo tried to ignore how soft the voice of the hybrid had turned. "It's raining. He gets clingy when it's cold and he needs someone to hold onto."
That's when Ranboo blocked his way, meters before he could get to the front door. "Step away, please." Tommy needed him, but the tall man grabbed him by the shoulders.
"Tubbo, he is- You can't go see him."
"Why not?" His voice grew louder and he felt irritated as he took one step forward. "He can't come back, but that doesn't mean I can't go to him. Let me through!"
"I'm not letting you go there, Tubbo." His tone was firm. After all, if he exited the building, Ranboo wouldn't be able to follow.
But goat hybrids are stubborn, especially when something is standing in their way. His horns tackled Ranboo's chest strongly, but his tall friend didn't move.
"I need to see him Ranboo!" He put all his strength into trying to push him. "I shouldn't have exiled him! He is all alone, don't you get it?!" Tubbo tried to ignore the tears running down his cheeks. "Wilbur- he's gone, Phil and Techno are not here either. I- I'm the only he can..."
He dropped to his knees as Ranboo held him close. "He is too proud to admit it. He- He bites himself to try to avoid asking. He did that a lot in Pogtopia."
"I- I know. You told me."
"Please, let me go."
"I can't."
"Why?..." How did he forget the answer?
"Tubbo," Ranboo embraced him, his voice sounding choked as well. "He's gone."
********
Philza turned around when he felt his cape being pulled.
They'd just finished their part of the outing and his son stood behind him with that horrible smiling mask covering his face.
"Tommy?" he talked to him in the softest tone he could, like treating a small animal that could flee at any second.
It was strange when Dream left Tommy with Phil for the mission of the day, and it was even stranger that his son had started a contact after being silent for months. He missed his voice, louder than Techno’s and warm like Wil’s. Ender, he missed him so much. Even so, he tried to hide the hope in his words. "Do you need something?"
Just let me hear you. Talk to me, please. But the boy didn't answer, his ears were down and his ring tail moved slowly. "We're close to the base, I know you want to wait for Dream but it's getting cold-"
He stopped as Tommy’s head hit Phil's chest weakly, and his hand grabbed part of his robe.
It's something that raccoon hybrids often do.
Philza couldn't resist a fond smile.
He realized that his hands were shaking when they rose up to touch the boy’s hair, and he caressed his ears as gently as he could.
Closing his eyes, forcing some painful memories away, he remembered his younger boy's face, blue eyes with a shy and pleading look to be held. He remembered the warmth of holding him during the rainy days when he was little. And when he remembered how Tommy called him dad a long time ago, Phil's eyes started to tear up.
His arms hugged Tommy strongly. Avians had instincts too. Wrap their loved ones in their wings it served to provide, or in his case, feel comfort. And so his black wings surrounded his son in a tight embrace as he breathed in the boy's hair.
I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. Forgive me, please don't go. He wanted to scream those words but for some reason, he couldn't. He felt Tommy shaking and his grip tightened a little bit more.
He didn't want to let go, no if it meant the boy going back with Dream.
He could kill him, he thought. Once Techno came back, they could end with the nightmare that surrounded them and his son would finally be safe.
But his thoughts of hope were interrupted when he noticed how Tommy was struggling under him. And he barely managed to avoid the swing of the ax directed at his heart.
"Tommy?! What-?" The boy was crying away from Phil. Tears dropped below the mask, he listened to ugly breathing as Tommy hyperventilated, his tail moved aggressively and he heard a growl coming from him.
He forgot that Tommy was claustrophobic.
"Mate, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to-"
Tommy's ears moved quickly to the side and his head turned. Dream was walking towards them with Techno next to him. And before he noticed, the boy ran towards the other masked man and tackled him into a hug.
Could he really call himself Tommy's father? Shame and frustration filled his broken heart as he watched Tommy being petted by the man he hated. "It's fine, Toms. I'm here." Dream seemed ignorant of the deadly looks he got from him and Techno. "We took longer than we thought, but I knew you could hold on."
As sick as Dream’s games were, that was the moment Phil started to question if he really deserved to have Tommy back.
********
Technoblade thought that Tommy was running at him.
It was a foolish thought, the voices told him, but it still hurt. He would've asked what happened, but when he saw Phil's look of regret and frustration, he could get an idea.
Especially when it also happened to him a few weeks ago. The last rains started to become poisonous to every living thing that wasn't crimson. Lucky for them, the most basic armor could offer protection, but the durability would drop quickly.
And because of that, he, Tommy, and Dream were waiting for the rain to pass inside some caves next to a mountain.
The green man went deep, looking for coal to make torches in case mobs would spawn in the dark. That left the piglin hybrid with Tommy. The raccoon boy curled up against a wall, hugging his legs with his mask covering his face.
And he sat next to him. Not too close to touch, but enough to notice the boy shaking, the fur on his ring tail was bristling as well.
"I'm here, you know." He told him. Just like his father, he had noticed the way the boy fiddled with his tail and tried to hide his ears in his hoodie. "We don't have to talk, and I won't hug you back if you don't want to."
In the past, when Tommy's pride got the worst of him, Techno would always tell Wilbur or Phil. It was his way of compensating for the fact that he didn't like that kind of physical contact.
But at that moment, he was more than willing to let Tommy hold him as much as he needed to, even if it would take all of his strength not to hug back, even if the boy despised his existence, and even when he knew that he had lost all right to call Tommy his brother. He wanted to be there for him.
But the raccoon hybrid kept quiet. Only when he looked at him he realized that he was sleeping. Shivering, but his breathing was slow.
"Tech, I'm cold." He frowned at the memory. The voices began to speak louder, demanding that he give some warmth.
Techno's eyes stared at him softly. Despite not being sixteen anymore, Tommy still looked so small next to him. His arm surrounded him, but before making contact, another memory came.
Suddenly, it was not the boy resting anymore, he was curled up on the floor, shaking, blood dripping from his nose, and with several bruises on his face.
"It stays in the pit."
His hand backed off immediately. A wave of quiet anger filled his mind. Some of the voices were cruel to remind him of that sight.
Blue eyes saw him with anger once. And then again in a plain, in a little refuge whose name Techno had already forgotten. Tommy looked at him that way when he mocked his pain. And that look would be engraved in his heart for the rest of his days, he wouldn't forget.
How could he? When the boy's face was getting hard to remember recently, always covered in a mask and staying silent.
Technoblade felt the most pain at the thought of forgetting Tommy's face.
He stood up and left his cape around the boy carefully. He walked until he reached the exit of the caves. It was still raining, so he leaned on one of the walls and watched the raindrops slowly kill everything.
He breathed, ordering his thoughts and calming every single voice. Their mission wasn't over. The best thing he could do was not lose his focus.
A few minutes later, he heard footsteps behind him, and the smiling mask appeared in his vision. Dream held his cape in front of him.
It was a single second of confusion. He grabbed the cape and the masked man spoke, making Techno's rage rise once again.
"Don't show compassion now, Technoblade. You once told him to die, and I pushed him to keep living."
Dream went back to the caves without expecting an answer, leaving him alone with the screaming in his head, every voice demanding blood, and never getting the satisfaction.
Techno liked to consider himself a calm individual, able to control his emotions better than others. But the voices called him a hypocrite when he pictured all the ways he could kill the masked man beside him.
********
Tobias blinks a couple of times when he feels a movement by his side.
And he almost screams seeing Theo clutching part of his shirt, eyes closed, and sleeping very peacefully over his shoulder.
For a second he considers the possibility of him dreaming, but he remembers entering Tubbo's house just minutes ago, he sat on the big couch feeling tired, and he didn't hear Theo come in.
He must be waiting for him. He recalls Dream asking Theo to wait since there were other matters to be discussed. And Tommy had gone with Tubbo to do other things as well.
A little part of him feels sad that he can't stop time at this very moment. But a warm feeling fills him as well, and he closes his eyes getting closer to the body beside him.
Just like raccoon hybrids often hug their family or friends.
He smiles. Theo can kill him later, he wants to enjoy the moment a little more.
—————
Man, this was a long one. You could say this is a bunch of ficlets into one? I dunno I just wanted to write something sad.
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𝐏𝐫𝐢𝐝𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐉𝐨𝐲
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐒𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧
↳ 𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 | uh fighting? Lmk if anything.
↳ 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭 | 2124
𝐚/𝐧 ~ sorry I haven't updated this story in a while. But I'm back now!
masterlist | series masterlist | taglist
<- previous chapter
After a couple of days, Rory kinda got used to her new "home." Since Tony didn't know how long it would be before they went back to California, and with Pepper gone, they decided it was best if Rory just took a break from school.
Rory did eventually grow to like her new room. She was not allowed to leave the current floor, so she basically just spent all of her time there. Tony was gone all day and didn't get home until very late at night, meaning Rory had to have food delivered. She didn't mind, though. She figured that if they end up staying, she'll be able to tell Tony what all the good restaurants are.
Tony never told her anything about why they were here with the exception of, "Daddy has business."
So in order to pass the time, Rory would read or watch movies. She even took up drawing which turned out to be something she isn't too bad at.
This morning, Tony was already gone by the time Rory got up, so she got dressed and migrated to the living area. She sat on one of the couches near the large window and began sketching the tall buildings surrounding her.
As she finished the shading on one of the skyscrapers, she peered back up to see a tall man with long, black hair dressed in what looked like a Halloween costume standing on the terrace. Rory put down her sketchbook and looked closer. He was very tall and had large, golden horns that decorated the top of his head. She had no clue as to why this man was standing outside of her window on her father's building.
Rory looked to her right and noticed her father, in the Iron Man suit, land on the landing pad. The man just stood there, watching as machines swiftly removed the armor from Tony's body.
The strange man made his way into the room from the balcony. The room she was in. Rory didn't know what to do. She was frozen, scared. Instead of running away as any sane person would, Rory remained in her chair.
The large man entered the room. He studied his surroundings, his eyes eventually landing on Rory. "Who might you be?" He asked with disdain.
Rory could do nothing but blink at him, too afraid to speak. He opened his mouth to say more, only to be interrupted by the presence of Tony. "Rory, come here," Tony said blankly.
Rory immediately dropped her things and ran to her father's side. Tony wrapped his arm around her protectively, hoping to shield her with his body.
The man watched this all happen before finally speaking, "Please tell me you're going to appeal to my humanity." He spoke as if she weren't there.
"Actually I'm planning to threaten you," Tony responded. Rory couldn't sense any different emotions other than his natural sarcastic tone.
"You should have left your armor on for that," the man bantered, walking closer to Tony and Rory.
"Yeah," Tony pushed Rory behind the bar. "It's seen a bit of mileage, and you've got the glow stick of destiny." Rory crouched down below the bar and pulled her knees into her chest. She couldn't help but let tears stain her cheeks, afraid of what was happening. "Would you like a drink?" Tony asked the man as he walked behind the bar, actively trying to ignore you in hopes you wouldn't become a target.
Rory heard the other man laugh. "Stalling me won't change anything," he said. If Rory knew what it meant, she would describe their conversation as passive-aggressive.
