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fiepige · 6 months

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Hobie Brown variant OC:

I finally decided to make Symbiote!Hobie (nicknamed SH by Hobie, which over time turned into Sage) his own thing, cause I've made so many changes to him that I've decided he's just gonna be another version of Hobie from another dimension.

I basically came up with him when thinking about what it would take for Hobie to truly bond with a symbiote and this is what I came up with.

While he's technically Hobie too I'm gonna refer to him as Sage in this post to avoid confusion <3

Gonna start with his appearance and then move on to his origins and how he got involved with the Spider-Society:

Disclaimer: I cannot draw so I haven't even attempted at drawing his face cause I know I'd never be able to draw him in a way I'd like- So I did the next best thing:

(He has a normal face I just tried to find a way for me to draw him without drawing his face lol)

Pictured above is Sage and his symbiote K.A.T (and their symbiote form- yeah it's the same as Venom!Hobie cause I like the design lol)

He looks like Hobie but younger- he's around 11 when he's bitten by the spider and fused with K.A.T - he's around 12 when he gets introduced to the Spider-Society

He's got short hair as it was completely shaved off when he got caught by Oscorp - more about this under his origins - he wants to let it grow out after meeting Hobie and being inspired by his approach to his looks (he really looks up to Hobie but don't tell anyone I said that!)

His left iris is white as a result of the symbiote DNA being fused to him. He can make it match his right eye if he concentrates but only really bothers to do so if he feels it draws too much attention

After meeting Hobie he helps Sage get a few piercings of his own

He usually wears a hoodie and/or a mask to hide his face - he's super paranoid and does his best to hide himself from others

Never goes anywhere without his noice cancelling earmuffs - he's got enhanced senses due to his spider powers but they can be a bit of a nuisance since he's also sensitive to loud noises due to his symbiote...

He also usually wears sunglasses to shield himself from sensory overload as he was subjected to it a lot as part of the experiments he was put through at Oscorp - and thus getting his senses overstimulated can result in panic attacks, so he does what he can to avoid it + it hides his eyes as well

K.A.T (Killing Authority-opposing Targets) is Sage's symbiote

It usually stays hidden unless they're alone or around people they trust/already knows about its presence.

If it does show itself it'll usually stay on Sage's shoulder or sit in his lap, it's still tethered to him so it can't go that far without him - not that it really wants to anyways

The reason K.A.T takes this form is that Sage is a cat person and it used it as a method to make him like it more when they first "met" + petting it helped Sage calm down and still does

K.A.T is still made of the same goo as regular symbiotes so it does not feel like petting a cat at all- Sage doesn't mind but most other people get suprised when they first touch it

If it likes someone it'll rub itself against their legs and mimic purring noises - if it dislikes someone it'll hiss and arch its back at them

K.A.T is a more animalistic symbiote and mainly communicates with Sage by letting him feel its emotions instead of speaking to him

To avoid making the post even longer than it's already gonna be I'll link to this post where I go into more detail about the design of thier Symbiote form instead of describing it here too ^^'.

This was originally supposed to be a short summary but I've realised I'm incapable of making short posts when it comes to stuff like this:

Origin:

Sage is a younger version of Hobie Brown. (11 years old when bitten by the spider and fused with his symbiote)

Sage and K.A.T "met" at one of Oscorp's labs

He was living as a homeless kid (having escaped an abusive household a few months prior)

He was bitten by a radioactive spider while looking for a place to spend the night.

He got very sick from the bite and was easily captured by Oscorp goons looking for new test subjects in the streets

Despite his young age Sage is a more ruthless Hobie variant, in part due to his upbringing and due to his symbiote (and the trauma they both go through at the hands of Oscorp)

K.A.T was a new kind of experimental symbiote that was set to be terminated due to it killing all its previous hosts - Sage was their last attempt at fusing it with someone

They decide to fuse it with Sage as he was deemed indisposable due to him seeming more dead than alive - suffering from the venom of spider bite at the time - and thus it wouldn't be a problem if the symbiote killed him too

Since the spider bite was still changing his DNA as he got fused with K.A.T some of its DNA got fused with him as well as a "side effect" during the process

Due to this it's incredibly hard (if not impossible) to seperate the symbiote from Sage without severely hurting them both

His body develops organic web shooters when it fuses with K.A.T - the webs are black and can be shot from either of his 4 arms when in his symbiote form (they can also be shot regularly while in his human form)

Sage develops enhanced senses and a taste for human flesh after being fused with K.A.T - he also has enhanced senses from the spider bite - making it easy to overstimulate his senses and overwhelm him before he learns to get it more under control

Since Sage's gotten powers from both the spider bite and the symbiote they quickly become the subjects for many inhumane and painful experiments as the scientists futilely try to figure out how to replicate the symbiote (as they're unaware of the spider bite, thinking the symbiote alone is behind Sage's new powers)

The main scientist behind the experiments is this dimension's version of Peter Parker!

Sage eventually manages to escape the lab during one of their many tests- killing as many guards and scientists on his way out as possible - and eating some of them as well

As a result of their treatment at the lab + his past with his abusive foster family, both Sage and K.A.T have developed a deep distrust to other people - at this point they both consider the other their only friend

Sage goes back to living as a homeless kid, avoiding people as best as he can, but he's also got an insatiable taste for human flesh as well!

He will usually target anyone associated with Oscorp when he's hungry (if none are available cops are the next best thing- his dimension is just as corrupt as -138 Hobie's dimension)

He doesn't feel bad about killing but will still try not to harm civilians (emphasis on try- sometimes the hunger gets the best of him)

Due to his senses being extra sensitive + his paranoia from his experiences at the lab and his foster homes, he tries to avoid crowded and noisy places - This all leads to him being more active at night while he usually tries to lay low and hide during the day.

He lived like this for months until a certain event changed that:

First encounter with the Spider-Society

Sage's dimension is blacklisted meaning people from the Spider-Society aren't allowed to go there (cause a spider-person who's embracing their symbiote instead of resisting it is deemed unsafe by Miguel and thus best to be avoided)

Sage does still get introduced to the spider-society albeit through a rather unconventional way:

- One day a portal opens up and pulls Sage through it, sending him to another dimension as an anomaly

Having no idea about what's going on, and being scared and confused about the whole situation, he does his best to lay low and avoid other people.

Because of this he spends a lot of time in the other dimension before the society discovers signs of an anormaly - glitched objects like seen when Kingpen uses the collider in itsv, or the museum that the Vulture appears in in atsv

Sage eventually has his first run in with other spider people when his hunger gets the best of him and he becomes more careless as he turns into his symbiote form to go look for prey

Here he encounters Gwen and Peter B as they're looking for the anomaly causing things to glitch out in the dimension

Not knowing he's a spider person and an actual child, Peter and Gwen attack him as they always do with anomalies - it also doesn't help that Sage doesn't exactly look friendly when in his symbiote form.

He fights back cause these masked people attacked him for no reason so they must be bad guys and of course he's gonna defend himself - it also doesn't help that he's starving and thus not thinking clearly at this point.

Unfortunately for him, these guys have high frequency equipment to deal with symbiotes and thus they manage to subdue him, but not before he manages to fight back, revealing his organic webbing which tips Gwen and Peter off to him having spider powers as well

He's subdued and forced into an electric cage (which brings back a lot of unpleasant memories from his time at Oscorp) and sent to the Spider-Society afterwards

When he arrives at the Society he quickly gets overstimulated and has a panic attack and lashes out in a desperate attempt at escaping his electric cage - also seeing the face of the scientist who tortured him for months everywhere certainly didn't help

Gwen then uses a high-frequency device made to combat symbiotes to force him to revert back to his human form

She immediately recognises him as a young version of -138 Hobie

Her and Peter both panic cause 1. They realise they basically beat up a kid and locked him up. 2. That kid has a symbiote! 3. That kid is a younger version of another spider-person they both know (and who they both know has a very long and strained history with symbiotes!)

Miguel gets involved and a discussion begins about whether they should try and seperate Hobie (Sage) and his symbiote

- The other spiders mean well by this but Sage and K.A.T both panic at the thought of being separated - at this point they really view the other as their only friend as it's been them against the world ever since they fused

Sage, still panicking, tries to protest but they won't listen as they view him as a kid who doesn't know what's best for him

Sage is taken to the room with all the villains while they discuss what to do with him

Here Margo sees Sage and K.A.T comforting each other, K.A.T manifesting physically in Sage's lap, being hugged tightly by Sage as he promises it he'll never let anyone separate them

Seeing this, Margo takes pity on them and 'accidentally' sends them home before the other spiders get a chance to try and remove K.A.T from Sage.

Relationships with other spider-people

Some time later Sage has an encounter with Hobie who found out about the whole mess - despite Miguel ordering Gwen and Peter not to tell him

While Hobie isn't exactly a fan of symbiotes he first and foremost sees Sage as a traumatised homeless kid in need of safety and stability

Hobie offers Sage to stay at his boat whenever he wants (as long as he promises not to eat anyone while he's there), he also gives him one of his bootleg watches so he can come and go as he pleases (and explains that he can also use it to get home to his own dimension if he's ever unwillingly sent to another dimension again)

Sage declines at first but over time he slowly opens up to Hobie and begins to trust him

(He also secretly looks up to Hobie once he trusts him, cause who doesn't? He's an older version of himself who's got a place to call his home, one that he opens up to strangers in need such as himself, he uses his powers for good and not just to survive. He's not afraid to be who he is and draw attention to himself - something Sage has been too afraid to do ever since his time at Oscorp. He's got friends and people he trusts. - all things that Sage wants too but doesn't believe he'll ever have) Also he'll never admit that he looks up to Hobie but he can tell anyways

Hobie's the one that gives Sage his nickname, it started as SH but over time it turned into Sage instead, though he doen't mind being called Hobie as well, it's just easier to go by Sage when both he and Hobie are present.

He still doesn't trust people, especially not the Spider-Society after their first meeting, which made it very awkward when Gwen showed up to visit Hobie while Sage was there - luckily Hobie managed to interfere before they beat each other up too much...

(He trusts Margo a bit as well since she 'saved' him from the Spider-Society - also it's nice to be around someone who doesn't smell like food since she's an avatar and not made of flesh and blood)

He currently lives at Hobie's boat, switching between it and his own dimension as he pleases

Hobie did his best to hide it but he was rather freaked out by K.A.T's presence in the beginning, he did his best to supress it cause he genuinely wants to help Sage

Hobie mentors him in how to use his Spider Powers and tries to give him a moral compass to at least prevent him from eating civilians when he gets too hungry - He usually targets cops or people working for Oscorp but the hungrier he gets the less picky he is

Another reason Hobie took him in is because he knows ostracising someone won't make them a better person and while Hobie doesn't believe in deciding what's best for others he still knows life will be a bit easier for Sage if he doesn't just kill whoever he wants whenever he wants - impulse control is important when you have a cannibalistic symbiote in your body.

- Hobie still dislikes symbiotes but he respects Sage's choice to keep his and does his best to help him control some of the more violent urges that come with a symbiote.

Hobie introduces Sage to his punk ideologies and slowly introduces him to the punk community

Hobie also introduces him to some of his friends but it's a slow process due to Sage having a hard time trusting people - especially spider-people after his Spider-Society encounter

Some of the spider-people also have a hard time opening up to him because of his symbiote

But Hobie's good at making a safe space for Sage to feel like he can slowly start to open up to others

For the first time in years Sage feels like he has someone (besides K.A.T) he can trust and over time he starts to view Hobie as his older brother

And that's that folks! (at least for now)

To the one person who actually bothered to read all of this - know that I'm infinitely grateful that you took your time to read about my boy <3

- I initially tried to keep this short but I gave up cause Sage has been living rent free in my head for weeks and it feels so nice to finally flesh him out and write about him!

You know I couldn't resist making my first oc angsty - but at least he ends up doing better than where he started.

Hopefully you guys like him too! If you have any questions please let me know, I could talk about him forever <3

#help I think I have a condition where I need to make all my new posts longer than the previous one!#can't believe I initially tried to make this post short and then it ends up being 2759 words long...#wasn't sure about his name but I wanted it to be something else than Hobie #so Sage it is!#Also I really wanted the symbiote to be called cat or kat - due to the form of its physical manifestation #so I had to come up with an abbreviation to make it fit lol #also evey time I've tagged a post Symbiote!Hobie this is who I've been thinking of!#I just didn't have a name for him back then #just to reiterate - Symbiote!Hobie and Venom!Hobie are two different people #their symbiote form looks the same but that's it #Venom!Hobie is -138 hobie with a symbiote but everything else about him is still hobie #Symbiote!Hobie is Sage who's another version of hobie from his own dimension #hope there aren't too many spelling errors but it's 1 am here and I've read through it once already so sorry if I missed something!#gonna post this and then go to bed lol #I'm addicted to that angst but I tried to give him a somewhat happy “ending”#though there's still a lot of room for improvement lol #also this is my fist oc which is very exciting!!!#idk if you can call it an oc when he's based on an existing character #but I've made so many changes to him that I feel like I can allow myself to call him an oc <3 #Symbiote!Hobie #Sage #hobie brown #spider punk #symbiote oc #symbiote hobie #gwen stacy #peter b parker #miguel o'hara #margo kess #across the spider verse

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deus-ex-mona · 2 years

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when you can never forget… _(:3 」∠)_

#mad cringe 3am rant incoming pls stand by—#…so i found my enstars screenshots from 2018 and i don’t even remember half of them happening h e l p #there’s stuff like spamming for repayment fes event nazuna niichan till i had 0 dia left…#…and making ship birthday board things for the 2019 birthday events. i made leokasa and subahokke ones s o bs #and i think i saw a makoizu ss from the librarian event? the outfit + blushing seaweed head sure looks like it’s from that event #(tfw you’re the only one shipping this problematic ship lmao)#also speaking of enstars hi are there any other hokke recasting rejectors out there👀👀👀#hokke’s current va has been voicing him for much longer than his previous va ever did and i *still* can’t get used to his ‘new’ voice lmao #i remember benching his 5☆ so fast the moment i heard his ‘new’ voice post-recasting. sad times. initial hokke was my first 5☆ too…#but the most cringe memory i have of enstars is… downloading it thinking it was a haikyuu game bc subaru lowkey looks like hinata.#in my defence i couldn’t read japanese back then ok. i was so confused when they told me to pick an idol unit bc ‘where my volleyboys at???’#i really should’ve realised something was up when i saw hokke (or as i thought he was back then: haru from the swimming anime) appear smh #it took me like 2 months to get through the tutorial bc i was so confused. 0/10 experience; should’ve quit enstars on the first uninstall #but lmao i still have the og enstars app unupdated on my old phone. it still has the dumb 4th anni thing on the icon. time flies…#and well if you read this for some reason or other… go listen to ‘crush of judgement’ or ‘sei shounen yuugi’👀 they’re the best songs (imo)#also nazuna niichan is the bestest boy and prettiest boy and the cutest boy and have you seen his frozen ice card it’s so cute and aaaaaaa—#also now that that’s done can i talk about my 3.5 year long love live phase—#ok i think i got enough cringe out of my system for now.#tune in in a few hours for (maybe) more cringe tag blubbering about shin jidai this time (provided my dvd comes in today dhl p l s—)#it is suiyoubi my dudes #inedible blubbering

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kyra45 · 18 days

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How to spot a scam blog

A very simple guide to figuring out if the blog messaging you is a scam:

Was you sent an ask within some time of sharing a specific type of post such as a trending topic or subject? - Usually scam accounts target particular posts and will spam asks to everyone who shared it. The ask may relate to certain events going on or more. These asks are always sent to many users all at once so it’s suggested to tumblr search part of the ask and see if its been sent by other accounts labeled as a scam or accounts with similar style.

Is the account relatively new? - More often than not, the accounts sending the asks are about a week old or even newer. They haven’t been made too long ago and often send asks within hours of being made. If you have timestamps turned on, you’ll be able to see the date something was posted. A fresher account is usually not going to be one who’s finding you unless they are searching tags and saw your blog.

How many posts are on the account? - Scam accounts rarely have many posts on their blogs beyond the initial pinned post. All their posts, being very few are very little, are most often just posts from a trending topic they looked up or a popular tag they decided to look through. They will share only a few and then make no further posts. This is to pad out their blog to make it look used but it’s easy to see how new the blog is if you scroll to the end.

Are the shared posts fitting a theme? - Scam accounts try to share posts based on the scam they’re trying to run. This means they’ll share posts related to the topic of their choosing and then stop once they’ve shared a few. Most of these posts come from the OP themselves and not from someone the blog is following though in rare cases they’ll find a person to reblog from so they don’t look suspicious.

Are the reblog dates accurate? - If you use timestamps, find a post the blog shared and check ‘Other notes’ and see if the reblog date matches the date that is listed on the blog itself. Often, scammers will backdate posts to make them look much older then they really are in an attempt to deceive people into thinking they’ve used tumblr for months or years.

Is the url auto-generated? - Not always seen from a scam account, but scammers often just use auto-generated usernames because it’s quick and easy to do. But real accounts may have these too. It’s just a thing to keep in mind.

Is the url familiar or similar to one you’ve seen before? - Scammers often try to copy their older accounts by using usernames based around previous scam attempts. It becomes obvious after about a while and usually makes it easy to figure out the scammer is back again. This isn’t always from scam accounts as regular accounts may do this for reasons.

How often do you get asks? - If you barely get asks and suddenly keep getting mutual aid asks it’s very likely you’re just a scammers latest target and they’ll keep spamming asks. This means you’ll consistently get the same style of asks from a brand new account that shouldn’t know you unless they found you in tags. You will keep getting these asks on a daily basis. You will eventually always get these asks.

Did they request you to message them directly? - On rare occasions a scam account will want you to send them a direct message and then they’ll just ask you for thousands of dollars on the spot.

Does your bio say no mutual aid asks? - Scammers don’t read/don’t care they will ignore that and send you asks anyway that won’t stop them.

Short version: More often than not the blog asking you for money is a scam if you don’t usually get asks for money from brand new accounts.

#scam #how to spot a scam blog #psa #scam alert #scam warning #important information #long post #longpost

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sheisraging · 8 months

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Tutorial: How to Embed Gifs (and get the one you actually want from the set)

There have probably been posts about this before, but since reposting is still a (deeply unfortunate) thing, I figured I'd give this a shot in case it's not a well known trick.

The tumblr Gif tool will allow you to embed gifs directly into your post without saving and re-uploading (reposting) someone else's work.

When you're building your post, just use the yellow GIF icon in the post builder:

You can search here by tag or keyword. If you happen to know one of the tags used on the original post you're looking for, that can narrow things down:

To narrow down to a SPECIFIC post, you can also paste the URL into the search field. This will pull up the very first gif in that set:

If you select that gif, it will pop into your post with a credit and link back to the OP (specifically back to the OPs post with that gif in it):

This is a properly attributed gif embed. The credit on the bottom right points back to the original post:*

Often, the first gif is not actually the one you want to embed, but there is a way to swap the image out for the one you want without losing the source attribution.

*It's helpful to put some reference text near your initial embed so you're able to swap the right image out later on. For this post, I'm going to use that short block right above the embedded gif as a reference.

In another tab/window, go to the OPs post and find the actual gif you want to embed from their set. Right click the image and Copy Image Address:

Once you have the URL copied, go back to your post and scroll to the gear icon at the top:

Open that menu and in the dropdown, where it says Text Editor, swap Rich Text to HTML:

Your post will turn into a bunch of code once you do this. Don't worry, we will change it back.

For this post, I put reference text above that first embedded gif so I could easily find the URLs I need once it becomes HTML. This is super helpful if you're embedding more than one gif. The reference text is highlighted below. This indicated the block that my currently embedded gif lives in:

In order to swap the first gif out for one that's later in the set, you just need to replace the SRC gifv and SRCSET gifv URLs with the image address you copied:

Once you've pasted the image address into these spots, you can go back to the gear icon and switch the Text Editor back to Rich Text:

Your post should return to it's previous, glorious state, but instead of the first gif embedded, you should now see the one you actually want from the set. The credit and source attribution back to the OPs post should remain intact on the bottom right:

This might seem super complicated at first, but it's pretty straightforward once you've tried it, and also a lot less frustrating for gif makers to see this than seeing our stuff just get reposted.

Anyway... If you found the gifs outside of tumblr or you didn't make them yourself, don't save and re-upload (aka. repost) them to tumblr, 'cause someone probably stole them from here to begin with and that's not cool. Search the tags and find the ones you want. Reblog from gif makers. If you want to embed a single gif from a set, try to do it this way, or minimally, credit the person you took it from.

#tutorial #how to properly embed gifs #support gif makers #credit gif makers #rogerhealey #userbess #userhallie #userlolli

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everparanoid · 5 months

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Headcanon: university student! Wriothesley

University student! Wriothesley x gn! reader

tags: fluff - word count: 1.2k

Wriothesley is what you would call 'the misunderstood "bad boy".' That is to say, he isn't bad at all but rather has a bad-boy exterior that intimidates your peers.

Wriothesley, as a student, is the quiet type and can seem threatening at first glance. But once you get to know him, you realise he’s quite relaxed and has a sharp wit. He’s always seen with a flask in hand, leading everyone to assume it contains alcohol. But it’s filled with tea. He doesn’t bother taking notes during lectures because he’s already read all the material for the class. His attendance at lectures is more about the atmosphere than the content, and it was even rarer before he met you.

Even the professors noticed a change in his attitude towards attendance after he met you. It was as if your presence sparked a newfound interest in him to attend lectures more regularly despite already knowing the material.

At the start of the second term, you arrive late to the lecture. To avoid the walk of shame down the stairs to find your friends, you choose to sit next to him at the back of the lecture hall. You side-eye him cautiously the entire time. However, the moment he turns to offer you some tea from his flask, you realise you have misjudged him. You’ve been sitting with him ever since.

If you happen to be in the same seminar group, Wriothesley will bring an extra flask lid to share his tea with you just in case. He’ll also catch you up on any notes you missed while daydreaming or dozing off from a late night of studying.

Wriothesley always hangs back after class, patiently waiting as you pack up your bag. Then, he walks you back to your place, even though his place is on the other side of campus. He says it’s because he enjoys the extra time to discuss the day’s lecture with you. In reality, he simply enjoys your company in any form--no matter the subject of conversation, and the long walk back to his place is just a small price to pay for that.

Wriothesley is the student you never see on campus unless you actively go looking for him. He’s part of the boxing society, so he often comes to lectures and seminars covered in bandages, which only fuels the rumours of him running an underground fight club.

Wriothesley often assumes leadership roles and no one objects. His presence commands both respect and a certain level of fear. It’s not that he actively seeks these positions he just doesn't like injustice. In fact, rumour has it that the previous president of the boxing society abandoned his post after Wriothesley challenged him to a match. The challenge was to verify if the president was truly as skilled as he claimed, or if he was merely rigging matches in his favor. As it turned out, the president was a no-show for the match, leaving the society without a leader. That day, it was unanimously decided that Wriothesley would assume the president’s duties. And he did so without batting an eye. You had been relieved by the strangely peaceful turn of events.

Wriothesley has an anonymous fan club of people who submit extremely blurry pictures and updates of him around campus, unbeknownst to him. You once opened your Instagram to see a picture of him holding the door open for a fellow student, followed by another picture of him helping one of the known aggressive campus cats down from a tree. You'd followed the Instagram page as a joke, but the images were quite cute, so you never unfollowed.

Wriothesley isn’t on any social media platforms, so you two keep in touch via text messages. Initially, you had him saved in your contacts as ‘His Grace’, a playful nod to the way people treat him with the reverence of a duke. But now, you’ve changed his name to ‘Ricecake’, much to his chagrin. He regrets ever letting you in on that annoying nickname. You’re always curious about how he has you saved in his phone. He teases you by saying he’ll show you if you can correctly answer three questions about the class material. But he’s crafty, always making the last question about something you haven’t covered yet in the readings. So, to this day, you still don’t know what your name is on his phone, and you probably never will. That’s just how Wriothesley is, always keeping you on your toes.

Every week, before the lecture, Wriothesley sends you a text asking what you’d like from the campus cafe. He knows your order by heart and doesn’t really need to ask. Plus, he always has his own tea prepared in his flask, so he doesn’t need to spend money there. But he does it anyway, just to see the smile on your face when you rush into the lecture hall, inevitably late, but relieved to have your weekly fix. Initially, he started doing this in an attempt to help you avoid being late to lectures, which didn’t quite work out. But over time, it’s become a habit he cherishes.

Wriothesley is your steadfast study partner in the library. Despite your best intentions, you often find yourself falling asleep at your keyboard, promising each time that it won’t happen again. Yet, there you are, waking up to find fifty pages of the letter ‘L’ on your Word document, and Wriothesley’s large jacket draped over you like a warm blanket. He continues to work quietly beside you, unfazed by your slumber. He doesn’t mind the late nights. In fact, he prefers them, especially when he’s in your company. And even after pulling an all-nighter, he somehow manages to look more put-together than you in your shared 8:30am class the next morning. Every time you call him out on this, he just laughs.

One night, you’re in the library with Wriothesley, half-asleep, buried under a three-thousand-word essay due by noon the next day. In the midst of this academic haze, Wriothesley looks up from his laptop and asks you out on a date.

"You know, there’s this supposedly fantastic spot in town I think we should check out after we're both done with all of this. That is, if you’d like to accompany me?" he suggests. His words hang in the air, a question wrapped in casual conversation.

Startled, you lift your head, which had been precariously balanced on your hand, and quickly wipe away the trace of drool from your mouth. "Huh?" you manage to utter, caught off guard.

