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#there ARE drawings of the far left and right ones but they were when i first started drawing minions and they are . ugly. so i didnt want t

thecapricunt1616 · 1 day

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Very First Time (c.b. one-shot)

♡ Chapter Inspo: So High School - Taylor Swift ; "You know what you wanted & boy you got her" ♡ Summary: Based on ✩This✩ big brained ask from @carmenberzattosgf ♡ W/C: 9.4K ♡ Posted Date: 06/11/2024 ♡ A/N: Omg I had so much fucking fun writing this you have no idea!!! I hope this satisfies your virgin carmy tooth my dirty olive martini! Also, New look for this one shot how are we feeling yall? ♡ Warnings for BTC: SMUT SMUT SMUT, Characters are 18+, High school relationship, childhood best friend trope, virgin!carmy, Fem!/AFAB!Reader, R has long hair, No use of Y/N (r goes by childhood nickname 'squish'

♡ 𝐌𝐲 𝐋𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐬 ♡ ➵ 𝐂𝐡𝐞𝐜𝐤 𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐦𝐲 𝐌𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐭 ♡ ➵ 𝐂𝐚𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐂𝐚𝐫𝐦𝐲 𝐨𝐧𝐞-𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐭 𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐩𝐚𝐠𝐞 ♡ ➵ 𝘊𝘭𝘪𝘤𝘬 𝘮𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘳𝘦𝘲𝘶𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 / 𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘵 ♡ ➵ 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐭 𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐫𝐞𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐬 ♡

2010

You had thought about this year at least monthly since … well - kindergarten. This was your year.

Graduation year.

4 decent years of high school were coming to a close. You were freshly 18 as of last week, and felt exactly the same. You actually felt worse now that your birthday had passed you by. Why? Oh. Virginity. Still having one, that thing.

As far as you knew, all of your friends had lost theirs by now, well - you weren’t so sure. You’d think asking your longest time friend if they were also holding onto their precious dire to get rid of virginity cards as well would be easy, right?

Wrong. Very wrong.

This was because your bestest longest term friend? You’d been concealing a massive crush on him since sophomore year. Well, actually - technically 7th grade, when he saved your volcano from prematurely erupting by pouring borax in the hole from his project about borax crystallization after the nastiest girl in the grade dumped the cup of vinegar in it while you weren’t looking so it would explode prematurely while the teacher wasn’t watching and you’d get zero credit.

But, you told yourself that he was just a really nice person like his sister who had babysat you a few times, so he’d probably heard about you from her and was simply being friendly. Nevertheless, the interaction made you fast friends.

What sealed the deal to you being so close, though, was when a few days later one of the mean boys in the grade tried to make Carmy his newest victim by continually throwing pencils at the back of his head. He did this every class to someone new, and always while the teacher wasn’t looking.

You had waited just until half a second before the pencil flew and “Mrs.Harrison!” urgently left your lips, she quickly looked up, just in time to see the moron let the pencil go, it hit the back of Carmys head, and for Carmy send him a silent glare.

“Jared! That’s a week of detention. It has been you with those pencils. I’m calling home too- this disruptive behavior is unacceptable!” She was so focused on writing out detention slips that she didn’t even remember you had grabbed her attention. Carmy gave you one of his shy close-mouthed smiles that made his adorable dimples show before going back to drawing some pair of cargo jean looking things on the inside of his notebook cover.

This sealed your friendship because you had shown him your loyalty. You have my back, I have yours was always the mentality between you two. By the time you got to high school, you and Carmy were attached at the hip. In middle school, specifically in eighth grade, people would tease you two that you were dating.

The both of you were late bloomers and hadn’t even thought about Carmy or anyone in that way yet, but by sophomore year of high school the teasing really hit home because you did have a crush on him but thought you were absolutely sure he could never like you back, that he saw you as a sister.

Until one fateful June afternoon.

You were laid on your full sized bed together in your childhood bedroom, flicking through a J-14 magazine to get all the latest gossip on the celebrities you follow when you settle on the Ask Sabrina page, a forum where a girl answers dating and love questions.

Dear Sabrina,

I was wondering - what age should you have your first kiss, French kiss, lose your virginity etc? I’m already 16 and I haven’t had sex yet, I had my first kiss at 14 and my first French kiss this year. But I feel like such a loser cause all my friends are having sex, and say it’s so much fun!! Is it really worth the hype?

Jane from California

You roll your eyes. 16 and already had her first French kiss. She was 2 years ahead of you in that sense. You hadn’t had sex yet, either. You hadn’t really kissed a boy for real either. The only kiss you’d had to date was -

Ew!

You had to rectify this situation immediately. The only kiss you’d had to date was Billy Guerrero? In fifth grade?! You couldn’t believe yourself. You’d let time slip away, you’d let your real first kiss prime time slip away. What guy is gonna want a girl at college who was gonna want to date a girl who can’t even kiss properly! You’d bet Carmy had kissed girls, hell he’d probably had sex already. With who you weren’t sure because the only person Carmy opened his mouth to give more then a muttered yes or no were you, and his direct family.

Maybe it was with Claire down the street, she always seemed to you to be sweet on him. He would probably be better for him, anyway. If Mikey wasn’t teasing him about her being his girlfriend, he was teasing about you being his girlfriend. Each time he brought it up Carmy would go red as a tomato and tell him to shut up, and if Richie was around it would get even worse.

You wondered if he liked it, why he didn’t tell you about it - wait - why hadn’t the two of you talked about sex? It wasn’t until this moment you’d realized you’d never breached the topic. You laid your magazine on your chest, flicking the cover of Carmys Spider-Man comic with your nail to get his attention from your position sprawled out over his thighs as your pillow.

“Mm” he hums in response, blue eyes continuing to move across the page. That was something you always loved about Carmy, those large round blue eyes. You loved to tease him that he looked like Flik from bugs life. You’d done very intense studying of those eyes from your many intense staring contests over the summer breaks you two spent together, he would cheat to win, of course - but you liked having an excuse to look at his eyes, so you didn’t mind.

“What was your first kiss like?” You test the waters. Without even realizing what you had done, he mirrored you and laid his open comic on his chest to hold his page so he could give you his full attention.

“First kiss?” He repeats. You couldn’t believe how much better his stutter had gotten over last summer. He had told you he wanted it gone or at least as gone as he could get it by the time you went off to college, so the two of you checked out all the speech pathology books the library had to offer and got to work every day. It was hard work, but after about a month he got the hang of it.

“Very first kiss, well - real kiss” you clarify and by nature he brushed away your bangs that had fallen in front of your eyes from the woosh of air that came from putting his comic down.

“Uh- w-wh-“ he stops himself, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath, focusing really hard on what he was trying to say and a few seconds later he tries again “what’s a real kiss? Like a kiss that’s not just the back of my hand?” He joked and you snorted a chuckle, rolling your eyes playfully.

“Yes dummy like- like a real kiss on a date or something or like…I dunno have you ever had a girlfriend? Well, before you met me? Would a 6th grade girlfriend count?” You thought out loud. You hadn’t ever had a boyfriend before, and Carmy hadn’t said he was dating anyone and spent all of his time with you that wasn’t spent at home or at school, so you could safely assume he hadn’t, but just wanted to be sure.

“n-no- no girlfriend uh- why do you ask?” He cleared his throat that way Richie did after he asked a question he knew was stupid and you shrugged a bit

“So who have you kissed? Claire?” You ask and those big blue eyes go wide as saucers as he shakes his head no like a bobble head

“What - what?! W-why why would you think I kissed Claire? Claire- Claire Dunlap? from down the street?” He clarified, his cheeks heating up

“Woah! Do you have a crush on her?” You sat up and he groaned, rubbing over his face dramatically.

“Squiiish. Not you too” he groaned dramatically. “No! I don’t like Claire! Actually to be f-fucking honest everyone always trying to cram her down my throat makes me hate her!” He huffed

“Well then who have you kissed! A real kiss!?” You question with a laugh, unsure why he was being so secretive over something so small. The two of you could vote in the next election for Christ sake, a kiss shouldn’t be this big of a deal.

“No one!” He blurts, the heat from his cheeks bleeding up to the tips of his ears and down his neck and collarbones. “There. Ok! No one and I sure as fuck didn’t kiss Claire Dunlap.” He crossed his arms, averting your gaze. You were sat there, just staring. You were frankly trying to absorb that, it was surprising to you with such a stud of an older brother - he hadn’t gotten around.

“Me either” you said after a few beats of silence and his eyes quickly found yours again, mouth dropping slightly and he blinked a few times, the way that told you he was trying to digest what you were saying.

“Y-you haven’t kissed Claire-“

“Anyone” you interrupted. His jaw dropped like a trout as he stared at you in shock and you grabbed your magazine, rolling it up and bonking him on the head with it. “Don’t look at me like that! You haven’t kissed anyone either! I technically have you beat because I kissed Billy G. at recess in fifth grade once even though it was just like… a mom kiss you know like a- like” you demonstrate a little puckery peck of your lips.

His eyes narrowed with jealousy and you smiled proudly “Squish, one - Bear? Zero” that was one thing about you two, you were always in a competition of some kind. Who could run farther, who could read a book faster, who could get their homework done first, you never realized it translated into other things too, and that neither of you were in the lead.

“I bet I’m better then you at kissing even though I haven’t done it I’ve practiced more so I’m good when it’s time for me to show my skill” he smirked, picking up his comic again. You scoffed

“Practice? On what, your bathroom mirror? It doesn’t count if it’s not a person, dummy.” You said and he shrugged

“Find out” he said casually, eyes not tearing up from the page. Now it was your cheeks that felt like they were on fire. Find out?! Find out what, does he even realize what he’s offering you right now?!

“Find out? What- you want to kiss me?” You said and he smirked a bit, dimples showing and his eyes flick back to yours.

“It’s you who wants to kiss me. I told you I’m a better kisser then you, so, if you don’t believe me why don’t you come find out.” He mused and went right back to reading. You sat there for a few moments, dumbfounded. You had a crush on Carmy, but it was only founded when you weren’t together - well, that was a lie, you still thought about kissing him while you were with him but would scold yourself for it that it was weird because he’s your best friend and it’s wrong to think of him that way.

But now he was just offering like it was his apple he didn’t want at lunch.

“French or regular?” You ask, trying to play it cool and the astonished look on his face led you to cackle, shoving his shoulder “what?! Stop looking at me like that weirdo!” You said and he smiled, shaking his head and doing one of those slow Carmy blinks as he sighs, a little smirk on his lips. He always reminded you of Natalie when he did that, he must have gotten it from her.

“You want me to stick my tongue in your mouth?” He mused and you nod

“I actually think it goes both ways- and with 0 practice I’d win. Sure of it.” You said cockily and shrugged a bit. He snorts a chuckle

“And how do we determine a winner?” He asked, shutting his comic and resting it on the nightstand next to your bed like he was genuinely weighing the offer in his mind.

You were quiet for a few moments, looking at him carefully - and it seemed like he was serious as you were, so you said “It’s supposed to feel good, right? So…whoever like..moans first?”

“Uh o-okay- okay sure um.” He swallowed thickly, wiping his hands on his jeans that you assumed were clammy now how they got when he was nervous. “So- how- how do you wanna like- sit,” he asked. Fuck. You were just now realizing you weren’t actually sure. Your heart was thumping so hard in your chest, blood was roaring in your ears. This was all going so fast - you were going to do it. You were going to kiss your crush.

“Uh-“ you said stupidly, tucking your hair behind your ears and digging your chapstick out of your pocket, cause guys like soft cherry flavored lips, right? If he was kissing you for a stupid competition you may as well make it good. “Yeah um. I think, maybe criss cross? Right? Like how we would play sailer by the sea” you crossed your legs and sat in front of him

“We should play later I’ve been practicing with nat - I’m totally gonna beat you” he crossed his legs, and you moved in closer so your knees were touching but your faces were still about 2 feet apart, too big a distance for a kiss. “Also- we’re gonna need to be closer” he said plainly. You snorted a laugh,

“Yes - we can play. How am I supposed to get closer?” You asked, and in one fluid motion he stuck his hands under your calves, and uncrossed your legs before dragging you forward quickly and wrapping your legs around his waist. You could feel his breath.

“There” he looks at you, eyes fanning from your eyes to your lips and back again. “That’s ok, right?” The low softness of his voice, mixed with the action of him just taking control how he did - it sent this feeling down to your core that felt so good. Like a pleasureful pulsing heartbeat, the only time you got that feeling was when you were alone in bed at night squeezing your thighs together thinking about Carmy.

“Mmhmm” you hummed, unsure what to do with your hands so you settled for placing them on your thighs. “So- uh- ok. I guess um..let’s get started?” Your voice was small, nervous. A definite switch of roles for the two of you. You weren’t sure if this was normal, but you assumed it was for Carmy.

He was being so normal about it, the same normal he was when you got your period at his house - he just went to Natalie’s bathroom, and came back to the guest bathroom with a few pads and tampons for you, as well as feminine wipes - normal. Not weird, like this happens every day for him. Like - periods (or in this case) sex isn’t the most embarrassing thing to teen life. His chill demeanor told you that he strictly saw it as a platonic friendly competition, so why do your panties feel sticky all the sudden?

“It’s ok- we don’t have to-“ he’s interrupted by your lips on his,

Now or never, right?

It was warm, a little messy at first, you found out quickly you should close your eyes since he closed his and once you did it was much easier to just focus on the sensation. His lips were soft, he tasted like the bowl of trix cereal he must have had before he came over. The way his lips moved with yours was… gentle, sweet, unhurried- you found yourself chasing them when he pulled away slightly and that caused you to open your eyes

“You-“ he huffs a small chuckle “you have t’kiss back, Squish. S’like i’m kissing a wall here” he said. You took a shaky breath, not even realizing you were just sat there like a dead fish, unmoving, in awe that his lips were really on yours. If you hadn’t just finished your period a week ago you’d be scrambling to the bathroom to see what was going on because you were gushing.

“Uh- sorry- sorry. I was just warming up” you clear your throat awkwardly, fingers tapping on your thighs nervously “lets try again” you said, leaning in and additionally mashing your nose with his “ow- oh- gosh, sorry” you giggle and he followed suit

“S’not your fault my beak is getting in the way” he joked, gently tilting your face and bringing his lips back to yours. You got the message this time, moving your lips with his and wow. It felt…good. That heartbeat right above your cunt had never pulsed so hard before, it nearly hurt and you weren’t sure what to do about it with him right there.

You’d usually use the firm corner of one of your throw pillows you kept on your bed when this uncomfortable sensation happened, thinking of exactly this - kissing Carmy - and hump it, and hump it, and hump it, until you were frustrated to tears because you still felt like you weren’t finished. That the feeling would never go away unless you stopped thinking about Carmy like that - but it was addictive, and you couldn’t help but think you were chasing something.

It all elevated when you felt his tongue on your bottom lip, it was almost like the sensation in your core was beginning to travel throughout your entire body and that had never happened before. It went from just that strong pulsing in your cunt, travelling to a tightness that was winding up in your stomach, your breasts felt good - as strange as that thought was, the only time you remembered they were there was when they were sore because your period was coming, so the warm gushy feeling in your chest and the pangs of pleasure that were coursing through you from the simple swipe of his tongue was something to be revered.

From there, it was like you were following a script you hadn’t even known you’d memorized. Your hands found his shoulders, before travelling to the back of his neck and rubbing over the little curls at the base. You swipe your tongue over his, fingers sprawling over the back of his head to pull him in closer. You didn’t know what came over you, but you deepened the kiss, and he accepted. His hands found the back of your waist, squeezing gently and trailing up your sides, stopping hard below your breasts.

You pulled away, looking at him. If it was any other day, he’d have thought you were initiating a staring contest, but the blown-out look in your eyes and small pants leaving your lips reminded him of when their family cat had a little too much catnip and started climbing the screen doors, wild. His eyes nearly fell out of his head when the next question left your lips

“Have you had sex before?” your voice was breathy, if you had known better you’d have called it for what it was - horny. The only thing on your mind was Carmy, not how your mom would be home any minute and you forgot to take out the chicken for dinner, not how it probably isn’t a normal thing for best friends or any friends really, to kiss. But you and Carmy hadn’t really ever been ‘normal’ friends.

“Uhhh” he tried to find his words. He looked so pretty. His cheeks were the pretty flush pink you loved on him so much, it suited him. His lips were swollen and kiss bitten and red. You realized that the glossiness on them was a mixture of your salivas and that brought a burst of that delicious warmth to your chest. “N-no, haven’t have you- I mean- can you have sex without kissing?” he wondered out loud.

“I don’t want to leave high school a virgin” you blurt out. It was half true, you did feel a bit like a loser, even though you could always lie and tell people you had done it even if you hadn’t. It also felt like the one opportunity was presenting itself for you to have sex with your childhood crush and if he agreed, then a win is a win in your book.

“Alright and- and uh” he sits back on the headboard, huffing a chuckle and rubbing over his mouth as he thought, staring up at the ceiling to try and get a gauge on what he was about to say. It was one of the habits he’d picked up during all of your speech practice together, it was cute, almost like he was stopping the words from falling out of his mouth before he was ready to say them so it didn’t come out all jumbly and stuttered. “And you wan’t help with this- i’m assuming you see it as a problem? Thats why you brought it up, right? You want help with that…issue” he mused.

Suddenly, you felt really, really shy. Shy, stupid, flustered, any synonym for embarrassed and feeling like a complete and utter moron. “I shouldn’t have said anything - i’m sorry, uh- you win” You got up, going over to your dresser and digging out your after-school clothes to change since you were in jeans still. Why the hell would you say that? What, was he gonna just offer to have sex with y-

“I-I mean- I don’t want to, either. I just uh- haven’t… y’know - met anyone who I trusted enough to do it with. But- it- it felt good… the kiss? So, if you wanted we could um..cause- cause I trust you, I trust you more then like…anyone- so, yeah- I-I mean it’s like- like a favor right? You uh…scratch my back- er whatever the saying is- if- if you want to” you looked back at him to see him rambling with his gaze locked on the floor, clearly feeling as stupid and embarrassed as you feel.

Holy shit, this may actually happen.

“Yeah- yeah” you agree, mulling it over in your mind. He’s right, this shouldn’t change your friendship, because from what you’d heard - losing said virginity wasnt fun, it was weird, uncomfortable, and a little gross sometimes, so it was almost like you two could get the awkward first time part out of the way together so you could both hit the ground running in terms of dating and hooking up when it came to college, cause that's what college was supposed to be all about, right? Finding the love of your life?

“Sure- Uh-” you swallow thickly and toss him one of the many pairs of sweatpants he kept in your dresser for when he slept over as well as a fresh t-shirt and grab yourself a clean pair of panties from your top drawer since although the awkwardness had taken away that dull needy ache, you were still uncomfortably wet and had to get yourself cleaned up and changed. “How about Friday? My parents have their date night so- you could come over after school and we can um…do it?” you ask and he nodded quickly, grabbing the sweatpants and sweatshirt.

“Yeah- perfect, that’s - mmhmm” he swallowed hard, cheeks bright red. You would totally be making fun of him right now if you weren’t absolutely sure you looked just as flustered, the two of you sharing at eachother in silence like a pair of deer in headlights.

“I’m gonna go change” you said and left the room, closing the bathroom door behind you and sighing deeply to yourself, leaning against the door.

And so it was set.

Carmy had exactly 3 days to study up on this topic other than sophomore health class he knew absolutely nothing about. Well- he had found one of Michaels Playboy magazines before when he was 14, it was the first time he popped a boner and it freaked him out so bad since his father wasn’t very present and Mike hadn’t given him the talk yet. It was a solid 2 months of worrying that he had some weird dick cancer because he got hard every time he peeked through said porn-mag before he asked Mike about it, and he still hasn’t lived down the teasing. Thank god Mike kept his word on not telling Richie.

The moment he left your house that day it was straight to the Chicago public library. 3 books, 3 days. He was going to do his homework on this, because he was going to win the game he knew was inevitably pun intended coming his way. It was going to become a competition, and he knew the name of the game in sex was an orgasm, he knew that much at least, thank god.

The 3 titles he’d settled on,

Sex For Dummies ; He’d figured that should speak for itself, it sounded to him like the beginners guide to fucking. He wondered why every teen didn’t get a copy of this book, he’d heard guys talking about how sometimes girls are really bad in bed - so if everyone got one, like the dictionaries they all got in elementary school - he thought their lives would probably be made easier in that department.

She Comes First; and boy, was that a read. He stayed up so late Wednesday night reading it that you had to wake him in homeroom when the bell rang to go to first period. He didn’t know there were so many things to know about a vagina, but he was confident now he probably knew more then any guy in the school about pussys and what gets them going at least on paper once he read all 350 pages in one day.

He comes next; It made alot of sense. This was the breaziest read for him, he sat on the L after school reading it on the ride home. Of course, the front was covered in a brown paper bag he’d taped to it so no one could tell what he was reading, he wasn't a pervert! He was glad he read she comes first, first, because he’d learned that girls can cum more then once, and that when they do - it gets better each time. He also learned that the clit is the best part to touch, and that it actually has like- a tail? Or something? Inside that you can mess with too, and it feels super good for the girl. He wasn’t sure how he was supposed to find something like that with his dick, but he guessed he’d figure it out.

The day was finally here. You had been thinking about it all week long. The prep you were doing was very different then the prep he was. You were making sure your entire body was smooth, plucking your eyebrows, waxing your upper lip, whitening your teeth, shaving your big toe. Literally, anything and everything grooming. You had put on a lacy pink thong that you’d gotten at the mall a year or so ago in preparation for the night you finally did this, but after observing yourself in the mirror you felt insecure about it. It was just Carmy, he wasn’t into you, it would be weird if you tried to be sexy, right? Like you were trying to seduce him or something? So you settled on some plain grey panties, instead, and a black bra.

You heard a knock at the door right at 7. Exactly on time, per usual. Your parents had left for their date 20 minutes ago, so it was perfect timing. When you opened the door, you heart may as well have melted and poured out of your ass to see Carmy standing there with a bundle of red roses. “Hey- uh- so - got you these” he thrust them in your direction. They were already cut, and thornless, ready to be plopped in a vase. You could see a little bandage on the pinky finger of his non-dominant hand that wasn’t there at school today, he must have pricked himself while he was trimming them up.

“Y’get a girl flowers, you trim em’ up, n’for the roses gotta take the thorns off, eh’? Don’t wan’t t’hurt ylady do you? And you trim ‘em cause girls like it, makes em’ all even n’shit. N’it Makes em’ live longer too. Y’givin a gift not a chore heard? Flowers need to be able to be dropped in a vase and that's it, otherwise y’re a prick f’givin’ y’r lady a job t’do” Mikey explained as he snipped the thorns off of the roses he’d gotten for his date. The conversation stuck with Carmy all these years, he promised himself one day he’d put the advice to use.

“Oh- wow - Bear, these are like -” you leaned in, smelling them deeply, the sweet floral sense filling your nose “Wow- this is so sweet of you, you didn’t have to” you stepped back and opened the door wider. He followed you in, shutting the door behind him like usual.