"No, no. threatening." Tony began making himself a drink. "No drink? You sure? I'm having one.
"The Chitauri are coming. Nothing will change that." His words sounded like gibberish to Rory. "What have I to fear?"
Rory watched her father casually make a drink as if nothing was wrong. "The Avengers. That's what we call ourselves. We're sort of like a team." Rory had no idea what he was going on about. ""Earth's mightiest heroes"-type thing."
"Yes, I've met them."
"Yea," Tony's smile helped calm Rory down. He had to have the situation under control, right? "It takes us a while to get any traction, I'll give you that one. But let's do a headcount, here. Your brother, the demi-god," demi-god? "A super-soldier, a living legend who kind of lives up to the legend." He secretly slipped a metal-looking band on each wrist.
"A man with breathtaking anger-management issues, a couple of master assassins, and you, big fella," none of his words were making any sense. "You've managed to piss off every single one of them."
"That was the plan."
"Not a great plan," Tony walked past you and out from the bar. "When they come, and they will, they'll come for you."
"I have an army."
"We have a hulk."
Rory finally gathered enough courage and stood up carefully. She peeked her head over the bar to watch the men while also trying to stay out of the way. Tony was approaching the man as they spoke; the man keeping his ground.
"I thought the beast had wandered off," the man said.
"You're missing the point. There's no throne," Tony's voice rose slightly. "There is no version of this where you come out on top. Maybe your army comes and maybe it's too much for us, but it's all on you. Because if we can't protect the Earth, you can be damn well sure we'll avenge it."
Tony took a sip of his drink while the man took a few steps closer, a scowl spreading across his features. "How will your friends have time for me when they're so busy fighting you?"
For the first time since this scene began, Tony looked scared. The man brought his scepter-looking thing up and tapped it against Tony's chest with a clang noise. The man's face dropped for a second before he tried a second time, and then a third. "This usually works."
Tony didn't look scared anymore. "Well, performance issues, it's not uncommon. One out of five--" his sentence was cut short when the man forcefully grabbed Tony's throat and threw him onto the floor. Rory squealed and then immediately covered her mouth.
The man turned his head in Rory's direction with a puzzled look. He turned away from her as soon as Tony stood up and went for his neck again. "You will all fall before me," he said.
"Deploy!" Tony called before the man threw him out the window, shattering the glass. Rory screamed with all her might. Did she just watch her Dad be murdered? What was he going to do to her?
Rory hid behind the bar once more, watching and listening closely to her surroundings. A loud sound rippled through the room causing Rory to throw her hands over her ears to block out the noise. She peeked over the bar and saw nothing but more shards of glass and broken furniture.
The man stared Rory down. "Who are you?"
Rory gulped, "who are you?"
He chuckled. "I am Loki, of Asgard. I'm surprised you have not yet heard of me." His tone was a lot softer with her than it was with her father. "What is your name, little one?"
"Rory," she nervously answered his question. "My name is Rory."
"Let me guess; Stark's child?" She didn't say anything. Rory simply nodded. "Ah I see," he gave you an almost heartwarming smile. "Come here, Rory."
Fearing she had no other choice, Rory walked over to Loki and he crouched down to meet her gaze. He smiled at her. Rory watched her father fly up behind him. She was more than thrilled to see her father alive and more tears fell from her eyes.
"And one more thing," Loki's face dropped and he spun around to face Tony. "Get away from my daughter!" Tony shot at Loki, sending him flying backward. Rory jumped out of the way, too stunned to do anything else. With Loki knocked out, Tony looked towards his daughter, "Rory go hide, now!" He flew away into the sky, and Rory wasted no time in running to her bedroom.
She slammed the door shut and locked it. She looked around her room for anything that she could put in front of the door to make it harder to reach her. Rory tried to move the couch, but it was no use. It was too heavy for a ten-year-old to manage. She tugged on her roots as she spotted her desk chair. Once it was securely tucked under the knob, Rory ran over to her window to watch what was unfolding.
Rory couldn't help herself as she began to sob. She was afraid and she was alone. There was nothing she could do to help. Tons of thousands of aliens flooded the skies and streets of New York as Rory sat up in her bedroom, watching. She was sobbing uncontrollably as she pressed her face and hands into the large window.
More loud noises were flowing from the living area into Rory's bedroom and Rory could do nothing to stop them. She hoped that the man who called himself Loki was gone and that her Dad was alright.
At this moment, Rory really felt like a child. She felt small and helpless. Lonely and afraid. There was nothing else she could do except watch. She had no clue as to what she was watching either, which was not making her feel any better.
At long last, the aliens seemed to dissipate and things seemed to calm down. It looked to Rory like the fight was over. But who won?
Rory was drawn away from her thoughts by the sound of her father's voice calling her name. She nearly sprinted out. She ran up to Tony and engulfed him in the tightest bear hug she could manage. He was still in his suit and covered in dirt, but neither seemed to mind.
"I was afraid," Rory murmured into his neck.
"I know, bubs." They pulled away from the hug and Rory got the chance to really see the other people in the room.
There was a giant-sized man with green skin, a man with a shield, a man with a bow and arrow, a man with a red cape and long hair, and what looked like Natalie, only with shorter hair. They looked odd. As if they were straight out of a movie. She noticed Loki in handcuffs. He looked angry and sad at the same time. Rory didn't really know what he did, but she knew he lost and her dad won.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
Tony held a silver case in one hand and Rory's in the other as he walked alongside the other Avengers waiting to send Loki away. Tony had made it very clear that from now on, Rory would not be leaving his side.
Rory let go of her Dad's hand to let him deal with the case. Thor, as he had told Rory to call him, led Loki a few feet away from everyone else. He waited for Loki to grab hold of the glass container for the Tesseract. Before she knew it, the pair had disappeared in a storm of blue.
Once everything else was settled, Tony reached for Rory's hand again and walked her over to the rest of the Avengers. "Rory there's some people I'd like you to meet," he motioned to the team. "That's Capsicle, Legolas, Jolly Green, and the Triple Imposter. This is Rory." The others shook their heads at Tony's nicknames.
"Steve," the tall, blonde man smiled and Rory shook his hand.
"Bruce," the shorter man with grey hair politely smiled and waved.
"Yea," Nat showed you a friendly smile to which you returned. "Nice to finally meet you, officially."
"And I'm Clint," the last man with spiky hair and sunglasses introduced himself.
"Hi," you said, shyly and waved at them all.
"Bubs, you go wait in the car I'll be there in a sec," said Tony.
"Okay. It was nice meeting you all!" You said as you walked to the car.
"You ready to go, kiddo?" Tony asked as he got in the car and fastened his seatbelt.
"Are we going home? Like, back to Malibu?" you asked as he started the car and pulled out.
"Yea," he smiled. "I think we deserve a break."
"What about the tower?"
"We're working on it. It'll be fixed in no time."
"Good," you sighed
"Good?"
"I don't mind it anymore. I don't think it would be so bad if we moved here."
"Really?" He raised his eyebrows.
"Really."
Next chapter ->
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Billy has to stick up for max a lot because of her autism, at school he walks to her class and their afraid of him because just,,, look at him
warnings for mentions of bullying and ableism.
It isn’t easy to make Maxine Mayfield cry.
At least, Billy had almost never seen her shed a tear in the six years he’d known her but maybe two times: once when she was still little, and just learned her step-family was going to move into her house and replace her real dad forever, and once when she was told they would be leaving California. Both times she’d run off to her room and slammed the door before anyone could see, but Billy had noticed. He always did when it came to Max. Had to when he knew damn well how much trouble he’d be in if things went wrong while he was watching her.
Beyond that there were a few teary eyed looks that got wiped away, maybe a sniffle she’d try to cover up by complaining about her allergies, but it was very rare, even during meltdowns, that she’d be full on crying, tears streaming down her face so quickly she couldn’t wipe them away while sobs wrack through her and make her shake.
So Billy knows first thing that something is very, very wrong when she’s already at his car after school, her face buried in her balled up jacket and doing exactly that. He can hear her from outside the car, so he sighs and knocks on the window before he yanks the door open, but Max doesn’t even flinch, just curls up tighter in the passenger seat and ignores him.
That’s a bad sign too, the fact she isn’t even trying to hide it from him, “What’s a’matter Maxi?”
“None of your business.” She snaps at him, voice thick and wet with tears. It’s unfamiliar seeing her like that and it makes Billy feel tense ang guilt even though he didn’t do it this time, so he tries, “Come on. It totally is my business. You get tears on my leather seats n’the salt’ll stain ‘em up, and you’ll be the one to clean it up.”
All it gets from Max is another heavy sob, instantly hitting him with a pang of regret for trying to be light about this, “Shit. M’sorry, Maxi. Didn’t mean it like that. Just tryin’ ta make you smile.”
“Well it didn’t work!” Max sniffles, throwing her jacket on the dash and finally turning to look at Billy, face flushed red and tracked with tears, her bottom lip still wobbling, “I’ll never ever smile again..”
“Why not? I know it’s not just because of your dumbass brother.” Billy sees a twitch at the corner of her lip, the slightest hint of a smile at him insulting himself, and he counts that as a small win, a sign he’s getting at least a little bit through to Max, so he prompts her again, “What happened at school today, Max?”
Her gaze drops to her lap, and she shrugs her shoulders slightly, stiffly, as she mumbles an explanation, “Remember how I told you about that boy, who's mean to me and my friends?”
“‘Course I do. I never forget anythin’ you tell me.”
Max wipes her nose on her sleeve, and corrects him, “Except for when you forgot I told you I had AV club and you came in the school looking for me and then you got stuck talking to a teacher for like, three hours after I was done.”
“Yeah, well that was one time. N’I was already havin’ a bad day when you told me, thank you very much.” He encourages her, his face serious though their tone is light-hearted, “Keep goin’, what’d this kid do now?”
Again Max’s features close off, and she tries to lie, “He was just.. Well it was my fault.. I-I don’t know.”
“Max. I need the truth.”
Talking fast, like she’s fighting against her thoughts, she makes him promise, “Promise me you won’t do anything dumb, first.”
Billy lifts a hand from the steering wheel, “I won’t. Cross my heart, Maxi.”
At this point, in the silence that builds while Max wills herself to speak, Billy starts to drive, since it’s clear he won’t be going back into that school. It isn’t lost on him the way Max takes a deep breath, out of relief that he meant it when he said he wasn’t going to be dumb and march back in there.
Quickly, once she’s ready, she explains, “Okay. Well he kinda sort of told me that I was annoying ‘cause I laugh too much, and I told him it was just a stim n’that I couldn’t help it but he said that made me a baby and I told him I wasn’t and he called me a retard instead and I was already stressed so I started crying like a dumb baby and he laughed at me and none of my friends said anything or helped me and I just.. yeah.”
All Billy can do is raise his eyebrows, has about a hundred and one pissy and angry things he could say, but he doesn’t utter a word, because he doesn’t want to make Max more upset than she already is.