Wriothesley leans back in his chair, a fond smile playing on his lips. It’s a look you’ve seen before, but never really pondered over. He’s often looked at you this way, so it’s not entirely unexpected. Yet, this time, it feels different, as if it carries a deeper meaning.

With a hint of amusement in his eyes, he repeats, "I am asking if you’d like to go on a date with me?"

It doesn't surprise anyone when you walk into the lecture late holding hands with Wriothesley. From the beginning, everyone, including your professors, had suspicions about the two of you. After all, the pairing of the quiet, bad boy and you, who always arrived late to lectures, seemed inevitable.

masterlist

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#wriothesley fanfic #wriothesley imagines #genshin fanfic #wriothesley x reader #wriothesley x you #gn reader #genshin impact x reader #genshin impact imagines #genshin fluff #genshin headcanons #wriothesley headcanons #wriothesley #college au #gender neutral reader #i have an unhealthy obsession

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ewanmitchellcrumbs · 4 months

Text

Gold Dust

Pairing: Modern Aemond Targaryen x f!reader Warnings: Public use of an app based sex toy, smut. Word count: ~1.8k

Summary: Aemond's office Christmas party is the last thing either of them want to attend, however, he comes up with an idea to make it fun for both of them.

Author's note: Can be read as an addition of this series, but also works as a standalone. Day seven of the Smuffmas prompts - "sharing a drink and toys". No tag list. Follow @fics-by-ewanmitchellcrumbs and turn on post notifications. Aemond edit in first picture is by @kyloremus.

It’s been six blissful months since her and Aemond moved in together. Having decided his own lofty high rise flat no longer felt like home - in truth, it never had - he’d offered a swap with Mysaria, and she’d leapt at the offer.

Aemond’s flat was paid for outright, so there’d be no expenses incurred on her part, beyond standard bills and utilities. She suited the space, adding a touch of glamour to the modern matte black and chrome surroundings. Her jaw had dropped when he’d handed her the deeds, his grandfather’s law firm already having handled the necessary paperwork and transfer of ownership. Aemond didn’t want rent, he simply wanted to live with the woman he loved. The simple act of Mysaria giving them a space to be by themselves was payment enough in his mind.

The security of the smaller, more homely feeling flat which she now shared with him had been trickier to negotiate. The landlord had snubbed Aemond’s initial offer to buy it from him, insisting he’d make more in rental payments from it than he would if he sold it. Some moderate pressure applied by the legal team of Otto Hightower, and an offer well above its current market value had soon seen to that, so now they were homeowners of a place that was theirs.

Mysaria’s old room had been turned into a home office, a space where either her or Aemond could work from home if and when they wanted to, aside from that they had made no further changes. The cosy little space was where they had shared their fondest memories, and every aspect of their relationship was woven into it.

She shrugs off her coat, hanging it up by the front door, and sighs in relief as the warmth of the central heating prickles her skin. She stoops to ruffle Vhagar behind the ears, a reward for the elderly doberman having reluctantly left her bed to greet her, before walking through to the living room. The blankets on the sofa are exactly as she’d left them the previous evening, and she eagerly retreats back into her nest, snatching up the TV remote from the coffee table.

“Good day?” Aemond asks, propping himself against the door frame as he emerges from the home office, the faintest smirk of amusement playing upon his lips as he looks at her.

She regards him with a warm smile, her features softening instantly despite how tired and irritated she feels. “Horrid, thanks for asking. Do we have any wine left?”

“There’ll be wine at the party, I expect,” he says, moving to sit next to her and brushing a chaste kiss against her temple.

“What?”

He narrows his eye at her, drawing back to look at her carefully. “You forgot, didn’t you?”

She groans as realisation dawns upon her. “Shit, your office Christmas party. Do we really have to go?”

He sighs, nodding and interlocks his fingers with hers. “Ordinarily, I’d give it a miss, you know I loathe parties, but my grandfather has called in more than a few favours for me this year. I owe him this.”

An hour later, and she steps out of the bedroom, hair and make-up finished and a slinky silk dress hugging her curves.

“Beautful,” Aemond breathes quietly, pressing a lingering kiss to her lips.

She smiles bashfully, feeling her skin heat up beneath the weight of his compliment as he pulls away, and watches with curiosity as he moves past her to rummage around on the top shelf of their wardrobe.

“What are you doing?”

“Your outfit’s missing something,” he tells her, pulling down the Lovehoney box, a glint in his eye as he turns to her.

“Aemond, no!”

The app controlled egg vibrator had been a drunken purchase on her behalf, that she’d regretted the moment it had arrived. Upon discovering it, Aemond’s reaction had been much more enthusiastic, kneeling between her spread legs and watching in fascination as she’d whimpered and writhed as he’d played with the settings using the app on his phone.

It had been fun at the time, but she’d considered it impractical and tucked it away, hoping he’d forgotten about it. It’s clear now that he hasn’t.

“Oh come now, darling, it’ll make the evening much more fun for both of us. Consider it an early Christmas gift to me.”

It doesn’t take much persuading, and soon she is sitting in the back of a black cab next to him, her coat pulled tight around her against the chilly December air, made colder still by a distinct lack of knickers, which Aemond had insisted she leave behind.

She is acutely aware of the feeling of the egg enveloped snugly inside of her, its presence, though discreet, making her feel as though she brandishes a scarlet letter that their taxi driver must be aware of.

“No!” She mouths desperately at Aemond as he pulls his phone from his pocket, thumb hovering over the app.

He flashes her the briefest of grins, tapping once on the screen. A mild singular buzz reverberates through her, causing her to clasp a hand over her mouth to muffle her squeal. Aemond eyes her carefully, poking at the inside of his cheek with his tongue before pocketing his phone once more.

Tonight was going to be interesting.

They step into the office, already bustling with people, chatter and light classical music fill the opulent space which is decked out in rich, mahogany furnishings and forest green upholstery, ever the indication that the Hightowers come from old money.

“There they are!” Aegon greets them loudly with a grin, arms spread and half drunk flutes of champagne clutched by the stem between each of his fingers. His shoulder length blonde hair is tousled, and his white shirt is open by three buttons.

“How long have you been here?” She asks, taking in his bedraggled appearance.

“‘Bout twenty minutes,” he slurs around a mouthful of vol-au-vent.

Otto steps up behind him, placing a ring clad hand upon his shoulder. “I tell you where you might like it, Aegon, on the terrace; outside.”

She watches with amusement as the older man leads him away.

“I’d better give him a hand,” Aemond mutters quietly, the warmth of his palm leaving her lower back as he moves to follow. He nods towards his older sister. “Good to see you, Hel.”

She smiles warmly at Hel leaning in as the two peck each other’s cheeks. “How are you doing?” She asks fondly.

“Starving!” Helaena complains, pulling her sheer turquoise wrap tighter around herself and waving away a tray of canapés that’s being offered around by a member of serving staff. “Not a single vegan option here, everything’s either got salmon in it or is slathered in cream cheese.”

“You could always sneak off to grab something?” She offers sympathetically.

“Aeg said there’s a kebab shop over the road. I might see if he’ll grab me a falafel wrap later. Anyway,” she continues, snatching up two flutes of champagne from a passing tray and handing one to her. “How are you?!”

“Yeah, really good!” She grins. “Aemond mentioned we might fly to New York for New Year’s, go and see Daeron. I’ve not met him yet and I– oh!”

She bows her head, biting back the quiet moan that tries to escape her, as the egg inside her vibrates incessantly. Her head snaps up, making eye contact with Aemond, who stands in a corner with his phone out, a sly smile upon his face.

Bastard.

“You alright?” Helaena asks, eyebrows pinched together in concern.

“Mhm…just...champagne bubbles…they go right up my nose!” She feigns a laugh, embarrassment making her skin feel hot.

Ever the dutiful girlfriend, she does her rounds of the office, speaking to colleagues and family members alike, though every interaction is thwarted by sudden and persistent vibrations between her legs.

After an hour of polite chit chat with Alicent, Criston, Otto and several other party guests, she leans back against the wall next to Aemond’s office door, needing a breather from socialising, but also feeling lightheaded from the intermittent throbbing in her core.

The door swings slowly open and Aemond steps out, a crystal tumbler of amber liquid in hand.

“Having fun?” He asks, raising an eyebrow.

“Mmm,” she narrows her eyes, “you clearly are. What’s that you’ve got?”

“Laphroaig,” he tells her, swirling the liquid in his glass. “Thirty six year old The Wall Peat, to be precise. Grandfather would never offer this around to the guests. Lucky for me I know he keeps it stashed in his bottom desk drawer.”

“Lucky indeed,” she purrs up at him.

He grabs her hand, pulling her into his office and closes the door behind them, before backing her up against the desk, until she perches on the edge.

“Let me see,” he whispers, pushing her dress up above her hips.

His free hand applies gentle pressure to her knee, spreading her legs, and she watches the bob of his throat as he swallows thickly, taking in the sight of the arousal that coats her centre.

“Fuck,” he mutters darkly. “The idea of you walking around making innocent small talk while you’re soaked is driving me mad.”

She giggles, clenching around the egg that’s nestled within her as she sees his gaze darken. Aemond pulls out his phone again, changing the setting to a constant vibrate, before setting it down on the desk behind her.

Mewling helplessly, shockwaves of pleasure ripple through her as Aemond’s thumb swipes against her sodden folds, spreading her open to watch intently.

He takes a sip from his glass, and she gasps as he grabs her forcefully by the hair at the back of her head, crushing her lips against his and letting the whisky pass from his mouth to hers. She moans quietly, the intensity of the burn of the liquid that slips down her throat and the throbbing ache between her legs making her feel dizzy.

She is devastatingly close, can feel the pressure building to boiling point, and she whines, pressing her face into the crook of Aemond’s neck, fingertips rumpling the fabric of his black button down shirt as she grasps his biceps for purchase. “Fuck, Aemond, I–”

“It’s alright, I’ve got you, let go,” he coos.

She bites down on the juncture of his neck to muffle her pleasured cry, earning her a startled grunt from Aemond. Her body spasms around the toy, climaxing with a force that makes her toes curl inside of her high heels, before going limp against his chest.

He settles his glass down and strokes her hair before pulling back. His long, dexterous fingers wrap around the cord of egg, and despite how gentle he is as he tugs it free, she still hisses with overstimulation as it leaves her body. The sudden feeling of emptiness is alien to her after having spent most of the evening with it inside of her.

“Can…can we go home now?” She asks tiredly, as he wraps the toy in tissue and deposits it on the desk.

“Hmmm, not just yet,” Aemond tells her, taking her hand and guiding it to palm over the erection that strains against the confines of his suit trousers. “I’m not quite finished with you yet.”

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povlnfour · 5 months

Text

ੈ✩‧₊˚ PADDOCK TO PADDOCK (LN) PART 8

series masterlist | previous part

lando norris x fem!horse rider!reader

landonorris just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by yourusername, charles_leclerc and 207,567 others

landonorris 100th race, p2, and a nice little call with my girl to show off her flexibility. thank you austin

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user3 ‘MY GIRL’🥹🥹🥹

user7 I KNEWWW EVERYTHING WOULD BE OKAY

user9 lando have you seen what she’s done?

landonorris have friends? yeah pretty happy for her tbh

charles_leclerc p2 because the fia hates lewis and me*

user2 see everyone the boys are fine

landonorris keep crying mate

yourusername i actually hate you so bad rn

yourusername @/charles_leclerc SURE you don’t wanna date me instead?

user1 HELP Y/N AJDJDJSJ

user6 she said i’ve had ENOUGH

charles_leclerc make me that rice dish again and i’ll consider it

landonorris @/charles_leclerc you don’t even know what tteokbokki is called you don’t deserve her😤

yourusername just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by landonorris, lilymhe and 200,087 others

yourusername from monaco with love

👤 tagged alex_albon, lilymhe, charles_leclerc

only people yourusername follows can comment

alex_albon we need to have a serious conversation about how cute lily always looks in the photos you take and yet…. me…

lilymhe that’s just your face baby

charles_leclerc he’s not gonna know what hit him🤫

yourusername you could not have made this sound worse

charles_leclerc i’m quite enjoying being an accessory to internet drama

lilymhe do you know what’s rude? you spend one (1) second with a man and get a dating rumour… yet NOTHING when you hang w me!

yourusername FR we’ve been married for two years atp🙄

landonorris i know a Better place in monaco you can visit🧡

yourusername get your cute butt home and show me then

texts with charles ੈ✩‧₊˚

y/nupdates just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by landonorris and 10,397 others

y/nupdates y/n at the airport today!! it seems she’s flying out to mexico for the upcoming grand prix 🩷

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user9 seriously? has everyone just forgotten she’s a cheater?

user3 and yet you follow fan accounts of her??? get a life

user7 ur actually miserable. lando hates u.

this comment has been hidden by the author

y/nupdates any unnecessary hate comments will be deleted and you will be blocked🩷

user8 she’s so pretty even in the rain :( and she stopped to take photos with fans

user1 apparently someone gave her a necklace with an L on it and she put it straight on🥹

user8 @/user1 YOURE KIDDING THATS SO CUTE IM GONNA CRY

user1 THEY GAVE HER A MATCHING BRACELET FOR LANDO WITH HER INITIALS ON AS WELL!!!!

landonorris thank you admin for giving me a new lockscreen

user2 OH MY GOD ADMIN

y/nupdates 🫣🫣🫣🫣🫣 YOU ARE SO WELCOME

landonorris just tweeted ੈ✩‧₊˚

tweet 4 should finish: hate towards those close to me*

tweet 6 should finish: blocked by my team**

twitter reacts ੈ✩‧₊˚

mclaren just posted a photo ੈ✩‧₊˚

liked by yourusername and 165,407 others

mclaren from p17-p5. not the start to the weekend he wanted but he only went and turned it around🙌🏻

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user2 SO PROUDDDS

user9 all because of her….

user3 HAVE FUN GETTING BLOCKED LMAO

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user6 GUYS I THINK MCLAREN ACTUALLY BLOCKED THEM THE COMMENT ISNT SHOWING UP FOR ME LMAOOO

yourusername that’s my boy

mclaren we heard it had something to do with his lucky charm😉

user3 this isn’t taking a week off ma’am

yourusername had to support the boy. it starts now <3

y/nupdates just tweeted ੈ✩‧₊˚

a/n:

OKAY this part was boring i am very sorry BUT there is onE OFFICIAL PART LEFT. it’ll be a long one i warn now but then there may be a mini epilogue of stuff i fully made up for next summer xxxx

thank you all for coming on this crazy ride with me — sorry it’s aLL OVER THE PLACE atm but it makes sense in my head ok

charles au is also otw next week and a one shot lando smau

taglist (found in pinned post): @idkiwantchocolatee @vellicoranorca @alessioayla @bborra @crimeshowjunkie @minkyungseokie @paolexsstuff @celestialpato @champagnelovers101 @loxbbg @hobiismyhopeu @tsukishitm-a @moonypixel @champagneproblems17 @ironmaiden1313 @lqvesoph @sunflower-golden-vol6 @six-call

#lando norris #lando norris x reader #f1 #f1 x reader #lando norris au #lando norris imagine #mclaren #lando norris blurb #lando norris scenario #lando norris smau

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onismdaydream · 6 months

Text

build me up

sweet stepdad!leon x fem reader

tags: mdni. 18+. stepcest. afab reader. sex toys (dildo). slight voyeurism. masturbating. pet names. oral (f receiving). multiple orgasms. daddy kink. not proofread.

notes: first actual fic i'm posting in.. 2 years? pretty proud of myself even if i'm really rusty lmao anyway, this is based on an ask i sent to @lipglossanon of sweet stepdad, so hopefully i did it justice!

You didn't hear the creaking of the old wooden floors as Leon came home — you didn't even hear him call your name when he didn't find you in your usual spot on the worn couch. He said he would be working late tonight, that an emergency came up at the office and they needed his expertise. So, needless to say, you didn't realize he was watching you from your door, his tall and muscular body leaning against the frame, enjoying the show you were unknowingly putting on for him.

Quiet moans escape your lips, your face scrunching up in pleasure, as you work the toy in and out of you. You’re on your back, flimsy shirt pushed up so you can tease your perky nipples, while your other hand holds onto the thick base of the dildo, pushing as much of the length in as you could. A deep blush covers your cheeks and stretches down to your chest, coloring your skin with a pretty shade of pink. Your legs spread slightly more as he silently observes, almost as if your body knew of his presence, giving him a better view of your glistening pussy. Evidence of your arousal make the light shine off of your inner thighs and the silicone toy, drawing Leon's attention even more. Who could blame him for the way his cock twitches, stiffening at the irresistible sight in front of him.

"Feel good, sweetheart?"

You start from the sudden voice, eyes shooting open before they settle on him and you visibly relax, shoulders falling back to the mattress.

"My poor baby just couldn't wait for me, huh?" His voice is thick with arousal, the rough sound making your pussy clench around the thick dildo. Leon takes a few steps forward, licking his lips as his eyes rake over your captivating body. You open your mouth to say something — apologize, maybe — but he cuts you off before you get the chance. "Don't let me stop you. Keep going, darling."

You hesitate for a moment, suddenly feeling self conscious despite everything the two of you have done together. Masturbating and pleasuring yourself with a toy just seems so… intimate.

"Go on, show daddy how good you can take your little toy." Instead of teasing you like you initially anticipated, he watches you with rapt attention, palming the front of his jeans. A surge of arousal flows through you at the movement, feeling your heartbeat quicken at his heated gaze. Licking your lips, you nod shakily and begin moving the silicone dick again, quickly returning to your previous pace.

“Such a good girl,” Leon praises, grunting softly as he squeezes his shaft through the rough material. “You were made f’r taking cocks.” You gasp sharply at his words and rub at your clit with your other hand, feeling the familiar build up in your abdomen.

“D-daddy.” Your needy whine is barely audible over the loud squelching noises from your pussy. “G’nna cum.”

Leon hums, taking the last couple of steps necessary before he’s at the foot of your bed and climbing onto it. He walks on his knees, stopping in between your spread legs and placing his large hands on your thighs. “C’mon, baby. Wanna see your pretty face when you cream on this fake cock.” His touch sends electricity through you, rubbing your soft skin as your legs begin to tremble. You cry out his name as you feel a gush of slick oozing from your still stuffed cunt.

You’re only vaguely aware of your surroundings, the soothing timbre of his voice making the come down feel syrupy and slow. Blinking up at him, he smiles at you — a soft one, filled with adoration and love — before he leans forward to press light kisses to your neck.

“Did so good, sweetheart,” he murmurs, his slight stubble scratching against your skin, breath warm. “‘m so lucky to have a girl like you.”

You sigh contently, your fingers finding their way into his silky hair. One of his arms rests next to you, holding his weight up, the flexing muscle visible out of the corner of your eye. He continues to cover your throat in kisses, all sweet and caring, before his teeth gently scrape at your skin. It’s a barely there sensation, but it makes you whine nonetheless. Leon lifts his head enough to look you in the eyes, his hand trailing up your side before it stops at your ribcage.

“Want something, pretty baby?”

You nod, shivering at the warmth of his hand, your eyelashes fluttering shut. “Want you, daddy.”

He groans faintly and moves his hand up to cup your breast, kneading the fat gently and rolling your sensitive nipple between his fingers. “Mmm, so lucky…” Leon watches in reverence as you react to his touch, committing every single detail to memory. Ducking his head back down, he leaves a trail of wet kisses down to your soft tummy. When he moves his hand to grab at the toy that’s still partially in you, you expect him to replace it, filling you up with his thick fingers or fat cock like he always does.

But he doesn’t.

Your breath is knocked out of you as he pushes it back in.

The angle that he has allows the toy to penetrate you even deeper. Each thrust has his fingers brushing against your swollen clit, making you writhe in pleasure. You can barely keep your eyes open when the tip rubs that sweet spot, back arching off the bed.

“That’s it, baby,” He whispers. You aren’t even sure when it happened, but Leon’s mouth found its way back up your body, his tongue darting out to lick at your areola. His breath teases along your skin, your nipples hardening as he places more sloppy kisses around your breast. “Want you to feel good.”

Leon’s spent enough time with you to know how to coax an orgasm out of your body and he uses the knowledge to his advantage. He presses the toy as deep as it can go, the tip pushing against your cervix, making your legs kick out under him. “Pretty girl like you shouldn’t have to lift a finger.” He uses his thumb to rub at your clit, fast circular motions that make you see stars.

“D-daddy, please,” you manage to whine out, panting as you feel yourself getting closer to the edge. It’s hard to focus on anything other than where he’s touching you, making you feel lightheaded as another climax washes over you. A pleasant, almost numbing feeling courses throughout your entire body, your cunt weakly spasming around the toy as he slowly begins moving it, easing the fake dick out of you. You whimper at the drag of it against your raw pussy, but he just shushes you, pecking the corner of your lips.

“Such a good girl.” He mutters, tongue pushing easily into your mouth. Leon kisses you slowly, savoring each moment, until the need for air becomes too great for both of you. He’s breathing heavily as he pulls away, his eyes taking in your swollen lips and flushed cheeks. He just can’t get enough of you.

He shifts again, this time pressing his mouth against your lower thigh, right above your left knee. A high pitched whine leaves your throat when his lips travel higher. He gently nips your skin, his warm tongue soothing the slight pain that follows it. “Just one more, baby. Wanna clean your pretty pussy.”

He waits for your shaky nod, squeezing your doughy thigh lightly before he laps at the slick that’s still drooling from your cunt. You’re a little looser than usual from your earlier orgasms, so he can effortlessly press his hot tongue into your hole, fucking in and out. Your hips buck up, pushing his nose against your sensitive button. The vibrations from a deep moan makes you cry out his name, body thrashing weakly underneath him.

“Always so sweet,” he groans, drawing back slightly to sloppily kiss your clit. “Could spend ages here.” He sucks the bundle of nerves in between his lips, latching onto it, making your third climax sweep through you. You can’t even form a coherent thought as you coat his lower face with your cum, his tongue cleaning up everything he can.

You feel too spent to try and move, your entire body feeling heavy with exhaustion. He pulls away from your sore pussy, pressing a loving kiss to your stomach. You don’t catch what he says as your eyes begin to droop, but when you open them again, he’s carefully wiping your thighs with a wet towel. You make a low whining sound, looking at him with pleading eyes, wanting him to come closer. He smiles as he notices you’re awake, gently brushing his lips against your forehead.

“Feelin’ alright, darling? I didn’t overdo it, did I?” He grabs a water bottle that he must’ve brought with him, offering it to you.

“‘m fine,” you mumble groggily. “Just tired now.”

He hums and opens the bottle for you, helping you drink some, before laying you back down fully. You fight to stay awake longer, but your body feels drained and the warmth of Leon holding you against his chest makes it nearly impossible. You drift off to sleep as his hands rub your back soothingly, whispering hushed praises against your head.

#leon kennedy #leon kennedy x reader #leon kennedy x you #leon s kennedy #resident evil smut #resident evil x reader #stepdad leon #perce.doc #resident evil #| ☆ | — resi

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agender-witchery · 9 months

Text

On Project Moon

Hey, this is gonna be long, I'm putting most of it under the cut. This post is about the recent firing of VellMori from Project Moon, I know that it warrants some tags for triggers, but I have no idea what's commonly used, so if I miss something, please tell me.

Additionally, I have written this up in a way that if it escapes the target audience of Project Moon fans, it can still be understood, so with that in mind, there will be Library of Ruina spoilers.

The tl;dr for those who don't wanna read the full thing is that Project Moon was put in a very bad position with some violent extremists targeting them and that I'm not happy about any of what happened.

So, for those unaware, Project Moon has fired VellMori, the CG artist for Limbus Company. Now, a not inaccurate statement that can be made from this is "Project Moon fired a woman for being a feminist" but this is... somewhat reductive. Let's immediately get out of the way that VellMori did absolutely nothing wrong. Some people have said she is a TERF. I've seen no evidence of this. Some people have said she wished death on all men. I've seen no evidence of this.

What I HAVE seen is that VellMori thinks sexual abuse is bad. Now, why would this lead to a firing? The short answer is that a bunch of violent incels, one of which was literally dressed as a clown, came knocking at their office doors.

See, Limbus Company has a "beach" event coming up. In this event, we are getting a water themed outfit for two of the characters, one male and one female. For Sinclair, the guy, he has been given an EXTREMELY slutty mechanic's outfit. For Ishmael, the woman, she has been given a very skintight wet suit outfit. Now, I wanna take care to note that VellMori is the CG artist - she had no hand in these designs, a man made them. I would also like to mention that both outfit designs are amazing, and I will be including them at the end of this post for reference.

Now, upon revealing the wet suit design for Ishmael, a bunch of whiny incels on what is basically Korean 4chan got upset that Ishmael, instead of being in a bikini as is usual for gacha games, was wearing a wet suit. Nevermind that the designs in Limbus Company have always been conservative and that the Sinclair design is the most skin we've ever seen and it's just an open shirt. Again, the wet suit is still super revealing, it's skin tight and this is literally the first design of her that doesn't make her look flat chested. They're not rioting over the lack of sex appeal, they're specifically mad that it's not a bikini.

The incels come to the conclusion that the lack of any skin being shown on Ishmael's outfit is a result of evil feminism. No, I'm not exaggerating. They initially begin harassing the artist who is actually responsible for drawing the outfits, but upon learning that he is a man, set their sights on VellMori because she's a woman, and being an artist is good enough I guess. What they do from here is they start digging and digging and digging on VellMori's twitter, making use of archived pages because many of the "offensive" tweets had been deleted.

