By The Time I Knew I Truly Loved You

Pairing: Steven Adler/Reader Word Count: 800~

Info: No Smut, Fluff, Happy Ending, Emotional, Mentioned Drug Use, Post-Stroke, /reader in a way that you can imagine just about anyone as the narrator its VERY vague

Summary: The month I knew I truly loved you was cold. It was 1996, sometime around October, but after the stroke, every day seemed to blend together. I begged with God, pleaded that you'd wake up and remember how to live; to function.

Authors Note: another old one from ao3 because i have a bunch of shit i never reposted!! this was the first gnr fic i posted so yay for that, hope it isnt TOO corny

The month I knew I truly loved you was cold. It was 1996, sometime around October, but after the stroke, every day seemed to blend together. I begged with God, pleaded that you'd wake up and remember how to live; to function. I prayed that you'd remember to speak overnight. Everything was so hard now. We- you, communicated grunts and grumbles of vague words to which I would sob over in the middle of the night. We slept in different beds. Other people were always in our home because you needed caretakers, and yet I convinced myself to hold on. 

The week I knew I truly loved you was hectic. You were frantic for God knows what reason, clawing at floorboards and yourself. I watched your mop of hair get more and more matted day by day as you adamantly opposed brushing it. You smelled of musk, a smell I once relished and showered myself in by wearing your clothes while you 'recovered' in the hospital. We had five different caretakers quit that week, so I had to resort to begging in the newspaper. Eventually, I found someone new, but what would have happened if I hadn't? One day, I realized you wanted your stash. You still had something, left forgotten in the floorboards, and you were determined to find it even though you had no memory of where it may be. We had to rip our home apart, piece by piece, to make sure you didn't find that stash- if it even existed, and yet, I convinced myself to hold on. 

The day I knew I truly loved you, we had let the sunlight waste as we spent the whole day 'fighting', if you could even call it that. It was like arguing with a stubborn child, even though I knew you didn't mean to be childish. We sat at the dinner table; you at one end with a stack of blank notecards and a pen, me at the other with only my voice and frustrations. You had taken to writing so much better than you had to speaking. So far, this was the only way we had somewhat fluent conversations since the stroke. It was horrible. I missed the silly way you poorly serenaded me with love songs. I missed the joking debates we held together, arguing on why one superhero was wholeheartedly superior or something along those lines. I missed when I didn't have to monitor everything on the TV because your therapist told me anything could set you off into another relapse.  I missed when it was just us in the house with no needed caretakers, and yet, I convinced myself to hold on. 

The night I knew I truly loved you, I stormed away and sulked in what used to be our bed. You had knocked on the door at two in the morning. I groggily opened it to ogle at your disheveled form. You stood there; pajama pants barely hanging onto your skinny hips, a broken hairbrush outstretched in your hands, hair tangled to your ears with another restless night, and a quivering lip paired with the glossiest eyes I had ever seen. My eyes had pricked with tears when I saw you, really saw how scared, lost, and small you were. I spoke not a word, simply let you crawl into our bed. I needed no more convincing, I chose to hold on and never let go for as long as I could. 

The moment I knew I truly loved you, I had just finished brushing out every knot and tangle from your mane as you sat between my legs. You turned toward me and stared for a couple of minutes before beginning to climb out of bed, but I stopped you. I needed you. You needed me. So, I simply held you. I held you for hours. Then, with as much force as you could muster you muttered three words that changed me. 

"I love you." 

The moment after I knew I truly loved you, I shrieked and sobbed so loud I swore the neighborhood shook. I tried to steady myself with the burst of pure joy that overwhelmed me, but I was over the moon. I wept and wept as I held your head to my chest and repeated how much I loved you, too. Those were the first words you spoke to me for months. Finally, you pulled away and I was met with your beautiful smile. It was so different, though. It was no longer a smile that showed for when you got your high, it was a show of love and gratitude. God, I was so lucky to have held on.

Tagged by  @theworldisabrokenbonebutitishome - thank you so much!! :D

3 Ships You Like:

Guo Changcheng / Chu Shuzhi! (ahahah bet no one saw that coming LOLOL, ok going to try to go outside of Guardian now :D)

Nie Mingjue / Jiang Cheng

Mobei-jun / Shang Qinghua

First Ship Ever: Oh, this is hard. I would have to say Scott and Jean from the X-Men.  I started reading them during the first Dark Phoenix saga and was hooked!  I loved Dark Phoenix Jean Grey :D

Last Song You Heard: Thoughts on Strange Visitors from the album Space Heroes & Other Fools. I’ve been on a filk music kick these last few days and am proud to admit it! :D  For more mainstream music Stalker by IAMX (seriously this has such Weilan vibes! :D)

Favourite Childhood Book: The Dream Tree.  I loved that fuzzy little caterpillar who just wanted the answers!

Currently Reading: I just started Oak King Holly King.