Clearly just the change in his expression spooks her though, because she insists, sounding like she could cry again at any second, “You promised me!”
He puts his hands up sort of defensively, though he has to grab the wheel again when the car veers, swallowing his anger to tell her calmly, “I didn’t even say anything. I promised I’d be nice and I’m gonna keep that promise.”
She nods hesitantly, more to show trust than agreement, so Billy continues, “But Maxi that’s.. bad. Why don’t you tell a teacher or some shit?”
“Yeah, like they would even do anything. They already hate me for being in their coed classes.” Max mumbles the last part, looking away, “They’d probably rather Troy beat me up so I wouldn’t be bothering them anymore.”
“Tell me you’re being dramatic.”
But Max just shrugs again.
“Fuck, I hate this fucking place.” Billy tears his eyes from the road to look Max in the eyes as she says it, even knowing she can’t return the gesture, “You know you don’t deserve to go through this shit, Maxi?”
“It.. is kinda my fault though.”
He lashes out, just a little, hearing her talk like that about herself. Because it’s not fair that a thirteen year old girl looks at herself that way, yeah, but also because he knows it’s in some ways his fault too, and their parents for the way she’d been brought up, and the shit she'd been around that she even thinks to say shit like that.
He hits the palm of his hand against the rim of his steering wheel, rather he goes to before he catches himself, slowing it before it really hits, tapping it more than anything, “No the fuck it isn’t. It’s nobody’s fault but the assholes that make it into a problem. And fucking Neil’s for dragging us to this close-minded little spot on the map. I hate this fucking town”
“Oh.” Is all Max says.
Billy waits, but he can see she doesn’t know what else to say, so he sighs, “Look, I made my promise to you. Can you make one for me now?”
Max looks confused, “Okay?”
“Promise me that the next time somebody says some shit to you, you stand up for yourself.” Max scrunches up her face, like she immediately disagrees with that, but Billy insists, “Look, I don’t care if you’re crying like a damn baby or you can’t even talk while you do it, just don’t let ‘em walk all over you like that again.”
“I’m not fighting anyone, Billy. I’m not.. like you.”
“That’s not what I said. I said to stand up for yourself. It’s different.”
“Yeah right. How am I supposed to do that?” Billy knows that some asshole had to have said that to Max, that for whatever bullshit reason she couldn’t stick up for herself. Damn kid can’t catch a break in life, so he tells her, at this point not sure if this is even advice or just him ranting at Max, “This kid calls you a slur again, tell ‘im at least you got the diagnosis. Make him feel like he’s the stupid one. And if a teacher ever pulls some shit about the way you learn, tell ‘em you’ll go to the board of education and personally get their asses fired. Your mom would fight for you.”
“No she wouldn’t.”
“Then dammit I would. Your friends would if they understood. I know Sinclair would kick ass for you.”
Max’s toughness finally cracks- she learned that from him, to put on that hard exterior and fake it- Billy's determination stronger than her stubbornness. She looks up at him with a look in her eye that says he’s said all the right things, “You really think so?”
“No shit. Big brothers know all about this kind of bull.”
“I guess.” Max smiles just a little, and tells him matter-of-factly, “But you’re not that kind of big brother. You’re too cool.”
“Hell yeah I am.” Billy hums proudly, adding with humor in his tone, “But it’s even more cool to be nice to your little sister than it is to be an asshole. Remember that one.”
Max nods, listing it off on her fingers, “Stand up for myself, but don’t be an asshole, and Billy's secretly a big softie. I think I got it.”
“Good. Now out of my car, shitbird.”
Giggling in that way that says she knows she got him, Max swings open her door and runs into the house, leaving Billy to watch after her. He turns off the car but doesn’t get out, trying to bury his worry for her under his expression, not because he didn’t care, or even because he didn’t want her to know, he was long past that, but because he was worried what would happen if Susan saw his concern.
She’d weasel the truth out of Max if she knew something was up, and somehow, despite her promises, Neil would find out once he dragged his ass back home from the bar later tonight, and then it would somehow be Billy’s fault. He just hopes, if Max lets slip about the bullying, she at least doesn’t get too mouthy and mention the part where she was crying.
That was a Friday when that all went down, so Billy has the weekend, which thankfully does not include any snitching, to decide what he’s going to do about it. It’s not like he was ever going to go beat up on any tweens anyways, but he promised Max he wouldn’t be dumb, and he knew that meant no passive aggressive bullshit either. At least not while she could see him.
Because that ruled out like, half of his options, he’s still kind of clueless on what he’s going to do that next Monday morning when schools back in. He’s sitting in the middle school parking lot, fingers twitching against the steering wheel without a cigarette to busy them with, waiting for 7:30 on the dot when Max always goes in.
At this point, he’s considering just ditching with her to go get ice cream or something so she doesn’t have to face any bullies today, but his epiphany comes in the form of watching Jonathan Byers walk the littler one all the way to the front doors, his hand protectively hooked through the handle on the kid’s backpack. When the clock ticks the right time and Max opens her door, he knows what he’s going to do, and he turns the car off.
She freezes, can tell he’s up to something. “What are you doing?”
“Nothin’. M’just walking you in.” She glares at him in response to the smug smile he wears, so he swears, “Honest. I got basketball today. No way I’m missing that shit ‘cause I fought some little kid.”
“You’re lying.”
“Can’t I just be nice to my little sister?”
From the look on her face, she’s still skeptical, but it's enough to get Max to agree to it, grabbing her bag from the backseat and mumbling, “Whatever. Just don’t embarrass me.”
Billy chuckles, giving Max a head start towards the building before he follows, “Hey now, I thought just yesterday I was your cool older brother.”
“Cool older brothers don’t walk their sisters to the door.” She calls it over her shoulder, and Billy can’t help but tease her more, correcting her in a sing-songy voice, “Who said I was stoppin’ at the door? I’m walking you all the way to your class.”
“Oh god.” Max stops walking, but Billy keeps up, this time pulling ahead enough to call back to her, “Come on shitbird. Don’t wanna be late.”
“I hate you so much.”
“Yeah, right. You love that I would take the time outta my morning to do this for you.” He props open the door for Max with his boot, pretending not to notice the way all the little middle school kids at their lockers turn to gawk at them, letting her shove past him with her face flushed deeper than the color of her hair in embarrassment.
Pulling on her backpack straps, like she’s trying to physically make herself smaller, she mumbles, “No, I actually hate you.”
He almost feels bad for embarrassing her, but that’s the other part of his job, and he reminds her of that, “Good. There’s some more advice for ya, little sisters should always hate their big brothers, or he’s doing something wrong.”
They get a little ways down the hall, Max’s confidence going up just some as the shock wears off and people start to turn away, but Billy hardly notices. He doesn’t even come close to being bothered by eighth grade politics anymore, and if he’s intimidating the poor kids, well that’s exactly what he’s there for.
When he’s met with a particularly harsh glare from some snob nosed brat, who happens to remind him a lot of one Tommy Hagan, he bumps into Max on purpose, and announces louder than he needs to in hopes the kid’ll know he was looking for him, “That the little asshole s’been givin’ you trouble?”
Glancing nervously between him and Billy, she nods, “Yeah..”
Billy just nods, a cross between acknowledgment and judgement, “I’ll keep that in mind.”
“You said-“ Again Max panics, but Billy cuts her off this time with a simple assurance of, “And I didn’t do anything.”
Her eyebrows knit together, realizing that that wasn’t a lie, “I.. guess you didn’t.”
“What’s your first class anyways?”
“We report to the cafeteria before first period.” She informs him, leading him that way, but he hooks two fingers through the strap on her bag to stop her, “Not gonna happen, Maxi. Being shoved in a tiny room with three hundred other kids makes you feel all ‘meltdowny’ I think was your exact word. So you’re not doin’ that anymore. I just decided.”
“But that’s against the rules.”
“Yeah, so’s me bein’ in this building during school hours, but nobody’s saying shit to me, are they?”
Max narrows her eyes at him then, and he knows he said too much, that he’s been found out, “That’s your plan isn’t it.”
There’s a crooked smile on his face he can’t hide as he plays innocent-like, “What is?”
Max pushes him a little and he pretends to misstep while she accuses him, “Coming into school and being all intimidating so nobody will bug me anymore.”
“Pfft, yeah right.” Billy denies again, getting nothing but an eye roll in response at first, but when it’s clear it’s he’s not going to give up and admit it, Max does, glancing shortly over at him, “Well thanks anyways, Billy.”
She adds, realizing he’s wandering with no idea where they’re going, having never been in the middle school himself, “My first class is in B-18.”
“Which one is’at?” He asks, just curious, but Max deflects the question, giving a short, “It’s taught by Mr. Clarke.”
Just from how quiet she is, Billy can tell that she's hiding something, “Max. You seriously don’t even know what class you’re in?”
“No I don’t, okay?” Max stops in the middle of the hallway, ranting at her brother, “It’s already not the same as my old school, and then they moved my schedule all around again after they decided I didn’t qualify for special ed, so now I just go where I’m s’posed to, and I know my teachers better than my classes.”
“And you didn’t tell anyone, did you?”
“No. There’s nothing anyone can do so it doesn’t matter.” Her tone implies she thought a lot about it, maybe even wanted to, but decided not to.
Billy insists right back, these past two days feeling like he’s constantly petitioning for Max to trust and rely on him, “Oh I could do somethin’. You know I could.”
“I do. But I don’t want you to. Sticking up for me is enough.”
That’s what makes Billy understand. The firmness in her voice says everything she needs him to hear: Max doesn’t want Billy to do for her what she can handle. This is bigger than just being the older brother. This is her setting boundaries, asking for help without wanting to be controlled. That’s something he never really got how to do, being raised by a dictator and all, but it’s something she needs. Sometimes he forgets that.
He doesn’t say anything else, just lets it sit while Max takes him down some stairs to the right room. She stops outside, scuffing up the dusty marble floors with the toe of her Chuck Taylor’s, “Could you.. stick around for a little bit in case he says something?”
Billy clicks his tongue, remarking, “I dunno. I got a class in a few..”
But his sarcasm falls short with Max, which, that’s his bad for not realizing that it would, and her face falls, “Oh, well I guess I can just-”
“Was just funnin’ you shitbird. I don’t give a fuck about my classes.” Max grimaces in that all too familiar way of uncertainty, so he promises, “I’ll be right out here. Go talk to your teacher, ‘n if he says some shit to you, remember I only promised not be stupid about the bully.”
He at least gets a smile for that one, before Max rolls her eyes, “You’re not fighting my science teacher, dummy.”
“Whatever. Just get in there, brat.”
He can see Max holding back a smile as she listens, bounding into her classroom with another quick glance back at Billy to check that he wasn’t lying and going to walk away.
Billy waits until the door fall closed to lean against the row of lockers opposite it, watching her through the little meshed over windows. By now, he’s pretty well versed on what arguments with angry authority figures look like, and the conversation between Max and her teacher is not one. He still stays though, just because Max asked him to, but maybe, just maybe a little for himself, a reassurance that the second he leaves shit isn’t going to get worse, and Max’ll have at least someone other than her equally as nerdy little friends behind her.