I'd like to take a moment to point out that VellMori never actually tweeted anything out here - it was all retweets from a 4-6 year old archive, and retweets that have been long deleted. These retweets contain such transgressive statements as "I'm sick of misogyny" and "If being against patriarchy makes me antisocial, then so be it" and just... mirroring back to men what those men were saying to women. Some people would like to have you think she was calling for death to all men. She wasn't. She ALSO retweeted all this stuff while she was a teenager and well before she worked for Project Moon.

Nonetheless, the incels had decided that feminism was the reason Ishmael had a wet suit and not a bikini and they had found a feminist working for Project Moon. It is at this point that we must take a brief detour and talk about Library of Ruina, Project Moon's previous game.

See, in Library of Ruina, one of the protagonists, Angela, has this whole arc about escaping her abuser and becoming a human. Yes, she is literally a robot, but Project Moon isn't exactly a stranger to symbolism in their stories and a feminist reading of Angela is ridiculously easy. The main antagonist in Library of Ruina is Argalia, the Blue Reverberation, and his crew is called the Reverberation Ensemble. Every member of the Reverberation Ensemble is a violent lunatic who each want to reinforce the status quo in their own unique shitty way. In addition to this, typically in order to reach the titular Library, you would need to be invited. The Reverb Ensemble are the "uninvited guests", the ones who managed to reach the Library and knock down the door without an invite.

Why am I talking about this? Well, the incels decided to start calling themselves the Reverb Ensemble, and referring to each other using names of the Reverb Ensemble members such as Pluto, Elena, and Oswald. Having taken on the moniker of the uninvited guests, they then showed up to Project Moon's office to protest. Over the lack of a bikini. Now, remember how I mentioned someone was dressed up as a clown? One of the Reverb Ensemble members, Oswald, is a clown with an extremely tenuous grip on reality. So much so, that his ideal world is one in which there is no meaning whatsoever. That is the character they chose to dress up as. This is either a case of extreme self awareness or extreme self unawareness.

Eventually, the incels were let into the office possibly as a form of damage mitigation to prevent the crowd of protestors from getting any bigger. This was a questionable decision, but they had a group of violent incels at their doorstep either way, and I don't exactly have full details on this. Regardless, Project Moon had on their hands a group of violent protesting incels, who they felt compelled to let into the building, and who had demands including the firing of their feminist employee. (7/28 update: a translation of the transcript posted to DCInside has surfaced. Please check the reblogs for it. Project Moon was verifiably threatened.)

So while "Project Moon fired a woman for being a feminist" isn't inaccurate it also isn't the full picture. More appropriately, it'd be "Project Moon fired a woman because a group of violent incels who weren't satisfied with a form fitting wet suit instead of a bikini showed up to their office demanding that an artist who did not make the wet suit design be fired because she retweeted some feminist stuff 5 years ago while she was a teenager".

I'm not happy with this. None of this is good. People are allowed to be feminists, and Project Moon stories have always presented progressive ideas to anyone with half a brain to do some basic literary analysis. I can understand why they would cave to the demands of people who were threatening them and showed up to their actual place of work, but at the same time, that's someone's livelihood gone and proof that in the future, the same sorts of people can use the same sorts of tactics to bully Project Moon into doing whatever they want. All of this sucks.

For those who would like to see the retweets in question alongside translations: https://twitter.com/danghwangs/status/1683884236888223744

And for people who would like reference as to what the artworks these incels were up in arms about, Ishmael in the wet suit and Sinclair in the mechanic's outfit.

#my nonsense #limbus company #project moon #VellMori #misogyny #library of ruina

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ginnsbaker · 7 months

Text

Bulletproof (10/10)

Part Summary: After figuring out your feelings for each other, you and Wanda return to the Avengers compound to determine your future.

Chapter word count: 4.1k+ | Tags: Smut (18+ only), Fluff, Steve being Steve, A little reunion with everyone else | Ship: Wanda Maximoff x Gender Neutral Reader

Author's Note: Another series comes to an end! But wait there're more--the alternative ending which will be posted tomorrow (or the day after tomorrow at the latest!). I had so much fun writing "Bulletproof" and it wouldn't be possible without the anon who initially requested a oneshot. Thank you to all who commented, reblogged, liked and read this mini series. Many of you are unaware that this blog was primarily a fanart blog before I started posting fics here, and I've been thinking about whipping up a short comic strip of a scene from Bulletproof, so watch out for that :)

Series Masterlist

As the morning sunlight filters through the window, Wanda stirs from her slumber. Blinking open her eyes, she's greeted with the sight of you, peacefully sleeping next to her. She can't help but remember the previous time she woke up with you beside her. That morning realization, that she had fallen for you, had sent her into a panic, eventually causing her to slip away to her room before you could wake up.

But this time is different. There's no urge to run, no lingering fear. Instead, there's an overwhelming sense of contentment and a desire to push closer to you. Wanda reaches out, letting her fingertips trace the curve of your nose, moving down to trace your slightly parted lips. A soft smile graces her face, watching as your brows furrow in mild annoyance at being disturbed.

She doesn’t think she’s ever felt this way for anyone. With that conclusion, rather than pulling away, Wanda leans in, her lips brushing against your forehead in a soft, chaste kiss.

When your eyes flutter open, they're met with Wanda's gentle gaze, filled with warmth and adoration. “Good morning,” she giggles happily.

Your lips stretch into a sleepy grin before your eyes travel down her naked form. “Mmm, it certainly is,” you mumble, pulling her closer, nestling her against your chest.

Wanda's eyes glitter with a mischievous spark as her fingers gradually drift down from your waist. The slow, deliberate journey of her fingertips over your abdomen has your heart rate quickening, and her touch alone makes your skin prickle with anticipation. By the time her hand settles between your thighs, cupping you softly, the drowsiness that once weighed down your eyelids is entirely forgotten.

A gasp leaves your lips, your body instinctively pressing into her touch. The sensation of her fingers teasing over the sensitive skin makes warmth pool in your belly, the heat of your arousal becoming impossible to ignore.

Wanda's tongue traces the contours of your ear before playfully nipping at your earlobe. Her breath is warm as she whispers, “Did I wake you?” Her tone is dripping with innocence, but the mischievous glint in her eyes tells a different story.

You swallow hard, finding it difficult to form words with her hand expertly coaxing out your desire. “You... have a unique way of saying 'good morning',” you manage to reply, a lump forming in your throat as her hand continues to move deliberately between your legs.

Wanda's smirk is devilish, full of promise. “I thought you'd appreciate it.”

“I do,” you reply, voice husky, as you shift to sit up against the headboard. Wanda takes the cue, momentarily halting her touch, only to move herself gracefully and straddle your lap. As she does, the sheets cascade from her waist, revealing the tantalizing wetness that's gathered at the juncture of her thighs. Your gaze locks onto the dampened patch of hair above her core, and you can't suppress a smirk, realizing she's been aroused for some time—perhaps the entire duration you’ve been asleep.

Locked in an intense gaze with Wanda, your fingers precariously trace her inner thighs, until they finally meet their intended mark, lightly brushing over her slick entrance. The mutual sensation prompts an audible sigh from both of you: Wanda, overwhelmed by the electrifying touch, and you, awed by the fervent response of her body as she dampens your fingers even further.

She’s so wet and so eager for you. You can’t believe how lucky you are to have her this way.

“Shit, baby, you’re gonna be the death of me…” you trail off before claiming her lips into a heated kiss, while Wanda keens against your mouth at the term of endearment.

With each light, teasing touch, Wanda's breath catches, soft whimpers escaping her as your deliberate pace keeps her on the precipice of desire. For a moment, she seems content with the languid rhythm you've set, a mix of frustration and pleasure playing on her face. But as the minutes tick by, that patience wanes. Her hips begin to grind against your hand, trying to draw you deeper, to elicit more than just a graze. Each time she attempts to capture your fingers within her, you deftly pull away, drawing out the dance and stoking the fire of her desperation.

The room fills with her ragged breathing and soft pleas, a sob catching in her throat as her need grows more pronounced. Recognizing the edge she's on, you decide it's time to give in—but not entirely on her terms.

Guiding her, you position her over your waiting fingers, the slickness making for easy entry. Whispering sultrily into her ear, you urge, “Ride me.”

The command ignites something in her, and Wanda starts moving, her rhythm gaining momentum as she rides your fingers, the sound of wetness and her moans filling the room. You take the opportunity to explore the canvas of her skin with your mouth. You suck, nip, and kiss, marking her pale, porcelain skin with more bruises to add to the collection from last night.

The fervor in Wanda's eyes intensifies, her movements becoming more frantic. You can tell she's on the edge, so close to her climax, and that's when you decide to change the game.

“Stop,” you whisper, and Wanda freezes, her eyes wide and pupils dilated. You carefully slide your fingers out of her, and she whines from the sudden emptiness, her eyes pleading. With a smirk, you bring your wet fingers to your lips, savoring the taste of her.

Wanda's breathing is ragged, her chest heaving as she looks at you, equal parts frustration and desire evident in her gaze. “Why?” she breathes, her voice almost a whimper.

“You'll see,”you reply cryptically, instructing her to lie on her back. Wanda obeys, and then you position yourself over her, placing a leg between hers. Your eyes lock onto each other as you lower yourself, allowing your centers to meet, the sensation immediately sending jolts of pleasure through both of you.

Surprised by the overwhelming feeling of feeling her against you, you wait for the tightening in your stomach to subside before you start to move, grinding your hips against hers. The friction between your sexes is intoxicating, driving both of you wild. Your hands find purchase on Wanda's hips, guiding her to meet your thrusts. Her hands wander up to grip the sheets, her knuckles white as she tries to anchor herself.

Your rhythm builds, each thrust deep and unyielding, fucking Wanda further into the mattress. The intensity of your movement eventually pushes her to find purchase in you, and as you feel Wanda's nails dig into your back, you can't help the low growl that escapes your throat. The blend of pain and intense pleasure from her touch makes your head spin.

“I'm sorry,” she breathes out when she feels the wetness of blood under her fingers.

But you shake your head, urging her on. “It's okay,” you assure her, a wicked grin on your face. “Feels good. Do it again.”

Her fingers once more find their way to your back, and each time she scratches, the sensation of your skin repairing itself serves to heighten the pleasure for both of you. It becomes a dance of sorts—Wanda marking you, you healing, both of you lost in the deliriousness of the exchange.

Her moans become more frantic, her mouth falling open as you drive into her again and again and again. “Don't stop. Please, just like that.”

And you're more than happy to oblige.

In a bold move, you shift your weight, seamlessly flipping Wanda beneath you without breaking contact, the newfound angle allowing you to delve even deeper, each thrust meeting her sweet spot, causing her to gasp and cling to you desperately. Her legs wrap around your waist, pulling you closer, urging you to go faster, harder.

You can feel the build-up, the familiar pressure that signals an impending climax. “Wanda,” you gasp, your voice heavy with need.

She responds with a keening whimper, her walls pulsating against you, urging you on. The two of you move in a frenzied manner, chasing that peak together, moving as one. The feeling is so intense, so raw, that when you both finally shatter, the pleasure is all-consuming.

As the aftershocks ripple through you both, you collapse onto the bed beside her, both panting heavily.

After a few moments of silence, you turn to her, the weight of the moment pressing down on you. “Hey,” you begin, swallowing hard, “I know it might seem too soon, but I can't help how I feel.”

“What are you saying?” Wanda asks, looking up at you, chest still heaving and you think she’s redder than she was just a few seconds ago.

“I’m saying I love you,” you answer with a soft smile.

Tears pool in her eyes, catching the morning light in a shimmering dance. She reaches out, cupping your face, and whispers, “I love you too.”

You might not recall much of your past self, but somehow, you wouldn't change this present for anything.

The two of you are nestled on the couch, mugs of steaming coffee in hand. Every so often, your eyes meet Wanda's, a smile forming on both your lips as the remnants of the morning's escapade play on repeat in your minds.

Soon, however, the serene atmosphere is interrupted by heavy footsteps approaching the front door.

“Were you expecting a visitor?” you ask.

Wanda shakes her head, placing her mug on the coffee table. “No…”

The apprehension in her voice is evident, and the two of you exchange worried glances.

“Hide,” she whispers urgently, her eyes darting to the bedroom door.

“Why? I've got my powers back,” you argue, rising to your feet.

Wanda's lips press into a thin line. “You might not remember how to use them,” she whispers urgently. “You could get hurt.”

You smirk, rolling your eyes. “Pretty sure I can take a bullet or two.”

Wanda looks like she's about to argue further when the front door slams open, the force of it sending it crashing into the adjacent wall. Her reflexes are instantaneous: Scarlet tendrils of magic emanate from her fingers, weaving a defensive barrier between the intruder and the two of you.

However, as the dust settles and the silhouette becomes clear, Wanda's magic falters, her eyes widening in recognition.

“Vision?”

Vision, slightly wary or Wanda's immediate defensive response, raises his hands in a peaceful gesture. “Sorry for barging in unannounced,” he says.

Wanda lowers her hands slowly, the red magic dissipating. “What are you doing here?”

“Steve has ordered both of you to return to the compound immediately.”

Wanda narrows her eyes. “Why?”

“He didn't specify, but it seemed urgent,” Vision replies, his tone indicating that he's as much in the dark as Wanda.

“Is it about the organization that's hunting Y/N down?”

Before Vision can answer, the sound of soft footsteps signals another arrival.

“They've been subdued,” Natasha declares without preamble, her eyes locking onto yours, a recognition in them. “The organization was kidnapping ex-agents who chose to live a normal life. And when your powers resurfaced, Y/N, they were hellbent in wielding you into a weapon.”

Wanda's protective instincts flare up. “Nat, I'll only return to the compound with Y/N if you can guarantee they'll be free. They've been through enough.”

Natasha hesitates, shifting her weight on one foot. “I can't promise freedom, Wanda, but I can promise safety. We need to ensure that no one else poses a threat to Y/N, or to any of us.”

Wanda looks torn, her eyes darting between Natasha and you, weighing the options and the promises. After what feels like an eternity, she exhales deeply. “Alright, but the moment Y/N is in any danger, we're out. Understood?”

Natasha nods. “Understood.”

She then takes a moment to glance around the room, an appreciative smile forming on her lips. “I must admit, you two found quite the hideout,” she comments, observing the tasteful yet cozy decor, the soft lighting, and the clothes thrown carelessly on the couch.

With the bedroom door ajar, Natasha's keen gaze settles on the slightly rumpled bed, a few candles still burning around it, and a teasing grin crosses her face. “Although,” she tilts her head, studying the two of you, “It looks more like a love nest than a hideout.”

You can feel the heat rising to your cheeks at her words. Though she doesn't say it outright, the implication is clear, and it's even more embarrassing given how accurate her observation is. You avoid her gaze, feeling slightly guilty as you remember the passionate moments shared with Wanda just the night before and again this morning.

Your face fails to hide anything and Natasha chuckles at you knowingly.

“Aren't there better things to spy on than our personal lives?” Wanda asks, the tips of her ears turning a pink hue.

Natasha laughs lightly, her arms crossed over her chest. “I can’t help it when the evidence is all around,” she teases, while you groan in embarrassment, hiding your face in your hands.

She then pretends to sniff the air, prompting a flustered Wanda to hurriedly nudge her towards the door before she can make any more cheeky remarks.

Steve is not happy.

But he isn't frowning either.

He has that ever-present solemn look on his face, and the only giveaway that something's off is the small patch he missed while shaving his chin earlier. Just as Vision is about to mention it, Natasha silently warns him off with a subtle shake of her head.

Steve leans forward, resting his hands on the table, his knuckles white with tension. “Wanda, seriously? Again? I can't keep covering for you every time you break the rules.” The disappointment in his eyes says more than his words ever could.

Wanda, defiant, steps forward. “If I hadn't been breaking those rules, Y/N would be in some corner of the world right now, being used by those monsters for their wicked games.”

“That doesn't justify your recklessness. We have protocols for a reason.”

Wanda's eyes flash with determination. “And sometimes, those protocols fall short, Steve. Y/N needed protection, and I gave it.”

Steve drags a hand through his hair, attempting to keep his composure, but it's slipping away with each passing second. “It's not just about the safety of one individual, Wanda. It's about the safety of the entire team. If we don't trust each other to follow the rules, then how can we function as a team?”

“Oh, cut the bullshit, Steve,” Natasha says sharply from behind them. “Half of these rules are outdated, and you know it. If Tony came up with these, you wouldn't agree to half of them anyway.”

Steve's eyes narrow at Natasha, a silent question in them.

She doesn't flinch. “Wanda did what she thought was right, and she's not the only one bending rules around here. Some rules are meant to be questioned, especially if they compromise the safety of our own.”

“But I’m not one of you right?” you chime in, surprising everyone, but Wanda most of all. Throughout the ride back to the compound, you'd been uncharacteristically silent, leaving Wanda tempted on more than one occasion to delve into your thoughts, seeking answers.

“Y/N,” Wanda mutters, but you raise a hand, stopping her, your eyes trained on Steve.

“I understand the need for rules, for protocols,” you say, your voice steady. “But this entire conversation assumes that I'm just some defenseless outsider. Wanda did what she did to protect me, yes. But she also did it because she knows what I'm capable of and how my abilities, and the knowledge I possess, could've been misused.”

Taking a step forward, Wanda catches a fleeting glimpse of the person you once were in the way you now stand before Steve. “The truth is, I'm not sure where I belong—here or anywhere else. But I do know this,” you say, pausing to look at Wanda and smiling. “I belong with her.”

Wanda meets your smile, her eyes shining in the wake of your confession. If the choice were hers, the two of you would be anywhere but here—maybe in a distant place where you could learn to find happiness, unburdened by duties and weight of the world.

Natasha, a smirk tugging at the corner of her lips, comments, “Well, this day just got a lot more interesting.”

Steve's shoulders sag, and for a moment, he appears older than his years, the burden of leadership is evident in every line of his face. “Wanda, I understand more than anyone the pull of duty and personal attachment. It's not always about the bigger picture, sometimes it's about the person standing next to you.”

He looks directly at you. “You still don't remember everything, Y/N. And with your powers resurfacing, it complicates matters. You can't just be thrown back into the role of an Avenger. You're essentially starting from scratch. There will be evaluations, both physical and mental. Training. Reacclimation. The compound isn't the ideal place for that.”

He then turns to Wanda, “But Wanda, you belong here with us. You're an Avenger.”

“Perhaps,” Wanda says before standing next to you and interlacing your fingers together. “But I also belong with Y/N. If I have to choose, then—”

“Maybe you don’t have to,” A voice from outside announces. The room's automatic doors slide open, revealing Tony Stark.

Steve regards him with a short nod. “Tony.”

“Interesting conversation we're having here,” he says, glancing at the group. “I think I might have a different approach.”

Everyone looks to him expectantly. But he turns to you and says, “What if we could get your memories back, Y/N?”

Wanda straightens up, her attention immediately drawn to Tony's words. “What do you mean?”

Tony taps a holographic tablet that suddenly appears in his hand. An intricate blueprint springs to life in the air, hovering above it. “While you guys were deep in your heart-to-heart, I've been in touch with T'Challa in Wakanda.”

“Wakanda? What do they have to do with this?” Steve asks.

Tony continues, “They've developed a technology that accesses areas of the brain we've barely touched on. Something that's way ahead of anything we've seen or worked on. If Y/N's memories are locked away somewhere in there,” Tony gestures to your head, “I’m not promising anything, but they might have the key.”

You swallow hard, Tony’s proposition sinking in. The idea of venturing to Wakanda, a place both unfamiliar and undeniably imposing, is overwhelming. But if it brings back your memories…

“I’ll do it,” you tell them.

“I’m coming with you,” Wanda says.

Steve hesitates, rubbing the back of his neck. “Wanda, it's not that simple. It's a highly sensitive mission, and with everything that's happened recently…”

“Steve,” Wanda cuts in, “I'm not asking for permission. I'm telling you.”

He lets out a weary sigh. “Tony? What do you think?”

“Why are you even asking me, Cap? You're the captain here. And if I remember correctly,” he adds with a smirk, “I'm not the one who can assign Wanda a 'mission' to formally accompany Y/N to Wakanda.”

Wanda catches onto Tony's implication immediately. “That's right. This can simply be a mission assignment. Y/N's retrieval of their memories is crucial, and who better to assist and protect them than me?”

“She's correct,” Vision interjects. “The restoration of Y/N's memories is of utmost importance. Wanda is uniquely qualified to help and ensure their safety.”

Natasha chuckles from the back, “Looks like you're cornered, Rogers. Majority rules.”

Steve looks between you and Wanda. After a moment, he nods slowly, a hint of a smile appearing at the corners of his lips. “Alright,” he concedes. “Wanda, you'll accompany Y/N to Wakanda. It's a mission.”

Wanda exhales, relief flooding her features. She turns to you, squeezing your hand, “We'll do this together.”

Tony, satisfied, adds, “And just to be clear, I'm always up for a trip to Wakanda. Count me in.”

From the doorway, a grin appears on Bucky’s face. “Great timing,” he comments, sauntering in. “I’ve been meaning to make a trip back to Wakanda. Now I can hitch a ride with you all.”

Natasha, already with a sly smile, says, “I’ll make the sandwiches. Wakandan cuisine is great, but I know how some of you are with new food.”

Sam, who’s been eavesdropping with Bucky, rolls his eyes from behind her. “Speak for yourself. Last time you tried their spicy dish, I thought we'd need to call in a medic.”

Steve looks around at his team, utterly confused. “Why is everyone suddenly so eager to go to Wakanda? This isn't a field trip.”

Bruce, peeking from behind Sam, adds, “Well, I’ve heard they have some impressive labs. Wouldn’t mind taking a look myself.”

Steve throws his hands up in mock surrender. “I give up. I can't control any of you.”

You laugh, nudging Wanda playfully. “Looks like it’s going to be a full house.”

Rather than reply, Wanda tugs you aside for a more private moment. “You do have a place here, you know? With all of us, as family, not just beside me.”

“It doesn’t feel like I’ve earned it,” you admit.

“You have,” Wanda says softly, leaning in to place a tender kiss on your cheek. “You just haven't realized it yet.”

Before you can react further, the door bursts open again and Daisy storms in, her face lighting up when she sees you. In an instant, she's wrapping her arms around you in a tight embrace. You stiffen slightly, taken aback by the sudden gesture from someone you don’t recall knowing. But not wanting to be rude, you return the embrace lightly.

Wanda clears her throat pointedly, and Daisy's eyes widen in realization. She pulls back, a sheepish grin forming. “Sorry, I got carried away. I just missed you,” she chuckles, but the apologetic glance she shoots Wanda suggests she remembers very well whose territory she's treading on.

“Hey, I’m Daisy,” she says with a grin, extending her hand to you. “We’re friends, you know. Actually, you’re my favorite teammate.”

From the corner of your eyes, you catch Wanda's expression, tight and slightly guarded. You smirk inwardly, amused by her obvious display of possessiveness.

Taking her hand, you give it a friendly squeeze. “I’m sorry, Daisy,” you mutter, letting go. “I don’t remember.”

“Don’t worry about it. On the bright side, at least you won’t remember all the embarrassing moments we’ve had together.”

Puzzled, you ask, “What moments?”

Before Daisy can answer, Steve yells over the growing chatter in the room. “Alright, everyone! Thirty minutes to pack. We're headed to Wakanda.”

Before you can process what’s happening, Wanda’s hand wraps around yours, pulling you towards the door. You're yanked forward, stumbling slightly in her rush. Glancing over your shoulder, you manage a quick, “Sorry, Daisy. See you soon?”

Daisy just chuckles, shooting you and Wanda a knowing, amused smile.

The sun dips low over Wakanda, painting the city and its green expanse in rich gold. The past couple of days blur with laughs, music, and dance as everyone celebrates the homecoming of old friends. But as the last aircraft departs, leaving a trail of smoke behind, the compound becomes eerily silent, except for the two of you.

The suite you're given overlooks the heart of Wakanda. From the balcony, the lulling sound of the waterfalls adds to the allure of the den you and Wanda have created within the room. Time seems to lose meaning. You seize every moment, every opportunity, tasting and immersing in each other fully.

The days merge into nights and back into days. You emerge, mostly together, to grab a quick meal. The only other commitment you hold is to work with Shuri, who is eager and hopeful that her technology can unlock your memories.

On one of those ordinary nights, you lie on your back, gazing at the ceiling. For once, your mind is at peace, void of its usual chatter, because you've never experienced contentment quite like this before. Beside you, Wanda lies, her skin bare and glistening, evidence of your ardor still evident between her thighs.

Wanda traces patterns on your arm, her fingers light and feather-soft. “You know,” she begins, her voice husky from recent activities, “This is the best mission I've ever been on. I don't want it to end.”

Turning to face her, you take in her flushed cheeks and tousled hair. Your hand reaches up to tuck a stray lock behind her ear. “It doesn't have to end, Wanda,” you reply, locking your eyes with hers. “With or without my memories, with or without my abilities, I'll always stay by your side.”

She pulls you closer, seeking comfort in your embrace. “Promise?” she murmurs.

You smile, pressing a soft kiss on her forehead. “Promise.”

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prettyboykatsuki · 2 months

Text

CIRCLE HAUNTS | TAKAMI KEIGO (HAWKS)

✮ tags ; dead dove: do not eat, gender neutral reader, no quirk au, horror + suspense, themes of cannibalism, implied / depicted cannibalism, noncon kissing + biting/drawing blood and flesh, intentionally open-ended, institutionalized cannibalism, white collar crime, yandere!hawks, 18+

✮ wc ; 9.9k (??)

✮ a/n ; another comm for the beloved @bitchkiss, thank you for your patience and also for letting me post.

