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1-800-kami · 9 months

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R U MINE? feat gojo satoru (II)

gojo satoru has got to be the picture definition of a stereotypical college frat boy. he’s cocky, loaded with his daddy’s money, and dangerously handsome. it seems like common sense to stay away from him since you’ll never get more than a one-night stand out of it.

that’s why you choose to turn a blind eye once you’ve come to the horrific realization: you’re in love with him. and you’re just itching to ask…

“are you mine tomorrow? or just mine tonight?”

IMPORTANT: this is part TWO (and the final part) of the r u mine? mini series. make sure to read part one of this fic before proceeding! :)

content: 5.4k words, afab!reader, rich college frat boy gojo, SMUT (fingering & unprotected sex.. wrap it before u tap it kids!) ANGST, (i listened to deftones while writing the breakup era LMAOO i was in my feels 😔) gojo "everything reminds me of her" satoru is really going thru it, idk how to feel about the ending tbh, cheating implications, kinda proofread ig, more emo gojo (u luv to see it)

author's note: guys. where do i even start?? first of all, thank u for all the support on the first part of this mini series!! we also hit 100 followers on this blog so tysm for supporting me n my writing <3 here's the long awaited part two (n also the finale) as i promised that i would get it out over the weekend! just a quick announcement that i may be a little bit more inactive from here on out.. mainly because classes r starting again nd im starting to get busier. i do have more fic plans though, (and a geto smut in my drafts? 👀) so i'll make time to write when i can! happy reading and thank u for all the support on this silly little series :)

tags: @soley613 @feariteriu @bear-likes-mushrooms @96jnie @keilaq1 @whydohumansss @luftyluft @fatbootymuncher (bold = i'm unable to tag u)

reblog and interact for a kiss ;)

everything’s been hazy.

you don’t really remember how you got home– you either waved down a cab or walked until you somehow found your house. either way, the alcohol is worsening the pounding in your ears. the straps of your dress are clinging terribly against your skin–you want to take it off, you want to wear something more comfortable, you want to just go to sleep, preferably forever… but you can’t bring yourself to.

you can’t even bring yourself to move.

so the rumors really were true? but why did gojo pursue so far just for you? why did gojo say those words to you when you spent the night together? why did gojo try so hard to convince you that night that he wanted to have sex with you because he loved you–and not solely because he wanted to have sex?

why did gojo lie to you?

another series of pings sound throughout the room, and you finally move to silence your phone. the noise is all so overwhelming. why the hell is your phone blowing up?

you check your notifications–mostly dms from people you don’t know, either asking if you and satoru were dating, or questioning you about what the hell happened at the party. you know that you’re gonna be the subject of gossip once you’re back at campus, and you hate it.

you were surprised at the numbers once you scrolled down your notification list a little further. ten missed calls from satoru, accompanied by a series of fifteen panicked messages. you open it, and you stare sadly at his contact photo and name, remembering the fond memory behind it. once you two actually started dating, you were merciful enough to add a heart next to his name, and even updated it to “toru”. he was elated at that.

you think you can barely even call him gojo now.

the most recent message was barely sent a minute ago. like it was on cue, you see the bright headlights pull up outside of your door. you wanted to sink into your couch and never resurface ever again.

you hear suguru’s car door open and close, and then frantic knocking outside. you walk to the door while sniffling, looking through the peephole just to confirm your suspicions. it was satoru.

“i can hear you crying through the door, y/n. i know you’re there.” he takes a deep inhale, and the tears start rolling down your cheeks again once you hear the complete and utter vulnerability in his voice. you just don’t know what to believe anymore. “shit, i’m crying too. well, i’m gonna explain myself even if you don’t care enough to listen to me. uhm, believe it or not, what happened at the party wasn’t my doing… at all. when you went to use the bathroom, this girl went up to me and started flirting with me, like she was waiting for you to leave or somethin’. i was g’na tell her to go fuck off but she pushed herself on my lap and before i could do anything about it you walked in and it was just all horrible timing and- god. i know it sounds unbelievable, right? you must think i’m terrible right now.”

“you don’t have to believe me. if i were in your shoes i wouldn’t know what to think either. i’m just… explaining what happened.”

there’s a long period of silence between you and satoru, aside from the occasional sniffling on both ends. you don’t know what to say. you want to believe him. you want to do nothing more than to open the door and let him hold you in his arms again, but you just don’t know what to think anymore. you poured your entire heart out to a man who you knew you shouldn’t be messing with, and now you don’t know who or what to believe. you feel like a fool, and you’re just tired. so damn tired. the silence feels asphyxiating, like it's tearing your relationship with satoru further and further apart the longer it draws on.

satoru is the first one to break the silence. “i’m guessing from the silent treatment that you don’t believe me. it’s okay, y/n. i’ll wait an eternity for you to forgive me because i’ll always choose you- fuck… over anything, and i hope you know that.”

your mind is a mess, and satoru’s words make it even messier.

i’ll wait an eternity for you

i’ll always choose you over anything

you put your head in your hands and sob. it hurts.

a minute passes–gojo hears you get up from where you’re sitting behind the door, and his heart fills with hope.

“i just… i just don’t know how to believe you, gojo.”

his heart breaks when he hears the door–presumably to your bedroom–open and close, leaving him alone with his shattered heart. his heart breaks when he takes in your voice, noticing how weak and exhausted you sounded. he wonders how much you’ve cried just from this past hour alone. his heart breaks once he realizes that he’s alone with his thoughts again, alone with the voice in his head that was berating him for not being able to prevent all of this if he hadn’t frozen up and just pushed her away the second that girl started flirting with him. finally, his heart breaks once it registers that you called him gojo–the last name that he shares with his corrupt and money-crazy family… the family he tries so hard to get away from. it was also the name you called him during the days that you barely trusted him.

now, he’s back to square one, and he has none of your trust again. this time, satoru swears that he’ll do anything in his power to get it back once more.

you didn’t come to school today.

there’s been nothing but radio silence on your end. gojo has sent you countless messages over the weekend asking how you’ve been, with the occasional desperate voicemail where he tells you that he loves and misses you. you’ve turned off your read receipts, so gojo doesn’t even know if you’ve seen his texts or listened to his voicemails. he’s concerned for you, even though he knows that he’s the reason behind all of this. he was hoping to talk things out with you today.. but you weren’t even here.

one thing gojo knew about you is that you cared deeply about your academics, and you wouldn’t miss attendance even if you were sick. it pains him to know that he was the reason that you weren’t here today. you were avoiding him, and he felt helpless.

he’s talked to geto—and the best advice that his best friend could offer was to “find proof that you didn’t cheat on her.” he’s right, though. the last thing you had said to gojo was that you don’t know how to believe if he’s telling the truth or not. gojo has absolutely no idea how to prove his fidelity to you, since words clearly weren’t enough. it frustrates him to no end.

gojo now knows that he feels absolutely lost. all when he’s not with you.

it feels nerve-wracking to walk the halls.

he remembers telling you the night that you slept together that he’d learned over time to drown out the rumors about him. he learned not to care about what other people thought about him, and he eventually became unaffected by the school’s gossip.

however, this time was different.

this time, he finds it difficult to drown out the rumors when he hears your name in them. he flinches every time someone whispers your name and his as he walks the halls, feeling that all eyes are on him. “i heard y/n and gojo broke up…” “they were dating?!” “yeah.. i didn’t believe it at first, either! apparently he…”

he doesn’t want to hear it, so he walks a little faster. it hasn’t felt this suffocating to be on campus in a while.

maybe that’s partially why you didn’t show up. rumors are hard to ignore if you don’t know how to shun them out.

gojo lets out a sigh. he decides that he’s going to ditch the rest of class. you weren’t here, he couldn’t talk to you, and he felt he was gonna go mad if he heard your name spoken by someone again, so he turns to leave, but flinches as he feels a hand lightly tap his shoulder.

“gojo-san?”

he turns around, with a girl that he’s never seen before standing in front of him… not that he pays attention to them in the first place, though. he raises his eyebrow in question, and the girl looks so nervous she might pass out. “i have to tell you something-“

“if it’s a love confession or whatever, i don’t want to hear it-“

“-no!” she flushes a deep shade of red, and he fights the urge to roll his eyes. she coughs awkwardly at his expression. “um, no.. it’s not that. please, just give me two minutes in the library. i have something to tell you.”

he decides to entertain this girl for a bit. he’d be lying if he said that he wasn’t curious about what she had to talk to him for. gojo sighs and says, “two minutes. that’s all you’re getting.”

“this is about the party last friday, no?” he says while taking a seat near one of the tables. he feels sick just being here. he’d never gone to the library before meeting you–as he had no reason to go here at all. then, he started accompanying you everywhere as he tried to win your heart. “study dates” were frequent here, and he even remembers forcefully changing his contact name and number on your phone during one of your dates.

gosh, everything literally reminds him of you. he can barely live like this.

she takes a seat across from him, and she shamefully nods at his words. “i went to the party on friday, and i just want to say i’m sorry-”

gojo gets up to leave. he can’t do this. he doesn’t need anyone’s pity. pity can’t change the fact that you still won’t talk to him. she panics as gojo is about to walk away. “wait!”

the librarian tells her to quiet down, and she mutters an apology. still, she persists. “please, just wait for two minutes… i need two minutes to explain myself. you promised you’d give me that.”

she stares at gojo, who hasn’t left yet, and takes that as her opportunity to speak. “i was a friend of… her,” he doesn’t need an explanation to know who she was talking about. “the reason why she came up to you was because of a dare i told her to do. she’s had a crush on you for a while now, so of course she was willing to flirt with you.”

“um, that was the dare, by the way. my friend told me to record it, because we were all drunk, and we thought it would be funny. just another memory to laugh at in the future, right? we didn’t know you were dating the girl you were with at the party. sorry but, we assumed she was just a fling… or something… we didn’t know she was your girlfriend.”

“yeah, i was dating the girl at the party.” gojo scoffs, and he feels his anger bubbling up again. “then your friend had to do that stupid dare, and she won’t fuckin’ talk to me now.”

“i’m sorry-”

“i don’t need your apologies. is that why you came up to me? to apologize so you don’t feel guilty about what happened anymore?” gojo sneers. he was right, though. guilt is ridden all over her face, and she can’t even meet his eyes. he’s about to leave, thinking that this entire conversation was useless, but gojo thinks back on what she said earlier.

“...my friend told me to record it…”

he turns back to look at her, which surprises her, to say the least. “hey, you said you recorded the dare, right?”

“uhm, yes.”

“so you still have the video?”

“it should be in my camera roll somewhere-”

“if you came here to apologize to me, then you should send me that video.” she looked a little horrified at his words, and gojo could almost laugh. “what? i’m not gonna do anything bad with it, god.”

she thinks about what gojo’s intentions could be with that video, and her eyes light up in recognition as she connects the dots from what he said beforehand. i was dating the girl at the party… then your friend had to do that stupid dare… and she won’t fuckin’ talk to me now.

she nods in understanding. this is the least she could do for him. she pulls out her phone, looking for the video, and says, “i hope you two make up soon, gojo-san.”

gojo satoru walks- no, runs out of that library with determination. determination as he finally has the video evidence of what happened at the party–his saving grace so he could finally get you to forgive him.

you miss him.

you miss him like hell, actually, and you blink at the messages he just sent you in complete disbelief.

you didn’t show up to class today because you were afraid. you were afraid to see satoru again, yes, but you were also afraid of what everyone else would say about you. the party was one thing, but the after-effects and the rumors were something completely different. you didn’t have the mental capacity to deal with that, unlike satoru, so you stayed home. all because you were afraid of what would happen on campus.

you just wish things would go back to how they were before… all of this happened. you didn’t want to admit it, but you’ve read all of satoru’s messages, and you’ve listened to all of his voicemails. you’ve cried to them. and it hurts because you’re still torn apart in the midst of your own feelings. and now, satoru wants to talk to you, because he’s been wanting to do nothing but fix everything between the two of you.

the doorbell rings, and you almost jump out of your skin.

you didn’t even know if you would open the door or not. despite that, you felt your body moving on its own, like you were relying on your own instincts. you washed your face to get rid of the dried tears on your cheeks, brushed the tangles out of your hair, and dressed into something more presentable. the next thing you know, you’re leaning against the wall next to the front entrance. your shadow is visible underneath the door, so satoru knows that you’re here.

“hi, y/n..” he sounded so nervous that you almost laughed, but you felt equally as terrified as him. “i have something to show you… uh, on my phone. if you don’t want to see me, it’s fine, i’ll just send it to you, but i’d really prefer if you open the door and we’ll talk about this inside-”

your hand is already reaching the door knob before you can even think about it. it’s such an impulse decision that you look at him in surprise once you open the door. it’s the first time you’ve seen him ever since you were at the party. it’s only been three days, but you can’t help but notice how his eyebags are more prominent, his eyes are a little redder, and he looks nothing short of exhausted.

“hey,” he manages to breathe out, his eyes meeting yours. “can i come in? please?”

you nod, too stunned to say anything, and he exhales in relief as he walks in. the two of you sit on the couch, and gojo notices how you’re keeping your distance from him. it breaks his heart a little.

he looks for the video on his phone and gets ready to show it to you. this is it. his last ditch effort for your forgiveness. he’s really fuckin’ hoping that this works. “i got this video from a girl who came to the party. it’s a recording of, um, what happened.”

he hands the phone over to you, and you take it skeptically, still choosing to keep silent. you press play, and you watch the recording. a shaky hand holds the camera, and the person behind it says, “holy shit, she’s actually doing it!” they're presumably talking to their friend, and the camera focuses on a girl walking over to gojo. your heart is pounding, eyes widening in recognition as you stare at her... the one who caused all of this in the first place.

the all too familiar girl comes up to him, saying something out of earshot. when gojo looks at her, completely uninterested, she pulls that move. the scene you saw at the party before you ran out. tears fill your eyes again, and you almost want to stop the video, but your interest is piqued at the next part.

..this… this part was something that you didn’t see. gojo angrily reacts at the girl’s move, with her falling on the floor as she looks at him, stunned at how furious he looks. the person behind the camera gasps, continuing to record out of shock as a crowd of people turn to stare at the two. geto eventually comes into the frame and takes gojo away from all the chaos. the video ends there, and you grip gojo’s phone shakily.

holy shit.

tears roll down your face, but this time, they’re tears of relief. you waste no time in hugging satoru, crying your heart out as you bury your face in his neck. you’re happy. you’re so fucking happy, and so relieved knowing that he didn’t lie to you. of course he didn’t.

“m’sorry-” you sniffle into his shoulder. gojo is so shocked at what was happening that it takes him a second to hug you back, but when he does, he starts crying. “m’so fucking sorry i didn’t believe you-”

“shh, it’s okay, it’s okay…” he says, and you only hug him tighter. “m’so tired, you know that? these past three days fucking sucked. i’m just so glad you’re in my arms again, fuck-”

“-i love you, i love you, i love you so fucking much, toru.” you repeat, laughing as you kiss him all over his face. it’s been a while since you said that to someone. you wipe his never-ending tears away, still in disbelief, and whisper, “you’re real. right? you’re actually here with me right now ‘nd i’m not dreaming, right?

“i’m very much real, baby.” he says, putting his forehead against yours as you take in his features again. “god, i missed that pretty face so much.”

he finally closes the gap between you two, pulling you into a much needed kiss. it’s a kiss filled with so many emotions–desperation, happiness, relief. satoru thinks his heart is finally whole again. he’s missed you. he’s missed you so fucking much, and you’ve missed him too.

you’re like an anchor to satoru. the light of his life that keeps him grounded. and god, he’s been apart from you for too long.

you reposition yourself as you’re deepening the kiss. you’re on his lap now, and you wrap your arms around his neck, tugging on his hair in desperation. “oh yeah? ‘y gonna do anything about it?"

“of course i am,” he says, hands roaming underneath your shirt as he caresses your bare waist. fuck. he needs you. right now. especially after thinking that he was about to lose you forever–for something that he didn’t even do. “i’m gonna show you just how much i missed you, baby.”

gojo can’t let you go.

you’re in your bedroom, and both of you waste no time undressing each other. he takes you in–all of you, in awe of every crevice of your body as he trails his hands further down your waist.

god, you’re so beautiful. “i can’t believe i almost lost you.”

his words are shaky, like he’s still uncertain that you’re real and you’re in his arms again. he can’t seem to break himself away from you, almost like you’ll disappear if he lets you go. “but i’m here now, toru.”

“i’m here to stay, and i’ll never let you go again… ‘m yours,” you whisper, and your words set a fire in him, fueling his body with nothing but desperation. desperation to have you right here, and right now.

he wastes no time in plunging two of his fingers in your cunt, and he groans at just how wet you are. “satoru-”

“fuck, you’re so wet… and it’s all for me,” he mutters, spreading your legs effortlessly when you try to close them, thighs shaking in pure pleasure. he adds another finger, and you already feel stretched to the brim, and you haven’t even taken him in yet. the thought of his cock inside of you makes you even wetter than you already are, and you look up at satoru with eyes full of lust and desire. “missed you so much, baby. missed you and your pretty little cunny,”

his fingers are long, and you whine at how full you feel right now. you’re so loud, and you don’t even care. right now, it’s just you and satoru finally feeling each other again. it’s only been three days, but it feels like you’ve been apart for years.

everything about this was filthy. from your erotic moans and the way your cunt squelched against his fingers… not to mention the vice grip you had on them- fuck, satoru thinks he can cum untouched just from watching you like this.

“haa-” you whimper when his fingers curl and hit that spot in your cunt that you can barely seem to reach on your own. it’s exhilarating, and only fuels the growing heat in your stomach. “toru- don’t stop- please, i’m close-”

“really?” he taunts, and it feels so fucking good–your head is numb, and the only thoughts filling your head are thoughts of satoru. the pleasure is too much, and you try to get away from him, but he keeps you in place, curling his fingers faster as punishment. “don’t run away from me, baby… be a good girl and just take it, yeah?”

“toru- fuck- i’m gonna cum, please-” you’re on the brink of release, but suddenly, he stops, ruining your orgasm. “no- wait-”

he pulls his fingers out, and you whine at the loss of stimulation. you were so close–why did he take that away from you? you try and swat at his hands, but he just takes his fingers and puts them in his mouth, locking his eyes with yours with a sly smile. “you taste so sweet, i can’t help it,”

“aww, is my baby mad ‘cause she didn’t get to cum?” he coos sarcastically, caging you in between his arms as he tilts your face up with his finger. “too bad… the only thing you’re cumming on tonight is on my cock.”

and with that, he eases his painfully hard member into your walls. your insides hugged him perfectly–it was like you were made just for him. you gasp once he’s fully sheathed himself inside of you. his fingers were already a lot to take in, but his cock was something completely different. he moans your name, barely keeping his cool. “fuck- you’re squeezing me so tight,”

“missed everything about you, baby. i need to hold you, please,” he pleads desperately, clasping your small hands against his. the size difference alone between the two of you almost makes him cum, but he holds himself back, choosing to bask in this intimate moment. he’s missed every part about this. “you ready f’me?-”

“-just fuck me, satoru, please-” he doesn’t need another confirmation from you.

he can’t bring himself to hold back. next thing you know, he’s fucking you into the mattress, and you feel the headboard shake at how fast satoru is going. fuck–you feel every part of him, every part of his cock as it slams against your tight hole. he’s so big, you feel yourself gasping for breath, and you moan out loud as you notice the prominent bulge forming in your stomach. it’s him, it’s all him, and it’s driving you mad.

satoru follows your eyes in the midst of all of this, and he watches everything in fascination. he decides to be a little mean, and presses his free hand against your stomach–it feels so good, you could almost scream at the pleasure. “you feel that, baby? that’s all me inside of you, hmm?”

“please-” the onset of pleasure feels so overwhelming, and tears fill your eyes. you feel an oncoming orgasm coming, and you know your release will hit you like a tidal wave. your heart is pounding, but satoru only grips your hand tighter and fucks you even harder. “oh, fuck!”

“m close, baby. are you g’na cum too?” he manages to say between pants, and you somehow nod, mind hazy and your release only coming closer. you feel your eyes rolling to the back of your head. “cum inside of me, toru- please- i need to feel you-”

gojo groans at your words, and you both cum together. you ride out your high, screaming as you spasm around his cock, the pleasure overfilling your senses until you’re trembling from it. he fills you up, staying inside of you as the two of you catch your breath. everything’s hazy, and you’re barely aware of your surroundings… it takes you a few minutes to recover.

“angel, are you with me?”

“yeah, fuck, just… give me a second.” you say, and gojo thinks that he would gladly give you all the time in the world if you needed it. he pulls out of you with a hiss, and his warm seed drips out of your cunny. it makes his cock twitch, but he knows that you’re probably not considering a round two right now.

when you come to your senses, you notice satoru–who put his clothes back on already, wiping your legs down with a rag. his touch is so soft, like he’s afraid to break you, unlike how he handled you just a moment ago. you look down and notice the bruises starting to form on your legs and waist. satoru looks guilty as he stares. “i didn’t go too rough with you, did i?”

“not at all,” you reassure him, and you see him soften up a little. “it felt really good, actually… thank you, toru.”

“s nothing. you know my girl only gets the best,” he teases, and you laugh. “i’m gonna go get you some new clothes and some water… i’ll be back, okay?”

you nod, closing your eyes again as satoru leaves the room. he’s back in two minutes, and he’s gently changing you into new clothes that he found in your drawer. you’re so tired that you can hardly move, so you let satoru do all the work. he caresses all of your bruises, apologizing again even if you already said that it was okay. he’s so gentle, a swift juxtaposition to what just happened beforehand, and so soft with you. once you’re clothed again, he brings a glass of water against your lips, and you greedily gulp it down as he keeps a hand on your back. he places it on the nightstand once you’re finished, and you grab his wrist after, tugging him back to the bed. “lay with me for a bit, toru.”

satoru doesn’t hesitate, laying down next to you on the bed and placing your head against his chest. your breathing is back to normal, and you feel his heart thumping against your ear. you wrap your arms around him, and satoru thinks that this moment is so domestic that he can’t help but daydream. he looks at your face, memorizing every feature about you with a lovesick look in his eyes. you’re so beautiful, so perfect, and he’s just so fucking glad that he didn’t lose you.

satoru thinks he could wake up to this everyday.

“you’re starin.” you say with an amused look on your face. gojo doesn’t even try to play it off. “what’s on your mind?”

“nothing. i just… love you so much, y/n.” he says, pulling you closer and kissing your forehead. satoru would trade anything if it meant that this moment wouldn’t end. “m so glad you chose me.”

“i think it’s the other way around,” you tease. “you chose me. ever since you saw me at the party, you’ve done nothing but try to win my heart.”

“how could i not? there was just something different about you compared to everyone else.” he reminisces about that night at the party, and how far he’s come with his relationship with you. he remembers that night like it just happened yesterday.

you sigh, almost like you were thinking about that night too. you pull him into a kiss, finally finding the courage within you to say a proper “i love you.” to the man who meant the world to you.

“i love you too, angel.” he says, and you snuggle into him tighter. “you know i’ll always choose you…”

“..from this life and into the next. i’m so glad you gave me a chance, y/n. i’ll forever be grateful to now be called your husband. i’m the luckiest man ever knowing that you let me into your life, and i’m the one who gets to read these vows to marry you. i cannot wait to spend the rest of my life with you. i love you so much, y/n gojo.” he’s crying. gojo satoru is crying, and he’s hardly ever cried before. though, that changed after he met you.

the last time he cried was during pre-k, and now he’s done it time and time again… all because of you. he cried once during your first argument with him, another during the night he thought he’d lost you forever, and then another when he finally had you in his arms again once he proved his innocence… and now, during his wedding, when he finally gets to call you his wife.

and when you share your kiss at the end of the ceremony to symbolize your togetherness, you hear all your friends cheering. mainly shoko, utahime, and geto. if you showed this very scene to shoko during your university years, she’d call you crazy, saying this would never happen. gojo satoru was once a man who’d never willingly committed in a relationship before, but you came into his life and you changed everything about him. it was like magic.

you pull away from the kiss, wiping his tears away and whispering against his lips, drowning out the crowd, “thank you.”

for memorizing all my favorite foods so you could buy them for me. for walking me to class every day. for making me fall in love with you that one day at the park. for waiting for me to slowly love you even when i was scared to love. for waiting for me even if i didn’t trust you. for loving me. for proving those rumors wrong. for proving that satoru gojo is actually capable of falling in love and pouring his heart out to the one he loves the most.

for everything that you have done to love me.

it was like gojo could hear all of your unspoken words. he smiles, letting one more tear roll down his cheek, and says, “it’s all worth it if it’s for you.”

thanks for reading <3 -kami.