Then they both turn and give him a little wave, Max and her teacher, an acknowledgment to Billy that this new routine was indeed going to work out. The way the school district had handled everything else, he wonders if the guy even knew Max wasn’t like his other students until now.
Still, seeing that, Billy gives a half nod in response, and decides his job is done here, at least until tomorrow when he does the same. Max’ll get used to it, and his hope is that the little bully brats won’t. He’ll just have to keep them on their toes.
Which is exactly why, while on his way out, Billy has to break his promise to Max, just slightly, and do something dumb. He finds the Troy kid again, and waits until the little punk is at his peak to knock him down a few pegs.
He’s complaining about some teacher, which is pretty typical for a thirteen-fourteen year old kid, but the other things he’s said to Max make it not as relatable, not as innocent. So he does what any logical, mature adult would do, and scares the piss out of him.
Billy waits until the kid gets a laugh from his troop of assholes, and slams the locker door beside him shut, uncaring of who’s it was. All eyes are quickly on him, all too wide against too pale faces. It’s too easy.
“What are you little shits whining about over here?”
The one in charge steps forward, trying to be tough despite the way he has to practically bend backwards to look up at Billy’s face, “None of your business. Did the freak send you after us to scare us? It ain’t gonna work.”
“Oh I’m not here to scare you. I’m just here to give you your final warning. We’re past the point of intimidation. Matter of fact, next time I have to come here.. it won’t be looking so good for you.”
“You’re lying.” The kid accuses, despite the obvious doubt written behind his features.
Billy can work with that.
“I might be. But I’m still an authority figure over your sorry little asses, and if you don’t start respecting that..” He bends down a little further, still nowhere near the kid but making his whole troupe flinche back, and drops his pitch, “well, I can’t promise what’ll happen to ya, but unlike your teachers, I don’t play by the rules. You got that?”
Straightening himself back out, Billy pretends to start walking away before he adds, “Oh, and if you pick on my kid sister ever again, I will know. Just remember that, uh, Troy was it?”
The kid nods dumbly, literally vibrating with something like fear, and Billy can say he’s pretty satisfied with that. He pats the kid on the shoulder, a touch so gentle it wouldn’t’ve hurt a fly, and notably couldn’t get him in any trouble, but the little shit scampers off, three other puffy head bullies trailing after him.
Everyone sees it happen, Billy with his nasty smirk and his distinguishably high-schooler way of carrying himself, Troy running for the hills in the other direction. He leaves feeling like his point has been thoroughly proven.
It isn’t easy to make Maxine Mayfield cry, but it’s even harder to get away with it, and Billy knows it won’t be a problem from now on.
#billy & max#billy hargrove#max mayfield#autistic max#tw r slur#tw ableism mention#tw bullying mention#ej writer#story by ej!#anon my beloved#you so read my mind with this#I had half a fic written out like this for ages and then this ask popped up (a while ago. I’m sorry I’ve been so slow at requests)#so have this little projection fest my beloved anon#i mighta went a little crazy with this#<3 <3 <3#thank you for sending me this! I love requests!
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Not Your Aunt
Chapter 1: Donald
[ao3 link]
She was nobody’s aunt.
Well, maybe she was once, but she’d lost touch with her family decades earlier and they were long dead by the time she arrived at this new, unfounded dilemma.
When she’d first come across her rival-with-benefits carrying around two little kids, her initial reaction was a twinge of angry jealousy. Maybe they weren’t exclusive but come on! Kids? A family? Seriously? Then it hit her that these kids were at least eleven or twelve (or eight or sixteen, who knew how kids aged) and she’d last visited Scrooge just a few years prior. So the jealousy dissipated and was replaced with pure confusion.
“They’re Hortense’s kids,” he’d said succinctly, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. They didn’t look that much like Hortense, though Goldie had only met the woman once.
“So what is this, then? Babysitting?”
Scrooge laughed in a way that pissed her off the tiniest bit. “No, no. Hortense and her husband just decided to take a wee trip for themselves is all.”
“...so you’re babysitting,” she’d said with a hand on her hip. Why couldn’t he just answer her questions with a yes or a no? She didn’t need all the extra details. Him blabbing on with unnecessary detail was the whole reason she knew more about his family than she did her own.
“Ack, call it what you will!”
The 1990s was an odd decade for her. Just a few years earlier, Scrooge had personally invited her to his home for the very first time and she thought something was going to come of that. Of course, nothing did. Then he started bringing children with him on his adventures, the adventures she used to tag along on - out of all his attempts over the years, it was the most effective way to keep her from following him. She didn’t want to hang out with kids, lower their excursions to a PG-rating and split treasure four ways instead of two.
Unfortunately, old habits die hard, and she did find herself spending time with the twins every now and again. They didn’t seem to understand her any better than their uncle did, and she didn’t understand them at all. They were loud and rambunctious and very different from one another and very different from Scrooge. Della was overly enthusiastic and kept trying to jump headfirst into danger. Donald clearly didn’t want to be out and about - Goldie had the distinct feeling he just wanted to sit in his room and play guitar. She liked that he had an appreciation for music.
He also seemed to appreciate having another adult around on dangerous adventures, what with the way he’d grab her arm or try to hide behind her when things got tough. Goldie found it very, very annoying, but it’d be even more annoying to shove him away and deal with that aftermath. So on a particular adventure in the Middle East - one where she’d legitimately accidentally come across Scrooge and his family while she was hunting the same treasure - she let him grab while Scrooge and Della forged ahead and ignored the boy’s discomfort.
She watched Scrooge talking so animatedly with the young girl and felt her own discomfort creeping in. She'd only just started to accept the fact that he was turning into a family man. But there were some obvious concerns with that realization. Particularly the fact that family men didn’t want to spend time with women like her. Family men wanted a wife.
“Miss Goldie?”
She looked down at the boy who’d finally let go of her arm, but was awkwardly trying to walk at the exact same speed as her while trying to look casual about it. “Hm?”
“Are you gonna come back to the manor with us this time?”
She blinked, surprised by the question. “Um...probably not.”
“Why not?”
“...why would I?”
Donald frowned. “Uncle Scrooge always gets sad when you leave. Didn’t he ask you to come over?”
“Oh, please. Scrooge would never purposefully invite me into his home.” She didn’t count the Christmas party. She let her expectations get ahead of her that night when he was just inviting everyone he knew and didn’t want to exclude her. It didn’t count.
“Why? ‘Cause you’ll steal stuff?”
“Seems like a good enough reason to me.” She shrugged and stared at the back of Scrooge’s head. “He’s pretty protective of all his priceless junk, you know.”
The kid stayed silent for a few moments and Goldie thought she was in the clear from this odd little conversation, but then he was back with more. “It’s just kinda weird.”
“...hm?” she mumbled while taking a drink from the canteen she’d stolen from Scrooge two decades earlier.
“I mean, like...you’re basically our aunt, right?”
What a waste of water. Goldie’s nice, clean water that she’d collected for herself before this adventure started, and now it’d been dramatically spit all over the ground, almost hitting Scrooge and his niece. But in her defense, there was no way in the world she could’ve seen that question coming. None. Nada. Zip.
Donald looked exceptionally concerned as she coughed and sputtered and slammed her fist against her chest a few times. Scrooge and Della even turned to see what was going on.
Goldie just shook her head at them and Scrooge immediately turned back around while Della gave the older woman a suspicious glare before joining him.
As soon as her voice came back to her, she pointed an aggressive finger in Donald’s face. “I am absolutely not your aunt, not even close, not even a little bit. Never,” she said quietly but angrily, not wanting Scrooge to hear this embarrassing conversation. “I am just some lady you know that likes to piss off your uncle, got it?”
Donald made a face that said the-lady-doth-protest-too-much but shrugged and went back to being silent. They still had another mile to walk through this forest before they reached the supposed location of the Temple of Nanna, which Della was particularly excited about because why wouldn’t she be? She wasn’t afraid of all the snakes they’d seen and she didn’t wonder if there were any apex predators waiting to eat them and she wasn’t paranoid about falling off a ledge and respawning back at the beginning again. Er, well. Yeah.
He shook his head and looked up at Goldie. She didn’t seem afraid of any of that stuff, either. Why did TV shows always make girls seem so frail and scared when every girl he knew was tougher and braver than him? It seemed kind of unfair. But maybe their family was just weird.
Goldie caught him staring at her and glared as if she was about to yell at him about mentally referring to her as family. He turned his attention forward to stare at the back of Della’s head instead. Then he turned to look at Uncle Scrooge, who was talking about the god of the ziggurat they were going to and how he impacted the people who used to live there.
He peeked up at Goldie again and noticed her staring at Scrooge and looking...weirdly sad. Like she was bored and didn’t expect to be. He considered saying something to her when he heard a hissing sound to his left and immediately screeched and jumped up, wrapping his arms around Goldie’s neck.
“AUNT GOLDIE HELP MEEEEEE!”
On reflex, Goldie did hold onto the kid and kick the tiny little baby snake away from them, but she looked very pissed off.
Scrooge and Della stared at them and Scrooge was blushing quite a bit while Donald’s words processed in his head. “...Aunt?”
“What did I just say?!” Goldie angry-whispered at the boy in her arms.
Donald’s eyes watered and he frowned. “I-I’m sorry, I just got really scared, and-”
As he spoke, Goldie accidentally looked up and made eye contact with Scrooge, who looked somewhere between excited and flattered and confused and maybe even a bit disturbed. His look made her heart do a backflip and she felt her brain deflate as she tried to think of what to say or do next. Aunt, wife, family...it was a bit too much for her. She tugged Donald’s arms off of her and roughly threw him at Scrooge, who caught him with relative ease.
“I’m done with this,” Goldie muttered in annoyance. She could see Scrooge was about to comment and ask what she meant by that, but then she quickly zipped past him in the direction of the temple, tired of going slow so the kids could keep up. She wasn’t in the mood for family-friendly adventures and she was barely in the mood for Scrooge-friendly adventures anymore.
Scrooge scoffed as she ran on ahead. “Goldie you no-good, greedy-!!!” he shouted, shaking a fist as he put Donald back down. “Ack, I’m sorry, kids. I thought she and I were in a good place right now, but it seems I misjudged.”
“She always does this, Uncle Scrooge!” Della crossed her arms over her chest. “I just don’t get why you let her come along!”
He chuckled awkwardly and scratched the back of his head. “Ah...it’s hard to explain. We have a lot of history.” Scrooge glanced at Donald, who looked uncomfortably sad. It wasn’t hard to figure out that he blamed himself for Goldie leaving them. He put a hand on the boy’s head and hoped it was at least a little comforting. “She always finds a reason to leave me behind, but I’m glad I’ve got you two with me this time!”
Della rolled her eyes and Donald just shrugged. Scrooge had a feeling they needed a distraction, since they were bound to run into Goldie again when they reached the temple. “Let me just grab the map and we’ll continue on our way……………..”
