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ghostofskywalker · 2 years

Text

Plus One

Rick Flag/Fem!Reader

Words: 2,993

Summary: After lying to your friend about dating someone for so long, she practically demands that you bring your “perfect boyfriend” to her wedding, no matter how much you try to get out of it. Thankfully, another of your friends comes to the rescue, but now you wish things were real.

Warnings: some sexual humor and references

Note: this is my entry to @that-sarcastic-writer’s 1300 follower writing challenge! i really hope you enjoy this :)

there is a flashback in this fic, and that whole scene is in italics.

Rick Flag Masterlist

“So what exactly have you told your friend about me?” Rick asked, his voice pulling you out of your daydream. The car shook slightly as he drove down the highway, and he spoke again when it became clear you weren’t really listening. “Is there any story I have to stick to?”

You paused for a moment before shaking your head. “Not really. I only said that we worked together, and I didn’t tell her anything about you in particular.”

“But you said you had a boyfriend.”

“Yes, because I wanted her to stop setting me up with people,” you said. “You have no idea the amount of terrible dates I’ve been on just because June thought they would be ‘good for me,’ so I said I was seeing someone to get her off my back. I didn’t even give her a name because I never expected this would come up again.”

“So why are you dragging me to this wedding and making me drive?”

You scoffed. “First of all, you offered to drive, so don’t twist that on me. And second, if I remember correctly, this whole fake date thing was your idea too.”

“I’m so excited to see you!” June had said into the phone, so loudly that you held the receiver a little farther away from your ear. “And I’m even more excited to meet this perfect boyfriend you’ve been telling me about! You better be bringing him Y/N, because I’m not sure he actually exists and I think I need to see this man with my own two eyes.”

You had been sitting in your office when she called with the details for the wedding, and you were incredibly excited for an excuse to see her again. Originally you were supposed to be a bridesmaid, but the three hour distance between you and June, in addition to the way that your job worked made it clear that you couldn’t handle everything at once. She had understood, but just wanted to make sure you were still coming to the ceremony and reception. “I don’t know June,” you started to say. “We work together, and I don’t know if he’ll be able to take off at the same time.”

She groaned on the other end. “Ugh, your job is once again making my life difficult. Seriously Y/N, I want to meet this man, not only so you can prove he’s real, so I can give him the scary best friend talk.”

The door to your office opened right as you started to respond, and you looked up to see Rick Flag enter and sit down in one of the chairs across from your desk. “I’ll see what I can do. If he can’t make it I’ll let you know before I leave, okay?”

“Fine,” June said. “But you definitely better be there, or I’ll break into the base myself and kidnap you!”

You laughed. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world, don’t worry. Boyfriend or no boyfriend, I’ll be there.” That last sentence felt strange to say in front of Rick, because you knew he was going to ask you about it (and he knew that you didn’t actually have a boyfriend) but right now the goal was to get June off the line.

Once you had hung up the phone, you turned to the man sitting in front of you. If June was your best friend, you considered Rick Flag to be a close second. You didn’t know if he would rank you that high on a list, but out of everyone at work he was the only person you really trusted. On the outside he was surly and guarded, but once you broke down that wall, he became almost an entirely different person. You were also a little in love with him, but he didn’t need to know that.

“What was that about?” Rick asked. “And why didn’t you tell me you had a boyfriend?”

You sighed. “Because technically, I don’t. But I’ve been lying to my best friend for the past month so she would stop trying to set me up on dates with random people.”

Rick laughed. “Seems like a handful.”

“She means well, I promise. Except she’s getting married in two weeks and is now demanding that I bring my nonexistent boyfriend to her wedding so she could meet him.”

“What are you going to do about it?”

Secretly, you were hoping you could drag him along and get him to play the part. He was sweet, he was attractive, and you knew each other well enough that you could probably pull this off. But you would rather eat glass than suggest that to him. “Honestly? I have no idea.”

“I could go with you.” There they were, the words you had wanted to hear, but now it felt weird to accept the proposal.

Instead of jumping over your desk and kissing him right there, you cocked your head to the side. “You’d want to go to a wedding where you don’t know anyone to help me not get caught in a lie?”

“Y/N, we’re friends.” Yeah, you were friends, but the problem was that you wanted more. “I’m sure you would do the same for me if the tables were turned.”

You nodded. “I would.” Your reasoning would definitely be a lot more selfish than he’s implying, but it’s true, you would offer to go to a wedding as his plus one if he needed it, so the statement wasn’t a lie.

“Exactly. I want to help you, and besides, a night away from here and with some free food sounds great.”

“Okay fine, I admit that I was the one who said I would go, but you would have asked me anyway.”

He was right, but you didn’t want to admit that. “I don’t think so.”

“So what would you have done?”

“Honestly? I probably would have made up some excuse about him not getting approved for the time off and then just suffered the torture.”

“Well, now you don’t have to suffer.” He smiled as he spoke, but you weren’t so sure about that. It was going to be just as torturous pretending to be Rick Flag’s girlfriend, especially when you knew that at the end of the night, you had to go back to just being his friend.

June was standing in her front lawn when Rick pulled into the driveway, and she had a huge smile on her face as you got out of the car. “Y/N, you’re here!” she said, rushing over to give you a huge hug. “And you brought the boyfriend I wasn’t sure existed!” That last part was said quietly, and you really hoped Rick didn’t hear it.

You couldn’t tell if he had heard the remark or not, but he smiled at June and held his hand out for her to shake. “I’m Rick.”

“June,” she said, and then turned back to you. “Damn Y/N, how did you get one so hot?”

Well, he definitely heard that remark. In fact, his cheeks were dusted with a tinge of blush, and you really wished you could be anywhere else but here right now. “June-”

Thankfully, you heard someone call June’s name and cut you off, because you honestly didn’t know what you would say at this point. You smiled at June’s sister April standing in the doorway, silently thanking her for getting you out of that line of questioning. “The caterer is on the phone for you,” she called out.

“Okay, I’ll be right there,” June responded, and then turned back to you. “You have the same bedroom you usually stay in, and you’re more than welcome to come to the rehearsal dinner tonight.”

You went to speak, but was once again cut off by April. “June! Hurry up!”

“I’ll be there in a second, relax!”

You laughed. “Go talk to the caterer. We’ll bring in our stuff.”

Once June had disappeared back into the house, you and Rick grabbed your bags and he allowed you to lead him to the room where you two would be staying. “I didn’t even think about it, but there’s only one bed in the room,” you said. Actually, that was a big fucking lie. You had been thinking about it, for the entire drive down, but you didn’t want to give away your true feelings because you were almost positive that he didn’t reciprocate them.

“That’s fine,” he said. “I’ve slept over at your apartment, and it’s not like you snore.”

This was a lot different than him crashing on your couch after a night of bar hopping, but you weren’t going to argue. When you pulled open the door to the room June had come to call “yours” (even though you only visited a few times a year), you dropped your bags and laid down face first on the bed.

It was already too much, this fake dating thing. You could handle June being embarrassing, but just the thought of holding Rick’s hand or kissing him, even if it was just for show, was enough to set your body on fire. This was going to be hell, except with a significant lack of pitchforks and fire, just you and your sexual frustration living a lie you would sell your soul to make real.

You felt him gently touch your arm, and you picked your head up off the bed. “I’m so sorry about June,” you said, before he could even open his mouth.

His laughter was bright, and you hung onto every moment. “It wasn’t that bad,” he said, a smile on his face. “My family would have been much worse.”

“Still, I didn’t think she would be so forward about objectifying you.”

“Y/N, you’re acting like I didn’t know what I was getting into,” he said. “Like you pointed out in the car, I was the one who suggested this, so I was prepared for a few comments. And you’re one of my closest friends, so it’s not hard to pretend to be in love with you.”

His words didn’t even register in your brain until it was too late, and just as you were about to ask him to elaborate, the door came busting open and June came marching in, her hands covering her eyes. “Stop the funny business! Innocent lady walking in!” she said loudly.

“June, nothing was going on,” you said. “You can open your eyes.”

“I was just making sure! Because you’re totally welcome to fuck like rabbits while you’re here, but I just don’t want to see it.”

You loved June, but she was going to be the death of you. “We’re not-”

You weren’t sure what to say, but luckily Rick came to your rescue. “We’re not really at that stage of the relationship yet,” he supplied. “This wedding would be the first really big event we attend.”

Not a single lie had come out of his mouth, but obviously June took the statement a little differently than you did (she believed you two were dating after all, and you knew the truth). “What did you need?” you asked, quickly changing the subject.

She paused for a moment, but then snapped back into wedding mode. “Can you help me and April finish the centerpieces?” she asked. “The wedding planner is going to pick them up at the rehearsal dinner, and we’re a little behind schedule.”

“Do you need me to do anything?” Rick asked.

June smiled, and you knew that she had plans to put him to work too. “How are you with a hot glue gun?”

So that’s how you ended up making floral centerpieces with April and June while Rick glued black and blue bows onto the wedding favors. The two sisters pelted you with all kinds of questions about your “relationship,” and you tried to keep all your stories as close to the truth as you could. Rick acted like the perfect boyfriend the whole time, and it genuinely felt like a punch in the gut. Your feelings for him were only growing, and you couldn’t let yourself get too comfortable in this lie, because it was going to be over before you knew it.

But letting him put his arm around you and kiss you on the cheek was just keeping up your cover, right? And you would have to sleep in the same bed tonight anyway. Nothing that had happened today was making you regret bringing Rick with you, but you sure as hell were regretting the fact that you weren’t together for real.

***

The ceremony was beautiful, and it was held at a park a few minutes away from June’s house. So far the reception was proving to be an enjoyable time as well, except for one big issue. Well, it wasn’t really an issue, but it was painful. Rick had taken the sentiment of “doting boyfriend” and ran with it. He held your hand during the ceremony, let you rest your head on his shoulder when you were trying to hide your tears (weddings could be emotional, damn it), and walked with you everywhere, his hand usually on your lower back. Even now, just sitting at your table, his chair was pulled directly next to yours. But the worst thing by far was the fact that he seemed completely nonchalant about the way that you had woken up that morning.

The spare bedroom at June’s house had a double bed, but it wasn’t particularly large, so you had fantasized about something like this happening, but you never thought it actually would come to pass. When you opened your eyes to the sound of the alarm clock, it had become immediately obvious that you were cuddling with Rick Flag. Or more specifically, he was spooning you. His arm was thrown over your middle, and his fingertips were just ghosting the bare skin of your stomach where your shirt had pulled up during the night.

But as much as you were mortified about crossing some kind of invisible friendship boundary (though, let’s be real, you really wanted to feel his arms around you again), Rick just brushed it off. It was like nothing had changed between you two, and you were genuinely wondering how he managed to be normal about this. And to make matters worse, he had been especially affectionate with you at breakfast, something that you knew was just because June had been watching, but you desperately wished could have been real.

A slow beat started to come from the DJ’s speakers, and Rick took your hand. “You wanna dance with me?”

“I don’t know-”

“You really don’t want to dance with your fake boyfriend?” his voice was soft, but thankfully there was no one else sitting at the table with you yet, so no one heard the truth about your relationship.

“Be quiet!” you hissed, even though you knew your secret was safe. “Someone will hear you!”

“Do you want me to shout it from the rooftops?”

“No!”

“Then dance with me for this one song.” There was a no-nonsense expression on his face, and you knew there was no getting out of this one.

“Fine.” You huffed, but secretly your feelings were a lot more positive.

You allowed him to lead you out on the dance floor, where you began to sway in time with the other couples. At one point he even pulled you closer to him, and the hand that was resting on your waist gently tightened around you for a moment. After looking up at him (and seeing a smile on his face you were sure was completely fake), you really wanted to kiss him.

What you never would have expected was for that to actually happen. You kept moving your head so you were staring at anything but his face, trying to remember that this was only going to be the reality for about twelve more hours, until you felt a gentle tap on your hip. “Are you going to look at me?” Rick asked playfully, with a smile that made you want to melt right there.

This is fake. This is fake. This is fake. Pull yourself together, damn it!

“Why?” you asked, trying to play it cool. “Do you want me to look at you?”

“Well I’d really like to kiss you right now, and it would be way easier if I could see your face.”

You stumbled at his words, but his hands were there to steady you. “No one is paying any attention to us right now,” you said. “We don’t need to keep the act up.”

“Who said this was all an act? Y/N, I’m crazy about you, and I have been ever since we met.” This could not be happening, it had to be either a dream or some elaborate practical joke. Maybe Rick spilled the beans to June and she’s conspiring with him to play a joke on you. “And I can see you don’t really believe me, but trust me, I didn’t just offer to be your fake boyfriend out of friendly obligation.”

You didn’t even care if he had more to say, you just didn’t want to wait another second. When you pressed your lips to his, he immediately kissed back. But since the middle of the dance floor at your best friend’s wedding wasn’t really the place to start making out with him, it was over much too soon for your liking. “You’re serious about this?’ you asked quietly. “About us?”

“More serious than I have ever been about anything,” he said, gently tilting your head so he could kiss you again. “And I knew for sure when I woke up this morning to see you cuddled up to me.”

You would have to thank June and her slightly-too-small bed later, but right now, you just wanted to kiss him again.

- the end -

#lias writing challenge #rick flag #rick flag x reader #rick flag x y/n #rick flag x you #rick flag imagine #rick flag fanfiction

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orenjibot · 3 months

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This is just me airing out a bit of my grievances right now so I’ll put it under a read more. It WILL be long but i will try to keep it short or make a tl;dr at the end of it. Idk honestly.

I WILL NOT delete this AT ALL because i swear I’m not bound by any legal NDA or anything and i’m not even trying to start shit with people. I’m just PISSED OFF and need to share it once and for all.

Edit: I added a tl;dr if you guys don’t want to read my thoughts.

So okay. I had a rant about trying hard to be in a community of any kind in a post I reblogged. I will spare the details of not having the right tools to COPE with my adhd since it made me socially awkward and basically come off as a weirdo and stuff. I have improved lots since but like you know lmaooo

You see. Here’s this thing about my thoughts of my time as a mod on the compass en (fan) discord. I was a mod for this community for years, only because we were severely UNDERSTAFFED for years to the point where I was essentially the ONLY person doing any mod work what so ever. This isn’t to blame other people or mods though. It’s a fan group anyways, people have obligations, people change interests, people hate what the group has become and ETC. I was never mad in these situations.

The issues I’ve had with being a mod was essentially just not knowing what to do and what was okay. Like there was one person who would constantly just act horny 25/7 and it seemed like??? Everyone was okay with that??? Like??? There were minors??? In the server????????? And also those jokes made me uncomfy like it’s a public server not a friend group.

I didn’t want to do too much where it comes off as being on a powertrip or SILENCING people based on a simple dislike/disagreement. The laid back moderation wasn’t a bad thing and not that many people were horrible people (and most of them were good people who stop when told). Essentially, it made it so that a lot of members in the server when confronted with directly would basically NEVER take any mod seriously. On multiple occasions, it pissed me off on a personal level.

But what can I even do? I’m only one person and the server owner was busy most of the time and can’t afford to put any time into dealing with the server anymore. It was truly a time where I was just off on my own and idk what to do.

Anyways, I’ll be skipping ahead of the timeline and to the one time we had to demote a mod entirely for improper mod behavior.

So this guy… I’ll call this guy Allen to avoid dropping names— so Allen here was allegedly DATING a minor. Yeah. So as the “head mod” I did grapple with whether or not I should bring it up with the rest of the other mods and even the server owner. I kept hearing more and more shit from him which was FURTHER backed up by the fact that I was actually griping about it for a long time until the guy finally got his fucking shit together one time after I left cause the bozo basically did nothing anyways.

It made me absolutely livid how this guy saw being a mod as some sort of status for clout. Like this guy flat out was making fun of being a mod for the server and basically just went “I dont have to do anything cause everyone’s asleep when I’m awake and awake when im asleep! So easyyyy lmaoooo”

There is NO actual proof about this, but this was backed up by the fact that he did absolutely nothing and continued to shove everything for me to do. So like, the dude was basically a lazy ass mofo.

I didn’t even know anything about the guy dating a minor until someone told me about it and sent us proof of it. A lot of us were of the mindset that “it didn’t rly matter to us what they did as long as it was sfw so we don’t have to take immediate action” but… we saw both of them chat in the cps server and for sure they were sending nsfw shit to each other based on what they’re saying about hcs (like it had waaay too much sexual energy in there to say they didnt talk about nsfw privately amongst themselves).

I really got bit pissed off at all of this so I took it up to everyone immediately. Like first of all, the server also has minors so it was really a huge red flag for us to keep the guy around as a mod.

This happened when Allen was trying to host his very own tournament (last year around this time), but failed cause he decided to put it off to oblivion and even rushed me to do everything. I volunteered to help but only to stream it and nothing else. When i brought it up to him that I can take over and do everything so he didn’t have to, he declined. Like this guy did nothing at all and expected ME to do it all for him when i made it clear from the get go that I wasn’t going to do that. The dude was clearly irresponsible. Even more so than me and he also has adhd like me. Like dude is just a bitch.

It made the poor guy PARANOID. Like he immediately stopped talking in the server after he was demoted and basically stopped working on the tournament all together. I didn’t want anything to do with him after all of this and the fact that he was unapologetic about dating a minor as long as there’s love. Like no. Bro. Wtf. (I heard this second hand so take that with a grain of salt)

Now here’s the kicker. Out of personal spite, and to not leave my work unused, I decided to host my own tournament after some time has passed. It was a challenge that I enjoyed, but I’m not cut out for stuff like this so I wasn’t going to do it anymore than one time.

But guess what? Allen joined the tournament with his team. And this was the team that gave me SHIT when we (me and my two helpers) had to give them a DQ for basically doing everything wrong. I wasn’t even surprised that something was going to come up with this group. It only sucked because they sure wrapped up a now former friend of mine into their whole schtick and basically started to hate me for something they clearly didn’t do right.

Not only did they think we were powertripping, they deadass thought we did it out of spite for them. Like no. We didn’t even do that. Like it’s a casual tournament but we had rules to abide by and it would be unfair to let them play when everyone else followed directions, read the rules, and was doing as told. That team did NONE of that and said that we, the staff, did it out of favoritism.

Like c’mon that was the SILLIEST reason I have ever heard. Imagine it being favoritism because EVERYONE ELSE FOLLOWED DIRECTIONS.

Granted, I can agree that my attitude wasn’t the best because I was tired and also FED UP with the fact that they didn’t even listen to what I was saying as the organizer. They flat out ignored all I was saying and decided on their own that I was okay with everything. Like no I’m not trying to make a callout post on them so I won’t post any proof of this, but ask anyone who was the staff with me during the tournament and they can give proof.

I will also say that my instructions wasn’t clear half of the time so I can understand that they might’ve been confused aside from not reading it. I will say that I didn’t make it extra clear at all about the timeframe. I had a lot going on the latter half of November and most of December so I know that that was on me. But they deliberately threw everything onto my shoulders and expect me to organize their team for them which is stupid to begin with.

The biggest reason why this did happen was because my former friend didn’t respond to a question I had asked ahead of time about their schedule. I had asked for them to tell me if their schedule in JST, so japan time. She only gave me a weekend schedule and nothing else so I assumed she answered in jst. And this point when I asked again to confirm if this time was okay, her two teammates responded in her stead by saying “yeah it seems like she’s free at this time”, which also meant that we all read her reply the same exact way.

She came out to tell me when I was asleep, that she couldn’t make it and didn’t even TRY to talk it out with my other staff and I only woke about a couple hours before their scheduled time cause I sleep funky hours. Like they expect me to get everything sorted out in 2 hours??? Like??? That’s not enough time??? And we couldnt find anything that worked with the staff and their opposing team, so they HAVE to play at their scheduled time.

Then they said they’ll find a sub, which technically isn’t allowed without prior discussion. They clearly didn’t read the substitution INSTRUCTIONS either. I still had every right to decline them of a sub since they didn’t ask for permission for one and assumed that it was okay.

But like whatever man, I didn’t care by the time we discussed this far. They then basically just…. Didn’t even tell us anything afterwards for an hour and 20 minutes. Like an hour before their match started and 10-15 mins after where they had a short waiting period before we hand them a DQ. We had strict attendance rules and it was their responsibility to let us know they found a sub before their match started… And not AFTER we handed them a DQ.

They tried to argue with us that we have to let them play and that they couldn’t “understand” why they can’t. Like it wasn’t that hard to understand that we couldn’t do that because it was unfair to everyone else who was following the rules. I couldn’t reschedule it to a different time due to everyone’s busy schedules and it would require having to do everything over again. Like granted, it was my first time doing this and I was very stubborn on not asking for too much help because I didn’t want to rely too much on people. It just came at a bad time when everyone was busy too. So I admit to just being an inexperienced first time tournament organizer and knowing that a part of this is also my fault, but not entirely.

Like, again, this really wasn’t done out of personal malice or anything of the sort. But this team also went out of their way to cause problems for everyone involved and basically quit last minute when it was time for their other match (after they got DQ’d for their match in the semis), which pissed the other team off. They led everyone to believe that the staff did something wrong, when really it was their incompetence and miscommunication that led to everything happening. I offered my side of the reasoning for what we did to my former friend who was the only one who tried to at least talk to me, but instead kind of gave me an attitude like I owed her something.

I actually thought she was blaming herself for what happened and I said stuff that said I was sorry and she didn’t deserve that, only to find out that… they thought it was…….. favoritism?? And I was just… “????? Huh????” So like… I don’t know what I can even say when they believed something so comedically foolish. They’ve been watching way too many dramas man like if I wanted to be spiteful, I wouldn’t do something that heinous. I also make it clear when I dislike people so if anything, I would’ve just trashed their application from the get go to be petty. I don’t have the energy to plan it out like that or even be that petty as to not let them play. If that was a concern to begin with, they could’ve just not joined at all. I did so much to work with their schedules and yet they conveniently threw it out the window in favor of a fictional revenge plot they made up. Disrespectful.

I still never gotten an apology or even an admittance that they misunderstood what was going on. I can only apologize for things I have done, which was just sounding crabby and being unclear about stuff. But favoritism was not something I or anyone did. This still hurts me right now. Even if they don’t want to apologize to me, apologize to everyone else.

The only saving grace was that when all of this was happening, all the participants didn’t ask or question us directly too much on what was going on. It, at least, showed to us that they were confused and/or also knew that we (the staff) wouldn’t do something this egregious. Still, it hurt that everyone didn’t even try to defend me and was perhaps skeptical, like maybe I am this irresponsible (I’m not).

However, there is more to my grievances about this.

Aside from feeling like no one respected me at all, even when I’m the one with the MOST POWER in the conersation, someone told me how everyone (in their server) wanted them to host the tournament. Like, it was very hurtful to hear that everyone else wanted this person to do the job. That everyone wanted them to do everything. It really pissed me off. Being a mod IS a damn thankless job, but I have never felt so hurt and betrayed. I was doing so much for everyone and was trying to make things more fun for people, but nah. They really wanted this cool person that everyone loved and babied, and not some boring old guy like me. Well, I’m sorry I made everyone’s times there boring and bland as fuck. I hope you guys are having more fun now that I’m not there ruining it for you all.

No one even tried to actually defend me when all of this WAS happening. Like? They really left me for dead. Not a single person wanted to believe me or support me until I said all that I could share about it in DMs. Then they all realized that the Allen’s team were being petty about it.

I’m ridiculously tired because this wasn’t EVEN drama to begin with. It was just Allen’s team being vengeful (mostly just Allen and his bestie who was in the team). I was just being dragged down simply because they couldn’t take an L.

Had Allen’s team came up with a better rebuttal, I would’ve let them play. Had they said they got a sub before we gave them a DQ, I would’ve let them play. They did not even try to have a discussion with us and tried to be petty because they thought we were being petty. Like please we don’t got time for your kiddy fights, man. I hope you’re all happy that I suffered for whatever the fuck y’all did.

It was just so damn weird how they correlated this as a “power trip” when…….. it really wasn’t that and everyone could probably read the chat log and will still say that it seemed like miscommunication. Like literally no one got in trouble for anything because it was just… wasn’t even the problem they made it out to be. This was something they could’ve tried to talk it out reasonably with us but they chose NOT to. That is ON THEM entirely.