“Mikey says it’s what y’do I guess, so - expect flowers from guys you do this with” he nudged you with his shoulder playfully. The action made your heart flutter but also stomach sink , heavy with nerves. Right. He’s here to just get something over with, like he was probably expecting you to be and the flowers were just a result of him wanting to do things right and not because he had any real, tangible feelings for you other than platonic.

“Mmm, will do. Thanks- I’m gonna go get these in some water, you can get settled” you told him and headed into the kitchen to find a vase. When you came back to the room his hoodie was neatly folded and sitting on your desk, his shoes tucked away beneath it and there was a… towel? On your bed?

“Uh-” you set the vase of flowers on your dresser

“Right- uh- so the towel, they say in the books for your first time, sometimes girls will bleed a little? Or- or if I do it right things can get really wet, so…just trying to be proactive I didn’t wanna make a huge mess y’know?” he explained while staring at the towel and rubbing the back of his neck nervously how he did, heat creeping across the bridge of his nose and onto his cheeks.

“You…studied?” you smile a bit at the idea. You wondered how he did so, did he just watch porn?! You had heard from girls with boyfriends that watch porn - the sex was usually bad, and that they went way to hard and fast. You hoped it wasn’t that.

“Yeah I read some stuff.. How else will I know what the fuck m’doin?” he watched you as you sat down on top of the towel, assuming that was the spot he meant for you.

“Uh- yea…yeah. Ok, well thanks- I guess I should have studied, too. Didn’t even think about it- my legs are soft, though. And I shaved my - um- yeah.” you said, voice getting meeker and smaller by the end. The two of you were never like this, it was usually constant banter and comfortable silence. Awkwardness wasnt something the two of you experienced together up until now.

“Thank you- you didn’t have to it’s…it’s just hair. But um…go pee, before we get started- you should pee.” he sat down on the bed in front of you. You looked at him confused, brows furrowing together but before you could ask he added “In the books, they said for girls - it can feel like…like you need to pee, right before the good part if I do it right. So, if I do do it right- I want you to be able to finish instead of worrying if you’ll pee on me, so I figured if you go pee now then-” you held your hand up, shaking your head as you stood.

“No further info needed” you said as you padded off to the bathroom. Even though the shower you had taken not even an hour prior to him coming over was so thorough made you fresh as the day you were born you still wiped up with babywipes before coming back to see 2 granola bars and 2 bottles of water on the nightstand. “Are you planning on making me pass out or something?” you joked, sitting back on the towel like before.

He chuckled a bit “Well if i’m that good my first time it’ll be a record or something I bet” he rubbed his forearm nervously “So um..should we kiss? Like last time?” he asked, averting your gaze. You didn’t know this, but he thought he was genuinely about to have a heart attack, and the only reason he was continuing instead of asking you to call an ambulance was because if he was to die in your bed while making out because of the sheer excitement that came with the potential of you touching his dick, he would have died happy.

The question being asked in that soft, sweet tone of his- syrupy and honest, made your stomach flip- and there was a pang of warmth to your heat that made your heart jump to your throat with anticipation. You couldn’t answer, instead, you just nodded, not breaking his gaze. Jesus fucking Christ those eyes. You had only seen the ocean once, in Hawaii on a vacation. His eyes made you think of the waters in Maui, that was how blue. You could get lost in them like they were the ocean, they often rendered you speechless, like he could peer into your soul. “Okay” he said gently.

This time, the kisses started small. He gently pecked the corner of your lips, before you remembered that yes you had a job to do here as well, and you put your hand gently on the side of his cheek, barely touching him. He could feel you shaking, so he put his hand over yours, gently squeezing your four fingers as his lips captured yours in a tender, affectionate kiss. The feeling was so…different then last time. This time felt much more purposeful, and not in the get it over with way, in the i’ve been meaning to do this, way.

Honestly, the feeling made you dizzy. Not dizzy in the kind of way that immediately made you want to throw up, -

(Carmy learned you got very motion sick very quick at your 15th birthday party when he, Mike, Natalie, and Richie were teaching you how to play dead-man on the trampoline and within 10 seconds of being bounced with your eyes closed by the 4 of them you were scrambling to throw up a mix of cake and pasta)

- but dizzy in the way that you weren't forming any kind of memory of the encounter, and you also weren’t sure what you were doing - but you came to with your shirt off, dry humping your best friend as he laid sprawled over your floral duvet panting into each others mouths as your childhood teddybear watched the two of you manhandle eachother, he honestly looked like he was judging, but you mentally told him to fuck off.

“Yeah-” he breathed, his cheeks were a pretty pink, his pupils “I-I think that was um…better then last time. Do you feel hot? I feel hot” he admitted, swallowing hard as you both caught your breath. You looked down and oh, yeah - he's still fully dressed. You were still mostly dressed, too. Well, your shirt - you hadn’t a clue where it went, but your fluffy pajama pants were still suffocating your thighs and holy shit..

He is hard as a rock against your clothed pussy right now.

You look back up at him, and nod in agreement. “Feels like - wow- yeah. Uh- m’hot” you got up and saw the evidence of his arousal straining against his jeans. “Uh- so…” you trail off

“I think i’m supposed to do that part” he sat up, taking his shirt off in that silly boyish way with one fluid motion pulling it up over the back of his head, his sandy blonde hair becoming ruffled by the action. You look over his chest, not even bothering to not stare. That was the point of this whole thing right, to experience? In turn, he crossed his arms shyly, to be expected. Carmy had been open about his upset that he got more of his moms genes then his dads. He was short, softer-jawed, smaller-lipped, and bigger-eyed, the only thing he got was the big Italian Berzatto nose.

His brother was tall, much broader, was able to grow a full face of stubble by 17. Carmy was still patchy, but he was proud of his little patch of curly brown hair in the middle of his chest. Mike kept telling him he would ‘grow like a weed’ as soon as he turned 20, he didn’t believe it, though.

“Oh- yea? Thats what they said in your sex books” you teased and stepped forward, between his spread thighs, likely to give his dick breathing room. His hands found your hips as he snorted a chuckle

“Shut up” he smiled and carefully pulled down the waistband of your pajama bottoms. “I did read…” he helped you step out of them, hands trailing up the backs of your now bare thighs. The action made goosebumps appear on your flesh, nearly made you shiver. “That you are supposed to cum first, it’s like…a warm up.” he explained, looking up at you as he made his way to hold your hips again. You realized quickly, that his hands were also trembling, and he kept stroking and petting you hoping you wouldn’t notice as much.

Your panties had a dark spot on them that he became fixated on momentarily, his tongue darting out to lick his lips. You felt that twitching at his words, your hole clenching around absolutely nothing. You weren’t sure you could remember what color the sky was if someone asked at that moment, you were so focused on Carmy, it was like you two and this bedroom were the only things in the universe. “I haven’t been able to do it, I don’t think you’ll be able to - but you can try. How do you want to do this should I just lay down and I dunno… you stick it in? I got 3 boxes of condoms, different kinds just in case” you went to open your nightstand and he stopped you, grabbing your hand.

He chuckled a bit, you took it as a you don’t know what you’re doing, let me explain kind of laugh, but really he was just wondering how the following words came out of his mouth “I’m supposed to eat your pussy, could I try?”

You swore your knees went weak. Carmen, Carmen Berzatto wanted to go down on you. Thank god you made sure that department was taken care of so well in preparation. “Uhhh- alright” you sat down on the towel, twiddling your fingers nervously “So- wow uh” you giggle nervously, covering your mouth with your hand.

“Your um..you look pretty, by the way” he said while looking at the duvet. He sounded as nervous as he was when he said that. He had thought you looked pretty from the moment he walked through the door, but was too nervous until you were both literally almost naked to say it. You could hardly believe it, because you did your best to not put in a ton of effort. Sure, you were very well groomed, but you didnt like - dress up or put makeup on or do your hair how you would have wanted, you were in regular bra and panties, and pajamas when he walked in. You were also pretty sure that you had a zit growing on your chin and really hoped he hadn’t noticed.

But, that was exactly why he thought you looked so pretty. He loved that you let him have you like this, well - in both senses. He felt so lucky to be able to see you comfortable, in your element. “Thanks, dork, so do you get the honors of taking my panties too?” you teased. That was the difference between you, when you got nervous you cracked jokes and made fun of him to ease the tension in your own mind - when he got nervous he often got lost in the tension of his own mind causing him to go quiet.

“I do actually, says the book- so lay down” he shoots back in the same teasing tone, a small smile gracing his lips once again. You, and his brother were the only 2 that could pull him out of his head so fast, and so easily. You shook your head, laying back on the pillows he’d set up and spreading your legs, laying your feet flat on the bed. He sat in front of you, running a hand up your leg and feeling over the soft, smooth skin. “You are really soft” he muttered, almost to himself, feeling up your thigh “Do you mind if I kiss you, here?” he asked gently, running a palm over the inner of your thigh. No one had ever touched you there, so the action made you shiver since the area was surprisingly sensitive.

“Sure” you said quietly, watching his every move with wide, curious eyes. You were sure the wet spot on your panties had grown tremendously due to the way you felt dripping down the curve of your ass, thank god for that towel when they come off or my sheets would probably soak through by the end of this. He started at your ankle, leaving gentle pecks and putting your manicured foot on his shoulder as he continued his journey of kissing up your shin, over your knee, not leaving a single part unkissed. If this is what sex was about, you totally got why all your friends were raving about it, because you were being driven absolutely wild and it hadn’t even really started yet.

He kissed up to your thigh, laying down in between your legs. His forearms were wrapped around the plush of your thighs, hugging them as he left kisses over the waistband of your panties. The action made your stomach muscles clench at how good he was making you feel. You needed something to touch you, though. That was the only thing on your mind, but before you could ask - he beat you to it. “Would you be ok with me kissing your middle here?” his voice was husky, breathy. He was gripping your thighs so his hands wouldn't shake, he was fucking panting like he just ran the mile in P.E. and he wasn’t sure why.

His mouth was watering at the smell of you, he had to fucking swallow a mouthful of spit before he could say something. He felt like a fucking starved animal, but he was gathering every polite, gentlemanly fiber of his being to remain kind, gentle. “Please do” you said and without hesitation, he was essentially making out with your cunt through your panties. The sight was filthy, but so sexy it was making your head spin.

Whines and moans were leaving your throat you weren’t even aware of as you watch him, slack jawed and sucking at the fabric of your panties, grunting and moaning at the flavor. “T-take em off…please-” you weren’t sure where the bedroom voice that came out of you came from, but he seemed to like it at the way his eyes rolled and fluttered shut at the way you were begging for him to eat you out.

He sat up just enough to get your panties pulled off, shoving them in the back pocket of his jeans before laying back down and resuming his position. “Taste so, so good, squish, better than I imagined” he said before kissing your mound. The wet clicking sound of your pussy clenching at his words made heat rush your cheeks in embarrassment, but it made his dick twitch against his jeans. “Can I kiss your clit?” he asked, the casualness of his tone made your head fall back on the pillow, covering your face with embarrassed hands at the vulgarity of it all.

“Go ahead, Bear” you said, smile lacing your voice.

“I liked it when you were lookin’ at me, just so you know” he said, spreading you out with his fingers and looking for just a moment, he found it easily as it had grown nearly twice it’s size, peeking out of its hood. He attached his lips to it, just like the book he’d read said to do, and lightly sucked, before flicking his tongue lightly over it. Your hand clamps over your mouth to stifle the cry that left your throat, hips jerking and you grab his hair with your other hand, not even meaning to but tugging.

This caused a moan to leave his throat, which in turn caused his lips to vibrate, and you looked down at him, vision hazy like a dream at the sensation. “God- oh god- feels so good Bear - wow- you’re so good at this” you said, breath heavy and jaw slack “uh-huh” you whine when he pads his tongue over your clit in wide, wet drags. The sounds his mouth was making as he sucked and kissed and lapped at your juices were absolute sin, the hottest shit you’d ever heard.

“D’you like it more when I kiss your clit like I was doin’ or when I run my tongue on it like that?” he asked, sucking at your folds and nose nudging your clit as he waited for an answer.

“Both - Both- everything feels good - you feel so good” you praised, pushing his bangs from his face. He smiled into you proudly, continuing to lick, and suck, and swirl his tongue. It had been a knot building for a while, and it had been about 30 minutes of him doing this, when you felt it. But, all the activities you’d been engaged in the conversation you had before you started slipped your mind. “Fuck- fuck - sorry- I gotta pee” you told him and tried to tug him off

“Y’dont, trust me, just trust me” he said determined, he had told himself before going into this that if he could make you cum, that it would be his prize because per the books he’d read one of the main complaints with women was that their male partners didn’t bother to be sure they finished, so if you never wanted to do this again - he’d pride himself internally forever on be the very first man to ever make you cum.

You whined, back arching to the ceiling and hips dipping back into the bed. You didn’t want him to stop, so you weren’t sure why you were subconsciously trying to wiggle away. Your eyes had been closed for a few moments, and you felt a hand on your stomach, dancing fingers following it. You opened them to see him looking up at you, and his eyes flicker to his hand that was laying palm up on your belly before meeting your gaze again, in a silent ask for you to hold his hand.

Without thinking, you did so, needing to be grounded in that moment. His thumb rubbed soothing strokes on the back of your hand as he built up the speed of his tongue, running it back and forth and up and down, flicking it, sucking on the sensitive nub until your brain turned to mush, and stars filled your vision.

“Carmy Carmy- Oh shit- Yes”

The grand finale only lasted about a minute or two, but by the end your thighs were shaking and you were gasping for breath. “Y’need to breathe, did you forget humans need oxygen to live?” he teased. You’d usually give him a light punch on the shoulder for that, but your whole body felt like warm jelly.

“Shut up” you pant, looking down when you feel your clit twitching every few moments “I think you broke it its like.. Having a seizure or something” you said and you both burst into giggles. After a few moments of comfortable quiet you nudge him with your foot “Hey” he looks up at you “Its your turn now” you said and his brows raised

“Y-you don’t have t’do that, that was sex, so - congratulations we are both not virgins” he wiped his chin on the inside of his arm and sat up. You furrowed your brow

“No- I want to, I can make you cum, too ” you said, in your mind, it was a challenge - and when it came out of your mouth you realized how it sounded.

“Are you… asking me for permission to suck my dick?” he looked at you carefully. Shyly, you just nod. For whatever reason the nature of the room and this particular situation had the two of you acting out of traditional character roles, and he was the one being bold. “I want you to say it, then you can suck my dick” he said and stood up, unbuttoning his jeans and looking at you, brows raised expectantly as he waited for you to do as he asked.

Your throat suddenly felt dry, and you were starting to drip on that damn towel again. “Bear, I wanna suck your cock, Can I please?” you asked, tone innocent yet laced with a confident determination. His breath got caught in his throat, you swore his eyes could have fallen out. He didn’t know the word cock was apart of your very colorful vocabulary, he could have creamed his boxers with the way that the word rolled off of your tongue.

“Sure” he said all too casual and tugged off his jeans, kicking them to the side. He laid down with you, like how he was while you were making out and you got on your knees tugging the waistband of his boxers until his cock came out and kissed his navel, the tip glistening with pre.

“So-” you look at it, mouth watering at the sight. You had never done this, but you were sure that you knew one thing for sure, Carmy had a really pretty cock. You didn’t even realize you were staring until he said

“S’not gonna suck itself, squish.”

Oh, right, that was what you were doing. You grab it and he hissed “Fuckin’ hell- y’tryna rip it off? A little nicer, please” he chuckled a bit and you felt your cheeks heat, loosening your grip.

“Sorry…” you said sheepishly, bending over and licking the tip of it, one slow drag from the back of your tongue to the tip of it, flicking your tongue over the slit your nose scrunching slightly at the new flavor. The action though, had Carm seeing stars and his toes curling.

“Hhhhnnn- oh my fucking god” he rasped. You figured that was a good thing, so you did it again “Squish I-” and again, “yes- fuck” and again, “Squish i-i’m gonna mmmmmffff” he whined, his cock twitching in your hand and leaking pre in a near continuous drip. You had no expirience, so you had no idea what this meant, or that he was trying to warn you. With 3 more slow sensual ball to tip licks, he was shooting cum all over your nose, upper lip, tongue, and chin. You squeak in surprise, sitting up and licking your lips. “Oh- hmmmmfuck- gimme a sec” he groaned, taking over for you and stroking himself, the remainder of his load shooting over his stomach.

You watched in awe as he got himself off, back lightly arched and head fallen back, eyes closed as sexy pants and moans left his lips, along with soft “fuck - thank you, thank you” It was literally the hottest thing you had ever seen. He stopped after a moment, finding his breath and looking up at you, when he saw your milky white chin it both made his softening dick twitch and drew a chuckle from him. “When I keep saying im gonna do something and my dick is leaking like a broken sink it means open up er get out of the splash zone” he joked and grabbed his shirt, wiping your chin and neck.

You laughed, laying back down and sighing contently. “Noted for next time” you said and he fixed his boxers, sitting up and stroking your calf.

“There can be a next time? I mean…. I was hoping so that was really fun, felt really good” he said and you nod, smiling a bit

“Sure, I mean, yeah… but it doesn’t mean we stop like- doing friend stuff, right?” you questioned. As much fun as you had, you could never give up something as treasured as your friendship for something as trivial as sex.

“Oh, absolutely, who else is gonna wait w’me to get the new spiderman comics? And whos gonna feed you when your parents are out of town?” he teased and you rolled you eyes playfully, smiling and shaking your head.

“Love you, dork” you bit your lip as he brought your other ankle to his lips.

“Love y’too, Squish. Can I?” he looked down at your glistening core, before back at you. You bit your lip lightly, you weren’t sure if all men were this enthusiastic about eating pussy - but you were thankful that he was because your mind was still swimming from the last time and you had to experience it again.

“Mmhmm” you spread your legs wider for him and he took your hand, lacing his fingers with yours as he got to work. You had found quickly that when you tell him something feels good or he’s doing a good job that it really got him going. It was cute, truly, how he loved being praised, so you made sure to do it whenever you could get something out that wasn't a babbled, coherent mess since the pleasure he was providing was causing your brain to short circuit.

An hour and a half and 3 orgasms later, after about 10 minutes of trying to catch your breath and cool down since you were boiling from the blood coursing your system like an F1 racetrack, you sit up. “M’gonna go get cleaned up” you said, going to get up on wobbly legs.

“No! No, I got it lay down don’worry” he said and made his way to the bathroom. He came back with babywipes and a wet wash cloth, as well as a dry clean towel to wipe off with after. He helped you wipe up and knowing your bedroom by heart, he went over to your dresser and got you a fresh set of panties and a tshirt, as well as a pair of his sweatpants so you could both be comfortable. After you had both gotten dressed, he laid in your bed after bringing the towel downstairs to the wash for you both as well as your dirty clothes, and you cuddled into his chest as you turned on your little tv, playing the next episode of Glee and he hands you a granola bar after being sure you had a few sips of water to replenish.

“To no longer being virgins, hm?” he smiled a bit, holding his bar up in a silly idea of a toast. You tap yours to his with a grin

“To no longer being virgins”

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fancyfeathers · 3 days

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zainiscompletelydone333 asked a question

omg but imagine william's potential darling to be like agatha christie? a mystery writer whose mysteries are almost impossible to solve. whether or not they are as smart as the masterminds or detectives in her books, her stories do come close to confusing even sherlock or william a bit. if you've read her "and then there were none" SPOILERS its about a judge killing people for being evil and that is so william coded. anyways i'm straying far what I mean is william could be a quiet fan, and as the lord of crime, even replicate some of her stories as part of his crimes. watching his darling's face pale at the unknown criminal doing such a thing.....ASDKSHD an when he finally does officially meet her, he wonders if she'l ever base a character off him. a hero, or perhaps a villain?

For some reason this isn’t showing up in my tumblr inbox but thank god for my email cause this is a gem! Thank you @zainiscompletelydone333 for this!

Okay I love Agatha Christie, an actual icon! Fun fact she actually faked her own disappearance in 1926 and the police couldn’t find her for over a week and she just took a vacation to London after her husband threatened to leave her and she said fuck it and decided to treat herself. Then also Arthur Conan Doyle the author of Sherlock Holmes was hired to find her.

Anyway I am getting so off track but I love this lady so much so here we go!!!

But yes William would absolutely adore a darling like her. Imagine him first finding her works for the first time, perhaps one of his brothers or Sebastian or Fred was reading her work and just out of curiosity he picks up one of her books and is just immediately enthralled. Whenever he is not busy he is reading or even rereading one of her books and even begins to be teased by others for his slight addiction to her works.

Then when he and Sherlock is on the train investigating the murder that is when he gets an idea from both this and one of her books.

Weeks later an aristocrat who had been acting as a loan shark was found dead on a train in his compartment, stabbed a dozen times, his door locked from the inside, just like a murder from one of her most famous book…

But what William did not know is that she was on that same train…

And of course she found the body…

As William was making his way back to his seat to join his brothers, he hears a blood curdling scream and he simply chalks it up to someone finding the body. Then the panicked woman is brought to her seat by the staff and she looks a mess, pale faced, tears rolling down her face, hyperventilating, all things someone should be after seeing a dead body.

She is being asked questions when she finally calms down enough and William’s ears prick up as he hears words he never thought he would hear…

“Oh god… this is my fault…”

He turns his head to the booth next to him and sees her in absolute terror as she speaks to the train conductor.

She is right next to him…

She is terrified, horrified even…

And she is beautiful.

After everything from that incident had settled and she is off at home, trying to work on her next work for the life of her but being horrified by what she just witnessed…

Then more deaths come to surface all with the same pattern…

They are based on her books…

The author is absolutely horrified, she is loosing sleep, not eating as she should, and has rarely left her house in weeks…

Then she gets a knock on her door from a certain detective who was hired to look into one of the deaths, Sherlock Holmes. While he may like her books, he has noticed the pattern like she has and has one request for her…

“I want to help you to solve these cases. Who better to solve murders based on books better than the author herself?”

At first she refuses and dismisses him, but then when she is laying in bed that night she realizes he was right.

Her drawing room becomes a mess of her old notes that she had tucked away from when she wrote her book, copies of her her books with dozens bookmarks in them, newspaper clippings all around, and evidence she had Sherlock get access to with his connections that she doesn’t have.

After days of pure investigation and nights of no sleep she finally was able to figure out where the next murder will be, just by what books are left…

But that’s the thing…

There is not a single work of hers left that this murderer has not take inspiration from…

The only thing left is the author, and she can only assume that she is the next target. So without telling Sherlock, she packs up her bags and fakes her own disappearance, to fool both the police and the murderer.

She spends so much time in the shadows, watching and waiting to see who looks into her disappearance, seeing how people react to it, but nothing, not a thing…

It frustrates her even further…

Then she finally decides to return home, feeling like a failure. Her house if just how she left it, even the papers in the drawing room that look like the work of a madman that she will have to clean up after her failure so she can go back to what she is good at, fictional murders not really ones…

No she can’t do that, that would only give the murderer ideas…

So she quits.