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queen-of-fanfics · 11 months

Text

Come Back to Me

Stay Away From Him pt. 2

Pairing: Miguel O'Hara x Reader

Prompt: Miguel has been away on a mission for too long and he comes back different.

A/N: I LOVE YOU GUYS! I am so happy that you guys loved part 1 so much that I knew I had to write some more. 99.99% of everyone asked for fluff, but unfortunately for everyone, I excel in tension and dramatic ass scenes. This scenario literally came to me in my dreams so I had to write it. I'm tagging everyone that left me a message or mentioned they would like a part 2. I hope you guys like it and don't hate me if you don't!

For new readers, welcome! You do not need to read part 1 to understand this part. If you guys hate this part, I will write more and I'll write some fluff to make up for it lol

Part 1

Taking a deep breath and letting out a sigh, you roll your shoulders and stretch out your muscles. You were inside Miguel’s chamber at your desk where you work. It was quiet there, only a few people were working about but none were talking above hushed whispers. Looking over the top of your monitor to see who was around, you notice that a few people were already looking at you before their glances shot away when you made eye contact with them. You think it was strange but you have been catching weird glances from people for a few weeks now.

Looking over at the empty dais, your heart pangs a little when you are reminded that Miguel isn’t there. It’s been about a month since your incident with Miguel. And every day since then, things have been awkward. Miguel was sending you off to help other people and giving you work that would keep you away for days at a time. He barely said a few words to you and looked at you even less.

A week after the incident happened, a mission came up and Miguel went to handle it. That was 2 weeks ago. It’s been radio silent since then. Jessica assures you that Miguel is checking in with her and everything is fine. She says that she’s been in contact with him and helping him through his mission, but still, that didn’t reassure you. Miguel always went over every mission with you. You always assisted him through every trip. You were his eyes and ears then all of a sudden he doesn’t even want to tell you he’s leaving or where he was going?

You were tempted to ask him not to go but you held your tongue. Ever since Miguel left, you had a bad feeling in your gut but you ignored it. Maybe he just doesn’t want to talk to me. That’s fine! If he wants to get all moody and dramatic then fine. He can check in with Jessica then. Have her run around for him. Huffing out a breath again, you refocus on the task you were working on.

You were pulled out of your focus when you heard in the distance, “Everyone, we are going into a soft lockdown. I repeat, soft lockdown. Gwen and Hobie meet up in Room 5. Keep it quiet. Y/N is still in the dark. Let’s keep it that way.” It sounded like Jessica’s voice coming through someone’s personal intercom. Picking up your own device, you check if you had accidentally turned it off since it didn’t go through yours, but it’s on. This means that Jessica purposefully sent out the message to everyone else, except for you. Y/N is still in the dark?

Pretending to stretch and yawn, you sneak a glance around the room again. The few people that were left in the room were huddled together, a few were walking out of the room urgently. But what made a shiver run up your spine was that everyone was looking at you. Everyone is hiding something from you. That is clear now. You weren’t sure what they were hiding but something in your gut is telling you it was bad. And it’s something to do with Miguel.

Room 5. She said they were meeting in Room 5. Not really sure where that is or what’s in there but it has got to explain why everyone has been acting so strangely. Standing up from your desk, the conversations in the room immediately stop and it’s utterly silent. Trying to act as normal as possible, you slowly walk out of the room.

After what felt like hours with your heart beating out of your chest, you finally found “Room 5”. Slowly creeping into the room, you can see that it is empty except for a giant cage in the middle of the room. The room is dark and there seems to be only one light directly above the cage. Surrounding the cage were Jessica, Gwen, Hobie, and Peter B. Parker, and inside the cage … was Miguel.

Except, it wasn’t Miguel. The Miguel in the cage was feral and animalistic. He was hunched over and crouched down low as if he was ready to attack. His arms are held out low to his side and his claws are extended. Though Miguel is already a naturally large guy, his tensed and flexed muscles seem to be bulging out more, giving him that beast-like appearance. His hair was a completely tangled mess, wild and unkempt. His breathing is frantic and unstable. Though he looks a mess, he is standing utterly still.

This isn’t Miguel. This isn’t your Miguel. Something is wrong. Something is seriously wrong.

Sneaking into the room and sticking to the shadows, no one in the room senses that you’re there. Everyone except for Miguel. As you slip into the room, he turns his head and watches you from over his shoulder but doesn’t make any other movements. Seeing him now, you could see that his lips are pulled back so that his fangs are out and on display. His eyes are wild and bloodshot red, though when he sees you, his eyes focus on you as if you’re prey. He doesn’t move and doesn’t make any sounds at you so you remain hidden from everyone else.

Everyone is oblivious to your presence and their conversation continues. Gwen is arguing with Jessica and it looks as though Peter is trying to keep the peace, though he’s not doing a good job. Hobie is casually leaning against the wall nearby giving off a nonchalant appearance but the look on his face indicates that he is upset.

“You can’t do this, Jessica! It could kill him!”

“What choice do we have? The next time he escapes, who knows what could happen. If the antidote doesn’t kill him then the poison that’s already in him will!”

“We still have time to find another way. Maybe he just needs more time and it’ll wear off.”

“Gwen, he doesn’t eat, he doesn’t sleep. He doesn’t even talk! All he does is growl and attack anyone that gets too close. This is getting out of hand!”

“Why don’t we tell, Y/N? Y/N should know about this. And you know as well as anyone else, he has a soft spot for her. Maybe she can help!”

“He’s been back for two weeks and he hasn’t gotten better. If he was going to get better he would have shown signs of it by now. If Y/N knows and he doesn’t snap out of it, how do you think Y/N would take it?”

“Why don’t you ask me?” You finally had enough and decided to make yourself known. Everyone turns abruptly as you step forward further into the room to be seen under the light.

“Two weeks?” You whisper as you look each one of them in the eyes and feeling betrayed, “He’s been back for two weeks and no one told me? None of you told me.”

Inside the cage, Miguel turns his body completely to be fully facing you now. The entire time, his eyes never leave you. Finally having the time to look him over completely, what you saw broke your heart. He looked tired but also on high alert to attack. There were dark bags under his eyes and his face seems sunken in. His eyes seem to soften slightly as he looks back at you but his face is still grimacing. While you were too busy watching him, what you didn’t see was all the knowing looks that everyone else was passing to each other.

“Not only did you keep this from me, but now I learn that you want to kill him?!” Instead of feeling hurt, now your adrenaline is kicking in. You’re feeling angry and upset and … panicked. Your mind feels like it’s on a high and you’re acting without thinking.

“No, Y/N, we aren’t killing him. We managed to create an antidote but it only has a small chance of working … and a big chance of killing him. But it’s the only choice we got!” Jessica tries to reason with you.

“And you would take that chance?” How could they even consider this an option? I have to do something and do it quick.

“We don’t have another choice.” Peter jumps in now, speaking in a calm tone.

“Let’s think about it some more.” Gwen is speaking to Jessica now and their original argument from when you first entered the room resumes. The three go back to arguing with one another and Hobie still stays on the sidelines. Except this time, he’s not watching them. He’s watching you. He’s giving you an intense look as if he was trying to tell you a message.

Slowly but pointedly, he looks at the door of the cage. Following his line of sight, you look back at the cage. The cage is locked but the key is a fingerprint pad. Which means that anyone who has clearance can open it. And you have clearance. Being Miguel’s assistant, you are allowed clearance to nearly everything he is. Looking back at Hobie, he inclines his head slightly to the cage and gives you one firm nod of confirmation.

Throwing a quick glance at the arguing three to confirm that they are preoccupied, without giving it a second thought, you take off running for the cage. Before anyone could react, you slam your hand down onto the pad. Less than a second later, you are throwing the door to the cage open and slamming it shut behind you. “Are you out of your mind?!” You hear Gwen yell at you and the others are yelling too but you’re not listening.

Now you’re staring face-to-face with a feral Miguel. Miguel has crouched low at your sudden entrance and his claws and fangs are fully on display, though he doesn’t move close to you. He’s standing still and watching you for your move. The world seems to fade away and your sole focus is on him but you could feel the flurry going on outside of the cage. But you don’t look, you keep your attention strictly on his face.

Half expecting to be mauled to death the instant you got inside the cage, you are happily surprised that Miguel seems more cautious of you at the moment. Testing your luck, you hold out both hands in front of you and take a hesitant step forward. Again to your surprise, Miguel inches back. Testing it again, you take a full step this time, and again he backs away from you.

“Careful, now.” Hobie sounds close. Turning to look over your shoulder, you see that Hobie is walking closer to the cage. Miguel lets out a low growl and your eyes shoot back to him. But looking back at him, his stance is different. He looks like he’s ready to pounce. His expression has also turned more deadly and angry. But rather than looking at you like you expected, he’s staring over your shoulder. He’s watching Hobie.

You can hear Hobie’s steps getting closer and the closer he comes, the more agitated Miguel gets. Miguel is starting to walk closer to you now but his eyes are still fixed on Hobie. Seeing that Miguel is moving towards you, Hobie says. “Y/N, I think it’s time to go. Let’s not push our luck, yeah?” Hobie is speaking in a serious tone, he’s not asking.

Without warning, Hobie shoots out his web onto your back and pulls you back towards the door. Your body is jerked back but you don’t get far because suddenly Miguel is there. He jumps forward and wraps one arm around your body and his other arm shoots to your back and slashes the web off of you. The web breaks easily under his claws and he is pulling you back further into the cage. He stops in the middle of the cage where he abruptly lays you down on the floor.

Thinking that he’s attacking you, your hands shoot up to your face but when nothing hits you, you peek through your fingers and look up at him. Miguel is crouching on all fours atop of you as you’re laid out completely on your back. His knees are straddling your thighs and his hands are on either side of your head. He is hunched low as if he was protecting your body. His face is looking up, you assume it’s towards Hobie still.

“Hey.” You whisper. He only shoots you a quick look but his head jerks back up again. Finding the courage, you try again, “Hey.” Except this time, you gingerly bring your hand up and let your fingers touch his cheek. He jerks at the touch and turns his head to look down at you. That motion puts his face firmly in your hand and now you’re cupping his face.

“Hey there, big guy.” He’s leaning into your touch and his body falls even lower. Your other hand comes up and it rests on his chest and you could feel his heart beating as if he just ran a marathon. All he does is just stare at you. You were waiting for something to happen. Maybe he’ll snap out of it and become normal again. Maybe he will just snap your neck and be done with it. But no. He doesn’t move. Just looks at you.

“Y/N, can you get out?” Jessica asks from somewhere in the room.

“I’m not going anywhere. He’s fine. Keep working on an antidote that will actually help him. I’ll keep him calm.” No one responds back to you but you can hear footsteps receding and you know that you two are now alone in the room. A few beats go by in the silence before Miguel starts showing signs of relaxing.

His lower body lowers and is laying on top of you. Miguel falls down to his elbows and it brings his face even closer to yours. He nuzzles the top of your head and you could feel the tip of his nose run through your hair as he travels down your body. Your hand that was resting on his cheek travels down his neck and lands against his chest. Your close your eyes and will yourself to keep a clear head.

The tip of his nose runs down to your cheek and he stills for just one moment when his lips graze yours. “What happened to you? I’m scared. Come back to me.” You whisper against his lips. You suck in a breath when his tongue darts out to lick your bottom lip but he doesn’t respond. One of his hands comes up to cup one side of your neck, keeping you still. His hand tightens ever so slightly there, not hard but putting enough pressure to make your heart skip.

He continues his exploration of you with the tip of his nose. His nose drags along your jawline which makes you tint your head up in response to give him more access. Taking it as an invitation, Miguel continues and comes up to your ear, and gives you a little nibble there. You notice that your breathing has turned to panting. He continues to play with your ear by tracing with his lips. Goosebumps appear on your skin as your body grows warmer and warmer. Your head feels intoxicated and no thoughts filter into your head, only your senses are alive.

You let out a loud gasp when Miguel suddenly nuzzles into your exposed neck and you could feel him smiling against your skin. His hand around your neck tightens some more and it pulls you closer. He runs his lips softly over your skin, feathering light kisses wherever he pleases. To your surprise, you feel a nick of pain on your neck and you realize that he gave you a bite with his fangs. You feel his tongue come out again and lick up the bit of blood that escapes. A shiver of excitement travels down your body and you have to mentally shake yourself. This feels wrong but you don’t have the heart to tell him to stop.

“Come back to me.” You whisper again almost like a prayer this time.

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

It’s many hours later, well into the night, and Jessica and Hobie came back to check on you. They’re standing side by side outside of the cage staring at the spectacle that’s in front of them. Jessica with her arms crossed in front of her chest and Hobie with his hands on his hips. “Huh. Ain’t that something?” Hobie asks.

In the middle of the cage are you and Miguel, sleeping soundly. You are curled into his front and he is curled around you like his limbs are vines. An arm is under your head, keeping you off the hard concrete floor, the other arm curled around you and wrapping up your back. His lower body is curled up tight against you. His body acting like a shield. You two fit perfectly together. Your hair was a mess and even from across the room, they could tell that your clothes were all rumpled.

“You think those two ever going figure it out?” Jessica asks.

“We’ll they haven’t so far. They wouldn’t be able to see what’s right in front of them even if a bus hit ‘em.”

She lets out a scoff of amusement, “I know. Remember when Y/N snapped at him and he was mopey for a whole week? God that was hell."

"Yeah? You shoulda seen how this one was sighing around while he was 'away'." Hobie shoots back at her with a chuckle.

"Anywho, I didn’t think the poison would’ve been that strong though. I was hoping to have this done in less than a week.”

“Eh, I might have given him a little more than we planned.” “Of course you did,” she lets out a sigh, “Guess that explains why it took him so long to calm down. It should be wearing off soon right?”

“Yeah, day or so.”

“Good. Let’s see them try to deny their feelings after this.”

tag: @bravest-hobbit @supaprettyg @itspinkdemon @fluffybunnyu @couchpotato2006 @adamsloverboy @aaalllice @namjoonsdimplesssss @onlyhimmi @dabu123 @fog-sama @yaichidragneel @sajova @iovaki @princessos-blog @bruhhvv@idratherbesleepingrn @shadyempathmoneycroissant-blog @starrdust11 @zaynabsblog @asfaltite @kuromidarkmoon @liz96893 @ceoofghosts @miaasmf @cosmicmagicgirl @alicefallsintotherabbithole @yamishibai09 @skylarlyn823 @dreamingofbucky @ngz18 @lemonmoonmochi @rattlethemskulls @iheartspderman @bobatealee @honeydrop-bunny @karrinn30 @winterwillow24 @blut00f @teyyyteyyy @urlovecarla @stealingyourturts @gothamsirenz @tazplum05 @greenteacats @the-smut-plug

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baddestbittyontheblock · 5 months

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hong jisoo (joshua) fic recs

you are responsible for the content you consume‼️

✧*:·˚ hi everyone!! here is a list of all the fics that are my favs with tagged writers/authors ✧*:·˚

✧*:·˚ remember to like and reblog the works you enjoy in order to support each writer!! ✧*:·˚

✧*:·˚ however, make sure you read the information on each story themselves such as triggers & warnings ✧*:·˚

✧*:·˚ also, if you'd like me to remove your fic from this list, message me! ✧*:·˚

°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。

ꈍᴗꈍ vanilla by @milfgyuu joshua hong x fem!reader | 11.2k words, friends to lovers, smut, 18+

-joshua has a secret but perhaps it’s not really a secret at all. maybe you’ve just refused to see it in an effort to keep your feelings at bay.

ꈍᴗꈍ vanilla II by @milfgyuu joshua hong x fem!reader | 8.7k words, friends to lovers, romance, smut 18+

-joshua has you on edge all evening and you’re not sure if you’ll survive dinner with your families. you, however, have him dealing with feelings he’s never had to war with, especially in the bedroom and it throws him into a tailspin.

ꈍᴗꈍ something more by @sluttywonwoo joshua hong x reader | swearing, smut (18+), masturbation, unprotected sex, choking, degradation, lowkey spit play, 4.5k

-it’s a tale as old as time- your roommate walks in on you masturbating and things escalate from there

ꈍᴗꈍ studio session by @sluttywonwoo joshua hong x reader | swearing, smut (18+), edging, sex toys, fingering, exhibitionism, degradation, 2.8k

-you and your boyfriend decide to try something new- aka letting other members watch him edge you (ft. seungcheol, jeonghan, wonwoo, seokmin, and vernon)

ꈍᴗꈍ your gentleman by @wonwussy joshua hong x afab!reader | smut, (minors dni), camboy!shua, voyeurism, exhibitionism, broadcasted oral (m), swallowing cum, pet names (for reader and viewers), very soft dom!shua if you squint and turn your head to the side 27 degrees, use of “sir”, TALK OF CONSENT (BECAUSE CONSENT IS SEXY Y’ALL); this is part of the collab with svthub, 2.2k

-“do you want to join me on stream this weekend?”

ꈍᴗꈍ honey lemon ginger by @seokmingiggles joshua hong x gn!reader | fluff, established relationship, the reader is sick (with the common cold)

-you’ve unexpectedly come down with a mild cold, yet your boyfriend doesn’t hesitate to leap in and take care of you.

ꈍᴗꈍ joshua blurb by @bbugyu joshua hong x reader

-bf joshua doting his girl

ꈍᴗꈍ lazy nights by @pileofwords joshua hong x reader | floofy fluff, 1.2k

-joshua comes home after a long day to find you in the middle of a beading project.

ꈍᴗꈍ title by @leejungchans joshua hong x fem!reader | fluff, established relationship au, ceo au, brief alcohol mentions and consumption

-in which your husband is all too happy to remind people of your new title.

ꈍᴗꈍ all my love by @jaestrz idol!joshua x idol!reader | fluff, angst

-the sound of soft background music was ringing in your ears as the room was filled with family relatives who knows if you knew them or not.

ꈍᴗꈍ love on air masterlist by @suhnshinehaos joshua hong x gn!reader | non-idol au, university au, childhood friends to ???, so much pining, fluff, a bit of angst, honestly so corny and cheesy

-joshua hong wants you to know how he feels about you, but god forbid he actually say it out loud. instead, he settles on the next best thing : dedicating a song to you every week on the campus radio. too bad you’re too dense to actually figure out it’s all for you.

ꈍᴗꈍ oceans and engines by @renjunphile hong jisoo x female!reader | exes to lovers!au, fluff, angst-ish, idol!au. fluff central. just thousands of words of self-indulgent fluff with little to no plot

-when hong jisoo left his beloved hometown at 18 years old, he also left you, his proclaimed great love. it takes another 7 years for you to catch up to him again and close the oceans in between you.

ꈍᴗꈍ impulsive by @leejungchans joshua hong x gn!reader | food mentions, kissing, fluff, humour(ish), university au, established relationship au, joshua’s flirty in this

-in which you help your boyfriend with yet another one of his 2am impulse decisions.

ꈍᴗꈍ non-flat by @venerex joshua hong x gn!reader | sex descriptions (but no actual sex), reader has some unspecified medical conditions and body insecurities, descriptions of body shape and stretch-marks (might be a trigger for someone with weight-related insecurities), 1.2k

-“something wrong?”

ꈍᴗꈍ smut blurb by @venerex joshua hong x fem!reader | oral (f receiving), head....pushing?

-"it's okay sweetheart, you can do it"

ꈍᴗꈍ forget with joshua by @venerex joshua hong x reader | orgasm denial, cockwarming, intercourse

-imagine coming home after a horrible day to a concerned joshua, who takes it upon himself to make you feel better - orders your favorite food, offers to ready a bath for you, offers cuddles etc.

ꈍᴗꈍ domino by @universecorp softdom!joshua hong x sub!afab!reader | fluff, crack, smut, standoffish reader (only for a bit), protected sex, slow burn, frat parties, Joshua is a butt when he's drunk/hungover, joshua is also bad at feelings, Throwing up (from drinking), past fling with jihoon(so y'all are pretty close), jealous joshua

-after a one night stand on your birthday, you never expected to meet the stranger again. you also never expected him to enter your life permanently.

ꈍᴗꈍ routine by @neonun-au joshua hong x reader | fluff, slice-of-life, established relationship

-domestic bliss

ꈍᴗꈍ simp by @horanghoe husband!josh hong x wife!reader | semi-sfw simping, mention of alcohol consumption, swearing, generally sfw

-joshua being a simp for his wife on a date while a babysitter watches the kiddos

ꈍᴗꈍ late to the party by @sluttywoozi husband!josh hong x reader | no specified pronouns or gendered terms; wears a dress, makeup, heels, lingerie, has breasts and a vagina, horny and in love husband!joshua, swearing, kissing, dirty thoughts, spanking mention

-joshua would be so extremely down bad for his partner

ꈍᴗꈍ cute blurb by @husbandhoshi joshua hong x reader

-joshua who, after making sweet love to you, wraps you up in blankets like a cloak so you stay warm before getting up to grab all the aftercare necessities

#kpop #kpop smut #seventeen fluff #seventeen x reader #seventeen smut #seventeen imagines #svt joshua #joshua svt #joshua hong #joshua x reader #joshua hong x reader #fic recs #fic rec

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bonny-kookoo · 7 months

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Jungkook

𝐒𝐞𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐀𝐧𝐱𝐢𝐞𝐭𝐲 | Part 5

A smile from you is all he needs to feel recharged.

Tags/Warnings: Game Designer!Jungkook, Non Idol AU, established relationship, Angst , emotional kook, suggestive messages, poor Maria pt.1 [Tags will be different for every part!]

Length: 1k Words

There is no taglist for this fic.

Collab with @euphoricfilter ! 💜

-> Masterlist

♥━━━━━━━━━━•.♡.•━━━━━━━━━━━━♥

This is not going to plan at all.

Not only is he behind schedule wise, he's also not thought about the possibility of what this all might look like to you at all. Because why would you even think that in the first place? He'd be absolutely stupid to cheat on you, let alone with a 64 year old married woman of all people!

But then again, you don't know that part- and he also can't really properly explain it as he would surely blow his own cover, and he's just too close to the finish line to give up now. He already almost cried at deleting your face ID and fingerprint from his phone, feeling like he deleted the memory of setting those things up too, but he swore himself it's for a good cause down the line. You'll make so many more memories together for sure, and they'll top those more than by just a little. He'll make sure that they will.

[Alright, I'm so excited! Next time let's do it this way right from the start- no need to make it so complicated!] Maria had wrote him in full, and he reads over it with a bit of worry. Does she really understand what he meant by his worries?

[I'm not sure you understand. I'm planning something big, and I'm also behind when it comes to physical intimacy these days, you know?] He writes the woman, who he's asked prior about the rules and such regarding.. well, sex in the home he's renting out for the upcoming special occasion he's planned. He doesn't want to get locked up for not following some Airbnb laws he overlooked after all. That would just be embarrassing. [And we're very intimate people. I'm taking her pleasure and happiness seriously, if you get the hint.] He texts her as he boils some water on the stove for his absolute accurately made ramyeon.

[Oh trust me, I've been young too! No need to be shy, I can only imagine that emotions will run high most likely!] She responds, and Jungkook pursed his lips for a second, before he starts to play with his piercings deep in thought.

[No, Maria, I don't think you get it-] he begins to type. [-it's been almost two full weeks at this point, that's the longest we've ever gone without any sex, we're talking at least three orgasms a day times fourteen, I've got some major catching up to do..] jungkook sends her, before he puts his phone down for a second as to prepare the instant noodles properly.

[It's fine, really. No need to worry!] The woman responds. But jungkook wants to make sure.

[She's a squirter- you know what that is right? Either way it's gonna get messy so I'm just making sure you REALLY know what you're getting into if you say it's alright because the carpet looked really nice and I'm not sure how to get cum stains out of that] he rambles, not noticing you emerge from the bedroom now as you put your bag on one of the kitchen chairs. [I can replace it too if that happens no problem, you know how my girlfriend gets haha. Well you don't but you will know after we're done with the place-] he taps and accidentally sends out as you call his name, causing him to almost drop his phone into the soup pot on the stove, only barely catching it in time before he can practically throw it into the pocket of his sweatpants. "Yeah?" He asks towards you, and you look at him still way too hostile in his opinion.

He knows you can be a bit of a hot head. It's what he loves about you- how fierce you can get and how you'll always stand your ground. But he also knows that you're a bit of an aklebiter with some serious anger issues sometimes- once you see red, you don't see anything else anymore. So he's got to be careful not to fuck it up any further, because once he loses you, he loses for good.