Given how I was also repeatedly just being disregarded even AS a mod, I was completely fed up with it all. When there were issues, no one brought it up to the mods directly??? And told the server owner instead??? LIKE??? He never even told me that’s how everyone actually felt, i only knew because when I used to be in Ann’s server, they all told me what they felt about the changing times of the server (which can’t be helped in most cases) AND the fact that I can tell that’s how people felt based on the vibes.

Was I really THAT untrustworthy as a person and a mod?? Was I really that incompetent to everyone???

I always felt like I was some half rate guy that no one liked. I tried because I knew that without someone there to manage it, it would’ve been so much worse. But it seemed like to me that everyone thought I was useless and a waste of space. They rather have that popular someone everyone loved to do my job for them. It would be so much better and much more fun, right? I agree.

I didn’t become a mod because I wanted clout. I wanted to help. I did it out of the pure love and appreciation of finding this community at one of the worst times of my life. And I still do want to help, but after all of this? Good luck on that. You all have to beg for me to come back to help. None of you guys deserve me at all.

Anyways, yeah, this is the extent to my side of the story WITH my personal thoughts and opinions on it. I don’t have the energy to make a tl;dr right now after saying all of this. So i’ll make an edit for it later.

This is why I personally left the server and cut off most of the people who I met there if they didn’t try to contact me again or get back in touch with me… And assuming I didn’t contact them first.

There’s just too much bad feelings in it for me to want to stay around. The thing with Ann and some couple others before her and this whole thing, all were as a result of being in this community, made me realize that they don’t want me around anymore. I figured it was time to me to step down or take more of a backseat, but now? Early retirement. Fuck this shit man.

Tl;dr: This is a rant of one of my MANY grievances about being a mod in the compass server. I am not blaming anyone for any of this as I understand that this was just the result of the circumstances that happened with everyone at the time.

The key points being:

Understaffed mod team and a busy server owner, which led me to struggle with modding as I wasn’t sure what was okay and what wasn’t, and overall a lot of work on me being the only person modding a whole server of people. I didn’t mention it before but it stressed me out constantly for years.

Having to demote a mod for misconduct. His list of crimes goes from bad work ethics, bad display of behavior on multiple occasions as a mod, irresponsible with organization (tried to host his own tournament but failed and had me doing most of the heavy lifting before it was ultimately “canceled”), and the worst of all: dating a minor (5 years younger than he was). This point later comes back as this former mod (whom I called Allen for the sake of using a name, it isn’t his name/online handle) joined my tournament with his team.

The team being the one that caused me a lot of trouble because they firmly believed that we were abusing our power and said we deliberately sabotaged them on purpose. None of which was true and I’m sure a lot of people have noticed this, but I refrained from dropping too much details as I’m not here to start shit or make it a callout post. Talk to the two helpers and they can probably explain it better. I listed various reasons for this happening and debunking some potential misunderstandings. The issue was largely miscommunication and I am aware of the issues it caused.

Most of this from that point onward was just my personal thoughts about feeling unappreciated, even under-appreciated, for all the stuff I have done. This extends from members not respecting what I had to say to feeling as if people didn’t want to listen to me or want me around because they thought I was useless, irresponsible, incompetent, and boring. “Clearly”, they don’t want someone like me as a mod so I left as a result of that. There is a lot more it but this is but a summary, so read it all if you want more details.

Overall, I’ve been disrespected and disregarded heavily before, but it felt somewhat clear to me that the community had a bias and very much wanted me to leave despite all that I was doing to make the server a better place to be in. I left after determining that they do not deserve me and if they want me back, they are all going to have to BEG for me to come back.

#teru’s complaining again #vent #rant

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lucy-sky · 3 years

Text

The Break of Dawn (Leo Barnes x f!Reader)

You work in a small diner not far from the bus station and try to get over a tragic event that happened to you three years ago. Leo Barnes is one of the steady customers, and at some point you realize there's mutual attraction between the two of you. There's no time for romance though - only one night left before the annual Purge, and Leo has an important job to keep Senator Roan safe as it's the only chance to finally put an end to the Purge.

Words: 3 656

Warnings: Sexual content (not super detailed, I would rate this story as Mature rather than Explicit, but still they f*ck), a bit of angst (trigger warning: loss), but Leo is a caring and protective guy who’s ready to hold you

A/N: My first time writing Leo Barnes or any Frank Grillo character, so please don't be mean :))

Taglist: @sweetfictionalworld, @skvatnavle, @lunamoon-87

“There he is.”

Stella pokes you with her elbow.

“What?”

“Your tough guy. He’s here,” she nods to the corner of the diner and you don’t even need to follow her gesture to know that Leo Barnes is sitting there, his usual spot. He’s a bit early today, and it’s understandable - you too find it harder to sleep well as the Purge is getting closer.

“He’s not my tough guy, Stells,” you roll your eyes.

“Oh yeah? Tell it to someone else,” she snorts. “So far I’m just wondering how long you’re gonna keep ignoring that sexual tension…”

“Stella, please.”

“What? Honestly, I don’t know why he’s being such a gentleman… But just FYI, y/n… You know it’s not the 19th century and you actually can make the first move?”

“Even if I wanted to, it’s not the right time,” you shrug. “You know he’s doing an important job. He’s got plenty of stuff to think about and it’s definitely not romance.”

“Who’s talking about romance, sis?” Stella laughs. “You’re both so goddamn tense, you need to blow off some steam. No, seriously. You need to get laid. He needs to get laid. It’s just way too obvious!”

“Oh dear god, just please shut up…” you groan.

“Fine,” she gives you a wicked smirk. “If you don’t want him, then I’m bringing his order.”

You chuckle at this.

“Don’t you dare.”

To be completely honest, you can’t deny that Stella is partly right. There is something between you and this grumpy silent man in the corner. But what exactly? You can’t really put it into words, it’s not just the attraction, or sexual tension as Stella says. You do find him handsome though, you admit that. A couple of times when he was wearing a t-shirt, you caught yourself staring at his muscular arms. Yes, guilty. And still… There’s more than that. You’d call it some sort of mutual understanding.

Leo Barnes works for Senator Roan. In the past, he used to be a cop, now he is the head of security for her. You learnt that one night when he was here, having his usual late dinner. The TV was on, evening news, something about the election of course. And suddenly you noticed him there, standing behind Roan’s back with another guy in a formal dark suit. You blinked, stared at the screen, then looked back at him. He caught your glance.

“Is that… you?” you blurted, realizing too late that you said it out loud. But he smiled, and in his smile there was no anger or annoyance.

“Apparently so,” he replied with a soft chuckle and ran his fingers through his dark hair. “How do I look?”

You started talking ever since then. Barnes usually came to the diner twice - in the morning he just had a mug of black coffee, and in the evening he ordered something to eat. Mornings were often crowded as many people passed the diner before heading to work in the city, so you were busy. But the evenings were mostly quiet.

You often stayed at work late, covering Stella who had to run to her kids or another date. You didn’t mind that since work was always your way to escape. Nobody was waiting for you at home anyways. Somehow, Leo Barnes started to keep you company. He wasn’t much of a talker and you were never into heartfelt conversations with the clients here, but something just clicked. Especially after you learnt about his job and it became clear that your views on the Purge are the same.

Many people hate The Purge, as well as many people support it. Some people hate it because they’re scared for their loved ones, their business (small shop owners who don’t have enough money to afford the Purge insurance often suffer), or they hate it just because they’re against violence in general. And the others… They have more personal reasons. You’re one of them. And somehow, even if you don’t know for sure, you just feel like Leo Barnes has personal reasons as well. He never really told you, and you don’t dare to ask because you know well enough how the memories can hurt. You didn’t tell him either. But still, you don’t know how exactly it worked, you just looked at each other and saw it. It’s like an unspoken secret between the two of you. The details don’t matter anyway. Your stories are in the past and you can’t change it, but what you can change is the future. If Senator Charlene Roan wins the election - the Purge will finally end. You can help with your vote, and Leo… Leo is determined to do anything to help her survive this year. Just this year, and hopefully no one would ever have to survive this nightmare again. You both want it more than anything else.

“Hey.”

You smile at Leo as you place a mug of coffee and a plate on the table in front of him.

“Hey…” he looks confused when he sees the food. Nothing really special: eggs, bacon, some beans and a toast. “What’s that? I... only asked for the usual…”

“Just thought you might need some extra fuel,” you shug. “Only one night left before the Purge, so… you must have a lot of work to do.”

“Yeah, you’re right… I actually do,” he gives you a tired smile. “Thank you.”

“Welcome,” you nod and turn to leave, but Leo suddenly touches your arm and you freeze.

“Y/n?”

“Yeah?” you face him again.

“Do you work tomorrow?”

“Yes… Why are you asking?..” you give him a puzzled look.

“Well uh… To be honest I’d be happier if you took a day off… You know, just to make sure you’re safe…”

You feel the heat on your cheeks. Does… does he worry about you?.. The realization makes your heart shrink for a second. Apparently he’s not just someone who understands, he’s someone who cares. You already forgot what it feels like when someone really cares. Well, of course there are your parents, but they’re far away… And Leo, he’s right here.

“It’s okay,” you say, trying not to look too baffled. “Tomorrow we’re closing the diner earlier, right after lunchtime, so I’ll be home long before the Purge begins. There’s no need to worry, really.”

“Good,” Barnes nods. “I just… don’t think I’ll be able to come over and check on you tomorrow, so I just…” he stutters as if trying to figure out something to say.

“I just want you to be careful, okay?” he finally utters, and to your surprise his hand reaches yours, squeezing it lightly. “Just be careful, yeah?”

“Yeah, I... Of course I will,” you try to smile reassuringly. “I promise.”

There’s about five minutes left before closing hour when Leo appears. As usual, you’re still here, helping Mary, the chief and the owner’s wife with all the cleaning up after the working day. While she’s in the kitchen, you wipe the tables, TV-set is murmuring something in the corner. The election, the purge… Always the same.

“You’re closed?” he asks, meeting your gaze. “Sorry, I… Didn’t realize it’s that late already…”

“We’re about to close, but it’s fine, come in!” you assure smiling at him maybe a bit more brightly than you wanted to show. “We’ll get you something to eat, right, Mary?”

“Sure thing,” she replies from the kitchen door. You weren’t the only one who saw Barnes on TV. Since then, he became an always welcome guest as the diner owners supported Roan as well. Otherwise, to be honest you don’t think you could possibly be able to work for them.

You put a plate with food in front Leo as he takes a seat at the counter. While he’s eating silently, you wipe the coffee mugs and place them carefully on the shelf. The TV keeps talking. Something about the bloomimg economy and international murder tourists who keep coming to the US to take part in the annual Purge. You glance at the screen, see their gut-wrenchingly excited faces.

“Jesus Christ,” you mutter under your breath and shake your head. “Fucking insane.”

“True,” you nearly jump at his words, as you didn’t realize Leo heard you. “I knew people who killed someone on Purge night for… different reasons. But those who kill just because they enjoy it, for fun or sport or whatever you call it - those are the most dangerous.”

“They’re just psychopaths. People like that should be kept in mental hospitals or something. But they just walk around as if nothing’s wrong with them. And the new founding fathers keep telling them how proud they are of them…”

“Roan’s gonna make it stop,” Mary joins the conversation. “This lady’s got some balls, am I right, sir?”

“Yes ma’am,” Barnes chuckles. “She absolutely got them.”

You leave the diner together with Leo. Mary chose to stay inside, waiting for her husband to come pick her up in a few minutes. The night is a bit chilly; you’re shivering, not sure if it’s the cold or the fact that you’re alone with him for the first time.

“Where’s your car?” he asks.

“Oh um… It’s in the service actually. So I’m going to the bus station right over there,” you point. Barnes frowns.

“What about tomorrow?”

“Stella promised to give me a ride home. Leo… I’ll be okay. It’s not the first Purge night in my life, you know.”

“Right,” he clears his throat. “Anyway, since I’m here I can drive you home.”

“You… sure it’s okay?” your voice betrays you a little. “I mean you must be tired…”

“I’m okay,” he assures, then nods at his car. “Come on. I insist.”

“Okay,” you hear yourself saying.

You’re mostly silent on the way. You feel a bit tense, but also kinda… weirdly excited to be in this car, next to him. Damn. Is Stella right, and you’re actually into him? Definitely so. But after all these years you almost completely forgot how it feels - to be into someone or how the relationships work. As if you’re a teenager again. Leo Barnes is the first man who actually made you think of something close to romantic longing since… That night.

“It’s here?” he asks as you reach your house. You nod, and he pulls over. You wait for him to say something, to tell you goodnight maybe, but he doesn’t. Without the sound of the car engine, the silence between you becomes even more awkward. You open your mouth to say goodbye to him, but instead different words suddenly come out.

“Leo, I…”

He looks at you intently. You stare down at your knees.

“Yeah?”

“I just… The fact that you worry about me - it’s very nice of you, really. And… I just wanted you to know that I worry about you too. I worry about you a lot actually…”

“Y/n…” his voice is quiet as he brings his hand to your face, gently urging you to look up at him. His eyes look darker than usual in the dim light of the street lamp nearby. You think if it’s possible to drown in someone’s eyes you’d already be gone.

“I’ll be fine, okay?” he says softly. “It’s gonna be a tough night for sure, but I’ll be fine, I have to be fine. You gotta trust me on this. You trust me?”

“Yes,” you barely whisper, unable to take your eyes from his, and when the tension becomes almost unbearable, his lips finally crush on yours.

You both expected and didn’t expect it, didn’t dare to admit even to yourself how much you really wanted it. Your breath hitches somewhere in your throat as you kiss him back eagerly, forgetting about everything and everyone for this moment that lasts so long and so painfully short at once. You’re both panting as your lips part, foreheads pressed together.

“I… I think I should go,” you mumble as a rush of panic suddenly overwhelms you.

“Yeah… Yeah…” he nods. “You should get some rest.”

“You too.”

You squeeze his hand for a second. Gosh, you didn’t even realize your hand was on his all this time.

“Good night,” you finally murmur, bracing yourself to get out of the car. You feel like something else needs to be said, but can’t really figure out what.

You enter the house and just lean against the door, heart hammering wildly inside your chest. You close your eyes and try to catch your breath. What the hell just happened? And why are you reacting like that? There’s nothing wrong about this kiss. You’re two single adults… Well, probably single. Leo doesn’t wear a ring, so… Damn it, you really got out of practice when it comes to relationships.

A knock on the door made your eyes snap open. As if in a daze, you slowly turn and reach the door handle, already knowing who you’re going to see.

Leo doesn’t say anything. And you can’t read the expression in his eyes, or you simply don’t have time for it, because the next moment he steps inside, his hands cup your cheeks and he kisses you with such longing and desperation it nearly kicks the breath out of your lungs. You don’t know what you’re doing any more, but your fingers are already in his dark hair, scratching the nape of his neck while his lips and tongue keep attacking your mouth. It feels like shockwaves running through your body, and for the first time in years you feel just so alive. All this time your feelings, passions and emotions were asleep, everything around you seemed pale and lifeless as if someone turned down the contrast, but something changed. Not right now, not in the snap of a finger, of course; it happened gradually. Something kept changing deep within you since the very first time your eyes met, and now - you’re finally ready to feel something. To let him in.

You don't think about it though. Or about anything else, to be honest. All you can focus on is what his lips are doing to you, how hot his breath is and how weirdly nice his stubble feels against your skin. Leo’s coat falls on the floor. His big hands seize your waist as he lifts you up, causing you to grip onto his broad shoulders. Pressing you against the nearest wall, he nuzzles into the crook of your neck, the kisses are sloppy, open-mouthed, and you can't suppress a soft moan. He's big and strong, you feel small underneath him, but you like it.

You can’t even remember clearly how you finally reached the bedroom, frantically helping each other to get rid of the clothes. When you tumble down and he hovers over you, the skin to skin contact is overwhelming. He brushes your hair away from your flushed face, kisses you with sudden tenderness. The look in his hazel eyes is warm yet still full of passion as you cup his cheek and he presses his lips to your palm. An affectionate gesture that makes your heart skip a beat, but you both are too impatient to be soft right now. So he leans in, kissing you harder this time, grunting against your mouth when you pull him closer, craving as much of him as possible. You can feel him twitching against your lower belly as you wrap your legs around him, eager to get more pressure. He’s not even inside you yet, but it already feels so good you can’t help bucking your hips, earning a low groan from him at the friction. His lips trail along your jawline, down to the side of your neck, where he kisses and nibbles, and you just know there’s gonna be marks tomorrow, but damn, you can’t care less.

When he finally enters you and starts moving, you’re almost delirious. Clinging to him, you gasp and whisper his name into his skin, feel the muscles on his back tense as he thrusts deeper. The wave of bliss hits you so hard your vision turns blurry and for a few seconds it feels like you’re not there.

Reality comes back to you slowly, with all the dark and troubled thoughts you can’t escape. Leo is lying next to you with his eyes closed, breathing evenly, so you think he must be asleep. Good for him. Carefully, you slip out of the bed to get a glass of water. It doesn’t help you to get rid of the lump in your throat though. Back to the bedroom, you sit on the edge of the bed and let out a deep sigh, trying to fight back tears. Too many emotions for one night.

“Y/n.”

Leo’s voice doesn’t even seem sleepy. You can feel him shifting in bed to reach you, the warmth of his calloused hand stroking your back soothingly.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, uh…” You shake your head, bringing your hand to rub your eyes. “I’m good. It’s just… It’s been a while since I… You know…”

“I know. It’s been a while for me as well.”

“I lost my boyfriend three years ago,” you blurt out, surprising yourself that you said it out loud. “During the Purge night. He um… He was a medical student. We lived in an apartment building and we heard someone crying for help. I wanted to stop him but he just couldn’t ignore someone who needed help, you know. He got shot accidentally, right into his head. There was no chance to save him.”

Leo’s hand gently squeezes your shoulder.

“Sorry, I… Don’t even know why I’m telling you this. I’ve never talked about him since the funeral…”

“It’s okay,” he moves closer, pressing a kiss against your shoulder blade.

“I was so angry at first, you know,” now that you start talking you seemingly cannot stop. “I wished I could find and kill them. But then I thought he wouldn’t want me to become a murderer...”

He presses his forehead against the back of your head for a moment. “I know how you feel, y/n.”

You finally turn to meet his gaze.

“I lost my son. I know what this anger feels like. Two years ago all I was thinking about on the Purge night was revenge. I was determined, almost obsessed.”

“Did… you do it?”

“No. I was close to it. Very close. But… One wise person made me realize that it wouldn’t help. Violence only brings more violence.”

“It has to be stopped,” you whisper.

“Yes,” he nods. “That’s why I left the police. Cops have to stay away from the Purge. I couldn’t any more. At least now I know I'm doing the right thing.”

“Right… Just… I’m just scared of losing you too,” you say very quietly, but he hears you anyway. His strong arms wrap around your body, pulling you closer, enclosing into his warmth. Making you feel safe.

“Hey, hey...” He whispers into your hair as he nuzzles into the top of your head. “It’s not gonna happen, you hear me? Everything’s gonna be alright. I promise.”

You have no doubt your colleagues noticed who drove you to work this morning. But today no one is in the mood for comments, not even Stella. Even though the work goes on as usual, there’s still this tension in the air before the Purge night.

Through the window you can see a bunch of guys gathered around the car with an open trunk full of baseball bats and other stuff you can’t discern. The owner proudly shows off his stuff, other guys laugh, they look pretty chill and relaxed, and your stomach nearly twists at the sight.

All night you could barely sleep a wink. A knock on the door drags you out of troubled slumber. At first you’re not even sure if you really heard it or it was in your dream. But the sounds repeat and you jump off the bed and without even caring to slip something over the huge t-shirt you sleep in. Barefoot, you rush to the door, open it with shaky hands.

He looks so exhausted it seems like he can barely stand. The collar of his shirt that used to be white is now stained with blood. And yet… He’s smiling.

“Leo!..” you gasp, stepping towards him and bringing your hand to his stubbly cheek. “Oh my god, are you… Everything okay?..”

“I’m great,” he breathes out huskily, and his smile slowly turns into a wide grin. “We did it, baby.”

You don’t even try to hold back tears as you fall into his arms, bury your face into his chest. He smells a bit like sweat and blood, but you absolutely don’t care. “I’m so glad you’re here,” you mumble into his ruined shirt. “I’m here,” he whispers back, stroking your hair. Then you realize the two of you are still standing at the porch.

“Alright,” you say, drawing back a little. “Let’s get you in, you need some rest… And you’re probably hungry too… And you definitely need a shower…”

“Wait, y/n. Let’s just… Stay here for a bit? I think we both need to catch a breath,” he chuckles crookedly, reaching out to wipe a tear from your cheek. You smile back.

“Okay.”

Sitting on the porch with your head on Leo’s shoulder, his arm wrapped around your frame, you watch the sky becoming lighter and lighter as the dawn breaks. You can hear the sounds of sirens in the distance. The city’s slowly getting back to life, waking up after another nightmare.

You both know it’s not the end, the war isn’t won yet, but at least you won this very important battle. And for the first time in what seems like ages you have a good feeling about the future.

Thanks for reading!

Hugs, Lucy

#the purge #leo barnes x reader #frank grillo #fanfiction #the purge fanfiction #the purge anarchy #the purge election year #lucy tries to write

231 notes · View notes

infernal-fire · 3 years

Text

five types of love.

what to expect: smut, swearing, friends w/ benefits arrangement, mention of Imposter syndrome, fluff, angst, heartbreak, overstimulation, implied creampie, rough sex

a/n: a little warning; you will be choosing your ending - there is a happy one and a sad one. a huge shoutout to @mollygetssherlockcoffee and @angrybirdcr for talking to me about the fic and offering such amazing advice! and @tuiccim was so damn lovely, even offered to beta this (though all mistakes are my own).

summary: you once heard that there were eight types of love. you only knew of five; the five that caused you to fall for one, blue-eyed menace.

Ludus: uncommitted, casual love that can attribute to a flirtatious and fun conquest. Not to be mistaken for Eros.

“I think we’re forgetting the reason why the mission failed in the first place. If the older fellow took a suggestion once in a-”

“-Tony, you know damn well that there were civilians in there.”

Steve and Tony glared at each other from across the briefing room. The tension in the room was exorbitant, but then again, it had been that way since Bucky joined the team.

“This is exactly why we need the new girl. You super-soldiers and billionaires are getting tangled up in each others’ asses and forgetting about what it’s like for the normal people,” Rhodey sighed.

“The last thing we need is another trainee fucking up orders,” Tony snorted and began messing with his tech. The projector flipped through random screens, FRIDAY most likely filtering out the irrelevant news.

“If you have a problem, maybe you should say it to his face,” Steve seethed, now standing up to match Tony’s stance. Usually, this type of jab at Bucky wouldn’t rile him up, but the super-soldier was at his wit’s end following the events of the latest mission.

Beside him, Bucky lightly tugged on his friend’s hand, signalling him to disengage.

“You’re with them?” Tony incredulously questioned Rhodey.

“I’m with the idea of calming this room down.”

“Besides, she’s already been prepped for her first mission,” Natasha piped up. “We’re supposed to have a sit-down in 5 minutes... that is, if you boys can get your shit together.”

The room broke out into a chorus of muttering and everyone settled in their seats again. Captain strode to the front of the room and pulled up his game plan, fiddling with the map FRIDAY was projecting.

You, on the other hand, could not decide how to act in front of the Avengers: Laidback? They wouldn’t take you seriously. Know-it-all? No, that was Stark’s play. Timid Tiffany? If you wanted to seem secretly conceited? Sure. That would work for now.

When Vision floated out to bring you in, you didn’t even flinch at the unforeseen phasing. Impressed at your lack of a reaction, Vision faltered before ever-so-courteously introducing himself.

Could this sentient being laugh of his own volition? You gave him your name and dramatically curtsied to test your theory; he could laugh, and you were pleasantly surprised to find that it was not at all robotic.

You felt the room intently eye you as you ambled to your seat beside one, blue-eyed menace. You half-expected the team to introduce themselves, but who were you kidding - anyone could hear the argument from three corridors away. There was no point in pretending like they wanted you here, but that wouldn’t deter you.

You glanced at your neighbour, met with the pleasant face of the one and only. James Buchanan Barnes was known to be a handsome devil, but the reputation of the Winter Soldier often precedes him; that, unfortunately, does not stop you from eyeing him.

When he caught your stare, you scolded yourself. You’re such a creep.

When he smirked at your ogling, you praised yourself. Oh, hello there.