No one hears from her for months as she nods herself taking up a librarian position at a local library, at least she is doing something with her literature. She says goodbye to Mr. Holmes and tucks away all her old books and works in progress that will never be finished on the shelves to collect dust for the rest of her life.

At her time working there she gets a frequent visitor at the library, a Mr. William James Moriarty. He had a fascination with murder mystery novels and the two form a quick friendship over their shared love of them. Everything feels like a new start, a clean slate but then he had to ask…

“Will you ever write again?”

That question has her heart hurt because she adores writing, but to sacrifice lives just for what she enjoys, she would never. She shuts down his question quickly and excuses herself, but then avoids the scarlet eyed man as to not be asked that question again.

But as she is laying in bed one night…

She hears the sound of footsteps in her study downstairs…

She feels her heart stop…

She closes her eyes and prays whoever is there will just go away, but they do not. So she musters whatever courage she has left and slips out of bed to see who is there in her study that has been collecting dust for almost a year…

And she approaches the closed door she realizes whoever is behind them must be the person behind the murders that gave plagued her and-

“William?”

The pangs of shock she feels in her chest when she sees the face of William Jane Moriarty looking through her unfinished works that she shelved away what felt like years ago. She must have looked like a deer in headlights as the Lord of Crime looking up at her with a smile, his red eyes staring into her soul…

She is terrified, horrified even…

And she is beautiful.

“Your unfinished work, will it have an ending? Or perhaps will we have to write one ourselves? What do you think, darling?”

The weeks go by and the next time the author is seen in public again she has an engagement ring on her finger and the announcement is being made about their upcoming wedding. The talk of the aristocracy says that she finally has a husband who is willing to deal with her crazied ideas that ended up killing so many people, not knowing that she is on the arm of the man who killed them…

Just for her.

(I could kinda imagine it ending up as a situation like the book Misery by Stephen King where he has her finish her work even if she doesn’t want to, but what differs is that while he doesn’t necessarily keep her locked up physically he does mentally. Sure go run off, he isn’t going to stop his darling, but just watch the bodies stack up pin ways she imagined, he is using her own mind against her which is the most terrifying of prisons. Then soon fear turns into dependency, she becomes terrified of him leaving her because now she has no where else to go but him so he has no need to hide her away when she clings to his arm like a terrified and wounded animal.)

#william moriarty x reader #moriarty the patriot x reader #yuukoku no moriarty x reader #yuukoku no moriarty #william james moriarty x reader #yandere william james moriarty #yandere moriarty the patriot #yandere yuukoku no moriarty

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garoujo · 8 months

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✩ ˛˚ . GOJO SATORU — you know as soon as you get out of bed, satoru isn’t going to be far behind you, especially when you’re draped in his shirt.

ஜ ˖ ࣪࿐ྂ warnings! f!reader, insatiable satoru :3, mostly teasing, some morning scenes as he tries to drag you back to bed, you’re in his shirt, he lifts you up at the end. ♡ ˖ ࣪࿐ྂ note! i am so very obsessed + crazed, i can’t stop <3

it’s still early, barely light outside as you stand in the kitchen of your shared apartment. you’ve left your boyfriend gojo still in bed, you felt a little bad waking him up when he always looked so peaceful, probably tired out after the night he’d given you lastnight— the evidence of his efforts still burning on your skin where he’s left his mark.

but it had still been an effort to peel him off of you no matter how soundly he slept, having to pull yourself away from the warmth of his chest— his arms were like a puzzle with how tightly he wraps them around you, but you thought he’d appreciate waking up to some coffee and breakfast on his day off.

the air in the kitchen is still cold, something you’ve put down to the early morning— the roads outside are still quiet but there’s a slight breeze along your bare thighs when you move. the rest of your body is fine though, draped comfily in one of satoru’s ridiculously huge shirts, the perks of your boyfriend being over 6’3 ofcourse—plus he always payed such expensive amounts for his clothes, it was almost guaranteed they were gonna be comfy.

you giggle as you scoop a ridiculous amount of sugar into your boyfriends coffee cup, the ceramic identical to yours— his idea when he started coming over more often, but you still thought his sweet tooth was adorable.

“oh? good morning to you too, sweet thing.” your train of thought is interrupted by the smooth, still sleepy drawl as you shoot a quick glance over your shoulder to see gojo already approaching you. he couldn’t be apart from you too long afterall— it’s like his soul was tied with yours. he’s still shirtless, his hair is messy from sleep— snowy peaks framing his features while his sweatpants rest dangerously low on his hips.

“you’re awake early.” you sigh out, dreamily as you feel your boyfriends chest press against your back, his long arms circling their way around your waist from behind as he rests his head in the crook of your neck.

“mhm, how my supposed to sleep without you, hah? so cruel.” there’s a slight whine to gojo’s words, you can still hear the sleepiness in his tone but it makes you smile when it’s followed by a smeared kiss along your jawline. you roll your eyes before you lean into him, feeling his fingertips trace along the hem of your shirt, his shirt that’s hanging around your thighs before he speaks again.

“you teasin’ me?” his words are lower this time, a little more than a growl as he plays around with the fabric between his fingers— grumbling before he’s deliberately pressing his hips into you from behind. he’s close and warm, making sure you can feel the problem you left him with this morning when you got out of bed without him— straining against the fabric of his sweats.

“‘toru, it’s 8am. you’re insatiable.” you giggle out, a sweet little sound so early in the morning and it only seems to draw gojo in closer to you— smiling into his next kiss along your throat as he rolls his hips into you.

“oh, but you left me cold and alone, i think you gotta make that up to me, no?” he’s teasing you, trying to lure you back into where he wants you most— not that he wouldn’t have you anywhere, he’s already had his way with you around this whole apartment. but he wants nothing more than you between the sheets right now, wrapped up in him and the plush mattress beneath you both.

“i’m literally making you a coffee. you needed the rest.” you try to argue but you should know that gojo’s never one to back down. you feel his fingers trail slowly underneath the hem of his shirt, before he sighs with the first teasing swipe along the inside of your bare thigh, so dangerously close to your folds that you shudder. no panties either? you really were teasing him.

“hah? but i feel better than ever.” he tries to argue, oh so convincingly before he’s turning you to face him— peppering sweet, ticklish smooches along your features until you’re arms are wrapping around his shoulders and your eyes are finally on him.

“oh, i’m sure~” you grin, his crystalline gaze is sleepy as you brush your fingers through his bed head— scratching at his scalp before he’s sending you a lopsided grin, followed by a quick peck against your lips.

“got no choice. you need a demostration? let’s go, sweet thing. only one way to show you.” is all you hear from gojo before he’s suddenly got you thrown over his shoulder, and you truly forget how strong he really is until he’s handling you with such ease— holding you with one arm like you’re as light as a feather.

“satoru! what about breakfast?” not that you’re putting up much of a fight, you can basically feel the smug look that’s on his face already as he turns to drag you back to bed. you grumble, defeated but it quickly turns to a shriek when you feel your boyfriends free hand come down sharply on your ass as he chuckles.

“hm? don’t mind. i’m hungry f’ somethin’ else right now, baby.”

#݁ . ࿓ : sealed#jjk x reader #jjk smut #jjk x you #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jujutsu kaisen smut #jujutsu kaisen x you #gojo x reader #gojo smut #gojo x you #gojo satoru x reader #gojo satoru smut #gojo satoru x you

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loganlermanstanaccount · 1 year

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Hello! Could you please write a stubborn, jealous hc for Miguel o'hara? Thank you!!

I had the brainworms, so I hope this is what you were looking for! Thanks for the ask <3

Jealous!Miguel O'Hara Headcanons

(AO3 Mirror), Main Masterlist

pairing: jealous!Miguel O'Hara x reader

summary: stubborn HCs for jealous!Miguel O'Hara.

a/n: this was meant to be a drabble and i basically wrote a full fic. i have zero self control lmfao

warnings: smut (fingering, f receiving oral, slight brat taming, etc) right at the very end, 18+ from then onwards, the rest is more pg-13

wc: 3.5k ish

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

Long story short: he's a stubborn little shit.

Pig-headed as fuck and it shows up in little things.

Let's say you first met as coworkers, and you were a lab technician at Alchemax.

Think: unstoppable force meets immovable object. He likes his labs just so, with very specific equipment in a very specific configuration.

It drives you crazy, regularly having tiffs outside the labs; much to the chagrin of your coworkers.

"Jesus." Your coworker mutters, wincing at the seemingly heated argument by the water cooler.

"Ignore it, Maeve." Another coworker rolls their eyes, nudging Mave with a snort. "They're at it again . S'pose they'll tire each other out by the end of the day."

Not that they were wrong. But this time, it wasn't your fault: dealing with O'Hara's bullshit had really taken it's toll. He was insufferable, prone to nitpicking and just plain mean. You could hardly be blamed if you gave him some of your own choice words.

"My notes were basically paint-by-fucking-numbers! How could you mess up a simple distillation? When I specify precision glassware , you don't think that's fucking important?"

"Your notes ," You draw air quotes pointedly at him. "-are illegible, you fucking cretin! Maybe if you didn't write like a goddamn pre-schooler-"

"- preschooler? Oh , fuck you!"

"Get your nose out of that highschool Chem textbook, O'Hara, this is a fucking job."

"Yeah? Stop using it to wipe your ass and you might learn a thing or two."

"Oh , so that's what we're doing?" You laugh in his face, so angry your hand curls into tight fists. You get close, staring him down as you look upwards through your lashes. His own face is contorted into a grimace; bushy eyebrows furrowed into deep shadows around his eyes. You can feel his steady breathing before he speaks, low and rumbling.

"I could do this all day, princesa. "

You scoff, ignoring the way his words weaken your knees. The one time you asked for a break during a long lab and he won't stop calling you a spoilt princess. His laughter then stings in your ears now, the ghost of a smirk on his face as you storm off. Miguel O'Hara: smug bastard. He would be the death of you, you're sure.

~~~

You spend many a late night with him, unwittingly, and find out he's more than a stubborn little shit.

You find out he's funny, and shares the same anti-Alchemax tendencies you do: both preyed upon by the company immediately after graduation, young and naive.

He's kind, even though he'd never admit it, often finishing up the lab notes and doing more than his fair share of work so you can go home at a reasonable time.

You both still butt heads, but it turns into a tentative friendship - coffees in the morning hidden as blaise convenience, covering for each other at work, and defending the other when office gossip goes too far.

That's why when he comes back to work after a week-long stint away - something about a blow up with the boss, an issue described as 'miscommunication, promptly smoothed over' by anyone official - you notice… something's different about him.

You first noticed something was off when he walked in without a snide remark. You left a mug overnight at the counter, something that would usually draw a sarcastic comment at the least , but he gives you… nothing. Blank, glassy eyes as he opens up his workstation - clicking away at the keys without so much as a glance.

"O'Hara?" You call, but he doesn't even look up. You walk to his workstation and knock at the desk. He jumps. God, he looks worse for the wear. Heavy bags under his eyes and a bruise blossoming under his collar.

"You okay?"

He rubs his temples, eyes flitting up at you. "Yeah, just…. just a long week, s'all."

You put a hand on his shoulder, and you swear he leans into your touch. "We can reschedule, tonight. The calculations can wait, Miguel."

He gives you a weak smile, but a smile nevertheless. "S'okay. Need to make sure you don't fuck it up."

"Don't push your luck, O'Hara."

~~~

As you get closer, you notice just how stubborn he is to admit the growing tension between you two.

Late nights at the lab turn into takeout at your place, morning coffee turns into a pleasant 20 minutes on the rooftop away from the hustle and bustle - just you and Miguel, talking and joking with a cup of shitty coffee in hand.

Wholly, he seems more assertive at work, not as quick to roll over.

It's hot, you have to admit; watching him fight with someone else other than you.

You're at work drinks with the other technicians and engineers, nursing a watery beer when another colleague makes small talk with you at the bar.

You’ve never been that close to him, and the conversation is amicable enough, but you’re almost bowled over when you see Miguel, in the corner, staring straight at you with a stormy look.

You suppose it's a little pathetic, getting all dressed up for a casual drink. Lips shiny with gloss and gently powdered with makeup, you feel a little out of place. For all your talk at work, actually being here was another thing. Suddenly, your blouse is too tight and your skirt too short. With a manicured finger, you trace the lip of your glass filled with watery beer. You sigh. You don't want to admit it, but you were only here because of Miguel. He said he would come, and now you're sitting on a barstool counting the chips in your glass.

It was probably for the best. You sink into the absentminded chatter of your colleagues around you, until there's a tap at your shoulder.

"Is someone-" He clears his throat; a tall man dressed in a sharp suit nodding gracefully towards the empty chair. "-is this seat taken?"

You shake your head, grateful for the company. He's handsome, sharp features curving into a wry grin as he calls for a drink.

"...and something other than shitty beer for the pretty girl, too." It makes you laugh, light and lilting in the bustle of the bar.

He stretches out his hand, and you take it.

"Eddie Crouch. I work in marketing."

Eddie…. as in… head of the most profitable division of Alchemax? Your eyes widen involuntarily and you try to clamp down your immediate shock, somewhat unsuccessfully. He narrows his eyes as you tumble over your words.

"Y-Yeah, same! I mean, not same , I just work in the l-labs and I thought it was just for us guys, working behind the curtain, y'know? Not that we're not thrilled to have you here, because we a-are." You spill out, wincing. "....Is this about the performance reviews? Because I know output was down this quarter but our projections are-"

"I'm not here to talk about work." He chuckles. You squint, not convinced. As if to alleviate your concerns, he loosens his tie and undoes his top buttons with a flourish.

"Can I tell you a secret?" He leans in, and the air becomes thick with expensive perfume. He twirls the signet ring on his finger, a ring probably worth more than your monthly paycheck.

"Your boss invited me," Discreetly, he stretches a finger at your boss; a man ruddy cheeked and red-faced with alcohol. "Guess he thought it would boost morale. He's a fucking idiot if he thinks having me, the one guy that could fire your entire department without recourse, exchange empty platitudes would boost morale. But, I digress. So here I am, dragging my feet to this bar, thinking I'm gonna get in, read the lines and get out. But then, " He pauses with dramatic effect. "I see the most beautiful person I've ever had the pleasure of laying my eyes on, just sitting by the bar. Like everyone isn't already falling over themselves to talk to you."

The irony is palpable. It's sickly sweet, and a line that wouldn't usually work on you. But usually, you weren't pining over a man so prickly and stubborn, you shouldn't have feelings for. Here you were, bright cocktail in front of you and a moderately attractive man by your side. He wasn't quite Miguel, but in the words of one of the greatest thinkers of the past age: country girls make do.

And so you make lazy conversation with the man. So lost in a tipsy haze, you barely notice Miguel walk in; dark jacket on his shoulders and deliciously loose slacks. You're drawn to him, his eyes seemingly searching the room, and you sigh into your drink. Technically, he looks like shit: eyes dark-rimmed and sunken, a cut at his brow. You think he is gorgeous, eyes tracing the slope of his nose and plush lips. Like he can sense it, he glances over in your direction and you look away hastily. He's watching , you can feel its burn as you turn, pretending to listen to the man besides you. A little cruelly, you lean into him, not breaking eye contact and curling a hand around his arm to laugh at a stupid joke. Eddie laughs with you, oblivious, as you glance behind him.

Miguel stands with a drink thrust into his hands, looking straight through him, eyes low and gazing at you.

~~~

He insists on walking you home, a steady hand on the small of your back as you stumble through the streets of Nueva York.

You make light conversation, tipsy and giggly from the alcohol. Miguel seems a little more put together, but his chest still creaks with rumbling laughter.

He definitely walks on the side of the pavement nearest the street, because he thinks it keeps you safer.

He walks you up the stairs and by the door of your apartment, like a gentleman. You watch him get nervous suddenly, and he hesitates, stubbornly digging in his heels and pausing you from opening the door and coming in.

You don't want it to end, opting to take the walk up the stairs as opposed to the lift. It's one of your more questionable decisions as you stumble up the stairs, almost tripping over your own feet. Miguel is quick to catch you even though he was just as drunk. Arm around your waist, he leaves searing touches to your hip. You giggle despite yourself, and he can't help but smile at your clumsiness.

"If you break your legs I won't carry you, princesa ." A lie and you both know it. He would carry you to the ends of the earth like a blushing bride, if you asked him.

You both stagger to up the stairs and through the corridor until you reach your front door. You rummage around your bag for your keycard, it's contents click-clacking in the quiet of the hallway. Miguel watches, quieter than he was in the journey. If you looked up now, you would see something else behind his eyes - a storm of apprehension and tension.

You find your keycard, and look up to find Miguel placing a careful palm on the door. He's surprisingly still, eyes on your lips as he steps closer. You look everywhere but to meet his eyes, tracing the curve of his collarbone, the slope of his exposed forearm, and the tempting juncture of his strong jaw. You watch it tense, as he brings a gentle hand to your chin. His thumb swipes over the fat of your lip.

"Got somethin' right… there." He mumbles, before tucking his hand away. You can barely breathe. Without thinking you take his hand in yours, lacing your fingers together like a gentle hug. You bring his hand to your waist, and he squeezes, ever so gently. Your hand drops and he moves his slowly, knuckles dragging along the smooth silk of your blouse, and then sending shivers when he reaches your bare neck.

He has to bite down the plethora of things running through his head - his drunken brain threatening to spill all his thoughts. You are so beautiful and soft it makes him short-circuit, desperate to pull you close. Instead, you do: hand inching up his chest and laying to rest on his shoulders.

He kisses you, finally ; a little messy and impossibly soft. Like his lips on yours would shatter you both. You deepen the kiss and wrap his arm tighter around you, angling your chin to drink up even more of you. You both come up for air, panting in the heat of one another. Miguel's eyes are full of lust and blown out.

"Do…do you want to come in?" You whisper.

Something catches in his throat and his expression changes, like he just woke up from a dream. Do you just want to sleep with him? He's not built for one night stands, can't do just sex, especially if it's you. No matter how much he wants to, he can't, he won't, "....I shouldn't."

The disappointment on your face is palpable. You want to ask why - after he kissed you like that - why doesn't he want you? Instead you nod dejectedly. He gives you a chaste kiss on the forehead, lingering, and a shaky smile.

You open your door with a buzz, and slam it in his face.

~~~

It takes Miguel some time to properly put a name to what you two have: not knowing if the kiss was a drunken mistake, animal attraction or something more.

He's not a grand gestures kind of person, he believes in action rather than words.

Which is why it takes so long for him to admit just how in love with you he is.

He steals glances at you all the time at the office, and tries to anticipate all your needs.

When you stretch and yawn in the morning, he happens to pass by your favourite coffee place and happens to buy one too many cups of your go-to order.

So imagine his shock when he arrives from his lunch break, churros and coffee in hand, and there's one of the top brass from the night at the bar perched on your desk - 2 polystyrene cupfuls of something half drunk on the desk.

He's never been insecure, but he can't help but feel possessive, something tense and tight growing at the base of his stomach.

"What was it you wanted to talk about?" You step into the equipment cupboard, Miguel close behind you. You rub your temples, anticipating an argument. "O'Hara, if this is about my calibration tests this morning, I swear to God -"

"No, no , nothing like that." He's quick to say. "They were… okay." He strains.

You raise an eyebrow. Okay? Since when did Miguel pass up an opportunity for a mindless fight? Your mind races with his actions of the past few days. He has been different since the night at the bar, a little nicer, sure, but nothing this out of the ordinary.

"That guy you were talking to. I saw him at the bar, and now here. Who is he?"

Your eyebrows shoot up. "You do not have the right to ask me th-"

"Are you fucking him?" A pause, and you study his expression, deducing that he is completely fucking serious .

"Are you insane? You definitely don't have the right to ask me that." You make for the door, and he steps in front of it, blocking it with his body.

"I need to know. Tell me and then I'll leave you alone, I promise." His voice is low and thick with something.

You step closer and he wraps his hands around your waist absentmindedly. The pressure feels good, and makes your brain fog up.

He repeats himself, softer. "Are you fucking him?"

You look at him for a moment, before shaking your head. His facial expression is steady, just as unreadable.

"Do you want to?"

You hesitate, wanting to be cruel and say yes, just to see his reaction. Perceptive, he sees your hesitance and says something that almost knocks you over.

"I could fuck you better than he ever could," He kneads your thigh now, lips close to the shell of your ear in the tight space of the cupboard. " Princesa , look at me."

You look at him, almost whimpering and putty in his hands. He's like a siren and you are lost in the pull of his gaze. It may be the proximity, but you swear you see a tinge of red in his eyes, like deep pools of lust.

"Will you let me fuck you?" He pulls you closer so the meat of his thigh presses against your clothed cunt. Your stretchy pencil skirt rides up suggestively, and you rock your clit against him, searching for sweet pressure. You nod.

Miguel titters softly, a hand on your chin pulling your lips to his. You moan into his kiss, body aching. It's hot and heavy like the kiss outside your door, but he swirls his tongue around yours and expertly nips at your lower lip. He guides your hips to rock against his thigh, tensing to make sure it's corded muscle hits the right places. He wants to break you apart, leave you so cock-drunk, you wouldn't think of even glancing at another man.

You separate and he dips a hand under your skirt. He pulls it up and places a big palm at your pussy, with a well timed slap. You bite into his neck with the pressure. You definitely don't expect it when he rips open your stockings like they were paper.

"Fuck, Miguel."

"It's okay, baby, I'll get you new ones." Your eyes roll back as he slips aside the gusset to run a finger through your lower lips. Shamelessly, he slips a finger in, then two, basking in the wet squelch of your heat. You claw at his forearm, as he curls them into that sweet spot.

You press your forehead to his shoulder, chasing his fingers with your hips. His sharp eyes watch every movement, every stutter and start that his fingers pull from you. He's practical, a man of action, and he is desperate to show you how much he cares.

"I've thought about you… about this." He hisses as you cover your mouth to dampen your moans.

"Wanted you for so long, princesa. Want to know how you taste, what this beautiful pussy feels like. What you look like when you cum."

His wrist aches with the back and forth motion but his pace barely faulters.

" M-Miguel …"

He applies pressure to your clit, and watches in awe as you spasm, nails digging into his forearm.

" Oh, there it is. Right there, hmm? Does that feel good?"

You nod frantically with a stifled sob.

"Not quite, baby. Need to hear you say it. Or I won't let you cum."

"...fuuck you."

" Oh, you'd like that. Still not what I want to hear. Tell me how much you like it when I fuck you with my fingers."

"F-Feels good." You stutter. He stops, wrenching his hand out of your pussy to leave you clenching around nothing.You almost scream.

"You're being a brat, not my princesa , hmm? Only good girls get to cum."

" Miguel , please. I'll do anything." He guides you along his thigh, still lodged between your legs, and licks up your wetness on his other hand. "You m-make me feel so good. So good. And I want you so much it hurts, sometimes. I just want to cum, don't even need your cock. Fuck me with something , please."