Because you're stubborn if you've made up your mind.

"The water's boiling over." You mumble, avoiding his gaze as you sit at the kitchen table, arms crossed in defense. He jumps at your words and turns off the stove at that, somewhat awkwardly playing up some food into bowl for the both of you, watching you eat silently across from him with an almost needy gaze.

You're gonna probably try and kick his balls if he asks you to sit on his lap right now, so he swallows down the request to keep them intact.

He's gonna seriously crunch some hours while you're sleeping over at a friend's house so he can still make the deadline, able to pass up on sleep with you not actually home to scold him for it. He hates the fact that the app on his phone constantly reminds him of the lack of intimacy between you two- taunting him with notifications about his streak being broken, his record being topped, his spot up top on the scoreboard being taken. He hates it. He created this app, he should be the one who's best at it too!

God he can't wait to get his hands on you again. He feels like his dick is going to fall off in the next few days.

And it's not just that, either. He doesn't sleep well when you're not with him, he misses all the interactions you usually have during the day, the love, the intimacy of just being close, he misses it so bad. And he kind of doesn't want you to leave right now- he'd love to just call it quits and just cave in, but he's come too far now, and you're also a strong independent woman. You deserve to choose where you want to go or stay, he's got no say in that- or at least he shouldn't try to have it.

"I.. You'll text me when you wanna come back home, right?" He asks as he finishes his bowl, and you shrug.

"Whatever." You mumble. "S' not like you want me home for more than the chores anyways." You huff into your food, and he can't help but feel his eyes tear up. No, stupid Jungkook, don't fucking cry right now. You're gonna ruin it all with your dumb tears and weak heart just like always-

"I do want you home.." he mumbles quietly, blinking harder to avoid you spotting anything off- but you notice. Of course you do.

"...I'll text you." You say, and that at least soothes his mind for the moment as his phone falls out of his pocket, screen cracking and making him cringe.

Fuck. That's the what.. 20th time this year?

But it's all worth it, if it means he can at least see the hint of a smile pull at your lips for once.

The sight alone motivation enough to make him work even harder now.

#bts imagine #bts fanfic #bts fic #jungkook imagine #jeon jungkook x reader #jeon jungkook imagine #bts jungkook imagine #bts smut #jungkook x reader #bts jungkook fanfic #jungkook smut #bts jungkook x reader #jeon jungkook fanfic #bts jeon jungkook imagine #jeon jungkook imagines #jungkook imagines #jungkook x reader smut

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sugarnspice630 · 6 months

Text

Dark Room - Wooyoung

"Working these late shifts with you has only made that urge grow, and I can’t contain my thoughts about you anymore."

•pairing: photographer!wooyoung x fem!photographer!reader

•word count: 1.9k

•tags: mdni, nonidol, dark room sex, wooyoung and reader are photographers, sensory deprivation(?), praise, fingering, wooyoung and reader have secretly liked each other for a long time, dirty talk, slight choking, ...did I miss anything?

Summary: Wooyoung and you work late shift at a photography studio and things gets a little risque in the dark room.

A/N: Inspired by my job honestly. Had this fantasy while working late one day and thought..mm yes Wooyoung would do this. I would like to preface that the dark room where I work is NOT the traditional, red lit, dark room. It's literally pitch black when you shut the door. Please be sure to drop a like, reblog if you enjoyed it, and comment your favorite part! Happy reading!

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ･｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ･｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ･｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆───

“Ah shit,” You curse out as you see the message on one of the printer computers. “Wooyoung, can you grab a Color Developer chemical for me? I need to change paper real quick, and my hands are kinda full!” Softly shouting from across the studio in hopes he could hear you from his desk.

“Yeah, I got it Y/N!”

“Awesome! Thank you!”

Both you and Wooyoung have been working the late shift at your photography job for a couple weeks now. You’ve been behind on processing orders because you were understaffed or everyone else had kids to take care of and had to be home by a certain time. This year has been crazy for school and sports pictures; taking on more schools and leagues, needing to train the new hires that only stay about a month and then leave, managing two printers that constantly need either paper changed or chemicals added to the bins, or the printer deciding to eat the photographs, causing you to have to reprint them—it was hell. You and Wooyoung however, were the perfect combination to take on night shifts! Naturally being night owls, not having kids to take care of, and working well together, you got more done than anyone else in the office could from their 7-3 shift. Hell, for the amount of work you do, you should be getting a raise or double pay, but alas, your boss doesn’t think that way.

Taking the empty paper cartridge back to the dark room, you snuck back out and browsed the shelf for the correct roll of paper, grabbing it before you turned around. You snuck a glance at Wooyoung grabbing the chemical off the shelf just down the hall. You shot him a quick smile before going into the room. Setting the paper down on the ground and moving the chair close to the wall so you could get a feel of your surroundings before entering complete darkness. The seal on the door wasn’t the best, so slamming it was the only way to ensure no light would get into the room. You flipped the lightswitch off and sat down in the chair.

While opening the paper case, you couldn’t help but think of the way Wooyoung’s long, black hair framed his face perfectly, when his bangs would occasionally get in his eyes, and the way he would tossle his head to move the pieces out of his way. Sometimes, when it was hot outside on a sports shoot, he would tie it up into a cute ponytail with such ease. The way he interacted with kids while on shoots, seeing his childlike nature come out and the kids getting along with him, was great. It absolutely melted your heart to see him so good with the kids. Always getting the best smiles out of them and staying on schedule while making the kids feel comfortable. On the opposite side of the spectrum, he really knew how to run the show. The way his voice commanded all the other employees on the job, telling them exactly what to do and making sure they were doing everything correctly. He hated to see people getting yelled at for taking “bad” photographs, but really it’s just the head photographer having a stick up his ass and being hard on everyone else while he does the same level of work, so he just wanted to make sure he appeased everyone.

Being in your own head, thinking about Wooyoung while changing the paper, you hear three knocks on the door.

“Helloooo? Y/N? You alright in there? Did you get swallowed by the dark abyss?” Wooyoung’s voice rang out from the other side.

“Shit.” You mutter to yourself. “N-No Wooyoung, I’m fine and perfectly alive! I just uh..had trouble closing the…lid.” You faked slamming the “lid” shut to make your statement seem believable.

“Oh gotcha, yeah, that thing is a bitch sometimes. Well, could you hurry up? I haven’t been able to finish the chemical cause I have to grab water and well uh…you’re in the room with the sink.”

“Oh right! Sorry!” You scrambled to clean the area up, almost forgetting there is a giant box in front of you and hitting your foot against the top of it, causing you to almost fall forward onto the door handle, but you caught your balance just in time. You pick up the cartridge and set it on the chair you were just sitting in to make room to open the door. You grabbed the handle, slowly turned it, and pulled the door towards you, hoping not to scare Wooyoung. You peaked your head around the side of the door and smiled.

“She’s all your’s~!” You stepped into the light and looked at Wooyoung to see his hands were empty and not carrying the water jugs. Your eyebrows contorted. “Uh.. your hands are empt-.” Your words were cut off by Wooyoung pushing you back into the room, grabbing the door from your hands, and slamming it behind him. The darkness of the room settled in, and you felt uneasy, not knowing where Wooyoung was. “W-Woo?”

“I’m right here~.” He said lowly and you felt his breath against the side of your neck. His hands softly trailing down your side and stopping right above your waist.

“What the fuck are you doing?” You protested and tried to squirm your way out of his grasp. His grasp on you only tightened as he had no intention of letting you go.

“Y/N I can’t help myself. Ever since the first time I saw you, I’ve had the biggest crush on you. Working these late shifts with you has only made that urge grow, and I can’t contain my thoughts about you anymore.” You felt your cheeks get hot and your thighs clench together. Did he really think about you this way?

“W-Wooyoung..” Your voice trailed off, not knowing how to feel about his confession.

“I think about you every night before I go to bed. Perhaps in ways that I…shouldn’t, but you’re just so beautiful.” Wooyoung brushes the stray hairs off your face and tucks them behind your ear. His breath feels warm against you and sends chills down your spine. You feel Wooyoung lean closer to you and his lips are right against your ear. “I touch myself to the thought of you. My name coming out of those precious lips of yours. I want you so bad Y/N. Please.”

“Fuck.” You mutter softly. His hands playfully sliding up and down your waist. You couldn’t help but feel excited at the thought of Wooyoung thinking about you this way.

“If I may have your permission, Y/N.” You softly nodded your head, allowing him to touch you in whatever way he wanted to. “I can’t see you love; I need you to use your words for me.”

“Y-yes Wooyoung…please.” You beg, and not a moment later, Wooyoung is kissing down your neck, occasionally nipping at your skin, causing you to groan. You tilt your head back so it is resting on his right shoulder. The feeling of his lips against your neck is intoxicating and you couldn’t get enough. He continues to kiss and suck at your neck, making sure to mark you up nice and pretty. A few kisses later, he grabs your hips, giving you a heads-up.

“Turn around baby.” His hands allow you to spin in place, not leaving your side and once you are fully turned around, he places them back onto your hips and you feel him lean into you again. Your lips search for his through the darkness, bumping into his cheek accidentally, and you let out a soft giggle. Soon your lips meet and you are passionately making out in the dark. His hands continue to feel up and down your body, one hand snaking its way to your ass and he grips it harshly. A soft moan leaves your mouth into the kiss. You feel Wooyoung’s lips form a smirk and he continues to grip onto your ass.

“You like that, huh?”

“Fuck, y-yes I do~.” You pant out, slightly out of breath. Wooyoung’s other hand, not playing with your ass, begins to toy its way down your waistband and slips through down to your underwear. His fingers tease the wet patch in your underwear that has been forming since he slammed the door, causing you to moan and tilt your head back against the door.

“So wet for me already babygirl~. You’ve wanted this to happen for a while, haven’t you?” You can only moan in response, his fingers pressing into you and you hear Wooyoung groan softly, his hips rutting against your thigh as he fingers you. “Making me so…fuck…fucking hard.”

“Woo..p-please stop teasing m-me. I need you.”

“As you wish~.” He wastes no time pushing your underwear to the side and slipping his fingers inside you.

“Fuck!” You cry out. His fingers stretching you more than your own or any toy ever has. You bite your lip and grind against his hand.

“H-Holy shit you do need me.” He chuckles at your body reacting this way to him. You’re absolutely driving him insane. “Wish I could see that pretty face of yours. Watch your face as I fuck you nice and good with my fingers.”

“W-Wooyoung~.” The dirty talk was getting you to your climax faster than you thought. His voice ringing through your ear like a melody you wanted to listen to on repeat forever.

“Fuck Y/N, you’re taking them so well.” You can’t see his face, but the way that sentence came out sounded like he was gritting his teeth together. You could feel your head spinning and you knew you were close to your release.

“Wooyoung, I-.” Your words are cut off by a moan slipping from your throat. “I need your hand on my neck.”

“Ho hoh~ kinky are we~? I always knew you were a whore.” Wooyoung quickly takes the hand that was playing with your ass and grabs your neck—not too hard, applying just enough pressure that you were seeing static.

“Y-Yes! Just like that.” You manage to choke out and feel the knot forming in your stomach. Your pussy clenches around Wooyoung’s fingers.

“Want you to cum on my fingers princess. I know you can do it.” Wooyoung’s demanding encouragement was all you needed to hear for the knot in your stomach to release. Wooyoung’s grip on your neck lessens, and a string of curses mixed with his name come out of your mouth. "Fuck, you sound so beautiful. Exactly how I pictured it.” Wooyoung pulls his hand out of your pants and kisses your lips gently.

“W-Wooyoung~.” Your voice is no louder than a whisper.

“Sshhh sh sh darling, I know~. Take your time recovering.” Wooyoung caresses the side of your face and wraps his other hand around your waist. He gently moves you out of the way and opens the door slowly, letting the light from the hallway come in, and you squint your eyes from being in the dark for so long. Wooyoung turns around and looks at you. "Fuck, you’re gorgeous even after your insides get rearranged by my hand.” You softly chuckle at his remark and lift your hand to swat at his shoulder.

“Not my fault; you know your way around~.”

“Guess working these late shifts together helped me get to know you better~.” A soft smile forms on his face. You feel yourself blush, and you shy away from looking at him. “Come on. Let’s get back to business.” He offers his hand for you to grab and you gladly take it. He walks you out of the room and down the hallway into the main area of the building.

“So…you working tomorrow~?” You ask playfully.

“I most definitely will be if you’re here.”

“Always.”

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unluckilyimnot · 26 days

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Hiii!! I loooooveee your blog so much!! Every time I see your notifications, I get like SUPER HAPPY!! It really makes my day!! AND SOMEHOW I DIDN'T SEE THAT YOUR REQUESTS ARE OPEN?? Could you do the types of dates kurona, otoya, and karasu from bluelock would go to? ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

Date with kurona, otoya, karasu, isagi, rin

m.list | rules

Note: Hiiiii omg your message make me so happy thank you sm 🤍 I hope it's what you expected

Kurona

He would loves outside date

Things like aquarium and parks, which is chill but you can still have fun and take great pictures

He changes his lockscreen all the time

He's kinda shy with pda but if you take his hand while walking around the aquarium he would love it a lot

He can stay a lot of time around jellyfish, the color it captivating

He can be loud around bigger animals like sharks or tortoises

Absolutely wants a matching keychain with both your favorite animals

He's most likely to play around if you're in places like parks so he would initiate contacts more

But he also like to take a plaid and lay down with you while toi read or just make fun about people around you

He would never be mean but likes to play along

Tag with along with some ice cream or a very fresh drink and you have a perfect date for him

Otoya

He tries to impress you even if you're already dating lmao

Would try to teach you how go skate

So you can fall into his arms or cling onto him

It's a good excuse to touch you outside

But he would really love to do it with you so he takes it seriously, don't worry

He would feel bad if you get hurt tho

He wouldn't say it out loud but you notice how super serious he'd become

He has a good sense of style so he would like to go shopping as well !

Window shopping is something he really likes

Add a coffee to the equation and he's the happiest!

Really to hear you talk about style and how you could style a piece with what you already have

Karasu

On the other hand, karasu knows he has nothing to prove

So he'll be chill about date

Don't get it wrong: he will plain it on every part and regularly (if not all the time)

And he wants to win your heart over and over again

But he also know that you love him and that staying inside with a movie only is enough

Yet he prefers to make it better like baking while watching a Disney movie!

Bonus point if you make something from the movie

Or while watching an old sitcom

Be prepared to have flour on your nose and for him to kiss it away

Rin

Football date, tell me he wouldn't

He takes you with him to see the matches of his favorite team

Or just with a pizza (for once) at home

He probably prefers date at home in fact

Even if he's not against it if you want so to something outside

Horror movie marathon

This is a routine, you have one every week, that's his cheating moment of the week

He stays up late, eat junk-food with you and don't get up early next morning

He loves it so much to be honest

His arm is around you all the time, pulling you against him if you're scared

He can also hide his face in your hair if needed

Bonus point if you fell asleep in his arms

Isagi

He would love taking a walk around the town and go see museum or important location

Like he read something about a place and he wanted to go check with you !

If you like historical places as well he's in heaven

I swear he falls in love again I'd you know some things and tell him as a cute funfair about the place

The type to find cute coffee shop that are not crown or trending

So be prepared ! He wants to try them all

And if you're a coffee or tea lover he simply needs to hear how you feel about it

His insta feed is mostly you on date and some pictures of the place (along with football)

I hope you liked it !

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mercurycft · 2 months

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𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐃 𝐋𝐀𝐔𝐍𝐂𝐇 — 𝐊𝐌 | ꒱ ₊˚ˑ༄

## social media | katie mccabe & awfc !!

september 18th 2023 — 📸

🔔 yourusername posted to instagram.

yourusername tagged arsenalwfc & 15 others in this post.

liked by bethmead_, jbeattie91, stepcatley, katie_mccabe11, arsenalwfc and 89,754 others.

yourusername : arsenal wfc on film 🎞️🤍🎥

posted 9 hours ago.

tap to view all 43 comments

arsenalwfc: lights, camera, ACTION! ❤️

katie_mccabe11: why has my tan disappeared???

^ yourusername: you’re still tanned bby dw <3

^ y/n.mccxbe: HOLY SHIT

^ awfc.gunner: OH MY GOOOODDDDD

leahwilliamsonn: NL is RED! ❤️

^ yourusername: as it should be!

jbeattie91: look at my bun poking over everyone 🤣

^ yourusername: buns for dayyyyys 🗣️

awfclw66: literally my favourite people ever

^ yourusername: ❤️

^ awfclw66: OMG

september 20th 2023 — 📸

🔔 katie_mccabe11 posted to their story

september 21st 2023 — 📸

🔔 yourusername posted to instagram.

yourusername tagged katie_mccabe11 in this post

liked by katie_mccabe11, bethmead_, leahwilliamsonn, arsenalwfc and 98,537 others.

yourusername : happy birthday, old woman. i love you. heres to many, many more ❤️💐🥳 xxx

posted 4 hours ago.

tap to view all 78 comments

📍 katie_mccabe11: glad i’ve got you ❤️ i love you

leahwilliamsonn: way to break the internet 😭

^ yourusername: my phone is breaking

arsenal.wfc211: OMG HARDLAUNCHHARDLAUNCH

^ awfcg0nner: THE SEASON IS UPON US

bethmead_: my favourites 🤍

^ yourusername: love you beffy xxx

arsenalwfc: ♍️ virgo season

^ katie_mccabe11: aka the BEST season!

september 22nd 2023 — 📸

🔔 katie_mccabe11 posted to instagram

yourusername was tagged in this post

liked by yourusername, bethmead_, arsenalwfc, stephcatley, jbeattie91 and 52,137 others.

katie_mccabe11 : one whole year of not hating your guts, even if you are too messy. i love you ❤️

posted 2 hours ago

the poster has limited the amount of comments on this post.

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📍 yourusername: a whole year of your loud, loud mouth. love you 🤍 also my post got more likes than yours 😚 xx

^ katie_mccabe11: yeah yeah, whatever you say

arsenalwfc: all been holding our breath for 365 days

^ yourusername: ❤️

^ katie_mccabe11: is this teamcest??

——————

read ‘soft launch’ here! x

hey pookies!! i bet you all weren’t expecting another post so quick ;) i really enjoy making these! please let me know what other players you would like to see! i have work all of tomorrow morning, but i will get around to requests & messages this! weekend! i promise :)) happy reading & love always! 🤍 - RG x

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sehodreams · 3 months

Note

who in riize would you think that will be in a phone call with the reader in the middle of the night just to listen her voice talking about nothing? (maybe i have something about this and this question comes through my mind). And i really, really love "sex, money, feelings, die", it's sooooo good. Sorry english is not my first language.

I'm so happy you like sex money feelings die, I thought people would get tired of their silly conversations on the phone this last chapter but I'm glad it wasn't that bad hahahaha

Don't worry babe, english is not my first language either, we're here doing our best to learn!

This is more a how would calls with them be, I imagined them all and it was so cute 😭👌

Tw and tags: pure fluff, a little suggestive with Shotaro.

Eunseok definitely would be the kind of guy who sends you a text at 2 am to ask if you're awake, and the minute he sees you've read his message he'd call you, ''Why are you calling me at this hour?'' you'd ask, and he'd reply with a ''Why are you awake if you don't want me to call you?'', to make you laugh and then ask you about random stuff just to hear you until you or him fall asleep.

Anton is needier, he likes his daily night call, so every day at the same time you'd receive a text from him asking if he can call you, and when you say yes, he'd immediately do it, but I see him, more than talking, asking you questions to hear you ramble, and if you ask him the same question back, he'd softly laugh a bit embarrassed, ''sorry, got lost in your voice for a second, what were we talking about?''

Sungchan seems like the kind of guy who also loves his daily call, but he also seems like he would rather talk while you listen, and even if he says nothing and you either, he wants you to stay on the phone with him just to feel your company.

Sohee wouldn't call you, you'd call him, and he loves that. I see him more as the type who prefers texting, but he would never say no to you asking if you can call him, patiently listening to you and giving you answers when you need them. However, what I also see, is he falling asleep with your voice, and after a few times like that he'd be stuck to his phone waiting for your name to appear on his screen every night.

Seunghan would call you and plan little activities to not fall in silence, you can't tell me he doesn't make his girlfriend download silly games to play while you two talk for HOURS.

Wonbin doesn't seem like the kind who rambles much on the phone, but he still likes long phone calls, just listening to you breathe or even singing, leaving little comments every now and then and only hanging up when you beg him to let you go (at the end he'd take screenshots of how many hours you've been on the call to show it off to the other boys).

Shotaro likes to hear your voice but I think he prefers even more to see you, so he'd ask for short video calls if you're not busy, and a long one once a week, asking you to model for him if you bought something new or just to see you better (you can't tell me this man won't love those calls to have a... happy ending).

#riize x reader #riize fluff #riize imagines #riize scenarios

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am-i-the-asshole-official · 4 months

Note

Am I the asshole for calling a (now ex-) mutual a stingy asshole?

So to start, I (NB20) am in a pretty rough situation, I'm facing homelessness soon, transphobia at home and work and my hours have been getting cut resulting in me making even less money that can sustain me. I have a toyhou.se forum post up stating I have emergency commissions open to help me out and to please support me if you can. This is where the situation begins. I have a mutual on toyhou.se who I'll call Apple (MTF22) I talk to sometimes to the point I'd say we are friends, not super close but friends nonetheless. She made a bulletin telling people about my commissions and to please comm me if they could which I'm very grateful for since I did get a few customers from her because of that. The thing is, a few weeks later, she made a bulletin talking about how happy she was so many commissions she bought were finished around the same time and posted all of them with the artists tagged in the post. It was honestly... quite a few, I'm talking like 9 pieces of art of her fursona and even a custom vtuber model she got of her sona. I was going to reply all happy for her, but it made me think... how much did she spend on those commissions?? So I went through all the artists socials to find their commission prices and came to a total of fucking $385!!! More than half of my current goal I'm trying to make through commissions to stay out of homelessness!! So I messaged Apple saying since I saw she bought a few commissions if she was interested in buying a comm from me. She replies saying "Ohh! I'd love to <333 but im just not in a place to buy any more comms right now :< sorry >.<!!" So I casually reply really? because it seems like your in the perfect place to help me out after already spending over $300 in commissions. She tells me she's sorry and really wishes someone would be able to help me out but she just wasn't that interested in my art or a custom to which I tell her she could've easily donated to my ko-fi which I have always had since she clearly has money to spend? To this, she straight up IP blocks me. So still fucking annoyed, I vented in a discord server I share with a few friends from being in a few shared CS together, saying how annoying it is rich assholes like her would drop half a thousand for a picture of their fursona but don't even blink twice at their so called friends. anyway, one of my friends takes a look at Apples th profile and notices she has a new bulletin up and sends me a screenshot, but anways the bulletin reads like "hey!! just saying, but please dont come into my dms acting like you know my financial situation better than i do, just because i buy a lot of commissions doesnt mean im made of money! and please dont think that me commisioning artist 1 means i hate artist 2? thats so weird, thanks!!!!!" and seeing all their subscribers just kissing her ass pissed me off so i made my own bulletin that just stated "i thought it was pretty fucking weird to know how bad ur friend's situation was and to go buy a bunch of comms instead of buying a comm from or even throwing a buck to help me out? like yeah im gonna think i know ur situation better than u, you stingy fuck!!!" Anyway, she mustve been block evading (which I reported her for) since she unblocked me, took a screenshot of my bulletin, then went on about how she lived in an abusive household; her dad had thrown her into a sink and chipped her tooth, bruised half her face and scarred it pretty badly. She bought a bunch of commissions immediately afterwards in a panic to make herself feel better, paying everything with her savings. Which to me.. isn't an excuse. Ive been hit and abused and still found scraps of money to pull together to give to mutuals who need it and Ive been bumping my own post like crazy and she had literal weeks to donate or comm me. Not to mention Ive had exmutuals of hers come to me saying that shes never donated anything to them either despite advertising their posts but always had money for plushies, comms and other crap, meaning Im not alone in thinking shes a stingy asshole. This is getting long, so here, tumblr AITA?

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole

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cookinguptales · 1 year

Text

So… last week I made a vent post about an accessibility issue I’d had with some podcasters. I really only meant for the post to be read by my followers (who to my knowledge aren’t familiar with the podcast in question) which is why I put minimal tags on it and didn’t name the show.

But… the post got legs that I wasn’t expecting, and eventually a lot of people asked for the name of the show. I hadn’t intended on creating a whole big thing, so I was kind of reluctant, but I did see the logic in what they were saying — as a disabled woman myself, I would also want to know if I were supporting podcasters whose values did not align with mine. So I told people quietly in the notes that the show had been Old Gods of Appalachia.