✮ synopsis ; you move into a suspiciously nice house in the shizuoka prefecture, and meet your good-looking and unnerving neighbor. nothing is how it seems.

An abandoned house. Mostly functional in the outskirts of the Shizuoka prefectures in a lived-in district.

On auction for a little less than 7 million-yen. Located in a not quite suburb. Too much land between acres and backyards to qualify that way. All the other houses are within walking distance though, and there’s no shortage of places to go with a fair bit of time and energy.

By all measures, a perfectly good house in a perfectly good prefecture. Even now you’re not sure why it went on sale. You stare at it, outside cream colored with a gate and a cat bowl left on the porch from the previous owner - food gone to dust. Something looms on at the doorsteps, the sun-cast shadows almost as dark as oblivion night. In the front yard are wild strawberries and bushes of ivy.

It’s a home, no matter which way you look at it.

But you can’t bring yourself to walk inside.

You placed your bets on this house completely on a whim months ago.

You’d been looking for a house. No that’s not it - it was more that you’d started to look at houses. An important distinction in this instance, because you weren’t looking to move when you began. You wonder if it’s a rite of passage in your adulthood to peruse listings for places you can’t afford. Dreaming habitually of your landlord's body on a cross or of in unit washer/dryers. You weren’t unhappy with your living arrangements when you started doing it, but the longing for autonomy sunk its teeth into you and showed no plans of letting go. So browsing through houses idly, wine-drunk and exhausted, became something of a regular practice.

It was three months ago, during that practice (and after an especially scathing argument with your roommates) you’d gotten drunk and committed your usual routine. Cracked open a wine cooler, took off your clothes until you were down to your underwear, and cracked open your laptop to look at more property listings. That time, with a little more weary bitterness in your heart than all times before.

The search process for Japanese property could range anywhere from uneventful to laughably cruel at any given time. Whether it be listings for upend mansions in Tokyo or worn down one-bedrooms in Osaka. For every house that seemed livable, there were ten or fifteen completely out of reach or in complete shambles.

When you came up on thee listing initially, it felt too good to be true. A house in Shizuoka with lots of yard space. A house with decent upkeep and an even larger kitchen - and nice tatami in one of the siderooms. A beautiful house in a beautiful area, on auction instead of the normal sale. Some people had bid on it - but the pool was still low. Seven million yen was your final bet - the mortgage would only be a little more than your rent. You’d put your name down on a whim. With a laugh.

Laughed yourself unconscious and forgot about it until a month passed. A call from an unknown number to your personal cell.

A call from a realtor. Your name, miraculously, got chosen with the highest bid. The house was yours if you wanted it. You could move in as early as May.

You were convinced it was a scam at first - like any normal person with common sense would be. Immediately rejected. But the realtors assured you over the line that it wasn’t a scam, that the previous owners just didn’t want it anymore. Some kind of emergency. Of course - you didn’t believe them at face value either. So you did some research, went to tour the house, tried to gather information proving the whole thing was a hoax.

But there was nothing you could find even after plenty of internet sleuthing and asking everyone in your life to help you vet. When you mentioned to everyone, not a single person advocated for you staying in the city. Your job even offered to move you to the Shizuoka branch.

It was a good opportunity. There’s a coastal path not too far from where the house is. The previous family didn’t take the cat or any of his papers with him - but he’s friendly from what they say. There’s lots of space indoors and out.

It’s a cheap price, for a good house and you’d probably never get an opportunity like it again.

Something is wrong with it. You can tell that just looking at it now, despite how picture-esque it is on the surface. It’s a beautiful house. There’s even a second story and a balcony. You could plant a garden in the yard and still have space for grilling outside.

It’s a beautiful house.

And something is wrong with it - but you’ll never get an opportunity like this again.

Maybe you’re more of a conspiratorial person than you thought.

You look at the truck you’ve hauled all your things in. Your loved ones have been helping you in moving in the rest of your belongings over the last few months - so what's left is mostly lightweight knick-knacks and essentials. Clothes too. The car is parked along the side of the road with the back popped open for easy access. You shake yourself off your thoughts like you’re trying to banish them.

It’s a beautiful day outside. Early June heat that’s enough to warm but not enough to burn or swelter. The sun beats down on your skin, the sounds of gnats buzzing and the breeze rustling the overgrown fields makes your heart swell. You take a breath and remind yourself it’s a good opportunity. Stretching your arms over your head, your spine cracks. Putting your hands on your hips, you nod enthusiastically, encouraging yourself to try harder.

“Let’s just rip the bandaid off,” You mutter. You pull your keys from your front pocket, planning on opening the door first before hauling the rest in.

The sound of an engine makes you turn your head towards the road. A silver car, something compact - drives along the edge of the pavement. Your expression changes as the car starts to slow in front of the house. Your house. You’re never going to be used to that. Are the realtors coming for a visit? Your move-in date was set months ago, so they should know you’re here.

The car halts to a stop a few feet from your own truck, the tinted windows rolling down to reveal a good looking blonde man. He can’t be much older than you. He lets his arm hang out from one side of the window.

His hair is pushed back and shiny, and he’s wearing a button up shirt and brown pants. There’s sunglasses resting on top of his head. He kind of looks like a douche, but you try not to let first impressions sour your views. You give him a confused look, instinctively backing away as he smiles at you.

“You must be the new neighbor. Heard someone was moving into this place after the Nakamura’s left, but there’s always rumors like that floating around here,” He says, talking so much at once. You kind of have a hard time getting used to him.”But I’m glad to see that it’s true. Gets a little lonely out here if all the houses don’t have people in it. In my opinion, at least.”

You give him a blank stare. He holds out his arm to you through the car window. You have no reason not to take it, and it seems rude for you to decline - so you shake his hand. His grip is firm and assured, golden eyes narrowing into something pleased. You feel a shiver run through you.

There’s something about him.

“Uh, do I know you?” You say instinctually. This catches him off guard. He pauses before breaking out into a laugh.

“I’m Takami Keigo! You’ll hear people call me Hawks too though. I’m your neighbor. My house is..” He points north, “..the one ‘bout two minutes that way. I’m very involved with the community here. It’s pretty tight knit.” He explains to you. It doesn’t reassure you for some reason. You think it’s supposed to. “Is there anything I can help you with? Looks like you’re still moving in.”

You make an expression of distrust towards him but his smile remains unfaltering.

“I’m alright,” You supplement, trying to keep the peace. “I wouldn’t wanna keep you but I appreciate you coming to meet me.”

He looks like he’s considering the words, enough to turn himself around and leave. After a few seconds though, he pulls away and parks his car on the side of the road in front of your house. When he emerges from the front door - his expression doesn’t change at all. His smile is disarming. He’s not a terrible guy to look at - but you wonder what he’s doing so far from the city.

The way he dresses is metropolitan. His shirt is loose but his pants are fitted like their tailored - expensive fabrics that the big suits from your job wear. He’s wearing slacks when he’s not working, and loafer shoes that don’t seem suited for the outdoors. You’re not far enough in the country to be expecting country folk, but the area is relegated to families. Something suburban and simple about the people you’ve met so far, yourself included in some ways. No one like him.

You go with your gut about him and keep a distance.

It might be too early to completely shut him out - and you do want to get along with the people here if you’re going to take permanent residence. Not friendly, but comfortable. You figure it might be less precarious to go with whatever he’s interested in. He’s not going to harm you in broad daylight, not when he’s dressed like that. And you’ve already had so much apprehension since you’ve moved - you’re almost hoping there’s something you’ve overlooked about him. Something to assure you’re just engaging in some self-sabotage about everything.

You soften your posture and put on a business smile. There’s a ghost of something - intrigue maybe, but it’s gone before you catch wind of it. You wonder if you imagined it.

“Well if you insist, but I don’t want to leave you with nothing,” You offer to him, as charismatic and naive as you can spin yourself. Neither of you seem to believe it, and the whole conversation feels like a sham. But he hasn’t turned to leave in offense, so you keep going “I do have some drinks inside and I’m curious about the neighborhood.”

His grin widens.

“June heat like this is the perfect weather for a cold beer. Would be great with some meat,” He hums noncommittally. You try your best not to let your face crack into distrust. “What do you need? Just some boxes carried inside?”

You nod.

“Yeah. It’d be nice to only make a few trips here and there.”

“Easy peasy. You didn’t give me your name though. Little impersonal, don’t you think?”

You’d prefer he didn’t know it - but perhaps that’s asking too much since you’re letting him move things into your house. You give it to him neutrally, picking up a tote that you can carry along with your keys. Takami picks up your things swiftly. The boxes he chooses are heavy - you know that because of the way they’re labeled. The gesture is effortless though, and you’re not sure if it’s good or bad that you’ve noticed.

“Pretty name.” He tells you, and you do your best to not make a face. When he notices your staring, he tilts his head to one side. His teeth gleam an unnerving white. You can’t get over the yellow-gold of his eyes. “Surprising, right? But I’m stronger than I look.”

He waits for you to walk in front of him. Maybe it’s the paranoia, but it strikes you somehow. How he’s trying to appear. He’s perceptive. You walk in front of him, starting down the concrete path to the front of the house.

“Any reason or are you just a gym buff?”

He thinks about how he’s going to reply, but doesn’t meet your eyes to look at you when he does.

“Got into a lot of fights as a kid so I had to get strong. Something like that.”

When your eyes meet the second time, you can tell he’s seeing what you’ll probe out of him. Wanting to know what questions you’ll ask.

“Rough childhood, then?”

Bullseye, if his reaction is anything to go by. He hums and chuckles, still carrying the boxes. You fidget with your keys, the door sounding with a faint click as you push it open with the weight.

The lights are all turned off. It’s not your first time seeing the house - but the first time seeing it furnished in full. For weeks you’d been putting your furniture in it, and putting food in the fridge to make moving in smooth. All the other times you’ve been inside, you’ve never felt one way or another about it. Living there wasn’t actualized for all those months - but looking at your things, new and old, makes it all feel real.

It’s a moment too intimate for a stranger to bear witness to and you think he’s probably well-aware. He doesn’t say a word, just observes you from the corner of his eye. When you come out of whatever trance you were just under, he whistles.

“Nice decor,” He compliments - a fair attempt at lightening the mood. “Where should I put these?”

“Those can just go behind the couch for now, thanks.”

He listens to you wordlessly, dropping the boxes off. You watch the light of the sun reflect onto him. He’s yellow gold. You think your mother might find him good looking. He stands back up and meets your eyes. Piercing, underneath everything. He has marks on the corners of his eyes that give you the impression of a bird. A hawk scoping for something to peck at.

“Two down, about how many more to go do you think?”

“I think 6, give or take. And then some luggage with my clothes.”

“Let’s get to work then, shall we?”

You give him a tight lipped smile.

“Of course,”

It doesn’t take long for the two of you to bring all of your belongings into the house. It’s a short few trips and there isn’t really much small talk for the two of you to engage in during it.

Once it’s over you, you thank Takami for his hard work and reward him with a beer as promised. You’re sure he knows that it’s only formality - but he’s completely comfortable in overstaying his welcome.

The two of you sit on the steps leading up to the front of your house - a cold beer in hand. The sun is starting to hide behind the clouds, and that deep shadow seems to cast once again. Over the both of you this time, and not just on your front steps. You let your nail push the tab of the can open, a soft carbonated hiss sounding as you depressurize it. Takami follows suit. He holds the can up to yours and looks at you before you can drink.

“Cheers to our hard work,”

You try not to balk at him, indulging his odd behavior per your own sanity. He’s aware of your apprehension, but his persistence is almost impressive. Another tight lipped smile. “Cheers, Takami-san.”

You take your first sips in complete silence and don’t look his way for any reason. You need the brief respite of peace to deal with the terrible weight of the pit in your stomach, still lingering. You wonder if his presence is worsening it, or if this is another thing your imagination decides to supplement. The cool liquid and faint sourness of Sapporo ease your mind, if barely. You observe the can in your hand momentarily, pretending to read the label.

He takes a similarly long sip of his drink and then lets out a semi-obnoxious aah. You peer over at him.

“Thanks again for helping with the move.” You say, mostly trying to fill the space with conversation so you don’t have to talk to him more than necessary. “I appreciate it.”

“Of course,” He says, waving his hand around in front of him. “Like I said, it’s a pretty tight knit community around here. I’ll introduce you to everyone whenever you’re free. They’re good folk.”

There’s something in his voice when he adds the last words. You wonder if you’re overthinking it again.

“Is that so?”

He looks at you, but you don’t meet his gaze. “Mm. A lot of people move out here to get a break from the hustle and bustle of the city. Hard-working folks. Families. It’s good to know them,”

You wonder if you’re being too honest about yourself - but decide that there isn’t anything he could do with the information you’re about to tell him.

“Interesting. I always grew up in the heart of the industrial district, so that’s lost on me. I even lived in Shinjuku for a while.” You offer mindlessly. “A good change of pace I guess.”

“Oh, we’re the same then,” He offers. You want to ask him to elaborate on what that means, but he brushes over it just as quickly “You’ll like it here then. Just knock on my door if you need something.”

He looks at you again that time, some knowing in his gaze. You try not to react in either direction, just nodding your head silently as you drink more of your beer.

“Yeah,” You offer, not looking towards him, “I’ll do that.”

For all the evading you down when you speak to Keigo, it was no lie that you spent most of your life living in the heart of the city.

The hustle and bustle of Musutafu, in the industrial districts of various prefectures - all of that was what you were accustomed too. When you were in your late teens and moved out for the first time - you lived in Shinjuku for two years and worked in the nightlife trying to pay for your tuition.

You would’ve never predicted a suburb for your future. It’s not the environment you know well. You can’t help but wonder if it’s always so… quiet.

In the time you’ve started living in your new home, not much has changed in your daily life.

Your initial paranoia has faded out enough to go about your responsibilities in peace. The previous family’s cat occasionally returns back to the porch, and you’ve started to buy it food just in case it decides it wants to stay permanently. A brown tortoiseshell who is always a little worried. You eat breakfast at the same time, but sleep in later since the Shizuoka branch you’ve moved to is a shorter commute. You still take your daily walks, and sometimes you’ll take some time to visit the coastal path and lay your eyes on the open water.

(The ocean doesn’t feel as comforting as it once did. Maybe it’s symptomatic of your own grievances, but looking at the endless expanse - your throat closes with the fear of it swallowing you along with it.

If it did, who would come find you? So far from everything you know?)

You’re entering into mid June, brushing along the edges of July. The heat is starting to be too much. You can’t stay outdoors for too long without feeling like your whole body is going to melt into the concrete and evaporate you from the inside. The nights get chilly, but the days are long. Humidity makes your skin sticky with sweat, and you’re running up your water bill with just how often you bathe.

Everything here is by all means much more uneventful. Some parts of it unsettle you. The nights are eerily quiet and before dawn breaks, there’s always a thick head of something perspiring in the horizon like fog.

Most days, the only people you talk to in person are your co-workers. Your friends live back in your hometown, so you only see them on weekends. Same with your family. It’s just you, and some after work dinners.

But mostly you.

And Hawks. You call him Hawks, in your head and Takami when he speaks. But Hawks feels more apt.

Hawks, seemingly, does not care what face you show him. Nothing stops him from showing up at your door at one time or another - always before you’re going on your walks.

(You want to ask how he even knows your schedule, but you doubt he’d give you any straight answers.)

And he doesn’t leave. You don’t think he would, no matter how rough you were about telling to fuck off. How demanding. You don’t want to confront him out of self preservation. It’s not easy to tell him to fuck off for some reason you have trouble placing. When you normally would, when it’d normally be so easy. You do it at your job all the time, to men much more important than him.

When he comes by, he hangs at your gate and never crosses the threshold to enter. He won’t move unless he’s invited in. You give up on being nice. If you offer him a glass of water, he’ll always agree just to see your expression change. He’s polite to make you uncomfortable. Says please and thank you, and makes conversation with you like he’s interested. An amalgam of reasons that you don’t like his company. Inescapable kindness that lends itself to plausible deniability.

What do you do for work? Oh, what’d you study for? Where are you from? Where are your parents from?

You never want to answer his questions. But he stays, lingers longer if you don’t. He archives the information, you’re sure - but you don’t know what for.

He knows what he needs to know. You live by yourself and your family is farther away. But he always wants to know more, always lingers at the gates - waiting to be let in despite how tight you’ve got your fingers on the lock.

You try not to involve yourself with him more than necessary. You avoid him if you’re walking around the neighborhood for any reason, and you never ask him about himself. He never tells you about himself either - but you can’t be sure why that is. If it’s for your sake or for his.

You try not to get used to him, but it doesn’t surprise you to see him just outside of your door. Sun pours over him in white rays like melted iron, but he’s the same as always. Same smile, same golden eyes, same unnerving expression.

He waves at you politely as you let your bodycon bag hang off of one side - a single headphone in as you look at him. You don’t bother smiling.

If it bothers him, it doesn’t show on his face.

“Hi neighbor,”

“Hey,” You reply, walking closer to the gate. It’s almost routine, but you try your best not to get used to it. No point in getting comfortable. “You’re here again,”

He laughs good-naturedly. “I am. Good to check in, no? Don’t want you getting lonely out here by yourself.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that,”

He laughs again, but he sounds more sincere.

“Going on another walk? You should be careful in this heat, you know. Take care of your body and everything.”

“I’ll be fine,” You offer, standing in limbo and waiting for him to leave. “Thanks for your concern.”

“So cold to me,” He quips. So he does know. “Hope it’s a nice little workout for you.”

You sigh as you make more small talk, mostly tuned out of whatever he’s saying.

“Got any plans for today, Takami-san?”

He pauses before smiling to himself. He lets his arms cross over the metal of your gate, but doesn’t flinch when the heated edge touches his bare skin. You wonder about it, go to ask - but he’s talking again before you can.

“I do, actually. Gonna go into the shop today and get a new fridge,” He tells you, his grin bright and unusual. You’re surprised. He never tells you anything about what he’s doing, no matter how casual. Nothing more than whether he’s working or not. “I’m out of room in my old fridge, so I’m upsizing.”

“Out of room?”

You ask before you can calculate the correct move. It’s a slip up, you both know it. His smile widens just barely, nodding his head and closing his eyes.

“Mm. Ran out of space. A lot of mouths to feed.” He says, and opens one eye playful. “A lot of people live with me. Too big of a house to leave everything all empty.”

“I wouldn’t have guessed that.”

“Oh my roommates?” Hawks says, and you nod. His smile gets bigger. “They’re kind of a rag-tag bunch. Not sociable like me. I can always bring them to meet you - if you’d like.”

“No need to trouble them.”

“But you should get to know the people who live here a little better,” He insists, finally backing away from your gate. “It’s good to be familiar with your neighbors. I’ll try and direct people to you. Word’ll get out faster that way,”

You go again to protest, but he cuts you off a second time - seeming faux apologetic about your upset.

“You should come over for dinner next week, too. Meet my roommates. At 7 ish, we should all be together. They’d love to meet you,”

You meet his eyes and wonder if his invitation is as deliberate as you assume. When you peer into them, you confirm that it is. He’s not forcing you. You’re sure that if you rejected him now, he’d return to the way he was. He might fake being hurt, but he’d still visit you at your door. He’d still linger, still be there. He’s inviting you in on purpose. Dinner with his roommates is a less than casual affair - and nonsense for your relationship.

It’s a bad idea, and maybe a trap. You’re almost positive of that.

But if you did go - it’d confirm things. You’re positive of that too. You’d know for sure if you were being paranoid, if you went into that house that looks just two minutes away and saw the inside of it. You feel your heart pump through your body as the sun moves away from the clouds. There’s no longer a shadow cast on your face. Just pure, blinding heat.

You shield your eyes with your hand, all too conscious of the heat crawling up your back and the tightness forming in your stomach.

“Sure,” You reply, noncommittally - trying not to show too much of any one feeling. No advantages. But you feel like you’ve already lost. “I’ll see if I can make it,”

“See you then, neighbor,” He waves, finally turning to leave. “Looking forward to it.”

He’s true to his word on multiple fronts. Which. Doesn’t comfort you.

An official dinner invitation, and more importantly - sending out the other neighbors to come and meet you. He’s made a point of making good on both vaguely threatening promises.

Like your old living arrangements, you don’t go out of your way to talk to anyone here. You’re busier in the Shizuoka branch (though you like it there) and you find that there’s more daily upkeep with the new and improved space. Plus it’s mostly family folks and retired couples - no one you have any business speaking with for more than five minutes. So you’re not really going out of your way to socialize.

You never planned on being buddy-buddy with any of the people who live in the area, anyway. Acquainted and friendly at best.

But in these last few weeks, folks from all up and down the streets have arrived at your doorstep bearing all sorts of gifts. Fruits and desserts and other housewarming things they think you'd find helpful. They come so often even you have a hard time refusing them, though you’ve wormed your way out of any of them coming inside of your home or crossing far-past the threshold of the gate.

On the surface, they’re good folks like he described them to be. There’s no distrust to the conversation, nothing they want to wield against you.

But something's off. And isn’t that always the case here? You’re starting to feel like you’re repeating yourself. Stuck in a loop, some kind of odd deja vu.

It’s two things you notice. They’re both minor, but they bother you.

The first is the way they describe Hawks.

Nothing but good things. Which makes you sound like a bitch, even to yourself. But it’s weird. The kind of kindness that doesn’t feel real. Empty praises like a helium balloon. Last week one of your neighbors described him as benevolent and his wife agreed whole-heartedly. Each time you wonder if you’re thinking too much about it. Benevolent isn’t a word you’d use to describe anyone you like, no matter how well acquainted.

You know people as charismatic as him so you know that it’s something people do. He’s a good guy, but you don’t know him so you say empty, kind things. Still, it bothers you. And it’s like they say. A friend to everyone is a friend to no one.

It’s uncomfortable that no one shows any sign of disagreement about how kind he is. That there’s no hesitant glances or country gossip. That not one old lady has pulled you in for gossip and wine. There’s no character. No humanity.

It’s backwards but there’s too much harmony. In the people, in the weather, in the road - paved perfectly with no cracks. Everyday of June since moving in has been nothing but blue, cloudless skies. A bright vivid sun concentrated into one shape, heat casting the illusion of waves. No June rain to water the gardens or wash off the dusty roads. No lightning storms that send all the animals howling, no winds strong enough to dust a city into the sea.

It’s not nothingness. There’s something to that at least. If it felt abandoned, it might feel less unsettling. An abandoned place is a familiar one, a memory from your hometown. An abandoned place usually means that someone lived there before you. At least ghosts are the promises of people, even deceased.

Is there something more nonexistent than a ghost, while still being material? You don’t know what that would be.

Hollow but not empty - the skeleton of a suburb. Like something has been carved out of it and replaced. Unnatural, man-made. It never fails to make all the hair on your neck stand.

Then there is the other thing.

Well it’s a stretch. Even you can acknowledge that it might just be coincidence. But nothing here feels like sole coincidence except for the fact you’ve been unfortunate enough to end up here.

A lot of people in town have… injuries. Particular ones. The elderly couple up the street has a lost leg and missing pinky between the two of them. Of the few other people living alone here - all three of them have some type of it - a part of them completely gone. A lost eye or arm, or visible scars along their sides like something’s been … cut out of them.

You know how it sounds. Even to yourself, you’ll reprimand your imagination. It’s not something you can discern meaning from, not something to draw conclusions from. This is Japan, a Japanese suburb with little kids playing in fucking mud and wild strawberries and bushes of ivy.

Maybe the people who retire here are veterans, or maybe Hawks has some kind of charity.

Maybe it’s something not sinister, because what else could it really be?

You keep trying to convince yourself that this time it really is your paranoia. Because even if you examine that, try to unravel - what does it leave you with but more questions?

You want answers. Need them so you stop tossing and turning. But even if you’re to get answers, you aren’t sure if you could trust them. You trust your gut - yourself and only yourself.

You know something is wrong, but just how wrong do things get before the point of no return?

But you can’t help living here if something is wrong. As wrong as you think. If it doesn't go away, what then? What happens to you? Neighbors keep meeting you and people keep being injured and tight-lipped and hollow eyed. Something is always waiting for you in the dark.

You want to get ahead of it, no matter how fucking sick it makes you. You have to know or it'll swallow you up.

You just want to put the whole thing to rest, and get answers. You’d take fake ones to placate you if they were believable, you’d take anything to get your fucking mind off of it.

But the longer you stay, the longer you live at the edge of the road, the longer Hawks waves to you as he passes by your place - makes you feel like you can’t rest until you know.

You need to know for sure.

It rains.

The day he invites you over for dinner, just two minutes down the street - it rains. Harsh, July rain that sounds like it’s running against the ground. Thudding as it floods the streets and turns the Earth to mush. You couldn’t have expected it. It’d been sunny in the morning, but it’d all gone gray outside while in the office. And then it got darker and heavier, like nightfall early.

You were soaked on public transport on the way home, tracking mud into your front door as you walked along the grass back to your own home. You had enough time, at least - between getting home and going over to shower and sit down.

In the two hours of your arrival from the office and your invitation - you pretend for a while that none of it is happening. You read on your couch and pet the cat you didn’t adopt. You listen to music and pleasantly paint your nails up until you have to get ready, because you don’t really want to get ready.

You’re being dramatic. Or you’re not. But you don’t want to go. You don’t want to know what happens when you get there. You think about canceling. Taking a raincheck because of the weather. Feigning an illness for your not-cat.

Something is wrong with this place, and it’s bothering you. But you don’t know if you’re prepared to find out what.

You decide to go, because the other option is remaining in the dark. You could tell him that you want to reschedule, but just like you trust your gut on most things - you get a feeling this is the only window you’ll get to find out anything important. Like if you do it another day, you’ll get the same hollow facade as always.