"Miguel? Not asshole? Or fucking idiot, this time?"

"Please, Miguel ." Your pleas go straight to his cock. He throbs with need, cock rock hard under his slacks.

He relents, not able to bear your dopey puppy-dog eyes for much longer. He slips three fingers in, without bothering to prep you. He hisses at the tightness of your heat, pounding into you and knuckle deep with his fingers. Shamelessly, you fuck yourself back on them, hips rolling over his thigh. He can't tear himself away from the sight, palming himself through tented trousers.

You kiss and nip at his neck, as he whispers obscenities at you under his breath.

"Can you cum for me, princesa? Cum f'me, and I'll take care of you, I promise."

You clamp down on his fingers and moan into a kiss as you ride out your orgasm. It's intense: leg-shaking and leaves you shuddering in the aftermath. You were rusty, sure, hadn't had sex with someone in a while. But Miguel made you cum so hard you saw stars, with only his fingers. Your chest heaves with the thought.

You thought he would leave you, torn stockings and all, in the little cupboard. But he stays, to sink down to his knees and lap at your folds. You rest a hand on a shelf for purchase, head back in bliss. You cunt is still sensitive, throbbing at the orgasm he's just given you, as you licks you clean. He's taking care of you. You card your hands into his hair, tugging gently as he moans into your pussy.

He gives your clit a gentle kiss, and swipes up a trailing tear that rolls down your inner thigh. You watch as he pops his fingers into your mouth, cleaning off the cum. Your cum.

Miguel gives you a lazy grin in the bare bulb of the equipment closet. He seems completely unfazed by the fact his fingers were in you not a moment ago.

"Are you free after work?" He asks, and it takes a moment for you to process.

"Uhhh… s-sure. Probably?"

"Let me take you for dinner, somewhere nice."

All you can do is nod, dumbly, ripped stockings still around your ankles.

"And then I can fuck you properly, princesa."

#across the spiderverse #miguel o'hara #spiderman 2099 #miguel o'hara x reader #miguel o'hara smut #smut #spiderman 2099 x reader #light angst #kat_writes😼#miguel o hara x reader #headcanon #miguel o'hara headcanons #jealousy

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gojonanami · 6 months

Text

JEALOUSY, JEALOUSY.

↳ JJK MEN: HOW THEY FUCK YOU WHEN THEY'RE JEALOUS

↳ feat. satoru gojo, suguru geto, kento nanami, choso kamo, yuta okkotsu

cw: 18+ only, nsfw, overstimulation (f!), dick drunk, orgasm delay (f!), riding, semi-exhibitionism, spanking, teasing, dom! geto, soft dom! nanami, breeding, body worship, pleasure dom! choso, unprotected sex, creampie, marking, oral (f!), fingering (f!), facesitting (f!), marking (f!), geto uses the term "monkeys," degradation (slut) in geto's blurb, ijichi and ino mentioned in gojo's and choso's blurbs respectively, a/n: the only way to read the title is to the tune of olivia rodrigo's song. also its my first time writing yuta - be gentle.

SATORU GOJO | overstimulation, dick drunk, orgasm delay

jealous of laughing at another's joke

"T-Toru, ngh, please, I can't—" and you're only met with a laugh, his lips pressed against your neck, as his cock continued to fuck you.

How many times had you cum? You had lost count. Your cunt was soaked with your release, along with your thighs and his cock, slipping down his skin as he fucked you hard and fast.

He was relentless, maybe limitless, especially today.

"You can handle it, sweetheart, know this little cunt can take it," he's grunting, as his fingers dig into your plush thighs, "haven't broken this pussy yet," and you couldn't bring yourself to be concerned about the "yet" as he brought you to cum yet again, and you were sure if every word hadn't been fucked out of your brain— it had now.

Your eyes were glazed over, fucked out, as you stared up at him, as only pauses a moment, to press your thighs to your chest, "gonna fuck you right, baby, gotta kiss your womb," and you're whining, and he's only pistoning in deeper, "not so funny now huh?" he's hissing as you grow even fuckin' tighter — how was that possible?

"what are you—" and you whine as his tip grazes even deeper, and you're sure he's somehow fucking your stomach now, "are you jealous of Ijichi?"

"Don't say his name," he gives a particularly rough thrust of his hips to punctuate his point, drawing another squeal from your lips, and yet he's the one who brings him up, "fuckin' laughing at his joke like I wasn't even there. He isn't funny. Nowhere as funny as me!" and you're already close again, tears pooling in your eyes, as you stammer.

Was he really that upset because you laughed at an old friend's bad joke?

"Toru, a-are you serious—" and he's slowing down now to a tortuous pace, as you whimper, "baby, he just made a joke, I was being polite," you can't even laugh at how ridiculous it is with how badly you want to cum.

"Only i'm supposed to see that smile, that laugh," and he's teasing you with the tip of his cock now, dragging it in teasing circles around your clit, "you're mine, mine to make smile, make to make laugh, mine to fuck," and he's fucking you again, bottoming out in one thrust, "say it, baby, tell me who you belong to,"

And your back is arching, throat raw as you tell him just how much he owns you, as you orgasm for the nth time, and he's not far behind, his hot release spurting into your needy cunt, as he fucks it only deeper.

"Toru," you moan again, "Toru, fuck," you murmur, fucked dumb by his dick, as you both come down from your highs, "were you really that jealous of—"

And he only pouts, pressing his lips to yours again, "Don't say his name," and he's pressing needy kisses to your neck, as he pulls out, your mixed cum leaking out, before he's slipping two fingers in, pulling another moan from your lips, "by the time I'm done with you, you won't even remember his name."

SUGURU GETO | riding, semi-exhibitionism, dom!geto, spanking, degradation (slut)

jealous of you talking about someone else

"Princess, you can do better than that," Suguru is clicking his tongue, as you split yourself open on his cock, warm walls squeezing all too deliciously around his already drenched dick, as only whines and pants left your kiss ruined lips, "gonna have to be quieter than that if you don't want someone else to hear—"

He had you riding him in a side room of a temple he used often to collect money, some his other followers congregated in the room over to hear him "preach of the new world." Bullshit that he fed to monkeys that made them full and happy and complacent -- but right now, he had something else that was making you feel so full.

"C'mon baby, ride me like you mean it," he coos, and his hand is coming down on your ass with a mean spank to your already sore ass, heat blooming from the impact, "you certainly had plenty of effort when you were sweet-talking those damn monkeys, didn't you?"

"Sugu, I was just trying to help," you whine, as his hips snap against yours, making you squeal, as he finds his way even deeper into your already fucked out cunt, "I just was--"

"You were flirting," he hisses, as his hands find their way to your hips, forcing you to meet his upward thrusts, as your hands cover your mouth to muffle your moans, "you love this, love it when I fuck you like this, think you want them to see you like this, grinding on my cock like a slut," you whine, but his words only makes your sweet cunt give a telltale clench around his dick, "that's it — you can lie, but your princess cunt can't, baby,"

"Sugu, please 'm close—can't—" and his hands are pulling back, letting you do all the work, and you do, fucking yourself stupid on his cock, the wet squelch of your pussy ringing in your ears — so loud, you can't understand why someone hasn't burst into the room yet— but you can't bring yourself to care, when you're so fuckin' close to cumming.

"That's it, fuck, s'good for me," and he's pulling your hands away from your mouth, letting your moans resonate and fill the room, as he watches a white ring of your cum form around the base of his cock, as he grunts, dick twitching as your walls cream around his cock, "now moan my name as you cum so these goddamn monkeys know whose cock you're bouncing on."

KENTO NANAMI | soft!dom, breeding, hair pulling

jealous of running into an ex

"Did he ever make you feel this good?" Kento's question murmured against your neck, as he presses soft kisses to your neck, dragging his leaking tip against your aching cunt, "did he love you like I did?" And his fingers sneak under your head, making your neck arch as he tugged your hair.

"N-no, Kento, he didn't—"

"He certainly acted as if we were the same," he scoffed at the thought of your ex, the one you had dated before Kento, who had the audacity to approach the two of you today. Catching up with you and even touching your arm, as if your husband wasn't there, even ignoring him, until you introduced him. They had shook hands, and you knew Kento had squeezed his hand a little too hard, but now those same hands were gripping you softly — but firmly.

"He's nothing compared to you you're everything to me," and he's rewarding you with sinking his tip into your needy pussy, "ah, Kento, please stop teasing me," you whine, a noise leaving your throat that you didn't even know you could make.

"You're practically sucking me in, but did you do the same for that bastard?" he's dragging his cock up and down, driving you insane with how your walls squeezed, trying to pull him in, but he resisted every tempting contraction of your sweet cunt, "did you take him this well?" and his teeth graze against the soft skin of your neck, "did he make you beg for him?"

"Only you make me feel this good, only you, Kento, only you make me this needy, make this pussy so—" and he's sinking into you, slowly, torturously, but pleasurably — inch by inch, until he's bottoming out, but he doesn't move, not at first, "please, Kento, please—move—"

And he obliges you, thrusting into you, fucking you in earnest, his cock dragging against your walls with each snap of his hips agianst yours, "such a needy baby," he grunts, "your cunt is trying to hold onto me even as I pull out — is that how much you want my cock? Want me to fill you?"

You're nodding, moaning his name, as you meet his lips in messy kiss, all tongue and teeth, as he fucks you harder, "Look at me, baby," he orders, and your eyes flutter open, meeting his lust clouded gaze, making you all the more sensitive to his touch, "want you to watch me as I breed you," and you're groaning, pussy twitching at the thought, "how're you even tighter?" he grunts, "want me to breed you, don't you? Want me to fill you with my cum? Make you full with my children," and your head is thrown back, voice raw as you can only groan his name again and again.

"Kento, mmph, 'm s'close, can't,"

"Cum for me, baby, let me fill you," he's finding your lips in another sloppy kiss as you cum, hard, walls gripping him as he fucked you through your orgasm. And he's cumming too right behind you, filling your womb with his hot release, "good girl," he murmurs, pressing sweet kisses to your chest, "but if you think I'm done, we're far from finished," and he's pulling out slowly, before gathering his cum that leaked out on his fingers before slipping it back into your still sensitive cunt, "we're not going to be getting much sleep tonight, love."

CHOSO KAMO | body worship, pleasure dom, oral(f), squirting, implied oral (m!)

jealous of a fellow sorcerer flirting

"Cho-so! Nugh, please—" your fingers buried in his black locks, hair ties long since come loose from your tugging — and you're not even sure if you want to pull him closer, or push him away, "i can't—"

"I know you have more in you, my love," he's only murmuring against your sweet cunt, tongue flicking against your swollen clit, "need to feel you flood my mouth, need to taste every inch of you,” he’s re-doubling his efforts, his hot tongue dragging your gummy walls, making good on his promise, “sweetest thing I’ve ever tasted — how are you this perfect? How do I deserve you?” You look at him, nestled between your thighs, his lips and chin glossy with your release, tongue darting out to lick your pre from his lips.

“Choso, y-you do, I love you, only you,” and he’s peering up at you with a lidded gaze — but you see something else besides lust — insecurity lined his furrowed brow, and then it clicks, “you know that Ino was just being friend—"

But he’s burying his face back, fucking your cunt his his tongue, as his thumb teases your needy clit, your words falling away to pleasure.

“It wasn’t just friendly. He wants you. I know the lustful gaze of a man, especially one who wants what I have,” he mutters, as his teeth graze your inner thigh, drawing a gasp from your lips, “but how do I have the right to you? Half curse, half human — what am I really to have the right to be with you?” And then he bites your thigh, pulling a loud moan from your lips, “but I can’t help but want you.”

“I love you, only you, I don’t care what you are. I love everything about you because you’re mine. My Choso,” you manage between pants, as your fingers tug his hair to force him to meet your gaze — make him see the state he’s left you in — utterly fucked out with your chest rising and falling, your eyes glazed over with lust, “please, I need you—"

And that’s all he needs to redouble his errors, rubbing himself on the mattress below him, certainly soaking through his boxers and the sheets.

“Mmph, Choso, please, I’m—“ and his lips latch around your clit, sucking hard, until you squirt on his face, and he’s eagerly lapping up your release, as you moan his name. He’s slurping and swallowing your cum with lips quirked in a smile, his groans and grunts only making your cunt flutter around his tongue.

And he’s pulling away finally, an unspoken question on his lips whether he did well, and your only response is to pull him into a kiss, tasting yourself on his lips, before flipping him over. You kiss your way down his body, as you tug his boxers down to free his erection, tongue grazing the underside, making him groan.

You grin, “My turn.”

YUTA OKKOTSU | fingering (f!), marking, face sitting

jealous of an ex you just broke up with

“Yuta, please—" the last word comes out a squeal, as his calloused fingers tease the crotch of your shorts, a warm heat settling over your skin all at once but all too slowly — like the start of a wildfire.

"I told you I'd help you forget about him," he murmurs, his long and lithe fingers all too skilled, as they snap the waistband of your shorts against your skin, "he never deserved you - you're special, especially to me," and he's pulling down your shorts, until you're kicking them away at your feet.

And this fire had spread far too fast — especially with his fingers teasing your folds through your soaked panties.

“Still thinking about him?” Yuta asks softly, his words soft but not the intent, and he only sighs at your whine, "I'll have to do better for you then," and his fingers slip past your ruined underwear as they tug the fabric down your thighs, making butterflies bloom in your stomach before they surely burst into flames from the fire Yuta is brewing, as two fingers part your dripping folds, "already so wet? I've barely started,"

"Yuta," and he's pausing, as you try to form a sentence, but only comes out as a single word, "more," and his lips quirk into a smile.

"Of course," and he's fucking you open nice and slow, your pre slipping down his fingers onto your hardwood living room floor, "i've been wanting to do this for so long — has your ex ever done this for you?" and you only swallow, whining when he stops, only continuing when you shake your head, "you deserve so much, you deserve the world," and a third finger sinks into you, making you cry out his name, "that's it, love, let me make you feel good."

"Yuta, please," you moan, as his fingers drag against your needy cunt, as he noses the nape of your neck, placing wet kisses along your neck, before his teeth graze your sensitive skin, sucking and licking marks that surely will dot your skin the next day, "ah—"

"Mine," he murmurs, and that makes your cunt twitch around his fingers — god you were so close, so close—and that's right when he's pulling his fingers out.

"Yut—" and he's licking your release from his fingers, before he's tugging you into a bruising kiss, sticking his tongue out to meet yours in a messy kiss, before he's pulling you on top of him, wet cunt pressed against his chest, "what are you--"

"Sit on my face," he says, his pupils nearly completely dark as he meets your gaze, "i want to show you what you've been missing -- how you deserve to be treated," and the blood rushes to your face, as your head shakes no, but he can feel your pussy say yes -- walls squeezing around nothing, "please,"

"Yuta, you don't have to—" but he's unwavering in his gaze, "what if I crush you?"

"It wouldn't be the worst way to go — you know I did have a secret execution scheduled before," and you smack him, but he only catches you by the wrist and kisses each finger, licking your fingertips, sending heat right to your cunt, "let me make you feel good — better than he ever has," and now you realize what it is — it's jealousy.

So you settle above his face, your cheeks burning as you feel his breath warm your aching pussy, "don't worry," and he's helping you ease yourself onto his lips, and right before his tongue drags slowly along the length of your sopping cunt, "you won't remember your name, much less his, after this."

a/n: i just realized i used a similar line in gojo's and yuta's, but y'know what, like teacher like student. what was this? who knows? will i do something like this again? maybe.

#sab [mlist]#satoru gojo x reader #geto suguru x reader #nanami kento x reader #choso kamo x reader #yuta okkotsu x reader #satoru gojo smut #suguru geto x reader #nanami kento smut #choso kamo smut #yuta okkotsu smut #jjk smut #jujutsu kaisen smut

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peachdues · 3 months

Text

THE GREAT WAR

PART I ♤ SECRET PREGNANCY AU

A/N: After seven months, it's finally here. Part I of Giyuu's Bundle of Joy. This fic involved a ton of research and tears. I hope you all enjoy. Special shout-out to @squishybabei @kentohours @homo-homini-lupus-est-1701 @ghost-1-y and @xxsabitoxx for letting me bombard your DMs with endless snippets from this fic for feedback. Note that this is a multi-part fic, and it will be a non-linear story.

CW: explicit sexual content ☼ MDNI ☼ loss of virginity ☼ unprotected sex ☼ protective/possessive Giyuu ☼ canon-typical violence

LISTEN TO THE PLAYLIST HERE

January, 1915

The moon’s rays filtered through the sparse canopy of the trees from above, bathing that small portion of the forest in its silvery glow. There, about twenty paces ahead, Giyuu locked eyes on his target.

A demon; one he’d been pursuing through the dense forest separating his Manor from the base of a great mountain for the last several miles

The demon had yet to notice him, for it was focused entirely on its own prey — a human woman, who was frantically zigzagging as she ran in a desperate effort to evade its clutches.

She was succeeding rather well in her endeavor, managing to dart out of the beast’s reach right as it snapped its sharp, deadly claws at her back. But the girl then miscalculated her movements and stumbled over something — whether it was a tree root or her own feet, he could not say — and she went airborne. For one, sickening moment, Giyuu feared he would not be fast enough to save her from falling victim to the demon he was readying to kill.

The girl squealed as she fell, just narrowly managing to avoid the swipe of the beast’s claws as they cut uselessly at the air where her back had been only seconds before. Something long and wooden flew from her hand as she sprawled across the forest floor – a broom.

Odd.

Steps quick and even, Giyuu’s thumb flicked his sword free from its scabbard. Within seconds of him drawing his weapon, the Slayer’s blade sliced seamlessly through the demon’s neck, its head thudding pathetically to the forest floor before the beast could comprehend the threat.

He landed swiftly on the balls of his feet, the Water Pillar quickly shaking his blade free of the demon’s blackened, rotted blood before sheathing it at his hip. A quick job – that was how he liked it; free of fuss.

Behind him, he heard the leaves coating the frozen ground of the forest shift and crack as the human girl he’d rescued rose to her feet. He grimaced; while helping rid the world of the blight inflicted upon it by demons was his life’s sole and true purpose, and one he fulfilled without hesitation, he was little more than a fish out of water when it came to talking to those he helped.

The girl had yet to flee; Giyuu suspected she might be in shock, if not a bit simple, and he sought to prod her along. After all, the sooner she left the forest, the less likely she’d end up a demon’s meal and waste his efforts in preserving her life.

“You should be fine now. Please return to your ho-,” The dark-haired Slayer’s words were cut off with a sputter as the head of the woman’s broom whacked him sharply up the side of his skull.

Giyuu stood there for a moment, dazed and slightly confused as he turned towards the woman whose life he’d just preserved.

The Water Pillar had not paid her much mind upon discovering her seconds away from becoming the slain horned demon’s newest meal, his attention having been entirely focused on eliminating his target. But now, without the distracting threat of a man-eating beast, he could see she was clad in the traditional attire worn by Shinto priestesses, though she looked far too young to have achieved such a status. Instead, she appeared to be much closer to himself in age. The front of her red hakama pants were streaked in mud and dirt from her fall, and several strands of hair had fallen loose from where they’d been gathered in a ribbon just below her shoulders.

And she was glaring at him.

“What are you?” She demanded, and the Water Pillar noted the faint tremor in her voice that she worked to conceal behind her defensive stance, her broom braced in front of her like a blade.

A slow blink. “I am Tomioka.”

It baffled him that he let his name slide so freely when he’d never been one particularly keen on sharing it. Yet, he’d thought that perhaps the exchange of names would get the wild woman before him to calm, and perhaps lower the sweeping tool —-

“What the hell is a Tomioka?”

Giyuu wondered whether the — Miko, that was what young priestesses in training were called — had hit her head in the fall. “My name.”

A faint dusting of red spread across the Miko’s cheeks as she realized the absurdity of her mistake, though she still did not lower her weapon. Rather, she jutted it towards him in what Giyuu thought may have been an attempt to be threatening.

“And what was that thing just now, Tomioka? And what are you?” Quickly, her eyes swept behind him, scanning. “Are there more?”

Idly, Giyuu wondered why he was bothering to indulge in such a silly conversation to begin with, chalking it up to the mere fact that they were still in a dark forest, with dawn still several hours away.

The foolish girl would end up a snack for another demon if she did not turn around and go home.

“It was a demon. I’d been tracking it for several miles when it stumbled across you. You can count yourself lucky — do not hit me again.” He cut off with a warning, eyes narrowing as the Miko drew the broom back up over her head.

There was a tense moment as the two regarded one another, Giyuu’s eyes locked on the Miko’s trembling arm as she stared distrustfully back at him.

The girl’s hands twitched as the broom cleaved through the air once more, but Giyuu knocked it easily away, sending the cleaning tool flying uselessly to the side where it rolled under a bush.

“Are you finished?” Giyuu asked, irritation creeping into his tone as he stared coolly at the flustered Miko.

“You’ve stripped me of my only weapon, so I suppose I have no choice,” the young woman sniffed, her tone as frosty as his glare.

Giyuu grimaced. “You would not have lost the privilege had you simply done as I asked.”

The Miko folded her arms stubbornly across her chest and glowered at him. “You would truly leave a woman defenseless in the woods? With nothing to protect herself?”

Giyuu scoffed. “You are not a woman; you are a menace.”

The young woman’s mouth opened and closed several times as her face flushed several shades deeper. “Y-you!”

A crack! somewhere in the woods made the sputtering Miko fall silent with a small squeak, and Giyuu was bemused to find that the woman’s hands shot to him for safety, when only moments before she’d tried to clobber him away from her.

“You said that…that thing earlier was a demon, yes?” She whispered and Giyuu nodded, tense as his eyes swept through the shadowy line of the trees, searching.

“Do you think there are more?”

“So long as we continue sitting here like a pair of lame ducks, more are bound to come sniffing.” The wary Pillar replied. “Which is why I suggest you return home — without bludgeoning me further.”

The young Priestess continued to cling to his arm, her eyes wide and anxious. Giyuu cleared this throat, and when the woman’s attention snapped back to him, he pointedly glanced down at her white-knuckled grip on the sleeve of his haori.

“Apologies,” the Miko blushed, and her hands quickly relinquished their hold on his sleeve. She wrung her hands nervously before her. “Might you escort me back to my Shrine? It’s not far from here – less than two kilometers.”

Still within his territory — albeit at the opposite end of the forest where is own Manor stood. He grimaced, but nodded stiffly. His efforts to save the woman’s life would be in vain if she walked away from him and straight into the waiting, eager claws of another beast that lurked in the shadows.

The Miko smiled brightly at him and offered her name. Giyuu elected not to reply, and the girl settled into step at his side, a small frown pulling at her lips.

“I’m sorry for earlier — for hitting you with my broom.” The girl — Y/N — said a short while later, the faintest trace of shyness in her tone.