Things… did not stay quiet.

Frankly speaking, one of the reasons why I don’t write as many posts about disability and ableism these days is because I got tired of people writing to me and telling me that people like me should be dead. So you can imagine what kind of fucking week I’ve been having since all that blew up. It’s been a very high symptom week, too, so I’m just. Very tired and stressed rn.

Personally, I’d be happy to never talk about it again and try to get back to my everyday life, but I did think it was important to note that the creators of OGOA must have gotten wind of the post, and they did contact me.

I won’t post the whole email here, but it was a good response. Since seeing my post, they’d tried getting in contact with the venue and realized very quickly why I’d been so frustrated. They ended up needing to go through their booking agent to get any kind of answers — so like, to the people who sent me a thousand messages telling me I was an entitled idiot who just needed to contact the venue, please know that none of you were remotely helpful.

Again, I’m not going to post the entire email, but I did think it was important to be fair and use the same platform that I used to vent to tell people that they seem committed to doing better in the future. They told me that they would be making sure that they have all this information going forward and that they would no longer allow it to be such a barrier to entry for disabled fans.

They invited me back to the show and… god, I’ll admit it. I really had to think about my answer. Not to sound ungrateful, but after the week I’ve had, even thinking about the podcast, the podcasters, and that damn live show has me stressed af. I had to really consider whether I even wanted to go.

But in the months since I first contacted them, they added a show that’s a lot closer to where I live, so rather than a weekend trip, I could just take a single bus. And it’s near one of my favorite Japanese restaurants in the city, so if all else fails, I can at least have some good katsudon. So I will be going to the Philadelphia show.

(Though for fellow disabled fans, Terakawa Ramen is not wheelchair accessible. 🙃 Most days I can do the two steps into the restaurant, but not always. Philly, I love and loathe you.)

Anyway, I wanted to reply to them before I made a post here, but… yeah. We’ve worked things out, I think. Only the future can tell what they'll do going forward but they do seem committed to doing better.

To me, there are always two goals when I write about disability and ableism. The first is that disabled people will feel seen. That is always, always my primary goal. It’s so easy for us to feel invisible and unimportant, and I always want to make you all feel seen, just like I want to feel seen. The second is that able-bodied folks will listen and learn and do their best to support their disabled peers in the future.

So… I think that my post managed to fulfill both of those goals. A lot of disabled people have reblogged that post and have talked about their own experiences, and a lot of them have explicitly said how much that post makes them feel seen. And the podcasters in question seem to have really reflected on their actions and seem to want to do better going forward.

So as incredibly fucking stressed out as I’ve been, I guess I can’t regret making the post. It’s always good to know that your words can have impact. The post has long since moved out of my friends circle so I assume it’ll just keep circulating and I’ll keep getting shitty anons and chat messages, but I’m just gonna focus on what good has come from it. I’m hopeful that my post will make life tangibly better for at least a few disabled people, and I’m encouraged by the fact that podcasters who I’d formerly liked do actually seem to want to do the work needed to improve.

And uh I’m not answering any more messages from people who just wanna swear at me. I’m tired. Leave me alone.

#it took me six hours to get out of bed today due to dizziness so like #forgive me if I'm not quite as coherent as usual lmao #it really has been a SUPER bad week as far as symptoms go #old gods of appalachia #OGOA #podcasts #cw:#ableism #disability

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fairuzfan · 4 months

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Your post about how many people are unknowingly falling for & spreading propaganda... yeah. I typed up a whole spiel of a comment on one of your posts the other day that I ended up deciding not to not actually post because it felt like detailing, but seriously. The amount of well meaning, genuinely anti-zionist people ignorantly sharing zionists' posts because they just don't pick up on the leading undertones is honestly more terrifying than than the amount of actual zionists in some ways.

I'm someone who was born into a doomsday cult, and seeing all these people falling for the exact same blatant (or so i thought lol) recruitment/manipulation tactics I've seen used by them my entire life has absolutely fucking terrifying. These are people who are actively trying to combat zionism, but I guess the general public is so uneducated about propaganda/cult tactics that what immediately reads as blatantly manipulative, misleading bullshit to me just doesn't even register as strange to most people. Not to be repetitive, but seriously: fucking terrifying.

There's so much focus on the way people/groups who want to manipulate you will use language of fear, but in this case especially, people need to realize they will almost always appeal to your compassion before they appeal to your fear.

It's all peace and love and happiness because that's what gets people in the door. You preach (or post) the mushy, happy, fun stuff that makes people feel good to draw them in, and you slowly start peppering in the ideas you actually want to lead them to believe later on once you've got them wanting to believe you.

This also has this added effect of helping the group or person's image. Even the people who you don't manage to draw in will have the impression of you as someone who runs their mouth 24/7 about how you're full of love and want the best for everyone, which is especially useful for when you inevitably want to frame yourself as the victim to demonize the people who will inevitably oppose you. If your first and only exposure to a person is seeing them calling for world peace and universal love, you are much more likely to be inclined to believe they (and by extension their cause) are the sympathetic, loving, peaceful good guys being unjustly targeted.

Sorry for rambling, but like... really. It won't always be something nefarious, of course--the vast majority of the the time, it won't be--but I think we would all be in a much better situation if people took it as a general rule of thumb that you should always be a little suspicious of overly vague talk about peace and love.

You're EXACTLY right. I really appreciate this message, because you put to words a lot of my inherent analysis of arguments and ideas. I like grew up with this rhetoric so it's easy to spot for me, but the way that people speak about "peace" as the overall goal when they're zionist is so blatant to me because there is no material change in the scenario they propose but rather a calmness where Palestinians are ignored.

And picking up on subtext of a lot of messages is something you have to have a muscle for kinda because of how subtle it is. The frightening part is, you're right, that the indoctrination part of zionism is the most harmful part because you appeal to their pathos — their fear, their sense of safety, etc — and you go on down the rabbit hole and slowly start being radicalized and pro-zionism or you might not even be pro-zionism 100% but enjoy... soft zionism as a mutual of mine put it once (if you read this and want to be tagged, lmk). Which soft zionism is the MAIN opinion in many liberal circles btw, its not an uncommon opinion.

I even remember once sharing a post by a zionist because i saw them talk about esims but when i went on their blog a few days later because something rubbed me the wrong way, I noticed their pinned and I was like "oh dam I gotta delete that other post" like that's how often this happens.

Idk, I try to combat this by putting sources or approaching from a standpoint of logical arguments rather than identity-based politics (although, sometimes i think there are some things that people who are a certain identity can be the only true experts on) so that I try to encourage actual engagement with ideas and walking them through thought processes rather than "I'm palestinian so just trust me."

Like even with my one fact checking list, idk if I succeeded but I wanted to emphasize that there are multiple factors you should consider when confronting ANY sort of information and should not blindly trust things. News sources have regularly burned or ignored Palestinians so I know a lot of us are really sensitive to these things, but I don't know! I hope people can engage with ideas more than just surface level thinking in general because it helps everyone when you actually interact with the point of view the other person is providing rather than just blindly trusting/distrusting people.

#thanks for this ask btw i really appreciate it

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my-secret-shame-but-fanfiction · 14 days

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I saw your hc post with Nathan with a feminine s/o and the part where he liked listening to her talk and that got me thinking about this. He would love it if his s/o played piano. Like, he puts a piano in places like the living room and his office just so when he's there he can listen to them play. Sh maybe you could make a small hc post based on that idea

Ahh, I love this! Sorry it took me so long to post!

Nathan Bateman GN!Reader • Rating: T•Masterlist• ao3• want to be tagged? | requestinfo• ko-fi •

Warnings: Soft!Nathan , swearing, over use of italics, typos, not beta read, railroad sentences, please let me know if I've missed a warning!

Word Count: 455

Oh my gosh, literally pianos everywhere. You have to tell him to calm the fuck down.

“Do you want a new piano?” “No, you bought me five already.” “Do you need one in a different colour?” “No.” “What about another grand piano for the-” “Nathan.”

Doesn’t pester you to play for him, but is very happy whenever you play. Even if you’re trying out a new piece and feel like you're constantly messing up, he’s just 100% heart eyes at all times.

Will, however, act like he isn’t if you call him on it.

If you’re playing and it isn’t within his earshot you’re gonna get a series of, ‘why aren’t you playing near me so I can listen?’ type messages.

You end up just practising near him so he doesn’t complain.

You call him a baby (affectionate) about it.

He says he isn’t and sulks for 3 hours.

When you find him you show him a little song you’ve written for him.

He gets a little over emotional that you made something for him. And tries to hide it. (He does a bad job.)

Asks you to teach him how to play.

He understands the theory really well, but gets annoyed when he can’t play perfectly after 30 seconds.

“You’re really good Nathan!”

“I’m shit.”

“You can’t expect to play it perfectly the first time.”

“Why?”

You roll your eyes. “Because you have to learn the muscle memory, you couldn’t box amazingly the first time you tried could you?”

“I could.”

“Fuck off.”

You give him little lessons every day, which he adores. He progresses well, he’s obviously trying really hard, but after a couple of weeks, you realise he’s doing it more to spend time with you and to share in something you enjoy than to become a master at it. (Which surprises you.)

He likes calling you ‘bossy’ when you tell him to practise or play something. This morphs a little and sticks into a nickname, ‘boss’.

Whenever he’s on a conference call and someone asks him to do something he doesn’t want to, instead of saying a flat ‘no.’ he just starts shrugging and saying ‘you better ask the boss.’

He does not explain this to anyone, causing a lot of confusion (which he loves).

No one has any idea that you’re ‘the boss’ until a rare in-person event when Nathan isn’t being his hermit self and he refers to you by the nickname in front of a couple of staff.

What you expect to be the end of the joke turns into people asking and emailing you for permission and sign offs. (And to get Nathan to do things.)

Nathan finds this all hilarious and will not correct the situation.

Thank you for reading!

@pleasurebuttonwrites @raven-rk @campingwiththecharmings @alexxavicry @whatthefishh

@romanarose @strangerhands @saturn-rings-writes @lonelyisamyw-0love @queerponcho

@steven-grants-world @eyelessfaces @angel-of-the-moons @minigirl87 @lunar-ghoulie

@silvernight-m @autismsupermusicalassassin @apesarecuul @reallyrallyauthor @basicalyrandom

@alwaysmicado @mangoslushcrush @marc-spectorr @soft-girl-musings @spxctorsslxt

@novarosewood

If you'd like to be taken off the tag list please let me know here

#nathan bateman #ex machina #nathan bateman x reader #x reader #nathan bateman x you #x you #nathan bateman x gender neutral reader #x gender neutral reader #nathan bateman x gn!reader #x gn!reader #my writing #fanfic #oscar isaac #oscar isaac characters

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4ce-of-2pades · 2 months

Text

Imagine a Heroes of Olympus AU where, due to the empathy link, Hera can’t snatch Percy and wipe his memories without also messing with Grover’s mind. (That or she’s just worried Grover would use the link to find Percy before the time is right, so she gets him out of the picture too.) Maybe she sends both of them to the Wolf House together, but more likely she doesn’t think Grover is very important and just drops him in the wilderness somewhere.

So Percy’s following Lupa’s instructions and heading to Camp Jupiter, fighting every single monster within a five mile radius along the way, and the whole time he’s got this feeling like he’s getting close to something. He assumes it means he’s getting close to camp, but meanwhile Grover has been traveling towards him, following that same unidentified feeling like a compass, as the only lead he has to go on with no memory. After like a full week(?) of fighting weird monsters that want to kill him, Percy encounters some guy with horns and goat legs and probably attempts to slay him on sight to get things over with. Grover of course yells “I surrender! Don’t kill me!” and they get to talking. Percy is mildly suspicious, but takes Grover’s word that not all animal hybrid creatures are out for his blood. So they set off for Camp Jupiter together.

When they get there, none of the Romans are too happy to welcome another “good for nothing” faun onto their territory, but Juno gave Percy her endorsement, and Percy gave Grover his endorsement, so if the Romans want to follow Juno’s instructions and make sure the son of Neptune sticks around, they’ve got to let the faun tag along. Grover is uncomfortable with being so utterly disliked on first sight by so many people—and he can read emotions, so the message is coming through loud and clear. Before he encounters the fauns of Camp Jupiter, he probably just assumes he’s a random monster on par with the gorgons, and that’s why he’s so hated. Monster or no, though, Percy is already unwaveringly loyal towards his new friend. Grover is the first person he’s met who hasn’t wanted anything from him but his companionship. No harsh training to survive, no fighting to the death. Just traveling and talking and making stupid jokes together to make everything seem less scary. The way they clicked, it was as if they had been friends for far longer than a few days. In fact, Percy can practically feel Grover’s fear and shame at the Romans’ reactions as if they were his own emotions, and it only makes him more defensive of his friend.

Eventually Grover and Percy encounter Don the Faun, prompting Hazel to explain that fauns, collectively, aren’t much more than beggars, thieves, and freeloaders. Of course, she probably phrases it just a smidge more tactfully, given that Grover is, y’know, standing right there. He now understands the dismissive way he’s been treated. A faun welcomed right into camp and given the “New Legionnaire” tour alongside Juno’s chosen hero. What a joke. He almost wishes he really was a monster instead. Evil or no, at least monsters are powerful and impressive, not… useless. He sees what Don is like, what all fauns are like, apparently, and he feels ashamed of himself. Percy tries to cheer him up, tries to remind him that the Lares keep calling him a Greek. An enemy. Nevermind how Neptune and his children are apparently barely respected here. If Percy and Grover are outcasts at Camp Jupiter, then they’ll be outcasts together.

That makes Grover feel a little bit better. But not much.

Grover certainly doesn’t want to seek out the other fauns. Even if it is off-putting that no one cares they’re all basically homeless, Grover still finds those that he’s met to be unfocused and irritating. He feels different from them. Grover sticks close to Percy, because Percy is pretty much the only person in the Legion who acknowledges his existence. Grover is not invited to join the Legion with Percy. Not that he particularly wants to sign up for ten years of army, but at least it would have given him a place to belong. Grover also isn’t invited to join the War Games, but no one stops him from coming either. They don’t seem to think he’d make a difference one way or the other, so if he wants to go charging in to his death, why stop him? Hazel and Frank have interacted with Grover enough, by way of interacting with Percy, to know that he’s at least a little different from other fauns, so they don’t mind having his help. And besides, the Fifth Cohort knows what it’s like to be the underdogs. How much worse could one faun make things?

When the Fifth Cohort takes the War Games by storm, and Hazel, Frank, and Percy prove their abilities, Grover is right there alongside them, using nature magic as a crucial part of their plan. Through this shared victory, Hazel and Frank and the rest of the Fifth gain respect for Grover as an individual, and the rest of the Legion at least has to notice that he’s there.

When it comes time for the quest, of course Percy wants Grover to come with him and Frank and Hazel, even if three is the usual quest limit. (I don’t remember if it is with Romans.) Whether three is the limit or not, though, the Romans aren’t too keen on letting a faun join a quest. Best case scenario, they think, Grover wouldn’t take it seriously, and would run away at the nearest sign of trouble. A waste of a choice for a companion. Fauns aren’t heroes. They’re just nuisances. Percy is clearly angry and about to argue, but Grover stops him, instead speaking calmly for himself, and putting to use his skill for convincing people of things. (You’d think he could charmspeak, honestly.) Grover swallows his pride and recommends himself as more of an assistant than an actual member of the quest. Someone to carry the equipment, set up camp, get groceries now and then, etc. A servant, practically, for the real heroes.

“You know you’re not getting paid for this,” Reyna points out.

Grover has to bite his tongue to keep his temper. “Yes. I know.”

In the end, Grover is allowed to join Percy and the others on the principle that, again, his presence shouldn’t make that much of a difference one way or the other. And besides, if he’s not technically part of the quest or the Legion, they can’t stop him from happening to travel to the exact same places at the exact same time, can they? If the questers don’t have an issue with it, then sure. Let the faun go on a quest.

Grover is laughed out of the Senate House. He tries not to get too upset. He got what he wanted, after all. But at the cost of humiliation.

Percy asks Grover why he would even want to come on a dangerous quest when he doesn’t have to, especially when the Romans made it as hard as they did for him to be allowed. Grover says he wanted to help Percy because they’re friends, and because Percy is the only person who’s ever stuck up for him.

Percy says, “I appreciate that, but we’ve only been friends for the better part of a week. Is this really worth the risk, for someone you barely know?”

“Even if it wasn’t,” Grover replies, “I can’t stay here. I won’t stay somewhere I’m hated. I’d rather be out there with you, doing something useful, than get treated like I’m worthless.

“Besides,” he says, “I’m sick of people telling me what I can’t do.”

#percy jackson #percy jackon and the olympians #heroes of olympus #the son of neptune #pjo grover #grover underwood #pjo au

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brisquad-unit-4402 · 1 year

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Hello it’s me again! It’s been a while, I hope you’ve been doing okay. I recently have been reading through a lot of angst to comfort and I have an idea for a request!

May I request an Ike fic where reader is a liver in NIJISANJI and has a crush on Ike but knows they have no chance with him. Then one day reader accidentally spills their feelings to Ike and Ike comforts them after hearing about readers feelings?

I hope you’re not tired of me requesting Ike fics (ily him to much) and I hope you have a good day/night! <3

-🖋️

stars above your skin

oh 🖋 we're really in it now

how long have i had this request in my inbox? early march? and now exactly one day after blue light dropped, i give you a ~19.5k word ike fic. much love and effort has gone into this one, only seconded by the massive amounts of brainrot.

so yeah, i'm not tired of ike requests. i'm literally a quilldren that writes fanfic. this is the opposite of a problem

in fact this might be one of my favorite things i've written... the second half is such a good bedtime story for me...!

this is going to get NASTY to read on tumblr—as in my site is lagging so hard just typing these a/n notes. so i'm going to remind you all that not only is liking/reblogging recommended to keep track of this fic, but also that i have an ao3 account (same name as url but without dashsince it's much more accessible than tumblr for long fic. i recommend reading on tumblr if you can because of some formatting but to each their own!

here’s a funny story about this fic. i was working on it while a bunch of people sat behind me, you see, and one of my greatest irrational fears is that people sitting behind me will be able to see my laptop screen and laugh at what i’m writing…! and with these requests i usually title them the fandom name and my name, and a short phrase about the request, and this one was “workplace romance”, and i just got so afraid right then and there i changed it to the first thing i could think of, based off a clip i saw of pomu, selen, aia and doppio…!! and that’s why the wip doc is titled “nijisanji 4402 - pliskin”, and why i will always refer to this fic as "pliskin" much more than the actual title

by the way here’s a cover of iris that was pretty fitting for this fic. you’ll know when to play it. enjoy

tags: hurt/comfort, reader is a niji vtuber, gender neutral reader, off-collab, mutual pining, misunderstandings, fluff, angst with a happy ending, friends to lovers, cuddling, everyone in niji is your wingman, implied uki/ren if you squint but it’s mostly because uki will flirt with 80% of the men in this company

cameos: aia amare, alban knox, mika melatika, nina kosaka, ren zotto, uki violeta, vox akuma, fulgur ovid (mentioned)

⚠️ drinking/alcohol (unspecified if reader drinks alcohol)

⚠️ horror/gore mentions (non-detailed), out of context outlast spoilers i guess?

author's commentary here (spoilers) ↣

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

There are dozens of these videos on YouTube, and never have you come across the same one twice. You would know. You have a bad habit of clicking on them.

After all, they’re labeled with your name on them, and right next to it, Ike Eveland. You are smart enough to recognize it’s not worth your time and just another compilation of the same moments and fans trying to make a mountain out of a molehill, but your heart says otherwise. To be fair, the compilations were a much more recent development than the one you hid under lock and key.

When you first joined Nijisanji, some of your senpais sent you messages full of greetings and offers to help you get on your feet as a streamer. Ike was one of those senpais, and whenever you popped into voice calls just to hang out, he was easy to talk to, like an old friend. Naturally, a fast friendship formed, and when you debuted, he was one of the first people you collabed with- and the one with the best reception. Your new fans (‘Bookworms,’ they called themselves, after your name Reader) loved how well your humor bounced off each other, and when weeks passed and you announced another collab on your schedule with Ike, your Bookworms rejoiced.

Even when you weren’t working, you would still talk to him. He told you about his homeland in the past and his novels, both released and unpublished. He was a storyteller even when he was talking about something as minute as making a sandwich, and whenever you brought up your past and interests, he was an excellent listener. You had your differences, but he always knew what questions to ask so he could understand you better, and you loved the opportunity to ramble.

It had been nearly three months since you debuted, and four if you count the day you were officially hired and began to build yourself as a streamer. Whenever you look at the endlessly long text history between you and Ike, you have to wonder: is it normal to feel so connected to someone you’ve only known for three-maybe-four months?

You’re not an idiot. You aren’t about to say Ike is the most important thing in the world to you, but he gets pretty damn close. That terrifies you. You shouldn’t be so attached to someone you barely know.

But then again, you trust Ike. He’s opened up to you about things he would never say to others, and he keeps your secrets buried in the grave. You’ve lost count of how much advice he’s given you, but you’ve never forgotten a single one, and whenever you feel lost about something you know you can count on him to help you out.

You grimace, sip out of your drinking glass, and press ‘play’ on the next compilation.

A cute intro plays with the clipper’s name. Above it are the words Pen and Paper, surrounded by puffy pink hearts.

That was the duo name between you and Ike, but "ship name" was more accurate among fanwork.

You weren’t exactly unaware about it. Weeks ago, you were surfing Twitter and the site’s algorithm granted you your introduction into Pen and Paper. This was shortly after your first collab with Ike, and after you established your shipping rules with your audience (“I’m fine with anything, as long as the other liver is okay with it!”, you proclaimed, totally oblivious to how soon that would blow up in your face). The fanartist posted a messy black-and-white sketch, but you could make out the pattern of Ike’s scarf wrapped around you and him at the same time, forcing your bodies into close proximity with averted eyes and dusty blushes.

You appreciated the fanartist’s passion and skill, but the thought of you and Ike as an item sunk in your chest like you swallowed a rock. You swiped past. You went back to your scrolling, found some good thumbnails, and retweeted some cute solo fanart, but before the week ended, you made a private account with a fake name and staked out the tags for Pen and Paper to follow that fanartist.

Damn fanartist. You tried to deny it, and told yourself that you followed their art because you liked the style. But their account was full of ship art, and when Twitter gave you similar users that all worked under the hashtag, you had to face facts. If you wanted to look at it optimistically, at least you figured it out early on before anything had the chance to sour while you were still blissfully ignorant of yourself; even then, that doesn’t make it any harder than it already is.

Besides all the texts, the meetings, the schedules and events, and then including the streams and collabs and the art and the fandom…

“Why?” You ask out loud in the silence of your room. “Why did I have to fall for my coworker?”

And with audiences of over hundreds of people watching you fall for him, nonetheless!

It’s irritating. You have a job that keeps you motivated to work hard. It’s given you a dedicated fanbase, rare opportunities, and coworkers you all recognize as your friends. Really, finding someone to care for because of it should be a blessing, but it’s such a headache. What if your fanbases get jealous, or even worse, outright hate it? Would you be able to keep up a relationship when you and Ike are dedicated to your careers and streams? Why are you even thinking like this? You scold yourself. There’s no way this would ever work out. It’s all fantasy and smoke and mirrors, because fandoms love love. Shipping is never a reflection of the streamers, just the characters you play. You’re delusional if you think your stupid crush could actually go anywhere.

But fandoms love love. The only comfort you have is being able to pretend something could happen. The ship art is a lie, and so are the fanfics, and the clippers that tag their videos as Pen and Paper are just here for a possibility that never could happen.

The compilation is full of little hints and teases, and if you were being honest with yourself, most of it was more like two friends getting along than actual flirting. But you didn’t trust yourself to see your clumsiness for what it is when Ike’s little laughs are like music to your ears.

Damage control, you tell yourself. It’s like studying how you play your favorite games. You can pinpoint where you stumble and leave yourself open for attack in Apex, Smash, even Crab Game, and then amend those mistakes the next time you pick up the game. Real life should be no different. Just stop acting so dorky all the time by finding moments of dork in your VODs and avoid them next time you talk to Ike.

This clip was from your second collab with Ike. Captions floated along the bottom of the screen. Ike's captions were in his signature blue.

IKE: You know, there’s a lot of content about us two as a duo.

READER: They call us Pen and Paper, right?

IKE: Yeah, my art tag is flooded with art of the both of us.