Scrooge patted at his pocket that he knew the map was in. Then he patted at his other pockets. Then he took off his hat and reached into it, checking the many pockets in there. Empty. Which could only mean one thing...
“GOLDIE!!!!” he shouted suddenly, scaring the twins and making animals scatter away from them.
Goldie, sweaty and out-of-breath and just a few feet from the temple entrance, smirked at the sound of Scrooge’s scream. She pulled out the map and looked up to make sure she was using the right entrance to avoid booby traps. She almost laughed at the thought of Scrooge having to navigate his way through spikes and arrows.
Then she thought about Donald’s stupid little face and the way he looked at her when he called her aunt and she felt an angry betraying twinge in her heart. She sighed in frustration before grabbing a knife out of her pocket and carving a checkmark into the entranceway that she knew was safe. It wasn’t the kid’s fault that Scrooge was dragging him on dangerous adventures. She’d be nice. Just this once.
#ducktales#goldie o'gilt#donald duck#scroldie#scrooge mcduck#della duck#fic#fics#this is not the fic i was talking about yesterday i ended up starting something else cuz i hate myself i guess#not your aunt
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Infrangible
AFGHSAGHJS THIS IS SO LATE IS NOT EVEN FUNNY ANYMORE LMAO
In my defense, I stopped being a person long ago and now, in all the ways except physical, I happen to be a potato. BUT ANYWAY :’) This is for the Renegades Ship Week hosted by @greasicookies <3 (Thanks again!), for day 5, which is Maxpie. The prompt is “secrets”! <3
I had a tough time writing this because I’m going through a lot of stuff rn :’) still, I hope you can enjoy it x’ddd.
Tag list: @healing-winston-pratt @obsidianfr3sk @the-wee-woo-rita and afsghagshja @all-weather-is-bad (because this is a very...me fic lol and I think you’re already used to my sad attempt at humor haahahaah i’M SORRY AGSHJAKL) AND @lackadae because agshjs I made a reference to one of your drawings, hon :’) (I promise once again, to catch up with your content once I feel better afsghjak).
And that’s it. I hope you like it <3
When Max turned nine, he reached the conclusion that everybody forgot their early years at some point. Before, Adrian had already explained to him that wasn’t quite true, because he misunderstood Max’s statement and thought he was feeling bad about himself for not being able to recall certain things. He told him that, unlike what he thought –which was false because that’s not what Max meant- people usually couldn’t store those memories from when they were younger than three.
“Some people do.” He said. “But it’s normal if you don’t remember anything from when you were…I don’t know. Two.”
“Do you remember anything from when you were two?” Max asked him.
From the other side of the glass, Adrian scrunched up his nose. And then, obviously, he saw himself in the need to adjust his glasses.
“I’m not quite sure whether I was two or not. But I do know I was younger than five.” He started. “There was a small canal on the way to the apartment. When it rained, it would grow a lot. It didn’t have big torrents or anything, but it did grow a lot. The water usually went higher than my ankles. But the thing was…that every time it grew, it became infested with turtles.”
He paused for a second.
“I really liked turtles.” He continued, shrugging. “My mother used to let me walk down to the water, as long as she was right behind me, obviously; one day, when we were coming back from the city, she stopped to attend a call. I got too impatient and went down alone when she wasn’t looking. The next thing I remember is that, just when I was getting up after catching a turtle, I felt her tugging me by the back of my shirt. The turtle fell on its shell.”
At that point, Max realized he had been staring at how he kept on fidgeting with his pen instead of looking him in the eye, but he continued doing so, because he didn’t like it when Adrian’s voice turned that serious.
“…She had never screamed at me like that.” He said, as if he were talking to himself and then, to erase the tension, he tried to scoff. “I don’t remember what she said, but I remember that she said it so loud I told her she was scaring the turtle. Then I started crying. Like, a lot. I think she was terrified too.”
In the end, everything turned too quiet for his liking, and Max did something his dad had advised him to do for times like these, when he just didn’t know what came next: Improvise.
“I didn’t know you liked turtles.”
“…Well, I did. I really liked turtles when I was younger.”
Max had seen a couple of turtles in his life, but not as many as Adrian had seen, he supposed, because Max had never stepped outside, except when he was a baby.
Which was exactly the point.
He didn’t have memories from when he was a baby, or a toddler. Most of the people who had come to talk to him had said they remembered events that were either too sad (like Adrian) or meaningful in their lives. Max didn’t have anything like that. In fact, his first –very blurry- memory was standing on the edge of the quarantine, with his hands pressed against the crystal, and then licking it.
According to his dads, he was between three and four (“He was three, Simon. What are you talking about?” “He was born in November.” “It wasn’t November yet.” “We had just celebrated his birthday. He was four.” “HE WASN’T FOUR, SIMON! HE WAS THREE! THREE! We were celebrating that his quarantine had just been built!” “IT WAS THE SAME EVENT, HUGH!”) and Aunt Tamaya, plus the both of them, were in the hallway. For some reason, the fact that his eyes were so huge (they were still big. But they were bigger when he was a baby) came off as odd to Tamaya. And the moment they made eye contact, he licked the glass.
Nobody knew why. Not even himself. The adults remembered it better than he did, of course, but none of them had ever been able to guess the reasoning behind it. They often expressed Max had been a very strange baby, mostly because of his lack of social skills. It’s not like he had chosen that, and it’s not like his fathers would’ve allowed it to happen if they had had any other option. But Max wasn’t willing to stand there and pretend that he knew what he was doing, either.
Most of the time, he didn’t.
He barely held any memories of the nurses that had ever been in charge of his care, but, for obvious reasons, he remembered Dad. It was always easier to remember the person who had taken care of you the most, he supposed. And Max knew, among a lot of things, that it wasn’t his other dad’s fault. Though, sometimes, he couldn’t help but blame him.
Again, he didn’t know why, but there were those days, when he needed he the most, where a voice inside of his head told him that, if Simon loved him enough, he would just sacrifice his powers to be with him. His powers weren’t that useful for combat anyway.
“Okay, but that’s kinda mean.” Adrian told him the first time he opened up about it, the night before he attended the Trials to choose the members of his patrolling team. “Pops might not have combat powers, but they’re as important as the rest of the members’. That’s why they work so well as a team, you know? Every power can be extremely helpful during a battle, as long as you know how to use it.”
Max wasn’t doing anything in particular that day. Nothing besides listening to Adrian and sitting on the floor , at least.
“But if every power is useful…” He said, tilting his head to the side. “…Why are you allowed to reject certain aspirants?”
Adrian frowned a little, not in the sense that he looked angry at Max. Rather, he was confused by the question and was trying to word the answer in a way that sounded rational.
“Because…” He gulped and clicked his tongue. “…Like I said…uhm…the Council is an extremely good team. They’ve been doing this for a while. Us, the patrolling leaders are…allowed to reject certain prodigies because we don’t have as much experience as them. And…we might not know how to use somebody’s powers, and that’s very dangerous. We don’t want people dying, do we?”
When he said that, something clicked inside Max’s brain, and he nodded in automatic. Obviously, a few years ago, a non-prodigy teacher had taught him how to read, and the moment Adrian notified him it was his year to be in the Trials, he managed to read the manual and the rules for the event, from a booklet and a pamphlet (respectively) he had asked his dad to bring for him. He didn’t get much new information, different from the one he heard on TV or the one presented in the posters. However, amongst the rules, there was a section that talked about banned powers, which contained only two categories:
-Complete telekinesis.
-Stardust modelling.
“Yeah.” Dad told him. He was bathing him in the quarantine’s bathroom (Of course. Where else?). “Stardust catchers…which….are able to model stardust, are extremely dangerous and there’s not much research about them. Nobody really knows how they work, and it would be pretty difficult for us to… handle a prodigy like that.”
“Like me.”
Dad had always had a pretty specific routine he had to follow when bathing him. If he missed or misplaced a step, he acted like would explode or something. Also, Max didn’t understand why, but ever since he started growing thicker hair, Dad became pretty strict on the fact they should take care of it so it would grow healthy. Hence why they had a full hair routine that they did in the bathtub. That day, the statement caught him so off-guard he grabbed the wrong bottle, and then, when he realized it, he was already pouring the dense liquid (that looked more like a paste to him) on Max’s head. Cursing under his breath, he placed his other hand in the middle so it would fall over his palm, washed Max’s head and started the routine all over again, before changing the subject:
“About complete telekinesis…there’s obviously a lot of research about that power. We know how to manage with that. But telekinetic prodigies are not …very accepted in our society. They’re pointed at…Frowned upon. In the worst of cases, other prodigies hunt them down and then kill them.”
In that moment, Max came to the conclusion that all that changing the subject thing had been in vain.
Because, from his part, the answer was exactly the same:
“Like me.”
And Dad didn’t like that, for he started scratching his scalp harder, accidentally.
“No. It’s nothing like you.” He said. “You’re not like that, Max. Society hates telekinesis because some evil dude decided to use his powers, his telekinesis, for awful reasons and stained prodigy’s names. You’re not like that. You’re not abusive, or selfish or evil. And I don’t want to hear you comparing yourself to him ever again. Understood?”
To this day, that was the most aggressive form of validation someone had ever given him, but Max took it anyway, because he trusted Dad, and if he had said something like that, then there had to be a clear reason behind it.
“Understood.” He whispered.
And he tried, he really tried, to believe it. But, like many other things, no matter how hard Max tried, he was still severely confused. Not that he didn’t know about the Age of Anarchy, or the parties involved in the Age of Anarchy.
The quarantine, needless to say, could get pretty boring most of the time. Max had to do a lot of things to kill time, and some of those activities involved reading books that children shouldn’t be reading. He did read some children’s books, but then he would find himself looking through history articles and books, and reading the chapters that interested him the most. For instance, he was confident he knew about the Age of Anarchy, but one thing was knowing about it, and another, different thing, was having an opinion about in regards to it.
Max didn’t know if he had something to say about the topic. If he did, it was a very incomplete idea, and it was very likely he wouldn’t be able to phrase it correctly.
The group of people Max talked the most to were adults, and those adults, especially the ones who had experienced the Age of Anarchy and somehow managed to make it out alive, refused to talk about it. As for the few children he had talked to…
Well, about them…
Long story short, they had lives.
They all had lives outside of a glass, unlike Max. Maybe they weren’t the most interesting of lives, but at least they for sure had to be more interesting than his’. They didn’t have a pre-established schedule, where a designated person would come in to feed him or extract blood samples from his body, to then take them to the laboratory. They didn’t have to hear a total of seven alarms to remind him what he had to do: Wake up and get dressed, have breakfast and brush his teeth, enter the virtual sessions with his teachers, take a shower, have his blood samples taken, start doing his homework –if he had any- and do whatever he wanted once he was finished, have dinner, brush his teeth and go to bed, and then start all over again.
That moment, when he had spare time, would be the same one normal kids used to go out with their friends, like Adrian did. To go to the park and get themselves a scarily huge wound at the center of their knee. To live. To breathe air. To do…literally anything that wasn’t this.