So you dress yourself slowly. You take an umbrella, and lock your door shut. You even say goodbye to that cat that isn’t yours. You’ll make it back in one piece but something will change once you go. Both of these you believe with full conviction.

But you go. You go.

When you get outside, you open your umbrella up and put it over your head - walking out past your front gate and onto the sidewalk.

It’s not a lie that Hawks is the neighbor closest to you. He lives within walking distance, less than ten minutes from you. The neighborhood is more compact closer to his place, your own house being more isolated - the first house when cars turn the corner.

You don't know what the house looks properly, only what it's like vaguely in shape and color. On the walk there, it’s the only thing your eyes can focus on. You stare at it aimlessly as it comes into your vision line.

It’s obscenely big. You don’t know how many people are living inside for that to be the case, but it sticks out. Even in your time in the city, you’ve never seen a house that size just out in the open, so protruding. It feels invasive.

You feel something forming in your gut as you start to approach the gate. It doesn’t look so different to yours.

Clearing your throat, you approach.

In the clear distance is Hawks, in front of the open door like he’s waiting for you. It’s still light outside, but the weather makes everything dark. The warm light pouring out of the open door casting shadow onto the concrete above it. Hawks runs to meet you at the gate to open it, not bothering to grab something to cover himself with. The rain soaks his head, makes his hair fall a little flat.

There’s a girl waiting by the door with him, younger than you both - who’s looking at you with a wide smile. Her teeth are sharp like fangs. You can see them from afar, and better as you get closer.

Hawks is quick as he unlocks the latch for you. He pulls the gate back and ushers you with his hands on your waist. Instinctually - you hold out the umbrella to cover his head. He gives you a smile as he leads you through to the front of the house. The rain feels like it gets heavier as he does.

When you’re underneath cover, you’re rushed into the foyer of their place before you can think twice.

The door shuts behind you, the noise of the rain muffled. You miss it and you want to go outside again. You look at the door as it shuts, and the girl with him closes it and looks at you.

She’s cute. She has to be a student, but she looks nothing like Hawks. He walks over to her and pats her head.

“This is Toga. She’s the youngest of us. She won’t be joining us for dinner ‘cause she’s going to see her girlfriend, but she wanted to see the new neighbor.”

You give her a passive glance. She smiles at you.

“Nice to meet you, neighbor,” She drawls the end of the word, then looks you up and down. “Hawks keeps talking about you all the time,”

“Aw, c’mon now Himiko-chan, don’t embarrass me in front of our guest,” Is what he says, but he doesn’t look embarrassed at all. “Take your raincoat and umbrella. Say hi Uraraka-san for me,”

“Uh-huh, I will. Bye-bye,”

You watch her get dressed for the rain and turn to leave. The brief sound of the rain returns and you’re all but too aware of how much you want to turn back from whence you came.

Hawks takes your jacket for you. His voice guides you to putting your shoes in the rack, telling you where the house slippers are for guests.

You’re not particularly trying to listen, but you’re out of your own body. The muffled rain thunders, cries out - makes you jump in your own skin. Lightning flashes through the whole house.

He looks at you bemused. “Just a little rain,”

“Right,” You reply, itching to get control of yourself “Been such a clear summer, so it spooked me,”

“Are you off put easily?” Hawks asks. You close up your umbrella and hang it against a wall “You seem like it,”

You shake the water off your face and neck and shake your head. “Not particularly. Just not used to living here yet.”

He nods sagely. “You’ll get used to it. But enough out of me, I’m here to introduce you to my roommates. You’ll have to forgive their curiosity, especially Touya.”

Curiously, Hawks doesn’t proceed with his usual testimony and fair. He doesn’t tell you that they’re good people, like he normally does. Just smiles, coyly, and gestures you to the corner of the hall.

From the kitchen on the other end of the foyer, you can hear sizzling and cutting - something being hacked away with a butcher's knife. Hawks waves your thoughts away as you turn your head towards it. “That’s Kurogiri. He learned we were having guests so he took up cooking. He’s the best at it, and I’m pretty decent. Himiko too.”

“Oh, that’s kind. What are we having for dinner?”

He stops to look at you. He holds his stare too long.“Meat. With some sides and rice, of course. I think it’s steak but Kurogiri doesn’t like western sides. You eat meat, right? You mentioned wanting to barbecue,”

You hesitate. Something slips in his face, but it’s gone before you can catch it. You nod. “I uh do meat. I try not to lately, to save money.”

He laughs. “Well, we have plenty to go around. Please eat as much as you like,”

You frown at him.

“...Thanks for the offer,”

He doesn’t say anything more. Doesn’t make a punchy quip, or have a fresh joke like normal. Just nods aimlessly before giving you another familiar business smile.

“Lets not keep ‘em waiting,” Hawks offers, as he walks you into the basement. The darkness at the end of the stairwell puts a familiar gnawing in your stomach. “I’m sure they’ll want to meet you sooner, rather than later.”

They’re not what you expect.

His roommates. You’re expecting people like him. Metropolitan, overly friendly types. You’re expecting people he gets along with well, and some of them do.

But they’re nothing like Hawks at all, not even close.

Most of his roommates remind you of the kids living on the street during your life in the industrial districts. Rag-tag bunches who got in trouble with the law frequently, always in and out of the penal system.

Of his roommates, Shigaraki is the most antisocial. He doesn’t say anything when Hawks drags you to his room. Hawks doesn’t seem to be expecting anything either, but he does ask if the former will join you for dinner. Shigaraki looks you up and down, then laughs for the first time, and says not tonight. Hawks shrugs and moves on.

There’s Twice too, and he’s kind. Of them, you think he’s the nicest. He’s the closest with Toga. A bad past, he’s fond of Hawks (though you can’t be sure Hawk’s is fond of him.) Apparently he has some kind of condition and disorder, he tells you candidly - but he’s not unpleasant all the same. At the very least, he doesn’t offset some baser instinct to run far in the other direction.

You meet Magne, an older girl and another man who doesn’t tell you his full name. Hawks calls him Compress, but he introduces himself to you as Sako. He tells you he won’t join you all for dinner - holds your hand, places a kiss on the back of your palm as an apology. The gesture weirds you out, but you try to keep the peace.

Hawks tells you he’s a performer and you believe him.

The last person you meet is Touya.

Touya is interesting. He has thick scars along his face and neck, burn marks - but he’s got a handsome face. Hawks seems most hesitant to introduce you two, but they room together. You want to ask if that’s necessary, given that there’s so much space in the house but refrain.

When Touya greets you, his grip is casual and firm. He mostly seems disinterested, except when you’re in closer proximity to him.

Enough for him to flash you something pitiful. Something knowing, something… like he’s condescending you and pitying you all at once.

He’s the one, of all of them, that leers at you the most openly. He assesses you, polite in his introduction before turning to Hawks. They communicate something to each other wordlessly and you don’t like any of it. After whatever that had been, Touya simply turned to examine you, shrugging as he agrees to dinner and slinking back down into his room.

After a while, you go back downstairs. Hawks doesn’t tell you anything about his living space. Just sits you in a living room and chats with you until dinner is ready. Chats hollowly about the same pointless dialogue fodder he always does. He stares at you with each word, and you try your best to ignore the shivering it incites.

He’s relaxed with the charade here, but he keeps it up exceptionally well irregardless.

Nothing is strange in a way that makes all of it strange. The rain pounds against every window like it’s begging to be inside and the doors sometimes shake when thunder claps. But nothing is wrong in a way you can prove. His roommates are nothing like you thought they’d be, and only serve to prove that you know even less about him than you might’ve assumed.

He’s quick, on all fronts, to brush over any questions.

Whatever you want to know about, Hawks won’t let you. But it’s not out of secrecy. If he could tell you to be patient without spoiling your little game, you’re sure he would.

The pit of your stomach only grows heavier as the evening continues. Even though he hasn’t done anything to warrant your increasing distrust. Nothing feels as it seems.

It’s nearly eight o’clock when Kurogiri calls you all to have dinner.

Hawks send you into the dining room alone.

The walk into the dining room feels like it goes on forever. The hallway remains dark. At the end of the tunnel is a kitchen. A brightly lit dining room with warm lights and a table that seats many people. On the table, there's a bottle of sake and glasses. A pitcher of water with lemons cut into it, and plenty of sides.

On display though is meat. A lot of meat. Meat you can’t identify any one way, and that doesn’t smell like any other meat you’ve ever had. Hawks mentioned steak, and you can’t be sure it’s not that. It just doesn’t look like it from this distance.

The tables are all set-out, and there’s a steak on each plate.

Kurogiri is polite when he greets you.

“Oh,” He says, thinking to himself. “You must be the guest. Sit here. Keigo insisted I sit you next to him,”

You’re startled, but nod your head. “Nice to meet you, Kurogiri-san,”

He shakes his head. “The pleasure is all mine,”

You sit at the far end of the table, and let Kurogiri pour you a glass of water. The rest of the housemates start coming into the kitchen. Magne, and Twice, and Touya mostly - along with Hawks at the tail end. He comes around the redwood table to join you. He sits at the very head while everyone sits in what seems to be their own assigned seats. Touya sits directly to your right. Kurogiri sits at the opposite end of the table, glancing at Hawks.

“Master Shigaraki won’t be joining us?”

Hawks shakes his head. “Said he wasn’t. You can always bring him something to eat.I can take care of your guest.”

Kurogiri pauses, then looks at you. He shakes his head. “Just be careful, Hawks.”

“Have some faith in my hosting skills, Kurogiri,”

You watch on in silence as Kurogiri fixes things in a tupperware. Master Shigaraki?

“Sorry about the delay!” Hawks offers, all of a sudden. You look at the plate in front of you, and all the bowls alongside it before looking back towards Hawks. “Thanks for joining us for dinner. Please eat as much as you like and consider this our formal welcome to the neighborhood,”

Touya laughs hard beside you. “Laying it on thick aren’t you, Keigo?”

He replies in his unflinchingly calm voice. Touya must really get under his skin though, because you can hear his demeanor crack just barely. “Just being welcoming. Wouldn’t kill you to take a page out of my book, I don’t think,”

“Enough bickering,” He supplements, throwing his hands up. “Let’s eat,”

There’s a resounding itadakimasu around the table before the sound of cutlery begins to scrape against the ceramic plates alike.

For the first time all night, you check into your body and stare down at the plate in front of you. It feels like all your blood is rushing to your ears. Your heart pounds, blood thrumming through your nerves as you examine the plate. There’s a cut of meat on it, tender with herbs - and a side of rice and pickled vegetables. The ceramic plate it’s on is red, a deep sort of maroon. Painted birds decorate the sides along with thin leaves and branches. The other cutlery is nice. Heavy stuff, nothing cheap. Even the chopsticks have good weight.

You feel out of body as your hand reaches for them, swallowing thickly and not looking up at anyone for any reason. From the corner of your eye, you see Touya who seems to be watching your every move. Hawks doesn’t pay you any mind. You wonder why he’s doing so deliberately.

You use a spoon to help pick up rice. You eat the vegetables plain. It hurts to chew and swallow even though none of it’s dry. The lemon water you drink from the cold glass cup doesn’t soothe your throat.

The blonde glances at you. He reaches towards the sake bottle and cups circling the centerpiece of the decor and hands you a glass. “This’ll warm you you,”

You look at him, and briefly at his plate. He hasn’t touched the meat yet. You take the glass from him and sip in long drinks until you reach the bottom.

But the feeling doesn’t leave you. You wonder if you’re imagining it.

It’s meat. Beef, from what they tell you. You look up to see Twice across the table, tearing into the flesh with his teeth - and something inside your gut churns hard. Your focus is unbreaking as you see it. Teeth sinking into flesh. The outside a golden brown but the inside raw and red, fatty and bleeding. Twice’s plate pools with what looks like blood. Steaks bleed, you know that.

And everyone is eating comfortably, like nothing is wrong. Except Hawks. He has yet to cut into anything. He mimics you. He’s waiting for you to eat first.

“You should eat first,” He goes as far as telling you. His smile gleams. Pearlescent white teeth, golden yellow eyes, blackness in his pupils like oblivion. “Feels a little rude as the host.”

Fuck. Something is wrong. It’s screaming at you. The sound of scraping and chewing and swallowing becomes a cacophony as it grates on your mind. You try your best to be unaffected and drink more sake. You keep your voice calm.

You won’t panic. You can’t panic. You steel yourself.

“No no, please - go ahead. I’m a little tired so I don’t feel like chewing, is all. It’s fine, I promise.” You offer, then stare at him. “Eat.”

He looks at you surprised, and Touya laughs besides you.

He shrugs though, and eats. Unconcerned with you, with refined manners and well practiced etiquette. Hawks is polite when he eats.

He cuts through the thick hunk of meat with a sharpened knife in precise, even squares. He’s an expert at it. You watch as the outside cuts open. Underneath the brown is tender red. Bleeding red. It’s practically raw on the inside, blood spilling out from the open slices. It has that soft texture of raw meat. Hawks uses his chopsticks to grab the piece, and it yields underneath the pressure - squished between the ends.

You watch as he chews it. You watch carefully.

There’s delight in the act of eating. He savors when he chews, slow and deliberate and when he swallows - he seems especially pleased. His expression changes after the first few bites, repeating it over and over. You feel bile rise in your throat.

“It’s good you know,” Hawks hums, looking at you so deeply you feel suffocated. Flying close to the ground to pin you right when you’re least expecting, how typical. It’s so like him it makes you sick. “You should give it a try,”

You clear your throat.

“I will. I uh, I do need to use the restroom though.” You say quickly, trying not to heave. “Where would that be?”

Touya snorts. “Down the hall on your left.”

Before he can get a word in edgewise - you bolt. You nearly knock the dining chair over with how swift you carry yourself on your legs. You run, speeding off towards the bathroom. Grabbing the handle you nearly slam the door as you hurry yourself inside.

Your chest feels tight as a sense of nausea overwhelms you, mixed with some morbid sense of relief. You were right. You were right about everything.

They’re taking body parts - this much you’re sure of. You can think of what they do with them. Selling them is a lucrative business. But eating them? It’s a level of depravity so far beyond your scope - you can’t help but feel nauseated.

Your hands grip the linoleum sink as the fluorescent lights of the bathroom flicker overhead. Your complexion has gone pale with disgust. Your stomach feels especially tight, soured. It’s almost painful how sick you are. Sweat drips along your back and into your shirt - all down the crown of your head. White knuckling the edge of the sink, you stare into the linoleum and take deep breaths trying not to fucking puke.

You’re in too deep. You were weeks ago. Maybe the minute you clocked that something was wrong about him, like you’ve seen past a carefully set-up illusion.

By rights of the illusionist, it’s only inevitable that he comes after you. You either die with his secret or become part of his magic act.

You don’t know which things he wants more.

By the time you steady your breathing at all, you hear the bathroom door click open behind you.

You nearly scream.

Hawks closes the door behind him. The enclosed space of the bathroom makes your chest ache, as you back into the sink. He looks calm. You ready yourself to run.

His eyes no longer shine. They’re almost dull, copper in color as he stares at you with a lazed smile. It’s like the mask has all but shattered. Leaving you two in this cramped, airless, stale room. Your stomach clenches, muscles tight with adrenaline. You think of all the ways out, but Hawks leans his weight on the door to keep you from running.

“Relax,” He offers, no longer pretending. “I won’t hurt you. And you’d rather not get the attention of my housemates, I’m guessing,”

“What the fuck is wrong with you? You fucking—you eat people?”

He smiles. “You know, it’s pretty clever of you to figure it out. Most folks here are too stupid to see through it, but you noticed right away. I was really interested in that when we first met,”

He stands up straight, readying himself to approach you.

“Stay the fuck away from me,”

He leans against the door and puts his hands up, but not because he’s trying to appear unthreatening.

“It’s a good gig. Cheap property, more people move in, more business. When someone proves loyalty, they get a cheap mortgage and live for a small price. Up until now, no one just moving has been able to get out of it. Except for the family before yours. Still feel sorry about that one.”

The dread that washes over nearly has you throwing up. You dry heave. Hawks smile only grows.

“But you noticed right away, which was interesting. So I started getting intrigued by you. I wondered how far you’d go to find things out, and it was farther than I expected. It’s good to be clever,” Hawks offers. He steps closer to you this time and you go to defend yourself, grabbing something from the counter to hit him with. You find nothing. “Not so good to be nosy. But you couldn’t help yourself, huh? I like the spunk, at least.”

“You’re a monster,” You say and you mean it.

“It’s a house full of them. I’m just the spokesperson. And this is a lucrative business practice. My colleagues aren’t the social type, so I handle all the HR. I can’t have some newbie who just moved in fucking the protocol,” Hawks hums, tilting his head at you. “In a way I’m helping you,”

“Helping me? How in the fuck are you helping me?”

It’s a swift movement where Hawks pins you. You go to move, to hit him - to scream. But Hawks is fast. He’s strong, and completely swift - and when he grabs you to pin you to the sink, you’ve never felt more completely helpless in your life. You bite his hand, but he looks at you steadily. Cold.

“No one will help you even if you scream, so don’t scream,” Hawks reprimands, almost bored. “Cops don’t come here anyways. I would know.”

He pulls his hand away from you.

“What do you want from me?”

Hawks looks surprised then laughs.

Before you can protest any further, you feel the grip on your arms and body tighten painfully. Hawks ducks his head down against your throat, and in one motion bites. He bites hard. You can feel it break the skin, and that time you scream. You pull away, but his teeth scrape and scrape and scrape till you’re bleeding.

He sucks the blood and licks the flesh, like someone might eat bone marrow from a carcass. You can feel it then. He’d devour you into nothing if he could - while you’re still all pieced together. You look at his mouth when he pulls away, covered in your blood. Some of the skin he’s taken off, just barely. Your whole body feels feeble as he goes again to lick up and clean the sensitive wound.

Your knees feel weak as he pulls away. Your blood is on his mouth. There’s surely more on his hands. You feel sick all over again. You’re gonna throw up.

“It’s simple what I want,” Hawk’s says, and then narrows his eyes at you “I like to play with my food before I eat it,”

Your eyes narrow.

“There’s no way I’d let myself wait around here to be killed.”

“Who said anything about killing, stranger? Just eating. It’s good practice to eat. We’ll eat together. We’ll eat each other. It’s romantic, don’t you think?” Hawks hums, hugging you to him. And it’s like you’re seeing him for the first time, for exactly what he really is. “Eating together is a basic facet of a healthy connection.”

“A healthy connection? You’re insane.”

He shakes his head.

“I’m in like. Different things.”

You try again to pull away, but remain stone still in his arms. For now, there’s no escaping. But you thrash and thrash and thrash. It comforts you.

“I’ll never take it lying down.” You tell him, as seriously as you can.

He gives you a smile. It’s pearly white. It’s unnerving. It’s genuine. Your heart feels heavy as the weight and implications all sink in. Oh, he’ll chase you - if it means getting to eat you alive.

Thunder strikes the house. The walls shake. July is unwelcoming and gloomy.

But Hawks’ eyes shine yellow gold like a false sin as he looks down at you in awe.

“I’m looking forward to it, neighbor.”

#cannibalism cw #noncon cw #yandere cw #hawks x reader #bnha x reader #writing tag #sorry if there are . still errors

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dojunie · 4 months

Text

MISDIAL; LJN [CH4] PICK UP THE PHONE!

[★]; [MISDIAL MASTERLIST] [PREVIOUS PART] [NEXT PART]

info;

lee jeno x fem!reader

college au

chaptered

very slow burn

genre; not-quite-friends to lovers, older brother mark lee, brothers best friend lee jeno, light angst, yn is a menace to society, story/character driven

warnings for this chapter; none

chapter wc: 9.5k / comment on this post for taglist!

taglist: @hibernatinghamster @jenoxygen @eaglesnotravens @donutswithjaminthemiddle @jvjsssnaa @huangrenhyucks @luvenshiti @shiningdery @jaeminsbebu @aliceinwhateverland @bebsky@gem-gem @jkjkseo @jenosbliss @pewpewpwe00 @ti--red @philanarose @softbbyg0rl @aaasteroidsky @carelessshootanonymous @en-boyz @jlsavyy @roseymerrie @bangchanisemo @skuezk @jaehyuns-adorable-dimples @ourbeautifulaffair@jeonnyread @jvjsssnaa @episkeyjeno @bockhyun @jenojammin @zarastrawberry @peachie-bear @itadaramaterasu @alymii @cuteejeno @episkeyjeno @nohunlee @ooojisoo @luv4jeno @not-clemb @jydivrs @maeyoung @axmdocs @nctzennikki09 @pinkysinnerbaby

unable to tag: @jenojenoyes

[a/n]: merry early christy mass

“SO. ARE WE GOING TO TALK ABOUT IT?”

It’s 7:38AM, and Jeno has finally driven for long enough that the Palisades building is no longer looming in his rearview mirror. In a perfect world he’d be heading back to his apartment right now to sleep away the next twelve hours of his life— but Jeno’s life has not been perfect since you moved back to Seoul, and he knows even before Donghyuck finishes speaking that the following conversation is going to be unbearable.

The man in the backseat slurps obnoxiously from the thermos he’s got at his lips. “Frankly, I’m a little suspicious that we’re not already talking about it. Because there is like… no chance neither of you have anything to say about all of that.”

“All of what,” Jaemin asks, nonplussed. “Your sudden closeness with little Jeon?”

Donghyuck scoffs, taking another loud sip from the borrowed bedazzled cup. The contents held within is fresh brewed coffee courtesy of the small Starbucks Jeon Somi’s has on her kitchen counter, and he’s practically perched on top of the center console because he’s leaning so far forward. “No, prick. Don’t even start. All of that being last fucking night. You know,” he prods very pointedly, “At Wooyoung’s?”

For a split second, Jeno’s mind goes completely elsewhere. Wooyoung’s. The guy was more Jaemin’s friend than his but he’d been invited to the party anyway, initially with a polite promise to swing by for an hour or two before clearing out to avoid the storm rolling in. Then, a few hours later at Mark’s place, you. Wandering into the apartment none the wiser to his presence, squinting into the depths of your phone; and the only thing Jeno can remember from the seconds before you looked up and shut him out again was wondering how the hell he didn’t notice how much you’d changed.

If he was being honest, it's something that's been bothering him since that night at Nabi Bar. Because you’d always been cute. Ask anybody with eyes. In highschool you were cute enough that sometimes Jeno didn’t quite understand why no one else seemed to be thinking about it as much as he was. Everything you did made him want to pick you up and shake you like a dog with a new toy. But somewhere along the lines, this…shifted.

“What about Wooyoung’s?” Jaemin sighs. “We were there for like, four hours. You’re going to have to be more—”

“You and Y/N,” Donghyuck says unrepentantly, striking right to the heart of his curiosity. “Mark’s birthday up in the woods, the lake house, whatever the fuck happened there. Her truth or drink question. To be specific.”

Jeno isn’t the best at understanding his own feelings, and he’ll admit that easily. So if he’s being serious about when he first realized something had shifted, when he noticed that something was undeniably different about you— he’d, coincidentally, also have to point a finger towards the weekend they all spent at the lake house. It was the first time he’d properly seen you in nearly a year. He’d shown up at Mark’s parents house with the van full of guys and hung out downstairs in the same living room he used to spend every afternoon in before college came and whisked them all away, and waited for you and your brother to come down.

And he’s not proud of this, but. Well.

Well, when you did eventually reveal yourself, finding his eyes amongst the crowd of his friends perking up at your arrival… he’d been expecting a bigger reaction.

He’d been working out more, is all. And he’d grown his hair out for the first time since he was a little kid, and had finally grown accustomed to the pokey, itchy world of contacts. He looked different. He felt different. He’d just finished his first year of college and was definitely feeling a little too cool about it. And in high school you used to look at him like he had done something great for just simply existing— so he’d been ready for you to all but drop when you saw him now— but you’d run your gaze over Jeno for what felt like half a second before turning to Renjun, smiling widely at this new guy like you’d been waiting to meet him and only him.

And he remembers being… confused.

That had been the first clue that something about you (or, maybe, something about him) had changed.

“Na Jaemin. You are absolutely not going to sit here and not explain what the hell she was talking about.”

“It was over a year ago,” Jaemin says. The uneasy beat that followed Donghyuck’s question was nothing to be envied, but Jeno wholeheartedly preferred the silence over actually listening to this conversation. “And you heard her. There’s nothing to explain. She was getting over someone, I was getting over someone, and like most stupid teenagers do, we did the only thing that came to mind—”

“Okay but you understand that she’s not like most stupid teenagers, right? You hooked up with Mark’s little sister. On his birthday. At his birthday party. Did you have a death wish? Why are you both acting like this isn’t breaking goddamn news?”

“Because it isn’t news,” Jaemin replies sharply. “For a myriad of reasons. Can you not phrase it like I was trying to seduce the Virgin Mary?”

“I’m not phrasing it like anything! I just… I mean, you’re not seriously going to pretend like this isn’t absolutely insane, right? It’s hard to imagine—”

“What about two people hooking up is so insane to you?”

Donghyuck seems flabbergasted by this. “Jaemin. Everything. Everything about it is insane. Because it’s not just two people ‘hooking up’. Of all the people on earth you could have— and trust me, the number of options you have is high, I’ve heard some of the shit the girls on campus say about you— you chose her? The single person on this earth that Mark would flay you alive for even—”

Jaemin snaps his eyes to the rearview mirror, and Donghyuck’s words cut short. “Is Y/N a human being to you?”

A stunned second passes.