READER: Oh my God, look at the chat. Mine’s full of people saying they love us together.

IKE: Aww, thanks, Quilldren! I’m happy I can play with Reader too.

READER: Thank you, Bookworms; thank you, Quilldren. Hey, there’s a lot more overlap than I expected.

IKE: They’re like Bookdren.

READER: Or Quillworms.

IKE: Quillworms, that sounds way better. They’re like our children.

READER: www

IKE: www

Never fucking mind about acting so dorky all the time. You kick yourself for bringing up Pen and Paper, and your giggly laugh. You hate it. A neon sign above your head that says “SIMP” would be less obvious than that stupid schoolkid laugh.

But Ike’s laughter is music, back in the moment and now as you revisit it, and his model’s eyes squint with a wide smile.

He really is an amazing man. If you didn’t know him as well as you do, you’d think he’s perfect. But you’ve seen him in moments of vulnerability, the parts of himself that never shows through on stream and even rarer among his friends. Through it all he manages to keep going, and you admire him so much for sticking to his guns even when he’s expressed all his doubts about himself. The fact that he trusts you enough to let his guard down only adds to how honored you are to know him, and at the same time, the fact that there’s so much trust between you two just makes you feel worse for having a crush on him. You hate keeping secrets like this when you let Ike read you like an open book for everything else, and even just wishing you were something more to him feels like a betrayal of all that trust. You wish you could just be satisfied to know him.

The compilation continues. The next clip is a totsu Fall Guys collab hosted by Fulgur Ovid that you and Ike joined in on. Fuuchan got eliminated early in the match, and spectated on you while the other livers ran around Roll On with players tugging them this way and that.

You moved around the rotating levels at the perfect sweet spot between two rings, and balanced at the top of the roll as the slime level slowly rose.

A longer wall approached, so you shuffled from one level to another, but another player grabbed your bean avatar and dragged you along to the wall even as you yelled out in panic on Discord. You smashed your keys to struggle, but they had an advantage, and it was clear the wall would push you down to the slime for an impending elimination.

That is, until a familiar Miku bean grabbed the other side of your avatar, and pulled the other way towards the ring that would save your life. Resigned, your attacker backed off and barely dodged out of the way while Ike’s Miku bean brought you back to safety.

The other two livers in the game were too noisy to notice you. Fuuchan was commentating every move you made, and when Ike saved you, he said, “Ike coming in clutch, let’s fucking go.”

Your recorded self didn’t hear him at all, though. You swooned, “Ike, my hero!”

Meanwhile in the present, you wanted to puke. You meant for that to sound like an over-the-top joke, but you crush is getting so serious that it sounds less like a bit and more like how you gush about him in private.

At least Fuuchan’s audio was louder than everyone else, since he was the host, and the other two livers were preoccupied with their own game to notice your lovey-dovey tone and how Ike laughed music at you. It was bad enough clippers transcribed your words in captions, but you weren’t sure how you would handle it if those three picked up on you and your dumb crush. The less that know about your workplace romance, the better.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

“Reader,” Aia coos. Even with audio only, you could tell her eyes were sparkling. “You didn’t tell me you had a workplace romance!”

Well, so much for that plan. You froze over. “Who told you that?”

Mika answers way too quickly. “It’s Alban’s fault.”

“Fuck off, Mika, you brought it up first!”

“You said it though!”

Man, you were already starting to regret joining VC today. You finished your offline work a lot faster than expected, so when you realized that three of your close friends in the company were all online in VC together while Alban privately streamed a rhythm game, you figured you would join the call while you prepared dinner.

But if that was your greeting, you needed to mentally prepare for the wild interrogation you were about to experience. At least Aia, despite her love for drama, knew how to navigate these sorts of things delicately. And you don’t mean to call Mika and Alban bad friends—they were the exact opposite, in fact—but they were much nosier than Aia ever came across.

“Okay, but Reader just asked who leaked it, and didn’t deny it,” Aia says. “So that means it must be true!”

Scratch that. Aia is the worst out of all of them.

“I hate you guys. No hello or anything, just gossip about my love life,” you lament.

She gasps, and if her eyes were sparkling before, then roses bloomed around her as she spoke. “It’s love?”

Mika shrieks like a banshee. “Oh hell no, you’re in love and you didn’t tell us?!”

“It’s not love. It’s nothing!”

“Nah-uh, Reader, no running away from it, we know,” Alban says. “Better to just get it all out in the open than pretend like nothing’s up.”

“You’re just saying that because you want to snoop.”

“I’m being serious. Keeping stuff bottled up deteriorates you, especially when love’s involved.” He missed a note. “Shit. And yeah, okay, I want some gossip, but I have a point and you know it.”

“Fuck you.”

“Fuck you, I blew a full combo just to say that!”

“Can I add? In case you forgot, Reader, we’re all in the same company,” Mika says. “Sure, I might be in a different branch, but who knows? Maybe we can help.”

“And fuck you too.” You sigh in defeat. As vitriolic as your shared humor was, these three were still some of your best friends, and you know they don’t mean any harm. “Ugh, I hate this. This is confidential information. Like, CIA levels of confidential. If I tell you guys, you can’t tell a single soul about it. Understand?”

The three all chime in agreement. And unfortunately, you trust them. You take advantage of your coworkers swearing themselves to secrecy to hype yourself up and just rip off the band-aid. “It’s Ike.”

“We know.”

“What the hell do you mean, you know?!”

“It’s obvious,” Aia says. Your heart hammers in your chest. Then she sputters for a moment, like she realized she might’ve hit a soft spot. “Well, you have to focus on it to see it, but once you see it, it’s hard to ignore. You two go well together.”

Alban pitches in. “Agreed. I’m not even gonna be subtle about it, you and Ike have great chemistry. I’m happy for you two.”

“Okay, I guess.” Your eyes drift away from your prepared ingredients to the corner of your kitchen. “But I don’t know. Are you sure? Because I feel like I always act like an idiot whenever I’m around him. And I doubt he’d ever feel the same way.”

“Wait.” Aia pauses. “You’re… not dating?”

“No. Just a crush. Not love, not dating, nothing. And it’s never going to be anything more than that because it’s just a big stupid crush on my coworker, who doesn’t even live close enough to visit, and this is all a recipe for disaster.”

She doesn’t say anything about that. Actually, none of them do. Even Alban pressed pause on his game, and the Discord stream went motionless as your words sunk in.

Mika is the one to break the silence. “You’re shitting me.”

“That’s the truth. Happy?”

“No, like, you’re shitting me, there’s no way.”

“Mikaaa.” Alban drags out her name as he scolds her.

“Hey, I’m just saying, that’s crazy, especially since—“

“Don’t tell Reader that!”

“Tell me what?”

“We thought you were already a thing. You know, dating, in a relationship, whatever,” Mika clarifies. It hits you like a punch to the gut. “Or at least that you had something going on, and kept it secret so it wouldn’t be awkward for everyone else to work with you two. Which, by the way, we’re all chill with, so if, hypothetically, you decided to hypothetically go for it, we would hypothetically cheer you on and set off hypothetical fireworks. I’d rent a food truck.”

Alban resumes his game. “Yeah, what she said. Go get that hypothetical novelist bussy.”

“Don’t hypothetically talk about my brother like that.”

“You’re sure this is okay?” You ask. “Mika, I know you and Ike are close. This isn’t going to make anything weird, is it?”

“You’re fine, Reader. If I had problems, I would’ve cornered you and threatened you over text ages ago when I figured it out.”

“That’s another thing. How did you guys know?”

Aia pipes up first. “I know I said it was obvious, but I think that’s just because we know each other since we’re good friends. You two just go together, you know? It’s hard to explain, but whenever Reader and Ike-senpai are in the same room you think, ‘those two would be cute,’ and then you realize they are cute, right there in the moment. And you talk a lot faster on stream whenever you’re both on the same page. Almost as fast as me.”

“Plus, it’s really common to see both of you on VC at the same time, and you’re always happy whenever he shows up,” Mika affirms. “Alban says whenever one of you enters the call the other is soon to follow.”

“It’s true. You talk fast whenever you talk to him on VC too, not just stream. And your laugh kind of changes?”

“Dammit, I knew my laugh was my tell. This sucks. This seriously sucks.”

“It might not be all that bad,” Mika says. “Who knows, maybe things might end up better than you expect. You should tell him.”

“No way,” you fire back. “There no way he’d actually reciprocate. And I know you guys are fine with me asking, but Ike himself is just going to reject me, and it’s going to be awkward, and literally everyone in the company who has ever talked to us will be able to tell something’s up.”

“They won’t be weird,” Aia insists. “We won’t, either, and Ike-senpai is a good guy. Even if it doesn’t work out, he wouldn’t leave you out to dry like that.”

“You don’t know. None of you have ever been in this situation.”

“That’s true, but there’s always a chance.”

“If you ask me, it sounds more like you’re afraid of what you think would happen instead of what rationally would,” Alban says. He’s still laser-focused on his game. “I dunno. If you’re really set on getting over it, then go ahead and ignore it, but that’s just going to eat at you for who knows how long before your crush starts to fade.”

“Well, I didn’t ask.”

“Fine. Forget I said anything.”

You regret the acidic tone in your voice the second you said it, but Alban was off in his own world of music. He’d tell you if he had a problem with how you spoke to him, but you still feel gross about your knee-jerk reaction.

You’re just… defensive. Yep, that’s the word. Whenever you’re this interested in someone, you put your walls up and protect yourself from letting anyone worm through and hit a weak point.

Aia hums like an analyst. “Just keep it in mind, Reader. Not everything is out to get you.”

You know your friends just wanted the best for you, but things just aren’t as simple as they’d like to imagine it. It’s none of their business, anyways. It was pure coincidence that they figured out your thoughts on Ike, and that means none of them have any real authority to advise you on your love life.

“I think we’re done talking about this,” you assert.

“Well, you heard ‘em. Pack it up, show’s over.” Mika changed the subject. “Hey, did you guys know if you try to break open a freshly boiled egg, it explodes?”

Alban slams his hands on his keyboard so loudly that you hear the switches over his noise suppression. The stream goes from a string of Awesome! notes to nothing but misses as he abandons the game. “YES. Yes, actually, I DO know.”

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

“MEAT! WANTS MEAT! WANTS MEAT! MEAT!”

“AAAAAAAAHHHH!”

The stream is to the birds. Fuck that noise. Godspeed to the Bookworms, they’ll need it, but not nearly as much as you.

When you were settling on a schedule, the last undecided spot for the week was Friday’s stream. That simply wouldn’t do. Friday nights kick off the weekend, and the break from school and work is prime time for a wide audience, so pretty much everyone in Nijisanji reserves their juiciest streams for the weekend. You’re no exception.

…Except for the fact that you didn’t have a clue about what to do for Friday’s stream. One Twitter poll and conveniently timed Steam sale later, you published your schedule with a game your fans voted on: Outlast.

You walked in knowing it would be a horror game, and you figured it would be fine. After all, you’ve played games from Chilla’s Art before, and a few quirky indie psychological releases here and there. You wouldn’t call yourself a stone-faced horror lover that can keep a straight face at anything, but aside from a few creepy moments in those game, you’ve kept your cool relatively well.

Outlast threw all that out the window. You realized almost immediately that you had no idea how to handle the primal fear of the chase.

Footsteps pound against a metal floor. You plead for help in the emptiness of your home as you smash the controls, as if that would make your character move the cabinet over the door any faster. Screams resonate in tune between you and the chained man in the room with you, and all the while, the howling of your pursuer grows louder and louder as he gets closer.

You finally uncover the door and dash through. Tremors run though all your thoughts while your heart beats overtime.

You still haven’t gotten used to all the jumpscares, even though you’re at the edge of your seat and ready to start running yourself. A fork in the road approaches, and when you start off one direction, you’re greeted by a bloodied man in the distance. “AAAHH!”

Faster than light, you slam the key to the other hall and book it. You spot a new storage container to shove in front of the door just in time for text to appear on the screen: Look for pushable objects to block doors.

“No shit, why wouldn’t you tell me that before, oh my God, aaaaah!” The screams—from both the voice actors and your own cries—grate against your eardrums while chase music thunders in-between the gasps for air.

As you grab the container and start to push, you mash the pause button. When the menu appears, you lean back in your chair and run your hands over your face. Your model pouts cutely while the real you whimpers. The mic barely picks it up.

You take a breath before groaning in fear and pain. “Guys. I don’t think I can do this…” Another groan as you trail off. “This game is so much. Give me a second.”

As you raise yourself back from your chair, it’s with a slump forward. Your chat is full of headpat emotes and hearts in your color, along with some quick words of courage. A few are recommending you take a break. “Thanks, Bookworms. I’m so afraid, but I’m committed and I don’t want to just leave it here.”

Your eyes flutter closed as you take a sip of water to clear your head. The cold drink startles you out of the dingy asylum atmosphere, but the screaming still lingers between your ears. “You know what? Who else is online right now? Maybe I need someone in VC to hold me to this.”

The emojis in chat slowly patter out as your viewers go back to text. Looks like most of your Bookworms like the idea of calling someone else while you stream the game. Some of their messages catch your eye.

gatamiizuus: you can call ike :ReaderHeadpat:

messXed-up!: ike!!

lunasmortas: what about ike?

A few more chats mention Ike, and while usually you’d be irritated they mentioned another liver out of the blue, your shoulders still relax at the sight of his name. “Wait, Ike? Is Ike here?”

You scroll back in the chat history, and search for any mod messages. Sure enough, barely a minute ago while you were still being chased:

Ike Eveland 【NIJISANJI EN】 ✓ : GANBARE!

You cling onto that message like a lifeline. Ike is familiar. Ike is comforting. And most importantly, Ike would never call you a pussy.

Chat floods over with his name while you check the official Nijisanji Discord server. Almost everyone in Nijisanji sets their status to offline by default, and Ike is one of them, but you still scan through the member list anyways, praying a little green indicator will light up by his icon.

His status doesn’t change, but before you can even click on his profile, your Direct Messages tab gains a notification. He just messaged you.

Ike Eveland: Watching your stream right now

Ike Eveland: Are you okay?

You exhale. Ike is the most dependable guy you know, even when it’s pure coincidence he was watching your stream while you freaked out.

With your heart still in your throat, you respond.

Me: uuuuuuugh i guess

Me: the game is really scary

Me: i don’t want to cancel the stream but i don’t think i can play it by myself 😭

Ike Eveland: 🫂 | 🫂 1 |

Ike Eveland: Would you feel better if I called you?

Me: i was just about to ask | 👌 1 |

Me: you don’t have to if you don’t want to tho!! i don’t want to be a nuisance lol

Ike Eveland: Don’t worry I offered to!

Ike Eveland started a voice call.

“Ikeee!” The second the call starts, all your restraint goes forgotten. “Ike, I was so scared!”

You babble on about everything you’ve endured up to this point: the gore, the grime, and the patients in the asylum that hunt you like animals.

“I’m here, it’s alright now,” he assures you. “I’m here, okay? Take your time, you’re safe.”

“Yeah, I know. I’m relieved. But it was so scary.” You sink and bury yourself in the collar of your shirt. “You’ve streamed this before, and kept a cool head the entire time, right? How do you do it?”

“Well, it wasn’t my first time playing, for starters. Everyone gets freaked out at first. It’s a horror game, Reader, it’s okay to react to it. I remember the first time I played it, it scared me so bad I had to quit after half an hour.” He giggles a bit at himself. The sound is comforting. “That was a few years ago. I think I had nightmares about it, until I realized I needed to know the rest of the story. ”

Your voice is small. “That was really brave of you.”

“I avoided it for days. I doubt that’s brave.”

“It’s braver than calling someone just to get the guts to play the game.”

“Hey, don’t put my friend Reader down just to bring me up.” He keeps his tone light to let you know you’re allowed to smile. “Being able to face your fears is plenty on its own, and you shouldn’t be devaluing that. How long have you been at it?”

“A little over two hours?” You glance at the stream monitor, and ignore the chat as much as you can. You still register the hearts in your color and his signature blue. “I don’t know. I did a lot of pausing, too, so it’s probably less than that…”

“But you were still able to stream for that long. Remember, I could only play for thirty minutes during my first time! You’re stronger than you think you are.”

You avert your eyes from your stream setup. You feel painfully seen, but the chat is nothing to you. “Doesn’t feel like it.”

“Then I’ll be here to remind you. Is that okay?”

“I’d like that.” You return to the screen, and in the darkness of the blurred labyrinth, you see your reflection stare back. Your hair is disheveled from how you kept thrashing around in reaction to the game and your shoulders are high with tension, but only now did you realize how the corners of your lips rose after the call started. Ike really got to you. “Thank you, Ike, you’re so considerate. I appreciate you a lot. You’re a really good guy.”

He chuckles slowly, soft like a blanket. Your shoulders ease. Ike’s words are just as soft, and if you didn’t know any better, you’d think he’s nervous too. “Haha, um. Yeah. Thank you?” He doesn’t take compliments well, but they’re true, and you hope he knows it as well as you do. He clears his throat. “Ahem. Um, how are you feeling?”

“Not great, but better. I want to try again.”

“You’ve got this, Reader, you can do it.” Ike is still quiet, but enthusiastic. “You can do it!”

You go shaky. “Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay.”

But you still press Return To Game.

And when you scream barely five seconds later, Ike is still calm, and you hone in on his voice as you persevere.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

Just as you go to bed, you realize that you basically just made a fool of yourself in front of your crush by getting scared at a game he’s already conquered.

You slam a pillow over your face and groan.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

Ike lands an all-out attack just in time to check the chat and the swarm of viewers that just joined. “Oh, Reader! Thank you for the raid, it’s good to see you! Welcome, everybody.”

Reader 【NIJISANJI EN】 ✓ : take care of my bookworms for me? i’m getting milk

“Of course. They’re our Quillworms, after all.” You go fuzzy. He remembered the fan name! “Have a good break, Reader! Rest well.”

Reader 【NIJISANJI EN】 ✓ : 👍

It was the end of the week, and the stream you just finished was the last on your schedule. You announced a few days ago that you would take a break for a little more than two weeks so you could catch up on offline work as well as rest, and the Bookworms sent you off with a lot of love. It’ll be hard for some of your diehard fans, but you’re sure they’ll manage. You have a feeling it’ll be easier than they expect.

“Speaking of breaks, I haven’t finished my schedule yet. I think I’ll wait a day or two to post it.” The stream cracks in red and black as Ike’s party in Persona 5 Royal clobbers the enemy Shadows. Monsters bleed out behind the protagonist’s cocky smirk. “I’ll be offline for the next two days, so I’ll have some time to think about it.”

Ike mashes through the battle results, and sets back off into exploring the palace. His stream fades into background noise as you get back to the task at hand.

You sent a few messages to some of your other coworkers regarding your break. Next was finishing some paperwork for management, and reaching out to others that needed access to the files. Sure, your time off was for offline work, but the work you had to get done would only take an afternoon at most. You wanted to meet even the far-off deadlines as soon as possible so you could be properly free for the rest of your vacation.

By the time you finished your paperwork, your coworkers were able to respond to you. A group chat full of other livers had a new response every minute about the next two weeks, and Aia sent you a QR code that would let you save some time and money on your flight.

Ike ended yet another super-long P5R stream just a few minutes after you grabbed all your luggage, got to the airport, and made it to your terminal. You had some time to kill, but you were sick of the headphones over your ears.

Not to mention, you were waiting for the fans to catch up on the real reason why you were on break.

Curiously, you log into your private Twitter—you don’t plan to interact with anything but you’re always paranoid about your online presence—and start searching for the code words fans think Vtubers have no idea about. Symbols replace letters and names morph into sounds while emojis speak volumes.

The Stargazers don’t mention it at all. That’s to be expected, after all. Their oshi goes on break often, so nothing seems too out of the ordinary. Besides, you wouldn’t put it past them to have even more intricate subtweets than what you’re looking for.

Only a few of Nina’s Honeybunnies put the pieces together at first, but then you check Quilldren subtweets. As it turns out, when Ike mentioned he’d be taking a few days off, a few of his fans noticed how Nina was going to be offline at the same time, and a smaller fraction of those compared how Mika had yet to release a schedule.

Underneath your face mask, you smile. With the career being dependent on both anonymity and your voice, you wore a nondescript black mask through the entire airport in case someone recognized you, just as well as to hide the tiny giggle that always bubbles up whenever you watch your fans scramble around theorizing. They don’t have all the pieces, after all. None of the Aiadmirers nor the Renvaders even considered it.

They’ll figure it out in time nonetheless. Uki and Nina are close to landing, and Aia was the first to disembark her plane. The rest of your friends are set to arrive after you, and besides, Vox should be ending his last stream of the week right now. You’re sure the Kindred will start plotting in the next hour, provided their oshi didn’t give them too big of a hint about his plans for the next week as he’s known to do.

You board your plane and settle into your seat, ready to nap the flight away. You’ll need the rest, after all. It’s about time you join an off-collab.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

Nina doesn’t even get the chance to look away from her phone before she gets a rush of replies on her first voice tweet.

She doesn’t bother to read them anyways. She’s too busy howling out the lyrics to “Wannabe.”

It’ll be hard to discern all the voices. Ike’s high range is always easy to pick out, but Vox blends in as a bass, and you can always hear Mika’s grin through her singing. Ren and Aia are the furthest from the phone, and as loud as they sing, they’re still drowned out along with you, Uki, and Nina herself.

Mika chooses the wrong time to look around the karaoke booth. While Aia sings passionately about what she wants (what she really, really wants), her body language crumples and rises like an electrocuted high school theater kid. The ghost has a hiccuping, sweeping laugh that overpowers half of the singers, and then Aia snorts at herself when Mika covers her mouth, which gets Vox to snort even louder, and before you know it, it’s just Uki and Nina doing their damndest not to break. Even then, Nina’s voice wavers along to the Spice Girls as she resists a laugh, and Uki’s eyes are squeezed shut smiling.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

The bar stool slides out from the counter so quietly that you wonder if the Airbnb owner knew just how handy it would be for a house full of streamers on vacation. You lean forward while Mika tells a story about how she, Aia, Ren and you went out for a coffee run, and crossed paths with some teenagers with matching Iluna keychains on their backpacks.

Speaking of Iluna, their represents sat together on the couch. Aia set her plate and fork on the coffee table, not a single pool of sauce left over from the pasta dinner Vox and Uki prepared together. Somehow Ren made enough room in his luggage to bring along a teal ukulele, and idly strums along. Uki sits between Ren and the armrest, swirling the last of his pasta between his fork.

Across from them, Vox and Nina took ownership of two plush chairs that could only fit one person each. Each chair was next to a corner table, and they stacked their plates on top of one another to make room for a jug of orange juice and two cocktail glasses. Ike took a bottle of rum and poured it into his soda, then slid it back to the corner table before pulling up the bar stool next to you.

“It was like, one of them had a clear phone case and held it out to show the others a video,” Mika says. She perched on top of the counter itself, next to her travel microphone and the second-nastiest kitchen stream setup you’ve ever seen. She was no Scarle, but so many wires stretched across the island and along the way that it was just easier for her to climb onto the polished granite to keep an eye on the chat. “Smack-dab in the center was a PNG of Vox. And then a bunch of tinier Voxes around it. And here’s how you know it’s bad, you could see the color of the phone itself through the case because it’s clear, right? It was red. Red! That’s commitment!”

“I’m telling you, Mika, there’s no way they got a red phone just because of Vox,” Aia says. “That’s got to be a coincidence.”

Vox hums into his glass. “No, they absolutely did. You mean to tell me your fans don’t spoil you rotten and buy new phones just because they’re your color?”

“My color is white, Vox, like every phone ever is my color!”

“Still, I’ve never seen Aia go so quiet so fast.” Ren’s ukulele twangs as he grins. His fangs were just as prominent in real life. “It was awesome.”

“It was scary, but funny,” you say. “We saw the Vox case and the Iluna keychains, and all of us just went silent. And we all had masks, too, so it was like, one moment you could hear Ren’s fuckboy laugh, and the second we saw the case, we all put up our masks and went quieter than the grave.”

Ren palms the neck of the ukulele and mutes the chord in mock offense. “Hey! I’m not a fuckboy!”

“Didn’t say you were, but if you want to out yourself like that, be my guest. They’d chop off your horns and sell them like Kyo.”

“One of them had an Aster keychain.” Ren bitterly resumes playing. Uki sets his plate on the table and drapes himself over the alien’s shoulder as he opened up his phone to check the off-collab’s live tag. The stream was supposed to be a live Q&A, but was so easy to talk to everyone that the questions often turned into conversation before someone remembered the stream. “If Aia or I said anything, we’d be fucked.”