This is gonna be fun.

Eros: sexual, passionate love that is fueled by lust.

It didn’t happen after the first mission; he had the decency to wait until the fourth mission to knock on your door.

You had been putting away the last of your belongings, finally adjusting to the grandiose living conditions the Avengers Tower provided.

As soon as you unlocked your knob, the door flung open; Bucky's stare was partially inhibited by his hooded eyes. He hadn’t always looked at you like that.

Like what?

With unadulterated craving.

That day, he strode in like he owned the place. You didn’t expect the shove that caused you to land on your bed with an oomph. Bucky wasted no time, climbing onto your form, straddling you. By the time you understood what was happening, a single finger was pressed into your lips.

“Either tell me you don’t want this right fucking now,” he leaned in, close to your face, “or shut the fuck up and let me use you.”

You whimpered in response.

“Not good enough.”

“Use me.”

That’s all the affirmation he needed.

You pushed off the bed to try and meet his lips but he firmly pinned you down by your shoulders. Bucky reached into your panties and circled your clit without hesitation. It only took some swivelling, his intense gaze and the unexpected plunge of his fingers in your channel to make you see stars. Bucky had made you come before kissing you.

When he finally slotted his lips against yours, it was nothing short of all-consuming; you hadn’t even realized the absence of clothes on your body. Had it been ten minutes? Or thirty? It was hard to tell when you were being ravaged by another.

He made you come twice more: once with his fingers’ repeated dipping and pressing into the soft, spongy part of your cunt. The second time was with the talented sucking and flicking of his tongue. Technically, it was the third time.

None of your past partners had been this steadfast in their duty to pleasure you. You were already putty in his hands, ready to be moulded according to his needs. Part of you was ready to tap out, unable to fathom the likelihood of coming over his cock again, but the better half of you needed it.

In your orgasmic haze, you failed to notice that his clothes were being discarded - if you did, it would have given you the opportunity to gawk at the body that you so desperately wanted to see shirtless. When you finally registered his naked person, your hand involuntarily traced the connection between the metal arm and flesh. He threw his head back and groaned before kissing you again.

He pulled off, just enough to get a good look.

“Look at you, all fucked out. I didn’t even put my cock in.”

He pumped his shaft with fervour before pushing the blunt head against your slit. You winced at his attempt to put it in.

“Made you cum three times and you’re still too fucking tight,” he muttered and ran his length up and down your folds. Once he had accumulated enough slick he tried again, this time, successful.

You moaned as he slowly sunk in and buried his cock to its absolute limit. If the walls of your pussy had a voice, it would be absolutely hoarse. You also realized that he only bestowed the three orgasms in hopes of reprieving the pain of the stretch. Without the preparation, he might have torn you in half.

When he began moving, the only thing that was slow or soft about him was his lips against your skin. The thrusts were punishing; if it wasn’t obvious that he was angry before, this made it clear as day.

You screamed and moaned, alternating between keening and arching your back; the pleas did nothing to falter his furious pace. The smacking of your skin was only heightened by the slick that your cunt produced in attempts to accommodate his length. Every time he pulled out, his balls were connected to your sex with a string of come.

If someone told you that you could come five times within forty minutes, you would have face painted and dressed them up like a clown.

Now you laid in bed, being used like a rag doll, begging Bucky to stop you from coming a sixth time that session. It was usually the dirty talk that got you off, but he hadn’t said anything aside from the occasional ‘shut up’ or ‘shhh’. His movements alone had you convulsing around his length.

His thrusts didn’t get sloppy. Rather, they increased in force, as his cock sought space beyond your cervix. You tried to scream, but all that came out was more broken tears and cries. At last, he let out a pornographic moan as his load flooded your insides. Sure, you had let past boyfriends come in you, but you never actually felt the liquid shoot up inside you, until today.

Following the pop sound that his cock made as it pulled out, you whined again. You could feel your heartbeat throb down there.

He flipped you onto your stomach and smacked your ass, laughing at the way you sobbed in pain before disappearing from your room altogether.

He was gone as fast as he showed up.

And he ruined everyone else for you.

In all fairness... you asked for it.

Philia: the deep, virtuous love that is formed in a good friendship. Lovers share a strong bond when Eros and Philia feed into each other.

What started as a release from the frustrations that accrue on the battlefield turned into a deep connection that neither of you had anticipated. Sex had only been used as a tool in the act of psychological detachment until that day.

It was a failed date of some sort: either you had been stood up or the guy was a total moron. You could wrack your brain for the memory, but in any matter, it was all irrelevant now.

You were upset, not just at your lack of a love life, but at the imposter syndrome that had weaselled its way into your liveliness. Feeling like you weren’t enough was catching up to your daily life and even Bucky had noticed the hesitation during your post-mission escapades.

Before you knew it, your hand was knocking on Bucky’s door at the ripe hour of 1 AM.

You heard the muffled thumps of his footsteps and considered booking it out of there, but before you made up your mind, the door opened. As you had predicted, Bucky was wide-awake.

“What?”

You had wanted to sass him for his tone but decided against it since you were the one who interrupted his 1 AM activities. You shook your head from the clouds and mumbled incoherently, starting to walk away. The coldness of his metal arm abruptly gripped your wrist.

“Are you okay?”

You hated that question. You could be doing so good, holding in the burden of a horrible week, but the moment someone asks you that question, the dam would disintegrate into dust, only to be washed away by the inevitable waterworks.

The sob you let out didn’t loosen his hold. He let you cry and watched as you tried to wipe away the unrelenting tears, still refusing to close the gap between your bodies. Finally, you shuffled into his arms where he bear-hugged you, cupping the back of your neck and holding it to the junction of his neck.

"You smell nice,” you sniffled.

He lightly chuckled before dragging you into his room and seating you on the bed. He ordered you to stay there and rummaged around his cupboard before pulling out a bottle with red liquid sloshing around.

“You keep that in your room?” you snickered, wiping your nose with the back of your hand, before blanching at your state. Hell, he had seen you naked, how you look right now is the least of your concerns.

“In case of emergencies,” he winked. “This seems like a real emergency.”

A fresh wave of tears pooled in your waterline as you peered at your hands that were picking at each other.

“I don’t have wine glasses, so we can just chug.”

Bucky stuck out the bottle and you grasped it firmly before gulping one-fourth of it. That’s all the coaxing it took to get you to spill.

You don’t even remember what you talked about, but before either of you realized, 3 AM blinked on the digital clock that hung above the bed frame. You were almost asleep, now resting on Bucky’s lap while he occasionally hummed or offered his two cents. Right before you drifted off, the super-soldier lifted you, placing you under a cover. He climbed in from the other side, one hand cupping your face, the other snaking around your waist.

“Thanks, Buck.”

“It’s gonna be okay. You’re okay,” he whispered.

Your eyes drooped but swiftly opened as Bucky leaned in, resting his forehead against yours. His lips barely touched yours, grazing their presence, but you moved, tenderly catching them. He returned the movement, the delicacy of his actions reflected in the softness of his eyes.

You pulled away and the two of you wordlessly bore into each other’s eyes. At last, you succumbed to the fatigue, as did he; both of you resting in the others’ possession.

Mania: an unhealthy, obsessive love that plagues the mind.

It was the third time Bucky didn’t show up at your door after a mission. Three missions, each of them ending in something that would have indubitably pissed him off - after all, they were HYDRA bases. That’s when you first suspected it.

The second was when you noted his intentional avoidance of your presence. Whether it be the kitchen, the gym or the hallways, the stealthy ex-assassin didn’t have trouble actively dodging you. Initially, you chalked it up to wanting space or simply taking a break.

Then you heard it.

Why was it that your gut told you to go right then? All this time you had been biding, yet it was at this precise moment that your hunch asked you to speak to him. It could’ve been the duration of the month that it took you to prepare yourself, but it had to be now. You raised your hand, prepping to knock on the door, but stopped.

Your hand froze mid-air. The elegant laugh of another girl sounded behind the door. It was faint, the noise slightly suppressed by the wall between you.

It could be anyone.

But it wasn’t. Your intuition, the one that told you to come here right now, was wise enough to know that this wasn’t just anyone. It was her.

You cupped your mouth to stop the sob that threatened to liberate itself from the confines of your constricted airway. You fell forward, onto your knees, as if to pray to the gods to not let it happen. But it already did. You let go of your mouth, gasping for air from holding your breath all this time.

Shoulders sagged and spine bent, you stalked back to your room like a zombie. Face devoid of all emotion, you fell onto the corner of your bed and crumpled into a ball. For twelve hours, you laid there. Sometimes sleeping, other times letting the tears leak out of the corners of your eyes. Memories of his fingers weaving through your own, the pleasures that chilled you to the bone. Most of all, the way you held his head to your chest as he whimpered about the nightmares that invaded his nights. It felt like those things happened to someone else. Nothing more than a distant memory.

Your heart clenched, tugging on the heartstring that you once thought was connected to him.

It was as if he knew you stood outside his door that day. There was an unspoken agreement to never speak of it. Yes, yes, don’t ever speak of it. The dam that you built so carefully will come crashing down. He stopped avoiding you, but you wished he didn’t; it was crueller to be reminded, easier to pretend he didn’t exist.

Be honest with yourself.

You didn’t pretend like he didn’t exist.

In fact, the first thought after waking up? Bucky. Last thought before going to sleep? My Buck. Every time he wasn’t around? James Buchanan Barnes.

Please, don’t act like every waking moment isn’t spent loving him. Because deep down, you know what’s true.

He never did introduce the mystery girl to anyone at the Tower, but you knew his disappearance after missions could be credited to her. Did he take out his anger on her as he did to you? Or were you nothing more than a toy?

Guilt was one of the few emotions you could make out from the rare occasions you caught his stare. Longing was there too, but you couldn’t be sure that you weren’t projecting. Months went by, waiting for thoughts of him to abandon your disturbed mind. The time never came.

As promised, he ruined anyone else for you.

Pragma: the type of love that endures all shortcomings. Committed relationships that stay in love have an element of significant Pragma to them.

a happy ending.

That relationship may have ended but it didn’t mean he would come back to you.

He did come back. But he wasn’t yours. Bucky made that clear when two more relationships ensued the last. Each time, the buffer period between them was filled by you.

His back-up plan. That’s what you had been reduced to.

After the third time he brought a new girl, you’d think you would be used to it, maybe even uncaring. Unfortunately, the opposite would always prevail.

Steve caught your fist and tutted, commenting on the bad form. You stopped, shook your shoulders and began hopping on the balls of your feet again. Jab, jab. Swing. At first, you’d imagine the faces of those girls. Nowadays, it was easier to envision the pads Steve held as his best friend’s face.

“Bucky’s girl broke up with him.”

“Oh,” you made out, focus slightly wavering.

“You know what happened?”

“Are you asking me ‘cause you wanna know or because you already know?”

“I already know,” he sighed, lowering the hand pads.

He exhaled your name, shaking his and rubbing the bridge of his nose. “When are you two gonna stop playing around?”

“I really don’t understand, Steve.”

“You know why she broke up with him?” You blinked, tongue poking the inside of your cheek in anticipation of an answer.

“He moaned your name during sex.”

“God, that’s so corny,” you huffed, now beginning to make your way out of the boxing ring.

“So what, you’re gonna do nothing? Keep letting him use you?” Steve jogged to catch up to you.

“No,” you faced him, “I’m not letting him use me as a fallback anymore. I’m putting an end to it.”

Steve pursed his lips and shot you and exasperated look before shaking his head. “Don’t let something good go to waste.”

It used to be something good.

You wondered if you could hold up the promise you had just declared to Steve; in the past, you failed every time he showed up at your door. Bucky knew exactly how to play into your emotions, how to say the right things every time. And just like that, the next morning you’d end up in his arms. That stops today.

Determined, you practically punched the button to go up on the elevator and impatiently tapped your foot. As the doors slid closed, you took one look at yourself and turned away, fighting the urge to fix your appearance for him. The doors opened again and you check the floor number, ready to step out, but stopped at the sound of your name. His ex. You almost ran off, unwilling to put up with an angry ex, but she called on you again. You sheepishly stood there, as if you were the one who did something wrong, until she stepped in and pressed the button to go to the lobby.

The silence stretched on, much like your patience. Does she even know who you are?

“We were both fooling ourselves.”

You turn to check if she was speaking to you. Her stare was unwavering and she maintained eye contact that almost made you squirm.

“We both love different people.” She smiled, an obvious melancholy tainting her face. You stood there, absolutely clueless as to how you should respond.

“It’s too late for me, but it’s not for the two of you. Just... don’t let him go. He’s one of the good ones.”

You turned again, now looking down at the ground. Even if she expected you to say something back, it was impossible, at this point. Your mind was in shambles, everything she said contradicting the choice you made five minutes ago.

After what seemed like an eternity, the doors opened and she stepped out. She turned one last time and nodded as if you knew what to do now.

Bucky’s door was unlocked. You called out his name, barely above a whisper and sauntered with hesitation lining your every step. Nothing. Empty. He wasn’t there.

It was a sign. You almost ignored the advice his ex gave, ready to walk into his room and end things. Your shoulder slumped as if your bore the weight of the world on them as you slunk back to your room. Now it would take another outburst or another month to prepare yourself to talk to him again.

As the days went by, you barely saw him around. It reminded you of the times he intentionally ignored you, except this time, you weren’t sure it was intentional. When you did see him, it was clear that he wasn’t doing good; his beard was unkept and scraggly, the bags under his eyes heavier than any trauma he carried. You pretended as though you didn’t notice and went about your routine.

1 AM

A knock sounded at your door. You knew who it was, how could you not, but hoped it wasn’t him anyway. The encounter would most likely end with tears or sex and you didn’t favour either outcome.

You waited a minute. Maybe he would leave if he assumed you were asleep. The knock sounded again.

You cracked the door open. Whatever you were expecting, surely, it wasn’t this. Eyes red and puffy, it was clear he had been crying and most definitely not sleeping.

He held up a wine bottle, and chuckled pathetically at himself.

“Maybe this is bad idea,” he sniffled and wiped his nose with the sleeve of his left arm.

It didn’t feel right to say anything. Rather, you opened the door wider and beckoned for him to step in.

“Emergency?” you asked with a little smile. God, you were so close to crying and he hasn’t even said anything.

“Oh yeah. Big emergency.”

He sat on your bed and felt the sheets, trying to remember the feeling of it on his knees. The days he would buck into you while you clutched them like a vice. The soldier pursed his lips and watched as you settled beside him.

“You don’t have to talk... if you don’t want to,” you said. Your voice cracked and you almost smacked yourself for being so weak around him.

“But I do. I should talk. I have so much to say... Can I explain?” He turned to face you, reaching out for your hands, holding them in his own. You didn’t say anything, opting to return his request with a pleading look in your eyes. He knew what the look meant: just don’t break my heart. Again. He took a deep breath in acknowledgement, trying to form the words that would help you understand.

“I can’t believe I hurt you. I swear, I didn’t know I was doing it, at first.” You mustered your best unbelieving look, almost scoffing for good measure. “No, really,” he hastily added.

A few tears streamed down your face and you frantically tried to wipe them. Bucky took one look at you before he began breaking down, tears slipping down his face.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to cry... I just- I don’t understand? I thought things were good?” you questioned. You had given up on trying to wipe your tears, as did he.

“I wasn’t supposed to fall for you. And by the time I realized, we were so far in. Then I found a distraction... and I really thought I was over you,” he paused, wondering if he should continue or not. You showed no sign of speaking up, so he went on.

“I didn’t think you cared. I didn’t think you felt the same way. I was so convinced that you wouldn’t blink twice but then... but, I-... I heard you at the door that day. I wanted to kick her out and hold you, but I-...”

“But you what? You what, Bucky?”

“I thought it was too late for us. I thought I ruined everything.”

“Then why are you here now?”

“Don’t be mad,” he murmured, retracting his hands and fiddling with his fingers.

“I don’t think anyone can ever replace what we had. Maybe... still have? Because you’re it for me. I’m sorry it took me this long to realize that. I was on the brink of losing myself.” He looked up at you, eyes brimming with a new wave of tears. He mumbled your name weakly, croaking out a please at the end.

You curled in on yourself and fell into his arms, hoping that was enough of a answer.

“I can’t promise you that everything will be back to normal by tomorrow morning... but with some time, I can learn to trust you again.”

Above you, Bucky hurriedly nodded. At the state he’s in right now, you suspected that you could ask him to sell his soul and he would agree.

“And if you ever break my heart again-,”

“-I would die before that happens,” he finished for you, kissing the top of your head for good measure.

“I love you,” you whimpered, “so fucking much.”

“I love you too. I really love you too,” he affirmed and encased you with his arms again.

Though there had been some rough patches on the road to happiness, with Bucky by your side, you felt as though you could make it through anything; for that, is the power of pragmatic love.

an unfortunate ending.

The tears that would’ve been shed during the ceremony have dried on your pillowcase about five hours ago. Now, you sat beside the team, waiting for her to walk down the aisle.

Bucky looked nervous, as if he were reconsidering his life decisions. The little devil on your shoulder was holding onto every little thing he did: the wrinkle of his forehead, his repeated tugging on the suit and his flustered glancing around. Oh lord, and when he accidentally locked eyes with you? You may have bitten your lip and looked away in contempt but the shoulder-devil was as persistent as ever.

He secretly still wants you.

Shut up.

He wants to call it off.

Get a life.

At last, the lucky girl stood at the end of the winding path and you couldn’t help but sneak a look at the groom. His tension and nervousness crumbled at the sight of her; it was difficult not to feel happy that he had found the one that made him feel this way.

It may have been him for you, but that notion was long forgotten, a nuisance of memory at most. Your love for him, regardless of the storms it has endured, is no longer respected or wanted by either party.

If he loves her, why does he come to you when things get bad?

You shook your head at that, having no answer for the nature of his secret infidelity. It was nothing more than taking out his frustrations on you - much like the old days.

Your reminiscing was cut short when a voice asked everyone to rise for the bride. You stood and straightened out your outfit, flicking off the little white petal that clung to your maroon dress. A hand grasped your own, and you turned to see Steve smile reassuringly. You squeeze his hand in appreciation and turned your attention to the white-clad figure walking down the aisle.

And that’s all you remember. You wish you could recall the rest of the wedding. You really do. Too preoccupied with what was going to happen after the event, you disassociated from the ordeal altogether. No matter how hard you grilled yourself, nothing would come to mind - dissociative amnesia only occurs as a protective coping mechanism during traumatic events; was that what Bucky’s wedding was to you?

What type of question is that?

For once, you agreed with the little red beast that sat on your shoulder. Long ago, the first time you saw someone else Bucky’s arms, the devil pierced the pitchfork right through the angel’s heart. These days, it was all you could think of.

After the bride and groom exchanged ‘I do’s’, you willed yourself to stay a while longer. Your only companion, Steve, slow danced with you in silence, knowing that whatever he says would be of no consolation. Bucky did have half a mind to ask you for a dance, but he saw you leave. You didn’t think anyone did. He waited for you to turn and look at him one last time, but you never did. It’s okay, he thought. I didn’t deserve her anyway.

No one saw you after that.

On your bed, Steve found a single note that didn’t explain anything more than what he already knew. If anything, it simply affirmed that you were gone for good. Your things packed up, no trace of a person ever having lived there. Even if he pulled some strings, it would take years to find you again.

After all, you had already been lost for quite some time.

hey folks. i know this seems a little desperate-sounding but i would really appreciate reblogs and would absolutely love to hear your thoughts on the story. what was you favourite part? which part made you feel some way? i really love knowing these things. love each and every single one of you.

Masterlist

Shoot me a message or fill out the form in my bio to be added to my tag list!

#sebastian stan #sebastian stan fic #sebastian stan character #bucky barnes #bucky fic #bucky x reader #bucky x you #bucky x y/n #bucky barnes x female reader #bucky barnes x y/n #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x you

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fific7 · 3 years

Text

Fake or Fortune

For @omgrachwrites 1K Follower Celebration - congratulations!

AU: Fake Relationship

Billy Russo x Reader

A/N: This does not follow canon, it takes place in my Alternative S1 Punisher Universe, with Arrogant!Billy in attendance.

Warnings: 18+ NSFW due to sexual content, slightly questionable consent, some dom/sub interaction, oral and unprotected* sex between consenting adults. Swearing and drinking.

*Irl, please don’t go wild in the country without protection.

(My Photo Edit)

Karen put a large G&T down in front of you, accompanied by a sympathetic look. You picked it up and took a large sip, sighing as you put it back down again.

“I give up, Karen. No matter what I do, without fail I either pick the wrong guy or else think everything’s fine, and then boom - it isn’t.”

This was a commiseration drinking session, which Karen had suggested after she’d noticed you moping around the office. You both worked at the same big newspaper but in different departments, and became good friends after spending numerous lunchtimes together in the staff restaurant.

“What happened this time?” she asked, then winced as she realised maybe that wasn’t the most tactful way of putting things. “I mean, I thought you and David were getting on really well?” You took a larger gulp of your drink, “Well, that’s the thing - so did I. Until I got the “it’s not you, it’s me” talk on Saturday.” You’d been seeing this guy from your Digital News Content section for a few months, and you’d really thought everything had been on track.

Karen sighed, “Oh lord, not that old pile of bullshit.” You nodded, “Yeah, right. I tried to pin him down to exactly what the problem was, but I guess it was just me, when it all came down to it. In fact, I saw him chatting up a girl from Accounts yesterday so he’s already moved on to pastures new. That didn’t take long, did it? Or maybe he’d already moved on but didn’t have the balls to tell me.”

“Look, I’m meeting up with Frank on Friday night for a drink...” her cheeks pinked up, and you smiled at her obvious pleasure in that thought, “....so why don’t you come along? He mentioned one of his friends might tag along.” You held up a hand, “Oh no! No! I’m not being set up.” She shook her head, “It’s not a set-up, I swear. They’ve got a little....issue.... with Homeland and we’re going to talk about it.”

You knew she’d recently met this ex-Marine called Frank when - in her role as investigative reporter - she’d been digging into some big CIA scandal. When was there not a scandal about the CIA, you thought. You knew she’d met him several times over the past couple of weeks and had detected a more-than-just-business interest in him. “Oh, so.... strictly business, then?” you teased. She shifted in her seat, “Well, mainly.... we’ve also been talking about more personal stuff.” “Uh-huh,” you nodded, smirking, “Karen fancies Frank, Karen fancies Frank!” you sang, while she batted your arm and gave an embarrassed laugh.

“Oh shut up, you,” she said, “...are you coming along or not?”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

And that’s why you found yourself sitting in a neighbourhood bar with Karen on Friday night, feeling quite nervous for some reason. Probably because Karen was fidgeting like hell next to you, and you were picking up on her nervous energy. You smiled over at her, “So you really like this guy, huh?” “No!”she denied, then as you raised an eyebrow at her, “Well... okay, yes I do like him. He’s so sweet.” Her eyes widened as she spoke, catching sight of two approaching figures, “Oh! Here he comes.” A big bear of a man came up to your table, smiling broadly at Karen and then including you in the smile as he stopped beside you. “Hey, Karen,” he greeted her, and she beamed back at him. “Hey, Frank,” and then she introduced you to him. His friend, who’d been partially blocked from your sight by Frank’s bulk, moved out from behind him and said ‘Hi - I’m Billy Russo,’ and shook your hand as he did so. “Nice ta meet ya,” said Frank, also shaking your hand and sitting down in the booth next to Karen.

The man who’d just introduced himself as Billy slid in next to you, and you tried not to stare. He was hot. Like, really hot. Dressed in a smart suit and overcoat, he really didn’t look like an ex-Marine, but Karen had told you that both Frank and his friend were ex-service, and that the friend had opened up a security firm called Anvil when he left the Marines. His handsome face turned towards you, and two very dark eyes looked into yours, “So.... you’re a friend of Karen’s?” You nodded, “Yeah, we just worked together to start with but now we’re besties.” “You a reporter too?” “Nah, I’m a lowly sub-editor on the news desk.” A sudden thought occurred to you, “Oh... and just to reassure you, this isn’t a set-up... you and me, I mean.” He smirked, and you found yourself staring at his lush brushed-back hair and sculpted jaw with its light beard. “Would it have been a big problem if it had been?” he was saying to you, and you shook yourself out of your little trance.