“Or is she just some attachment to Mark, some little doll with no will of her own? You realize that this is why she hates being around us so much, right? Why she’s never around in her own fucking apartment? Did you even notice that you’ve only ever said her name once in this whole conversation? Do you know what you’ve been calling her?”

Jaemin’s question hangs in the air like a physical weight. Mark’s little sister. It hits Jeno like a punch; his hand tightens around the steering wheel with immediate guilt. Guilt for not even noticing how interchangeably they’d all been using the words in the first place and, much deeper down, knowing that even if Jaemin wasn’t talking to him, Jeno was definitely the worst culprit in the vein of only seeing you as an extension of your brother.

That’s basically what you’d told him on the balcony before you left and took half of his spirit with you.

“That’s not what I meant,” Donghyuck says, sufficiently chided. All the gossip-seeking enthusiasm has drained from his voice. Now he just sounds sorry. “You know that’s not what I meant. That’s not how any of us see her.”

“I know that,” Jaemin says quietly, returning his gaze to the window. “She doesn’t.”

They ride in silence for almost a whole block before Jaemin sighs.

“She found me after I got off the phone with Jurin for the last time,” he supplies, unable to ignore Donghyuck’s scolded pouting. “Sometime while you guys were off getting wood for the campfire.”

Perking up a little in the backseat, Donghyuck tentatively asks, “At… At the lake house?”

And, having foolishly assumed the reprimand would've ended this conversation, Jeno almost wants to slam his head against the headrest when Jaemin nods and he realizes they're not done talking about you. He feels raw; sensitive and uncomfortable and combative. It's residual from what just happened with you, he knows that, and he also knows saying something will probably just draw attention he does not want, but he still can't help but blurt; “Do you really need to hear the details, man?”

He’s not sure who he surprises more by the edge in his voice: himself or the other two. Both turn to look at Jeno like he’s just magically appeared in the vehicle.

Donghyuck is so caught off guard by the distaste that he actually rocks back a little bit in his seat.

“I’m not asking for those kinds of details!” he exclaims, scandalized. “I just want to know how it went down beforehand, because as far as I remember, they were the perfect picture of normalcy on that trip! Jaemin was a little sulkier than normal because of the whole girlfriend-breaking-up-with-him thing, but he perked up after, like…”

Donghyuck trails off. Then after a very long second he gasps, sounding almost appalled, forgetting Jeno again immediately.

“When we came back from camping because it started raining, you were like a totally different person. It was then, wasn’t it? You and her stayed back. I remember being worried that you were going to bore her to death if she ever came out of her room. Holy shit, dude, don’t tell me you guys planned—”

Jaemin whirls around. “Do you think I’m completely crazy?”

“Well how am I supposed to know, when you won’t tell us anything?!”

“You really want to know so badly?” Jaemin says, fed up. No, Jeno thinks uselessly.

“Earlier in the afternoon Y/N heard me on the phone with Jurin and figured something was wrong. She came over to talk to me about it and I found out that she was having guy problems of her own, so we tried to make each other feel better— Verbally," Jaemin tells, pointedly adding the last word when Donghyuck's eyebrows jump in scandal. "The next time I saw her was when you guys left to go camping and we stayed back. I was watching a movie in the living room and she asked if she could join me because she couldn’t sleep, and— And after that you can put two and two together. That’s it.”

“Prude,” Donghyuck mutters. When Jaemin shoots him another look in the mirror though, he’s the perfect picture of innocence. “—Is what I would have said, if you were talking about any other girl, ha ha. Anyway! Did you guys kiss?”

Jeno's arms tense up so quickly that he almost swerves into oncoming traffic. Hyuck nearly topples out of his seat.

“Fucking hell—! Hey! You’ve got precious cargo back here, jackass!”

“Pothole,” Jeno bites.

He’s lying through his teeth. But it’s the only thing he could think of. There’s no such thing as a pothole out here— they’re in Gangnam, on a main goddamn road, but he can almost feel Jaemin’s eyes on the side of his face, so keeps his eyes sharply forward despite the fact that his ears are no doubt already starting to flush pink from discomfort.

“I’m not telling you that,” Jaemin replies after a second. “Voyeur.”

“What? What type of sense does that make? You two literally fucked on our communal couch, but asking about a kiss is too—”

Even if it feels like every nerve instantly lights ablaze under his skin from this comment, Jeno is much better about controlling his expression this time around. It probably wouldn’t have mattered because in the moment after the words left Donghyuck’s mouth Jaemin whirled around in his seat to pinch him, a sharp grab at his thigh that had the boy yowling in surprise— and then immediately thereafter, agony, because Jaemin’s strength is nothing to sneeze at.

“Listen to me very carefully,” Jaemin hisses. “Not a word of this is leaving this car. Do you understand me, Lee Donghyuck? If you tell anybody—”

“Okay, okay!” Donghyuck cries out. “Fuck, do you have razors under your nails?! I think I’m bleeding!”

“I’m serious,” Jaemin continues darkly. “You can laugh about it all you want, but we all know exactly how Mark is going to react if he finds out and I am not interested in playing the odds on whether he ends my life via strangulation or vicious beating. Keep your mouth shut.”

Donghyuck is still muttering to himself, rubbing bitterly at the spot where Jaemin sniped him.

He’s thinking of ways to reassure Jaemin, probably. Or maybe that’s just what Jeno hopes he’s doing, because a younger him could have used some reassurance that Mark possibly wouldn’t have tried to kill him where he stood if, back in highschool, he’d ignored your brother's wishes entirely and actually told you how he felt.

But Donghyuck simply says, “Remember when we all watched him punch that watermelon in half during spirit week? Back in our senior year, when they were still finding chunks of it a week later in, like, the ceiling rafters and shit? I think my money is on him beating you to death if he finds out you slept with his sister.”

And on that very positive note, Jeno flicks his turn signal on and coasts into the lane that’ll take him right back to SNU.

It’s four days later, Jeno hasn’t seen you once in that span of time, and he’s beginning to think it’s driving him a little insane, because he’s been staring pathetically at a photo of you on Mark’s fridge for the last five minutes. You’re mid-laugh and you’ve got one arm tight around Mark’s neck— you’re both on the beach, jeans rolled up to your knees, and your hair is a startling, bright red.

Back in highschool, when you were a junior and he was a senior, you’d had a short lived obsession with dying your hair. Mark had mentioned it to him in passing, recalling the half a dozen conversations he’d witnessed of you trying to convince your parents to let you bleach it, but he hadn’t really thought about it too seriously until he was over at Mark’s house to work on a project a few weeks later. Your brother, who’s brain stopped working properly when he was hungry, tapped out after about fifteen minutes to hit the convenience store a few blocks away for a pint of ice cream and a few energy drinks.

It was only after the front door slammed shut that Jeno even realized you were home; he was slouched in Mark’s desk chair scrolling listlessly through his phone when he heard the bedroom door creak open, and turned around expecting your brother. It was not your brother.

It was you. Standing in the doorway like a deer caught in headlights as your eyes met, dressed in a pair of pajama shorts and a tank top, hair slicked down to your head with cherry red dye— it was all over your hands, splattered down your neck, an artful blob on the tip of your nose.

The two of you stared at each other for what felt like minutes. He hadn’t seen you this close for a few weeks now, since this was around the time that you’d started hanging out with your friends more and were rarely ever home. That was what he blamed for the way his brain seemed to start buffering at the sight of you.

“Are you okay?” he finally asked.

You stood up straight and hid your hands behind your back like he hadn’t already seen them in all their bloody glory, and said, “I thought you… Left. Just now. With Mark.”

“I didn’t,” he replied. You stared at each other some more. Then, because he wasn’t quite sure what else to do and he’s never really been good at reading a room, he said,“You missed a bit, there. On the top.”

You stiffened, and then your whole body slumped like he’d cut your strings with those eight words alone. “I know. Mark has a little mirror in here somewhere that I was going to steal while he was gone, because I didn’t realize until it was too late that I couldn't see the back of my own head.”

And somehow this ended up with Jeno standing behind you in your bathroom, dutifully brushing red goo into your scalp as you fidgeted and twitched and tried to pretend you weren’t staring at him in the mirror, even though it was very obvious that you were. Jeno pretended, like he’d been doing for the last three years, that he didn’t notice— even if he was finding it a little harder than normal to not stare right back.

Back then, he chalked up his jitters to all of the physical things that were happening in that moment. He credited his desire to stand a little closer to you than necessary to the pleasant scent of cherry coming from the dye in your hair, and blamed the uneven straps on your tank top for the reason his eyes kept drifting to the curve of your shoulders. He was hyper-focusing on the tiny beauty mark below your ear not because he found it fascinating, but because it was easier to keep his eyes trained on that than to risk forgetting what he was doing and finding your eyes in the mirror.

When the dye ran out and your head was sufficiently gooped, he’d been gearing up to ask if you needed help washing it out too, when the sound of the garage door opening whispered through the house and you stiffened. In an instant you were plucking the empty dye bowl from his hands and then herding him out of your bathroom— startled, he turned around to mention his sweater, only to find it flying at his chest with enough force to knock him back against the hallway wall. Your eyes were huge as you stood in the bathroom doorway, hand already on the door as if already positioning to slam it shut.

“Don’t tell Mark you helped me,” you said quickly, before blinking very hard a few times, “And— Thank you? This probably would have turned out like shit if you didn’t offer to help me. Thanks.”

Downstairs, the front door opened. Jeno stood there with his balled up sweatshirt in his hands suddenly feeling very odd. Only later did he realize that feeling was hesitance. He didn’t want to go yet. “Why can’t I tell him?” he asked.

“Because Mark’s going to freak out when he sees me, and I don’t want him to get mad at you too for, like, being an accessory to my crime.”

“An accessory to your what?”

“Oh,” you said belatedly. Then you raised your eyebrows at him, lip quirking into an innocent smile that felt like anything but, and his stomach twisted. “Might’ve said too much.”

Your brother's voice rang up the stairs and Jeno made the mistake of turning towards the landing. By the time he turned back to you, mouth opening to speak— even though he wasn’t even sure what he was planning to say— he only caught the last glimpse of your red stained hand through the shutting the door.

Mark returned a few moments later to find Jeno sitting back in the desk chair, back to peering into his phone, but what he probably didn’t notice was that Jeno was really staring at the little, cherry colored splotch on his palm.

Back then he hadn’t known yet, just what he was feeling. He didn’t put two and two together to realize why whenever he’d see the color red in the corner of his eye at school after that, he’d turn around in the middle of a conversation to see if you were passing by; why, when the school strong-armed you into dying it back to its natural color a few days later, the missing cherry red had bothered him more than he could justify. It took him another few months to really get it.

“No-Jam! Dude, did you get lost in there or something? The cola is in the little—The bin thing! In the back!”

Mark’s voice pitches over the rest of his friends' muffled bickering and right through the memory he’s sunk into, and he tears his eyes away from the fridge to remember who he is and what he’s supposed to be doing right now.

It’s movie night. He’s been put in charge of drinks now that the take-out has arrived, and yet he’s malingering in the kitchen like some kind of sad voyeur. Right.

He snatches the cans and shuts the door a little harder than necessary, if only to get away from that photo of you faster. The conversation he returns to isn’t much different than the one he’d left; initially it was Chucky versus Annabelle, now when he sits the rack of soda on the coffee table and sinks back down between Jaemin and Jisung, it’s Jason versus Michael. Hyuck is ripping his hair out trying to explain that Michael is a borderline mutant and therefore obviously the winner in this bracket, and per usual, Chenle is completely unbothered and arguing the opposite solely to raise their friend’s blood pressure.

This would usually be Jeno’s pre-movie entertainment, chiming in with the occasional fact check to keep the sides even, but tonight he can’t focus on their debate. Instead, his eyes drift towards the clock on Mark’s TV stand.

7:06. He frowns.

“Where is Little Lee, by the way? Out getting into trouble?”

It’s embarrassing how quickly Jeno snaps back to attention at the sound of your nickname.

Mark shrugs in response, completely unbothered, even though Jeno is almost boring holes into the side of Mark’s head waiting for an answer to Renjun's question. “She’s at dance practice. Been at it all week for her showcase, and it goes real late. She should be back in about an hour if you’re looking for her.”

“Not looking,” Renjun says, “Only noticed she hasn’t been around. What showcase?”

“Goodness,” Jaemin coos. “My hard worker. Saw her this morning on my way to chem, looked a little like death, eyes all dark and broody. I guess that's why?”

“She leaves in the morning before I do, too. Probably dead tired.”

Mark tries to return to scrolling through Netflix’s catalog but Renjun, not satiated, flaps his hand in front of his face. “Wait, but what showcase, though? I didn’t even know anything was coming up. The school is hosting something?”

“Not the school,” Jisung offers instead. He sounds oddly eager to talk about it, and for a second Jeno is rattled by the idea of Jisung paying enough attention to you to know the intricacies of your schedule, until he realizes it’s the topic he’s excited about. “It’s this thing called the Aegon Showcase, a big competition for unknown hip-hop dancers. It’s a nationwide thing so it’s broken up into different showcases in every province, and there technically aren’t supposed to be favorites, because talent is like, everywhere, but pretty much everyone knows that the Seoul competition is the most popular. It’s pretty difficult to get chosen for Seoul, and yet Y/N’s team got in. They even air it on TV.”

Chenle whistles. “I knew about the competition, but I didn’t know all that. That sounds like a big deal.”

He remembers how sheepish you’d been when Somi told them in his car; the awfully shy look he’d caught on your face when your eye met in the mirror.

“It is a big deal!” Jisung declares, sounding proud. “Yonsei hasn’t been on the roster since 2016, so the guys in my hip-hop class are pretty excited about it. There’s posters up in all the hallways of the performance building and noona’s name is all over them. Jeongsob nearly knocked my head off when he found out I had a ticket to see it live, and I didn’t even tell him it was center house because I thought he’d really hit me.”

“A ticket?” Renjun’s spine straightens indignantly. “From where? When was this an option? I want to go!”

Jisung’s shrug is interrupted by the loud smack of Donghyuck’s mouth as he swallows a swig of his soda. “This is how I know you don’t read my messages.”

“What?”

“I sent you the ticket, loser. I sent everyone the ticket like, a week ago.”

“Where the hell did you get them?”

A beat of silence as Donghyuck stares at him, before he realizes Renjun is serious and begins to whine. “So you don’t read my messages or listen to me. Somi. Jeon Somi! Rockstar’s little blonde bestie pulled some strings and gave us all tickets. Gave the rest of us tickets, should I specify, since Y/N-ie doesn’t love us and only got one for Mark.”

The Mark in question only hums proudly.

“Right up in front,” Donghyuck continues. “All she’d tell me is that they’re opening with DNA.”

“By BTS?”

Chenle scoffs. “By Kendrick Lamar. My God. Listen to something other than Seoul Top 50.”

“Their tracklist must be stacked if they’re opening with Lamar,” Jisung adds, awed.

Jeno has never really seen you dance before. It’s something he’s always known about you, sure, but only through word of mouth; He knew you started dancing because of Mark, since your brother has been telling the story to anyone who would listen for half a decade. How you were dragged along to his lesson one day, bitter about missing out on an afternoon of Guitar Hero for some ‘lousy physical activity’, when the dance teacher happened to notice how quickly you’d been picking up on the moves. She convinced you to come to another, and then another, until you ended up attending those classes more often than Mark did.

Those lessons had been before you and Mark transferred to their school though. Mark dropped dance to pick up basketball, which meant Jeno didn’t hear much about it from him, and while you kept up with it, it wasn’t like the two of you were close enough to talk about things like that.

So it simply stayed a fun-fact. A topic only brought up in passing, like Mark randomly mentioning a competition you had one weekend, or apologizing for being late because he had to pick you up from a lesson across town.

A topic only brought up in passing until the next words that fall out of your brother's mouth.

“That’s the type of music she dances to all the time though,” Mark says belatedly. “Kendrick Lamar I mean. She has like, four or five videos on Youtube from that album alone. It was her favorite for a while.”

“She has videos on youtube?” Jeno blurts.

The world pauses. Or it feels that way to him, since he hadn’t even registered the ending of Mark’s sentence before his own mouth was opening without his permission. It’s the first words he’s spoken in nearly half an hour and it shows in how they all glance at him, varying from brief confusion to clear interest in his sudden curiosity— and he instantly wants to kick himself considering that the latter comes from Jaemin, who’s already suspicious that he’s hiding something.

Mark furrows his eyebrows, staring back at Jeno like your presence on youtube is just supposed to be common knowledge.

“I never told you guys? Freshman year of highschool, she had this channel she’d upload all her dance class videos to. Mostly just for progress, to see how she improved, but I guess they must’ve hit some weird algorithm or something because the videos actually ended up doing super well.”

“Rockstar is famous?” Jaemin asks.

Mark scratches his chin. “Subjectively, I guess so. I meant doing well as in like, a dozen of the videos have broken a hundred thousand views, but subscriber wise she’s not—”

Donghyuck chokes so violently on his cola that it sounds like he’s being waterboarded. Instinctually Jisung starts to pat his back, but even he looks surprised; not that Jeno is confused by why. A hundred thousand?

The second that Donghyuck is able to form words again he all but demands Mark pull up her channel on the TV, which is when he finally seems to realize the predicament he’s put you in. All of your older brothers' friends. Watching your old highschool videos. Without your knowledge. Any little sister’s waking nightmare.

Mark tries to backtrack; ‘Ah, well, the whole reason she stopped uploading was because she got embarrassed about all the attention. She’d seriously kill me if she knew I showed you guys.’ But Hyuck only grins. ‘You damned yourself to that the second you mentioned it at all, tiger. You know I’ll just find it on my own if you don't, right? I’ve got resources!’

Doubtful. Donghyuck can’t even find files on his own computer, much less sift through the entire internet for a few six year old videos from a person that’s no longer uploading. Even though Mark doesn’t look fully convinced, glancing warily between his phone and the clock like he’s worried you’ll walk through the door the second he picks up the remote, Jeno knows he’ll fold. He always does.

We shouldn’t, he could say to help. Y/N wouldn’t like it. You know she wouldn’t.

He would’ve a month ago. Maybe even a week ago.

But right now he’s mortifyingly desperate to see you again, even if it’s only through the glass of a screen. So he does nothing but swallow his shame when Mark sighs, “One video. One! And if she finds out, dude, I’m telling her it was you!” and snatches the remote from the coffee table. He does nothing when Mark scrolls through the seemingly endless list of people he’s subscribed to, and he continues to do nothing when you blip to life on the television, Xx_SGirl2002_xX’s youtube channel.

Mark presses play on the first video there is, the last thing ever uploaded to your account— a three-minute clip titled ‘Kiss Kiss - Chris Brown, (J’HO’s ADV class)’ with ninety-eight thousand views.

Jeno knows it’s 2016 from the date in the description but for some reason he’s still startled by how young you are here. This is how you looked when he met you, and its a whiplash he isn't prepared for. Fourteen years old with a glare that could cut down grown men. You have on a baseball cap that Jeno recognizes because it actually belongs to Mark, and an oversized t-shirt over a pair of green sweatpants (that Jeno also recognizes, because you wore them around your house all the time in high school)— but there’s no time to get into the intricacies of your outfit because soon enough the beat kicks in and Donghyuck is squealing like this is his favorite song.

You’re dancing with four others who look just as confident as you, bouncing on their feet before the choreo starts, but it immediately becomes clear why you’re in the front. Your movement is so natural that Jeno would’ve thought you were freestyling if it wasn’t for the others you’re on beat with, easily capturing the center of attention with your style— though he knows you’re not intending to.

That’s how you’ve always been. The brightest person in the room, without even realizing it.

It’s not as surprising as he expects it to be. Despite never having seen you attempt to dance in front of him in your life, he’d somehow always known you were going to be this good. It’s familiarity probably that keeps his eyes on you, even when the videos go on and on and on and new dancers filter in and out of the choreographies. He’s only made aware of how blatantly he’s ignoring everyone else in your videos when Jisung excitedly points out that he recognizes one guy you’re dancing with, some famous popper in the hip-hop circuit, and Jeno has to drag his eyes away from you to even realize you’re dancing with a man in the first place.

Too engrossed in showing you off now to remember why he’d been so hesitant in the first place, Mark, obviously, fails to stick to his word. They’re on video four or five when there’s the very, very sudden sound of the front door handle rattling.

It’s mere dumb luck that Mark manages to scramble for the remote fast enough to mute the TV before you get the door open. It’s even luckier that you wander into the apartment with both your headphones in and your eyes squinted at something on your phone. It’s just enough time for them to all assume the picture of perfect innocence when you do finally look up— appearing almost startled by the sight of them all staring at you with wide eyes, silent and still like a bunch of weeping angels.

Jeno for an entirely different reason than the rest of them, however.

“Hello… all?” you greet, clearly suspicious, but you can’t seem to put your finger on the reason they’re all looking at you, and this makes the whole room seem to relax.

“You’re late, Rockstar,” Jaemin says, playfully scolding, “Take-out’s gone cold.”

“I ate before practice. What are you guys doing?”

“Is it not obvious? Movie night, of course!”

There’s a beat as you glance at the TV behind their heads, all their eyes on you, before you nod slowly.

“Movie night. Right. Uh. I’m going to head in early since I have to be out of here early tomorrow, so try not to have too much… fun out here. I’ll leave you guys to it then?”

You readjust your duffel on your shoulder and pull an apple from the bowl on the island as you pass, not sparing a glance behind as you head for your room.

“Too much fun?” Jaemin echoes quietly beside him, the both of them still staring off after where you’d just been, when Donghyuck curses and brings their attention back to the front.

“Are you fucking— Has this been on the screen the whole time?”

It’s only belatedly Jeno realizes that, in his haste to just get your youtube channel off the screen, Mark must’ve just pressed any recommended video from the suggestions. Even if it didn’t make the most sense for them to be so diligently watching. Because, still muted, a video of an aerobics class plays on the TV dozens of women in a giant studio, dressed in very tight, very small clothes, all bending over and lunging and casually contorting their bodies into positions that would probably make nuns across the country blush.

Quite the movie you walked in on them watching. Together. Without speaking. On mute. Mark gasps when he realizes this and snatches the remote again, frantically clicking on something else like the damage hasn’t already been done, and Chenle laughs until he cries when he, also, finally understands what a sight that must’ve been. Jeno probably would’ve found it hilarious too, if he’d been paying attention to it at all.

Instead, all he could really think about was the fact that while he couldn’t take his eyes off of you— you hadn’t thought to look in his direction once.

Movie night comes to a close with two casualties— Renjun and Jisung, snoring and completely unconscious on the couch and floor respectively— Mark shooing the rest of them out at one in the morning with a loud yawn and a promise to continue Scream VI after everyone's classes tomorrow night.

Per usual, Jeno gets sacked with taking Jaemin home. And per usual, like a Gremlin straight from the films, Jaemin turns into a pit of insatiable hunger after midnight and demands they stop at a drive through so he can get something to eat.

But if Jeno is being honest— he really just wants to go home.

He’s tired. It’s been a long day. Four classes, basketball practice, having to take his car to get looked at because the air coming out of the aircon kept smelling like burnt lemons. The final nail in the coffin had been you not even batting an eye at him when you’d gotten home, when he’s been physically unable to think of anything else besides you for the last four days.

He is entirely ready to call it a night… but he knows that he’ll never, ever hear the end of it if he doesn’t take Jaemin somewhere before he drops him off, and it’s only fate that he spies McDonalds golden arches at the next turn signal.

He whips into the drive through and is preparing to turn right back out of the lot when the food is safely in the vehicle a few minutes later, but Jaemin asks him for something he’s never asked for before.

He asks him to park.

Jeno glances at him, incredulous, but Jaemin doesn’t seem to be joking at all. “You can’t wait until you’re home?”

“I’m hungry, I said. And I want to eat in peace.”

“You had two whole servings of that Lo Mein and still snuck some off of my plate.”

“Don’t fat shame me,” Jaemin replies mildly, eyeing the steaming contents of the paper bag. “My digestion is only a quarter of the reason. Jaehyun will snatch this from me if he sees me come into the house with it. Just park it, will you?”

And because Jeno has never really been one to argue, despite being annoyed by the detour, he does just that.

He should’ve known better though. Jaemin knows a dozen ways to sneak food into that apartment without setting off the nose of his brother; the two have been living together for a year and a half. He’s never asked him to park before because he’s never needed Jeno to park— but he doesn’t start realizing any possible ulterior motives until a few minutes in, when (after he’s polished off half of his nuggets in complete silence) Jaemin asks how he’s doing.

Jeno’s eyebrows dart up to his hairline. “What?”

“I’m asking if you’re okay,” Jaemin says. “Doesn’t take a psychiatrist to see that you’ve been off these last few days. What’s on your mind?”

“What’s on my mind?”

And only then does he put two and two together.

“Is this... is this an intervention?”

“What? Of course not! I can’t just wonder how my friend is doing?”

“You made me drive you into an empty parking lot at one in the morning because you were just wondering? Are you even hungry?”

“I would never lie about food,” Jaemin says with great offense, seemingly forgetting himself for a moment before he sees the jarred look on Jeno’s face. “Well. Okay. Fine. I just… I heard what happened on the balcony with you and Rockstar a few days ago.”

It’s like being suckerpunched.

“You’ve been all weird since,” he continues, “And watching you do nothing about it is starting to stress me out.”

Jeno expects to feel angry once the shock wears off; to get mad at Jaemin for eavesdropping, or butting in, or for trying to offer advice Jeno didn’t ask for. But nothing actually comes to him besides an eye twitch, courtesy of Jaemin’s straw squeaking as he stabs it through the soda cup lid.

He releases the tension from his spine. No need to play coy, then. “Weird is an understatement.”