“Imagine how fucked we would’ve been if Vox woke up in time to go with us,” you say.

Ike snickers. “Is it bad that I would’ve paid money to see that?”

The two Luxiem members get into a playful argument over who would win in a fight: all the effort Nijisanji and its employees put into protecting their privacy, or one silly phone case. Ren’s riffing turns into a simple rendition of “Iris” and Nina hums along from across the living room. The ukulele is slow and unique enough to not be mistaken for the original, but you wonder if those two would be able to avoid copyright entirely.

Nonetheless, the vibe is comfortable. You’re miles away from home, but in a room with some of your closest friends in the world, it’s like you never left. Truthfully, it’s more like you’ve finally found your place. The music just feels right, like it was written for this moment, and Aia leans back into the couch while Nina sways in her seat to the jaunty little ukulele. Ren looks as cheery as his instrument sounds, especially with a peaceful Uki nuzzled up to him.

While Ike and Vox go at it, Mika props her chin up with both hands and watches them like a reality TV show. There’s a glint in Vox’s eyes as Ike drums up a snide response, the only sane man to the demon’s goofiness. He brings his rum and coke to his lips like punctuation, a silent so, what? hidden in the boozy soda.

Vox knows how to run his mouth, and he launches into one of his patented anecdotes. While all eyes are on the demon and the chat hones in on his voice, you focus on how Ike tilts his head up to drink. His neck stretches out from the collar of his black band tee, and with each sip, his Adam’s apple bobs.

You’ve always thought he was good-looking on stream, but he’s gorgeous in person, all long lines and graceful features, and cameras can’t capture the tiny little freckles drizzled down the back of his neck. You didn’t even know he had freckles. It was only after you saw him for the first time that you noticed pale, reddish dots all over his nose and cheeks, fading out by his temples and the arch of his lips. Spending the day walking around in the sun from place to place revealed more whenever the wind flicked his jacket collar out right. They scatter at his nape, right below the blue tips of his hair, and meet one another further down his back, or so you’d presume. Without the jacket, you can catch marks spread out along his arms with distance between one another, and his shirt sleeve starts right where the freckles cluster together. You can only imagine how far down they go.

You avert your eyes. You can’t think about what’s under the shirt when you’re sitting right next to him, and certainly not while on stream, even if chat can’t see you check him out!

Unfortunately, the side opposite of Ike is the one with Ren and Uki. Those two are idyllic. Without a care in the world, it seems. You envy how easily Uki can act on what he wants, even if you know he doesn’t see Ren like how you see Ike. Ren doesn’t mind it at all, either. He literally lives by the rhythm of his own ukulele.

Ike lowers his drink with his eyes closed, as if it would make the refreshing feeling last longer. His eyelashes are the same ashen color as his hair. Gold gleams between his ears and on the chain of his glasses.

Possessed by the music, and distracted by the rambling, you become one with the background and lean along Ike’s arm.

It’s an indulgent dip into the waters, but shallow compared to all you feel for him. Ever since you met Ike in person it’s been easier to control yourself around him, and if anything, you’re reminded that this is the man you’ve gotten the closest to in both career and friendship. The only barrier between your cheek and his body is his shirt sleeve, but your arm rests against his forearm, right where the freckles taper off. There’s no resistance at all as you make yourself comfortable in the crook of his arm.

But you hold yourself back. Even though the off-collab made you feel gutsier than before, you think that you’d pass out if you tried anything else. Besides, you feel so at peace against his arm, but too afraid to look up and see his reaction.

The blend of peace and fear churns in your heart as it dawns on you: you were wrong to call this a crush. It runs far deeper than you could’ve imagined.

Vox says something with finality. His voice snaps you out of your thoughts, but the words go unregistered. As he spoke, his eyes drifted around with his body language, but he snaps to look at Ike expectantly. You swear his smirk gets a little more mischievous as he does.

The air stills, even though you know eyes aren’t on you, just the man you lean on. It stays frozen as Ike waits to respond. You still don’t have the heart to look up at him and break your selfish, unrequited fantasy.

You just want to stay here, unresisted.

Ike deadpans. “Anyways.”

Just like that, the moment is over, and Mika laughing at Vox striking out clears the air around you. But Vox’s eyes fall to you for just a split second as he moves in his seat. Frost settles down your back at the thought that he knows, but there’s a solid chance he hasn’t connected the dots. You pray he hasn’t.

Then you see Fox Mom herself right behind him, and she shoots you a shit-eating grin with a hand over her heart and a glass in the other.

No doubt about it. You’re screwed.

The frost turns to glaciers and burns into hot shame all at once. You love Nina, you really do, and you’d always consider her a good friend before coworker. However, she’s known for fishing around for any crumb of fanservice, and she gets straight to the point whenever she eggs it on, not to mention how she loves to tease her kids on just about anything. You are never going to hear the end of this if she can help it.

You really don’t know what you expected. It feels like everyone’s staring at you, even the chat. You can’t help but feel bitter. How come Uki can flirt with as many guys as he wants, you wonder, but I can’t even touch Ike without getting eyed up?

You know the answer, but it doesn’t do anything to help the bitterness and the embarrassment, and how much you want to hide. On instinct, you take advantage of the warmth and nestle yourself deeper into Ike to hide your face, just in time as he curls his head above yours.

Nina makes a sound kind of like a fork stuck in the garbage disposal for the briefest of moments before smashing her lips together and bringing her glass to her mouth like a mute button. As if you didn’t feel seen enough.

“Find any other questions, Uki-senpai?” Aia’s nose is buried in her phone, and God, you could kiss her for changing the subject. As much as she poked fun about you about Ike, she was still a total angel and a ride-or-die all at once.

“Oh, I have questions,” Uki says. Luckily, he’s graceful enough to leave it at that. “Twitter wants to know first impressions for everyone that hasn’t off-collabed before.”

Ren speaks. “I think the only person I’ve done an off-collab with before is Nina, so is it cool if I go first?”

Aia gestures for him to go on. She’s still stuck on her phone as he continues.

Your phone vibrates in your pocket, but you ignore it. Then again and again and again, and when you finally check it, you understand why. When Aia, Mika and Alban first heard you spill your feelings for Ike, they made a group chat dedicated to wingmanning—or at least, that’s what they pitched it as. They tease you more than anything else, and as irritating as it gets… you have to admit, it’s nice to confide in them, and nice to know they wouldn’t hold it against you.

Anyways, Alban’s going apeshit.

Group Chat: 💙 PENANDPAPER REAL 2K4EVER 💕 (4 Members)

Aia Amare: image.png | 📌 2 |

Alban Knox: AKDHSLSJDKSHSA

Alban Knox: AASDFSDF

Alban Knox: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Alban Knox: AAAAAAAAAA

Alban Knox: HAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAA AAAAAAA KYAAAAAAAA

Alban Knox: 💕💕💕💙💕💙💕💙💙💙💕💙💕💕💙

Alban Knox: 🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳

Alban Knox: HOW ARE YOU GUYSS NOT LOSING YUOR MINDSA BOUT THIS

Aia Amare: I AM

Me: omfg did you seriously get a picture of us

Alban Knox: WHAT ARE YOU DOINGGGGGGG DONT CHDCK THIS GC | 👆 1 |

Me: wtf did you expect you’re spamming

Alban Knox: YOU AR ELITERALLY CUDDLNG GO FOCUS ON THAY JOT US

Me: we are not cuddling

Alban Knox: YOU ARE

Aia Amare: YOU ARE

Mika Melatika pinned a message. | 🖕 1 |

Me: mika wth you too? 😭

Mika Melatika: image.png

Me: did you srsly take a selfie with us in the background

Mika Melatika: YES this needs to be immortalized

Me: you people suck | 🥰 3 |

Alban Knox: GET THAT NOVELIST BUSSY!!!!

Aia Amare: As if you aren’t about to save that picture yourself~

Alban Knox: NOVELUSSY!!!!!!!!!

Fuck, she got you there. You cast a pointed look at the angelic maiden herself, or at least as pointed as you can be with a man you’re scared to love wrapped around you. She looks as satisfied as a cat pushing a glass off a counter.

You set your phone on ‘do not disturb’ and placed it behind you on the counter with a huff.

“Reader, honey, how about you?” Nina leans forward, half-lidded and as sultry as ever. She swirled her drink around in its glass. “It’s your first off-collab ever, right? I’d love to hear what you have to say.”

“Oh, well, um.” Your brain struggles to catch up. “First impressions, right…”

Aia slips you a thumbs up. You’re going to rip her a new one after this. Her, and Mika, and definitely Nina; this is the most subtle Nina’s ever been but you can tell she’s fishing for an answer here. You can take your friends figuring it out, embarrassing as it is, but you are not about to expose yourself to thousands of live viewers.

“It’s kind of crazy actually meeting up with everyone,” you start. “I’ve known them for so long, but all online, and being able to match the voice to the face in real life, I don’t think I can actually describe it. It’s kind of surreal, but it feels so nice to just talk to them in person. Aia, Nina and Uki were the first people I met up with, and man, those three are a sight. I know everyone says it, but Uki is absolutely the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen. Nina and Aia are really pretty, too. Hey, Aiadmirers, did you know when your oshi laughs, she looks just as cute as she sounds?”

Aia yells. “Reader, shut up!”

“Then stop being so cute all the time, you dork!”

“I’m not a dork! I’m cool!”

You resume, satisfied with your revenge. “Mika and Vox are both really chill. They’re kind of quiet, so if you’re just walking by, you’d think they’re two normal people just going about their days. But whenever we talk it’s always something insane. Vox sounds like a dignified gentleman and Mika is kind of like that cool girl that you want to be friends with, but if you actually pay attention, Mika’s showing Vox a picture of her insides during surgery while he’s reciting something about the Bite of ‘87. And Ren is probably one of the most straightforward people you’ll ever see. He’s so optimistic, and really expressive, too, even though most of the expressions are all different types of smiles.”

“What’s your impression of Ike?” Nina asks.

What does she expect you to say to that one, that screens can’t capture how the sun glitters through his glassy green eyes? Hearing him say your name in-person sends shockwaves through your body? How you want to kiss every little freckle he’s never mentioned before and keeps hidden under long sleeves, even though it’s the beautiful skin he lives in daily?

“Same old Ike. He’s exactly like how I expected,” you say. A total fib.

She cocks her head. “Really? Even after all the time you’ve spent together?”

“I’m trying to hang out with everyone.”

“You haven’t answered my question.”

Cornered. Nina takes a long, slow drink from her glass as you scramble for a quick answer that won’t immediately out you. “Whenever I talk to Ike, he’s really emotive. You can tell what he’s thinking before he says anything. He also has a good sense of style, so he’s fun to go shopping with, and honestly, fun to do anything with. He’s someone you can always have a good time with, and always makes you feel so comfortable around him. Ike’s magnetic.”

Mika muffles a coo behind you. You’re going to kill her if you survive this stream.

“That’s very sweet, Reader,” Nina replies. “Hear that, Ike?”

“Yes, I did.” He sounds strained.

“Got any feelings about it?”

“Yes? I mean—er, thanks?” You feel Ike’s head rustle. “I, umm. What am I supposed to say about that?”

“I don’t know. I just think that about you, that’s all…”

“Aww, cute. I love that you love each other,” Nina muses.

Ike spits out, “It’s not like that!” Just as you admit, “Yeah, I guess so.”

You process his words too late, though, and even as you sputter the ukulele music cuts out just in time with Nina and Mika’s unfiltered fangirl squeals. Ren’s palms mute the chord as his eyes go wide. Aia is already on her phone with her jaw to the floor and Uki throws a look at Nina while he mouths, did that just happen?

“I-I mean!” Your throat goes dry and Ike lurches away from you when Vox gleefully shakes Nina like a rag doll. “I—wh—Ike, I mean, of course I love you—“ Mika screams again— “As a friend!”

When you turn to face Ike, he’s curled up into a ball on the barstool with his shirt collar over his face. Even as you feel the blood rush to your face, you keep shouting. That’s all you have left. You’re live. “Like, we’re best friends on and off stream and I love you!”

He mutters something, but you can’t tell what. Only his neck and the tips of his ears poke out from his shirt. Were they always that red?

You repeat yourself. “I said, we’re best friends and I love you, so much!”

“And I said, I know, thank you, I love you too, Reader!” Ike jerks out to face you as he cries. He looks like a tomato.

Then he buries his face into his hands and squeaks like how he always does when something’s too cute to handle, or he’s got too many emotions he needs to let out. “You can’t see me, I’m too embarrassed. I’m hiding forever and I’m never coming out.”

You hope the ground swallows you up and you never have to confront this moment again.

Uki hisses under his breath and muffles Ren's ukulele. You don't know what he said, but you realize all too late that the alien prince himself was laying down the first few notes of “Fly Me To The Moon.”

While you slump and fold your arms over your face on the counter in pure embarrassment, Aia stands up and commandeers the mic. She slaps a hand over Mika’s mouth to muffle the scream. “Man, bummer that Ike-senpai is gone from us forever, but you know what else might be gone forever if you don’t get it now? The sponsor for this stream, our current limited-edition Nijisanji voice packs!”

And as much as you could kiss her yet again for changing the subject, you can’t get over how everything blew up in the last five minutes, and groan into your arms instead.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

The stream passed, luckily, without a hitch after that. No one asked any questions, but it was pretty damn clear everyone in the room had an idea of what just happened, and the impending shitstorm. In fact, it was so clear that when you stalked off to your room to sulk, no one made a fuss, and when you realized ten minutes into your sulking session that you left your phone on the counter, you figured it wasn’t worth it to show your face again until after you finished your pity party.

The entire time, you laid in your bed with a pillow over your face so you could pretend like you were being absorbed into the sweet embrace of death. Overdramatic, sure, but you figured you were justified.

Without your phone, you had no way to check exactly how bad the fallout was on Twitter. The poor Pen and Paper tags were sure to be flooded with fans imagining a happy ending to that stint you’d never be able to experience yourself, like salt in the wound. Not to mention, it was a huge seven-person off-collab! It didn’t just end with the Pen and Paper fans. No, it would extend past the Bookworms and the Quilldren, and certainly to the rest of the fandoms with an oshi in this Airbnb. Maybe even the offshoot viewers who don’t regularly watch your content, but made an exception for the off-collab, or, you know, the ones who have no idea who you or Ike are but can’t get enough of the whole accidental-confession-live-on-stream thing. Forget Nina; the entire Vtuber community is never, ever, ever going to live this down.

Ike sounded so distraught, too. You wanted to kick yourself for it. Not only did you make a fool of yourself, but he got caught in the crossfire just because you didn’t catch yourself slipping. Not like he’d reciprocate anyways. He’s always been bad at taking compliments, but you keep thinking about how embarrassed he was about you loving him.

All your frustration and humiliation coursed through the darkness under your pillow, and you stew so bitterly that you don’t even dream when you fall asleep.

You just wake up groggy and exhausted, but too restless to go back to sleep. You look out the window, and the stars have barely come out to play in the early night sky.

As much as you’d hate to admit it, that impromptu nap made you tired of brooding. Besides, you can’t hide from your friends forever. Hopelessly in love or not, they’re still your friends, and even if you decided to stream during the trip, this off-collab was always about spending time with them instead of worrying over your online presence.

It takes you half an hour to hype yourself up, but eventually, you open your door and step out into the hall.

You can already hear voices further away in the Airbnb. You place one of them as Nina, and after her, a baritone that could only belong to Vox.

“…Fuck Twitter, they’re going to forget about it in two weeks or less anyways.” You overhear as you walk down the hall of rooms and closer to the living room. You’ve heard Vox passionate before, but never this serious as well. “Besides, what exactly did they say?”

A mumble. You can’t place the words, but you bristle when you recognize the voice. That’s unmistakably Ike.

“See? Again, I’m so sorry. I was out of line, and I forgot my place. I shouldn’t have interrogated them like that,” Nina says. “But you’re overthinking what they said.”

Another mumble. By now, you’re in the kitchen. You lift your phone from where you left it, and hold your fingers over the half of the screen where your notifications appear as you check the time. It’s barely 11 PM.

The kitchen and living room are connected, with plenty of seating space all around. That was why Mika’s travel laptop was still on the counter and plugged into the wall from the stream earlier, but on the other side of the wall from the kitchen, you noticed an open window and silhouettes from it. Four people sat on the shallow roof overlooking the uneven ground plenty of feet under the building. A pair of fox ears twitch at the night wind as they watched the stars grow brighter in the sky.

You look through the fridge. You’re peckish, but if you were to be honest with yourself, you’re trying to stay quiet for a reason.

There’s a huff. “Oh my god, dude. Just tell Reader already.”

You stand up a little straighter. Mika was with them? Were they talking about you?

“There’s nothing to be said, Mika!” Ike huffs back. “I’m screwed anyways. Just drop it, okay? I don’t need this getting in the way of what was supposed to be just a normal trip.”

“You can’t keep running away forever. Just act like an adult and tell them. It’s going to be fine, I swear.”

“And how exactly do you know that?”

“Well…” Mika trails off. “I can’t say. I just know, okay?”

“Uh-huh. And I know I’m screwed.” The wind rustles outside. You stay motionless. “Just two weeks. Can I please just have two weeks where I don’t have to worry about this until the trip is over.”

It’s a question, but he says it with such exasperation that no one can consider any other answers.

“Fine.” Nina relinquishes. “Have it your way. I’m just worried for you two.”

“It’s going to work out, Ike. But I’m tired.” Vox stifles a yawn. “Tomorrow is going to be better. Let it go for the night and come back to it once you’re in better shape, and just remember. It’s going to work out.”

“Thanks, Vox.”

“Now get in here.”

You hear shuffling fabric before the two men start yelling. Vox cackles while Ike cries through gritted teeth. “Dang it, Vox, I’m going to shove you off this roof!”

“Get ruffled, idiot! That’s your fault for trusting me!”

“I just wanted a hug!”

You snicker under your breath. Vox loves to ruffle Ike’s hair despite the latter’s protests, though he tends to accept it instead of shove him off like anyone else that would dare. Besides, as dreary as Ike sounded during that conversation, he nearly sounded like his old self as Vox and the others laughed.

“I think I’ll go too. Mommy needs her beauty sleep.”

“Mm, I’m still pretty awake. Wanna keep looking at the sky with me, Ike?”

“Sure. Here, Nina, let me move out of the way…”

Shuffling turns to footsteps, and brings you back to reality. You busy yourself looking through the paltry groceries.

The sound of footsteps gets louder and louder, until they become a hollow click on the hardwood floor. Nina crawls through the window, but stops in her tracks with a startled noise.

You turn around and nod as casually as possible. “Oh, hey, Nina.”

Vox is also halfway through the window, and his eyes go comically wide as he forgets how to move. “Oh. Hey. Reader. Fancy seeing you here.”

“Yeah! Um!” Nina coughs long enough to make you uncomfortable. “What are you doing here?”

“Took a nap. Got hungry.” It’s not a lie. You grope around in the fridge and breathe a sigh of relief when you see a stick of string cheese in your hands. “You guys just hanging out?”

Nina nods. “Yeah, we were on the roof. It’s getting late, though. You should get some rest for tomorrow—“

Vox elbows her. “But not after looking at the sky for a little bit. It’s beautiful. Very clear. Romantic, even. The architects did a wonderful job placing this house right at the perfect angle to watch the stars rise. Did I mention it was romantic?”

You act natural and take a big bite out of the string cheese. “Once or twice. Is it the seniors’ bedtime?”

“You got me,” Vox says.

“I love going to sleep early and giving my kids private time before bed to reflect and hold deep conversations with one another about their feelings,” Nina says. “And also nighttime face masks.”

“Woo, skincare, what she said.”

“Hey, by the way, Reader, honey, did you hear anything we talked about?”

“No,” you lie.

“Cool,” Vox says. You eat the rest of the string cheese in one bite. “Good for you. And goodnight, Reader.” He dusts himself off before casting his golden gaze down at you. “Be nice, will you?”

Shivers go down your back. You have a feeling he’s referring to something unspoken. “I will.”

“That’s my sweet thing,” he purrs. “Anyways, I’m going the fuck to beddy bye. Honk shoo, Reader, don’t stay up too late.”

Vox struts off with dark hair flowing behind him and the scent of his aftershave in the air. He leaves you to stand awkwardly next to Nina.

Suddenly, she takes you by your shoulders and forces you in front of her. You blurt out an unflattering startled noise before she gets right up in your face and stares dead into your eyes.

“Please be good,” she says darkly. Was that a threat? “Please be so, so good to my baby.”

“I will,” you say, more out of fear than anything else.

She blinks once, then she’s back to the doting mother you know and love. She squeezes your shoulders. “Thank you, honey! Sweet dreams!”

And just like the Voice Demon before her, Nina bounds off to her room.

Huh. That was weird. Nonetheless, you’re alone in the living room, and you can see the outline of Ike and Mika sitting on the roof in silence.

You lightly knock on the side of the window. They both perk up at the sound. “Cool if I join you?”

Mika responds quickly. “Sure! Watch your step, Reader. The roof isn’t that steep but it would be awkward if you ate shit.”

“Agreed.” You step onto the tiling, and shift your body to match the angle. You feel like a newborn deer learning to walk. Luckily, Nina and Vox leaving meant that there was more than enough space for you right next to the window.

Ike sits between you and Mika. “It’s pretty, isn’t it?”

“Yeah…”

‘Pretty’ is putting it mildly. The stars are so clear tonight, and scatter across the sky like sequins. The Airbnb was located further away from the heart of the city, so the darkness only amplified how bright the stars shone against the stark night. A breeze drags through the air and fallen leaves rustle between the grass.

“This is so nice.” Comfort settles into you like the breeze in your hair. “I love it.”

Ike sighs. “Right? It’s so peaceful.”

“And there’s so many more stars out here than there are in the city.”

“It makes you want to just zone out and cool down.”

“Yeah, totally.” Mika coughs. “Huh! Cool! Well, I’m tired now. Just keep staying out here and enjoy the sky, I’m going to bed. Enjoy yourselves.”

Mika inelegantly shuffles around your bodies and slips back inside before either of you can properly tell her goodnight.

Ike cocks his head as he watches her stumble through the window. “She just said she would stay out…”

“Hm?”

“Ah, nothing. Just thinking to myself.”

With the extra space, Ike leans back and lays along the roof. The stars cast a dreamy glow over his soft smile as he continues. “It really is something that just makes you want to have a deep conversation, or just think, you know?”

You hum in agreement. You get what he means, but there’s only one topic you can imagine having a deep conversation about right now, and it’s the very one you brooded over earlier that day.

But Ike is Ike. He’s rational and calm and kind, and laughs at your stupid jokes, and texts you first before any of your other mutual friends. The night turns the tips of his hair bluer than usual, and the stars remind you of the freckles hidden along his creamy skin. His glasses reflect the galaxy above.

Even though today’s stream was embarrassing, you know Ike trusts you enough to tell you if you’ve ever crossed a boundary. After all, it’s commonplace to discuss limits on and off stream as soon as possible, and your friendship was so strong that you’ve both opened up to one another. He’d let you know if the whole cuddling thing was too much. Besides, he didn’t resist. He even rested his head on yours. That has to account for something, right?

You snap out of your thoughts when you feel a gentle tug on the sleeve of your hoodie. It’s Ike. He asks, “Lay down with me?”

A wave of fondness washes over you like the tide. He’s cute when he’s earnest like this. You get as comfortable as you can on the tiling, and when you still, you hear something shift before your hand grows warm. Ike scooted closer to you, and placed his pinky finger over yours.

This is bliss. A beautiful sight with a beautiful boy next to you. Your best friend.

“I do love you,” you say.

It just feels right to say.

Ike is silent. He doesn’t make a single sound as you stare up at the stars and the blackened sky. The breeze rocks a tree, and as the leaves part, you see the moon for the first time: one thin, waning crescent that blends into the darkness.

Ike’s head is turned away from you. You can’t tell what he’s thinking at all.

“…I don’t know what you mean,” he admits. “You do? As a friend?”

“We’ve always been friends.”

“Just that?”

“I don’t know what you’re asking me, Ike.”

“N-never mind. I’m sorry, am I making it weird?”

“No, you could never make it weird.” The colors of the view gloss together. You feel like a balloon slowly deflating. “Feels like that’s all I’m doing lately, though.”

Neither of you say anything.

This was a bad idea.

You swear the rustling leaves mock you.

“Wait.” Ike practically snatches your hand up. “Wait, Reader, are you saying you like me?”

“Yeah. I’m saying that I love you.”