“No, I guess not...” you replied, laughing nervously, “...but I just wanted to get it out there.” He looked you over appraisingly, “Well, I wouldn’t have been disappointed at all,” the smirk got bigger, “....so if you change your mind, just let me know.” This left you speechless but he was still looking at you, asking, “Whaddya want to drink? First round’s on me,” before turning his gaze to the others.

Several beers later, you were sitting listening to the other three talking about a lot of indecipherable nonsense (from your point of view), and you were beginning to get antsy. “Karen, I’m going to head off,” you said in a break in the conversation and she looked slightly guilty, “Oh sorry... we’ve been going on about this for ages.” You shrugged, “It’s fine, Karen, honestly. I’ll see you Monday, okay? Have a great weekend.” You turned to the guys, “You too, and thanks for the drinks,” and made to move out of the booth. But Billy didn’t move. “See you home?” he questioned you, and you saw small smiles on both Karen and Frank’s faces. “Yeah, okay,” you nodded, and then he moved, standing aside as you slid out of the booth. As you headed to the door through the crowd of people, you felt his arm snaking around your lower back. Oooh, very confident, you thought. You’d marked him out as a player as soon as you’d set eyes on him.

“Sorry about the boring shop talk,” he said as you both hit the street, “....me and Frankie’ve got some problems with Homeland right now.” “That doesn’t sound good,” you said as you found yourself being guided around the corner from the bar. “Oh, I was going to take the subway,” you protested, but he shook his head, “This time on a Friday night? Nah.” He pointed towards a rather flashy-looking car parked in the street, “Got the car with me so I’ll take you home. I only had one beer, case you didn’t notice.” “I didn’t,” you admitted, “I thought you were sinking beers like the rest of us.” He gave a low laugh, “I was a sniper in the service, so I like to be aware of my surroundings at all times.” A little frisson ran through you, this guy was quite dangerous, you could tell. As you reached the car, he held the passenger door open for you and you climbed in, trying to be as elegant as possible although you weren’t sure you quite achieved that.

As he started the engine and moved the car out into the flow of traffic, he asked, “So what made you come along tonight if it wasn’t a set-up?” “I was bored. I just split up with my boyfriend of a few months so...” you shrugged. You heard a chuckle, “His loss.” “I don’t think that’s what he thought,” you replied, with a self-deprecating laugh. “Well, it’s true,” said Billy, “...believe me. He must be mad to give you up.” “You silver-tongued charmer,” you said back to him, and again you heard his deep chuckle.

“Seriously, it’s my gain. Look, this might seem a bit of an odd request seein’ as how we’ve only just met...” he began, looking across at you as he pulled up outside your apartment block, “....but you’d be doin’ me a big favour. How ‘bout you come along to this charity event I gotta go to next week? As my ‘plus one’?” You hesitated, and he carried on, “No strings, I promise. Just come along as my girlfriend and be on my arm all night. Help me ward off the attentions of someone I’d rather avoid.” You scoffed, “Fake dating? Really?!”

Much to your surprise, you found yourself walking into your building a few minutes later having just agreed to go to this event with Billy. He’d looked pleased, thanking you for saying yes. And you’d also been on the receiving end of a surprise kiss from him. He’d suddenly leant in, slid his big hand around the back of your neck and pulled you in, his mouth finding yours as he did. The kiss had been short but very sexy and you were still tingling from the after-effects.

He’d laughed at your look of total surprise, and wished you sweet dreams. You’d better be careful, warned your internal guardian angel, he said ‘No Strings’.... remember? So don’t go getting all invested in this guy. He’s a player.... for sure.

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

Billy and you had swapped numbers, and the following morning you were pleasantly surprised to get a text asking if you could meet him later that day. Intrigued, you texted back saying you didn’t have any other plans but why did he need to meet up? He came back saying he’d had an idea to help out with the event next week, and said he could pick you up. Feeling like you could be making a big mistake, you agreed so he said he’d be at your place around two.

You made sure you dressed casually. Not having any idea where you were going, but sure it wouldn’t be a date as such, you just chose a shirt and jeans with some suede ankle boots. When Billy texted you to say he was parked outside, you left your apartment and locked up, feeling a spark of excitement run through you as you did. “This is not a date, this is not a date, this is not a date!” you chanted in your head as you went downstairs. Billy, you saw with relief, was also dressed casually in jeans, t-shirt, leather jacket and combat boots. He gave you a big grin as you got in the car, the luxurious leather aroma of the interior filling your nostrils. “What make of car is this?” you asked, being an “it’s a black one” kind of girl. He gave you what could only be described as a smug smile, “Rolls Royce Wraith, sweetheart,” he answered. “Oh, okay,” you said, “....expensive, I take it?” “Very.” “Surprised you park it on the street the way you do then,” you shrugged, and he burst out laughing. “Is it one of those so-called penis extensions?” you asked next, and Billy nearly choked he was laughing so hard.

“Firstly, I take it that means you aren’t particularly impressed,” he gasped, getting his breath back after his laughing fit, “...and secondly, no darlin’, it definitely isn’t one of those ‘penis extensions‘ as you put it. Got no need for one-a those.” You returned his smirk, “Really? Well, I don’t care what car a guy drives,” you said firmly, “...that’s got nothing to do with what he’s like.” He glanced across at you as he swung the car into one of the downtown underground car parks. “And what do you think I’m like?” You looked at his profile as he concentrated on parking the big car in a corner space, “Mmmm... I think you’ve had a hard upbringing and now you’re making up for it. Big time.”

Billy switched the engine off and turned to stare at you, the dark eyes drilling into yours with an intensity you hadn’t been expecting. “Wow,” said Billy, “....you sure you’re not one-a these psychoanalysts or somethin’?” “Definitely,” you replied. “Well, you sure sound like you’ve been analysing me, sweetheart,” he said. You didn’t know him well enough to gauge his mood, and he carried on, “I mean, you got all that from meetin’ me last night and just now?” You nodded, saying neutrally, “I’m just speculating of course... but the expensive suits, the car, and I bet a big flashy apartment too, it just says ‘I can afford this now and I’m gonna enjoy it’ to me.” You were relieved to hear a chuckle as you’d been worried you’d really offended him. “Spot on,” he said, “...yeah, you’re spot on. I think you’re maybe in the wrong business.” You decided to change the subject, “So... where are we going, Billy?” “You’ll see in a minute,” he grinned, “....c’mon, let’s go sweetheart.”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

Minutes later, you were standing outside one of the expensive and trendy boutiques in the area. Billy’s hand went under your elbow and he steered you inside. “Billy... what’s going on?” He nodded to one of the staff who started making her way over to the two of you. “Look, it was my bright idea to drag you along to this thing, so the least I can do is treat you to a new outfit.” You were shaking your head before he’d stopped speaking, “Oh no, no... I can’t let you do that!” He was nodding back at you - it must’ve looked quite comical to the store assistant, “Oh yes, you will - I insist.” He turned to the woman, “Please can you help my girlfriend pick out an outfit for a formal event?” And before you could say anything else, he’d wandered over to a seating area near the changing rooms and seated himself in a comfortable armchair. “I’ll be right here, sweets,” he said, beaming at you. Girlfriend indeed, you thought.

The store assistant looked expectantly at you and you nodded hesitantly at her, so she led you over to some rails filled with lots of beautiful dresses. “How nice of your boyfriend to buy you a whole new outfit,” she commented, beginning to slide the dresses back and forth along the rail looking for a selection for you, “He’s very charming,” she continued, admiringly. “Yes, isn’t he,” you said between gritted teeth. Truthfully, you were feeling as if you were out shopping with your sugar daddy. But you had to admit that your bank account would’ve been protesting loudly if you’d had to make the purchase yourself, and you definitely would’ve had to buy something new as nothing in your wardrobe was even remotely suitable for a formal event. And he was right, this was all his bright idea. So you’d just suck it up, you thought, however reluctantly.

Eventually the assistant had several dresses folded over her arm for you to try on, and you sailed past Billy to the changing rooms without as much as a glance at him. But you just knew he was staring at you as disappeared behind the curtain.

After twenty minutes of struggling in and out of the various dresses, you had to admit that the assistant had made some good choices. There were three that you really liked, and you finally chose a midnight blue silky sheath of mid-thigh length, an asymmetric one-shoulder-strap neckline and a swirl of sequins diagonally across it from neck to hem. It was tight-fitting but didn’t show off an excessive amount of skin - you didn’t want to have it all out there on show after all.

The assistant had also brought several pairs of shoes to you once you’d chosen your dress, and you picked out a pair of matching delicate strappy sandals. Pleased with your choices, you put your own clothes back on and went out to find Billy. He looked up from his phone as you exited the changing room, a disappointed look on his face, “What.... no catwalk show for your boyfriend?” You leant down and whispered, “Okay, you’re laying it on a bit thick, Russo,” to which he grinned, gently took hold of your chin and softly kissed you. “You’re welcome, sweetheart,” he smirked. Then a horrible thought occurred to you, “Billy!” you whispered forcefully. He looked a bit nervously at you, “What?” “There was no price tag on that dress or the shoes either!” He waved a hand at you, “Yeah? That’s okay, just leave it to me.” “No! That’s not on. I’m going to ask her what the price is.” He jumped up out of the armchair, “Nah, nah! Told ya, it was my idea you come along so just let me do this, okay?”

He set off without further delay to the cash desk, while you reluctantly waited in the seating area. Not particularly comfortable with the idea of him buying you an outfit, you decided that you’d offer to buy him dinner to kind of offset his no doubt hefty bill for the dress purchase. He came back over to you a few moments later carrying a large box in one of the boutique’s carrier bags which he handed to you with a grin. “She’d already boxed it before I could see it so it’s still gonna be a surprise when I see it on the night.” You smirked back, you were quite pleased about that. “Billy, let me buy you dinner as a thank you for the dress.” “Okay, I won’t say no to a free dinner,” he grinned, “...where d’ya wanna go?” You mentally reviewed your bank balance and named a mid-priced restaurant close by.

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

After a pleasant couple of hours chatting over dinner, Billy drove you home. Debating how to end the night, you came up with what you felt was a decent plan. Not that you were trying to extend the evening of course. That would be just plain stupid as the ‘relationship’ was all a big fake. Remember? your brain asked you. “You know Billy, we haven’t prepared a back story yet, have we?” you said as he drew up outside your place. “A back story?” “Yeah. I mean, if this person you’re trying to avoid happens to ask us - together or separately - about our relationship, we need to be singing from the same songsheet, don’t we?” He looked thoughtful, “Uh yeah, you’ve got a point there.” “OK, well how about you come in for a glass of wine or a coffee and we can get that sorted now?” A devilish smirk appeared, “Plannin’ to ravish me, sweetheart?”

You felt your face heat up with a sudden blush, “No!! Purely to agree on the back story. But hey - we can just text about it if you’d prefer!” Embarrassed, you grabbed your bags, opened the car door and began to get out, but Billy grabbed your arm, “Hey, hey, sweetheart - I’m just kiddin’. Hold on an’ I’ll park up. We can walk up together.” You huffed slightly and closed the car door again, while Billy looked around for a parking space. Once parked, the two of you went up to your apartment and you unlocked the door, waving him inside and over to the sofa while you stashed the bags and headed to the kitchen area. “What would you like? Wine, beer or coffee?” “I’d better just have a coffee,” he said, “...don’t wanna get drunk and pass out in your apartment. Not a good look.” “I don’t see you as a ‘getting drunk’ kinda guy, Billy. You already told me you like to be aware of your surroundings.” He laughed, “You’re right, I don’t make a habit of gettin’ wasted.”

So you switched on your coffee machine and asked what kind of coffee he’d like, holding up a handful of different capsules. He strolled over to you, draping his leather jacket over the back of one of the high stools at your breakfast bar as he reached you. He leaned down slightly and looked at the selection you had in your hand, and you were suddenly very aware of the scent of his aftershave. “Whattya got there, then?” You took his hand and dumped them all in it, saying, “I’m just gonna fill up the water jug while you decide,” and moving swiftly away from him. You were finding it very difficult indeed to ignore the magnetic attraction he was exerting over you, but you really had to try harder as you were only going to end up getting hurt otherwise. He held out a capsule toward you, “Americano’s fine,” he said.

The two cups of coffee made a few moments later, you led him back over to the sofa and you both sat down at opposite ends. “Okayyyy,” said Billy, “....back story then?” You nodded, “Yeah. Nothing too fancy as the less details we have to remember the better.” “Good idea. We should probably add in some truth too. So.... we met through Karen & Frank?” “Yes, that’s a good start. Where did we meet and how long have we been seeing each other?” “Neighbourhood bar, and a coupla months?” “Okay, yeah. Actually is that about it? That was easier than I thought! Or...what else might they ask? Who is this person you’re avoiding - are they gonna be really nosy?” Billy snorted, “Oh yeah! Her name’s Caroline, a spoilt rich bitch. Her father owns a tech company and he supplies some of our equipment. She came along to one of the meetings recently and now she’s stalking me.” You grinned, “And that’s a problem for you? I would’ve thought you’d quite enjoy that, Billy.”

He grinned back, “Are you sayin’ I’m a player or somethin’?” “Well, aren’t you? I’m kinda getting that vibe.” Now he laughed out loud, “Maybe. But I like doin’ the chasing, sweetheart, not the other way round. If she ever got hold-a me, I’d never get outta her clutches.” “What - you wouldn’t? Not much of an ex-Marine then, are you?” He rolled his eyes, “Seriously, this woman’s so clingy she’d attach herself to me like a limpet mine. And I don’t like violence against women so I’d be in a difficult situation. Plus the main thing’s the business link with her daddy. His stuff’s good, I wouldn’t wanna have to replace him as a supplier. So you see, you’re doing me a solid here.” “When you say stalking you, do you mean literally?” “Well, like turning up at Anvil all the time to ‘check on the equipment’ and shit like that.” “So not outside the office then? I’m just thinking along the lines of her not seeing us around together before the event if she’s around you outside business hours. She might not buy it.” “As far as I know, only in office hours.”

“As far as you know? That’s not exactly reassuring if she’s as much of a stalker as you say she is.” He laughed, “No, I’m sure she’s not around apart from that.” “Okay, well is there anything else you can think of that she might ask?” He gave you a sly grin, “If we’ve slept together.” You got up and took your empty cup over to the kitchen sink, “Uh-huh.... well she can ask! We’ll just have to lie, won’t we?” You turned round only to find Billy invading your personal space again, and you moved back slightly in surprise. He followed, crowding you against the counter, dark eyes gazing into yours, “Uh... we don’t have to lie.” You leaned further back, your brain yelling ‘don’t give in to him!’ at you. “Billy... you suggested this whole thing and you also said ‘no strings’, remember? Well, if we did that... that would be strings, don’t you agree?” He reached round you and put his cup in the sink too, “Yeah, I guess so. Just thought we could make things look a little more.... authentic, y’know?” He turned and grabbed his jacket off the back of the stool, but then took you by surprise again by swooping in for a long kiss, pulling you against his body and his big hand sliding around the back of your neck. You pulled away, trying to catch your breath.

Those espresso-coloured eyes were gazing into yours, a lazy grin on his face. “Hey, you’ll need to get less jumpy when I do that else she’s definitely not gonna buy it.” He stood back from you, shrugging into his jacket, “Might need a bit more practice, sweetheart,” he smirked, “....so how about we meet up again tomorrow? We can learn a bit more about each other, as well as you getting more comfortable when I get physical with you,” and wiggled his eyebrows at you. Against your better judgement, you agreed and so he said he’d pick you up at four the next day.

Once he’d gone, you poured yourself a stiff brandy. You couldn’t deny you wanted to spend more time with him, much as you knew you were setting yourself up for a fall. Really... just what the hell did you think you were doing?

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

Billy was thinking the very same thing to himself as he drove away. He was enjoying those kisses way too much. But he was the one who’d suggested this whole fake relationship thing, and definitely with ‘no strings’. Because that was the Russo Way.

He’d better get his head back on straight, and stop thinking about the gorgeous woman in the apartment back there as anything other than a way to ditch the very irritating Caroline.

He also got the distinct feeling she’d marked him out as a player and wouldn’t want to get involved with him anyhow. Well, he was a player and he couldn’t deny that. Wasn’t sure he could ever see himself as a one-woman man. Caroline was attractive enough and in the normal way of things, he’d’ve taken her out maybe a couple of times, fucked and then forgotten her. But her father and Billy’s business relationship complicated things somewhat.

So yeah, he’d make sure she saw him with a lovely woman on his arm at the gala, kiss (and maybe fuck if he got lucky) the lovely woman at the end of the night and move right along. Apart from anything else, the fact that she was Karen’s friend complicated things way beyond what he wanted to get involved in, because he couldn’t afford to upset either her or her friend, Frankie’d kill him if he did.

Definitely better stick with the Russo Way. It had never failed him before, had it?

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

The next day, Billy glided the car to a stop outside her apartment block at 4 o’clock as promised, dropping her a quick text to announce his arrival. Soon, he saw her figure walking out of the main door and making her way towards him.

Damn! Mmm, she was looking good. Little pink sundress, short denim jacket, bare legs and low wedge pink sandals. Yeah, really cute. Smart and funny too. And sexy, of course. Very sexy. Totally fuckable. Completely and utterly fuckable. Woah - stop that Russo! Right now!

All these thoughts ran through his head in the 10 seconds it took her to reach the car.

He leant over and pushed open the passenger door for her, “Hi sweetheart.”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

You’d noticed Billy’s eyes running over you as you went up to the car, and then spotted his tongue making a swift trip over his bottom lip as he greeted you. You got the feeling he was looking at you like you were a snack to be consumed. Determined to resist how attracted you felt to him, you hopped into the car and said Hi back. Billy’s big hand landed on your thigh as you fastened your seat belt, his long fingers sliding upwards. Batting them away, you continued clipping yourself in and he laughed, leaning across and pulling you to him, kissing you long and slow. Breaking apart, he said, “Remember we gotta practice, sweetheart,” grinning at you. “Mmmhuh,” you nodded, “I remember you saying that.” “Just relax! Get comfortable with me touchin’ and kissin’ you. We’re boyfriend and girlfriend after all.” “Mmmhuh,” you said again, and once more his hand found its way onto your thigh and began stroking, eventually inching upwards again.

This time, you decided to stay still, thinking that yes, you had better get comfortable with this if this whole stupid fake relationship thing was going to work. But when his hand parted your legs and one long slim finger swiftly made its way inside your panties and - without further warning - actually inside you, you jumped like a startled deer and squirmed away from him. “Billy!” you protested loudly, but he merely smirked victoriously at you and pushed a second finger inside you to join its cousin. You shoved at his resistant arm, “Stop it!” His mouth found yours and he began kissing you as his fingers moved steadily in and out of you then his thumb was on your clit, and he began massaging firmly. “Sssshhh, sweetheart, we’re just messin’ around,” you heard his low voice in your ear, “...this is high school stuff.” “But I didn’t say you could do this to me!” you snarled, trying to ignore how good he was making you feel, and you felt his fingers leave you. He sat back in his car seat, taking a tissue out of his jacket pocket and slowly wiping his fingers, looking across at you all the while with a contemplative look on his face.

“I’m sorry,” he said, but not sounding regretful at all, “I didn’t think you’d mind. Thought it’d loosen you up a bit like we said.” He smirked at you, “You can’t deny I got you wet, and I know you’re attracted to me. Thought you’d enjoy it.” Your mouth dropped open, “You arrogant fucker!” you exclaimed, “You know what, you can take your fake dating shit and shove it where the sun doesn’t fucking shine!” You jumped out of the car, slamming the door with an almighty bang behind you. Stomping back up to your apartment, you opened your front door and slammed it behind you too, angrily throwing your bag onto the sofa as you passed on your way to the kitchen. You took off your jacket and threw it onto a high stool, furious enough to take a bottle of gin out of the cupboard and grab a clean glass from the dishwasher. You were just taking a bottle of tonic water out of the fridge when there was a knock at your door.

Okay, well that was either your annoying across-the-hall neighbour... who complained about anything and everything... here to moan about the door-slamming, or else it was Billy. Whoever was on the other side of the door was going to be greeted by your frowning face, and you really didn’t give a shit which one it was. You dramatically swung open the door, and it was in fact Billy Russo who was confronted by your unhappy visage. He immediately held up his hands in a placatory gesture. “Look, I am really, truly, sorry. I ... can I come in and explain?” You turned on your heel and walked back to the kitchen, leaving him to close the door behind him and follow in your footsteps. “Want a drink?” He nodded, “I’d love a beer if you’ve got one, please.” You took a bottle of beer out of the fridge and handed it to him, then got a bottle top remover for him out of one of your drawers.

He popped off the cap then took a long swig, as he watched you prepare a G&T for yourself. You also took a big sip then leant back against the counter and regarded him with a steely gaze. “You said you wanted to explain.” He took another gulp of beer and began, “I.... look, I’m so sorry okay? I totally misread the situation.” Sipping your gin, you said, “I’ll say you did, Billy! I get the distinct impression you mistook me for one of the easy lays you no doubt pick up in bars. Is that how you treat your one-and-done’s, huh? Well, don’t try that shit with me, okay?” He looked over at you shamefaced and shrugged, “Uhhh...I ..uhh.. yeah, I guess I did.... look, I really am sorry, sweetheart. I can’t apologise enough, and I really didn’t mean to upset you.” You took another big hit of your gin, slightly - but only very slightly - mollified. “And as for your comment that I’m attracted to you...!!!” Momentarily you were speechless, unsure what you wanted to say or how to put it. Mainly because it was the truth, you acknowledged to yourself.

Before you could say anything, Billy held up his hands again, “I’m incredibly embarrassed about saying that. Really crass. And arrogant, as you said.” You noticed that his face had pinked up somewhat. “In fact just forget I said it,” he carried on. “Bit late for that now isn’t it! Did you say it because you’re used to women falling at your feet, Billy?”

He looked down at the beer bottle in his hand, waggling it back and forward before saying, “Yeah. If I’m honest, I don’t usually haveta try too hard.” His eyes met yours, “And if I’m bein’ even more honest, gotta admit I’m attracted to you. Like, really attracted. So, yeah - I was hoping for something more than just going to the charity event with you.”

You drew in a big breath. What? What did he just say to you? No. You mentally shook your head, and then realised you were actually shaking it. “Billy.... you’re a player, that much is blatantly obvious. Would you know what a relationship is if it came up and bit you on the ass? Something tells me you wouldn’t.” He had the grace to look guilty. You continued, “So here’s what we’ll do. If you still need me to come along to the gala, then I’ll do that. And then we’ll go back to being strangers. Okay?”

He twirled his beer bottle between his long fingers, and shrugged, “Okay, sweetheart. M’happy you’re still gonna help me out. But can’t we at least be friends afterwards? Reckon Karen ‘n Frank’re gonna be seeing a lot of each other so we’ll probably keep bumping into each other.” Your face softened into a smile, “Yeah, they like each other don’t they? You’re right, we probably will be spending some time together because of those two. Okay... friends, then.”

He smiled at you, approaching warily and sliding his hand round to the back of your head and up into your hair, pulling you closer. “M’gonna kiss you, s’that okay?” but being Billy, didn’t wait for your reply. His lips met yours in a gentler kiss than earlier, his fingers stroking the back of your neck. He moved his hips against yours, and you knew he’d done this so you’d feel his erection against your body. You moved sideways and pulled away from him, why did he have to make you breathless when you just wanted to be cool, calm and collected around him? He looked a bit crestfallen, but recovered swiftly and asked, “How about we order in some food and just spend some quality time together?” You sighed, “Okay, Billy, let’s do that. But no more groping or anything, okay?” He nodded, looking serious and miming a cross over his heart, “Promise.”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

You pushed the pizza box away from you, “God, I’m stuffed.” Billy picked up his beer bottle and drank, giving a small delicate burp as he did so, “Me too.” Reaching over, he picked up the remote and began flicking through Netflix, “Whaddya wanna watch next?” he asked. “Mmmm, you pick a movie. But not one about war.” He laughed, “Oh don’t worry, I never watch war films, had enough-a that in real life.” Lying back and letting out a deep breath, you said apologetically, “I bet you did. Sorry.” Shrugging, he also lay back, his head turning towards you, “S’okay. We can talk about it sometime if you like. And about my less-than-perfect childhood. And some of my more recent fuck-ups.” He gave a bitter laugh, “I’m a fuckin’ train wreck, sweetheart - you’ve made the right decision, best you don’t get involved with me.” His eyes looked big and a bit glossy, and before you could help yourself you’d laid your hand on his shoulder, “I’m sure you’re not that bad, Billy.” He turned away from you, looking at the TV before selecting a sci-fi fantasy movie, “Oh believe me, I am,” he said in a low voice.