“Of course it is. You’ve been moping around like you’re about to be executed.”

“Because I screwed up, man.”

“What?” Jaemin says flippantly. “Hardly. There were a few rough edges, like how you probably could’ve gone without calling the poor girl’s eternal undying love for you… cute, but as far as I know nothing you told her was a lie. I don’t actually see where you went wrong in telling her that her brother was the reason you didn’t acknowledge her feelings when she asked.”

Jaemin says nothing for a moment as he leans forward, shaking and then rifling through the brown bag for the few fries that had somehow escaped his previous sweep. Jeno knows better than to take that speech as final verdict, however. A silence this heavy over ever means that there’s a but. There’s always a—

“If you’re not interested in her anymore, that is. Because what you did up there was pretty straightforward, for someone who was actually trying to let a girl down easy.”

And there it is. Jeno screws his eyes shut and exhales for much, much too long, if only to focus on the feeling of his lungs caving in instead of where he is and what he’s talking about.

“And if I wasn’t trying to let her down easy?” Jeno asks.

Jaemin doesn’t even look at him. Just keeps his eyes trained lazily on the traffic going by, humming as he inserts another whole nugget into his mouth. “Then you’re fucked.”

Okay. Here the anger comes, just a little belated. The wave of irritation that hits him at Jaemin’s stupid reply catches him off guard. Then you’re fucked. If Jeno didn’t already know that would he have asked? Did Jaemin bring him out here to rub it in? Just to hear the details?

Without thinking he jams his middle finger into the push to start, roaring the car’s engine to life— if his only goal was to remind Jeno of his colossal mistake then he could finish his damn nuggests elsewhere.

“Woah, woah!” Jaemin bursts as the car jerks into first gear, big eyes wide in alarm, “Damn, man, I was just— Can I finish before you tear out of here like fucking Batman?”

“Why can’t you just eat while I drive?”

“What? No, I meant finish what I was saying! There’s still hope for you, dipshit!”

And he sounds so sure of himself that Jeno can’t help but hesitate. With a huff that even he knows is petulant, Jeno knocks the shift back into park and drags a heavy, tired hand down his face. “What hope.”

“Have you maybe considered telling her how you feel?”

“Did you pull that from an episode of Dr.Phil?” he mocks childishly, but before he can finish Jaemin socks him in the arm hard enough to make him yelp, patience waning, and wary of being hit again Jeno says the first thing that comes to mind.

“No! No, I’ve never considered it, because I don’t… I don’t know.”

Jaemin says nothing, so he just keeps going. “I don’t know how I feel. Whenever I felt myself caring too much about what she was doing I’d just chalk it up to Mark’s overprotectiveness rubbing off on me or something, and I’ve been like that for so long that it’s just become my go-to answer. I’ve never let myself think about it long enough to come to any other conclusion. I couldn’t.”

“Because you were scared of what you’d realize if you did?” Jaemin finishes, unsurprised. “You’re so stupid.”

“Fuck off,” Jeno bites, but Jaemin shakes his head.

“No. You’re actually dumb. You already know how you feel about her. You’ve known. You’ve just never let yourself say it out loud because saying it out loud means confirming it, and confirming it means you have to choose, but not looking at the writing on the wall doesn’t mean it isn’t there. What you still don’t seem to realize is that not choosing is still a choice.”

“A choice that keeps everyone happy,” he replies through a taut jaw. “Y/N got over me, and Mark doesn’t hate my guts. Easy.”

Jaemin looks like he has a lot to say about that statement, but swallows it down to ask the one he finds will get him the closest to his goal. “Why are you even friends with Mark if you think he’ll hate you over something like this?”

“What?”

“Don’t get mad at me, Jeno, actually think. He’s your best friend. You’re closer to brothers than two people who only met in high school. But you swear he’d drop you without a second thought if ever found out that you ever happened to look at Y/N in a way that wasn’t entirely innocent. Why? Are you some sort of threat Mark should be wary of? Do you have nefarious intentions with his baby sister?”

Jeno balks. Jaemin is clearly just trying to rile him up, his questions nothing but rhetorical, but regardless of knowing this Jeno still feels something angry and dark churning in his gut. His voice is a touch sharper than me means for it to be when he says, warningly, “What the hell are you trying to say, Jaemin?“

“I’m not trying to say anything! I’m asking you, because I’m seriously starting to think that you’ve never asked yourself! What reason do you actually have for thinking Mark wouldn’t even hear you out?”

“I know you’ve heard him, man. When he told us she was hanging out with Yeonjun again, you don’t remember that? How pissed he’d get— the tangents he’d go on, how he’d insist no guy was good enough for her, how guys ‘our age’ have nothing good in mind when it comes to chasing after girls? You think just because we’re his friends that rule doesn’t apply to us?”

“I don’t think that, actually,” Jaemin snorts and pulls yet another nugget from the bag. “Especially because Yeonjun was a super senior that was nearing twenty when he graduated, and had a reputation you could see from around corners for using girls like fast food napkins. That’s your big hang up? That Mark didn’t want some sleaze like that hanging around his sister?”

He has a point. But in Jeno’s mind this isn’t nearly enough to undo years and years of Mark’s theoretical judgment hanging over his neck like a guillotine.

“Yeonjun is a strong example, but it still seemed pretty clear to me that he meant that about every guy. Not just the real shitheads.”

“Then you read him wrong.”

Jeno surprises even himself when he laughs. “What makes you so sure, Na?”

“‘Cause he—” And Jaemin hesitates. All that informative bravado wavers, a visible wave of uncertainty crossing his face. “Because a few years ago he pretty much gave me permission. To go after her, I mean.”

Jeno thought for sure that after Wooyoung’s party he’d really experienced it all. The confusion, at first, as the explanation fell so casually from your mouth; Hooked up with one of your siblings friends, Somi said. But you only had one sibling, and Jeno also was pretty fucking sure he knew all of Mark’s friends since. Some itchy part of him wished you were lying— merely putting a finger down to look cool amongst the party goers and not because you’d actually lost the round, but he knew you and was therefore acutely aware of the fact that you weren’t one to play pretend for strangers.

Then, before he even had time to come to terms with why he felt so bothered by this knowledge, Somi accidentally outed this mysterious Mosquito Boy and Jeno felt like he’d just been doused in ice.

In the span of a few seconds he ran though the five stages of grief like a racecar zipping around a closed track. Denial, quick and easy, he thought Somi must’ve just been mistaken. That Jaemin probably just looked like whoever it was that you hooked up with, and in her stupor tried to connect dots that weren’t there. But not only did that stop making sense once he really thought about it— since you explicitly mentioned the lake house and Mark’s birthday, two landmarks that would be very hard to miscalculate— he’d seen the look on your face when Somi said it.

You weren’t annoyed that she got it wrong. You were terrified because she’d gotten it right.

Then came anger. Sharp and barely contained, Jeno’s eyes drifted from your face to Jaemin’s, and a wash of deep, burning… something, took him over. Jeno might not have been able to name the crime Jaemin committed, because you were both consenting adults who were fully allowed to do what they pleased and it wasn’t like Jaemin was bound by blood to tell them everything he did in his freetime, but Jeno as he watched Jaemin smile at you, none the wiser to what secret of his had just been spilled to half their class, he still felt like he was staring at someone who should be on the top of a wanted list.

There simply was no final stage of acceptance, because for the last week he’s been stuck squarely in depression. Replaying that moment on the balcony over and over again like a kid picking at a scab, moping around campus like some sort of ghost as the days went by.

He thought he’d felt it all, in the last four days. He thought that there were no more bombshells to be dropped.

This presumption is blown out of the water when, after the near fifteen seconds it takes for him to compute what Jaemin has just said, Jeno finally feels something new.

And whatever it is, the appearance of it on his face seems to worry Jaemin greatly.

“He gave you… permission?”

“Which I did nothing with,” Jaemin says with careful haste, “I didn’t. He’d just… picked up on something. He took the fact that I dote on her so much as— As a sign, or something, that I liked her, and pulled me aside one day before you and Hyuck got to their house.”

He swallows. “When?”

“Some time when we were juniors. I know it was close to summer because I just turned eighteen.” He laughs, awkwardly and a little too loud, like this is the first time he’s telling this story and is just now realizing how ridiculous it is. Jeno doesn’t laugh with him. “I asked if Rockstar was coming home ‘cause I had something for her, and he said dropped her off at her friend’s house already. Then he got this look on his face and said, super seriously, that he wouldn’t mind if she liked a guy like me. I said what, he said what, and then elaborated that he noticed how much I fuss over her and stuff, and that if I liked her more than I let on that he’d be cool with it. Said I’d— He knew I’d treat her well.”

“Cool with it,” Jeno echoes distantly. “Cool with… you. Dating Y/N.”

“I turned him down,” Jaemin tells him for some reason. “Just laughed it off, because I didn’t know what else to do.”

“Why?”

He blinks like this is the last question he was expecting Jeno to ask. “Why?”

“Obviously, you—” The words almost don’t want to come out. “You’re clearly attracted to her. I don’t see why you wouldn’t take that as a greenlight to really pursue it.”

“You’re asking me why I didn’t ask her out?”

“Yes?”

“Are you kidding? I didn’t do anything about it because of you. So you could then kill me in my sleep?”

“I wouldn’t have felt anyhow about it,” Jeno lies. “If Mark gave you his blessing then that— That has nothing to do with—”

“Yes it does, man! I only brought it up because it’s proof that Mark doesn’t just shoot blindly when it comes to who his little sister likes, and if you don’t have to worry about that, you can stop lying to yourself about what you really want. You have a chance.”

“I had a chance,” Jeno blurts before he can swallow it, truth sharp and instantly sobering. “Before the lake house. Maybe even before what I said on Saturday. But—” He remembers the look on your face on the balcony. The clear, deep hurt. Then he remembers how you looked at him an hour ago. Or how you didn’t look at him, more realistically— Casual, unbothered, composed.

Unlike him, you’ve already reached some semblance of acceptance.

“But this time I think I really messed up.”

The lights of the restaurant are too bright in his periphery. The silence is too quiet, and the air in the car is too suffocating. Again he’s grabbed by the urge to go home, and before Jaemin can say another word Jeno glances at the finally empty fast food box in his lap.

This time when the engine revs and Jeno wordlessly kicks the car into drive, Jaemin says nothing.

You owe it to her to tell her the truth, you know.

Jaemin lives in an apartment with his older brother, a few short blocks from Jeno’s own place. The ride had been mostly silent, neither of them really feeling the need to speak in lieu of the rather tense exchange they’d left behind— the first thing Jaemin said since they left the parking lot was when he was pulling in front of the building, and it was for Jeno to cut down on the moping if he didn’t want to have wrinkles by twenty-five.

Before Jeno could roll his eyes and tell him to get out, Jaemin opened the door and stepped out himself; but not without doing what he does best. Lecturing.

She’s miserable. You’re miserable. I know you know that much.

Jeno only sighed.

All because of one big miscommunication. I know you, and I like to think that after half a decade of being in her house I’d know Y/N pretty well too, and you’re both never going to be able to look at each other again without this hanging over your heads if you don’t sort it out. If you’re so sure that this is the end, then you have nothing to lose by telling her the truth about everything. Everything. How you feel now, and how you felt then. And if there’s any part of you that believes this can be saved, then you need to try as hard as you can to make sure it happens. And it starts with you manning up and telling her feelings weren’t nearly as unrequited as she thinks.

And Jeno wasn’t quite in the mood to tell him he was right, so he didn’t. Instead he squinted at Jaemin, and asked the question that’s been prickling in his mind since they pulled out of the fast food place.

“What Mark said about giving you his blessing,” he started, “You said you turned it down for me.”

Jaemin raised an eyebrow. “Yeah. Because regardless of how obtuse you are, I know what I saw. You liked her. A lot. I wasn’t getting in the way of that.”

A beat.

“And If I wasn’t there to get in the way?”

It’s a clear inquiry to Jeno, cut and dry, but Jaemin laughs like he’s just been asked a trick question. With his eyes narrowed and a cavalier smile in his expression, Jaemin stared at him as if he was thinking ‘Do you actually want to know the answer to that?’ and in that moment without a single word spoken, Jeno saw it all. There was a world quite similar to this one where they weren’t having this conversation, or talking so casually about you, or sharing advice. A world where Jaemin was a more opportunistic person who didn’t care that Jeno had liked you first; A world where they weren’t friends, but rivals.

If you weren’t in the way then she would be mine.

“I don’t think asking things like that is going to help you get the girl.”

“I would still appreciate the clarification,” Jeno said, just as vague.

“Mmm. I bet. Well, Lee Jeno,” Jaemin tapped the roof of the car twice, the whole car echoing with the force of it despite how casually he spoke, “My answer to that question is going to make you do everything but appreciate me, so how about we call a draw here, huh? Before we open that can of worms and everyone gets all… thinky.”

And they both knew that by not answering Jaemin had actually replied loud and clear. But once he heeded his words— really sat there and thought about it, what good it would do for anyone if Jeno knew how Jaemin really felt about you, he found himself agreeing.

Maybe ignorance is bliss.

“You smell like french fries,” Jeno called offhandedly, as Jaemin retreated closer and closer to the revolving doors of his building. He turns right as Jeno steps out of the driver's seat, just in time to catch the tiny cologne he keeps in the console for emergencies. “No chance Jaehyun won’t clock you.”

Jaemin cooed. “So thoughtful you are, No-Jam! If you weren’t so buff and scary, Y/N-ie might’ve had competition.”

And for the first time all night, maybe even all week, Jeno felt a genuine laugh.

[♥︎]: and there it is, folks! please leave a like if you enjoyed! it REALLY gives me the motivation to work on this faster! plus, yay, new chapter after a literal entire year, LOL

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suhnflowerstay · 3 days

Text

game night

bang chan x afab!reader

a/n: this is based on a real life situation so it might not be super relatable (no description of what reader looks like besides the fact that they're afraid of sitting on his lap)

and it is not representative of any characteristics the idols have or anything lol it's moreso therapeutic. it does require the knowledge of Jackbox Games. quiplash is a game where you get a prompt and you anonymously write down what you think is the funniest answer and everyone votes for the funniest one. i'm posting this twice because i originally wrote it for mark but my sister thought it was well suited for chan as well soooo yeah!

wc: 2.9k

tags: toxic situationship vibes (like really toxic), smoking, high emotions, angst, smut, sad ending

You and Chan had known each other for a few years. You had initially met on vacation and got each other's contact information to keep in touch. You were talking all the time and FaceTiming nearly every day. You were friends, such close friends that you decided to go to the same university. Once you moved to his area for college, you were spending all your time with each other. Eventually, the sexual tension between you began to build and before you knew it, your situationship began.

A few months before your friends with benefits relationship with Chan began, he had been sharing with you how messy his previous arrangement was. You had seen other girls come and go because they could never handle him sticking by his word and refusing to commit to them. You were also not interested in commitment, so you felt comfortable going into it. You knew exactly who you were friends with, so you assumed you would be fine. You were just friends who had a sexual attraction to each other. There was no reason that having sex would have to complicate things, right? Wrong.

Yes, there are people who can have a healthy friends with benefits style relationship. Sex is easy to detach from for some more than others. Your relationship with Chan was anything but detached. You were best friends who had sex, and the gray area was extremely gray. You were practically dating without the label, and that brought a lot of negative feelings bubbling up. But you both didn't want commitment. You were terrified of being vulnerable in that way and he, well… he just loved the attention.

Chan's cousin Felix was hosting a game night with some friends, and he wanted you to come along and meet everyone. When you two arrived at Felix’s house, you introduced yourself, and the first words out of his mouth were:

“Are you the one that called on Christmas?”

Immediately, Chan jumped into action to try to shut Felix up. He stood in front of you and blocked Felix from view, mumbling, “No, that was someone else.” You knew he had a previous situationship leading up to your current situationship with him; this was no secret. You knew this because you were the one to talk him through the end of that relationship. You just hadn't realized how intense it must've been if Bang Chan was bringing that "friend with benefits" to meet the family.

You had small talk with Felix, asking him what his major was, and he asked you yours. He offered you drinks and snacks, and you took a seat on the sectional with Chan taking the seat right next to you. You two were in your own little world, giggling about god knows what while he had his arm around you, when all of a sudden the door behind you swings open.

“CHAN PLEASE TELL ME YOU HAVE DONE THE ENGINEERING HOMEWORK!” the disheveled boy yelled. You giggled because of how insane this random man appeared with his backpack barely slung over his shoulder, hair a mess, running up to take a seat on the couch diagonal to you two.

“Y/N, this is Minho. Minho, this is Y/N.”

Minho’s brain is going a million miles an hour, and the first thing he thinks to ask is:

“Are you two dating?”

You and Chan look at each other, and he says, “No, we’re just friends.”

“Oh," the disheveled man says, "Well, it looks like you two are dating.”

Minho proceeds to talk to Chan about whatever homework they had, and his whole demeanor has you nearly falling off the couch with how hard he has you laughing. He has major himbo energy and says everything with so much passion. At one point, he ends a story he's telling with, “WHATEVER FUCKOOO!”

Soon, more of Felix and (kind of) Chan's friends start showing up. A taller guy who catches your eye greets you. He says his name is Hyunjin and makes light conversation with you, asking how you know Chan and Felix and asking how long you've lived in the city. There are also three guys in the corner smoking, and one of them catches your eye as you hear his distinct giggle while he laughs with his friends. Is Chan only friends with hot people, you think. The last guy walks in and very quietly says hi and immediately walks across the room to sit between his friends. Chan lets you know that the shy guy, also known as Jisung, is really shy with strangers, but he's sure Jisung will warm up by the end of the night.

Felix loads up Jackbox Games, and your group plays Trivia Murder Party for a few rounds, and then, a guy named Seungmin says he thinks the group should play Quiplash. There are a few rounds where you make some pretty good jokes, and all of the guys hype you up, telling Chan he brought someone super funny to game night. You even make a quip at Chan's expense, and Minho high-fives you for doing so. At this point, you've had a few drinks, and you aren't drunk, just tipsy. But you absolutely need to pee. You ask Chan where the bathroom is, since this is his cousin's house, and he leads you to the bathroom, waiting for you outside the door. Once you’re done, he drags you to the empty bedroom across from the bathroom and lays back on the bed, pulling you down you on top of him.

“Are you having fun?” he looks up at you.

“Mhm," you hum, "are you?”

“Yeah."

"Your friends are nice. Minho's super funny. I can't believe he's real,” you giggle.

"Yeah, he is... ok, c'mon. Let’s go back before they think we’re having sex or something," he says abruptly. You thought his response was weird, but you didn't think too much about it.

Upon returning to the living room, you see your seat on the couch was stolen by a few of the guys, and you are now forced to sit on a recliner in the corner to watch the game from there. There’s only one seat though, so you just stand while Chan takes the seat.

“What are you doing?" he questions, "Come on. Sit down.”

You pause. “I-I'm okay. I don’t want to like hurt your legs or anyth-”

Chan pulls you down on his lap, so you’re forced to sit down on him. He asks if you want to smoke, and you take a singular hit, not really interested in doing that, and watch the game from afar. Minho has his eyes trained on you two, and you feel his stare. You turn to look at him, and he yells from across the room, “Are you sure you guys aren’t dating?”

You giggle saying, "Yes, we’re sure we aren’t dating."

He tilts his head to the side like a confused kitty and proceeds to ask “So, are you guys cousins?” and you cannot stop yourself from keeling over because what does he MEAN?? What kind of line of questioning is that? Why would his brain jump from dating to cousins? You look at Chan incredulously as you both laugh and confirm once again that you are just friends.

You two keep watching the game, rather than participate, and go back to your own little world until Chan decides he’s ready to go home. You follow him out, saying a single goodbye to everyone in the room. Everyone bids you goodbye in their own way with many of the guys saying how nice it was to meet you and how you should definitely come to game night again. You two walk out and Chan unlocks the car before remembering he has to go back in to get something from Felix. You sit and wait in the car, smiling to yourself, and text your best friend about game night. You make sure to mention the beautiful man you met and how funny it was that he asked if you and Chan were cousins.

Once he enters the car, he slides his hand onto your thigh.

“Did you have fun?” he asks, leaning in to give you a kiss.

“Yes, actually. I really didn't think I would, but that was so nice and all of your friends seem so cool! Minho is such a himbo it’s so funny... I can’t believe you guys are taking the same classes.” you add.

You don't notice, but Chan's hand clenches the steering wheel. He doesn’t say anything and begins the drive home. You stop by the grocery store on your way home to pick up some snacks, and everything between you and Chan seems pretty light hearted.

You get back to his place, shower, and change into pajamas. You two sit on the couch for a bit longer watching shows and just snacking, cuddled up together. You get up to go to the restroom, leaving your phone behind on the coffee table, and when you come back, Chan is in a noticeably different mood. His body language is tense, and he’s moved away from your original spot.

“Channie… what’s wrong?” you ask, still standing.

“Nothing. What are you talking about?”

“It just seems like... like there’s something bothering you,” you insisted.

“Why would anything be bothering me? You’re literally making something out of nothing!” he snapped.

Now, you're officially in a bad mood.

“Fine then! Forget I even asked,” you huffed, collapsing onto the opposite side of the couch to go through your phone.

Half an hour later, your anger has subsided, and you're back to being invested in the show you’re watching. Then, the leading man betrays his love interest.

“Ughhhhhh," you drone, "Why does every man suck? Like even him? You have to be joking.”

“I bet Minho would never do that…” Chan mumbled mockingly from his side of the couch.

“What the actual fuck did you just say?” you snarled.

“Nothing.”

“Please do not fucking tell me that you’re upset over Minho, a man I only just met a few hours ago,” you scoffed.

“Oh, so you’re counting the hours,” Chan said, not even looking at you.

“Chan, shut the fuck up! What are you saying right now? What is your deal? I don’t even know or care about Minho!”

“You sure seemed to care when you texted your friend about how hot and funny you thought he was,” he said, finally looking up at you to see your reaction.

“Motherfucker, you went through my phone? Again? Are you fucking joking? Why would you do that?”

“I didn’t! I saw you texting it,” he tried to say, but you knew that was a lie because you had texted your friend right when you got into the car. He absolutely went through your phone, but this was not the first time.

“You’re a fucking liar, Bang Chan. I know you didn’t see me texting it. And either way, what does it matter to you? Newsflash! In case you weren't aware, I’m not your girlfriend! You made sure of it, and you also made sure everyone knew that tonight!”

Chan scoffed, “What did you want me to say to them? 'Oh yeah we’re fucking’?”

“it doesn’t matter what you say to them because we aren’t anything. And that means you don’t get to be upset over me texting my friend that i thought your friend was attractive," you emphasize, "You’ve done far worse or would you like me to remind you about your sexting with Soyeon or sending good morning and goodnight texts to Sana when you couldn’t even find two seconds to text me back even if it was just to let me know you were busy?"

Chan sits there knowing he can't say anything to that.

"You have even less of a right to be upset because of all the shit you pull all of the time, so I’m not going to apologize for sending my friend one text about a cute boy I will probably never see again." you finish.

“So you would want to see him again?” he tries to say steadily, but his voice cracks.

You look up and see that Chan is looking at the ground now and has tears in his eyes.

“Chris…” you put your arm around him and embrace him.

“I get it, though, like he’s so much more than I could ever be," he sniffles, "He’s so funny without even trying, and he’s just so cute and attractive and everything about him screams 'y/n's type.' I don’t blame you for being interested.”

He pushes himself up to lock eyes with you. “It’s only you, you know? I know you saw the texts or whatever with other girls, but I only care about you. No one else could ever be you. I promise that at the end of the day, no matter what, I only want you.”

He looks down at your lips and hesitates before he kisses you. The kiss starts off slow and slowly progresses into a more passionate, needy one. Chan is grabbing at your hips, your stomach, your arms, whatever he can get a grip on. He starts whining and pulls away, “Please take off your clothes, babygirl. I need you.”

You both strip down in his living room. Chan carefully lays you down on the couch and lines himself up with your pussy before slowly pushing himself in all the way without any issue. You guess high intensity and emotional situations just make you wet now after all the arguments you've had with this man.

“Fuck, baby, you’re so tight," he praises, "You always make me feel so big. it always feels like the first time.”

You moan and beg Chan to move, and slowly, he does. While there’s still a desperate neediness in the air, Chan is moving slowly and intentionally. He keeps his eyes fixed on yours while caressing your body. He praises every inch of you that he touches, littering you with compliments. He traces a finger along every curve and focuses on tracing circles on your tits, teasing your nipple ever so slightly before finally taking the buds between his fingers. He squeezes them, eliciting moans from your "pretty little mouth" as he calls it. He keeps one hand focused on your breast while he uses the other arm to hold himself up as he leans down to kiss you, maintaining the slow but steady rhythm. You wrap your legs and arms around him, pinning him to your chest. This position makes it so much more intimate, and you swear that he's hitting even deeper. The combination is pushing you right up to the edge. By the way Chan starts moaning, you can tell he feels the same.

“Fuck baby, I'm so close,” he groans

“Please cum inside me, Daddy. I need it so bad.”

“Ugh, f-fuck, beautiful, I can’t until you do. Please cum with me baby girl and- fuck- and I’ll fill you up as much as you want.”

His words send you over the edge, catapulting you into a strong radiating orgasm. Your hands are grasping at his arms and back, leaving scratches in their wake, you're sure. It’s very different from what you’ve previously experienced, muted but long lasting, and you can feel it all over. Your orgasm triggers his, and he continues to fuck you through it until the overstimulation becomes too much. He pulls out of you and grabs some wipes to wipe you and himself down. He lays you down in bed and makes his way to lay down right alongside you. He sits up and places his hand on your cheek, turning your head to make you look at him.