Ike stares at you, and if you had to choose just one word to describe his expression, it’s stricken. His mouth is slightly parted, and his shocked eyes drive holes through your skin, leaving you exposed. The brief stutter that escapes him sounds like it was dredged out from frozen, murky waters. “I—”

He drops your hand and turns away.

“I’m sorry,” he finally says, barely audible. “This is… this is a lot.”

“I’m sorry too, this was a stupid idea. What was I thinking?” You get on your feet, but the slope makes what could’ve been a fluid motion into a stumbling, slow rise, as if your legs weren’t jelly enough already. You inch to the window mortified. “I think I should go. Sorry to bother you.”

You don’t dare to glance at him before you step back inside, not even when he calls your name halfway through the window.

Once you’re back in the living room, you cover your face, then drag your hands through your hair. You can’t even begin to describe how exhausted you feel. This is heartbreak, isn’t it?

You blink furiously, and the outline of a figure by the fridge comes into view.

“Reader?” Mika asks. She has a stick of string cheese in her hand, but walks to you. “Reader, what happened—”

You take her empty hand and pace to your room. You open the door. “Are you okay?”

The second it shuts, your breath hitches. Mika doesn’t hesitate to take you in her arms. She holds you as the first tear falls, and you begin to cry.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

You wake up the next day sprawled in your bed, even though the blankets are tucked comfortably around you. On the floor is a pillow and another pile of blankets, and when you recognize the dark hair tied into a loose ponytail, the memories of last night come rushing back.

What an awful night. Awful decisions all day, really, and all of them ones you made. You really don’t know what you were thinking. You groan at the memory.

“Reader?” Mika perks up. Her phone is in her hands, but she sits up level to your face on the floor. “Good morning. How are you feeling?”

Another groan.

“Yeah, I figured,” she says. “Nina, Vox and Ike went out to do their own thing, and I think Ren and Uki are cafe-hopping. It’s just you, me and Aia in the house right now.”

You rub the sleepy out of your eyes. “That’s cool, I guess.” You cast a downward glance to Mika’s makeshift bed on the floor. “Sorry for being a nuisance.”

“You’re not a nuisance, Reader, don’t say that.” She nudges you. “We’re friends. It’s what friends do. Speaking of, do you want Aia to come by? And Alban’s online, so I can call him, too. If you want.”

“It’d be nice…”

Less than ten minutes pass before Aia shows up at your door with breakfast sandwiches and orange juice. All three of you sit on the blanketed floor while Mika voice calls Alban on her phone. A pot of coffee brews over speakerphone as you recount last night.

“...And to make things worse, we just streamed yesterday,” you explain. “God, I should check Twitter. There’s got to be a million people with eyes on our ship tag, and ugh, I hate thinking about how many weirdos are going to push a ship that can’t work out IRL.”

“I can check it for you,” Aia offers. You hand her your phone. “You remember your Twitter password?”

“Yeah.”

“Cool. Sorry in advance.” She deletes the app off your home screen.

You begin to protest, but she turns off the phone and sets it aside, out of your reach. “You’re off the clock, Reader! Work troubles can wait until you’re back online, and that includes doomscrolling. You can redownload it when you’re in a better headspace.”

“I really hate admitting you’re right.”

“Shit, Reader,” Alban finally says. “He seriously dropped the ball. I’m sorry.”

“I know. I really thought he would get it, but it took him so long to piece it together, like he never thought about us like that before. I should’ve known it was just me. I’m so stupid.”

“You’re not stupid, you’re hurt,” Mika says. “It’s understandable, but that still doesn’t make it hurt any less.”

“Is it wrong that I feel like I deserve it? I mean, I knew day one that this wouldn’t work out. We work together online, and we have fans that ship us with each other and the rest of this company, for fuck’s sake. Getting heartbroken was inevitable and I still went for it. Either I’m a glutton for pain or I’m just plain clueless.”

Alban’s voice is distant from the phone as he messes with his coffee maker. You can’t properly hear him under his breath and over the pot, but if you could, you could’ve heard him mumble, Trust me, you’re not the only clueless one here.

But he returns back at the phone, and you’re totally oblivious. “You can’t choose who you fall for,” he says. “It was really that bad?”

“It took him like a minute to realize I was confessing. And then when he realized it, he apologized to me.”

Aia straightens. “Did he say no?”

“Not really, but why would he apologize if he reciprocated?”

Aia exchanges a look with Mika. Alban grumbles. “No fucking way.”

“Tell me exactly how he reacted,” Aia instructs. She plowed through her sandwich during the conversation, but she left the remaining half on her plate forgotten as she laced her fingers together and leaned forward like a calculated boss.

“It was like he couldn’t comprehend what I was saying at first. He asked if I meant it as friends, until he asked me if I liked him. And when I told him I loved him in response, he was so shocked that he let go of my hand, so I left.”

“No fucking way,” Alban repeats, and groans as he drawls out his words. You can practically hear him drag his hands over his face. “No fucking way. Ikeeeee. He seriously dropped the ball.”

“I know. I can’t believe it.”

Aia takes both of your hands in her own. “Reader, I’m not even saying this to hurt you, but this is the clumsiest confession I’ve ever heard of.”

You squint. “Right, that makes me feel so much better.”

“I’m really not! You know what this sounds like? Miscommunication,” she declares. “You didn’t get a solid yes or no. So now it’s going to be awkward between you two until you get an actual answer to the confession, or at least some kind of resolution. You wanna know what I think? It sounds like he didn’t even believe what he was hearing before you left. Which, by the way, is a common response to not just confessions but other major news, so chances are you didn’t blow up your friendship as hard as you thought.”

“She has a point,” Alban says. “I believe you, Reader, but Ike isn’t the type of person to just crush other people’s feelings like that. You just woke up, right?”

“I haven’t even left my room yet. Mika says everyone else is out of the house. He’s with Vox and Nina, I think.”

“So then he hasn’t had a chance to talk to you since the confession,” he continues. “And those three are really close. I’m willing to bet they’re helping him manage it, ‘cause it sounds like he’s going through it just as confused as you are.”

You stare at the floor. Hope feels foreign, yet you can’t help but wonder. You struggle to remember the exact way Ike reacted last night, but you really can’t tell what facts were clouded over by the rejection. A rejection that possibly didn’t even happen, mind you. The confusion and regret blurs over everything like water on wet ink.

“You really think so?” You quietly ask.

Aia nods, and Alban agrees over the phone.

Mika pipes up, a glass of juice in her hands. “Here’s my take. We can theorize as much as we want, but none of us really know what Ike’s thinking about, least of all you. Especially since you didn’t actually resolve anything, and that tension is going to eat at you until you get an answer or it actually damages your friendship. You ask me, the next best thing you can do is bring it up.”

She takes a sip of her juice and leaves you to absorb her advice.

You mull it over along with the memory of last night. “He called my name as I left.”

Alban chokes on his coffee. “He called your name?”

“Yeah, but I didn’t respond.”

“Oh my God. READER!” He shouts so loud that Mika turns the volume down. “I’m going to lose it. I’m actually freaking it right now. Reader!”

“What?”

“Fuck what Mika said earlier, you are stupid!”

“Hey!”

“I’m saying this in the nicest way possible, you are so stupid. He was trying to talk to you!”

Your face goes through a handful of emotions as you sputter. “Are you serious, Alban?”

“Yes! Mika, Aia, back me up.”

Aia crinkles her nose. “I did just say it sounded like a total miscommunication.”

Meanwhile, Mika twirls a lock of red-and-black hair between her finger, distracting herself. She hesitates, trying to figure out exactly how she wants to say her piece, before she simply shakes her head and stills. “Just talk to him.”

“Which is easier said than done.” Your shoulders roll back as you stare up at the ceiling, your hands supporting you as you lean. Even with your friends’ encouragement, the memory of how hard you blew it last night still haunts you. It’s even worse than starting at ground zero; you’ve already tasted failure once, and you’re hesitant to embarrass yourself again.

That stricken look Ike gave you flashes across your sight every time you blink. What was he thinking when he stared at you like that? You can’t tell if the disgust is true or if your anxieties are getting the best of you.

The best solution to anxieties, however, is looking at the facts—or at least, what isn’t tainted by your bias. Your friends mentioned there was nothing wrong with a workplace romance, and as much as the stream made you want to cringe, no one seemed put off by it. Alban and Aia are set on getting you and Ike to talk, and so is Mika. In fact, Mika spoke with Ike as well as Vox and Nina last night before you entered, and even if you had no idea what those four were talking about, you still picked up your name and that apparently Ike had something to tell you.

Pieces start to fall into place when you consider the three around you, staging an intervention over a late breakfast. Aia always gets you in situations where you can be close to Ike and bails you out when it gets awkward, and as much as he won’t get off your back about it, Alban gave you great advice between all his teasing. Mika was nosy at first when she learned about your feelings, but now that you think about it, she’s been incredibly tactful ever since the off-collab began.

You can’t help but snicker as you connect the dots. “Is this the first time you guys actually started wingmanning for me?”

Aia purses her lips. “Hey, not the first. Remember when we made that group chat? We’ve always been your wingmen.”

“I know. But you guys are seriously helping,” you say. “Thanks. Though I do wonder, Mika…”

She perks up as you say her name. “Be real with me. Do you know more than you’re letting on?”

She flinches. Alban’s fingers snap over the phone. “Busted.”

Mika holds her hands up like a criminal caught in the act, but there’s a loose, sly smile hanging on her face. “I don’t think it’s my place to say.”

“What do you mean, it’s not your place to say?”

“I’m sorry, Reader, but I made a promise not to spill, and I’ve been doing way too much behind the scenes to break the promise like that. Just do me a favor and talk to the guy, will you? That’s the best I can tell you.” Mika rests her head in a hand, and the smirk looks even more knowing. “And if you can’t figure it out after that, then you’re definitely stupid.”

You bluster. “I’m not stupid!”

“Still remains to be seen.” Aia gently flicks your forehead. “But you do look a lot better. How are you feeling now?”

Aside from the fading pain on your forehead? You’re surprised at how much lighter you feel now that you unloaded all your worries with your friends. The rejection still stings, and you’re not exactly confident, but, well, you’re smiling. The clean, tangy taste of orange juice lingers between your tongue. Aia and Mika sitting on the pile of blankets reminds you that regardless of your love life, they’d stay by your side until the bitter end, and Alban’s voice keeps you connected with your friends no matter where in the world you are.

You snatch Aia’s half-eaten sandwich off her plate and sink your teeth into the bread. She cries out in protest. “Hey!”

“Better now.” You set the sandwich back where you found it. Even though your future with Ike looks cloudy, the smile doesn’t leave. “Don’t flick me.”

“Speaking of.” Mika picks up the phone and scrolls through her messages. “Nina just texted that she, Vox and Ike will come back in an hour or less. Reader, are you up for this?”

“What do you mean, ‘up for this?’”

“Just seeing Ike again. It was a weird night,” she says. “I stand by what I said, but if it’s going to be too much too soon, then Aia and I can cover for you until you feel better.”

“I don’t know.” That’s what gets your expression to sink from light to thoughtful. “I think I want to take your advice. I just don’t know if I’m ready to talk it out yet.”

“Still wanna hang out with us or take a moment to yourself?”

“I think I’d just go back to moping if I was alone,” you joke.

“Cool. Let me go grab some nail polish Nina gave me yesterday.” Mika rises and strides to the door. “You have a steadier hand than me. And Nina said the color suits me more than her.”

Aia’s face lights up. She happily cries ”Girls’ night!” even though it’s barely noon and Alban is decidedly not a girl, but then he croons something in a valley girl accent so strong you can’t even tell what he’s saying. Scratch that; he’s a girl by association.

When he drawls out one long “Yaaaaaas, bestie!” you can’t help but laugh. Your love life is in shambles, but at least your friendships are solid as hell. You’d give the world for these three.

Mika returns a moment later, travel-sized nail supplies in her arms and a totally unrelated topic on the mind. The sharp scent of the lacquer startles you out of your thoughts as you uncap the bottle and Mika splays her hands out, and Alban and Aia air their opinions on something entertainingly dumb.

Nina was right: this color is stunning on Mika. You paint Aia’s nails too, and halfway through her second hand, you hear the front door open, the end of an intelligible conversation, and telltale footsteps, each diverting across the house. The girls’ eyes flicker to you. You know they’re trying to read your expression, but you concentrate on how the brushstrokes pool together into one smooth coat. Your thoughts are a storm and you can’t even pick out the emotion commanding it.

So you keep joking along instead and focus on the nail polish, refusing to give the storm an opportunity to strike. Alban quips off of you, and the moment passes as Mika and Aia return to the conversation.

That is, until half an hour later when you hear a knock on the door. Mika cocks her head, a silent question, and when you nod she stands. Her nails dried when you finished Aia’s, and dot the doorknob as she cracks it open. A tiny margin of light from the hallway shines into your room, and you realize she positioned herself square in front of the threshold, shielding you from the person on the other side.

She talks evenly. “Hey, welcome back.”

“Thanks. Is Reader here?”

Your mind thunders as you register the voice. You can only see the leg of his jeans behind Mika, but you recognize Ike’s voice on the other side.

Aia shuffles by as a second shield. “Need them for something?”

“Kind of,” Ike says. “Do you mind if I talk to them?”

“I don’t know, what’s it about—“

“Aia, you can lay off him.” You call from your corner of the room. “You too, Mika.”

“Whatever you say. Just let me just grab my stuff…”

Mika grabs the nail supplies and deafens on Discord, but doesn’t even think to pick up the blankets along the ground. Instead, she glides to you and whispers under her breath. “We’re rooting for you. Send us a text if you need anything, okay?”

You nod. Aia slips past the threshold, but not without shooting you a thumbs up and mouthing ‘good luck.’ Not even a second later, your phone buzzes, and you catch Alban’s contact sending you an encouraging message in all-caps.

“See you later!” Aia chirps. “Play nice, you two.”

The scent of the lacquer follows them as they leave, and the sound of their footsteps fade in time.

Still in the doorway, Ike raises a hand to fidget with the chain along his glasses. “Do you mind if I…?”

“Oh! Come in. Sit anywhere, I don’t mind.”

You stay planted on the floor like how you were with your friends, and Ike sits next to you. You face the wall in front while he gets comfortable.

No words are exchanged as Ike maneuvers around the blankets, and eventually settles down with his back on the floor and head resting on a pillow, staring up at the ceiling. The light is off, but the blinds filter in thin beams of sunlight that cross over the room and the edge of his collar like a grid.

“Lay with me?” He asks. Then it strikes you like ringing metal; you sit next to each other in the same positions as that night on the roof.

Suddenly Ike raises his hands like static. “Not that you have to! I just figured it would be good to get comfortable and all, you know?” Ike hastily explains, then clears his throat. “I wanted to talk. About last night, I mean.”

Your chest flutters at the mention of it, but you remember all your friends’ encouragement. Here he is, the novelist of your (heartbroken) dreams, already bringing up the topic you dread to mention. You need to take this chance to face it head-on, now or never.

You glide down like the ceiling is full of stars. “Okay. What do you want to talk about?”

“A lot, honestly. I don’t know how to go about it, but first of all, I wanted to tell you that I’m sorry.”

You cross your arms. “You said that enough last night.”

“Not like that! I mean I’m sorry I acted the way I did. I think I made every wrong choice once you said that you… that.” He shovels a hand through his hair. “I’m making it weird again. I should apologize for that, too, it’s just kind of embarrassing saying out loud that you, um, you loved me. Not that you should be embarrassed. I mean, I get it if you are, but that took a lot of guts. You should be proud of that. I admire you for that.”

“Slow down. What are you even saying?”

“What I wish I said last night. More than anything else, I’m sorry I got caught off-guard. I must’ve been so standoffish, because my idiot brain just didn’t believe what I was hearing until it was too late and the damage was already done.” Hair the color of ash and ocean falls over his face. “Honestly, I can’t believe it now.”

“I get it. Bad idea from me. Can we move on from that yet?”

“I don’t think it was a bad idea at all. I just had no idea that you liked me.”

“Give me some time and I’ll get over it, eventually. I’m not going to let it get in the way of working with you, if that’s what you’re trying to get at.”

“No, that’s not it either! I—“

Ike’s eyes squeeze shut. His voice is so quiet, you can’t discern what he’s saying. “…Actually, I’m…”

“Repeat that?”

“I’m happy. Really happy,” Ike says. His pitch rises like a balloon floating up into space, struggling to stay composed. “I’m not good at saying it, but I meant it when I said… when I said it during the stream.”

You wave a hand in the air. “It was weird timing, and I know you mean it like a friend,” you reply. “I didn’t mean to pressure you into saying it, and just being friends is fine. Even though I’m a loser that messed up just about everything.”

The hand catches in midair. Doll-like fingers weave through your grasp, and turn your touch warm as Ike turns to look at you. “Not with me. Don��t say that about yourself, okay?”

You stare at how easily he held your hand, and how his fingers cradle your heart between the palms. The corners of Ike’s eyes are narrowed, two beads of peridot stone that can see through every little line of text between your pages, but there’s gentleness under his glasses. Something uncertain and fluffy. Softened like a lamb even though he leaves you defenseless.

You don’t know what to say. Ike is beautiful and kind and handsome and thoughtful when he’s earnest like this. He’s got you stupid in the head and wrapped around his pinky finger, and doesn’t have a single clue.

Peridot sparkles. “You’re so much more than that. You don’t mess things up, Reader. I’m in love with you.”

Your mouth goes dry and your tongue is still tied. Forget speechlessness; the man took your own damn thoughts away. Your hand remains frozen in air with Ike’s. If it weren’t for the light drag of one of his fingernails along your skin, then you would have figured he took your senses as well.

But the drag ends, and the fingers unlace themselves, and chilled air fills in the gaps Ike once held close. The tips of his fingers rest at the curve of your palm for just one second more before they drift away.

The glint in his eyes dulls. His hand falls to his chest, over his heart, just as slow as he parted. The uncertainty took over, and now it’s like staring at a cloud that doesn’t know if it should rain. Ike’s gaze lowers to his heart. There’s a stretch of silence and motionlessness as he stares at where your touch once was, and you’re paralyzed where you lay.

Ike's hand curls in on itself, too loose to make a fist, and his lashes sink over his eyes. His mouth is set into a flat line, but the cheeks are dusted in pinks and reds and peppered freckles in-between, demure and shy all the while.

He turns his face away soon after that. Another break of silence, and he shuffles again, with your vision on his back as if it were a hiding place.

It startles you out of your stupor. The gridded sunlight lets you analyze what you missed. After months of thinking your feelings would never be reciprocated, Ike thought of you just the same. He’s always been in your corner, and you would go to the ends of the earth for him, and everything is in its perfect position. But his back is still turned, and the memory of last night—your confession, and his inaction—it rushes to your head.

So you reach out instead.

Maybe it’s a little selfish. You’re tired of bumbling around and concealing your true feelings, and now that everything's out in the open, you aren’t about to let go without resolution.

But Ike is your best friend, and the man you fell in love with. There was no way you’d ever let go in the first place.

You wrap your arms around his back and hug Ike.

“I think I get why you were so taken aback last night,” you whisper. Even though you’re alone with Ike, you still say it like a secret. “I can barely believe it myself.”

Your warmth is inviting, and every second that passes is another defense downed. Your head perches right above his neck and along his shoulder. It’s not your first hug with Ike at all, but there’s only been so many since you first met him in person that it still feels special, and with your bodies flush to the floor, it’s intimate. His eyes are averted and one cheek lays down on the blankets, but the tips of his ears glow scarlet under his jewelry.

“I’m glad you were patient with me. I really didn’t think I had a chance with you. You know, the long distance and the company, and you know, the standard pining fare. I’m really lucky.” A smile slips through your words. “I’ll stay with you, okay? So take all the time you need.”

Ike chuckles. Even his laughter is blushy-bashful. “I’m just so happy you feel the same, too. I don’t even know what to do with myself.”

His body curls as he lays, and your legs brush along his as you cuddle. Holding him makes it feel like he was made to fit in your arms. You sigh. “I love when you can’t contain it. It’s so cute.”

Ike squeaks at that, and unwittingly proves your point. “It feels so good to say that out loud. I mean, you’re okay with it, right?” A nod. “And you’re okay with… I don’t know. Are we still friends?”

“Of course we are, no matter what. You said you loved me first, so let me say this one?”

You have a feeling you know what’s coming next. You hug him even tighter.

“Reader, let’s go out. I don’t want this feeling to end,” he confesses, and your world turns into rose and blush. “Can we?”

Though you expected it, he still takes your breath away—until he taps you on the hand. “Come on, say something before my heart explodes!”

“Mine already did! I can’t even think straight, and—I’d love that. I really want this.”

Another squeal breaks out as Ike buries his head into a blanket, and your heart soars as he melts. He resembles a swaddled-up kitten, and the rays of sunlight line his silhouette. The fluffy blanket reminds you of an angel’s downy wings along his kitten features. You can’t even see his face between the blanket and his hair, but his squeal continues, muted through the blanket as he swoons.

Somehow that only makes you feel even more flustered. “No, don’t hide! I want to see you!”

Maybe it would’ve been better for your heart if he stayed put, because when Ike rises—with disheveled hair and glitter in his eyes the color of seaglass, and jewelry that frames his red face, and that galaxy of freckles you hold so dear and shine like stars between his blush—you feel your heart stop. Again.

“When did you start having this effect on me?” You ask, mesmerized, and before you know it you thumb over one of his rosy cheeks. “Your freckles are so beautiful.”

He sheepishly grins. “They don’t really show up online. They’re pale.”

“Never noticed them until I met you in person. I love them. I love you.”

The grin gets a little wider. One of his fingers grazes along the corner of your ear. Has his hand always been along your jawline?

Ike’s eyes are shining under the grid of sunlight. The lashes flit just a bit lower from your gaze. “Reader, can we…?”

You close your eyes.

And when Ike’s lips graze your own, you smile on instinct before you remember to kiss back.

Ike brings you near, searching for the taste of you as he continues. His touch lodges past your jawline and into your hair, and when one of the fingers grazes along your ear you’re reminded just how much you love Ike. All the yearning you hid for so long bleeds through as you sink down to his level with his head in your hand, gentle yet impassioned.

Then your face bumps against Ike’s glasses. The kiss breaks as you back away.

There’s a brief pause in the aftermath. Ike wordlessly adjusts his glasses, now knocked off-center. Despite finally getting on the same page on your relationship with Ike, you’re still as clumsy about your feelings as ever.

But the corners of your lips curve up as he inspects the lens you squished, then a barely-stifled giggle, and next thing you know, Ike’s laughing along with you, still underneath your body and with one hand in your hair while the other holds his glasses in place. He sounds as charming as he looks, and the fact that he joined you even when you chuckled out of the blue means that his mind is just as charming as well.

Not that it was breaking news. You know your best friend well, and now that you don’t need to deny your feelings any longer, you know you’ve got good taste if Ike’s under you with crinkled eyes and hearty laughter.

When you speak next, the giggles patter out between your words but the quiet delight hangs in your teeth. “Can we try that again?”

Then his lips are on yours again, and the laughter twists between the second kiss, and the third, and the fourth, all the way until you collapse on the blankets with arms around each other, staring up at the stars on the bland popcorn ceiling as adoration fills the space between you.

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

bonus.

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Starting soon…

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

The chat flickers alive as a four-pointed flower, a diamond, and a thorned heart give way to the stream and the novelist behind the stinger.

Kaidororero: welcome back ike!

Min (Ikey’s Book): 💙 IKEY IS BACK 💙

A normal broom: HI IKE

lunasmortas: 💙💙💙

viperip: ike! :_heart: :_heart: :_heart:

Sun shines through a clear day in Ike’s room onscreen, but in reality, blackout curtains block out the day outside. A sweet smile graces both Ike’s face and his model as the Quilldren welcome him home.

He greets them, and cracks open a can of soda as he quickly scans through the chat. Obviously, the off-collab is on everyone’s minds.

juuuuuuuuuus: did you have fun?

Kaidororero: offcollab POOOG

lunasmortas: SO CUTE :_heart: :heart:

Johnclone: Hope you had a good time!

zZirasthingZz: PEN AND PAPER REAL

Hm. A mod will eventually bonk that message. But then again, it’s inevitable that the ship would come up in chat.

Ike takes it in stride and ignores it like any other shipper, but his heart still skips a beat. Nonetheless, he doesn’t call any attention to it. “How about that off-collab, right? I met up with my friends! Where do I even begin?”