Giyuu did not think the apology warranted a response, and so he gave none, but the chatty little devil prodded him once more.

“Did I injure you?” She gestured to the side of his head where her broom had caught him.

Giyuu snorted, raising an eyebrow at her. “The day I am hurt by a mere broom is the day I retire from the Demon Slayer Corps.”

Y/N hummed in contemplation. “And what exactly is the great and mysterious Demon Slayer Corps?”

The Water Pillar’s eyes remained forward. “I should think the name is self-explanatory. There are demons who eat humans. We slay them.”

Inwardly, Giyuu cringed at the harshness of his words. It did not happen often, but there were times when he wished he was better with them, when he wished he did not come off quite as aloof and callous —

“You do not know how to talk to people very well, do you Tomioka-sama?” Y/N’s tone was not judgmental; it rather had a mild curiosity to it, as though she were merely commenting on the weather or the quality of a cup of tea.

But the Water Pillar did not know how to answer her. Kocho once told him that others disliked him, but Giyuu wasn’t sure that was entirely true; after all, no one had ever said so much to his face.

Then again, if the young shrine maiden’s words were anything to go by, then perhaps the Insect Pillar’s scathing assessment hadn’t been too far off the mark.

“What even brought you into the forest so late at night?” Giyuu did not know why the question needled at him, but he found the pressing silence of the trees more disconcerting than the Miko’s voice, and so he was desperate for the distraction. “And why a broom?”

Y/N herself seemed surprised at his sudden interest. “Night-blooming herbs,” she said plainly, as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. “They are critical for certain rites and medications. And I cannot collect them any other time. The broom was for protection, obviously.”

“I wasn’t aware shrines still performed rituals,” Giyuu pushed an errant tree branch out of their way, and ahead, faint lights began to swim into view. The Shrine. “Are you not a mere relic of a time long since-passed?”

“I’ll have you know that we still perform basic cleansing rites for those in the village,” Y/N bristled. “And we provide medical aid, since there is no hospital nearby.”

She shot him a cold look. “Modern medicine would not have developed but for ancient practices such as ours.”

Giyuu frowned. He hadn’t meant to insult the woman. “Be that as it may,” he said flatly. “Demons prowl at night. You wandering into the forest none the wiser is akin to you waltzing into their territory with a giant sign that says ‘Eat me.’”

Y/N grimaced. “Then what would you have me do? Neglect my duties?”

He could sympathize with that. “No, I’m not saying you should forsake your obligations,” he furrowed his eyebrows at the thought. “Perhaps it is simply a risk you must take. But you should at least be aware of your surroundings.”

Y/N looked upon him with a miserable expression. “You’re of little help, you know that?”

Giyuu only frowned, perplexed as to why she couldn’t understand the import of his words.

An awkward silence ensued, punctured only by the faint hoot of an owl. For that, the established swordsman was grateful; noise meant the absence of predators, which meant they were safe – for now.

“You mentioned tracking the demon earlier – how long had you been doing so?”

“A while.”

The girl was relentless. “And you just so happened to track it here? Where it was conveniently chasing me?”

“I patrol this region. Your rescue was nothing more than coincidence and luck on your part.”

“My gratitude is endless,” the shrine maiden said drily. “Forgive me for not falling to the ground in prostration.”

At that, Giyuu fell silent and refused to engage in any further conversation. The shrine maiden, for her part, seemed to take his cue that he had no interest in her or exchanging meaningless pleasantries, and so she too, went quiet.

The forest floor eventually began to slope gradually up, and before long, Giyuu found himself walking along a carved rock path that curved through the trees until it widened at a great set of stone stairs. At the very top of the steep incline, he could spot a great Torii gate.

Y/N turned to him with a beaming smile. “Allow me to introduce you to the Shrine." Tomioka opened his mouth to protest, but she quickly added, “You should at least know who it is you have dedicated your life to protecting.”

“I’d rather not.”

But she was already leading him up the stairs, his wrist pinched delicately between two of her fingers. Realistically, Giyuu knew it would take him no effort to shake the woman’s hold and disappear into the night. But to his own bemusement, he allowed her to tote him behind her as though he were little more than a useless pet.

The pair passed under the Torrii and into a sprawling courtyard. Though night sky was a deep, inky black, the perimeter of the courtyard was dotted with several stone lanterns -- toro -- each of which had been lit with a generous flame. Giyuu's quick perusal of the Shrine, however, was cut short as the Miko led him into the Shrine's main structure -- the honden -- and tugged him down a narrow hallway. Based on his rough appraisal of the building, Giyuu surmised she was taking him to the center of the honden, likely where the girl's master was.

His theory was proven correct when Y/N drew up to a great slat of shoji panneling. The Miko knocked softly on one of the wooden beams before she slid the door aside, revealing a great, open room that was littered with scrolls, half-dried pots of ink, and burned incense sticks. There, in the center of the room, knelt the head Priestess of the Shrine. She was an old, shriveled, wrinkled thing. The white hair that she’d gathered into a knot at her neck was as wispy as the thinnest clouds, and a quick glance over her hands revealed swollen joints covered by skin spotted with age.

But the Priestess did not appear to be a gentle elder by any means; her thin mouth was curled down into a sneer that was directed at the Miko at his side, and her eyes were hard and cold.

"Head Priestess," Y/N bowed to her elder. "This man is called Tomioka, and he helped save me tonight in the forest."

Giyuu resisted the urge to snort. Helped, indeed.

The old woman's eyes shone bright with an emotion he could not name as the Miko continued. "A creature attacked me as I was returning home. Tomioka says he is a swordsman whose occupation --"

“I know what he is, girl,” the Priestess snapped at her student before she turned those beady eyes to him. “A member of the Demon Slayer Corps will always be welcome at this Shrine – particularly one as esteemed as yourself.”

The Water Pillar straightened at the old woman’s casual mention of the Corps. “I was not aware that of any Shrines so affiliated with the Corps.”

“There was a time when the Demon Slayer Corps would partner with shrines such as this to carry out its mission,” the Priestess replied evenly. From his periphery, Giyuu spotted Y/N’s head snap toward her mentor, her jaw slack. “Once, priestesses were akin to shamans who offered a variety of rituals for cleansing and protection. You slayers relied on our connection with our communities to operate more effectively, and we in turn, counted on your protection to fight what we could not.”

Despite the distinct scent of sake that clung to the elderly shrine keeper like a cloud, her eyes remained sharp and fixed upon him, and her wrinkled mouth pulled into a rueful smile. “Now, it seems, our wise and benevolent government has forced us both to retreat to the shadows to operate in secret.”

She bowed her head. “You have nothing but my respect, Lord Hashira. You are always welcome here.”

Giyuu did not respond, but he inclined his head toward the Priestess in polite acknowledgement.

Y/N gaped at her Master. "Lord --?"

The old woman poured another generous serving of sake and brought the choko to her lips. “Though we are honored by your visit, young Lord, I’m afraid your presence is nothing more than a calculated effort by this one,” she nodded pointedly at the young shrine maiden at his side, whose cheeks pinkened. “To keep herself out of trouble. My apprentice was not permitted to leave the grounds, you see.”

“Oh hush you old drunk,” Giyuu’s eyes snapped to the irate Miko in surprise. “I told you earlier I was going to the village market –”

“Telling me while I am in the middle of lessons with the younger girls and sprinting off before I can respond is hardly me giving you permission,” the Priestess’s mouth curled into a sneer. “You’ve defied me for the last time, girl.”

The old Priestess turned away from her apprentice, dismissive. “You will take the rice bundles and hang them in the drying shed – every last one, for the next three days.”

“You hag!” Y/N fumed, her face pinched in outrage. “I was on rice duty all last week without an ounce of assistance –”

“And you apparently have yet to learn your lesson,” the old woman retorted bitterly, shooting the seething Shrine Maiden a withering glare. “Considering you still think it seemly to mouth off at any and every opportunity –”

The Miko spat a curse at the elder Priestess so filthy and colorful that even Giyuu could not mask his surprise, raising his eyebrow. But if Y/N’s outburst shocked the Shrine’s head, the old woman gave no sign. Instead, she only glowered at the young woman as the latter turned and shoved the shoji door harshly to the side. Giyuu, ever the unwilling observer, was left to be pulled by his wrist back into the hall behind the young Miko before she whipped around to face her senior once more.

Giyuu had thought himself stunned by the crassness of the Shrine Miaden’s language before, but nothing prepared him for the sight of the obscene gesture she made at the old woman before she slammed the door firmly shut.

A telling crash on the other side of the wall signaled the Elder Priestess had hurled her empty sake dish at the door with all her might. “And work on your aim!” Y/N snapped before turning sharply on her heel to stomp out of the honden, tugging the Water Pillar helplessly behind her.

“She seems unstable.” said Giyuu once they were a safe distance away from the main Honden.

Y/N brushed aside his concern with a flippant waive of her hand. “Granny is harmless. As her charge, I suppose I instigate her nearly as much as she torments me.”

Granny. It made sense, then, the curious affection the girl held for the rancorous head Priestess, even if he could not bring himself to fully understand it.

“You are more than welcome to stay the night,” the Miko’s mood lightened considerably the more she put distance between herself and the drunken head Priestess. “We serve breakfast at sunrise, but of course, you’re not obligated to attend.”

The ravenette’s mouth quirked down in a faint grimace, the only sign of his discomfort. “I should return to my own home.”

“It’s quite late,” Y/N glanced up at the night sky, now awash with stars that surrounded the fat, glowing moon like thousands of glittering jewels. She turned back to him with a radiant grin. “At least allow me to show you around.”

—

If anyone had asked him, Giyuu Tomioka would not have been able to explain the series of events that had led him here.

He distinctly remembered telling the vexatious young Shrine Maiden no, that he could not stay the night, yet somehow he’d found himself in the Shrine’s old, musty guest house, already prepared for his stay, a lantern flickering merrily in the corner.

He glanced warily at the fresh sleeping kimono folded beside his futon. The possibility of him actually sleeping in such an unfamiliar place was nil and while the Water Pillar certainly had no issue in appearing impolite to others, he thought that perhaps the Shrine was affiliated with the connection of Wisteria Houses dotted throughout the land, and he didn’t want to risk offending the head Priestess and cause her to shut her gates to other slayers in need of lodging.

So, Giyuu paced the floor of the small guest house, restless. Though his eyes remained carefully trained on the window of his room, waiting for the slightest hint of movement that would give him an excuse to leave without offending his hosts, no sign of either his crow or any demonic threat manifested. Though, he supposed with a frown, it shouldn’t surprise him that he’d not heard from Kanzaburo; the ancient bird was likely flitting about the forest, lost.

He continued to pace until finally, the sky in the East began to lighten signaling that dawn was fast approaching. Stealthily, he slipped out of the small hut that had served as his temporary accommodations and made his way toward the Torii under which he and that Miko — Y/N — had passed upon their arrival.

He’d almost cleared the gate when he saw the elder Priestess standing beside the Torii, apparently waiting for him. Giyuu nodded his head at her, the only expression of courtesy he was willing to give, but he was halted as the old woman flung out a single arm in front of him, her hand flat and palm turned up, waiting.

And that was how Giyuu learned the Shrine was not, in fact, a Wisteria House; not as he was forced to fork over a considerable sum of his earnings into the Priestess’s expectant hand.

Wisteria Houses meant Corps Members stayed free of charge; the price the Shrine’s keeper demanded in exchange for his brief stay bordered extortion.

At least he’d had the money; if he’d been of any lower rank, the old woman would have cleaned him out.

He scowled as he departed but his irritation quickly fell away as he finally laid eyes on Kanzaburo, who nearly collided with his Master’s head as he struggled to pant out his orders.

And so, as the Water Pillar trekked through the forest and toward his new assignment, the view of the Shrine faded behind the dense canopy of the mountain forest, and so too, did any final, sparing thoughts of it, or its inhabitants.

———-

Nearly a month passed since Giyuu stumbled across the strange shrine maiden in the forest separating his Estate from the old Shrine, and the Miko had nearly faded from his memory. Not that such a feat was difficult; the raven-haired Pillar’s mind was far more occupied with tasks like patrol and chasing down leads that could potentially lead the Corps to an Upper Rank demon to focus on much else.

He’d intended only to find a decent meal and then depart the village before nightfall to investigate rumors of women disappearing in a small town to the south. Night was rapidly approaching, however, and he’d yet to find any vendor that sold anything he liked, much to his chagrin. He was about to cut his losses and continue on, when he spied a familiar blur of white and red idly perusing one of the stalls, apparently oblivious to the impending sunset.

Without thought, his feet carried him toward her, his annoyance sparking to life.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

The Miko’s – Y/N’s – head turned back and her eyes widened in surprise at the sight of the Pillar standing behind her.

“Tomioka-sama,” she greeted with a polite bow. “I did not expect to see you so soon.”

He ignored her greeting, choosing instead to take a step closer. “I asked what you were doing.”

If she was taken aback by his terseness, she didn’t show it. “I am returning to my shrine after an afternoon of errands,” she replied smoothly. “As is usual for me.”

“It is nearly dark.”

“An astute observation,” and to his annoyance, he saw an amused twinkle in her eye. “Do you also know that tonight is also a full moon?”

Said moon had already made an appearance above them, growing brighter and brighter as the sky faded from twilight to night.

Giyuu had never been one for rolling his eyes, but the young woman’s knowing smirk grated at something inside him, made him feel as he often did whenever Kocho would make a sly comment with that smile of hers, that for some reason made him feel like he was the butt of some joke only she knew.

He grimaced. Teasing; that’s what the shrine maiden was doing. She was teasing him.

“It is nearly dark,” he repeated. “And I did not think you’d be naive enough to risk traveling after sunset.”

“I believe it was you who insisted I did not have to ignore my duties, so long as I paid attention to my surroundings.” She replied coolly. “So that is exactly what I am doing.”

He resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Fine. If the stubborn girl wanted to be bait for whatever awaited her in the forest once the sun finally set, then that was her choice. He’d saved her once, and he’d given her sufficient warning; what she did from then on did not concern him.

He was about to bade her farewell when a slurred, boisterous voice boomed her name from across the market. Several heads turned toward the source, including Giyuu's, until he found a round faced, piggish man stumbling away from a sake stand, his cheeks flushed a bright red.

The man repeated the Miko's name in that grating, sing-song voice of his. "Whe're you goin' all by yourself so late?"

He didn't know what possessed him to ask, but Tomioka turned to the shrine maiden. "A friend?"

“His name is Susumo,” she said airily, though she could not conceal her scowl as the man drew closer. “He’s merely the village drunk who forgets to keep his hands to himself.”

The shrine maiden’s eyes narrowed accusingly at the villager, and the Miko remarked, in a raised voice, “And he is not welcome at the Shrine, though he pretends to forget otherwise.”

Susumo only held his hands up, as though in surrender. “You can’t blame a man for wanting to know what lies under all those layers,” and as if the implication of his lechery wasn’t clear enough, he gave the Miko a leering once-over. “Can’t say I was disappointed.”

“But your friend is right,” he slurred, a smirk forming on his lips. “The dark is too dangerous for a pretty thing like you to risk walking back alone —“

“I shall escort her,” Tomioka said abruptly and she whipped back to him, her mouth falling open. “After all, I’m welcome at the Shrine.”

Susumo, too, gaped at the Swordsman. The Miko recovered quickly however, unwilling to allow the opportunity to pass or for the Slayer to suddenly come to his senses and realize he’d rather leave her to fend for herself in the forest.

“You have my gratitude, Tomioka-sama,” and she gave him a small bow of her head. Relieved, she flipped her braid over her shoulder and smiled warmly up at her raven-haired companion. “Shall we?”

She did not wait for Tomioka to answer, nor did she give any further acknowledgment to Susumo, who only continued to stare at the Hashira, his face bright red. With a feigned indifference, she breezed past him, but a sudden yelp from behind caused her to snap back in alarm.

The first thing she noticed was the proximity of the back of a dual-patterned haori as it stood between her and the village drunkard. The Water Pillar’s shroud nearly brushed the tip of her nose, forcing her to step back. Cautiously, she peered around Tomioka’s rigid form, and her eyes widened at the sight before her.

Susumo, it appeared, had tried to grab her, only to be cut off by the Water Pillar himself, who snatched him by his wrist. Though it did not appear that Tomioka was using a great deal of effort to restrain him, it was clear Susumo was struggling — greatly so — against the ferocity of the Slayer’s hold, given how a vein bulged in his forehead, his face, rapidly turning purple.

Her gaze flicked to the Swordsman’s hand, and she felt herself blanch at the odd angle of Susumo’s wrist.

She was no doctor, but she knew wrists weren’t meant to twist as his did in Tomioka’s crushing grip.

“Leave.” the Water Pillar ordered coldly, and there was a darkness in his eyes that matched the brutality of his hold. “Your presence is unnecessary and unwanted.”

“Y-you! Susumo sputtered.

But Tomioka’s grip only tightened. “Now.”

And then he released him, Susumo half-stumbling back from the Swordsman. His eyes were wide with both fear and loathing, and he muttered incoherently under his breath as he massaged his rapidly-swelling wrist.

The Water Pillar, however, did not pay any more attention to the red-faced villager. He turned only to the shrine maiden, who remained frozen in place, her eyes wide. "Shall we?"

Numbly, Y/N nodded and the two set off down the path that led back to the Shrine. Dimly, the Miko noted that the Slayer kept noticeably close to her as they walked, as though he was unwilling to let her wander too far away. The air between them as they traveled was thick and tense. She was on edge enough thanks to Susumo and his oily words, and she was desperate to do anything to distract herself from the buzzing mounting under her skin.

She cast a sly, sidelong glance at the Swordsman walking at her side. He’d not been receptive to her small-talk the last time he’d escorted her back to her Shrine, but saying something — anything — would be better than this stifling quiet threatening to choke her.

“How old are you?” Before the Swordsman could decide whether to answer, she continued on. “If I had to guess, I would suspect you’re around my age, and I just passed my nineteenth birthday.”

She hummed aloud. “You seem quite young, yet you’ve achieved some level of status as a swordsman, according to Granny.” Her eyes fell to the blade secured at his hip before she lifted them back to his profile. “Yet you’re as withdrawn and taciturn as an old man.”

Her words, thankfully, seemed to irritate him into responding. “Are you always so forthright?”

The Miko grinned. “Perhaps I am like you, Lord – what was it? Hashiba?”

“Hashira.”

“Yes, that. Perhaps I am like you, Lord Hashira – utterly lacking in social ability.” There was a mischievous twinkle in her eye as she brushed her shoulder against his bicep. “But at least I make up for it by talking.”

“Talking is a distraction,” Tomioka monotoned, his eyes fixed resolutely on the hidden path of the forest before them. “It only serves as an interference to one’s duties.” He looked pointedly at the Miko’s profile, but inexplicably found himself unable to look away. “Or an excuse to ignore them.”

But she was unflappable. “And yet you are the one who decided to escort me all the way back to my Shrine – so who is the one ignoring their duties, Tomioka-sama?”

“I think you enjoy diverting my attention,” the Water Pillar retorted, though Y/N could see the rising annoyance in his eyes.

She felt his gaze bear into her as she flipped her loose hair behind her shoulder. “It’s not possible to distract someone unless they find the diversion in question captivating, Tomioka-sama.”

The Water Pillar almost looked amused. “And you are certainly that, Y/N.”

The Miko ducked her head to avoid that piercing gaze, so that the ravenette would not see the faint rosy blush creeping across her cheeks. “I did not think you had the constitution for teasing, Lord Hashira.”

Tomioka looked at her fully then, a frown tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I do not jest.” He hesitated for a moment, eyebrows furrowed as he scrutinized her. “Nor do I lie.”

Y/N’s lips parted. There was something about the way the Swordsman beheld her that made her stomach flutter. In her last encounter with the enigmatic Slayer, she’d been so rattled by her close encounter with the demon, that she hadn’t truly noticed much about the man who’d saved her life, apart from his bland detachment and rather unfortunate social skills.

But now, the Miko was struck by how handsome the raven-haired Hashira was; she was mesmerized by the deep azure of his eyes, as vast and deep as the sea. His skin was a delicate alabaster, and, contrasted with the flesh of his hands which were calloused and scarred, his face had not a blemish in sight.

She blinked, clearing away some of the fog that had crept into her mind, put there by the vexatious Slayer. “I must return to my duties,” she said softly.

They spent the remainder of their journey back to the Shrine in silence. She was quick to break away from him the moment they passed under the Torii, though not before she muttered that he was welcome to stay, should he so choose.

She busied herself with her duties, but even the neediest obligations could not fully distract her from feeling the burning heat of his stare as the Water Pillar’s watched her fiercely from across the courtyard. And nothing, nothing at all could have prepared her for how he eventually joined her in carrying out her duties,

The Water Pillar stayed the night once more, departing sharply at daybreak. Later, as Y/N swept the courtyard free of loose brush and clutter long after his departure, she noticed a crow sitting high in a tree, its black eyes watching her every movement. Though its gaze was sharp, the presence of the great, sleek bird did not disturb her, though not as much of a feather twitched from its perch upon the branch as the Miko continued through her day.

As she’d readied for bed later that night, she realized she’d felt oddly comforted by the crow. She imagined it a silent protector, a new guardian of the Shrine, no different than the statues of the gods which dotted its grounds.

She settled into her futon with a great yawn, the image of a certain dark-haired Swordsman flickering in the back of her conscience until she was swept into sleep’s sweet embrace.

Just outside the Shrine’s sleeping quarters, the bird remained, eyes carefully tracking every shift in the shadows, waiting.

And then the first light of dawn broke over the horizon, and the threat of night receded once more.

But the crow remained.

———

Spring, 1915

The crow became a permanent fixture at the Shrine, though it always seemed to keep strictly to a single tree at the edge of the property, one that gave it a full view of the courtyard and structures surrounding the main honden.

Despite the bird's constant presence, more than a month passed before the Water Pillar returned, though he'd seemed even more sullen and withdrawn than he'd been during their previous two encounters. Y/N did not consider herself a friend to Tomioka by any means, but she was the only one brave enough to approach him as he'd lingered by the Torii, apparently unsure whether he should seek out their hospitality or return to the forest.

"You are welcome to come and sit for a hot meal," she called cordially, though she maintained a tentative distance. She frowned when he did not respond. Instead, the Water Pillar continued to stare unseeingly at the cracked stone path leading to the Shrine's courtyard.

"Tomioka-sama?" She pressed gently and the Swordsman's attention finally snapped to her, as though he'd just become aware of her presence.

The haunted look in his eyes sent a chill up her spine. The Miko cast one, cautious glance up at the sky, and her eyes narrowed at the wall of black clouds steadily rolling in from the east. A shift in the wind brought forth the distinct, metallic scent of rain, and if she listened hard enough, she swore she could hear the distant rumbles of thunder. “You know, there will be a storm tonight — please consider waiting it out here, where it’s safe.”

Tomioka only stared at her for a moment before he nodded. His hand twitched into a vague gesture inviting her to lead the way, and Y/N escorted him to the Shrine's elder, in search of her permission.