“I-" he hesitated, "I’m sorry I went through your phone again,” he says, rubbing his thumb back and forth along your cheekbone.

“It’s okay, Chan,” you reassure him.

“I just- I knew you’d like him. I could tell from the way you were looking at him and how he was looking at you. Minho is never interested in other people let alone other people’s relationships. I knew if he was asking if we were dating, it was so he could ask you out, and it made me freak out," he sighs.

“You have no way of knowing that, Channie,” you reason.

“Regardless, I meant what I said. I know we aren’t official, but I'm only loyal to you.”

He lays back down, and you say nothing.

You say nothing because this is a conversation you have often.

You say nothing because as much as you want to commit to Chan, you probably also aren’t ready.

You say nothing because the previous statement is probably a lie you tell yourself to make yourself feel better in this relationship you have with him.

You say nothing because you know there will be more instances of you finding text messages with other people in which he gives them more compliments/attention/time than he gives you.

You say nothing because you know he isn’t loyal to you at all, and you’d rather not start another fight tonight.

You say nothing because there is nothing here to fight for.

You say nothing as he falls asleep in your arms, and you see his phone light up with a text.

minho: hey can i get y/n's number

#chan #bang chan #christopher bahng #christopher bang #chris bang #bangchan #bangchan x reader #bang chan x reader #chan x reader #christopher bahng x reader #christopher bang x reader #chris bang x reader #skz x reader #stray kids x reader #skz #stray kids #bang chan smut #bang chan angst

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morallyinept · 5 months

Text

Summary: Joel Miller comes back into your life unexpectedly after a gap of thirty years, and stirs up all kinds of memories and longing. Now, as you're stationed on an outpost for five days alone with the man you stupidly let go of all those years ago, you have a chance to confront him about your past life together and all the things you wished you’d said and done.

But Joel’s different now, and you know you need to tread carefully. Joel Miller is not the same man you once knew in another life.

A slow burn romance set in the post apocalyptic world, approx. twenty or so years after the initial Cordyceps outbreak.

Pairing: Post-Outbreak Joel Miller x MatureF!Reader (No name or physical description of reader. However reader is of a similar age range as Joel; in her late forties/early fifties. Joel is slightly older at 56.)

Chapter word count: 4.8k

Series Masterlist

☝🏻See Series Masterlist for full smut warnings & triggers in this story. Chapters that contain smut or triggers will be highlighted in the chapter notes below. 👇🏻

Chapter notes: You and Joel finally - finally! - get close and embrace your feelings. Detailed descriptions of smut.

☝🏻 I WILL NO LONGER BE ADDING NEW TAGS due to some of them not working as they should, despite me tagging, so please ensure you're following me and turn on notifs so you don't miss an update on this story.

Enjoy! 🖤

Previous Chapter

You wake, what feels like an eternity later, but has only been hours, with your head stuffed into the crook of Joel's swamping armpit; the material slightly damp there, from sweat or the possibility of your own saliva pooling in your cheek.

He's asleep, snuffling gently, and the shack is thrust into the pale blues of the night as it carries its silent eeriness with it.

You stir gently so as not to disturb him; your arm numb that’s been crushed under your weight, and stand feeling your legs come back to life.

You step over the wayward bullets scattered on the floor from your panic earlier, transported back to the steady thrum of your heart, mirroring Joel’s movements as you fired at the infected. Keen and unwavering, the world narrowed into single points of focus as you cleared the way for him.

In that moment of controlled chaos, the world reset. A formidable duo against the canvas of the wild, standing as a bulwark against the horrors screeching to get you. A new kinship forged through shared missions and unspoken trust that had never really dissipated, despite the passage of time passing between you.

You felt it then. And you were certain he did too.

The scent of gunpowder lingers on your top, your skin, merging with the organic perfume of the wilderness outside. Approaching the window, you peer out carefully and the valley is still and infected free, aside from the corpses that still litter it from the attack.

Joel’s flooding your line of sight again; shooting at them with a calm rhythm that sends you back into that moment when that unspoken tether between you both convinced you this was all too real.

Funny thing about staring death in the face...

The kiss, God the kiss. You can still taste it on your mouth. Feel Joel’s tongue slip inside and search you out, taste him.

A moment carved out in the brutal landscape of survival, where every ounce of tenderness is a precious commodity and he was feeding it to you, a succinct piece of himself that you'd craved and missed terribly.

The absence of him only amplified now that he's in your personal space.

So many years wasted. So much regret.

So much to say, but how do you even begin? How can you start to tell him that you’ve felt out of sync, incomplete, for over thirty years? It feels like standing on an emotional plateau, the expanse of your failings spread out below. Each step requires careful negotiation over that craggy peak; a perilous dance between intimacy and self-preservation.

You reach for some water, refreshing your mouth and cooling you in the summer heat that still clings to your clammy skin.

Throughout your life, you'd often play this encounter out in your mind with sweet lucidity; something to bring you comfort and cling onto as you shivered in the cold, or maybe some petulant delusion that refused to relinquish its hold from the ledge. Either way you couldn’t have predicted that it would actually birth into fruition through a tiresome and painful labour.

And now that Joel is so within your grasp, reaching out and clutching onto you with two tired, calloused hands, you can’t help but to speculate and ponder on how you can both navigate forward together in this wilderness called living now, despite your mind trying out the slay of convincing you that you shouldn’t question it; you shouldn’t look for holes to pick at and make wider, bloodier.

He’s here and that’s all that matters, right?

A sleepy grunt from Joel stirs your gaze to his direction on the cot, leaving your muddled thoughts to tumble at your feet; a warm mountain of a silhouette unmoved and lost somewhere inside a dream as he clings to the fading remnants of it.

You smile recalling the sincerity of his words. The fact that he still feels it between you both; he never forgot, like you didn’t. You feel it finally warm the cold channels of your veins.

Time is fleeting, a verklempt commodity carrying nostalgia in its blood. Moving at speeds hard to comprehend, and a whole lifetime has almost passed by you both. You wonder how it could be that you’ve got so lucky to have a second chance, when most people in this world hadn’t begun to embrace their first. Their chances were gone, stripped from them and buried in the ground littered with bones.

It only makes you feel some swill of remorse; some ebb of guilt rises up out of the weeds with a small, fluffy head. You shake your head physically as the shadows of doubt recess back into the depths of your cranium.

Too much time has been wasted and you’re determined not to waste anymore. Not now, not when at any moment Joel could be lost to you again through this world digging its feral claws in and ripping him from your clutch.

The heat beads on the back of your neck, a stickiness all over that you feel, more prominently between your legs as it registers.

He’s here and you want him, more than you’ve ever wanted anything.

You swallow the water down, failing to extinguish the burning; the sparks flaring inside your chest full of hunger and need. You make your way back over to him, climbing back on the cot beside him.

His arms gravitate to you instinctively as he wakes.

He smiles in some lazy contentment as you feel warm in his grip.

“What time is it?” Joel murmurs out groggily into the blue fade, a heavy exhale from his nostrils warms your face.

“Late, probably.” You caress your fingers through his hair.

He hums out softly with the smile spreading wider on his lips. He’s so beautiful, even more so in this life now. You examine his aging face in the dying, inky light and take note of all the lines and wrinkles that have set up shop around his eyes and forehead.

He blinks the sleep away, setting his focus on you from curious brown orbs that appear like black glass in the encroaching dark.

“How’s the back?” You query gently. His hand, weathered by life’s challenges, finds a home over yours as you weave through his silvery flecked locks.

“A bit better now.” He says as you peer into him. You're certain he can feel your heart, hear it even, as you rest against the bulky frame of him. “Did ya sleep?” He queries trying to stifle a yawn.

“Mm.” You nod gently.

“Should probably move,” he goes to shift, but you stop him with a gentle palm to his chest, and he eyes you softly; his digits find yours, squeezing gently, when they start wandering over his sternum over the bobbling flannel.

“Don’t you dare.” You shake your head, eyes getting lost and tangled in his own.

A charged stillness hangs between you until you press your lips to his gently, and he doesn’t resist. Melting into you, with a sigh of relief, as his other hand sweeps up your back and clutches you tightly to him.

Joel moans into your mouth, filling you with helium and making you float slowly into the ether. Your head is dizzy, your stomach simmers as his tongue sweeps around yours tasting all your colours.

Joel kisses you as though he's chronically starved of affection as well as nourishment, hungry. He could gorge on you forever, filling himself up on you as his moans and clicks of his mouth confirm these promises to you.

Your heart quickens, you’re convinced you can taste it in your throat, standing on the threshold of a reunion that’s been three decades in the making. Time and the relentless hardships of survival have etched their marks on your faces, your bodies, but beneath the surface, the familiarity of your shared history lingers, burning brighter between you.

The touch, once so familiar, sparks a resonance that reverberates through the years, rekindling the flame that had never truly extinguished between you. It’s very much alive in the way he holds you close, how he gasps into your mouth.

How you know he wants this; wants you just as much.

You shift, straddling over him and then you feel him; excited and wanting as he grows hard between your thighs. Joel growls and delicately pinches your bottom lip between his teeth as you rub yourself against him, the delicious friction winding you up tighter.

“Ya still want me?” He puffs letting your lip go. It’s more a desperate, resounding plea than an actual question. A slight tone of weariness, caution - a faint ebb of fear - laces his voice.

“Always,” you gasp and he grunts. "Always, Joel."

He pulls back, watching you in the shadows and how your eyes find him and pull him under your hypnotic spell. He could never resist you; even with a shot to fuck back and the length of time that has separated you, he’ll find a way to be inside you again. To be at one with you.

To make you come undone and feed him all the pieces of you he’s missed out on for so fucking long - he decides instantly the pain later will be worth it.

“Haven’t even touched ya yet, but ya heart is racin’.” Joel breathes against your face in a coarse whisper.

“How do you know that?” You pant, a catch in your breath.

“‘Cause mine is.” He takes your hand, flattens it to his chest and you feel that thrumming metronome like he said.

“Joel,” you groan. "I want you."

You take his mouth again, smiling. It’s pure fucking bliss; the swirling, sucking and licking of that darned tongue, reminding you of all the ways he knows how to use it. His languorous kiss makes every nerve tingle, every heated shudder birth within your bones, sending you towards the edge already.

His hands, albeit shaky, begin to map the old routes of your body he once knew so well. Trailing all the contours of you, running up your back, down to your hips, squeezing along your ass and thighs. Rising up over the mounds of your breasts where he caresses and squeezes gently as he swallows your pants and gasps as he reminds you of his protective grip.

Your fingers fumble with his shirt buttons, he sits upright with a slight wince as his back cracks, shaking free of the offending item, eager to have you touch him.

You plant kisses over his broad, bruised shoulders, running your hands down the sculpted muscle of his tan arms. His chest is littered with a few moles; whitened scars that you run your fingers over and long to hear the stories of their origin, even if they're painful for him to revisit. You want to know it all.

You scratch your fingers in the soft greying hairs on his chest, tracing patterns in the freckles dotted over him like constellations.

Joel’s hands relinquish you of your top kissing over your skin, and finally your bra, and rather than hide from him, you reveal yourself in your aged flesh and graces.

Breasts that aren't as perky as they once were, skin mottled with your own scars and blemishes. He can see the echoes of the young, wily woman he once knew in the lines of your face, and as he looks upon you now, he relishes the resilience, the tenacity.

The way you can still take his breath away as you hear it dislodge in his throat.

“Ya beautiful,” he husks. And you believe it.

His mouth latches onto your nipple, sucking it into that warm, wet orifice and making you whine as he flicks his tongue against it.

“Mmm,” you breathe out as the hardened nub tingles inside his mouth. You feel it rush over your body, toying with your core as he kisses and licks.

He pushes his hips upwards and you feel him rut against your centre as he gets comfortable on the cot squeaking beneath you both.

You groan out and reach down; your hand sliding down his wide chest and over the swell of his tummy paunch, travelling between you both to feel him out over his jeans.

He audibly grunts as you reach him, squeezing and rubbing gently over him, and your nipple slips out of his mouth.

“Can’t guarantee I’ll last. S’been too long.” He blushes as you palm against him.

You shush him with your fingertips to his mouth, he kisses them gently as they traverse his lips. “It doesn't matter. I just want you, Joel."

“Ya want me, darlin’?” He asks again, heavy gravel plinking out his mouth like gold nuggets.

“I want you inside me,” you whine with so much need strangling your voice that it could be pathetic. But neither of you care right now.

"Always loved bein' inside ya."

He unbuckles his belt as you rid yourself of your jeans and panties, and are back in his lap wholly naked and bare.

His fingers find your bubbly seam, probing at the sticky folds there and he groans out. A delicate exploration, one that tantalises and teases, as he brushes up to your swollen clit and presses against it, watching you react and buck in his lap.

You watch as he tastes his fingers, sucking them clean of your slick and eyeing you as he does so. You instantly melt, your body fizzing.

You pull him into a kiss, tasting yourself on his lips as two of his thick fingers slide up into your pussy; your thighs are seated over his and open for him to whelve.

He sucks on your bottom lip as he slips them in and out, gently curling them against your spot that he finds so easily; muscle memory of your wet cunt that he never forgot.

Once he finds it again, he’s merciless in your undoing.

“So fuckin’ wet for me, darlin’.” He purrs; he’s your complete annihilation as he furrows and strokes deeper pulling those noises out of you he never forgot the sheet music too. "Goddamn..."

“Joel,” you murmur into his mouth feeling him pull you closer to the edge as he fucks you slowly with his thick digits. A fusion of rediscovery and the familiarity of long-lost passion that you don’t ever want to end.

"Aw God… such a beautiful cunt ya've got. Fuck, I missed this." He sighs as he listens to your mewls, your breaths.

The filth from his mouth makes you blind, eyes glazing over as your irises and pupils sink into the whites. Your insides clench around his fingers furrowing deeper in rapture.

"Joel, you feel so good. Oh my God..."

"Just wanna make ya feel good too, darlin'."

“Please, don’t stop.”

"M'never gonna stop."

You reach down and feel the weight of him in your palm, leaking into it as you massage up and down. He hisses and groans, his face running against yours and scratching at your cheeks with his soft scruff as you familiarise yourself with his cock that’s so hard and heavy.

You can feel it throb around your fingers as you work him up; pulsing, he’s a quivering bundle of muscles shaking against your body. Re-discovering all the delicious things that make him whimper, pant and shake like he’s terrified.

“Fuck,” he whines. He remembers this, remembers your touch. Revels in it and craves more as he shudders for breath. His energy, his vibrations getting tangled up in you as you pump him slowly.

“Mmm, Joel,” you pant as he feels you tense around him. Your pussy squeezing as your own grip around his dick falters a little. You can feel it deep in your belly, blooming and buzzing through all your nerve endings; that heat starting to engulf you.

He recognises it; that sweet moment when you tense up fully right before you become boneless flesh in his arms. He’s missed this so fucking much; the feel of your pussy so wet and dripping for him. The way your body shakes like a constant earthquake clacking against his ribs. The tingles on his skin as you moan and pant for him.

The rush he gets when you tell him you’re about to come for him.

“Come for me, darlin’,” he coaxes. “Been so long, let me have it.”

And you do, clenching around his fingers as you soak them; your orgasm peaks through you and makes your thighs shudder.

It’s glorious, fuck it’s like staring into the sun and seeing it for days after when you shut your eyes, burned into the back of your eyelids.

“Fuck!” You caterwaul.

Your body unkinks itself from being coiled up for so, so long. Your eyes water, a silly thing you are, as you feel it bloom and flower; the scents fill your nose with recognition, with remembrance as your orgasm greets you with wide, open arms.

Hello, old friend. I’ve missed you.

His hand grasps yours with an urgency that betrays the years of separation. His touch is electric, sending shivers down your spine. Your palms pressed together, fingers interlocking, squeezing as you come.

“Joel, I need you,” you sigh, begging into his shoulder trying not to drool over it. An unrelenting schism of his name uttered from your lips as you rattle and shake around him. “Please, please…”

And you begging him is his complete undoing.

The head of his cock is swollen and poking excitedly through the uncut skin. He runs his thumb over the gooey bulb; massaging the sticky secretions of glossy precum into it, making his hips buck weakly as he lines it up with your sopping slit.

You feel him, right there on the cusp.

A few pounding beats of realisation that you’re finally both here. Hearing your mutual breathing all around you, echoing like it’s been slowed down and turned up full blast; that laboured hmm-haa as you’re finally connected when he pushes in.

That lingering pause between you both where nothing exists around you anymore. It's just you and him.

The world can burn outside, the horrors and the creatures within can devour it - it doesn't matter. You’re here, he’s here with you.

He’s inside you.

He’s all you need to breathe as you pry your useless lungs from your chest and toss them aside like silk ribbons flying in the wind.

“Ah fuck.” Joel whines out as you sink down fully on him, feeling him stretch you out again after a long hiatus.

He groans out, that choked gasp in your ear as he enters you, flooding down your spine. The cords in his neck tensing; that deep, guttural sound when a man finds his pleasure reverberating out down the valley outside.

He always grunted when he slid inside you. That familiar whine of him escaping him a short, gruff burst sending your skin alight. Every hair on your body responds to him as he claims you again after a thirty year or so hiatus.

Your lips, once a mystery he thought he'd forgotten, are now an irresistible temptation as he kisses you again, deep and with an intensity that burns you up. Savouring it, relishing the feel of it after so long.

You realise he’s not simply fucking you, he’s making love to you.

Tiny pricks of pain are felt deep in your core as he slowly bottoms out and your cunt remembers the shape of him as he fills you fully.

“Ya pussy was made for me to fill it, darlin’. Still so fuckin’ tight.” He groans.

You coo, gripping him as he squeezes at your hips greedily. That single sheath of him into you takes your breath away, and for a moment it’s like you can’t breathe.

All oxygen is stripped from you and floating in a void of nothing where it’s only Joel; the feel of him inside you again at long last and the way he’s staring back at you as though he can’t believe that it’s just happened himself makes your eyes water again.

“Ya feel so fuckin’ good. Mmph… just like I ‘member.” He pants through delicate, desperate pecks at your face.

It’s a collision of pent-up desire, a reckoning of the years you’ve spent apart. The taste of familiarity mingled with the urgency of the present, creating a heady cocktail that intoxicates you both.

“I remember you too, Joel.” You nuzzle into him, clinging onto his broad shoulders. “God, your cock is still so huge.” You gasp with a bewildered giggle. It’s perfectly unbearable as you grind slowly on it.

“Yeah?” He smirks. “So big it’ll rip ya open, huh? Ain’t that what ya used to say?” He teases.

A small, juddery chuckle escapes you and he feels you clamp round his cock as you do. Joel shunts his hips upward once and it hits you, all the way deep in the furthest reaches of your cervix and you cry out.

"Like that, remember?" He croons.

"F-fuck, yes!"

He does it again and you claw at his skin desperately with your nails.

"Joel!"

He does it again. And again, until he settles into a heady rhythm as he fills you with each thrust, your clit grinding against his pubic bone deliciously.

You’re mewling, clutching onto him as you remember his body connected to yours like this and experience it again all over for the first time.

Your hips meet his every snap with a wet mash as you take him in. He packs you out, rubbing against the right spots and you start to see chrome stars gathering under your eyelids again.

“Joel,” you mewl as the tension starts stiffening your vertebrae straight and spreads into your pelvis, locking up around him. Your walls flutter and squeeze and he groans the most delicious sound in your ear.

Every touch, every caress, carries the weight of history - a brutal history that begs to be rewritten. The grittiness of your pasts fuel the fire, and the room becomes a battleground of desire and the utmost acquiescence.

“Mmm, don’t stop,” you plead as he smothers you wholly. Your head feels like it no longer belongs on your neck, your eyes are rolling back as though you're possessed.

Your body snaps back, letting go. You shake; your cunt clenching, soaking. Surrendering wholly to him.

“That’s m’girl," he pants. "That’s m’fuckin' girl!” Joel praises as you flood his throbbing cock.

All gentle masculinity gone as he grabs you tightly, shunting your hips against him; leaving bruises in your skin to bloom into violet flowers as he fucks you through your peak.

You cry out, constricting around him. Feeling it ripple all over your body; punching glitter out of your back in colourful, metallic bursts. You throw your head back taking in a deep, heavy hit of oxygen, but there is none when you’re this far thrown up into the universe.

The feel of his hot breath against your neck and the slither of his wet tongue leave aftershocks flooding through you. His arms crush you closer as he continues to wind and flex.

You look at him when you resurrect from the dead, and he smiles crookedly through those pink lips you need to taste again. He’s not lost it, that ability to leave you absolutely wrecked as though high on some wondrous drug.

And like an addict, you’ll always crave him.

You kiss him deeply and he completely surrenders too.

“M’gonna come,” Joel husks, sweat from his forehead sticking to your face. You want it; you taste it on your lips and lick the salt of it up.

“Come inside me,” you mewl.

“Ya sure?” He queries with weak, desperate trepidation.

You nod. “Fill me up, Joel. It's okay." You assure.

Little breaths of "fuckfuckfuck" puff out of him on a ragged whisper as he feels your pussy milking him until he’s coming deep inside of you; spraying you down with that thick pearly warmth.

His body jolts and his grip tightens further into your hip skin as he releases. Feeling your pussy pulse and rib around him from the sensitivity; those fluttering twitches against his shaft squeeze him further into an utter brain dead mess.

“Aaw fuck.” He whines gently.

You kiss all over his sweaty face until his lips latch onto yours and he groans contentedly into your wet cheek flesh.

You both rock to a slow gradual halt; staying sheathed on him until your centre becomes a faintly ebbing contraction of muscle that eventually stills and leaks him out down his balls.

Joel’s voice is a gravelly whisper finding you in the violet hues of the dark and being strangled.

“Ya kill me, darlin’.”

You stroke through his curls, untamed and damp at the back of his neck. His arms hold you close, pressing you to his chest as he plants kisses along your collarbone.

You pull his head up and look at his face, into his sleepy, dreamy eyes. His beard isn't full, in fact it reminds you of a teenager trying to grow one and being left with patchy fluff. It's greying slightly in some places, towards his ears and chin as you run your fingernails through it scritching gently. But the moustache is thick, despite being short enough to see and taste his pink chapped lips.

So you do; a deep kiss that melds your skin and binds you to his. He kisses back deeply and then plants an amuse-bouche of little tender kisses over your lips and chin to seed and grow.

“I… love you, Joel,” you say as you pull away from him.

You can’t help it, you always have. It just flows naturally, feels right.

And the lesson here is not to let things fester. Seize the moment in this crazy, horrific world. Too long have you spent feeling incredibly bereft of hope. A complete immolation of you as you fight and bolster, endure and survive.

This can't be all there is left in this world. There has to be more. And you found it, you finally fucking found it.

Kelper was right, he was right to bring you back, he was right to breathe life back into you. He knew, that bastard just knew. You smile, thinking of his face when he'll say he told you so.

Joel nudges his forehead to yours and breathes out in sweet relief. “I never stopped lovin’ ya.” He replies. “Not really.”

You sniff trying to stop the tears, but they fall onto his thumbs as he holds your face close to his. He can taste them on his lips, drinks them down as you let them go, free falling to their death as they take some of the grief and suffering with them, lightening the load.

It shifts. You don't know how or why or when. Just dwelling in his energy now, rather than the lines around his eyes.

They're still beautiful, Joel's looks have only gotten better with age, you’ve deduced, but it's not the thing that’ll steal your breath now. No, it's the subtleties. The way he glows inwardly when you catch a rare smile he throws you in the shack. The safety you feel in the weight of his arms right now that stops the worry and angst of his absence for decades almost immediately. It's in the words he doesn't say, because he doesn't have to say them.

And sometimes he can’t, and that will be alright.

You realise that Joel now in this world, is the man you've always wondered what it could be like to be loved by. Joel back then wasn't ready. Wasn't mature enough. He hadn't had everything stripped from him so he could appreciate the small things, the finer details. That comfort in silence, that warmth of a body that just wants to be next to him because they simply enjoy his bruised weight crushed against them.

And as you rest contended against him, slowly allowing yourself to shed some of those crusted layers of pain in salt water tracks, Joel does the same as he contemplates this too.

As he allows himself a moment to see in the opaque fog as it starts to shift and thin out.

He knows he loves you; that he loved you back then, and loves you now.

Love is no longer some massively unattainable thing that needs to be filled with capitalist sentiment to be brought. Love, to Joel, is in the small things unnoticeable by others.

In a world when you have nothing, sometimes forgoing even the basics, like food; love is the thing that will be savoured when it’s found, taken care of. Not tossed around so foolishly or frivolously like before.

Love is to be planted, grown and watered; tended to every day. It's leaves smoothed and rubbed gently between a finger and thumb. Pruned and clipped so it can bloom into something beautiful that he can dare to enjoy in this rotten world that has already taken so much from him.

And he refuses to lose anything else - he can’t. He's just one fucking man, he can't.

“S'never gonna be enough,” he murmurs a little while later as you’re laying in his arms on the cot.

Both naked and he’s running his hand down the length of your spine leaving goose pimples. “But I got as much love in me to give as ya fuckin’ need.” His voice is in the roots of your hair. "I dunno if it’s gonna be easy, if I’m gonna be easy at times… But m'gonna try. I want to."

You smile with wet eyes, and place a kiss just below his nipple. “You’ll always be more than enough, Joel.” You lift your head to find him in the dark. “You’re everything.”

Joel’s arms cradle you so tightly that he could snap your bones.

“M’not goin’ anywhere, darlin’. It’s you n’ me now, okay?”

To be continued...

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