Currently watching: The K-drama Knight Flower. I’m really loving it! :D

Currently consuming: Delicious cronchy pretzels.

Currently craving: The freedom to not feel so bogged down by work responsibilities.

Tagging: @snarkivistfic @silvandar @griseldagimpel @felinesomnambulist @yilian0203 @flamingwell @tehfanglyfish as always no pressure no pressure! :D

9 Fandom Peeps to Get to Know Better

I was tagged by @hideyseek thanks so much my friend!!!

3 ships you like: WEILAN my babes my beloveds my absolute darlingest boys! also weilan derivatives: LUOLIN (Luo Fei from Detective L/Lin Nansheng from The Rebel). Can I list anything not vaguely Guardian-related atm???? Eeeehm why not: QINGYA (Qingming and Boya, from The Yin Yang Master: Dream of Eternity specifically), bc how can you not ship it when the shipname is literally in the Chinese title of the movie (晴雅集).

First ship ever: ooooomf you think i remember that? probably sth Tolkien-related? Glorestor (Glorfindel/Erestor) perhaps? idk.....

Last song you heard: uuuuuhm Poor Unfortunate Souls from the Little Mermaid (but specifically the OG Broadway Cast version)

Favourite childhood book: ohhh there is too many to choose :((( I will just list a few. De Wereld van Sofie by Jostein Gaarden (printed originally in Norwegian, but I read it in Dutch, hence the Dutch title. Iit really turned my world upside down when I was eight.) Secondly Mark Tijsmans's De Ridders van de Ronde Keukentafel (which I guess was my first experience with the Major Character Death rating, at around the same age. I remember crying so hard.) I loved the Grey Ranger series by John Flanagan also (also read in Dutch, obviously). And definitely also The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel series by Michael Scott, which my aunt recommended to me. I'll stop now.

Currently reading: actively? nothing. technically I'm still halfway into the first volume of MDZS, but i have been for over a year so... I still need to finish Yu Hua's Brothers also, bc my high school Chinese teacher gifted that book to me (signed by the translator even) upon graduation (5 years ago) and I never finished it because it's sooooo long and I keep getting distracted, and I feel vaguely guilty about still not having finished it.

Currently watching: Parallel World!!! Which I'm having a blast with. Bai Yu and Ni Ni are sooo much fun together. But I briefly interrupted it to finally watch Shadow and Bone. I'm gonna get back to Parallel World soon though.

Currently consuming: nothing. though I should probably get myself something to drink soon. It'll be lunch time in like half an hour. I'll do it then.

Currently craving: not really anything? I think? More sleep probably, but that is an always problem.

Thanks again for the tag <333

Tagging: @omaenanimonoda @the-marron @lucientelrunya @dual-domination @pangzi @programmedradly @mjsakurea @aredhel-of-doylkien @deathofsanity if you want to :)))

Tagged by @snarkivistfic! Thank you!!

1. What ship were you completely obsessed with when you were a teenager, but now you don't care about anymore? It would have to be Jean Grey/Scott Summers.  I have lost the majority of my taste for X-Men comics.

2. Which ship would you consider your first one? See question 1 LOL. 

3. Your first fanfic was about which couple? I didn’t start writing fanfiction until 3 years ago so it was all Weilan (Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan) from Guardian :D

4. Do you remember the first couple you saw fanart of? Uhhh probably Jean Grey and Scott Summers LOL.

5. Have you ever gotten into ship discourse? Nooo. I cannot stomach arguing.

6. Did you use to have any NOTP or have one currently? I mean not really? I just don’t read those ships I’m not into 😊

7. Who were the couple in the last fanfic you read? Astarion and Halsin.  Oh BG3 you have a strong hold on me right now.

8. Currently, do you have any OTPs? ChuGuo (Chu Shuzhi/Guo Changcheng), Weilan (Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan) and MingCheng (Nie Mingue/Jiang Cheng).

9. Is there any couple that, to this day, you are extremely mad about not getting together? I can’t think of any off the top of my head.

10. Is there any ship you used to dislike but now you think they are kind of interesting? Hm.  Nothing pops up in my brain, but I’m sure there was at some point in my life.   

11. Do you have any ship that, in the past, would've been considered normal but now you would be cancelled over? Not that I can think of! 

12. What is your favorite crack ship? I don’t know if I have any crack ships, depending on how you define it, but I think the smaller ships often are seen as crack ships.  Otherwise nah!

13. What is the couple you read the most fanfics about? ChuGuo and Weilan.

14. What do most of your ships usually have in common? Oh what an interesting question!  It probably has to be not thinking you deserve love and then the person who loves you shows you that you do deserve love.

15. What you absolutely hate in a ship? I guess just the ship breaking up and never resolving their issues and staying in a relationship.  I love me happy endings. ALL THE HAPPY ENDINGS.

If anyone wants to grab this you can totally say I tagged you :D