Granny Priestess agreed to let him stay, but on the condition he paid for his imposition. The Water Pillar had silently agreed, producing one small money bag from his pocket and placing it squarely in the Priestess’s outstretched, waiting hand.

The heft of the bag had made Y/N frown; it seemed a great sum in comparison to their meager lodging offerings, but the Swordsman did not object, so she held her tongue. To comment would only serve to irritate her Master, and the old hag was scornful enough to assign her to duties that would isolate her from the raven-haired Slayer.

Only after the old Priestess sauntered off, leaving behind nothing but the lingering, bitter stench of sake, did the Miko speak again.

“I’m glad to see you in good health, Tomioka-sama,” she bowed, though she thought she spied the corner of his mouth twitch down at her formal greeting. “I trust your patrol went smoothly?”

The Water Pillar’s expression was tight; dark. “It did not. The demon I was tracking managed to get away.” His jaw clenched tight. “But not before it slaughtered an entire family in the mountains.”

All at once, the world around her seemed to slow. It had been easy to assume the dark-haired Swordsman before her always managed to find his target just in time, before it could slaughter its victim. Now, as she beheld the lethal coldness that had settled over his features, Y/N knew her assumptions had been wrong.

Perhaps, she noted with a shudder, her rescue had been the exception and not the rule.

Beneath the icy stoicism limning the Water Pillar’s eyes, the shrine maiden noted a distinct heaviness that weighed down his shoulders; made them curl slightly forward, defeated.

She resisted the urge to reach out to him, in comfort. “I won’t offer you empty platitudes,” she murmured. “But I can invite you to offer your prayers for those who were lost.”

He looked at her, brows drawn, and she knew his instinct was to decline, so she added, “I will do it regardless of whether you join me.”

All at once, any protest he had was snuffed out within him. Instead, he was left with a curious softness as he regarded the shrine maiden, so assured and earnest in her invitation.

He didn’t know why he’d sought out the Shrine.

He’s been angry; angry at himself for not being faster, for allowing innocent people to die on his account of his failure.

He still felt angry. Yet, as he followed Y/N into the Shrine’s haiden to light incense, he also felt a solemn gratitude for the Miko, who’d not let him indulge in his self-loathing but instead requested he act, and act with her.

So he had; and somehow, the weight on his chest, the one that threatened to suffocate him, lightened bit by bit until Giyuu felt like he could breathe once more.

Later that night, Giyuu spotted the shrine maiden from his window as she darted around the courtyard to light the tōrō to illuminate the Shrine grounds. A deep rumble of thunder, however, signaled the spring storm had finally arrived. Y/N, however, only continued with her task, huddling over herself to strike the matches needed to finish lighting the lanterns as rain began to dampen the landscape around her.

He was about to go outside and demand she return to the warm, dry haven that was the girls’ sleeping quarters lest she catch a cold, but then the last of the lanterns were lit and the shrine maiden straightened.

And then she tilted her face up toward the sky, allowing the rain to wash over her.

And she grinned. And Giyuu was mesmerized; so much so, that he had not stopped staring at where she’d stood, laughing in the rain, even long after the Miko retired to bed.

Y/N awoke well before sunrise the following morning and spent hours laboring over the hot stoves in the kitchen. By the time the sky finally lightened, she'd only just finished her task and was in the process of boxing up her creation when she spotted one of her fellow shrine maidens passing by the entryway.

The Miko called out her name. "Has Lord Tomioka awoken yet?"

Her sister trainee lingered in the doorway. "Oh yes, he's been up for a while," and the girl looked back over her shoulder. “But he is already on his way out —“

The Miko swore viciously under her breath as she slammed a lid atop the small bento and hastily wrapped it in the small cloth she’d swiped from the laundry.

“Move,” she barked at a small group of trainees that had gathered in the hallway outside the kitchen. The girls flattened themselves against the wall as Y/N sped by. She hurtled up the stairs, nearly tripping in her haste. Just as she burst into the courtyard from the honden, panting and winded, she spotted him.

“Tomioka-sama!” Y/N called, hurrying after the retreating form of the Water Pillar before he could pass through the shrine gates. “I have something for you!”

The raven-haired slayer turned back to her, his face neutral, though Y/N could tell, by the slightest raise of his brow, that she’d piqued his interest.

“Thank goodness you hadn’t left yet,” the Miko said brightly, holding out a small bundle wrapped in furoshiki cloth. “I was worried this wouldn’t be ready before you did.”

Tomioka’s eyes dropped to the parcel in her hands. “What is it?”

Y/N motioned for him to take it, and to her slight surprise he did, holding it slightly in front of him as though it were liable to burst open. “A meal for the road. Granny and I prepared it this morning — as thanks, for everything you’ve done.”

But the Water Pillar was already shaking his head, trying to press the package back into the shrine maiden’s hands. “I need no thanks; I do my job, and your shrine happens to be part of it.”

If his words disappointed her, Y/N did not show it. “And yet we are grateful all the same,” she said firmly, arms crossing in front of her chest to avoid taking the small bento back. “Besides, it’s salmon; it will only go bad if you don’t eat it.”

Had she not been watching him, Y/N would have missed the slight widening of his eyes, or the way his hand twitched back towards himself, bringing the packed lunch closer to him.

Cerulean eyes watched her for a long moment, before dropping as Tomioka tucked the bento into his pocket.

“Thank you,” was all he said before he turned away and continued through the gates of the shrine, setting off on the path which would lead him through the forest.

If she hadn’t known better, she would’ve sworn the Water Pillar looked happy as he departed.

———

The Slayer returned exactly one week after she’d given him the home-cooked salmon – but he did not return empty-handed. For there, wrapped in the same furoshiki cloth, was a strange, oblong object, sitting in the palm of his hand though if he thought it heavy, Tomioka gave no indication.

“What’s this?” Y/N leaned curiously over the Pillar’s outstretched hand and squinted, trying to discern what the cloth could have been concealing.

Tomioka pushed his hand toward her, beseeching her to take the parcel from him. “A knife.”

The Shrine Maiden looked up at him in alarm, pulling away from the Water Pillar. “Why on earth would I need a knife?”

He rolled his eyes. “Protection.”

“From what?” The Miko wrinkled her nose down at his offering, though there was a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “As I recall, I walloped you just fine with my broom.”

Tomioka shot her a dull look. “Be that as it may, cleaning tools are useless against demons. Without the sun, the only thing that works against them is decapitation with this — its metal is unique.”

He parted the folds of the cloth to reveal a simple blade, though Y/N found it daunting all the same. The hilt was basic, an unembellished metal handle wrapped in plain black leather. The blade itself was an unassuming silver, slightly longer than her hand.

The Slayer motioned for her to take it, though she only shrunk away. “You know how to use one, yes?”

The Miko’s eyes met his, wide and anxious. “For domestic uses, of course, but not –”

Tomioka’s fingers closed around her wrist and lifted, guiding her hand toward the dagger. His hand moved to cover hers, wrapping them both around the hilt of the blade before squeezing. “Grip it like this,” he held their joined hands up for her to inspect. “Keep your hand in a fist; do not lift your fingers away from the grip – that’s the best way to injure yourself instead of your target.”

But the shrine maiden could hardly focus on the Pillar’s instructions. Her attention was directed entirely at the way her hand was swallowed by his, his skin warm and his grasp firm. She studied how his calluses – thick and forged from years of brutal sword training – pressed against hers; how, despite the roughness of his fingers and palms, and his solid hold still remained gentle.

“-- and thrust like this,” he remained oblivious to her distraction as moved her arm in a sharp jab, a second and then a third time, before dropping her hand. “Now do it yourself.”

His command startled her out of her trance, a heat creeping up her neck from beneath the collar of her kosode. She held out the blade awkwardly before her as scrambled to recall the Water Pillar’s words. To her dismay, all she was able to conjure was the memory of his touch, and how cold she suddenly felt without it.

Lamely, she mimed jutting the knife at an invisible enemy, the blade gracelessly wobbling through the air. Though she was by no means a swordsman, even she knew something was off, her movements disjointed and clumsy.

She glanced shyly back to the raven-haired Demon Slayer and deflated as she was met only with bemused resignation.

Tomioka shook his head in disdain. “Perhaps you would fare better with a broom.”

The Miko bristled. “I am not a swordsman —“

“You’ve made that abundantly apparent.”

“— and I do not have the basics you seem to take for granted.” She finished, glaring indignantly at her raven-haired companion. “So teach me.”

The Water Pillar considered her for a moment before he gave her the slightest, almost imperceptible nod of his head.

“Watch me.” He turned his body toward the Miko and mimed getting into a defensive stance — feet ajar, his weight evenly distributed on each leg, and bent.

He looked back to the Shrine Maiden expectantly, and she parroted his movements, crouching into what she imagined was the perfect mirror of his position.

It wasn’t.

“No — you need to—“ Tomioka straightened and huffed, impatient. He moved quickly behind her, and without thinking, his hands shot to grip her hips to guide them into the proper stance, until her weight was evenly distributed on both feet.

“Like that — now bend your knees.” The ravenette pushed down on her hips until her legs bent, apparently oblivious to the way the Miko flushed crimson.

He was close; far, far too close. She’d never been touched the way the Water Pillar touched her. Tomioka’s hands were twin brands, burning her skin even through the layers of her shrine attire, and it sent every nerve beneath her skin buzzing.

She was aware of every inch of him pressed against her; of his arms, caging her in, his hands twin brands against her hips as he turned and pulled her into the proper stance. She was aware of how warm he was, of how formidable his presence felt, even though to her, he posed no threat. Every movement of his was precise and fluid, like the water he’d claimed to style his techniques after.

And if his touch wasn’t distracting enough, his scent threatened to overwhelm every last bit of sense she’d clung onto. Y/N didn’t know how she hadn’t noticed how good he smelled — like mahogany and citrus — so rich and so warm; a stark contrast to his otherwise cold and aloof nature mask.

The swordsman, however, appeared to remain oblivious. “There,” he finally said, having satisfied that she’d achieved proper form. For moment, the two of them lingered there, with Tomioka’s chest against the shrine maiden’s back, his hands remaining steady in place on her hips. It was as though they’d frozen: Y/N, out of a mixture of shock and red-cheeked embarrassment, and Tomioka out of utter cluelessness.

Another beat passed before the Water Pillar finally realized the compromising nature of their position. His hands dropped quickly from her hips, and there was a rush of air at Y/N’s back as he swiftly stepped away, putting distance between them once more.

The raven-haired Slayer gruffly cleared his throat. “You should also keep wisteria on you.” And Y/N gulped down her embarrassment to turn back toward him.

Tomioka kept his face neutral and cool, but the tips of his ears had turned pink. “Check your perfumes for it or ask one of the other shrine girls if you can borrow theirs – oil would be better. More concentrated”

Any residual awkwardness that may have lingered fell quickly away. The Miko only stared blankly at him, her head tilted slightly to the side as her eyebrows pinched together. “Perfume?”

Tomioka blinked. “Yes. As all women have.”

It was an effort to fight off the smile twitching at the corners of her lips. “Exactly how many women do you know, Tomioka-sama? Such that you would know their perfumery habits, that is.”

His mouth thinned into a firm line. “Enough.”

And though Y/N supposed he’d meant to sound self-assured and confident, the Slayer was betrayed by the slight doubt in his voice, as though he’d been questioning his own answer.

The shrine maiden only continued to look at him, her eyebrow slightly raised, amused. The longer the silence stretched between them,the more awkward the ravenette grew, his discomfort plain from the way he shifted under her stare.

“You seem like someone who would use it.” He finally offered, after another moment of quiet.

It was her turn to blink, taken aback. Her smirk quickly slid from her face and with a grimace, she felt her right eye twitch, ever so slightly. “Apologies, then, for disappointing you.”

Tomioka frowned and he made like he was going to respond, but the Miko squared her shoulders and stalked briskly past him.

“I must return to my duties, and I’m sure you need to do the same,” she paused in the doorway of the garden hut and cast one, sidelong glance back to where he stood, clueless. “Until next time, Tomioka-sama. Thank you for the blade.”

With that, the Miko paced briskly away from the garden hut, her spine stiff. The Water Pillar remained in place for a moment, stupefied, before he collected himself once more, before setting off back toward the forest; to his Manor.

And as Giyuu retreated through the rusting Torii gate, he could not quite shake the distinct impression he’d done something wrong, though he knew not what.

–

The Water Pillar returned the following week, though to a decidedly cooler greeting than that which he’d steadily grown accustomed to receiving.

That wasn’t entirely true — the majority of the Shrine’s residents had welcomed him warmly, their kindness always far more than he thought he deserved. Only one hadn’t greeted him as enthusiastically as the others, and to his annoyance, that one was the only person whose opinion of him mattered, even if he couldn’t quite articulate why.

She hardly stopped to acknowledge his arrival, only gracing him with a brisk nod, though she’d refused to meet his eyes. Bemused, Giyuu followed her across the courtyard as she made her way to the Shrine’s small storeroom. He leaned against the doorway and watched as the Miko began pulling jars of dried herbs from the rickety shelves lining the walls and stacked them on a sizeable work counter that cut halfway across the room. All the while, she continued pointedly ignoring him, humming lightly under her breath as though she could not see or hear him as he shifted against the doorframe, waiting.

Her obstinate silence grated at him. “May I assist you?”

“No, no, I am perfectly fine, thank you.” She turned away to browse the shelves once more, before finding what she needed: a stone mortar and pestle.

The grinder settled against the wooden counter with a heavy thud and the shrine maiden snatched up one of the jars she’d stacked and dumped its contents into the bowl, followed by another bottle of herbs. Pestle in hand, she set to work grinding the leaves together, mixing in a vial of fragrant oil she’d kept in her pocket to create a thick paste.

Giyuu watched her quietly as she worked. “You’re…” he frowned. “You’re behaving strangely.”

Y/N glanced up at him. “In what way?”

“You’re trying to avoid me.”

“Am I?” She straightened, rolling her shoulders. “Only because I’ve not yet bathed today. I didn’t want to risk offending you with my stench.”

Giyuu paused. “Why would that matter?”

“You made sure to point out you thought I needed perfume during your last visit.”

He pushed off the doorframe, eyebrows knit together. “For protection.”

The shrine maiden rolled her eyes. “Yes, and apparently, because you believe I am the type to need it.” When Giyuu only continued to stare at her with that same, mildly lost expression, Y/N groaned, exasperated. “You implied I stink.”

The Water Pillar’s jaw slackened as he gaped at her. “That is not –”

“It is what you implied,” she repeated, turning away from him to focus on her task of grinding herbs, though the force with which she ground the pestle was perhaps greater than necessary.

Giyuu rounded the small countertop of the Shrine’s storeroom to face her head-on. “I like how you smell.” He insisted. “It’s nice.”

The Miko’s irritated churning of the stone paused and her eyes finally lifted to his. For a long moment, she watched him, head slightly cocked.

“You are very odd, Tomioka-sama.”

But she said it with a small smile that he almost wanted to return.

Before long, things between them returned to normal once more, with the Miko directing him to collect her gathering basket from where she’d left it in the Shrine’s infirmary and bring it to her. Once he returned, he helped her grind charcoal to make incense sticks as she chatted happily away.

Surprisingly, Giyuu found himself not only engaged in her musings about daily life at the Shrine, but offering her small personal anecdotes of his own, though he was not nearly as proficient as she when it came to story-telling.

Once the sun began setting once more, and he received no new orders from Headquarters, he simply sought out the Shrine’s head Priestess and silently passed her a small money bag.

And then Giyuu retired to the guest’s quarters for the night.

—--

As spring warmed into summer, the Water Pillar began making bi-weekly visits to the Shrine that quickly melted into habit; expectation. Once a fortnight, a thrill would settle over the young maidens in anticipation of the arrival of the stoic yet handsome Slayer, with girls of all ages eagerly looking toward the Shrine gates in hopes of spying him the moment he crossed beneath the Torii. The elder employees of the Shrine had learned to time Tomioka’s arrival by listening for their excited gasps, exhaled as a collective as brooms and rices sacks were dropped where their handlers stood, the girls far too interested in rushing to greet the exalted Slayer than they were in completing their tasks.

“I do not see the reason for such excitement,” she sniffed, though even she wasn’t stupid enough to think her fellow trainees bought her bluff. “He is only a swordsman.”

“A handsome one,” a wispy trainee named Miyoko sighed dreamily. “And no doubt strong and capable.”

The group of maidens dissolved into another fit of giggles, concealing their blushes behind their hands.

“His face is attractive, but his hair is odd,” another commented. “It looks like he’s hacked at it with his own blade.”

“Oh, who cares about his hair? I’m far more interested in what’s beneath that uniform —“

“Enough,” Y/N snapped. While her friendship with the Water Pillar was tenuous at best, the suggestive way her sisters-in-training spoke of him left her feeling decidedly discomforted.

Though, if she were honest with herself, she’d admit that she, too, wondered whether Tomioka’s strength was the product of a finely-hewn tuned physique. But she wasn’t, so she bottled that thought up and tucked it tightly away, where it belonged.

Slowly, her cohorts all turned to look at her.

“You seem to spend a great deal of time with him, Sister,” Miyoko directed at Y/N, who felt her cheeks heat. “Is there anything you’d like to share?”

“Tomioka-sama always asks where Sister Y/N is, the moment he arrives!” A tiny voice chimed, and Y/N’s eyes slid shut in an effort to fight off a wince. “Sometimes they even do chores by themselves!”

Komatsu. At only ten, she was the Shrine’s youngest trainee, and followed Y/N around like a shadow. Not that the shrine maiden minded all that much; she tended to spoil the girl a bit, when she could. But as pure as the girl’s intentions surely were, she’d yet to lose that childlike earnestness that made her prone to revealing information that Y/N rather remained a secret.

“Alone with a man?” Miyoko repeated, her eyes shining with malicious glee. “How scandalous — even for someone without a family to embarass, dear Y/N.”

“Careful, Miyoko,” she warned softly. “Don’t go speaking on matters of which you know nothing.”

“Or what? What would you do?”

As fond as Y/N was of her sisters-in-training, one did not make it through the Shrine’s rigorous education and training without learning how to trade in the kind of currency young women valued most.

Information; specifically, gossip.

So the shrine maiden only leveled Miyoko’s own smug smirk with one of her own. “Or I shall tell Granny how you spend your afternoons kissing the boys from the village, rather than tending to your lessons.”

The other girls gasped, their stares turning back to the gossiping shrine maiden. She savored how quickly the girl’s prideful grin slipped from her face as the weight of the threat settled.

While Y/N, parentless and thus without anyone to truly care about her propriety, was being primed to take over Granny Priestess’s position overseeing the shrine, her position was unique. She was parentless and thus, without anyone to truly care about her propriety or whatever other ridiculous expectations of modesty that were often attached to other young women her age. In being no one, Y/N was relatively free to do as she pleased, and that freedom almost made up for her lack of belonging.

But the other girls residing at the Shrine were different. Families across the region sent their daughters to the Shrine for training, not only in their cultural practices and arts, but also for education; to become well-rounded women who would then serve to be valuable marriage prospects once they returned home.

Scandal would not affect her; but it would affect someone like Miyoko.

“How do you think your parents would feel, to know their heir was behaving so brazenly in public? Risking her reputation on the marriage market before she’s even entered it?”

Truthfully, she liked Miyoko; had gotten along well with her, in fact. But she would not risk those sacred few moments she spent with the Water Pillar in an effort to keep the peace with another trainee. Not when those few instances she spent in his company were the only times she’d felt connection — true, human connection and belonging.

Her sister-in-training ruefully fell silent, and Y/N savored her victory. Later, when she was left with nothing but the company of her own thoughts, however, the exchange played back in her mind.

In all her posturing, she’d managed to avoid having to answer for Miyoko’s lofty observation.

You seem to spend a great deal of time with him, Sister.

She did; and, to her slight horror, she realized that she had no interest in stopping.

She only wanted more.

–

It was past dawn when Giyuu trudged under the great Torii gate of the Shrine, exhausted and aching.

It had been a long while since a demon was last capable of wounding him, but he’d been blown backward by a delayed attack that hit after he’d beheaded the damn thing. As a result, he’d been sent flying back, slamming through a dilapidated wall of the abandoned hut he’d tracked the creature to, resulting in a sizeable gash to his shoulder.

He grit his teeth in mild annoyance. He would need some treatment of his wounds — not that they were deep by any means, but they were substantial enough that he knew infection could spell trouble for him, should it spread.

Some small, irate voice in his head snidely reminded him he could have just as easily gone to the Butterfly Mansion for treatment — that, in fact, the Insect Pillar’s estate had been much closer to the location of his mission than the Shrine had been. He’d rationed that, as much as he admired and respected Kocho, he was still a bit raw from her mocking about how unliked he truly was among his comrades.

Besides, he groused. Kocho was not the one he really wanted to see, anyway.

He found Y/N in the Shrine’s storeroom, seated upon the floor with a detailed ledger spread out before her as she took inventory of various scrolls and texts.

Giyuu did not bother to announce himself. “You have medical training, do you not?”

The Miko startled, the charcoal stick she’d been using to tally the ledger clattering to the floor. She blinked up at him in surprise. “Tomioka-sama — welcome, it’s been a few weeks — forgive me, I did not see you come in.” She quickly rose to her feet, shutting the store ledger and tucking it under her arm.

Her eyes found the blood-stained shoulder of his hair and widened. “I have some; I can stitch and dress wounds —“

He nodded. “Then I require your assistance.”

—-

Y/N led him to a small office inside the honden that served as the Shrine’s unofficial infirmary. “Take a seat,” she nodded at a small stool that sat under the room’s solitary window, right by a modest working table. “Let me see what we have.”

Tomioka sat upon the stool with his back to her as she busied herself sifting through cupboards in search of supplies. “What sort of wound is it?”

She turned back and nearly dropped a tin of medicinal salve she’d located as she beheld the Water Pillar strip himself of his clothing from the waist up.

There, across his right shoulder blade, she saw it — saw his blood. Quickly, she located thread and a needle and she grabbed a roll of cloth that could double as wrappings and she crossed back across the room.

She spread her bounty out across the table, right beside the neatly folded pile of his clothing. Silently, she set to work cleaning the gash, and she breathed a quiet sigh of relief when she saw that it was little more than a shallow flesh wound.

“Lucky you, this won’t need stitching,” she said lightly as she wiped away the last of the dried blood from the Water Pillar’s skin. “But I shall need to wrap it so it won’t become infected.”

Tomioka only gave her a curt nod. She stepped back to work open her tin of medical salve, and as she warmed the substance in her hands, she let herself fully examine the Swordsman sitting before her. Her eyes trailed over the sculpted planes of his back. It surprised her how muscular he was, given his leanness. Yet, without the layers of his uniform shirt and haori, she could see he was well-built, each muscle defined.