Because Max was different from the many children he hadn’t yet gotten the opportunity to meet or talk to, because, obviously, they wouldn’t want to spend the whole day hanging out with a person…like him.
The only way Max could see two out of the three people in his family was through a crystal wall. And he couldn’t kiss them, he couldn’t touch them… sometimes he even wondered if he knew how their voices sounded, because, after all, Dad’s voice sounded the tiniest bit different once he crossed that infamous glass door.
He couldn’t walk through the streets of Gatlon, because, for starters, he didn’t know them. And if he dared to go out there, he would get killed on spot for having accidentally neutralized a prodigy who didn’t want to be neutralized.
Other kids had nannies whom they complained about when their parents couldn’t look after them (at least that’s the kind of things he saw on the TV shows he watched) but Max had patrol units that would move from one corner of the room to another, ready to attack anyone who came closer than necessary to him, because the only one who could take care of him in person, was Hugh.
Other kids could go out freely, without being scared of anything at all. They could get hurt while having fun with their friends and family. They could laugh until they cried with them. They could hug them, sleep in the same bed as them. They could walk their pets, go on road trips, go to amusement stores, water parks…
They could experience the current world; watch all the new events that were happening every day, in first hand.
They didn’t have to read about the past, or the people from the past to keep themselves entertained. They didn’t have the need to do that. At all.
They were living the lives Max couldn’t have, because he was too dangerous for that.
And obviously, that’s why he couldn’t just…go around asking other kids about what was their favorite bug, their favorite planet…or their opinions about Ace Anarchy, and if Pops (Simon) saying “Alec, with an A as in Abusive Swine” made them laugh.
Besides, he hadn’t even met that many kids his age. Or kids, for that matter.
He was aware Adrian wasn’t exactly a grown up, but he wasn’t a kid either, so, he usually didn’t make it into that list.
In fact, just like the banned powers in that manual, there were only two kids in Max’s list of acquaintances.
Aunt Tamaya’s first baby was born without powers, when Max was like four years old, and his dads were way too excited about it (Weird thing to brag about out loud, honestly, because all the recruits in the Headquarters were betting ridiculous amounts of money on which powers the Thunderbaby would have –Max could hear them- and one day they just heard The Dread Warden storming into the hallway, euphorically screaming “GUESS WHAT, MY LITTLE CHERUB BABY? YOUR COUSIN IS ABSOLUTELY FREAKING POWERLESS!”), for they thought Max would finally be able to have a friend who was more or less his age. Dad was the one who brought him in, two weeks after he was born. He was still tiny, red and chubby, and wrapped in his three different blankets that way, he looked like a bloated marshmallow.
Aunt Tamaya, her husband, Pops, Adrian, Aunt Kasumi and Uncle Evander were outside (as always) waiting to see what happened…and, it was extremely odd for Max to admit it, but he couldn’t remember much about that moment, even though he was already older than three. There was, however, a video taken by Uncle Evander where, if you narrowed your eyes hard enough, you could see the moment Max burst into tears right after kissing the baby’s cheek.
Neil was his friend.
At least, Max considered him to be his friend. Still, they had an age gap of four whole years, and a part of him was waiting until he was a little older so they could be on the same page. Because sometimes, when Neil couldn’t comprehend something semi-important that Max had just said, things could get pretty awkward, because there were occasions when, if Neil got too frustrated over anything, he would start crying, and his sobs often summoned his mother all the way from across the building. She never particularly tried to put the blame on Max. In fact, she hadn’t even glared at him not once, ever.
But she did choose to take him with her, into her office, or ask Adrian to babysit him while he calmed down. Afterwards, he usually didn’t come back to the quarantine.
“It’s not your fault, Max.” Pops would tell him, always. “It’s just that…Neil...he’s younger than you. There are things that might be…easy to you, but that are super complicated to him. And you might be able to do things that he can’t, and he can’t understand why he can’t, so he gets super confused and angry and that’s why he cries and Tamaya has to come and comfort him.”
“That, and because she’s like a...very freaky bird mom who hears her children cry and comes around with her super sonic enhanced sense of hea—“
“Hugh, don’t be rude.”
Every time they had that discussion in front of him, Max could never understand why Pops said Dad was being rude. He was right, to a certain extent. Aunt Tamaya was just…being a mom.
And that’s what moms did.
At least, that’s what Max had read and seen on TV because families like his’ were…super rare to find in his cartoons or favorite books. In fact, the times when he had seen himself represented in any of the things were so few that, for the longest time, Max had this weird, messed up idea that biological men could give birth. He thought that Adrian, apart from the fact that he was the closest to him, looked more similar to Simon, and that had to mean he had given birth to him, while Hugh had been the one to give birth to Max.
One year, when Max was six, they finished Lady Indomitable’s gigantic golden statue, placed downtown. It was late June, and though the city had previously looked covered in colors, that day it just looked…white and golden. That’s the best way Max could find to put it into words.
According to Max’s weather application, the heat was unbearable that day (good thing he couldn’t feel anything because the temperature in the quarantine was always regulated) yet, according to what he was seeing in one of his screens, a great percentage of the citizens of Gatlon were marching in the streets carrying floating lanterns, headed towards downtown where the event was being held.
The Council was standing in front of the covered statue. All of them except Blacklight, who had stayed to take care of the Headquarters, and Max could see him from where he was. They gave a speech about Lady Indomitable together, and as they started revealing the statue, Tsunami sang a song that was supposed to be one of Lady Indomitable’s favorite ones, and that Max was too young to recognize (he supposed). In his opinion, it was a cute event, but he would be lying if he said he wasn’t utterly confused the moment he saw Adrian taking one step ahead to be the first one to let go of his floating lantern, which was different from the other ones, because his’ was bigger, and it had a big “I”. Besides, people waited a couple of seconds until it was stable above their heads to let go of their own floating lanterns.
It still looked cute to him, but now it looked weird as well. So he got up from his chair, and walked towards the edge, pressing his hands against the glass. He hoped that would be enough to magically catch Evander’s attention, who was, at the moment, using his chair as a swing, as he typed a number in his computer, copying it from his calculator and eating from his salad every now and then. Obviously, Max’s telepathic call wasn’t enough, and he had to knock on the glass a couple of times, loudly. Even then, Uncle Evander didn’t look up in his direction.
But he did hear him, because he did respond.
“It’s not gonna work, Maximus. I’m not getting you out.”
As a side note, Max considered telling him his full name was Maximilian and not Maximus, because that was way before he realized it was a nickname. Nevertheless, he just let it pass, for the simple reason he had better things to ask. That’s why he proceeded to knock again, instead of speaking.
“What is it?”
“I wanna ask you something.”
Evander tried to steady himself in the chair without falling on his back, and once he succeeded, he came closer to the quarantine, with his arms over his hips.
“Why is Adrian doing that?” He asked, just because he wasn’t able to find another way to phrase it, while pointing at the screen behind him; Evander narrowed his eyes following his finger, as if he hadn’t been watching the event himself from a livestream on his phone. A few seconds later, he seemed to realize what he was talking about, and bit his upper lip, before pouting barely a little.
Then, he clicked his tongue.
“Because that’s his mom. And today’s her birthday.”
And it’s not that Max was insensitive enough not to recognize that it was very sad, but at the same time those single words were enough to make the idea he had of his life fall apart. All the things he thought he had already managed to understand felt fake and incorrect, and it was so fast it almost made him feel dizzy.
“She’s not his mom.” He declared.
Evander opened his eyes very widely and, next thing he knew, was that, for some reason, he looked nervous. Which, to say the least, was very…unlike Evander. He was usually super…confident, and, in Dad’s words: “He walks with his back too straight for a person who says some dumb shit every time he opens his mouth”.
At that moment, his back wasn’t straight at all, and he kept on wiping the sweat off his palms in the suit.
“…I mean…she’s not…alive anymore. But… that doesn’t mean that…”
“Noooo. I didn’t mean that.” Max cut him off. “She’s not her mom, because Adrian already has a mom.”
He stopped suddenly. Max could almost see his brain working at full speed, trying to process the data he had just received. Then, he blinked, arching his eyebrow.
“Who’s…who’s his mom?” He asked, getting closer to the crystal, and crouching down to be at Max’s height (Evander was almost too tall for his own sake). “Do Simon or Hugh…?”
“No. I mean she’s not his mom because Simon’s his mom.” Max stated, confident enough to move a mountain with his raw determination and his bare hands, which, needless to say, did nothing but make Evander even more confused.
Not that Max couldn’t understand why.
He was a brand new, redeemed person now.
But back then he wasn’t.
“…Simon is what, you said?”
“Adrian’s mom.” Max reaffirmed.
Still bewildered, Evander gawked. Perhaps he understood where that confusion was coming from but, at the same time, maybe he was too disturbed to ask for additional information. Max didn’t know which one of the two would make him feel more embarrassed, especially taking into account the next thing Evander said:
“That is the weirdest shit somebody has ever said to me, and I’ve talked to the Puppeteer an unhealthy amount of times.”
He wasn’t the one who explained to him the way his own family worked. On the contrary, he immediately told his dads about it, and next time the both of them came to talk to him, they tried to make him understand the concept of homosexual couples.
And they failed.
Miserably.
And he was using that term, because after that talk, Max went through life for a while saying that his ethnicity was Gay, because both of his dads were gay. Over and over again, they tried to correct him, but nothing seemed to work, and Max kept on spreading the information that he was gay (something he didn’t know yet) until Aunt Kasumi decided to intervene and, for his birthday, she got him a children’s book called All in Rainbow, which, according to the information in the first page, was actually a translation from a Latin American book written by two lesbians (one of them non-binary) and illustrated by the same woman who had made the Anarchists’ and the Renegades’ graphic novels and was also a Latina.
That book was something similar to a gay encyclopedia. It was narrated by this girl named Phoenix, because it followed her throughout her school and her daily life, where she came across different people and families. After every short story, there was an informative section explaining everything in regards to the new person’s identity, including their flag, the meaning of said flag, and the explanation of certain terms. Max really enjoyed it, and, in fact, he ended up going through it more than once. When he tried to persuade Adrian into reading it too, he admitted he already had, when he was younger, and proceeded to make a comment about how pretty the name “Phoenix” was.
It was only then that Max was able to understand how his own family worked, and how freaking inept he had sounded when he decided it was a great idea to use it as an ethnicity.
That book was, in fact, the cue for all the grown ups in his life to start buying books for him, which he was grateful for, except for the one that he, ironically enough, had gotten from Uncle Evander. Sure, he appreciated that he had spent money on that, but Max didn’t appreciate the fact that the plot was about a dog that was sent away to a school for dogs but made everyone believe he was in jail so he could escape. The drawings were cute, but he just couldn’t find the moral of the story and he didn’t like that.
His dads, from their part, got him a book about two frogs that, at least to Max, acted as if they were a couple; Aunt Tamaya was the one of the short books without drawings.