Ike recounts his trip from the beginning, and the Quilldren react to his stories with interest. He was one of the last to arrive, so Nina, Uki and Reader picked him up from the airport, and met up with Aia, Ren, and Mika at the Airbnb. Vox was the only one to arrive after him, hot off the heels of a flight delay, but the demon was a welcome party all his own despite his exhaustion.

“We went to karaoke once Vox got situated,” Ike explains. “Nina put that song in first so we could all let loose, and so she would have a fun voice tweet for everyone. Might as well confirm everyone that showed up, right?

“But after that, we didn’t want to stress ourselves out to perform for voice tweets instead of just having fun, so that was the only song we recorded. I wish you could’ve heard Uki and Vox’s duet, though. And while we were singing, turns out Ren packed a ukulele with him! Sometimes he would learn how to play along by ear, like a jam session. Mika knows how to play ‘Somewhere Over The Rainbow’ too, so everyone joined in singing that while she played it. It was so much fun.”

Johnclone: Everyone sounded great!

sunblast99: uki’s voice >>>>>> everything else 💜💙

haabinae: :_tskr:

Festersk: WHAT I REALLY REALLY WANT 🗣🗣

A normal broom: what did you sing?

Ike leans back in his chair. He blows a lock of hair out of his sight as he tries to think. “I remember Vox sang something by George Strait, so then we all egged him on to sing ‘Country Roads.’ He only did it once I promised to queue up ‘Toxicity’ by System of a Down afterwards.”

lunasmortas: OMG 💙💙💙

gatamiizuus: ayo?

Y A M: YESSSSSSS :_tskr: :_tskr:

haabinae: I LOVE SOAD :_fanboy:

Thornmy: SO COOL 💙

“Thank you.” He says it out of obligation. If he thinks too hard about the compliments, he’ll get embarrassed. “What else was there? I think there was some Motionless in White, and Spiritbox. Oh, and My First Story. Can’t forget My First Story.”

K. K. Soda: ooooo

Alban Knox 【NIJISANJI EN】 ✓ : what about mcr

asper ch.: METAL SCREAM?

deeboorgur: HI ALBAN

Y A M: MCR YEAAAAA :_glowstick_1: :_glowstick_2:

“I’m getting there, Alban!”

Ike takes a sip while the Quilldren greet Alban. He’s not too surprised Alban seems to know more than the other viewers. He’s close with almost everyone that went on the trip, and was super active on Discord during the off-collab. The novelist lowers his soda as the chat floods in orange hearts. He wonders how Alban learned so much as an observer. He should ask.

But that’s a question for after stream. Ike continues. “Thank Nina for that. She queued up ‘I’m Not Okay’ by My Chemical Romance, and then shoved two mics in my hands and Reader’s.”

And the chat explodes.

Kaidororero: OMGGGGGG 💙💕

Y A M: PEN AND PAPER SO CUTE :_tskr:

zZirasthingZz: PEN AND PAPER DUET

asper ch.: AYOOOO MCR

gatamiizuus: I LOVE READER

ystariya: PEN AND PAPER MY BELOVED

“It’s a really fun song! It’s almost all clean vocals, but there’s this scream in the middle. Up until then, we sang together, but then I screamed, and Reader picked up the slack and sang the parts of the verse I couldn’t. They’re amazing.”

gatamiizuus: READER SIMPS COME GET Y’ALL’S JUICE

Thornmy: THAT SOUNDS SO GOOD

lunasmortas: 💙💕💙💕

ystariya: READER KARAOKE STREAM WHEN

Kaidororero: AWWWWWWW

The model on the screen doesn’t have the same glint in Ike’s eye when he talks about you. That first day of the trip was all about getting comfortable after long travel hours, and the stories went on as the days went by. Sightseeing with Aia and shopping with Uki by day, and spending the night shooting the shit with Ren until it turns into the littlest hours of the morning.

“Vox wanted to try a bunch of different restaurants with me, but you know me, ya boi is not good with most foods. So Nina usually came along in case I couldn’t finish something. She and Vox would share my leftovers.”

Something fond crosses over Ike’s face. His eyes cloud over in fog descending over a clear-sky day. “We would always talk over food about anything. I appreciate it a lot. They really get me.” The fog stills. “And over breakfast one morning, they gave me some excellent advice over something I’ve been meaning to do.”

ver*batim: ❤️💙❤️

K. K. Soda: MILORDDDDD

nroneo: :_heart:

A normal broom: upcoming project? 👀

Johnclone: I love Nina Kosaka!

“Not a project, no. It was something I was really worried about, even when I was supposed to be taking a break with my friends,” he says. “But those two seriously helped me clear my head about it. Mika, too. Vox and Nina had a lot of nuanced advice, but Mika told it to me straight, and helped handle what I couldn’t. I’m really thankful to have them.”

His set jaw loosens. “Maybe I’ll talk about it one day.”

The model cocks to the side. Motion blurs the foggy sobriety away. With a lightness to his voice and a knowing gaze, Ike looks straight into the camera and smiles, sentimentality forgotten. The air clears. “But for now, it’s a secret~!

“Ah, now where was I? Spending time with my friends, right? Reader and I hung out often. Sometimes with others, but it ended up being the two of us more than not.”

Birds chirp outside Ike’s window in time with the hum of his PC. The backlit keyboard in front of the monitors glows the same color as the computer, a healthy blue light that tints the tips of his fingers. He usually sets it to a rainbow spectrum in his own time, but static blue is reserved for going live. It gets him in the right mindset for streaming, and makes his little apartment feel fantastical like the noble background that accompanies his model, even if it only reaches his fingertips.

He’s sure the Ike on the screen has fingertips tinged with blue just like him, an extension of the man outside the screen but without the grittier details. Smooth, pristine hands under gloves where his are callused from guitar playing. Nothing under the model’s eyes but lashes and a line of red that brings out the pink in his eyes, very much unlike the heavy bags and sunken face from an awful delay on his flight back home. No freckles, either, but even cameras rarely pick them up on video call. Nina cooed over them the first time they met, as motherly as ever, but behind closed doors Reader was utterly fascinated with them. They mentioned something about watching blush travel around his face with the smattering of freckles in-between once or twice… maybe more? Doesn’t matter when he’s never heard that before and it repeats in his head when he catches himself daydreaming. It’s one of the best things he’s ever heard.

Vtuber Model Ike’s face doesn’t heat up like how Real Ike’s certainly is now. He clears his throat. “The weather was really nice during the entire trip, so we would always get into good conversations while walking back to where we were staying. And sometimes we didn’t want to end the conversation, so we’d just keep walking past our Airbnb until our feet hurt or it got dark, whichever came first.

“Oh, here’s something funny. Uki really loves cafes, right? Usually he woke up early with Ren to go check out some cafes in the morning, way before the rest of us would even think of waking up. By the time everyone else woke up, they already finished their breakfast, and Uki would tell Reader about the ones to visit or skip. Whenever Uki recommended one, Reader always wanted to go themselves, so I went along to keep them company.”

Even as his skin returns to its original shade, the sweetness sticks to his throat like the soda he’s barely touched at all. He’s wistful. He didn’t expect to miss Reader this much; after all, his relationship with them has bloomed so much ever since you first started working together, but two weeks together (including mutual close friends) changes things. It’s only been two days since he returned home, but he feels out of rhythm with them.

He’s gotten too accustomed to them. Over the last few months, he thought he did a good job putting aside his feelings for Reader, even when Nina would tease him after every Pen and Paper collab and Vox and Mika would be right behind her, hyping him up to make a move. The fear of rejection was what motivated him to keep his close friendship with Reader without ever confessing to them.

“Reader…”

The world around him is nothing. Paused to buffer as he thinks. He can’t remember the last time he felt so happy. Just being in the same room as them makes him feel stupid, and surely he’s been acting like it. Everything he says sounds clumsy when he’s with them. After all, on that day when he owned up to the feelings he repressed for so long that he couldn’t properly react to Reader’s confession, he couldn’t say much more than how happy he was. Words fail to describe what Reader means to him, yet he’s a novelist, for crying out loud! How ironic!

“...Reader is so patient with me,” Ike says. “And they’re so considerate and dedicated. I wish I told them that earlier. It’s hard to say things out loud like this, but you only meet people like Reader once in a lifetime if you’re lucky, and even then, there’s no one quite like Reader.”

ystariya: i love reader

Kaidororero: pen and paper awwww

Y A M: PEN AND PAPER

acklmystafoot: ike is so sweet!!!

Reader 【NIJISANJI EN】 ✓ : 💙

“Aaah!”

Ike recoils like his keyboard is flaming lava. The model on the screen leans back and freezes in place while he nearly throws himself out of his chair. “R-Reader! What are you doing here?!”

Reader 【NIJISANJI EN】 ✓ : FKJLJJSLKFJDKS LMAOOOOOOOO

Johnclone: Hello Reader!

Y A M: OMG

Reader 【NIJISANJI EN】 ✓ : just wanted to say hi

Reader 【NIJISANJI EN】 ✓ : hi!

Festersk: LMAO

Ike sputters out nothing but empty air and nervous laughter. “Haha. Um. Hi! Welcome!”

Stupid! He wants to kick himself. He’s made improvement on verbalizing affection, and he’s comfortable with Reader, especially now that there aren’t any secrets left, but he’s still so unfamiliar with affection being returned that his heart is still doing kickflips in his chest.

haabinae: :_blush: :_blush: :_blush:

juuuuuuuuuus: most normal pen and paper moment

Thornmy: AWWW

Reader 【NIJISANJI EN】 ✓ : check discord

A normal broom: Oh?

“Ah, okay! Give me a second.” Ike keeps his Discord on mute, and usually disables desktop notifications when he’s live, so he’s not surprised to open the window to unread messages and some non-urgent pings. Sure enough, Reader sent him something.

Reader: because you were talking about cafes

Reader: image.png (3) | 💙 1 |

Me: Oh I recognize these from our first date!

It’s been over a week now, but just saying he went on a date with Reader has him squeezing his legs together so his feet wouldn’t start kicking in the air.

Reader: ahh you remembered!

Me: I should’ve figured you took more pictures than the ones you showed me

Reader: dw i have more i wanted to show you

Reader: image.png (8) | 💙 1 |

Me: Seriously how are you so good at photography I don’t get it-

Me: You’re really pretty in this one!

Me: UGHHHH WHY DO I LOOK SO WEIRD | ❌ 1 | 💕 1 |

Me: I DIDN’T EVEN NOTICE YOU TAKE THIS ONE

Reader: WTH YOU’RE NOT WEIRD

Reader: YOU’RE LITERALLY SO HANDSOME WHY DO YOU T H I N K I TOOK THAT PIC

Well, great, now he’s actually kicking in his seat. Ike is inclined to disagree, but when Reader says it, it’s a super-effective attack on his poor little novelist heart.

Me: Akaslwdnja

Me: Thank you 😭

Reader: anyways i gotta go i stream in 20 min and i’ve barely eaten my food

Me: Go eat! Do you have enough water?

Reader: just refilled my bottle

Me: Good then don’t let me keep you! Have a good stream!

And before he can overthink it, in the moment—

Me: I love you!

His sights are set on his second monitor.

Reader is typing…

Reader doesn’t have to respond. Sometimes just saying it is enough.

Reader: fdsjdfkl.

Ike’s been trying to relearn that lesson ever since he realized everything he repressed was reciprocated.

Reader: i love you too, ike

Words heard across the world, one of the people he holds most dear.

His heart beats loud in his ears, but he can feel it slow, somehow. Reader is exhilarating, but there’s security in them, too. The nerves kick in until he remembers they’re just as exposed as the other, and the vulnerability generate a sense of comfort. Reader makes him feel understood like no one else in the world does, and he trusts them more than anything.

He does. He does, he does, he does, even if he only has the strength to say it one at a time. Ike is in love.

Reader: i’ll let you know when i’m done streaming, we can watch a movie together after

Me: It’s a date! | 💕 1 |

It takes him a moment to tear his gaze away from your messages.

His streaming monitor reflects his movements. The chat moves along. Blue light spreads through his fingertips, just like how he imagines Vtuber Model Ike’s hands resting on his own keyboard, an extension of the man outside the screen, proof of the fantastical.

“They sent me something.” Ike’s laughter is gentle. “I really do love them.”

The chat zooms past, as expected. Surely that would get clipped alongside the off-collab Q&A, but he can’t seem to care. He doubts the fandom would really understand how deep the connection goes, and if they do? Some things are just meant to be private.

Besides, on the day Ike and Reader get comfortable enough in their relationship to go public, he knows the Quilldren have his back, just like Reader and their Bookworms.

“Reader, if you’re still there, we need to meet up again,” Ike says. “I don’t know when, but one day.”

A flurry of messages, but only one truly matters.

Reader 【NIJISANJI EN】 ✓ : i wouldn’t miss it for the world

The model onscreen grins. It pales in comparison to Ike himself.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

✧. ┊commentary ↣

✧. ┊ ⁭masterpost ✧. ┊ ⁭kofi

#ike eveland x reader #ike eveland #ike eveland fluff #ike eveland angst #luxiem #luxiem x reader #nijisanji x reader #nijisanji #4402 writes #🖋 anon #fanfic is unrealistic and i know this because clippers would NEVER use semicolons in their captions #eating string cheese wrong is symbolic. it represents eavesdropping and shitty lies that go unnoticed #i hope i never see a typo in this thing this fic is literally impossible to edit on mobile #update: there were typos. and i had to wait 3 minutes for the editor to load on my laptop before i could fix them. rip #pliskinverse

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chilumi-shipper · 1 year

Text

My Favorite Girl (2)

Arataki Itto x Shrine Maiden!Fem!Reader

Summary: Part 2 of My Favorite Girl, you unexpectedly return, missing everything and everybody. You want to make things clear, does he still love you? And do you still love him?

Tags: Two lines with curses, Bullying in work place, Angst to Fluff

~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~

Itto remained seated by the docks, similar to how his days ended the past month. The burning ache of your departure never left him, in fact, it has only gotten worse, your lack of presence making itself known to him and a certain mini-sized bull.

Two months.

You've been gone two months, double the time you said you were gonna spend on Watatsumi Island. All his prayers to see a boat containing you had been ignored, much like the letters he sent to you while you were gone.

"Hey, babe! How's the job treating you?"

"I know you'll ace this job like you always do! What is it that Shrine Maidens do specifically that they have to switch locations? Well anyway, you'll do so good, you probably won't even need a full month to finish the job."

"Looooveee, don't let Ushi warm your side of the bed for too long, okay? His sleep moos are kinda annoying, ya know? Ohh, crap! He caught me writing you a letter!" This particular letter had a bite mark and a hoof print of the sleep moo-er.

"So... I don't know how to start this up without sounding like a total jerk, but... Well, first I wanna say happy birthday! Very very late happy birthday..." This letter was quite long, yet it received no reaction.

"You haven't returned any of my letters yet, which is totally okay if you're too busy! But I just wanna know if you're okay... I really miss you, Ushi misses you, the gang too! It been a little bit over a month, waiting for you~ I love youu." This letter was signed by each member of the Arataki Gang, each with their own little message.

A few letters of concern goes by, no response.

"It's been two months, my darling... When are you coming back home?" He wrote this one drunk and in tears, the feeling of missing you sinking deeper and deeper into his gut, not letting him shrug off the feeling like he did before.

"Boss! Look what I found in your mail!" The loud shout of Akira irritated the many people at the docks of Ritou, but it did its job of catching the oni's attention.

Itto turned to see the gang running up yo him. "Hey! You can't just go through my mail like that! What if you accidentally open ones for Y/N? She'd kill ya!"

"Yeah, I know, boss. But I actually got this from the mail delivery before it reached your house, sooo... this isn't your mail yet..." Akira remarked, proudly showing off his loophole.

Kuki Shinobu rolled her eyes before urging him, "Go on then, show him."

The Akira, Mamoru, and Genta excitedly showed Itto the letter in Akira's hands. "From Miss Y/N herself! Ohhh, is our Honorary Maiden about to return? We must rejoice!" Genta exclaimed, hyping up the other members too. Ushi himself couldn't keep his little body from jumping in joy.

"Looks like we don't have to go to Watatsumi for a grand Arataki rescue mission."

"Yeah, hmmm... I was kinda excited about that though."

"Now, hold on..." Shinobu broke their thrilled conversation. "We haven't even read the letter."

"Shinobu's right. Maybe... she just wants to say there's nothing to worry about, and she'll be staying there longer..." The hopeless voice coming from the oni, perhaps preparing for dissapointment, didn't go unnoticed. The gang noticed the change in attitude their leader has been having a few weeks after you left, getting worse with each passing day without you.

"Aww, boss, don't be like that! I'm sure Miss Y/N's had enough of Watatsumi now, she's probably preparing to head home right now." Mamoru attempted to comfort his boss, but Itto has told himself the same so many times that he feels like he can no longer hold the statement in a high regard.

Ushi softly pushed Itto's ankle with his hoof, urging him to open the letter.

"I apologize, my dear. This letter may be long overdue, but I want to let you know that I am doing just fine, there is nothing to worry about. I will be returning in just a short while, I trust that Ushi has kept my side of the bed warm for me, hehehe. To the Arataki Gang, I missed you all as well, I look forward to seeing you. And as for my beloved, Itto, let's talk once I'm there."

"She's really coming back home!" Everyone celebrated, but Itto's mind started spinning.

The most terrifying words... "Let's talk..." without a hint of emotion.

He looked at the letter once again...

Not even an I love you.

~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~

Itto didn't expect the "returning in just a short while" to be just a few hours after he received the letter.

But when he found the door of your shared home open, you were standing visibly inside with your luggage laying on the ground, he could only stand in shock.

He has been dreaming of your return for the past month, but he hasn't exactly thought about how he was gonna greet you, he wasn't even sure whether you were still upset about how he treated you then.

"Y/N..." He whispered the name of the love of his life into the air, being loud enough to just about graze your ears.

You turned to look at him, and immediately, your heart fluttered at the sight. The ever so idiotically dashing man you think is still yours. Your heart sunk at the thought, opting to smile at him instead.

"Itto... Am I still welcome here?" There's a pain constantly in your chest when you think of him. Is his home still your home? Have you been thoroughly replaced? Did you absence spark something between him and a certain ninja you know?

"What are you-" The oni started of confused. "Of course you're welcome here! This is your home, did you think Ushi clamed your ownership entirely? He only took up the bed, but that's it, really." You giggled at his remark, finding it easy to talk to him still.

"It's just that you probably didn't expect me to come back now. My letter was pretty late, as I've heard." You reasoned as you look around, seeing that practically nothing has changed from when you left.

"Well, you wanted to talk, so let's save that for later, why don't we?" Itto picked up all of your luggage, reminding you of his pride of not making two trips just to transport something, prompting you to smile as you nodded at his suggestion.

Your smile lit up the house he found so lonely while you were gone, so naturally, he noticed you smiling at him, and it brought a light feeling to his heart. "What? Missed your strong oni carrying everything for you?"

Your oni... Is he really?

Your smile faded a bit, but you made sure to catch yourself so he wouldn't notice, "Yeahh, I really did..."

...

"So you're the maiden from Narukami right? The one in love with an oni?" You caught the condecending tone of another Shrine Maiden as she spoke to you.

You decided to ignore the way she spoke to you. "Yes, that's right! How can I be of assistance?"

"Mind throwing this to the garbage, just some useless junk mail." She placed a sizable amount of crumbled and shredded paper onto your hands. "Thanks." After giving you the most ungrateful thanks, she walked away giggling with her friend.

You merely sighed, heading for the trash can, pouring the paper in the bin. Just as you were about to walk away, you noticed something on the paper... Ushi's signiture hoof print.

With a gasp, you grabbed it and read the letter that was at such a sorry state. The letter was light hearted, yet when you read it, you almost broke down right next to the garbage. You scooped up the rest of the paper you just threw away and hurriedly ran back to your quarters. Most of the letters are in pieces, but you still needed to see what they say.

After two months in Watatsumi, you only received their letters then.

...

You're finally back home, the suffocating air the Watatsumi Shrine Maidens breathe no longer in your lungs. You took another look of the house as Itto carried your things into your shared room.

In a tired manner, you sat down on the couch, and Ushi immediately took a seat next to you. "Hello, my little bull..." You cooed affectionately, patting his head, which he all responded to positively.

Everything is where it should be... so normal and so familiar.

"Darling! I have a surprise for you! I almost forgot since, ya know, you came unex-" Itto's excited voice and enthusiastic movements halted when he saw you sitting down on the couch. "Y/N...?"

Your head was down, small sobs came from your throat, and he can tell that you're trying yo hold them in. You curled up into a ball, sobs getting louader as you can no longer hold such a pain in your heart.

"Itto, please... I need you..." At your call, the oni dropped his gift to the ground and hurried to your side before pulling you to his chest. "Let me stay here..."

"Love, it's okay... I'm right here. And you can stay right here too." He kissed the top of your head, rubbing you shoulder to calm you down.

"Don't leave me all alone. Do-Don't forget about me..." You were begging, clinging onto him. Hoping he wouldn't walk out the door without a thought.

You wrapped your arms around him, sitting on his lap before burrying your face on his neck. The concerned oni didn't completely understand, but he understood that you needed him, so he's going to be there, he isn't leaving you alone in your home this time.

...

"Feeling better?" With a grin, Itto placed a cup of hot chocolate in front of you. The sight of you nodding left him feeling relieved.

"I'm right here, darling, alright?"

"Do you still love me?" The oni was shocked by the suddenness of your question. You looked at him, expecting an answer.

After composing himself, Itto stood in front of you at the dinner table, giving you the same look. "I fucking love you too much for you to start questioning my love."

"But you gave me a reason to... question it..." You pointed out sheepishly.

The man you love sighed, "I know, and I'm hoping... if you let me, I can make up for that..." He then proceeded to place a gift in front of you, right next to the hot chocolate.

"My very very late birthday present?" You gestured at the gift with a smile.

You felt in your heart that... you should trust his words, to let him prove his love. So you will.

"So you did receive my letters..." He teased right back.

"It's a long story..." You sighed, looking at the present in front of you.

"And I'll be hapy to hear it, love. Because I will always be here." Itto walked up to you and proceeded to wipe the lone tear that fell from your eye.

You stood up and jumped at him, hugging him immediately. "I'm really sorry, Itto... I shouldn't have left."

Tears yet again fell to your cheeks, "But when you forgot about my birthday, about our special day... about me..." You recalled the many nights you spent without him by your side.

"It made me... questionn your love..."

The love of your life hugged you back, letting you lean on his chest. "Then let me ask you now... Do you still love me?"

You chuckled against him.

"I fucking love you too much for you to start questioning my love." He couldn't help but let out the biggest grin when you said that.

The oni let go of you, before bringing the gift to your attention. "Since you love me so much, you'll let me take you out on a date and wear this, right?"

As he opened the box, you saw a necklace with a pendant that in a shape of a bull... he knows you too well. Yes, this is the beautiful jade necklace, it is made out of jade, soooo...

You hear a moo at the your feet, making you look down. "Oh, and here comes Ushi." Itto bantered with the idea of him and the bull being competitors for your love.

Ushi presented to you a wilting flower, along with the purest eyes you can see on a bull.

"Ohh, my sweet darling, thank you so much!"

Itto scoffed, "He literally plucked it out of the neighbor's garden, he almost cried when he was being shouted at."

"Ahh, Ushi has faced such a great trial for this flower, I appreciate it even more."

As the two compete for your love just like old times, the hot chocolate on the table goes cold.

...

"Uh, Shinobu..." The boat of the rest of the Arataki Gang docked at Watasumi Island. "What are we doing here again?" Mamoru questioned the green haired girl.

"Apparently, there's a problem about receiving mail in the Sangonomiya Shrine, and that's why Miss Y/N took so long to get back home." Kuki Shinobu clarified. "Miss Yae asked us to take care of it. Think of this as part of the rescue mission you were talking about."

"Yeahh, alright! Let's kick some mail troblemakers butts!" Akira exclaimed.

"Yep, that's exactly what Miss Yae asked for. This is probably the only Shrine Maiden related thing I like, except for Miss Y/N, of course."

~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~

After a year with no update...

I was done with a lot of things on my plate (thankfully) so I thought, why not pick up an old project :3

Thanks so much for everyone's patience, for waiting for part 2 of this story for such a long time, I appreciate you guys (⁠ ⁠ꈍ⁠ᴗ⁠ꈍ⁠)

Tags: @l0diluvs @iiyumii @lockem @t4m3-simp @eliciana @freezombielover

#genshin impact x reader #genshin impact imagines #genshin impact #genshin impact angst #genshin impact fluff #genshin angst #arataki itto x reader #genshin impact itto

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