You shifted a bit closer to him on the sofa, “Don’t be so down on yourself, Billy. You’ve achieved a lot of things... got your own company, fancy car, fine suits, lots of money, prestige.” He grinned at you, “But all that doesn’t matter to you, does it?” You shook your head, “No, but they’re still achievements to be proud of.” His head dropped and some locks of hair fell over his forehead. “Thank you,” he mumbled, and you watched as your hand went of its own accord to his face and stroked the errant hair back off his forehead. His head swivelled towards you, dark eyes gazing into yours; he took hold of your arms and drew you against his chest. “Can we snuggle?” he asked you, then wrapped his arms right around you, before lying down and swinging his long legs up onto the sofa, pulling you with him. You snorted out a laugh, “Snuggle? That doesn’t exactly fit with your ex-soldier or current playboy personas!” “Aw, c’mon sweetheart, gimme a break - I’m tryin’ to be a well-behaved boy here!” You snuggled into his chest a bit, “Okay, but remember - no wandering hands!” He held up both hands, “Not wandering - look!” before placing them chastely on your arm and shoulder.

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

Your eyes opened, and you groggily looked around you, disorientated. Hearing soft little snores from beneath you, you raised your head to look at Billy’s sleeping face. Oh. You’d both obviously dozed off in front of the TV, the Netflix menu now on the screen. Moving slowly, you started to try and stand up but two hands went round your arms in a vice-like grip. “Where you off to?” said Billy’s deep voice. “Just...ummm... just...” you stuttered, but suddenly you were underneath him, his weight pressing you down as his mouth found yours in a hungry kiss. You knew you should resist but damn, he was a good kisser! Feeling yourself dissolve into the kiss, one of your hands moved up to his bristly jawline.

His kisses became more passionate and he pushed himself against you even more, his arousal very evident. You tried to ignore them but your feelings of desire for him were becoming overwhelming, and your arms went round his neck almost unbidden. He was smiling against your lips, and you heard, “Wanna sleep with me? D’you wanna?” Your treacherous mouth said “Yes!” in a breathy whisper, and that was all Billy needed to hear.

He picked you up in his arms, whispering “Where’s your bedroom?” You nodded towards its general direction and he carried you across the apartment and into your room. Setting you down, his fingers were immediately at the zip of your dress, pulling it down, pushing the fabric down then further down until your dress was round your ankles, before whipping it fully off and dropping it onto the floor. You watched him as his eyes roamed all over your body, taking in your lacy lingerie and moving the straps of your bra off your shoulders. “Mmmmm, sweetheart - wow - even better than I imagined,” he said hoarsely, his hands going round your back and unclipping your bra. He stripped it off you and dropped it, both hands immediately cupping your breasts and massaging firmly, thumbs running over your nipples as they peaked. Moving you backwards until your head hit the pillows, you felt his fingers pulling the fabric of your panties aside and suddenly the head of his cock was at your core and pushing inside you. “No time for foreplay, sorry,” you heard and you gave a deep groan when he kept going, feeling his balls brushing your pussy as he fully sheathed himself. His head went back and he gasped, “Fuck!” before he began to thrust. He lifted your legs and draped them over his hips, encouraging you to cross your ankles on his back to pull him even closer.

His mouth was everywhere on you, kissing you deeply one minute before his mouth went to one of your nipples, teasing it with his tongue while his thumb and fingers toyed with the other, then his mouth and teeth were on your neck and shoulders while he set a ferocious pace. A constant stream of low groans were leaving your lips as he moved on you, and you could hear him gasping and muttering words above you, not all of which you could catch, but you did hear “Uhhh, been wantin’ to do this to ya since the minute we met” between thrusts. You ran your hands over his chest and up around his neck, threading your fingers through his lush hair, and you felt him shiver as you pulled on it gently. His thumb was on your clit now, rubbing at you relentlessly and your orgasm washed over you like a wave. His teeth were fastened onto your shoulder and he bit down as you felt his body tense as he came. He lowered himself gently onto you before rolling off, lying on his back and staring up at the ceiling as he got his breath back. “Wow,” he said quietly, before moving onto his side and gazing at you, running a finger gently along your jaw. “Yes, wow,” you replied, putting your hand on his bristly cheek.

“Well, if Caroline does ask if we’ve slept together, now we don’t have to lie,” smirked Billy. This instantly ruined the mood and you sat up, prior to wrapping one of the covers round you and getting out of bed. He looked a bit surprised, but you began moving away from the bed towards the bathroom. Returning a few moments later, you hesitated for a moment before climbing back into bed beside Billy, who was still lying there in all his naked glory. He immediately moved next you, his hands on your arm, “Did I say something wrong earlier? You were up and off like a ballistic missile.” You looked over at him, “A girl doesn’t exactly like to hear another one’s name getting mentioned just seconds after lovemaking.” A guilty look passed over his face, “Awww, shit!... I didn’t think, I’m really sorry... I was just so happy you slept with me, sweetheart.” He stroked your hair away from your face, “Forgive me? And my big clumsy mouth?” You huffed a bit but eventually nodded, not least due to the soft kisses he was peppering over your face and neck.

He breathed a sigh of relief, “I seem to spend all my time apologising to you,” he chuckled, “I’m really making a mess of this fake dating.” “Can’t argue with you there, Billy,” you agreed. “Look, I’m gonna try a lot harder, okay?” he said, running a finger along your arm. You sighed, “Okay... well here’s hoping it’ll be alright on the night.”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

The rest of the week, you and Billy had traded phone calls and text messages but (to your secret disappointment) the two of you didn’t meet up. To your mind that could only mean that Billy, who’d admitted to you that he liked the thrill of the chase, had now already caught you so that was it as far as he was concerned. He’d said that his work had been crazy busy but you didn’t feel at all convinced by that.

Friday eventually rolled around, and you were glad you’d decided to take a half day off work to get ready. Karen had strolled up to your desk as you were packing up your stuff before leaving, and you recognised her ‘Serious Talk’ look on her face. She walked along to the elevator with you and followed you inside. “Y’know I hope you really enjoy your evening with Billy tonight, but....” she bit her lip before continuing, “...you know he’s a player, right?” She quickly put her hand on your arm as the elevator reached the ground floor, “I’m not trying to spoil your fun, honestly I’m not, but some of the things Frank’s let slip recently would make your toes curl. Billy’s totally ruthless when it comes to cutting women loose.” The elevator doors opened and you both walked out, with you saying, “Don’t worry Karen, I sussed that out the minute I saw him,” over your shoulder as you continued out into the main lobby. You stopped and turned to her, lowering your voice and continuing, “But I slept with him last weekend and just as expected, he’s avoided meeting up with me all during this week.” Her mouth tightened, and you knew you were in for a Page Lecture. “Gahhh! What were you thinking?! You’ve just reinforced his impression that he can pull any woman he wants and then disappear on her! I can’t believe you didn’t even wait for this gala thing tonight! You could at least have held off till then.”

“Yes, mom,” you sighed, then smiled at her. “But you know what Karen, he’s so hot I just couldn’t resist! And I knew exactly what his reaction would be, and he hasn’t disappointed. He’s been in touch obviously because we’ve got this thing tonight, but he’s been ‘too busy at work’ to meet up. I’m sure that in Russo-speak, that really means ‘too busy chasing tail’ but I’m cool with that. Like I said, it’s what I expected,” shrugging as you said this. “Hmmmm,” replied Karen, staring at you intensely as if trying to read your mind, “...well as long as you know what you’re getting yourself into.” “I do,” you reassured her, hugging her before walking away with a nonchalant wave.

Out on the street you exhaled a big breath. If only you truly believed that.

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

Billy pulled up outside her apartment block and, as before, texted her to say he was there.

He was disappointed that he hadn’t been able to meet up with her during the week, and was also aware she probably thought he was avoiding her now they’d slept together. But he’d truly been up to his ears in it at work, and he wasn’t yet established enough in the security market to turn down job offers. So he’d taken on probably a few more than he should have done, and both he and Frank had had to weigh in on a couple of them to make sure they were handled correctly.

So apart from calls and texts, he’d had to miss out on seeing her. In fact, all he’d been thinking of the entire week was the prolonged session they’d indulged in last weekend. Once he’d apologised for mentioning Caroline’s name after they’d first made love, (really smart move Russo, he thought to himself) there had been a whole night of energetic and very enjoyable sex. Then a shared shower late the next morning after she’d woken him up with a surprise and very welcome blow job. God, the things she could do with her mouth! He squirmed in his seat, starting to get hard just thinking about it. He couldn’t wait for another one of those, that was for sure. Tonight after the gala if he was lucky!

He saw the main door to her apartment block open and she started walking towards the car. Wish I could get a better idea of how she looked in her dress, he thought. Oh well, I’ll just need to wait till we actually get to the place.

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

You slid into Billy’s flashy car, tucking your feet in last in an effort to be elegant. He leaned over, grabbing the back of your neck and kissing you long and hard. You eventually shoved him away, exclaiming “Billy! My lipstick!” You peered at his face, “And you’re covered in it!”

He burst out laughing, “Well, hello sweetheart!”

You handed him a tissue whilst you began trying to repair the smudges around your lips. He dampened it on his tongue and then quickly rubbed the burgundy colour off his mouth. Once you’d fixed your face, you leant over towards him and his mouth headed to yours again but you pulled back. “I’m checking your shirt collar to make sure there’s none on there!” Chuckling, he started up the car, “I did wonder why you waited till you’d put your lipstick back on before kissin’ me again.” “You kissed me!” you protested. He just laughed and manoeuvred the car into the traffic stream.

His head then swung towards you, “If you say so, sweetheart! Hey, I’d say you look beautiful but I can’t get a proper look at you in the car. So wait a little while till we get there and then I can compliment you properly, okay?” You nodded, “Yeah, same. I can’t get a look at you either.” Another chuckle, “You can see as much of me as you want later tonight, sweetheart.” “You’re very sure of yourself, aren’t you?!” Billy’s hand stole onto your thigh and travelled higher. “Wearin’ panties?” You tolerated his wandering fingers, “Yes I am, Marine. Sorry to disappoint.” He shrugged, smirk firmly in place, “Fine by me. They’re not gonna stop me gettin’ to where I wanna be anyhow.” Somewhat surprisingly to you, his hand went back onto the steering wheel. “But I’m gonna wait till we’re alone later. See, sweetheart - I’ve learned my lesson!” “Glad to hear it!” you shot back at him, before looking out of the window at the passing streets.

After arriving and parking at the venue, one of the big downtown hotels, you and Billy made your way upstairs to the function room. Leaving your coats at the cloakroom, Billy twirled you round in front of him, looking you over slowly from top to toe. “You look gorgeous,” he said admiringly, “really beautiful.” “Thank you. Not so bad yourself, Russo.” He was in one of his bespoke suits and was looking edible. He mock-bowed then leant down and kissed you on the lips, and you reminded yourself to act naturally when he did that. You both began walking towards the sound of music and chatter, his hand straying down onto the top of your ass as you went. Karen’s voice rang in your ears about how much of a player he was, and once again you fought the instinct to swat his hand away. If you could just do your duty and get through tonight, then you could put yourself deep into protective mode over this handsome devil.

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

Several gin & tonics later, you were returning from the ladies’ room and heading back to where you’d left your ‘boyfriend’ at the bar, wondering how much more of this tedious event you could stand, when you heard a high-pitched voice trilling, “Oh Billy! There you are, I’ve been looking everywhere for you!”

Hahah! you thought, this must be the infamous Caroline! Well, at least this next part is going to inject some much-needed fun into the evening.

You could see a small brunette standing in front of Billy with her hands grasping his biceps and beginning to pull him towards her. He spotted you approaching over her shoulder and extricated himself from her clutches saying, “Caroline.... how nice to see you! Just in time for me to introduce you to my girlfriend...” “Girlfriend?!” She whirled round and met your eyes, her own narrowing as she looked you up and down in a flash. You continued walking towards the two of them, noting that she was pretty but was heavily made up; she really didn’t need to plaster it on like she had but - whatever, you thought. Billy moved past her to swiftly put his arm around your waist and draw you to him, introducing you at the same time. She nodded her head briefly at you, “Hi, I’m Caroline. A friend of Billy’s.” She emphasised the word ‘friend’. You beamed back a big smile at her, “Lovely to meet another of his friends,” you said, also emphasising the word. You felt Billy tense up a bit, but you thought that playing the jealous girlfriend might be a good way to go, especially when you noticed the little smirk on her face. You tugged on his arm, “C’mon Billy, you promised me a dance,” you said in a ‘little girl’ voice, which nearly made you heave quite frankly but you felt struck the right note.

Billy raised a hand vaguely towards Caroline as he said to you, “Yes I did, sweetheart. Let’s go. Bye, Caroline - good to see you,” and then gave you a long kiss as the two of you headed to the dance floor. Once Billy had you in his arms, you felt his lips next to your ear and he whispered, “So.... jealous girlfriend, huh?” You nodded, smiling up at him, “She’ll like the fact that I think she’s a threat. But as long as you keep up the PDA’s, I think she’ll buy it.” He immediately kissed you, the hand which had been on your waist surreptitiously sliding downwards at the same time. As you broke apart from the kiss, you caught sight of Caroline glaring at the two of you from a table near the edge of the dance floor. You ran your hand up onto Billy’s jaw before continuing to the back of his neck. You’d discovered during your night together that this was one of Billy’s weak spots, so you trailed your fingers over his skin and had him wrapped round your finger within seconds, just as had happened that other night. He pressed his body close against you, ensuring you felt how aroused he was. “When can we skip out of here?” he breathed to you, making you laugh. “I don’t know! It’s your event - when do you want to stay until?”

Before he could reply, you were aware of a figure next to you and a hand went onto Billy’s arm. “Mind if I cut in?” asked Caroline, giving you a nasty smirk. However it dropped off her face when Billy said hurriedly, “Sorry, Caroline - we’re just leaving,” and began leading you off the dance floor. “Oh, that’s such a shame,” you heard, and realised she was trailing after you and Billy as you left the dance floor. “I was so looking forward to hearing all about how you & Billy met.” You stole a quick glance at Billy before saying over your shoulder, “Through mutual friends.” Still following you both as you headed over to pick up your coats, she rattled out, “it’s just that I’m a bit surprised - it seems quite strange that Billy never mentioned a girlfriend before tonight.” Billy looked irritated but his face became blank as he turned slightly back towards her and replied, “Uh, I am right here y’know!.... well Caroline, we never spoke about our personal lives so it’s not that strange at all to be honest.” You’d reached the small counter by now and had handed over the tickets to the attendant, and while you’d hoped that Billy’s answer would have silenced her, Caroline continued, “So how long have you been dating?” You turned and stared at her, and found her already staring back at you, “Mmm, it’s about two months now, isn’t it Billy?” and moved your eyes to his. He glanced quickly behind him at her, “ Yes, sweetheart - a little over two months actually,” he turned back to you, smiling fondly, “and I gotta say, they’ve been two of the sweetest months of my life.” He leant down and kissed you full on the lips.

Caroline’s lip curled up at this and was still curling as you met her annoyed gaze once Billy’s lips left yours. “Well,” she began, but was then interrupted by a tall older man who came up to the three of you and placed a hand on Caroline’s shoulder. “Hello, Russo,” he said, shaking hands with Billy who greeted him with a “Hi, Mike,” as the older guy’s eyes wandered quizzically over to you. “And who’s this lovely young lady, then?” he asked but before either you or Billy could say anything, Caroline spat out, “His girlfriend, Daddy - imagine that!” However her father merely gave you a friendly grin while Billy introduced you. After a quick handshake, he commented that it was a real shame that you were both leaving before he could buy you a drink. But Billy said firmly, with a mischievous look at you, “Sorry, Mike.... we’re... uhhh... quite anxious to get home.” Mike laughed knowingly while you heard a loud ‘tut’ from his daughter. You smiled brightly at both of them, “Well.... lovely to meet you and hope you enjoy the rest of the evening. Bye!” Taking your coat from the attendant, Billy helped you into it before putting on his own and the two of you said final goodbyes to Mike and Caroline before making your escape.

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

“Thank god that’s over!” you breathed out a sigh of relief as you settled back into your seat, while Billy switched on the car’s powerful engine and it purred into life. “You didn’t enjoy it?” he grinned, “...even with such a charming boyfriend attending to your every need all evening?!” You laughed, “Sorry Billy, no I didn’t. I hated every second of it! But I think we accomplished the mission, don’t you?” Turning your head and watching his profile as he reversed the car out of the parking space, you asked, “D’you want me to get the dress dry-cleaned and you can take it back to the store? I mean I’ve only had it on for a few hours and I managed not to spill anything down it.” He glanced over at you, a strange look in his eyes. “No, I don’t want you to clean it and return it. It’s yours to keep. And yes, we did achieve our goal.” He started driving away from the hotel, and you realised it was the wrong direction for your place. You’d never been to his apartment but had a feeling that’s where you were heading.

“Where are you going, Billy? I just want dropped off at home so I can get out of all of this and relax.” He laughed, and for some reason you thought he sounded a bit pissed off. “Ahh no, that’s not happenin’, sweetheart,” he said, looking across at you, eyes gleaming with something but you weren’t sure exactly what. Determination? Desire? “We’re headin’ to mine. And yeah, you’re gonna be gettin’ out of those clothes, don’t worry.” “Look, Billy,” you said, feeling a bit uneasy for some reason, “...we’re done here, okay? We’ve already slept together, you got what you wanted so now you move on, correct? That’s your usual M.O. isn’t it? You made that obvious this week. Don’t worry, I got the message loud and clear. I’m not some clingy desperate woman that’s gonna keep chasing after you. I knew what the deal was with you the minute I set eyes on you. So.... just turn around and take me home.” You’d been staring at the road ahead but were aware of him shaking his head, “No.” You looked across at him, “No? What, you’re kidnapping me now?” “You can think of it that way if you like, sweetheart. I knew you’d think I was avoidin’ you this week, but I wasn’t. I’m not ready to let you get away just yet. We’re gonna go to mine, and you’re gonna spend the night on your back - and in various other positions - cos I need another night of sex with you.”

“And what if that’s not what I want? What if I don’t want to be used like a fuck toy before you disappear over the horizon? Doesn’t it matter to you what I want?” He chuckled, and you felt a little shiver of fear run through you, “Not right now, no. Because this is all I’ve been thinkin’ about the whole week. And because you’re sayin’ one thing, but you mean another.” “Really?! That’s what you think?” you scoffed, shaking your head, “You’re unbelievable, you know that? The level of arrogance....!” He pulled the car over into the inside lane and then turned into an underground car park. He killed the engine, and in the sudden silence you heard him say in a low voice, “Call it arrogance if you like. I call it knowing what I want and makin’ sure I get it.” He released his seat belt and got out of the car, coming round and opening your door before taking hold of your arm and pulling you out of it. He locked the car with a bleep of the remote on his keychain, then dragged you - firmly but not roughly - over to an elevator which he unlocked with a key before calling it down. Once it arrived, he hustled you inside and once the doors closed, his mouth was instantly on yours. He kissed you roughly, open-mouthed with teeth and lips and tongue all involved. His hands were undoing the buttons on your coat and then were inside it, immediately going to your breasts.

You struggled with him, trying to push him off but he continued kissing you, and you heard his voice telling you to just admit you wanted it. The awful thing was, you did want him and it annoyed the hell out of you. However his current attitude was also annoying the hell out of you so you continued to push at his muscled, toned body to get him off you. But you were no match for the ex-Marine and you heard a ‘ting’ and the elevator doors opening as Billy continued to kiss and grope you. He pushed you firmly out of the lift, keeping hold of your arm and propelling you towards a door - the only door, you noticed - and then into the apartment after he unlocked the door. He slammed it behind him then was on you in a flash, grabbing your bag and throwing it onto the sofa before stripping off your coat and dropping it on the floor. You were aware of being in a large open-plan space with floor-to-ceiling windows and trendy furniture, before you were scooped up as easily as if you were a throw cushion and carried into an equally large bedroom. He kicked the door shut behind him and dumped you rather unceremoniously on the bed, stripping his clothes off in a matter of seconds and letting them fall where they may. Then he was back on you, flipping you over and unzipping your dress in one quick motion. He stripped it down off your shoulders, turned you back over and pulled it off you. You looked up at him, finally finding your voice, “Billy! Stop it.” He shook his head, “Nah, not happenin’ sweetheart. We’re gonna have sex now.” You opened your mouth but nothing would come out. Why couldn’t you say anything else?

Because you do want it, said a sly voice in your head. And whilst the caveman routine might not be the most appealing of Billy’s wooing techniques, he’d excited you beyond belief and you could feel how damp your panties were. You’d told yourself before the evening started that you weren’t going to have sex with him that night, but at the same time had perversely hoped that it would in fact happen. You were absolutely furious with yourself but at the same time, totally conflicted and unable to ignore the desire you felt for him.

You felt his fingers fumbling a bit at your back and then your bra was dramatically whipped off and thrown across the room. His mouth and hands were immediately on your breasts, fingers massaging and toying with one nipple while he licked the other, his tongue roughly raking over its peak and surrounding skin before he started to suck and bite at it, enough to make you squeal but not hard enough to cause you real pain. Then he swapped and your other breast came in for the same treatment. You felt his fingers sliding down your body and pulling at your panties, after a few seconds he then sat up and stripped them off you. They also joined your bra across the other side of the room. He lowered himself onto you, hands parting your legs and you knew he was guiding himself inside you. His hard length pushed into you and you felt the stretch much more than you had the first time you’d had sex with him. Of course he was in a more of a rush this time, seemingly desperate to have sex with you, judging by the way he’d thrown you down, ripped your clothes off and immediately got between your legs.

He slid his hands under your knees and lifted your legs up until your ankles were on his shoulders, deeply thrusting into you as he did so, and you heard yourself give a loud groan. He gave a long, low groan himself as he picked up his pace, and you heard his whispered words next to your ear, “You like that, sweetheart? Feel good?” “Yes!!!!!” you gasped, hating yourself for admitting it but it was the absolute truth. He kissed you passionately, hands running up and down your legs and onto your body as he thrust hard into you, mouth moving to your neck and collarbone, nipping at your skin then licking where he’d lightly bitten you. You climaxed first, Billy’s thumb having found its favourite place on your clit, and you’d dug your nails into his shoulders before running your hands up into his hair and pulling it. Hearing his answering chuckle, his hips cannoned into yours a final few times before you felt him release into you, and he sank down heavily on top of you, panting and trying to get his breath back. He moved off you and laid on his back, seemingly exhausted by his over-eager exertions. His head tilted towards you, “I’m not finished with you yet, sweetheart. Need more.”

You propped yourself up on an elbow, “Just what the fuck is all this neanderthal stuff about, Billy?” He sighed and looked back up at the ceiling. “Remember you said I wouldn’t know what a relationship was if it bit me on the ass?” “Yeah?” “You’re right. I’ve never experienced a loving relationship in my life. I dunno what love is, really.” Then out it all spilled.... his abandonment as a very young kid, the group homes, the abuse, the stigma. How he’d signed up for the Marines as soon as he was old enough, got a business degree before shipping out, how Frank had his back almost from day one. The dark eyes eventually looked into yours, “So just confirmin’ - I’m officially shit at relationships.” You nodded thoughtfully, “Well... now I understand things a little bit better, Billy. You discard women after a very short time as a self-defence measure, because you have a fear of being abandoned again. Ditch them before they can ditch you, right? Because you still have self-esteem issues, deep down underneath that confident exterior. It’s hard to overcome years of being looked down upon and sidelined.” You reached out and ran your fingers through his small patch of chest hair. He flinched slightly so you withdrew your hand, but his own hand went out and he laid it on top of yours for a brief moment.

Then he sat up a bit and stretched, laughing as he did so, “Told you, you’re in the wrong job, sweetheart.” He leaned back onto the pillows, carefully looking away from you, “Guess I didn’t do a very good job of lettin’ you know I want you to stay around and be with me?” You sat up, pulling one of the sheets over you, “What?” you asked. He looked over at you again, “All of this,” his hand waved vaguely between you and him, “This is me tryna let you know I really like you. I honestly missed bein’ with you during the week. An’ I was really busy, me and Frank, all week - I wasn’t tryna avoid you, okay? All I could think about was the night we spent together, how I want that to be a regular thing. Spend time with you.”