As for Aunt Kasumi…she usually brought a lot of educational books; every time she overheard him expressing something that was making him confused, she brought him a book about it, including that time she heard him asking Ruby Tucker “So, are you always bleeding?” completely out of context.
Max supposed that it had a lot to do with the fact that Aunt Kasumi was in charge of Child Services, and she spent a lot of time with children, especially because she liked to volunteer in orphanages, having been in one herself when she was a little girl. She usually moved in prodigy orphanages, for she was one to know the poor conditions they sometimes presented.
And…to say the least, she wasn’t a woman of many words. She was very reserved with everything she did. And, besides, it was none of Max’s business. After all, he was just a kid.
But, in this case, it kind of involved him.
Kind of.
For the simple reason that there were two names in the list of people his age Max had talked to. The first one was Neil (who wasn’t even his age. He was just close to that) and the second one…
The second one involved Aunt Kasumi.
Just like people were able to overhear his conversations through the quarantine, Max was able to overhear the conversations they were having on the outside, especially when he was trying to do it on purpose.
Every time he was too bored, in other words.
Some of the things older people said were confusing, but, over time, Max had learned to store that information, so he could comprehend it better in the future. He didn’t know at what level that was healthy, yet he still did it because, literally, he didn’t have anything better to do.
During extremely busy days, the Council chose to spend the night in the Headquarters, just in case, and while they could sleep in the common room, if Pops was too insistent on wanting to be close to the quarantine, they slept in the hallway.
In Max’s hallway.
Of course, Dad would sleep with him inside the quarantine but, in order to make it feel more like a pajama party, they slept close to the edge of the “room” (if it could be called that way), so close to the Councils’ inflatable beds, they could’ve touched them if there hadn’t been a wall in between.
When they were sleeping in that hallway, there wasn’t a patrol looking over Max, because they were the patrol and, every two hours, they changed turns to stay awake. All of them except Dad, who stayed the entire night with Max. The others often got up and started walking around the quarantine according to their ages. That is, Aunt Tamaya went first, followed by Pops, then Aunt Kasumi, and Uncle Evander at the end. However, since it wasn’t like they were too used to having many hours of sleep, Kasumi and Evander usually got up at the same time and patrolled together.
That night, Max was having trouble sleeping. Dad was hugging him, which made him feel very comfortable, but, at the same time, before he wrapped his arms around him, he had been moving way too much, and that had made Max feel uneasy, because a part of him, though he knew it was highly possible it wasn’t true, was feeding the annoying worm at the back of his brain that told him he was the one making Dad uneasy. That Dad was moving and couldn’t sleep because he didn’t want to be anywhere near him. Perhaps he would’ve preferred to be with Pops. Perhaps he would’ve preferred to be with Adrian, even. Anyone but Max.
Which, again, he knew things…weren’t like that. But that little, nameless, uninvited worm was always telling him that, over and over again, determined to repeat those awful words until they made so much noise they made him cry.
And even then, when he was already crying, the worm ate deeper into his brain and told him to stop because, in the end, who was he crying for anyway?
Who was he crying for, if nobody was here to see or hear him?
That night, of course, he didn’t cry, for the simple reason that…well, he did have somebody who would hear him cry, and maybe comfort him like Aunt Tamaya comforted Neil when he was crying…
But he didn’t want Dad to do that.
Not today.
Not because he were mad at him, but because he feared that, if he did, then Dad would be the one who would get mad.
Besides, that night he got extremely busy trying to overhear the conversation between Kasumi and Evander who, the moment they got up, started talking as they walked, first at a volume so low their voices could’ve been considered murmurs, but then, with every second, the issue started escalating.
And it wasn’t that they were arguing, it was that they weren’t exactly happy with each other, nor did they seem to manage to get to a mutual agreement.
Max felt like that time he was watching a movie with his earphones on, and instead of paying attention to the plot, he kept trying to identify which sounds were dominant in his left ear, and which ones were dominant in his right ear, because Uncle Evander and Aunt Kasumi were walking around the quarantine, and the echoes of their voices were floating right behind them, making it almost impossible for Max to decipher their messages word by word.
At least, until they stopped in front of him. That is, very close to the inflatable mattresses, too. And with just one eye open, he was able to tell Aunt Kasumi wasn’t amused, with her arms so tight across her chest that way, and with Uncle Evander standing more straight than necessary (because, yes, Dad was right about that...sometimes... because Max had read somewhere that tall people had to be really careful with their posture to avoid spine deformities or have less complications when they were older) waving his –as Aunt Tamaya would’ve called them- Hot Cheeto fingers right in front of her face, in a way so aggressive she sometimes had to lean backwards not to get one of her eyes poked out.
“…and it won’t look good for the organization. It won’t look good, Kasumi. You know why?”
“Yes, Vandy. I know why. I already knew before, yet you took the time to explain it to me another seven times. I mean, thank you, I guess, but—“
“If I kept on explaining it to you, it’s because I didn’t…and I don’t know what’s not clicking.”
“What do you mean with what’s not clicking?” And she tilted her head to the side. “…Are you still talking to me?”
“Don’t play dumb, Kasumi. Especially not in front of me, because I know you.”
“Right. But I still don’t get what you’re referring to. What’s not clicking about what, exactly?”
Evander laughed in a way Max would’ve just…understood if she had decided to punch him in the face so he would stop.
“We’re a big organization, Kasumi. People talk.”
“Of course that people talk. I mean, our citizens support our cause and our government system. In fact, statistically, more than half of the population do, but sometimes there are things that… are for their own good but they will refuse to understand and accept them anyway. And that’s normal. We might be the law, but we can’t control how the masses think, you know?”
“For their own good, you say. Beneficial.”
“Exactly.”
“Beneficial for who, if you’d be so kind?” Evander laughed again. “As far as I understand, we’re talking about one single problem, from a single person. It won’t bring anything beneficial, as you call it, for our organization, or for our system…if anything, it will damage it and make us lose credibility.”
“…Why?”
As a response, he started flapping his arms around, as if he were trying to point at something invisible. Or at something that wasn’t really there.
And this time, Aunt Kasumi didn’t try to pretend she was seeing it, and remained silent until Evander realized he would have to make himself understood.
“Because…” He clenched his fists, sighing loudly, almost like he was certain he was right and Aunt Kasumi wasn’t. “Our policy. Remember that? You know, a thing that actually exists and you helped write?”
She didn’t respond.
“Our policy as Renegades, it’s that we shall keep our people safe, and that includes prodigy and non-prodigy citizens. We shall preserve their lives no matter the cost, and create a safe environment where all can coexist and protect each other. That means that no prodigy individual with questionable reasons is to be allowed to cross that gate and disturb the peace or, worse, put somebody’s life at risk.”
“I’m aware of that.”
“Yes, you should be, because we wrote it, for fuck’s sake.”
“Evander, please. There’s no need to curse or—“
“…But you know what that means? It means that we can’t just…go against that policy and expect our citizens, our recruits, even, to still take us seriously.”
“Oh, but I’m following that policy because, as you might remember, we also pledged to assist anyone whose life was at risk, and people who, day by day, have to live under very vulnerable circumstances. It is our job to intervene and take them to a safer place, where their quality of life can improve, isn’t it?”
“It is, but that applies for people who aren’t dangerous to society.”
At that point, Max had both his eyes open, and he was seeing the scene more clearly.
In fact, everything was so clear, that he was able to read the confusion in Aunt Kasumi’s expression, even before she said:
“…This is a kid we’re talking about.”
“She is dangerous.”
“She’s not dangerous, Evander. She's a kid. Sure, her behavior has caused her to go bouncing from orphanage to orphanage like a rubber ball but that doesn’t mean she shouldn’t be helped, that doesn’t mean we should just turn our backs at her, and that doesn’t mean she’s dangerous.”
“You know damn well her behavior’s not what I’m talking about.”
“Well, I am, because that’s the only thing that should concern us at the moment.”
“No, it’s not?”
“It is. Because she’s a kid…and, honestly, Vandy…” Aunt Kasumi sighed. “… I know we were raised thinking life is war, but… the truth is, people are not born evil. Or dangerous, for that matter. Take your time and think about it, and you can talk to me again once you’ve calmed down, because you must be pretty much aware I don't appreciate this tone. Besides, it’s not like this little argument is going to stop me anyway.” She shrugged.
“…after all, I already talked to Hugh.”
“…And what did he say?”
“It’s not my place to tell you that. Ask him.”
Max never knew whether he had taken that suggestion or not but, knowing Evander, he just assumed he hadn’t. And, to be honest, he never asked Dad about it either. He just stood and watched how everything proceeded to go down and chaos unleashed.
Though, he had to admit, unlike what had happened with other “big” events, this one specific chaos was rather discrete. A kind of well-kept secret.
In fact, the only explicit hint that something would happen in the next few days, was the little disturbance caused by Team Frostbite (it was always Team Frostbite. Max had no idea why everyone was so…willing to put up with their…issues so much, and without hesitation) when it was their turn to patrol around the quarantine and Evander came around, holding his notepad, and muttered something to them.
“Whom?!” Genissa Clark, Frostbite, snapped immediately.
Evander frowned and, judging by the way his moustache moved, he also pouted, before turning at Mack Baxter, Aftershock, to start talking to him instead.
“Do you have any idea of what she’s talking about?” He clicked his tongue. “Like…okay, nevermind…”
When Max looked up, he saw the exact moment when Evander realized he was listening to the conversation, so he lowered his tone once again. Yet, Max was still able to see the million ways in which Genissa Clark's face contorted and, in the end, the first second Evander shut his mouth, she declared:
“We’re not available for that. Perhaps that task should be assigned to Team Sketch or Team Peregrine. They’re always lollygagging around, it’s about time they get some real responsibi—“
“That’s a no, then. Alright. Thanks for your cooperation, Team Frostbite. Or, lack of, more likely. Do better next time, okay?”
If Max wanted to be honest with himself, it hadn’t taken him much time to realize he wasn’t fond of any of the members in Team Frostbite. Or Frostbite herself. In fact, he considered her to be almost insufferable, and, again, he couldn’t quite understand why they were allowed to boss everybody around. To a certain extent, they reminded him of the popular kids (who were also bullies) in every movie he had ever watched. They weren’t nice. Not even likeable.
Maybe Max was just very specific on the type of people he liked.
Or maybe he liked everyone and their mom, except Team Frostbite, because he didn’t know any better than that, while at the same time he knew better than liking Team Frostbite.
But he didn’t know better than liking Margaret White, because…well…
She hadn’t done anything particularly awful for him to have an opinion as strong as Uncle Evander’s about her.
She came on a Friday.
Not that she exclusively came to talk to him.
She, in fact, arrived alongside Aunt Kasumi, who was wearing her civilian clothes –High-waisted jeans and a baby blue shirt, damp with sweat because it was hot outside- and kept leaving her car key on every table that came across her, before coming back to it to grab them.