She didn’t know why it surprised her that there was a man beneath the mask of the Slayer, but what a man he was. Her mouth went dry at the thought. It was an effort not to allow her eyes to wander lower; to ponder what he might look like under his uniform pants, stripped and fully bare before her —

“What is that scent?” Tomioka’s sudden question startled her away from her increasingly treacherous thoughts.

She’d never been more grateful to be facing away from him. That way, he could not see the blush coloring her cheeks as she hastily slathered the salve across his wound. “Anti-septic; I know it’s rather stringent, but — ”

The Water Pillar shook his head. “I know what antiseptic smells like. I mean you. The scent you wear.”

She pursed her lips for a moment before she recalled the distinctly floral scent of her cleansing oils. “Sakaki blooms, I suppose.”

“What properties does it have — what are its effects on others?” He pressed. She was surprised at how insistent he seemed, and there was almost an urgency in his tone that unsettled her.

“None, to my knowledge — why do you ask?”

The tips of Tomioka’s ears turned pink and he turned away from her, lips pressed into a firm line. “Forget I said anything.” he muttered after a moment, his shoulders and spine stiff.

Neither one of them spoke again as Y/N finished treating the Water Pillar’s injury and wrapped it.

“You're done,” she said after a moment, tapping him lightly on his other shoulder.

“You have my thanks,” Tomioka quickly refastened the buttons of his uniform shirt as the Miko stepped aside, pointedly wiping her hands clean with a small cloth. She only looked at him once he lifted his haori from where he’d carefully laid it atop the small examination table, but her eyes narrowed as he rose from the stool, shrugging the material back over his shoulders. “I am happy to pay you for the resources you used —“

Y/N did not appear to be listening, not as she leaned forward and pinched the sleeve of his haori between her thumb and index finger.

“You have a tear,” she frowned, rubbing the fabric between her fingers. “Right here, see?”

There, on the side bearing his sister’s half of his haori, right where his sleeve met his shoulder, was indeed a small hole, the threads around it broken and shifting slightly in the wind.

The Miko’s hand fell away, and she squared her shoulders, mouth set in a firm but determined line. “If you’ll give me a moment, I assure you I can have it repaired in no time –”

“Not necessary,” the Swordsman said abruptly, twisting back from her. “I can figure it out on my own.” He would not part with it, would not so much as let another put their hands on it and risk ruining his most cherished possession.

Y/N only stepped toward him, ignoring his attempt at distance. “There’s no need to be prideful,” she huffed impatiently. “Truly, it would take no effort at all –”

“No.”

“Why are you being so difficult?” She snapped, but her hands continued reaching for him, for his sleeve –

Tomioka snatched her wrist mid-air and held it there, halting her. “No one touches this. Understand?”

Y/N’s lips parted in faint surprise at the Water Pillar’s severity. Her eyes darted to where his fingers were locked tight – uncomfortably tight – around her wrist. When she glanced back at the stone-faced Slayer, she felt a chill lick down her spine. She’d known he could be intimidating against threats, even without saying a word. It was his eyes – his eyes would harden, with the lapiz hue of his irises darkening to something more akin to indigo, as he stared down an opponent. She’d witnessed it the very first night she’d met him.

She just hadn’t thought she would ever be on the receiving end of such a cold glare.

“I understand,” she said softly, and she began flexing her wrist against his grip in an effort to work herself free from his hold. “Please forgive my indiscretion, Tomioka-sama. I overstepped.”

The raven-haired Slayer blinked and quickly let her go, her wrist falling limply back to her side. Just outside the infirmary’s small window, he heard the familiar, urgent cry of a crow.

He’d never been more grateful for a distraction. “I must be on my way.” His tone was stiff; clipped.

“But — you’ve only just arrived —“

“Farewell, Y/N.” Giyuu gave her a curt nod.

Helplessly, the Miko watched as the Water Pillar stalked out of the small office, his hands curled into fists at his sides. He did not so much as spare a glance back, leaving Y/N to wonder whether she would see that odd patterned haori again.

The thought she might not made something cold and heavy sink into her gut.

—-

(One week later)

It wasn’t often that Giyuu Tomioka found himself annoyed, much less angry. He much preferred channeling his existing emotions into slaying demons, allowing them to taste a fraction of the rage and hatred he felt deep within, a vicious fire he so rarely let bubble up to his service.

Until that evening. After the fiasco that was Mount Natagumo and the subsequent chaos at the Master’s mansion as a result of the Kamado boy and his demon sister, Giyuu had finally noticed that the previous day’s trials had resulted in the tear along the shoulder of his haori that he knew could no longer be ignored.

He grit his teeth; the battle against the Lower Moon spider demon had hardly required him to exert any energy — yet the demon’s last ditch attempt to preserve its life had managed to enlarge the small hole in his most prized possession, and the Water Pillar was utterly without the skill to repair it.

So, he’d been forced to sit through the meeting with the Master, the hole in his haori feeling more like a gaping wound that only festered with every passing moment, until finally, finally they’d been dismissed.

Giyuu hadn’t wasted any time departing swiftly from his Master’s estate, though that hadn’t stopped him from catching the tail end of Shinazugawa’s biting remark of how fuckin’ typical it was for him to leave without so much as a farewell to his comrades. He tried not to let the Wind Pillar’s words get to him; but he was unworthy of their company regardless, so he supposed it really didn’t matter what they thought of him. It shouldn’t.

And so, that was how Giyuu found himself padding silently along the cracked, stone pathway which led to the Shrine at the edge of his designated territory, ready to eat crow and ask for assistance from a particular Miko whom he felt certain would not hesitate to remind him of how he’d coolly rejected her help only days earlier.

Hence, his irritation.

So, his movements stiff and his mouth twisted into a firm grimace, Giyuu stalked under the Torii and into the main courtyard of the old Shrine. It was coming upon midday, though there was a thick cover of clouds overhead that threatened that open up at any moment and shower rain across the region. He ignored the respectful bows of the Shrine’s various inhabitants and staff, eyes sweeping over faces in search of her.

He located her near the storehouse, chatting with one of her fellow trainees as the pair worked to clean vegetables. Giyuu trudged over to her, eyes locked unwaveringly on her serene, easy smile, as he tried to ignore the way it made something in his gut clench and churn.

He drew to a stop right before her and her Shrine-sister, the latter looking up at him with wide eyes, her hands stilling over her work as she looked up to the Slayer in awe.

Giyuu cleared his throat but Y/N only continued wiping the dirt from carrots with her cloth.

The ravenette tried again. “I am in need of your assistance.”

Y/N’s comrade nudged her with her elbow, but the Miko only continued to clean, pointedly ignoring them both.

Giyuu pursed his lips. “With my haori. The tear has grown larger —“

“I am busy.” Y/N’s tone was clipped. “Perhaps there are others who might assist you.”

“Please.”

The Shrine Maiden’s hands finally stilled and she lifted her chin to face him. The moment she beheld the pleading sincerity in his eyes, coupled with the hard set of his jaw that betrayed just how desperate he was, her gaze softened.

She sighed. “Very well then,” she rose, brushing her hands free of any residual dirt. She held her chin high and squared her shoulders, determined not to show him how he’d bruised her ego; how he’d frightened her. “Follow me.”

—

The Shrine sat at the base of a great mountain. But, nearly half a kilometer up the winding, twisting path leading up the mountain and carved into its side, was a grassy hilltop that then plateaued into a small overlook that boasted a phenomenal aerial view of the Shrine below.

The summer grass had turned a vibrant shade of emerald, broken up only by dots of tiny white and blue wildflowers that had gathered in small clusters sprinkled throughout the overlook. At the back of the clearing stood an ancient willow tree, its trunk gnarled and knotted with age, its wisps swaying lazily in the wind.

It was her favorite spot; a little ways away from the hustle and bustle of the Shrine, which meant they would have some privacy as she worked. Y/N settled down against the grass and pulled a needle and a spool of thread from her pocket. She turned her face up toward the Water Pillar where he stood over her. “I’ll take that haori, now, if you’ll please.”

Wordlessly, Tomioka carefully slid the garment from his shoulders and handed it to her, though he hesitated in letting go as she took it gingerly into her hands.

It was clearly very important to the Slayer, and perhaps that was why she felt the need to reassure him. “I promise to take care of it.”

He nodded stiffly and let go of the fabric and the Miko quickly set to work repairing its torn shoulder. The Water Pillar lingered awkwardly beside her for a moment longer before he too, sat in the grass next to her, though his back remained straight, his posture rigid.

She glanced at him as her needle wove the haori’s fabric back together. “I suppose this happened because of your occupation?”

It was faint, but the shrine maiden swore she saw his mouth twitch into something reminiscent of a grimace. “Yes.”

“You should be lucky it wasn’t your flesh.”

At that, Tomioka scoffed. “I would not allow such a weakling to get close enough to try.”

“My, I’d not pegged you as the boastful sort, Tomioka-sama.”

“It’s not boasting; I speak only the truth.” He retorted evenly.

The shrine maiden only hummed as she worked. “And what of your family? Do they support your path as a Slayer?”

The Water Pillar turned his head away, his form stiff. For a moment, the Miko feared she would be left to repair his haori in silence, with nothing but the faint whistling of birds to keep her company.

“I have none,” Tomioka’s voice was soft, nearly swallowed by the wind. “There is no one left to object, even if they wanted to.”

Y/N’s hands paused their work as she thought. “You are alone?”

It would be nice, she supposed, to find another who, like her, belonged to no one; a kindred spirit of sorts.

“I suppose,” Tomioka spoke up after a moment, his eyes squinted in thought. “I have a mentor. But it was he who trained me to join the Corps.”

“I should hope he’s more sober than mine,” Y/N drawled. “And less irritating.”

The Miko’s attention was so fixed on her careful stitching along the hole in his haori, that she didn’t see his faint smile at her words.

——

The Slayer and the shrine maiden continued talking long after she’d finished repairing the tear in his haori. It was only when Tomioka had realized nightfall was a mere hour away that the two reluctantly descended the hillside to return to the Shrine.

“I almost forgot.” The Water Pillar said, halting in front of the honden as Y/N escorted him back to the Shrine’s entrance. He dug into his pockets and pulled something free. “Here. For you.”

The Miko gaped down at the fat red fruit that sat heavily in his palm. “This is -“ she said breathlessly, “A pomegranate!”

He nodded, arm still outstretched towards her as he waited to drop the ruby fruit into her hand.

She shook her head. “No, Tomioka-san, I cannot accept something so expensive-“

“I insist.” The Water Pillar withdrew a small knife and split the fruit in half, staining his hands crimson with the juice that spilled over its soft flesh.

Hesitantly, the young Miko accepted the half he offered her, and thumbed some of the fat, glistening jewels loose. The moment she brought them to her lips, Y/N sighed, contentedly, and for some reason, Giyuu found his cheeks heating as he watched her savor the sweet fruit.

She lazily opened her eyes after swallowing her first mouthful, but she was startled to see the Hashira staring at her, unwaveringly, and she realized he’d moved closer towards her than he had been only seconds earlier.

Tomioka’s azure eyes were fixed hard on her lips, as he leaned in close to her, Y/N flushing as he drew nearer.

Is he going to kiss me? Her traitorous heart thundered at the idea, and it caused her no short amount of grief to know she was uncertain whether she wanted him to do so. As her emotions warred with her logic, the Water Pillar’s gentle fingers cupped under her chin, and his thumb brushed delicately across her lower lip.

“Pomegranate juice,” he said, but Y/N could still feel the warmth of his breath still as his hand lingered under her chin. His eyes were wide as though he, too, could not believe what he’d just done.

“Yes,” she breathed, before she felt her cheeks heat. “I – I mean, thank you.”

The Water Pillar’s gaze dropped to her lips and her stomach twisted violently. All at once, awareness seemed to come crashing down upon him, and he then stepped back, his hand falling from its hold on her face and back to his side.

The shrine maiden remained frozen in place for a heartbeat longer. “Are you certain you’re unable to be our guest tonight?” Her voice was little more than a pitiful squeak.

Her eyes lifted to his and she knew the answer before he spoke it. “I cannot,” and to her surprise, he almost looked as disappointed as she felt, but he added hastily, “But I will be back. Soon.”

“Soon,” she echoed, feeling rather dazed. “Yes. Of course. I — we — look forward to it.”

She was thankful that Tomioka had already turned away from her as he made his way down the long, winding steps that led to the main route out of the forest; that way, he could not see the way her cheeks burned crimson, or how she buried her face in her hands as she cursed her own embarrassment.

—

Giyuu was grateful his back was to the young Miko as he retreated through the Shrine’s gates and back to the path which would lead him home. It meant she could not see as he stared at his thumb – the thumb he’d used to clear away the small bead of pomegranate juice from her lips – or how his eyebrows pinched together. It meant she could not hear his heart as it beat wildly in his chest at the memory of how soft and full her lip had been beneath the pad of his thumb, soft enough that some treacherous part of his brain had urged him to lean in, to see if her lips would feel as good against his –

He shook his head, trying desperately to dispel his wild intrusive thoughts. It was ludicrous; he did not think of the young shrine maiden in that way. Not when she frequently sought to needle him, not when she frustrated him to no end.

His collar suddenly felt tight; his skin, far too hot. His gaze dropped back down to the hand that had touched her, and it clenched.

A pomegranate. It was only a pomegranate; nothing more.

“It was a thank you gift,” Giyuu declared, as though speaking the words out loud gave them more force. “It is nothing more than an expression of gratitude.”

And even his crow, ancient and dull as he was, scoffed at the obviousness of the lie.

——

Late Summer, 1915

Summer blazed hot and humid. But neither the sweltering heat of the sun nor the most arduous missions he took exhausted Giyuu more than the complicated, tangled mess of feelings that had taken root within him. Because with every day that passed, the Miko of the Shrine at the edge of the forest occupied more and more of his mind. And Giyuu did not know what it meant or what he should do about it.

She’d not just repaired his haori or made him salmon; she’d somehow wormed her way into his every waking thought, and to his great confusion, he found himself almost unwilling to think of anything but her.

Admittedly, Giyuu Tomioka did not have the requisite tools in his social arsenal to successfully navigate human interaction. He hadn’t quite known the extent of his ineptitude however, until the Insect Pillar had so cheerfully pointed out that none of his comrades, in fact, liked him. That revelation had made him doubt every interaction he’d had since, made him wonder whether even the lower ranked Slayers viewed him with the same apathy, if not the same outright hostility toward him shared by Shinazugawa and Iguro.

He’d come to doubt them all — except her.

Y/N was different; at the end of each visit to the Shrine, the Water Pillar did not find himself feeling drained or unwanted. He felt lighter; rejuvenated, even. She was a breath of fresh air that Giyuu found more difficult to go without with each passing day.

She still picked at him, but she did so without the malice he’d normally come to expect, even from those he considered friends, like the Kocho. The young Miko had a way of teasing him that did not leave him feeling decidedly othered. Rather, her japes only spurred him to respond with his own, though admittedly, they tended to fall flat.

He’d known, from the moment she’d attempted to bludgeon him with her broom, that there was more to the Miko than met the eye; but he hadn’t imagined he’d find himself as drawn to her as he was, unable to tolerate going more than a handful of weeks without paying her a visit.

And, given the way she’d blushed after he’d thanked her for repairing his haori, perhaps she was drawn to him, too. Perhaps he hoped she was.

But he would have to wait to find out, for his obligations to the Corps had taken him to a village a considerable distance away from his designated territory. He’d been tasked with investigating a series of disappearances of young women in the region, but his orders had come abruptly enough that he’d not been able to spare a visit to the Shrine before he departed.

He was anxious — eager — to return, though not before he took care of the demon likely behind the mystery plaguing the village he now patrolled.

Nightfall was still a little ways off, and so Giyuu found himself wandering the streets to pass the time. He made his way to a sizeable outdoor market, still packed with shoppers oohing and ahhing over vibrant displays of silk, crafted jewelry, and sugary confectioneries.

Idly, he too, joined other patrons in browsing the small vending stands that lined the bustling village streets, though his perusal was disinterested, if not bored. But his eyes snagged on one small bauble displayed on the merchant’s small stand upon a swath of silk. It was small; unassuming. But the carefully crafted decoration was painted in a startling shade of crimson that he found hard to ignore.

The image of a certain Miko flashed through his mind. He couldn’t leave without it. he wouldn’t; not when its paint so perfectly matched the color of Y/N’s hakama trousers.

I spend the year longing for autumn. That was what she’d told him, that day on the hillside after she’d repaired his haori.

He almost smiled to himself. This would be a way for her to enjoy her favorite season even in the scorching heat of summer or the biting cold of winter.

He waited for the merchant to notice his presence, his fingers twisting around the small money sack he kept tucked in his pocket. His eyes flickered back to the small trinket. Idly, Giyuu wondered when he’d begun associating the color red with the shrine maiden and not with the blood he’d always imagined stained his hands.

He continued to stare the merchant down until he finally managed to catch the vendor’s eye, who flinched at the intensity of his unblinking stare.

Giyuu jutted his chin toward the small token. “How much?”

—-

He found the Miko a few mornings later, relaxing on the hillside overlooking the Shrine. She laid amongst the late summer wildflowers that had bloomed, her form framed against the grass with petals of soft blue and bright marigold.

Giyuu wordlessly settled beside her, and he tried to ignore the thunderous beat of his heart against his sternum as she rolled her head toward him to greet him with a sleepy smile. They exchanged pleasantries and settled into a comfortable silence, both content to watch the sun rise higher over the horizon.

Easy; it was so easy for him to sit beside her, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

“So, you are to take over the Shrine, one day?”

Y/N’s head turned to the Water Pillar in surprise; though he’d grown steadily more talkative over the months since she’d met him, it wasn’t often that he initiated conversation.

She settled back against the cool grass of the hilltop overlooking the Shrine, enjoying the precious few moments of quiet in the early morning before the chaos of the day called her away. “Yes,” though there was a slight uncertainty in her voice. “I’m sure it’s the expectation, after all. I have to repay Granny for her kindness.”

Giyuu frowned. “But is that what you want?”

“What I want is irrelevant,” the Miko folded her arms behind her head and tilted her face up toward the sky. Her eyes tracked the great, fluffy clouds that drifted lazily by, though the Water Pillar suspected she was attempting to avoid having to meet his eye.

“It’s not irrelevant,” he countered. “If nothing else, you should be allowed to consider other possibilities.”

She did not answer him, and the silence between them stretched enough that he thought to drop the subject, not wanting to press her any further.

“I think,” she said in that faraway voice that Giyuu had come to learn meant she was trying to conceal some deeply felt emotion. “I think should like to belong somewhere.” Her eyes shone. “No, that’s not it — I want someone to belong to me, and I to them.

“A husband.” He said flatly.

The Miko shook her head. “I have never belonged to anywhere or to anyone. I’ve no family to call my own - only an old woman who took pity on me as an infant and raised me. I wonder — what must it be like?” She laid back on the grass and closed her eyes. “That is the one thing I would change. I belong nowhere because I’m no one — nobody’s.”

Giyuu frowned. “I don’t think that’s true—“

“It is true,” she insisted, though she said it with such ease and conviction, like it was the most obvious and natural thing in the world. “I am here for a moment and then I will be gone, and no one will ever know or remember that there once was a shrine maiden named Y/N here. I’ve made peace with that.”

I would, Giyuu wanted to tell her. I would remember and I would tell them all.

“I am nobody as well,” Giyuu admitted quietly after a moment. “And I have no one left to belong to.”

The image of her face, so kind and sad and full of understanding at his words, had stayed with him for the rest of the morning and even as he settled in for a few hours of sleep in the Shrine’s guest wing.

And in his dreams, her face remained a constant.

—

The sky had turned a vivid shade of orange by the time the Water Pillar emerged from his guest lodgings, ready to depart and resume his duties. Y/N had been helping another shrine maiden tote firewood across the courtyard when she heard a quiet call of her name.

She turned and saw the raven-haired Swordsman standing near the great Torii gate.

She looked back to her fellow trainee, who waved her off with a knowing smile, and Y/N brushed her hands clean against her hakama pants before she approached him.

“Leaving so soon?” And she tried to mask her disappointment at the shortness of his visit.

Giyuu nodded. “We’ve been stretched thin, in light of a few…changes to our ranks.”

The Miko nodded grimly. He’d told her that a fellow Hashira had been slain a few months prior, and another had retired following a rather violent battle that had destroyed part of a far off city.

“But I wanted to give you this.”

She glanced down to his outstretched hand, where a small parcel was wrapped in plain furoshiki cloth. Stunned, she took the package from him, her eyes flicking between it and the Water Pillar watching her intently.

Gingerly, she unfolded the bundle and unveiled a long, but fragile metal and wood reed.

A hairpin, she realized with a soft gasp. Y/N could scarcely bring her fingers to run over the exquisitely crafted ridges of the leaves that adorned the top portion of the pin, afraid that even the slightest pressure from her touch would cause the Water Pillar’s precious gift to her to crumble.

I spend the year longing for autumn, she’d told him. She hadn’t thought he’d been particularly interested in listening to her talk; but as Y/N cradled the delicate ornament between her palms, she felt a blush begin to creep across her cheeks.

As her fingers traced across the delicate ridges of a cluster of maple leaves, lacquered in a thick coat of scarlet paint — a perfect match to the hue of her traditional Miko hakama pants — Y/N realized that perhaps Tomioka had been paying more attention to her than she’d realized.

For the Water Pillar had given her a piece of autumn to hold onto year-round.

“Tomioka-san, you do not-“

“Giyuu.” The ravenette interrupted her. “Please, call me by my name; it’s Giyuu.”

Y/N’s mouth closed, but she smiled softly, considering. “Alright. Giyuu — please, you do not need to feel obligated to bring gifts for us — it was only salmon.”

But Giyuu only shook his head. “I don’t bring gifts for everyone; just you.”

Y/N turned scarlet.

“Please, just-“ Giyuu frowned, and Y/N could have sworn she saw the faintest glow of pink coloring the Hashira’s cheeks. “Just take it.”

“Okay,” her voice resembled a mouse’s squeak as she cradled the pin delicately between her hands. “Thank you. It’s beautiful.”

“And it wasn’t just salmon.”

Y/N looked to him in surprise, her head cocked in curiosity. “Pardon?”

Giyuu exhaled harshly through his nose before stepping closer to her. “This is not only because you made salmon.” Her eyes tracked his hand as it rose to grip the front fold of his haori in his fist. “This – this is all I have left of my family.”

“My sister,” he gestured to the red half of his haori. “She died protecting me.” His hand drifted to the green and orange patterned half of the garment. “And this belonged to a dear friend. He also perished protecting me – and others.”

The Miko’s lips parted, understanding and sorrow flooding her eyes. “Tomioka-san — Giyuu — I had no idea —“

“They both died because of demons – because I could not help them. And now this is all I have left to remember them by.” And then he did the unthinkable; he grabbed her hand and pressed it against the checkered portion of his haori, right over his heart. His hand was warm and firm. Gentle, though she could feel his callouses against her knuckles as he held it in place. “So it wasn’t just salmon.” He repeated, and there was a heat in his eyes Y/N had not seen before, one that stoked a fire in her belly. “And you are not just anyone.”