You started chuckling to yourself before it bubbled up into real laughter. He’d been looking down and fidgeting with the covers but now his head swung up and his eyebrows pulled into a frown. You calmed down a little and reached out to him, softly stroking his shoulder, “Billy... I’m not really laughing at you. Well, I suppose I am but only because I’m really surprised. That’s not how guys usually let girls know they’re interested! - kidnapping them and telling them that they will have sex with them.” Billy grunted, “Yeah, I realise that. It’s what I’m tryna tell you, sweetheart. I’m shit at this kinda stuff.”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

Sunday lunchtime, you met up with Karen who was gagging to know what had happened on Friday night. You dutifully recounted everything, even Billy’s metamorphosis into caveman as you left the hotel. Karen’s expression got more and more incredulous and as you drew to a close with his admission of being completely crap at all things relationship-related, she finally said, “Fuck! That’s unbelievable. So how did you leave things? You kick him to the curb?”

You took a sip of your G&T, and smiled back at her, “He wants me to teach him what a real relationship is all about.”

“And you’re prepared to take a chance on him and show him, are you?” You nodded, “Yeah I guess I am, Karen. I know it sounds crazy, but he wants to try. And I’d like to try. So we went from fake to genuine as of Friday night.”

She chuckled, shaking her head and sipping her drink before saying, “Well, you’re a glutton for punishment, I’ll say that for you. And I wish you the best of luck trying to tame that bad boy.” She lifted her glass and you clinked yours against hers, “Thanks, Karen. I’m just gonna take it one day at a time. If it doesn’t work out...” you shrugged, “...at least I gave it a shot.” She put her hand over yours, “Do you think he’ll keep it in his pants? He’s used to putting it about all over town,” squeezing your hand, “...sorry to have to say that honey, but it’s true.” You nodded, “Yeah I know, and all I can say is he’s promised he won’t be doing that from now on. But if I get even a whiff of another woman’s perfume off him, I will be kicking him to the curb faster than he can say ‘it’s not what you think, sweetheart’, believe me! And I’ve told him that too, in no uncertain terms.” She nodded, “Well, you’ve given him fair warning so if he fucks up, that’s definitely on him.”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

Frank threw his head back, giving a great belly laugh which went on for a lot longer than Billy Russo thought it should do. After a few moments, Frank’s face had gone beet red and tears were squeezing out of the corners of his eyes. Billy folded his arms across his chest, sitting back in the diner booth and scowling at Frank, “Okay, okay, Frankie - enough already,” he grumbled as Frank continued to laugh. Eventually Frank calmed down enough to speak, “Russo! I don’t believe it, I really don’t. Does that girl know what she’s letting herself in for?! She must be missing a few rounds out of her ammo clip.” Billy pulled a face, “Look... I like her, okay? She’s gonna teach me what a proper relationship’s like. She’s willin’ to give me a chance, so cut me some slack over here, will ya?” Frank took a big pull at his beer, “Oh Russo, how the fuck ya gonna keep it in your pants?” (unknowingly parroting Karen’s very same comment to her friend). Billy shrugged, “Look...I will, I tell ya. I mean it, I only want her. The sex is....” he made a chef’s kiss hand gesture, “....and she doesn’t take any of my shit, either. I really like her, Frankie. I think I’m ready to...” “Settle down? Really, Bill - are you? Cos if you fuck this up, you’ve got Karen to deal with as well as your girl.”

Billy took a hit of his beer, “You think I don’t know that? And I’d get a ton of crap from you too, cos Karen’d be upset. You like her, dontcha?” Frank’s cheeks went a slight shade of pink, “Well, yeah. I guess I do.” Now it was Billy’s turn to laugh, “You guess you do? Frankie, you’re like a teenager with a major crush every time your phone rings! ‘Ooh, it’s Karen!’” he said, the last bit in a high-pitched voice. “I do not talk like that!” Frank growled at him, “And you better spend your energy learning how to treat a woman properly, rather than ripping the shit outta me, Russo!”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

Your phone dinged and you picked it up, seeing a text notification from Billy on the screen. Turning your phone briefly towards Karen to show her this, you clicked on it and then smiled as you read it. Showing the message to her, she also smiled, “Wow, seems like he’s definitely trying!” You agreed, “I do believe he is!” Maybe this crazy relationship thing you and Billy had agreed to embark on did have a chance of working out after all. You definitely still had your misgivings - does a leopard (or panther) really change its spots? - but you were willing to give it a try as long as Billy stuck to his end of the bargain. No other women, no lying, spending a lot of quality time together... let’s just see how all that goes, you thought. Re-reading the text, it made you smile once more.

Billy’s text said simply, “I’m missing you, sweetheart. Come over to mine, I’ll cook you dinner.”

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(My photo edit)

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Tags: @blackbirddaredevil23 @galaxyjane @behindmyeyes-insidemyhead @ourloveisforthelovely @swthxrry

(Using D&D’s taglist, if you’d prefer to be removed, just let me know!)

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#ben barnes #billy russo #billy russo x reader #billy russo fanfiction #billy russo imagine

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octania · 4 years

Text

Benimaru Shinmon x Reader ( NSFW, 18+)

Word count: 3.8 k

Warnings: NSFW,smut,oral sex,sexual teasing, orgasm prohibition

Short description: You were in love with this man for over a year, but your bratty mouth an denial of your feelings got you in a situation where Benimaru will teach you how to behave in very teasing and heated way....

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The air was filled with the scent of a variety of traditional dishes and enriched by the happy shouts of excited residents through the streets. This time, the festival did not mean destruction, this time it was celebrated by making delicious dishes and socializing with each other. The celebration itself began at dawn, when they brought out their wooden tables and portable stoves, beginning to enrich the street with enticing scents of a variety of spices and ingredients. You could also hear the gentle sound of kota, whose strings were gently touched by the pale hands of young talented musicians. While these were all just preparations for the big ceremony that would start when sun kisses the mountains, everyone shared their joy throughout the day. His dark hair fluttered in the morning breeze around his narrowed eyebrows. Ruby eyes barely opened as he passed like a shadow past people. Although it was not visible on the expression on his face, he secretly enjoyed the liveliness that spread through the streets of his hometown. Countless greetings lined up behind him, giving him words of praise and support to which he only nodded a few times, nothing more, and continued his walk. The silence of his thoughts was broken by a hoarse female voice. Although it was rough, it sounded kind of gentle. He soon discovered to whom it belonged, when a plump old woman with black hair streaked with gray strands stepped in front of the captain. Her wrinkled face wearing a smiled from ear to ear, her eyes squinting at the young man.“Benimaru, my boy! I have something for you, please do except my gift in honor to you and the members of your squad.”- she was direct, not talking his ear off, just bowing slightly after her words and handing him a medium sized package. He stared in the thing wrapped in light blue material with a lack of interest that he did not hide not even the slightest. “Tempura and sushi, to hold you till the festival tonight.” – she explained getting back up from the slight bow. After a couple of lazy blinks, he raised his hand and responded. “That is alright, we will wait till the festival.”- without waiting for a response, he passed the woman in attempt to leave, but she was not letting go so easily. Shoving the thing in his hands, she smiled again, not bothered by his behavior.“Nonsense! Twins will love it, and we all know Konro could use a break for cooking today.”- Benimaru sighed, pushing the package slowly back at her, but before he could say anything, a female voice sharp like katana echoed the street. “Obaachan, can you please stop giving food to the people who clearly have no decency to even say thank you? Rudeness should not be rewarded.”- (Y/N) stood at the door of their restaurant, squeezing the sleeves of her kimono. Benimaru didn't say a word, looking at the young girl with the expressionless face. The lack of his reaction only made (Y/N) even angrier as she furiously crossed her arms over her chest. “(Y/N), you watch your mouth! You are addressing our beloved captain, to whom you owe your safety!”- obaachan scolded her, raising her finger as a warning, but that didn't stop (Y/N) from responding with even greater ferocity, targeting Benimaru with a look of utter contempt. “Because he is a captain, he should show more respect to his people and their offerings! Shouldn’t leaders be role models? Poor us if that is the case. People usually pay for the food in our restaurant, and yet he shows no gratitude even when his meal is free!”- she did not waver, her stand proud and determent, not showing even a bit of fear from the man who is the head of this town. “Child, hush! Go back inside right now! Sol help your rude mouth!”- Obaachan started waving her hands, showing (Y/N) to go back inside the house, turning to Benimaru. “I apologize captain Shinmon, (Y/N) did not mean it.”- the elderly woman bowed again, with clear expression of shame smeared around her wrinkled face. Still speechless, Benimaru watched the girl, who was now biting her lower lip in frustration as if it were chewing gum. Eventually, he slung the bundle over his shoulder, turning on his heel. “Thank you for the meal madam (Lastname of your family).” – that was the only thing he said, strolling down the dusty street without turning around again. Even though he wanted to allow his mismatched eyes to gaze upon the fearless woman one more time....

The celebration that had its core in the great hall that belonged to your family, otherwise intended for weddings and large feasts, was already spreading like wildfire. People were raising glasses full of sake, feasting on specialties they had been preparing all day, but they preferred to treat their palates to desserts that belonged to your family restaurant. Young artists danced a traditional dance with fans, attracting curious glances with their gorgeous and colorful kimonos. Outside, the streets were crowded with people, gazing merrily at the early fireworks that ate up the starry sky with their tantalizing shapes. You were in charge of serving the guests who sat on the heated floor of the hall in front of the beautifully carved tables. Countless comments on your beauty and grace have accompanied you in your assignment, while you have given a kind smile to anyone who would praise you. No one has noticed that your eyes jump restlessly from person to person, searching the room in hopes of encountering the phlegmatic face of the man who was the source of your deepest suffering.You were afraid that your sharp tongue had resulted in his absence, that he wouldn't show up for the rest of the evening, maybe not after either. Did you overdo it... or didn't you? He was rude after all! Yes it is true, he is guilty of this! You weren't even aware that your angry thoughts betrayed the state of your mind on your face. You eyebrows narrowed, lips squeezed in a straight line, your body tense, as you rushed towards the kitchen, when a familiar voice addressed you. “(Y/N)! Your family always knew how to make the best celebrations, I congratulate you.”- a tall man with a kind blue eyes that resembled a calm and mysterious sea, smiled at you, holding the door of the kitchen open for you. “Konro! I..”- you stopped for a second, almost dropping the mountain of dirty dishes you were carrying, as your eyes finally find the one they’ve been searching for. A smile almost escaped your lips, but you prevented your rooted emotions to show. Behind the tall man, Benimaru was standing, scanning the room full of cheerful people. He did not even look at you once, and you could feel the frustration rising in you again. Who does he think he is? No matter how much you were bothered by his disinterested posture, your eyes wandered over his crossed arms on his chest, the muscle that adorned his forearms reached to the very core of your desire. The hands filled with veins always looked tense and ready to fight, as if he was waiting to defend the whole world with them, alone. You could no longer resist the sight, you had to run away. Blubbering a couple of thanks to the lieutenant, you ran past his arm into the kitchen, kicking the door with your foot behind you to close them. You took quick steps to the sink and nearly broke half the porcelain plates when you threw them inside. You grasped the edges of the sink, closing your eyes shut and taking a deep breath. Before you could muster your whirlwind of thoughts, a young woman approached you from the back.“You know, if you were not such a proud and bratty thing, you would be breaking beds now and not dishes.” – (B/F – name of your best friend) mocked your state without restraining one bit. Your nerves were thin, and being called out like this only made you react like a cornered animal.“Shut up, I don’t know what you are talking about (B/F). Seriously, if you worked even the half of the time you spend teasing people, we would actually get something done. “-you snapped at her, pulling out bamboo boxes filled to the brim with colorful mochis. “Sure, if you had a bite to support all that barking, maybe you would get something done. I think Benimaru would appreciate your teeth on his skin more than your mouth just bullshiting all the time.”- she did not back down,wrapping the strands of hair around her finger, (B/F) continued before you could counter attack.“How long has it been since you started drooling over Waka? A year? Year and a half? Oh my God, when I remember how pissed you were when you though he was dating that girl from company 8th just because she brought some papers a couple of times.”- the more she talked, the more did rage boil in you, so much that it seemed that steam will start going out of your ears. Her voice only rose as she continued through laughter.“Damn, you made me wait around corners like crazy people just so we can see if they are a couple or not. And when it finally turned out they were not, I will never forget your jumping in the air from excitement.”- before she could say any more , something gooey and sticky landed right on her forehead. She whined in surprise, as the pieces of mochi started falling down her face.“Anything else you want to add?!Huh?!”- you lifted your hand high, ready to throw another mochi at her.“Maybe if you threw yourself on Benimaru in the same way you are throwing this mochi, you would get some and your nerves would calm down!!”- she screamed before ducking down as your hand catapulted another one at her. You didn’t even know that your little show didn’t go as private as you thought. The high tones of the people from the main hall were unfortunately not enough to cover your voices, and one curious ear absorbed every word. Benimaru lowered his head, starting to walk away from the kitchen door. Under his raven hair, a grin was hiding.

He sat quietly watching the people around him fiercely try to get his attention. Some were male neighbors praising his fighting skills, their speech interrupted by hiccups from too much sake was almost humorous, while on the other hand a couple of girls discreetly tried to gain his favor, but all they got was a restrained smile. He brought the glass to his lips to take a sip of the bitter liquid, but there were no more inside. Your grandmother, who was actually only a few seats away from him, noticed the lack of refreshment for the beloved captain, and of course, called your name instantly. “(Y/N)! Fill the captain’s cup!”- you kept away from his table. Actually, you targeted those behind him, in order to better avoid a face-to-face encounter. The things (B/F) told you bothered you too much, and you didn't just want to deepen your cravings and quarrel with yourself over the feelings you carry for this man. Hearing your name, Benimaru tilted his head, looking over his strong shoulder with his glowing eyes. That deep gaze made you swallow, barely keeping you composure. You knew if you came any closer you would break, and you will not give him that satisfaction. You lifted you chin up, pushed back your shoulders, and turned on your heal as the cold answer followed.“He has hands. He can fill it up himself.”- without second thought, you walked away, but you swore you could feel a set of burning eyes following you.

The hallways were empty, all the guests retreated to the main hall. As the night went on, even the workers began to relax, completing their work and joining the rest of the town in celebration. There was no longer a need to bring the food from the kitchen, at least for the time being, the tables were full. (B/F) was the last person leaving the kitchen, as you said you will join her shortly, you just wanted to finish a few things up. Carrying the empty bamboo boxes, you took a turn into the hallway bathed in dim light, crashing with your shoulder into something big and hard. You blinked in shock, barely managing not to drop the boxes on the floor. The thing in front of you was a person, and seeing him made your heart race. Benimaru Shinmon stood there silently, his eyes half opened, shoulders relaxed, while he studied you. You almost bit your lip, but seeing the man baring that uninterested expression once more, made your blood boil instead. “Excuse me is the words you are looking for! You should watch where you are going.”- you said irritated, trying to go pass him, hiding your flustered face beneath your hair. A feeling of slight pain spread throw your back as it crashed on the wall. It took you a couple of seconds to figure out what was going on, that is, you needed to believe that this was not one of your dreams. Pressed with his hips on your abdomen, Benimaru towered over you. He seemed stronger than usual, more dangerous, but there was not a shred of fear in you, just excitement. “Wh..what are you doing?! Get off!”- funny you should say that, when in reality you didn’t wiggle or struggle at all, your big mouth once again just stood in your way in order to show your true feelings. But Benimaru was no fool. He did not respond on your demands, instead, he tilted his head on the side, like he was checking something, then returned his gaze on you. You could feel the ground disappearing under you. You gasped at the unsettling feeling, trying to grab onto something from pure instinct. But the only thing you managed to grab was the one making you lose the floor under your feet in the first place. Benimaru picked you up by your waist, his forearm adorned with prominent veins wrapped around your waist like a snake, not letting go of his prey. He was fast, pushing the door of the kitchen that was empty and dark, kicking it again as they closed with a loud bang that made you flinch, while he turned the key in the lock. “Benimaru ! What the hell? I said let go!”- in reality, you hated the thought of his hands leaving your body. The feeling that flowed through your veins when you were this close to him, almost took over even your insolence, but the bits that were left now squirted like popcorn from your lips. “You are too huffish, (Y/N).”- his voice smooth like honey, but a bit dark. The sudden feeling of falling down made a muffled whine to escape your mouth, but you did not hit the ground. He held you in his lap while he sat down on a kitchen table. Your permanent denial tried to strike for the last time, making you turn around furiously, facing the man who dared to pick you up like a helpless and fragile thing. But the sharpness of your words did not come down from your lips, when sweetness filled your taste buds. The warm flesh of his lips now merged with yours. The bitter taste of the sake he drank from didn't bother you, because for you he tasted like cupid's wine, intoxicating you, maddening your thoughts and driving your senses wild. You felt dizzy from the heat that rushed into your cheeks when he first ran his tongue over yours, caressing its soft surface with his tender muscle. You tried to get some air in your lungs but you didn't know how to breathe, you were so enchanted by his kisses. You almost swore in displeasure when he pulled his lips away from yours.“If you just did this, we would be able to skip the punishment.”- confused, you did not even manage to answer his statement when his hands that were resting on your waist till now, pulled you down and flipped you across his lap. Your knees landed on the wooden surface of the table, as you kept your balance on your elbows in the front. “What…what are you doing?”- you asked with a shaky voice, seeing how his hand hold you by the material of you kimono on your lower back, keeping you steady. “I declined the home made meal from your obaachan today because I knew we already had a meal prepared for the day.”- he said sliding his rough palm of his free hand across your spine, down to the your lower back, all the way to your peachy ass. You bit you lip, shivering when his touch did not stop, traveling down your thigh, then taking a handful of fabric of your kimono.“Taking more would mean throwing it away because it would not be eaten. And that would be disrespectful.”- he jerked your kimono abruptly, exposing your entire lower body. Your perfectly shaped ass made him discreetly lick his lips, while you covered your face with your palms in shame. “I-I…I didn’t k..know that ..”- you tried to explain yourself, but in vain, as his voice responded harshly, accompanied with his finger movement, slipping under the side of your panties. You whined loudly as his index finger brushed along your folds.“You did not bother to ask. But fortunately as you said earlier, I do have my hands. And with my hands I plan to teach you how to behave.”- the sound of tearing fabric filled the kitchen. You bit your hand when you felt the exhaled air from his mouth pass over your naked cunt. He was so close that he could feel the heat coming from it, barely restraining himself from biting into that cookie. You stirred a little, the discomfort ate at you up, the feeling of arousal overcame you.“Don’t look there….Benimaru, please I-….”

“You know how to say please already? Well, I wonder what it will take to teach you to say sorry.”- his fingertips crossed over your silky pussy lips, gently caressing the rosy flesh. You whimpered at the slow pace of his movements. He didn't remove his head, he calmly watched the wet glow slowly appear on those folds. He pushed his finger closer to the opening, collecting some sticky liquid with his fingertip. He didn't push his finger inside, but continued to draw a line along your slit. “Oh my Sol!”- you cried out, squirming already, but that did not even make him flinch. He pushed his digit a bit harder, make it sink into the sensitive flesh, brushing over it all so gently. “Sol will not help you (Y/N), but some manners might. Luckily again, as you said, captain should be a role model, showing the people the art of good manners.”- his thumb slipped across your clit, making the rough skin stimulate it so greatly it made your icing flow more intensely. You yearned for him to do it again, but you were out of luck. This was not supposed to be something to reward you with, this was a straight up lesson to teach you what will happen when your bratty mouth bump into an opponent like Benimaru. He settled his thumb above your throbbing nerve bud, adding another finger to the game. His index and middle finger pulled your pussy lips slowly, massaging them between them. The sensation you were feeling made you feel dizzy. The overwhelming pleasure that arose in you now got your legs shaking without stopping. The feeling was unbearable, because he touched all the sensitive places but leaving the critical ones empty and eager. This teasing was so arousing your juices now strained down your thigh. The crystal like liquid did not go unnoticed by Benimaru, as a grin appeared on his face. Without a second though, he lowered his head, sticking his tongue out and pressing it on your plushy thighs, collecting the juices in long strokes. “Beni!!”- you moaned like a whore, voice filled with begging desire and maddening need, but he did not plan to be interrupted. He slid his hand under you, finding your mouth and sticking the fingers coated in your icing in it.“Clean this up, while I clean you down here.”- he lifted his hand a bit to make you close your mouth around his fingers, pumping them in and out to insure you will do the job well. You sobbed in a low voice as you sucked on your own cum, barely concentrating on his order when the feeling of him patiently licking off the wetness along your thighs and getting closer to your cunt made you almost faint. His soft muscle finally found its way to the grand prize, as he brushed it on your folds and around your entrance in circular motions. You could not take it, you started to push your ass back, trying to make him stick his tongue in, touch your clit, anything to give you the sweet release you so desperately needed. But he will not grant you that. He pressed his mouth right on your heated hole, and started sucking, gathering the last of your juices. You body was on the edge, you could feel your heart skipping a beat, lungs barely catching air and muscles tensing, begging for that much needed release, but the only thing you got was a tender kiss on your clit, before he pulled his fingers out of your mouth, and lifting you off of him. He placed you in the sitting position, spreading your legs so your cunt was fully exposed to him once more. Your own wetness was smeared around your lips. You lowered your gaze, seeing something that made your mouth drop open. On Benimaru’s loose pants, there were more than clear outlines of his thick dick. You never saw something like that before, stretching the fabric mercilessly. He was not big, he was huge, and you wanted every damn inch buried inside of you. But you again forgot that this was not your lucky day….“You can only watch as I get the release that you are forbidden to reach tonight.” he slid his hand under his pants, giving his length a couple of experimental pumps before exposing the beast to you.“If you will behave, next time I will reward you, this time you will only swallow your bratty words…and my cum.”- he started slowly jerking it off, gazing at your plumb lips where his load will end.

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#benimaru shinmon #fire force #enen no shouboutai #benimaru shinmon x reader #benimaru shinmon x you #enen no shouboutai x reader #enen no shouboutai smut #benimaru shinmon headcanons #fire force benimaru #benimaru x reader #enen no shoubotai headcanons

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onewithnomightypowers · 3 years

Text

Old Habits

pairing: Tom Holland x fem!reader

summary: Old habits come back when you meet an ex lover after a long time. Conversations feel like you never stopped talking to them. Sometimes you have to see them one last time to say goodbye like you mean it but most of the time it doesn’t go as planned.

warning: drinking

words: 2.1k

a/n: could be read as part 2 of last kiss but is a stand alone. got a bit poetic at the end. hope you guys like it. and as always, love reading your opinions/reactions. also asks are open. (gif not mine)

masterlist

'@tomholland2013 posted a story'

She picked up her phone to open Instagram. Yes, Y/N still had notifications on for his account even after they were broken up for months. Classic Tom.

He posted two of the same picture on his story. No one understood how that would happen almost every time, not even the people working at Instagram to whom they contacted about the glitch.

Tom had his hair slicked back, standing in a white t-shirt next to Harry, his brother, giving a million-dollar smile. They were holding a clapperboard together. There was text on the picture too, 'day 1 let's go!!' She smiled to herself. Just because they weren't together doesn't mean that she wasn't allowed to feel happy for his achievements. Even though she wishes to know all these big things from Tom himself she is, unfortunately, left here, watching a small part of his life flash in front of her for less than thirty seconds.

"Are you listening?" Hope, Y/N's date said.

"Yeah, I'm sorry. You were saying?" Y/N placed the phone back where it was resting, next to the cold wine bottle.

"You seem distant," they said.

When she 'met' Hope (she only really met them 30 minutes ago), Y/N wasn't looking for love, just sex, and that is what online dating specializes in. She hoped Hope knew what they were signing up for, sexual intimacy and nothing else.

"It doesn't matter does, does it? We both know what we are here for. Why not just cut the chase," Y/N replied.

It was early in the morning, the sun had yet to shine in its full glory. Y/N could only think of the first time she stayed over at Tom's old apartment but then she turned her head only to find Hope's naked body next to her. Her heartbeat accelerated with the realization that he was not hers anymore. Being in a foreign environment didn't help her growing anxiety, twisting and turning her intestines.