At first, Max wasn’t able to see Margaret very well, mostly because he was distracted with his online classes, and she was taken straight to Dad’s office, along with Adrian’s entire team. And though Max didn’t see much, he was able to catch a glimpse on how Adrian kept on trying to grab her hand, and she insisted on pulling away.
At some point, he had read about that too.
The Renegades accepted recruits from ages 14 and up, talking about patrolling. However, they had a child protection program, where, basically, they assisted orphan prodigy children with behavioral issues or, though only few people liked to admit it, potential to be a part of the organization when they were older. Adrian didn’t like it and, strangely enough, out of everyone, Evander didn’t like it either. Nevertheless, Evander was one to get more aggressive when it came to child recruitment, which, thankfully, wasn’t common at all.
In fact, those cases were so rare, that they referred to them as “exceptions”. After all, children were not allowed into the Trials. As far as Max knew, they weren’t placed in patrol units. On the contrary, they were given small positions in the organization, and their paychecks were directed to their respective savings account, something that Pops was in charge of. However, they could use that money for their personal needs or something they wanted to buy, as the few children recruits resided in orphanages around Gatlon and went back there after their shift was over. Max supposed that sometimes their caretakers refused to buy them something because it wasn’t good for their health and it must be very satisfying to tell them it was their money (That’s what Adrian always did when Dad refused to buy something for him).
(That, or he went and asked Pops for that same thing).
Usually, they could have cash withdrawals just by presenting their Renegade Recruit ID because, obviously, they didn’t have an official ID yet.
And not only that. The children recruits were assigned a patrol unit with older members to look after them, or help them with anything they needed. Taking into account the conversation he had overheard, he supposed that duty had fallen on Adrian’s team (A theory that was later confirmed to be true by Adrian himself).
They were never left unsupervised, just like Max.
The day Margaret arrived, for a couple of minutes, maybe hours, Max was submerged in his own little world, and in the assignment his last teacher had told him to do. It was just him, his colored pencils, his paper sheets, his notes, his head, his hands, and the miniature planet Earth that his quarantine supposed, against the real world that he had never stepped on.
But every now and then, a little piece of the unknown, mysterious real world came running to his encounter and talked to him, sometimes in the most sudden, unsolicited way.
Sometimes it was Dad opening the door without calling. Sometimes it was Adrian pressing a new drawing against the crystal. Sometimes it was Pops, making a little “Psst” sound to get his attention.
Sometimes it was three little knocks, and the girl that was producing them with her knuckles.
Back then, Margaret’s hair was longer, to the point where she could tie it in a high ponytail, decorated with a blue bow, which combined with his orphanage uniform: A white polo, with the institution’s symbol by the right side of her chest, beneath a cobalt blue skirt with suspenders, long white socks and black scholar shoes.
He saw her and recognized she was real the first time, but Max still gave himself a couple of seconds to grasp the fact that she was really there.
Well, not there-there.
That she was there, as in, through the glass.
And she was calling him, even if she wasn’t saying anything. In fact, she was just there, eating from a chocolate bar with puffed rice. Her free hand was still over the glass.
And she was waiting.
So, he figured he didn’t want to keep her waiting anymore, and leaving his task and his tools behind, Max walked in her direction. And like it always happened, he stopped right before bumping his forehead against the hard, translucent surface.
Margaret took another bite from her chocolate, with an arched eyebrow, but she said nothing. From afar, Max hadn’t been able to really appreciate her features, but now that he was closer, he realized she was taller than him; her small, brown eyes were making her lashes look bigger; her black hair looked thicker and he was able to conclude that her skin tone was more or less like Pops’, maybe a little darker. She had a mark over her cheek, and at first Max thought it was a mole or a birthmark…until, of course, he realized that moles weren’t (or, at least, shouldn’t be) purple, and realized it was a bruise.
He didn’t ask her about it. Adrian had once told him that there were people who might not want to talk about their bruises or open wounds, not because the stories behind them were painful to tell, but because they were too embarrassing and telling embarrassing stories was an inconvenience.
“…well… now that I think about it…” He said right after. “…That’s not it. No. Not really. Sometimes your wounds’ backstories are painful. Or sometimes…you just want to keep them a secret, you know? And secrets are…sort of important.”
He believed every word.
Hence why, instead of saying something too nosy about that bruise, a little slowly at first, Max started lifting his hand up, until he reached the spot where Margaret’s was, and pressed his palm there. When she stared at his palm in confusion, Max clarified:
“Hugh five. You know?" Max giggled a little." As in… the Captain? Hugh? ...No?"
She didn’t laugh. And that was odd because Adrian would’ve.
Margaret wasn’t Adrian, sadly. And, it seemed to be, she hadn’t had an older sibling to tell her that some things just…weren’t adequate as icebreakers to start a conversation. Because, like Adrian had said, there were certain things other people might not want to talk about.
“Are you sick?” She directly asked.
Max was still “pressing” his hand against hers.
Gulping hard, he felt his throat boiling hot, almost as if it were growing blisters.
“No.” He said in a hoarse voice. “Why?”
Not pulling away either, Margaret said:
“The other day, Sister Malinda brought a very tiny baby into the orphanage. They were so small they had to take them to the medical wing.” She took another bite from her chocolate, and kept on speaking with her mouth full. “I sneaked out of my room to see them, and they were inside this little glass box that helped keeping them alive. Sister Tam told me so.”
Max kept quiet for a while. He would’ve been lying if he said he didn’t have a little curiosity about the name, but Margaret solved everything that had to be solved even if he didn’t ask her to.
“Sister Tam was named after Thunderbird. She’s younger than the other nuns.”
He guessed so.
Aunt Tamaya’s real name had been revealed to the general public on the 13th year into the Age of Anarchy, when she reappeared after being away for months thanks to an accident that involved Queen Bee and a cliff or something like that (Max couldn’t quite understand it, and Aunt Tamaya couldn’t remember much about it either. If she did, then she just didn’t desire to talk about it). It wasn’t a fun anecdote or anything like that but, according to his dads, the name Tamaya topped the lists for the most female-assigned names for at least a year, and the same thing happened in the 20th year into the Age of Anarchy...however, by the time she was buried, the world didn’t know Lady Indomitable’s real name, and for an entire month, people used Regina instead of Georgia. When Max asked why, Dad answered that, when attending public events, Lady Indomitable used to wear a pair of shiny golden R-shaped earrings that caused everybody in Gatlon to develop mass hysteria and made themselves believe that those Rs meant Regina, when in reality, according to Lady Indomitable herself, one of them meant “Rawles”, and the other “Renegade”. In fact, Oscar Silva (Smokescreen, one of the members of Adrian’s team) had once said that one of his cousins, who lived in Mexico, had been named Renata Regina (Though nobody knew what the heck that first name was, and Oscar had a really peculiar way to pronounce Regina) because she was born a few days after Lady Indomitable’s decease.
“I knew that.” Max lied.
“Sure, buddy. I bet you did.” Margaret chuckled. And there, Max realized she thought she was too clever.
Which, he didn’t doubt she was. He wasn’t in the position to state that. At least, not yet.
But what he was in the position to state, was that, if she thought herself to be clever, then it was his opportunity to think of himself as clever too. After all, he had been reading his whole life because he didn’t have anything else to do.
If Margaret was clever, then so was he.
“You’re talking about an incubator.” He said.
Margaret looked up out of a sudden (Max hoped she hadn’t gotten dizzy). He could still see the chocolate, that at this point should’ve been mush, stored in the inside of her right cheek.
“Uh?” She asked, struggling to keep her mouth closed.
Max gulped, and tapped the surface with his fingers.
“The thing where they put the little baby. It’s called an incubator. That’s where they put pre-term babies, because they’re not ready to survive outside of their mother’s womb. Sometimes their lungs don’t work on their own, sometimes their hearts are too fast or too slow…”
“You look too old to be a baby.” She observed. “Are your powers something related to that? Like, are you a baby who doesn’t look like a baby?”
For a second, Max thought about quoting Evander that time he had boldly stated that Simon was Adrian’s mom, but he didn’t because he wasn’t in the mood to curse.
“…No. First, this is not an incubator. And second, I’m a kid.” He answered. “I’m not a baby.”
“Then why are you here?”
The short answer was that, honestly, that was none of her business. And the even shorter answer, was:
“I can’t tell you. It’s a secret. And secrets are sort of important.”
“A secret.” She repeated, as if tasting the word. “…You don’t look like you want to be here. Are you allowed to come out?”
The short answer was still that it was none of her business. But, if he wanted to be honest, for some reason, he didn’t want to give that answer. Because, to be fair, she would find out on her own sooner or later. Because, yes, people talked, and while his dads were kind of secretive about him, everyone in the headquarters knew him. Her being clueless was just a temporary event that would vanish into thin air in a blink.
And, for some reason, he wanted to enjoy it while it lasted.
Maybe tell her something that wasn’t real. Maybe… tell her something that wasn’t necessarily true but that he wanted it to be. Maybe something that was more interesting than what he was, in reality; maybe something that would make the worm in his brain go away for two weeks.
"I can't get out." He finally decided. "Because this glass is infrangible."
Then, he knocked on it three times.
"See?"
Margaret tilted her hair to the side, looking like a cat.
"What does that word mean?"
And dumb as it sounded, Max felt a twinge in his stomach along with a violent wave of pride. Because, even if it was hard for him to admit it, he was hoping she would ask that.
He wanted her to ask that.
"It means you can't break it."
Margaret's eyes seemed bigger. But just as she was separating her lips to speak, somebody behind her cleared their throat.
That's when Max spotted Aunt Kasumi leaned against a wall with her arms crossed. When Margaret looked over her shoulder, she found her there too. But while Max waved at her, Margaret remained inexpressive.
"You're very far from the restroom, Maggie." Kasumi said, in a serious tone. Afterwards, she massaged her temples.
"Please, darling. Just… help me here, okay? We have to go back to the office."
And she didn't seem mad, but rather disappointed.
When it came to Aunt Kasumi, that was enough. Max knew that, and Margaret knew that too. That's why they both removed their hands from the glass, and Margaret started going away.
However, before she was too far, Max asked:
"Why are you here?"
And Margaret turned around, smiling.
"If you're not telling me, I'm not telling you." She sentenced. Then, she proceeded to imitate his voice as she said:
"It's a secret."
And for a while, obviously, it remained that way. A secret. But it wasn't long before they both knew everything they needed to know.
Margaret was integrated into the janitorial team, but, for a while, people talked about her and her powers, and Max couldn’t help but remember what Dad had told him in the bathtub, and the conversation between Evander and Kasumi.
Yet, more than scared, Max felt… something he didn't know what it was. In fact, he wasn't scared of her. More likely, a part of him felt that he knew what it was like to be her, because maybe they weren't that different after all.
People were scared of them both.
But he wasn't scared of her. No, not really.
He hoped she wasn’t scared of him either.
Maybe they could've been very good friends, even through the infrangible glass that kept him from getting pointed at, frowned upon or killed.
#renegades trilogy#marissa meyer#Dawnie writes#renegades ship week#margaret white#magpie#max everthart-westwood#the bandit
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