It's been four months, her feelings for Tom refuse to quit on her because she knows she could never quit on them, on him, even if he has. He probably has already found someone else in Canada, she thought. She didn't want him anymore but she still needed him, one last time just to teach her stupid heart how to say goodbye.

Y/N wore her clothes and picked up her shoes, going on a trail to find Hope's door to get out before they wake up. Climbing down the stairs, she took out her phone from the back pocket of her jeans.

'5 new messages from Sam' 7 hours ago

Sam: hey

Sam: ik it's late

Sam: I am going for a run tmr morning @6

Sam: do you wanna come?

Sam: will go to the new coffee house near my house after that

Y/N texted him back

Y/N: I'll meet you at the coffee place

Sam: come fast. already here

Sam and Y/N were standing in the queue to place their orders. “You look especially shitty today,” Sam said, running his right hand through his sweaty hair.

“I haven’t been home yet,” Y/N reasoned her appearance.

His mouth formed an ‘o’ shape. The person in front of them left the queue, they moved towards the counter. “One hazelnut latte, double shot with skimmed milk,” Y/N gave her order.

“And you?” the cashier’s question directed to Sam.

“I’ll have a matcha latte with oat milk”

Sam turned to Y/N, “Harrison got me on matcha, and now I can’t go back to coffee”

They paid their dues and moved over to the barista counter to collect their order.

“So, what were you doing last night?” Sam inquired.

“I was on a date, it isn't a big deal though. Just had some needs to take care of”

“Oh, was it any good?”

“It was fine. I was distracted the whole time. Saw Tom’s story about halfway into the bottle of merlot. Couldn’t stop thinking about him”

“Seems…sad. But you know Tom is coming back for the Christmas weekend, I think. He might attend Harrison’s Christmas eve party”

“One hazelnut latte and one matcha latte,” someone behind the counter screamed.

“That’s us,” Sam raised his voice.

Harrison had a bucket inside his house, under a sign that said 'drop your tracking devices here' with an arrow pointing to the bucket. Y/N dropped her phone on a pile of roughly fourteen others. Debating whether to see Tom's face was something she wanted or not made her late and not very fashionably.

The house was decorated with empty liquor bottles along with red and green streamers from one wall to another. Everyone was drunk in their best dress. There were no signs of Tom yet. Y/N took a deep breath, walking towards the kitchen to get herself some liquid courage to help her socialize.

The kitchen was rather scarcely populated. Empty glasses were lined up next to the sink. Are they clean or used? Bending down, Y/N opened the refrigerator to see if Harrison had any chilled wine. No luck. "Hey," a familiar voice was heard.

She looked up at the familiar stranger.

"Hey Tom," she smiled. The refrigerator light falling on Y/N made her blush visible.

She grabbed a half-cut lemon placed in the egg tray.

“How have you been?" Tom asked leaning back on the kitchen counter, observing her movements.

Y/N walked towards the sink to grab herself a crystal glass hoping for it to be clean. "Just busy with work these days"

"I heard you got a job at Condé Nast, is that true?" he took a sip from his beer.

"Well, you heard right. You are looking at their new senior brand manager for digital", she said proudly.

Tom hugged her from the side she was holding a knife to cut the lemon for her gin and tonic. "That's great darling! You always wanted to work there"

Darling. The butterflies in her stomach were fluttering like the first time she met Tom.

"I saw your story the other day. You started filming your script, right?" she dropped the lemon in the glass.

"Yup, it was a long time coming," he grabbed the knife she was using and washed it without even knowing. He was so used to Y/N never washing utensils after using them and, he would always have to clean up after her.

"Congrats on that babe!" The word 'babe' just slipped out of practice.

Y/N grabbed a Bombay Sapphire standing still on the marble slab. The blue of the bottle shinning even in the dim-lit room.

"I missed you," Y/N made eye contact, screwing the cap back on. A long, silent pause.

I miss you too, so very much

She cleared her throat, "so, how long are you staying?"

"Going back Monday morning"

She opened a can of tonic water.

"Are you seeing someone?" Tom asked.

"Wouldn't you wanna know" a smirk on her face grew. "I've been out on few dates, nothing serious. What about you?"

"Met this girl online, dated for a bit but, she wanted something I couldn't give to her"

Y/N scoffed, "did she have a foot fetish or something?"

"No, Y/N. She wanted love, not my feet" they both laughed.

"On that topic..." Tom calmed himself, "...I was listening to this song a few weeks ago and, there was this line, 'the smell of your hair reminds me of her feet' and it made me think of you"

"I reckon," she took a sip of her gin and tonic.

"No, seriously, I really related to that line. No matter how many people I hook up with, it will be hard to find the type of intimacy I shared with you. I still relate to it"

"I hate going on walks alone and having faceless dreams," Y/N blurted, lacking a proper reaction.

"You're still the face of all my fantasies," Tom confessed.

None of them knew what to say next. Anything they thought of saying now included walking over the blurry line of exes to lovers.

"You look pretty"

"Classic me, had a glow up after getting my heartbroken"

"You always looked this pretty. You are beautiful," Tom assured her. The 'heartbroken part did not sit well with him. He already felt guilty for taking a job across the pond which was a great opportunity for him to grow but was only possible by severing his ties with Y/N.

It had just started snowing on Boxing Day. Tom was alone in his cold home, boiling a pot of ramen noodles. He took out his phone and snapped a picture of the burning stove with the pot on top.

Tom: *attached photo*

Tom: I come back after months and my family leaves me alone with no food

Y/N: you should add a poached egg

Tom: Thanks. I shall.

Tom: I think I made too much ramen for me

Tom: do you wanna come over and share?

Her indecision was visible by the coming and going of the gray dots. Then finally, Tom could tame his anxiety by her simple reply.

Y/N: sure.

There was a loud knock on the door. Tom put two bowls of hot ramen on the dining table and went to open the door. Behind the door, Y/N was standing with her hands inside her brown checker coat. There was dust of snow sitting on her shoulders. Her braided hair was made by the most anxious hands in town.

The door opened and, Tom’s hands flew to take Y/N in his arms. They hugged like little kids hug their parents after being away from each other, for them, an eternity. It did feel like an eternity to them too but, they hadn’t forgotten each other’s touch.

“I parked my car at the church, couldn’t find any spot here ‘cause of the snow," she pulled out.

“The snow seems to be gaining momentum.”

Y/N hummed in agreement. She took off her coat and hung it in the Holland’s coat closet.

“Come on, the ramen is getting cold,” she followed tom into the kitchen.

They sat adjacent on the wooden table in comfortable silence. Tom used chopsticks and, Y/N used a fork. Only the occasional noodles falling in the broth were heard, along with the gushing of wind.

“It’s really spicy for me,” Tom said.

“Yeah, I can see your ears turning red.”

She still remembers

Y/N raised her hand to cover her mouth while yawning.

“Since you made the food, I’ll do the dishes,” she got up, grabbed their bowls, and walked over to the sink.

Wearing the gloves, she turned to Tom, “it was quite tasty”.

Tom gave her a smile.

She spread the soap on the dishes and turned the tap on. Tom pushed his chair back to get up.

“Have you made any friends at your new job,” he jumped and sat on the counter next to Y/N.

“Yeah, sort of. Kyara works there too so, I have just made her friends my friends,” she washed his chopsticks.

“That’s good. Have you talked to Emily after the wedding? She told me they are planning on adopting.”

“They invited me over for dinner when they got the approval from the agency. Kyara made this amazing Hyderabadi biryani, it was her mum’s recipe so, it was obviously better than the restaurant”

“God! You and your love for Indian food”

Y/N removed her gloves, “I should go. Thanks for the ramen, by the way”

“Are you sure you can go out in this weather?”

“Yeah I think," she started walking out of the kitchen.

Tom grabbed her hand. “Stay”, his voice was like cotton.

Y/N turned and made contact with his pleading eyes. She moved closer to him. “Please”, he said. They both were inching in to lock their desperate lips.

Y/N did not notice when she had fallen asleep talking to Tom. Their naked bodies were covered by the white comforter. Her eyes slowly opened to a boy with brown eyes and messy hair looking at her.

“I like it when you sleep. I love watching you sleep”

She chuckled. “That’s a bit creepy, don’t you think?” She had a sleepy voice.

“You look so serene, the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. I could stare at you for eons”

“But love, I'm only here till the snow settles,” she caressed his cheeks.

“Then the cold shall frost our limbs," he leaned in to kiss her.

tags: @elios-timotea

#tom holland #tom holland fanfiction #tom holland imagine #tom holland smut #tom holland x reader #tom holland fluff #tom holland x you #tom holland x y/n #spiderman #marvel fanfiction #marvel #spiderman x reader #spiderman x y/n #spider man #spiderman x you

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elysianslove · 4 years

Note

Hello! I know this may not be your thing but I decided to give it a shot, if not no biggy!

I was wondering if you would be interested in writing Gojo and/or Sakuna with an asexual lover? (One that doesnt feel sexual attraction but doesnt mind kissing and cuddling etc and loves physical affection but nothing beyond that?) And like, how a relationship with that kind of person would come to be?

Because Sakuna and Gojo both give off *he totally fucks* vibes.

So how they ended up with an asexual lover would be interesting, maybe the MC rejects their advances because fear of being hated for being Ase? Because they know that the other person definitely fucks.

How would their relationship work? How would the guy react/comfort the MC.

(Maybe it ends with a epilogue with no sex(as in penetration and blowjobs to be exact but mc later in a relationship would be willing to do things like handjobs and other hands on/Using toys to pleasure their partner because they cant in that way) but lots of passionate makeout sessions/kissing/sucking and worshiping the mc's body? Especially the collar bone)

If you arent into it that's cool! I totally get it!

This is pretty self indulgent after all ahahaha it's hard being an asexual in fandoms lmao.

hi my love!! okay to start off, i’m really honored you sent in this request to me. idk just the fact that you’re trusting me with it is really sweet hehe. i’m fairly knowledgable about sexuality but i don’t like to write about things i’m not 100% sure about because i don’t wanna risk doing anything wrong or accidentally offending you! but!! thank you for going into detail with the request, and i hope this is what you were looking for, and that i didn’t do any mistakes <3

i wrote headcanons so i can go into detail and write for both!!

some nsfw under the cut, my loves! <3

ryomen sukuna

i’d say, to begin with, it would take a small while for sukuna to even be accepting of his own feelings towards you. nothing having to do with your sexuality, just you in general, specifically that you’re human and so different from him. i don’t think sex ever crosses his mind, at least at the start, because he’s too busy being really angry over the way he can’t seem to control his reactions to every little thing you do. so he himself won’t actively work at starting a relationship with you.

but he will realize, over time, that you’re not doing anything either, even though he’s been noticing that you’re not pushing him or his advances away. like any act of protectiveness that involves him physically touching you intimately, you don’t reject, and you’re always ready to retort at any quip he had. he could tell that these feelings he had for you were mutual, he was just so confused as to why you weren’t doing anything about it.

sukuna’s a thousand year old cursed spirit. he does not know shit about sexuality. i think the way he’d look at it is fuck who you want and fuck who you like. i feel like nicki minaj’s said that before, has she? he doesn’t like thinking too much about it, you know?

his confession would probably be a kiss because words? he doesn’t know them. when he feels you return the kiss he’s, deep down, elated, really, and this is simply because of his naturally sexual personality, he starts hinting at more, until you stop him. he’s really confused because you just kissed him back? you’ve been kissing him for so long why do you want to stop now? he can see the fear steadily growing in your eyes and he’s even more confused now he’s just. humans are so weird.

when you cautiously tell him, “i don’t want to go further than this. is that okay?” you look like you’re waiting for the world to erupt in your face. he just frowns and shrugs like, “yeah but that’s not the point. do you not want me?”

it takes about an hour and a half for sukuna to properly process what you’re saying. at first he’s so thrown off by it, not by you! he just can’t process the fact that someone doesn’t feel any sexual attraction towards someone or doesn’t crave sex at all. it’s not that he’s rude about it, it’s just a really foreign concept to him, you know? when you add that it’s just sex, and you’re okay with a lot of other things, the gears in his brain finally start working again and he just goes.

*shrugs* ok.

literally lmao. like i said earlier, sukuna doesn’t give a shit like whatever do what you want.

because of the rush of emotions he’s feeling towards you, and the fact that this in itself, a relationship, and a relationship with a human too, he doesn’t really focus on the fact that he might want more from you. he’s easily satisfied with a lengthy make out session, and he admits it to you every time he sees you get a little anxious or unsure of yourself.

however, his needs do grow with your relationship. it’s kind of clumsy, your transition into a proper long term relationship, especially with sukuna, but you two make it work.

you agree to try different ways to pleasure him, even if he kinda rushes through them because he’s generally just excited to have your hands on him. at first he’s content with anything you’re offering, but it makes him feel kinda useless when you won’t let him touch you and you have to remind him that your needs are different than his and that you’re sated differently.

i see sukuna as a curious and experimental guy, so he would definitely let you use toys on him. nothing too extreme, because he still needs that sense of control, but you do use some toys like a fleshlight or a vibrator to rile him up. he likes using your hand too, because it’s always so soft against him and it feels a hundred times better than any toy. he learns not to overstep any boundaries though, and not to do anything that might make you uncomfortable even if it takes him a little longer. like i said, the whole idea is just different to him, so it takes him a while to understand, and he’s still learning as he goes!

he loves your make out sessions, especially after you establish your boundaries and your limits and what you’re willing to do for him. he absolutely adores leaving your skin a sky of blue, pink and purple it sends chills down his spine marking you like that. he’s always touching you all over, and just loves to grab and knead at your skin.

in the proper long term, he doesn’t mind it at all tbh. the two of you develop a system, and he’s okay with it. the same way you would never cross his boundaries and force him to do anything he doesn’t want, he’d do for you too! it really never truly mattered, and it truly never will.

gojō satoru

different from sukuna, i think gojō would definitely be knowledgable about things like this. idk he just seems like the kind of guy that’s innately so aware of everything around him, and can read people exceptionally well.

he probably picked up on the fact that you weren’t comfortable with sex, or just didn’t experince sexual attraction, on his own, but never really brought it up because it was never his place. but the same way he picks up on that, he picks up on your obvious crush on him. he pays both details no specific attention until he starts to realize his own feelings for you, and begins on his subtle advances.

he tried to make his advances as sfw as possible, you know? just in case his suspicions were confirmed to be true. he was just extra flirty, sometimes touchy but never in an inappropriate way. very subtilely like always having your shoulders or knees touching or dusting of your jacket or feeding you a piece of his food. cute little things like that.

he gets super worried when he notices you start to distance yourself from him, because he can’t imagine what he might’ve did to push you away. he overthinks a little, worried that he overstepped his boundaries or made you uncomfortable in any way, but he isn’t afraid to approach you about it, to make sure he doesn’t repeat his mistakes, especially with someone like you, who he’s slowly growing more and more infatuated by.

when you admit to him you’re asexual, he realizes he was right, but then he’s like, “and? did i do something?” and now it’s your turn to be confused because here you were worried about rejection but here he was worried about you?

this specific incident is what makes you let loose and finally just freely admit your feelings for him. he’s ecstatic about it, seriously! all that’s on his mind is that he gets to go on a date with someone he really likes. sex is the last thing on his mind, and yeah, you’ll eventually have to talk about it, but not for now. it’s for later, when things get a little more serious.

they do get serious, to both your delights, but the dreaded moment is approaching you. gojō definitely sits you down and says, “we’re only having this talk so i know never to do anything outside of your limits. everything about this relationship is 50/50, and i want to know ways to make you feel good, too.”

please sir your hand in marriage.

i definitely believe gojō’s a kinky guy, and is more than willing to try out literally any sex toy you pull at him. genuinely, he’ll try anything you wanna try. if you ever offer a handjob, he’ll ask a million times over if you’re sure. usually, he likes to just do it himself, but have you there next to him. he won’t touch you, but your hands will be in his hair, and you’ll be kissing his neck, or just murmuring how much you love him in his ear, just spurring him on. he knows the last thing on your mind is anything sexual, but there’s just something about being under your watchful, almost bored gaze as he fucks himself.

anyways before i get too into it lmfao, he loves kissing you. loves loves loves it. not even full blown make out sessions, just gentle, serene kissing. he can kiss you for hours.

he is also incredible at body worship and praise. paints your pretty collarbone pink and purple, whispers about how you’re perfect for him, describes all your features to you like poetry. he’s an incredible lover, really. nothing can make him fall out of love with you, absolutely nothing.

#jujutsu kaisen #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jujutsu kaisen headcanon #sukuna #jjk sukuna #sukuna x reader #sukuna headcanons #saturo gojo x reader #gojo x reader #satoru x reader #gojo headcanons #saturo gojo headcanons #gojou x reader

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bloatsome · 3 years

Text

Why R*wling failed to make Lily Evans a Mary Sue:

Moral superiority

Lily was a Gryffindor, and there is enough proof that everyone else thought less of Slytherins. The author has tried to convey that Lily was better than everyone else because she was friends with a Slytherin. However there is more than enough evidence of Lily being friends with Severus because they went way back and there is NO WAY they would be friends if they didn't know each other from their childhood. One, the Gryffindors didn't interact with the Slytherins and two, EVERY DAMN thing Snape did was questioned, and shown to be horrible by Lily. She didn't look at things from his perspective. (More on that later)

Lily also made it seem like she was doing him a favour by giving him her companionship.

She shows disdain towards Snape's likes and dislikes, and doesn't even treat him as a normal person should be treated. It was almost as if her friend was the scum of the earth and she was assigned to look after him for a bit.

Selectively forgiving

Plenty of instances of Lily being biased towards Gryffindor house in general, and the Marauders in specific. She tells Snape she can't ignore the fact that his friends used dark magic on Mary which we are not given context about (it could've been making her tap dance, for all we know). But what we are given context about is the Marauders sexually assaulting Snape. However that is okay with Lily, she even goes as far to smile (and possibly laugh) at it.

Maybe because they didn't use dark magic to choke and pantse Snape, or maybe, as the rest of the school would agree, it doesn't matter because it's a poor, ugly Slytherin.

Hypocritical

Lily says "I don't understand how you could hang around Avery and Mulciber" but befriends the Marauders (who were not just pranksters, they were BULLIES). She tells Snape to ditch his friends, the only people he could talk to without getting hurt, but cannot ditch her own friends to be there for him, implying a hypocritical and as mentioned, seemingly superior nature.

Not compassionate

Contrary to what is usually said about Lily:

"Your mother was not only a singularly gifted witch, but also an uncommonly kind person. She saw the best in everyone, even when they didn't see it in themselves"

Lupin's famous quote about Lily holds true, but only in HIS case.

Lily did not see the best in Severus. She was always telling him he was obsessed with the Marauders and he should be thankful James saved his life, after putting him in peril. She said he can't make her think otherwise (because she was always in the right, wasn't she?) and was mad at him when he said he wouldn't just leave it at Potter's version of the story. She deliberately ignores Severus' pain and worry.

Also the SWM incident. If Lily was really a badass queen who wouldn't stand for discrimination of any sort, then, after Snape called her a mudblood, Lily would NOT have retaliated with a low blow comment about his underwear, shaming his lower class status.

Not really intelligent

I'm not saying Lily was stupid, it's just that her intelligence is overblown in the series. We have several points that can lead us to believe this.

She was supposed to be a potions prodigy. However we know the text book was horse shit and you couldn't properly prepare a potion without diverging from the text. (As shown in HBP) Lily, like Hermione in HBP, couldn't have come too close to perfecting a potion practically, while she might be good at theory.

Maybe I could take her intelligence more seriously if it were in another subject.

Then about her non-academic intelligence, her street smarts, we see that Lily does not find out about James regularly hexing Snape, despite her having many friends and well, the gift of sight. Either she chose to be blissfully ignorant or she really did have no clue what went on around her.

She can't stay friends with someone who called her an offensive term, but can marry a guy who threatened to hex her? (Magical equivalent of hit) Not the smartest move.

Egoistic

Lily knew Severus respected her and held her on a pedestal. She didn't leave his side. James Potter, on the other hand, threatened to hex her and didn't treat her as she (or anyone, really) would want to be treated.

We see that Lily knows Snape's friends (and possibly Snape himself) call people of her birth "mudblood". She still doesn't leave. However, she does leave at a particular point, and that point is when Snape calls her a mudblood.

She befriends the Marauders soon after, as they treat her well enough now that the threat (her friend, Severus) is out of the way.

Superficial OR too deep

Why would Lily Evans, the "nice girl" agree to go out with the school bully? Two possibilities:

1. She thinks it doesn't really matter as he's treated her alright after the SWM incident. He's a popular Gryffindor guy, plays Quidditch, doesn't look bad either, stuff dreams are made of etc etc.

2. She thinks she can "change" him, what every teen girl thinks when you meet a bad boy type, shown in the lines "after he deflated his head a little bit".

Oh my god!! He did it for me! I'm gonna make him a better person and give him all my love.

Honey, spare us the swooning and realize people don't change because you agree to go to Hogsmead with them. But you wanna get pregnant with his child at 19/20? Oh okay then.

Straight up mean

This point only holds true if my one of my earlier ones about her low EQ and street smarts do not.

Lily Evans had an inkling to what went around in the Snape household, but couldn't conjure up enough compassion to be empathetic.

She thinks she can't trust Snape on his word about the werewolf incident when that's what friends do. Why? Because Slytherin = bad.

I don't blame her for leaving Snape friendless after he called her a mudblood (frustrated and humiliated as he was, it was wrong of him) but atleast she could have stopped herself from insulting him BACK. And then, idk, dating his bully maybe? Who threatened to HEX you miss?

It's never made sense to me to be badgered a person till you say yes and then actually falling in love with them.

What does make sense to me is that Lily Evans said yes to James Potter to get back at her former friend. And then fell in love.

All in all, Lily is not only a horrible "friend", but also a uncompelling character to me.

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bobohu4eva · 3 years

Text

Pink Lace - Chapter 2

Characters: Baekhyun x Reader

Genre: College AU, stripper AU, fluff, smut, slow burn

Summary: Baekhyun, a philosophy professor with mysterious wealth, got himself completely fucked over a girl who can’t let him into her life.

Word count: 6.2k

Warnings: sex work, mentions of sexual assault, adult themes/situations, eventual smut

Tag list: @smolbeanmika @leave-me-in-the-summertime @totallynerdstuff @bbhmystar @nana-banan @kimyhappy @thegreatandi @geniusloey @deligxt

Masterlist

“God I’m so fucking sick of this semester and it hasn’t even started yet.” You complained, lying on your roommates bed flipping through one of your textbooks for the upcoming semester.

“Relax, at least you have money and you’re smart y/n, you’ll be fine.”

“Easy for you to say, you’re an arts major, not an architecture student.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?!”

“Nothing! It’s just different!”

“Mhm sure I’d love to see you paint a landscape or sculpt something.”

You gave your best friend a dirty look before focusing your attention back to the textbook.

Mia had been your best friend since 2nd grade and she had lived with you since you were 18. She had always been the more artistic one, doing dance from a young age and taking all sorts of art classes whenever she could. Her overall view on life was quite different from yours. She saw the world through the lens of an artist, and an optimist.

Her views on relationships were very different from yours as well, with quite the laundry list of exes, each one more thrilling than the last. You honestly loved hearing all her stories and found it impressive how well she seemed to have the dating game figured out. You on the other hand, could count the men you’d slept with on one hand, and aren’t one for parties or anything like that, preferring to stay home and study or watch a drama.

With your dislike for parties and dating apps, you stayed pretty single. Not that you minded, being too swamped with schoolwork to make time for a real boyfriend anyway. Sometimes you thought about going out to parties and trying to find yourself a hookup but you never followed through, not wanting that kind of intimacy with a stranger.

“Did you see Baekhyun again last night?” She asked casually, knowing all about your work. Although for her, asking if he was there really meant ‘are you going to buy me my lunches again this week’.

“Yeah...” You contemplated for a second if you should tell her, but you quickly decided to just say it, not wanting to keep things from your best friend. “I told him my name. Like my real name.”

Her eyes went wide, definitely surprised by your confession. “Wait seriously? Why?”

“He asked and I just couldn’t tell him no.” You replied, much quieter now.

“Well it’s your choice but that really wasn’t a good idea, he’s already way too into you and now he’s just gonna think he actually has a shot with you.”

“Yeah I know I just.. I can’t explain it but it felt different.”

“He’s just another pervy dude who wants tits in his face! There’s a reason he pays you.”

“He’s not a perv! He’s still a guy of course, but he’s sweet.” You felt a twinge of embarrassment at how quick you were to defend him.

“All that matters about this guy is that he gives you nearly a thousand dollars every night he sees you, right?” You nodded. “You don’t want him thinking he doesn’t have to pay you anymore do you?”

You stayed quiet, because you knew she was right. This was the nature of your relationship with Baekhyun, and straying from what you had with him now just meant opening yourself up to the possibility of losing a lot of money, money you needed.

You were kind of surprised by how opposite you and Mia seemed to be in this situation. Usually it was you talking to her about boys, telling her not to make reckless decisions.

“Yeah you’re right. I’m gonna go to bed. I have classes starting pretty early tomorrow.” You told her as you left her room for yours.

You needed to sleep, but your conversation with her left you with the same uneasy feeling you’d had after last seeing Baekhyun. The longer you stared at your ceiling, the more you felt like you did the right thing telling him your name. He really liked you and it probably made his day, and you knew he wouldn’t use it against you in any way. He was too nice for that. What’s the worst that could happen, right?

The first few classes of the day had gone okay. Your physics and statics professors didn’t seem like complete assholes, and you only had one class left for the day, philosophy. Part of you was annoyed you even needed to take the class, since you wouldn’t exactly consider yourself a very “deep” person, but you figured it would be easy enough.

Being the good student you are, you decided to get there early to get a seat close to the front to make a good impression on the professor. When you arrived the previous class hadn’t finished yet, so you sat down on a bench nearby and opened a book.

“Hey, are you waiting for philosophy class too?”

You looked up to see a rather cute boy, books in hand, looking down at you with a smile on his face.

“Yeah, do I know you?”

“I’m Lucas.” He sticks his hand out for you to shake, so you do and he sits down next to you. “Are you a philosophy major?”

“No, architecture. And I’m y/n.”

“Damn you must be really smart then! I’m a business major.”

“You also just have to take this for the humanities credit?”

“Yeah, but I’m excited, the professor seems cool I met him earlier today.”

“Really? What’s he like?”

“Super cool and smart, kind of young, but like a genius.”

“Yeah well hopefully he’s nice too. Especially with grading”

Lucas laughed and you noticed the previous class leaving the lecture hall so you got up and made your way in, sitting down in the second row, Lucas sitting down next to you. The professor hadn’t showed up yet so you turned to Lucas again, making small talk to pass the time. As you talked to him you realized he was actually fairly funny, although not the smartest. You had to admit though, he was pretty damn handsome. He had to be an entire foot taller than you, with beautifully tanned skin and a smile that would make any girl weak in the knees.

“Are you going to any parties this weekend? I’m going to one at my buddies frat Friday night if you wanna be my date.”

You frowned “Sorry, I don’t really do parties.”

You could see the disappointment on his face. “Damn really? Well if ever change your mind you can text me.” He said as he scribbled something down and slid a piece of paper with his number on it across the table to you.

You internally cringed, but took the paper anyway and give him a small thank you. You weren’t lying when you said you didn’t do parties, but you still felt bad shooting him down, especially since he was actually pretty cute. That was the problem with you and dating in college. No matter how cute a guy was, what they wanted and what you wanted rarely added up well.

You’d bought your textbook already so you decide to get back to looking through it before class started. You also just wanted an excuse to stop talking to Lucas. You got lost in the book, finding yourself surprisingly interested in different moral theories and types of ethical arguments.

“Ahem.”

You heard who you assumed to be your professor and looked up, not expecting to see Baekhyun of all people smirking back at you. Fucking smirking.

You almost choked on air when you realized who you were looking at. Not only was it Baekhyun of all people standing in front of you, but he was wearing a fitted white button down and slacks with his hair styled out of his face, and glasses abandoned on his podium. He looked hot. You felt your face getting warmer and warmer.

“Hey you ok?” Lucas asked, having seen your reaction to Professor Byun.

“What? Yeah I’m totally fine why wouldn’t I be?” You responded, too loudly. Loudly enough that Baekhyun noticed. And laughed.

“Do you guys know each other or something?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” You told him while giving Baekhyun your best version of a death stare, but he didn’t seem to care.

“Hello everyone I’m Mr. Byun, I’ll be your philosophies of life professor.” He said, starting the lecture with a fairly neutral look on his face, although you noticed him looking in your direction often, and smiling.

You had to admit, he was smart. Not that you were particularly surprised, he seemed fairly intelligent from the conversations you’d had with him at work, but granted those weren’t always the most intellectual conversations either. The way he explained what you had read in the book was both interesting and informative, but you couldn’t focus on him talk about Socrates when just two days earlier you had been grinding on him, and had even let him touch you. Especially when he looked like that now. Your whole body felt hot and you knew you were probably as red as a tomato.

You tried your best to focus on what he was saying for the sake of your grade, but he wasn’t making it easier by the way he kept looking in your direction with that smile on his face. Now, often looking you directly in the eyes with the same intensity from the club. Only this time, while sounding incredibly, frustratingly, smart.

As much as you tried, you couldn’t focus. Not when you had to process the fact that Baekhyun was now your college professor, and knew way more about you and your life than you ever wanted him to. You were hit with the realization that he now also knew you’d lied to him about nearly everything.

You became painfully aware of how you looked compared to him. While he looked exquisite in his business-casual attire, you had barely rolled out of bed in time to throw your hair up in a messy top knot and apply some mascara. Your hoodie and leggings combo wasn’t your best either, and you started feeling more and more embarrassed by the second.

Every other time Baekhyun had seen you, you had been dressed in expensive lingerie with your hair and makeup done perfectly. You had always been the one in control of the situation. Now, you only felt small and underdressed.

After what felt like hours he finally ended the lecture. But he wasn’t done yet, not with you at least. And you could tell by the way he was staring at you, smile now gone and replaced with a much more serious expression. As soon as he dismissed everyone to leave, you frantically started shoving your things in your bag, trying to get out of the room as quickly as possible but your hands were shaking so badly that you ended up fumbling and dropping most of what you’d been holding.

“Shit, shit, shit” you whispered to yourself as you desperately reached for your belongings, feeling Baekhyun’s eyes on you, but it was too late and right after you saw the last student leave the lecture hall, you heard your name.

“Y/n come here.”

Not really having the option to say no, you walked up to him, trying to look as annoyed as possible.

“You look cute like this, without the heels and everything. I like it.” He said, now smiling down at you. Despite the mocking feeling of the statement, his face was soft now, the smug smirk from earlier gone.

Baekhyun was absolutely thrilled. The girl he usually looked forward to seeing all week long was right in front of him now, within reach. And he’d get to you see you much more now as well. He had to keep himself from looking too happy since he knew you weren’t in nearly as good a mood as him.

You’d never wanted to disappear as badly as you did in that moment. Here, Baekhyun was the one with all the power, and you despised it. He was the one all dressed up and making all the rules. You felt small and embarrassed, having little choice but to listen to whatever it is was he had to say to you. You hated the feeling.

“What do you want?”

“You lied to me.” His face didn’t look angry at all, just blank, void of any emotion.

“Why are you making me do this can I please just leave?” You asked, hoping he’d have some sympathy but you have no such luck.

No answer

“Baekhyun, please. Just let me go home and switch into a different section.” You look at him with pleading eyes, wanting this nightmare to be over.

His face hardened, now slightly annoyed.

“Professor Byun, and I’m afraid you’re stuck with me y/n. I’m the only one teaching this class this semester.”

“Well, fuck” You muttered, looking down at the floor.

“Is that how you speak to your professors?”

Your head snapped back up, and you narrowed your eyes at him.

“You know, y/n, I’m not mad that you lied to me. I should’ve assumed as much. After you told me your name and I saw it on the attendance sheet I had been hoping you’d been lying.” He still looked annoyed, but his face had softened a bit.

“Oh fuck off Baekhyun”

Immediately his expression went sour again, jaw clenched and brown furrowed.

“Here it’s Mr. Byun. And don’t use that language with me again, I’m serious.”

“Why are you doing this?”

“What do you mean? I didn’t know you’d be here. It was just yesterday that I even realized your name was on my roll sheet.”

He had a point. He couldn’t have planned this, you’d signed up for the class months ago and he didn’t even know your name until two nights ago.

“Why aren’t you freaking out then? Shouldn’t you be worried about having me in your class?”

He only let out a chuckle.

“Why would I be worried? As far as I’m concerned this only means I get to see you more often, which I’m fine with. And you need to pass this class to graduate on time, so shouldn’t you be glad you’re already friends with your professor?”

You knew it wasn’t what he intended, but the smile on his face felt like it was mocking you.

“Yeah. Friends.” You scoffed. “Can I go home now?”

“So this is your last class of the day?”

You internally cursed yourself for giving up that bit of information.

“Yeah. Now can I leave?”

“Well you’re not in a hurry are you? Since you don’t have anywhere to be after this.”

“Baekhyuuun” you whined “please, this sucks, just let me go home.”

He smiled, seemingly amused by you begging him.

“Okay. I’m not gonna make you stay any longer since you obviously don’t want to. But let me make it clear, I’m not gonna go easy on you here just because I like you. You still have to try.”

“Okay, that’s fine.” You reply, picking your bag up to leave, wondering what exactly he meant by like you.

“I’m really looking forward to reading your essays by the way.”

He flashed you a smile as you finally turned to leave, and you hated yourself for not doing a better job at looking mad. As much as you hated to admit it, he had a damn beautiful smile.

“See you on Wednesday!” He shouted after you as you left the room. You didn’t respond.

When you arrived back at your apartment your mind started to fill with panicked thoughts. He wouldn’t come to the club anymore now would he? That meant having to try to mingle with strangers again, something you hated about your work. It also meant less money. It’s not often that customers bought hour long dances.

And what if he did show up again? How would you even act around him? Part of you wanted him to for the easy money, but you just couldn’t imagine grinding on your professor. Your face heated up just at the thought, especially since you knew he could look that good now. Would you even be able to give him a lap dance without losing your own mind?

You had trouble processing the fact that this was even able to happen. You’d never thought to ask Baekhyun for his last name, and since it had been summer break he didn’t mention his job. The whole situation seemed bizarre.

And what about class? Will he make it more difficult if he doesn’t get what he wants?

No. Baekhyun isn’t like that, you tell yourself. As much as you disliked having him in a position of power over you, you’d gotten to know him well enough to know that he wouldn’t abuse it.

The more you’d gotten to know him the more you liked spending time with him rather than other customers, regardless of the money. And for good reason. The longer you knew Baekhyun, the more you realized he wasn’t like the other guys who came to the club. You could tell he was good, decent guy.

He was always there to see you, and only you. You had several other regulars, but none of them had any qualms about talking to and getting dances from other girls. Not that you minded, but you’d never seen Baekhyun even speak to another dancer.

He’s also just nice. The kind of nice that you don’t see in people often anymore. He was always incredibly respectful and would never do anything you weren’t comfortable with. Very few of the guys you came in contact with cared at all if they made you uncomfortable. They’d just assume that’s a part of the job for you.

Baekhyun was actually interesting to talk to as well. Since you’d met him at the beginning of summer, he usually told you about adventures he went on with his friends, most of whom you knew from the night they’d dragged him into the club.

They were a genuinely cool group of people. The one he was closest with, Chanyeol, was a music producer, another named Kyungsoo was an up and coming actor, and the one who’d introduced himself as Jongin was a professional dancer. Chanyeol had been the one to come with the idea of taking Baekhyun to the club in the first place.

Baekhyun would tell you anecdotes from nights out he’d had with them during college, as well as other wild stories and you’d often find yourself laughing and smiling so hard your face hurt. Ever since your first night with him, you noticed how good he was at making the people around him feel at ease. He always knew what to say and when to make people laugh.

Baekhyun was different from the other men at work because you liked being around him. You’d be lying to yourself if you said you didn’t find him attractive either. If you’d met him anywhere else, and he wasn’t your professor, you’d probably be more than willing to go on a date with him.

But unfortunately that wasn’t the case.

You tore yourself out of your thoughts and realized how late it had gotten. Although it was only the first day, you already had homework you needed to start on. You spent the rest of the evening trying to be productive, but you couldn’t stop thinking about Baekhyun. How good he had looked, how attractive he sounded giving the lecture, how he wouldn’t stop looking at you.

He was going to be much more present in your life now, whether you liked it or not.

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

Wednesday morning Baekhyun felt stupid for how excited he was to see you. He’d decided to get up early to work some exercise into his day, and hopefully clear his mind, but even as he took a shower and started getting ready to leave for work, he couldn’t get you out of his head. He’d decided to wear something a bit more casual and stylish, opting for a new pair of glasses, striped red t shirt, and cream slacks. He tried to make other excuses for why he wanted to look nice but in the back of his mind, he knew he wore it because he wanted to look good in front of you.

During the class before yours he noticed a female student in the first row chewing on the back of her pencil as she very intentionally leaned over her desk to grab a pen, putting her cleavage on display to him.

He only rolled his eyes, but he was pleased to see that his outfit was getting good reactions. He just hoped you’d like it.

When the class before yours left, Baekhyun felt his heart rate go up. What if you’d found a way to get out of his class? Would you even show up? Or if you did, would you just end up sitting as far from him as possible?

Usually he’d leave to go get a coffee during his break between giving lectures, but today he stayed in case you came early again. As the minutes went by students started to fill the lecture hall. Baekhyun couldn’t help but keep his eyes fixed on the door every time he heard it open, but he just kept seeing everyone but you.

A minute before class started, you walked in and sat down in the second to last row.

Baekhyun felt his face light up as soon as saw you, only to immediately turn into a frown when he saw where you chose to sit down. It was as he’d suspected, you wanted to be as far away from his as possible. But at least you were there.

As Baekhyun started the lecture, he couldn’t help looking in your direction every few seconds. Even though you were in casual clothes without any fancy hairstyle or makeup, this was the version of you Baekhyun loved seeing the most. He was used to the perfected product you presented yourself as at your job, and he knew that wasn’t the real you. This was. You in leggings and a t shirt, your hair messily falling over your shoulders as you scribbled down notes. He could watch you like this all day. He noticed how your brows would furrow in confusion whenever he’d bring up a new concept, and how you chewed on your bottom lip when you were concentrating. Ever since he’d seen you like this on Monday, he couldn’t get enough. It was you, the real you.

He also noticed how you seemed to look everywhere in the room except for at him. You spent as much time as possible with your head down taking notes, even when there wasn’t much to write down. Other times your eyes would stay glued to the power point slides, or wander around the walls and ceilings. He understood why you weren’t exactly comfortable looking at him.

Despite being on the other side of the room, he was still able to pick up on little things. He noticed your leg bouncing, fingers tapping on the desk, and how much you would fidget when you weren’t writing notes.

He knew you were uncomfortable, and he hated it. He hated himself for being the reason. He wished there was something he could do or say that would make you enjoy being in his class more. Anything that would make you feel more at ease with him in this situation. If he wasn’t the only one teaching the class he wouldn’t have minded if you’d switched to a different professor, if it meant you were more comfortable. Of course he would’ve missed seeing you, but he also knew that was a selfish thought. He felt guilty that you had to be there and be uncomfortable because of him.

At the end of the lecture he gave the class their first proper assignment, a short essay analyzing Plato's “The Ring of Gyges”. It was an assignment he always gave at the very beginning of the semester, since it was a quite difficult read and gave him a good idea of how everyone would do in the class.

He was especially excited to see how you would do.

When class ended, you were the first one to leave and this time he didn’t stop you. He knew you wanted to leave and didn’t want to bother you again, still feeling slightly sorry for how late he’d kept you the first day. He’d only done it to try to reassure you about having him as your professor, but he hadn’t been expecting you to be as distressed about it as you were. In hindsight he realized he’d probably only made things more stressful for you.

Once the room was empty aside from him he packed up his things and left as well, hoping that you could become less anxious over time, and eventually, maybe even enjoy being in his class.

For now though, class had not been something for you to look forward to at all. You’d been dreading it ever since Monday afternoon.

That morning as you were getting ready, you tried to make yourself look a bit more presentable than you’d looked Monday, not wanting to live through the embarrassment of seeing Baekhyun look so nice while you were basically wearing pajamas again.

For the first half of your day you threw yourself into your other class work, successfully taking him off your mind for a while, but when your physics class ended and your next class was with him you felt yourself starting to panic.

You thought about skipping class, but you cared too much about your grade. You decided your best choice was to just get there as late as possible and sit as close to the door as you could so he wouldn’t be able to get you to stay after class again.

As you walked across campus you felt yourself get more and more nervous. Despite being there 20 minutes early and the room being open to sit down in, you sat down outside. As the minutes drew closer to class starting you felt your heart start to race and had trouble controlling your breathing. One minute before class was to start you got up, walked over to the door, and took a few deep breaths to calm yourself down a bit. You pushed open the door with shaky hands, and the second you could see into the room you notice Baekhyun's eyes on you, and his beautiful smile. You quickly looked down and hurried to the closest available seat in the back of the room, cringing at yourself.

As much as you wished you could, you couldn’t just ignore Baekhyun. He was the professor, you had to listen to him. But you had a hard time doing anything when he looked like he did. His shirt showed off his broad shoulders and he was wearing different glasses now too. He looked even better than he had on Monday. Had it not been for you already knowing him, you probably would’ve found him distracting for different reasons. You did everything you could not to look at him directly, knowing he’d catch you and see you blush. But who wouldn’t blush if he was staring at them while looking like that? You could tell some of the other girls in the class liked his outfit as well by the way they whispered to each other while shooting glances his way.

You wondered if maybe this was something he did often, if he liked starting things with students. If maybe his whole nice guy persona was fake and he really was just another scumbag.

But you soon realized that was just the bitterness speaking. You wouldn’t admit it to yourself but the thought of other girls trying to seduce him was bothering you. Baekhyun wasn’t a scumbag, not when he’d dedicated his life to teaching people about ethical issues and moral arguments.

As the class went on you couldn’t help but fidget and shift around in your seat. Even though you were avoiding looking at him, you knew his eyes were on you for much of the lecture. You’d figured it would be like this.

As it got closer and closer to the end of class you felt yourself get more and more panicked at the thought of him keeping you after again. You didn’t know what he could possibly keep you after for, but you didn’t want to stick around and find out, so as soon as he dismissed the class you nearly ran out without looking back.

“Hey, y/n!”

The sound of your name nearly gave you a heart attack, thinking it was Baekhyun who was going to force you to talk to him like this again but when you saw Lucas waving at you, you let out a relieved sigh.

“Hi Lucas.”

“I thought you’d come sit by me again today what happened?” He asked.

“Sorry about that, I was almost late today so I didn’t want to walk out there in front of the whole class” you said, hoping he wouldn’t see through your lie.

“Well I hope next time you’ll sit with me again.”

You managed to give him a small smile and nod, still a bit too frazzled over everything to want to talk to him.

“I have to get home, but I’ll se you Friday. Bye Lucas.” You waved at him as you went in the opposite direction.

You felt bad for not talking to him any longer, but you just weren’t in the right headspace.

On your walk home you felt weird. Had it really been that bad? Or were you just overreacting? Although he did look at you a lot Baekhyun seemed to teach the class as if everything was normal, more or less unaffected by your presence. He hadn’t seemed to mind your leaving either. Maybe he’d hadn’t planned to make you stay again. Maybe, it seemed, he was going to leave you be.

You knew Lucas would bother you about it if you didn’t sit with him again next time, but would you be okay to sit that close to the front again? Or even worse what if Lucas caught on that there was something going on between you and Baekhyun? He’d already seemed suspicious on the first day.

You decided your best course of action was to just do it and tough it out. All you needed to do was act like you did in all your other classes and everything would be fine right?

First however, you had to go home and face your roommate and tell her about this nightmare, having bottled it up until now. You weren’t exactly sure why you hadn’t told her right away. Maybe you felt strange about it since she had already told you you needed to keep him from getting any closer to you. Obviously that wasn’t going to be easy now.

As soon as you got home and put your things away you knocked on her door.

“YEAH?” You heard her yell through the door.

“Can I come in?”

“One second!”

A little while later the door opened.

“What’s up?”

“Can we have a girls night? I have some shit I need to tell you.”

You couldn’t remember the last time you saw Mia look so excited.

“You?? Have tea for ME??? Fuck yes!”

You thought about it, and this was pretty rare. 90% of the time she was the one unloading her boy problems on you, or any other kind of drama too for that matter. Not that you minded, that was just the dynamic you had gotten used to.

“Wanna order some food and put on a movie?” You asked.

“Sure.”

Your food eventually arrived and you put on a chick flick you’ve both seen a thousand times.

“So?? Are you gonna tell me what’s going on or what?” She asked turning to you, obviously looking forward to whatever you were about to fill her in on.

You sighed.

“So my philosophy professor this semester...” You swallowed, now having trouble getting yourself to say it.

“I know this sounds fucking insane but, Baekhyun’s my philosophy professor.”

The look on her face told you everything you need to know. The two of you had known each other for so long that words weren’t needed.

“I don’t know how it happened either. I signed up for the class forever ago anyway, before I even met him at the club. Just a bizarre coincidence. And he’s the only one teaching it and I need the credit to graduate so I'm stuck.”

“Shit dude.”

“Yeah I know. He kept me after class Monday and it was a fucking nightmare.”

“What did he say?”

“Basically just that I’m stuck with him. He also called me out for lying about what university I go to at work. And he said he liked me better ‘like this’ whatever the hell that means”

“He’s like obsessed with you isn’t he? He’s probably over the moon that he has a way into your personal life now which really fucking sucks for you.” She had a point. “Do you think he’ll still come see you at work?”

“I honestly really don’t wanna think about that right now.”

“Be careful, y/n. A customer having a crush on you is one thing but having him in charge of your grade is another. What if he starts trying to make moves on you and you shoot him down? He could fuck up your GPA just to get back at you or something.”

“No.” You responded, perhaps a bit too quickly. “No, Baekhyun isn’t like that. He’s not a bad guy, and I don’t think he’ll try anything anyway.”

“Really?”

“I’m not sure of course but he’s also a lot older than us and this is his job, I can’t see him risking his livelihood just for me.”

“He’s a college professor who’s giving you a thousand dollars a week, how does he even have that kind of money anyway? No way he gets paid enough as a professor to be giving you that much. He either has some other source of income or you’re already making him broke.”

You felt stupid for not having considered that yet. How the hell was he giving you so much? She was right, unless he was secretly rich or something there was no way he could afford to give you so much money every week without fucking himself over. Your stomach started to churn with the idea of him possibly even putting himself in debt just for your Saturday nights together. He couldn’t be that stupid right?

She could tell how much the conversation was stressing you out at that point.

“Listen,” she said, grabbing your hand “you just need to get through the semester. You can handle 16 weeks, class with him will get less awkward, and hopefully he’s at least smart enough not to come see you at work anymore now.”

The thought of him not coming anymore wasn’t a good one either though. You made much more money when he was there, and in under 2 hours. Staying at the club until 3am with school going on now, only to take home less money wasn’t really a good option either.

“I don’t wanna see him there but I need his money.”

“You’ll find some other guy who’s rich and in love with you soon enough, don’t worry, it’ll all be fine.” She said, pulling you in for a hug.

“Yeah..”

You knew she was just trying to make you feel better, but realistically you weren’t going to find another guy like Baekhyun at work, Even if someone came along who gave you as much money as he did, they wouldn’t be as fun to talk to, or as respectful as him. Guys like that just don’t come to strip clubs. You still didn’t even fully understand why he did.

“Just think of him as another one of your professors. It might be tough at first, but I think if you can do that you’ll be okay.”

“You’re right, I just need to get my shit together and not let him distract me.”

“See? Of course I’m right.” She grinned, and you couldn’t help but smile back.

Eventually the movie ended, and by then it was late enough for the two of you to get ready for bed.

Talking to your best friend about it had made you feel slightly better. At least whatever happened, she would be there for you to talk it out with. Baekhyun wasn’t a bad person or anything either, it was just the situation that was stressing you out. As long as you could get ahold of yourself enough to focus on his lectures and do well in the class, you’d be fine.

You kept reassuring yourself as you closed your eyes, and for the first night that week you didn’t stare at your ceiling for hours worrying, you went right to sleep.

Next Chapter

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