A soft exhale blew past her lips at the sincerity of his words. For the first time in all her nineteen years, she wondered if this was what it meant to mean something to someone.

“Thank you,” she breathed, eyes wide and sparkling with unshed emotion. “I will treasure it.”

She swore she saw a faint blush creep across the Water Pillar’s cheeks, but she brushed it aside as nothing more than the shadows of the sky as twilight darkened the horizon.

Tomioka nodded. “I must get going now; I will see you soon.”

She did not want him to go.

But the shrine maiden concealed the pang she felt in her chest with a breezy smile. “Farewell, Tomio-“

“Giyuu.”

She blushed. “Yes — Giyuu. Until next time.”

—

“I cannot believe he lets the old woman charge him an arm and a leg to stay a single night,” Miyoko said in awe as the pair watched the retreating form of the Water Pillar through the shrine house gates.

The hairpin clutched tightly in her hands suddenly felt like a stone weight. “I’m sure he stays here only for convenience’s sake,” Y/N replied airily, turning sharply away from the egress to the shrine to hide her warming cheeks.

Miyoko snorted. “Hardly. The Demon Slayer Corps has tons of safehouses throughout the country. Corps members get medical treatment, hot meals, and lodging free of charge.” Y/N’s sister-in-training grunted as she heaved a hefty bag of rice flour from the storeroom to the girls’ side, no doubt hauling it out to prepare the evening meal.

“I’ve heard of at least four such houses in this region alone. As a Hashira, Tomioka-sama could go to any one of them and be treated far more kindly than he is here.”

Y/N frowned. “I wonder why, then, he continues to return here so often? Surely our shrine is some distance from his home, given that he stays the night each time.”

Miyoko shot the young shrine maiden a knowing glance. “Perhaps he tolerates the Granny’s abuse because he is fond of the company.”

Y/N only felt her face grow hotter as she ducked down, though she felt Miyoko’s amused stare burn through her back.

—-

The Water Pillar had returned from his intel assignment and promptly journeyed to the Shrine, its inhabitants abuzz as they prepared for the arrival of autumn and the colder months, now only mere weeks away.

He found the shrine maiden of his interest inside the main wing of the manor, back in the kitchen as she prepared herbs to be incorporated into various salves and medications. Y/N smiled brightly at him as he’d sidled up beside her, taking a handful of dried greenery from the bunch next to her and deftly pulling the leaves from the stem and handing them to her.

“Is it your day off?” The Miko gratefully accepted the leaves he’d stripped and dumped them into the rocky mortar to join the others.

Giyuu felt his stomach clench as his fingers brushed against hers. “I have completed my duties for the time being, yes.”

"You're welcome to help me, as long as you do not mind a bit of busy work."

He didn't; of course he didn't. In fact, as he accepted the heavy stone pestle from the Miko and set to work mashing the leaves she handed them into the mortar, Giyuu rather supposed he would do just about anything to remain in the shrine maiden's company, even if that meant assisting her in a task as banal as grinding medicinal herbs. And though the Slayer and the Miko fell into their well-practiced habit of quietly tending to Y/N's duties side by side, there was a notable absence of the bright chatter he'd grown accustomed to hearing during his visits.

The Water Pillar frowned. “You’re quiet.” It was not a question. “There is something on your mind.”

“Is there?” Y/N hummed loftily, her hands continuing to strip leaves from their stems. “Perhaps I am simply focused.”

Giyuu found his eyes wandering to the side to study the Miko’s face more often than usual. Though she maintained a pleasant smile as they worked, he could see that it did not fully reach her eyes. And even her sage expression could not conceal the way the troubled look in her eyes, hands pausing their work as she stared at something behind the walls of the small shrine kitchen.

“Something is bothering you.” Giyuu took the bundle of herbs clutched in her hands and replaced them with his pestle, allowing her to work her frustrations over the paste forming at the bottom of the stone bowl.

She blushed and refocused her gaze, grinding the pestle hard. “Nothing is wrong!” She chirped.

“You are a dreadful liar.”

The Miko replied with an airy laugh that made his throat tighten. “So I’ve been told — often, in fact.”

“There is…trouble in the village,” Y/N said carefully, though she kept her hands busy as she continued to grind herbs into a thick paste. “It is nothing we can’t handle, but it has put many of us on edge. Particularly Granny.”

Giyuu frowned as he handed the shrine maiden another bunch of leaves from her basket. “What sort of trouble?”

She hesitated. “It is petty village drama, nothing more.”

“You won’t give any further details?”

The Water Pillar could not explain it, but he found himself troubled by the way the Shrine Maiden forced a smile and a far too casual shrug of her shoulders. “There are none worth re-hashing.”

He frowned, but he did not press her further, resolving instead to poke around later. Perhaps he would see whether the Shrine’s head Priestess’s tongue was as loose with information as it was with vulgarity once she’d properly indulged in her sake; he’d make certain she was well-stocked in advance.

Giyuu furtively glanced back at the shrine maiden’s profile, in part to see whether he could deduce anything from her expressions, but he found himself instead studying her, puzzling over a change in her appearance he hadn’t noticed before.

Sensing his stare, the Miko turned to him with a light smile that then faltered. “What –?”

“You changed your hair.” It took everything within him not to reach out, to see if her hair would feel as silky in his fingers as it looked shifting softly in the wind. “I’ve never seen it down.”

“Oh!” Her smile turned bashful, a pretty pink dusting spreading across her cheeks. “I wanted to wear my hairpin – see?”

She turned her head, the long curtain of her hair rippling smoothly with the movement. With her back to him, Giyuu could see the pin he’d given her neatly tucked into the long strands of her hair, pinning half of it back. The red of the pin’s maple leaves posed a lovely contrast with the hue of her hair.

Y/N was already quite beautiful, but with her hair partially down, he thought she looked softer; younger. She peeked over her shoulder at him, fingers nervously combing through her tresses. “It’s not practical for every day, of course, but I thought since you’d likely be arriving soon –”

His eyes widened and Giyuu became acutely aware that his heart now thumped wildly in his throat as Y/N choked off with a squeak, apparently realizing what she’d revealed. Though she hurriedly turned back around, Giyuu could see how the tips of her ears burned bright red.

Despite her efforts, her admission hung like a cloud in the air between them. She’d worn it – the hairpin – for him.

Giyuu swallowed thickly. “I like it.” He cleared his throat and turned, allowing his own unruly hair to obscure his face. “On you, that is.”

For once, the Miko had neither a quick remark nor barb to lob back at him. Instead, she only turned back to her task of grinding her herbs, a thick curtain of her hair concealing her face from his sight.

Once she'd finished bottling up her new medicinal salves, Giyuu helped her carry the tins to the Shrine's storage house, directly across the courtyard from its main wing. The shrine maiden remained curiously quiet, even in spite of his own lame attempts to converse with her. He'd finally given up after his dry comment about the weather went ignored. But every so often, he let his eyes wander to her as they returned to the honden, and that nagging feeling returned as he watched her gnaw incessantly at her bottom lip, a faraway look in her eyes.

Giyuu was not a nosy man, but the Miko's clear distraction unsettled him. He was about to pull her aside, to demand she tell him exactly what it was that had chased away the smile he so longed to see when they were approached by Y/N's haughty Master.

“Lord Tomioka,” the head Priestess nodded curtly at him in greeting. “I am glad to have run into you — I am in need of your assistance.”

The old Priestess turned to her young protégée. “Go assist the younger ones; they need to give their offerings before dinner.”

Y/N’s mouth opened to protest but the head Priestess cut her off. “Now.”

To his surprise, the shrine maiden did not argue with her Master, only turning to him to give him a helpless shrug before she began to make her way toward the Shrine’s honden.

The Water Pillar grimaced. He tried to convince himself the pit in his stomach was only because her odd behavior gnawed at him; that he was only curious to learn what it was that troubled her. But as the Miko cast one last, reluctant look over her shoulder at him, Giyuu found that he was as unwilling to watch her go as she was to leave.

If the Shrine’s head priestess noticed his inner anguish, she paid it no mind. “You will accompany me in the kitchen.”

—-

The first thing he noticed was the conspicuous absence of the scent of sake, which he’d grown accustomed to following the Priestess around like a pungent cloud of perfume. He resisted the urge to scowl; he would have to find another way to get the old woman to talk.

Giyuu followed the woman into the small structure that stood adjacent to the honden that served as the Shrine’s kitchen. He watched silently as she pulled a cleaver, large and deadly sharp, free from where it was stored in a cabinet and laid it atop a butcher’s block. The elder stepped outside of the kitchen and returned a moment later, a recently de-feathered and skinned chicken in hand.

“Things around here seem…tense,” Giyuu observed carefully as the old woman slapped the chicken on the counter for preparation.

“Tense is one word for it, I reckon,” she bit, taking up her cleaver. “The world we live in is dark. I should think you would know that better than most.”

The corner of his mouth dipped down. “But even your girls seem unusually subdued; distracted.”

Her eyes flashed to his, piercing and sharp. “You mean Y/N.”

It wasn’t a question.

“She is always restless this time of year,” the old woman sighed. “Though she loves autumn, she despises winter — or, rather, she despises how it reminds her of what she does not have. And winter is well on its way.”

He nodded, recalling what the shrine maiden had revealed to him that day, on the hillside.

“But your observation is correct — that is not all of the reason she is so distracted,” the old Priestess said darkly, and Giyuu was surprised to see how alert and focused the normally soused elder seemed. “A man from the village — Susumo — has been following her. Demanding her.”

Giyyu straightened. “What do you mean by ‘demand?’”

The haggard woman cursed below her breath as she broke down the chicken’s body. “I mean in the way that men often feel entitled to women — especially angry drunks like him.”

Every hair on Giyuu’s body stood straight as the weight of the Priestess’ warning settled.

“I have forbidden her from venturing out in the dark alone,” the Granny continued, harshly wrenching a joint on the fowl.

“She is a Priestess in training; surely that status affords her some protection?” Giyuu’s knuckles turned white where his fists clenched at his sides.

“I’m not sure the shrine is enough to keep him out for much longer. He’s been lingering — and threatening consequences, if I do not agree to hand her over to him for marriage.” The old Priestess grimaced. “Her status does her no good if he burns this place to the ground.”

The old woman set her cleaver next to her with a heavy thud, her frustration palpable. “The girl is of age, and I am not her blood family; there is no one here who can claim authority over her, not like a parent or an elder sibling.” When her eyes lifted to his, Giyuu could see a hint of fear underlying the hard anger in her gaze. “These days, I half-expect to awaken and find that she’s been stolen in the night.”

The Water Pillar felt his jaw clench. It was rare that he felt the burning flush of anger and it was not directed at a demon, but the idea that Y/N was being harassed and threatened by some village drunkard who felt entitled to her, lit something hot in his stomach. For as vexatious and confounding as he found the young Miko to be, no one deserved to be stalked like prey.

Especially her.

“I’ve had a crow stationed here to alert me of any demon attacks for months,” Giyuu began, and the old woman looked to him in surprise. “But I will assign more to keep watch during the day. If there is anything strange afoot, they will tell you.” He paused a moment before adding, “And they will alert me, too.”

The head Priestess laid down her cleaver to look at him, long and hard. “Then she may have a fighting chance yet, Lord Hashira.”

————-

By the time he found Y/N once more, dinner was over and the moon had risen high in the night sky, casting the shrine grounds in its pale, silvery glow.

He’d told her, rather tersely, that he was unable to stay the night, and he tried to ignore how his chest tightened at the crestfallen look that flashed across her face. Despite her tangible disappointment, she insisted on escorting him out of the Shrine, desperate to cling to every second that might be spared to them.

“You are rather quiet tonight,” the Miko observed, walking him to the grand Torii. “More so than usual.” It was an understatement; the Water Pillar had been downright sullen and withdrawn from the moment he’d returned from whatever takes Granny had insisted she help him with.

Rather than give her any explanation, Giyuu halted his step and reached for her wrist, stilling her. “You did not tell me you were being harassed.”

She looked up to the Water Pillar in surprise. “How did you —?”

He released her from his grip in favor of drawing closer to her. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Y/N opened and closed her mouth, struggling to find her words. “I suppose,” she began, but her mouth quirked down in a frown. “I did not think you needed to be burdened by something so insignificant.”

Giyuu stared at her as he mouthed the word insignificant, the look he shot her giving the distinct impression he thought her an idiot. “I do not think your safety is insignificant,” Giyuu’s hand drifted to the hilt of his sword, clenching it tight. “Nor do I think you are insignificant.”

“Compared to your other obligations? I should think I’m very unimportant.” Y/N turned away from him, fiddling with a gathering basket she carried on her hip to avoid having to look him in the eyes.

But the raven-haired Pillar caught her wrist and turned her back to face him, not willing to be ignored. “If you call for me, I will come to you.”

Y/N’s heart lurched at the Water Pillar’s words, spoken with such conviction and sincerity that it made her falter in her step. “Tomioka-san,” she said breathlessly, her eyes wide as she turned to him. “You have far more important duties to see to than to concern yourself with than mere village drama —“

But the raven-haired Hashira only shook his head as he took another step towards her, his expression severe; calculating. “You have the knife I gave you, yes?” His eyes dropped to her pocket, and Y/N felt compelled to show him that the small blade was indeed tucked safely within the folds of her hakama pants.

“Giyuu,” she pled, and she noted the way that he twitched towards her at the sound of his name falling from her lips. “Please, don’t worry —“

“I do not make promises I cannot keep,” the Water Pillar cut her off, closing the distance between them until the tips of his zori nearly grazed hers, his head bent down towards her as the heat of his stare threatened to consume her. “So I repeat: if you call for me, I will come to you.”

Any thought of arguing faded from her mind as Y/N became keenly aware of the lack of space between their bodies, of the way her hands, clasped in front of her chest brushed against the folds of his haori as it shifted softly with the wind.

“I understand,” she breathed. Y/N held his gaze for a long moment, though it was in part due to the battle waging within her not to allow her eyes to drop to his lips.

She would not let herself acknowledge how close they were; how soft they looked, or how warm they might feel against hers; her skin.

Giyuu lingered as well; after a pregnant pause, he finally stepped back, blinking as though coming out of a trance. “Good,” he nodded, and he glanced furtively over her shoulder. His eyes narrowed and he nodded as though satisfied before he turned crisply on his heel to begin his trek towards his duties and away from her. “Do not forget.” He called one last time over his shoulder, before the shadows of the woods swallowed him whole.

As Y/N dazedly made her way back towards the shrine, a crow following closely behind her, she almost laughed at the suggestion she could.

——-

Autumn, 1915

The weeks passed by without much fuss, and soon, the palpable tension that had settled over the Shrine as a result of Susumo’s lingering threats subsided. Soon, life at the Shrine returned to normal, and Y/N often found her mind wandering to thoughts of raven hair and endless blue eyes.

Until that night.

It had been a normal evening at the Shrine; autumn, blissful autumn had arrived, heralding forth crisp winds and golden skies. Though the days were steadily growing shorter, Y/N found herself rejuvenated by the new chill, especially as she watched the leaves of the trees shift from green to gold to ruby.

The leaves on her hairpin indeed had been a perfect match to those which were steadily drifting from the tall maples dotting the Shrine. Though she couldn’t wear her hair down the way she had the last time the Water Pillar paid the Shrine a visit, Y/N had found new ways to incorporate his gift into her daily life, weaving it through her plait or tucking it behind her ear.

That night had been one like any other; after dinner, the girls of the Shrine had scattered to tend to their evening duties. The shrine maiden had been walking alongside her Master, planning for the upcoming festival in the nearby village, during which the Shrine would seek new patrons to keep it operational. The women mulled over which families might be more inclined to assist them, and settled on a prominent merchant known to frequent other shrines on his travels through the country.

That was when they’d spotted the smoke.

“Fire!” A shrill voice cried, and both the old Priestess and Y/N blanched. “The honden is on fire!”

All at once, chaos broke out across the Shrine grounds as girls darted to and fro, frantic. Granny began barking at her charges, ordering the younger ones to gather in the courtyard while instructing the older girls to assist in putting out the flames.

"The granary!" Someone else cried. "The granary has gone up in flames!"

The elder Priestess snatched Y/N's wrist in her weathered hand. “The scrolls!” Granny's expression of horror was a sure match to her own. “They’re in the storeroom near the granary!”

The scrolls in question had been in the Shrine’s custody for over five hundred years, carrying sacred inscriptions of the gods and prayers essential to its operation and legitimacy.

They were priceless; irreplaceable.

“I’ll go!” And before her Master could protest, the Miko had already turned away and began sprinting toward the fire that was rapidly engulfing the granary near the back of the property.

Thankfully, the storeroom had yet to catch fire, but if the one steadily consuming the granary was not dealt with soon, it wouldn’t be long before it spread to consume the small wooden hut.

And Y/N knew it wouldn’t take much to reduce the storeroom to ash.

Coughing, she pressed her arm to her nose and mouth, using the large bell sleeve of her kosode to block some of the smoke that burned her eyes and nose. She pulled her other sleeve over her hand to protect it as she pushed the storehouse’s door aside.

Inside was dark; quiet. Though the nighttime made it difficult for her to see the scrolls and prints carefully rolled and tucked away into tiny cubbies lining the hut’s walls, Y/N wasn’t stupid enough to waste time searching for a candle to light. So, with only the flames eating away at the granary at her back to light her way, she began pulling handfuls of scrolls free from their storage, tucking them under her arm.

She turned to take her first armload of priceless Shrine artifacts from the storeroom and nearly tripped over a collection of heated coal pans that had been stacked in the corner to keep the scrolls sealed within the room at a stable temperature. She managed to hold onto her scrolls, however, and she quickly moved them away from the hut, placing them safely on a nearby rock that was still far enough away from the storeroom should it catch fire. She returned to the hut to survey what else she needed to salvage, but a familiar, tiny yelp and the flurry of movement in her periphery made the Miko’s stomach twist.

“Komatsu!” Y/N turned and saw the anxious younger girl lingering at the storage hut’s door, her tiny hands trembling. “Get away from here! It’s not safe!”

“B-but Sister,” the girl cried, hopping anxiously from foot to foot. “This is too much to do on your own —“

“You need to go find Granny,” the shrine maiden ordered. “I will join you in a moment.”

The girl’s lower lip wobbled. “But —,”

“Now!”

With a great sniff, the girl turned away, leaving Y/N alone once more. The Miko sighed and resumed her hasty perusal of the hut’s shelves, searching for anything else that could not be replaced.

There was a rustling near the doorway and Y/N bit her lip in an effort not to swear in front of her younger peer. “Komatsu, what did I say —“

She turned to admonish the girl, but her reprimand dried instantly on her tongue. For there, in the entryway to the storeroom, was Komatsu, her eyes wide and her face bone-white with a terror that matched Y/N’s own.

Because the girl was not alone.

Wrapped around her bicep was a hand, as large as a small boulder, and tipped with long, wicked claws that threatened to pierce Komatsu’s bicep. The hand was attached to a forearm, inhumanly thick and muscled. Slowly, Y/N’s eyes dragged up the length of the monstrous arm to behold the sinister face that grinned at her.

It was Susumo — only it wasn’t Susumo. Y/N recognized the vague features of the face that had once belonged to the village drunk and her personal tormentor. His hair was the same as was the general shape of his face, and the cruelty of his smirk, but that was where the resemblance to the Susumo she’d once known ended.

Now, he boasted a row of sharp fangs that distended nearly to his lower lip. And his eyes — no longer were they a cold, soulless black; now they were crimson red, and his pupils were cut into catlike slits.

Demon. A voice whispered in her mind. Demon.

“Enjoy my fires, Priestess?” Even Susumo’s voice had changed, forming a growl that matched his monstrous appearance. “I set them for you — I knew you would not be able to resist seeing such a spectacle.”

“Komatsu,” Y/N ignored him in favor of addressing the young girl, though her voice was unusually high though she fought to keep it as steady as possible. “Please go find Granny and help her with the honden.”

The young trainee trembled but Susumo’s clawed hand only tightened around her arm. “I’m afraid I can’t allow that, sweet Priestess,” the demon crooned. “You have something I want, you see.”

The slick, oily look in his eyes made his desire clear.

Y/N’s eyes darted quickly around the hut, finally falling on a series of coal pans stacked to the side of the room, only a few feet from where she stood, paralyzed. Her quick, cursory glance at the pans revealed iron that was slightly red, and she swore she could see the air around them distorted by the heat.

Hot; they were still hot.

The Miko looked back to where the demon continued to leer at her, ravenous. “Fine,” she said coolly. “I will go with you, Susumo.”

Komatsu looked between her and the demon in horror, but Y/N only kept her eyes locked with the demon’s. She edged closer to where the coal pans were still burning hot, eyes not daring to drop his as she drew closer to the demon and the younger trainee. He grinned, revealing cruelly sharp and bloodstained teeth, and his yellow eyes shone with a triumphant smugness, believing the Miko was surrendering to him at last.

As she brushed past the pans, Y/N furtively reached out a hand and closed her fingers around one of the handles. “Komatsu,” the Miko kept her eyes carefully trained on the demon. “Run.”

Her hand seized around the coal pan and with every ounce of her strength, she swung it toward the demon. The hot iron of the pan slammed into the side of his head, forcing him to drop his hold on the younger girl. There was a struggle between the older shrine maiden and the demon, who fought to wrench the pan free from her fierce grip, but Y/N would not relent.

“Run!” She shrieked at the girl again, and Komatsu darted away. Y/N’s fingers stretched to close around the tiny lever on the handle of the coal pan, and with a snarl of fury, she managed to latch around it, squeezing it with all her might. The lid of the pan opened and red-hot coals spilled forth over the demon’s head. Susumo howled in fury, and Y/N dropped the pan, letting it crack against his head as she shot past him, desperate to escape the tiny storeroom.

The faster she got into open air, the better chance she had of living.

But a claw, sharp and deadly sunk into her bicep, and yanked her back. She could not help the small scream that tore from her throat as she felt his talons rip at her skin and the sleeve of her kosode was shredded into ribbons beneath his nails.

“Sister Y/N!” Komatsu’s tiny, terrified voice cried out from several feet ahead.

The shrine maiden swallowed her building panic. “Go!”

The little girl hesitated again and Y/N knew she could not follow after her, not without risking her safety once again. With a defiant scream of rage, the shrine maiden tore her arm free of the demon’s razor-like claws, fighting back the bile that rose in her throat as she felt blood run down her arm, hot and thick.

The demon grasped wildly at her but found only air. Thinking only of the safety of Komatsu and her fellow trainees, Y/N turned on her heel and ran for the trees, away from the chaos unfolding at the Shrine.

And the demon, still snarling and panting and undoubtedly enraged, followed her into the forest.

Shit, shit, shit!

Y/N hurtled over a snarled root as she ran, her life dependent upon every stride as she fled the newly-demented Susumo.

In the back of her mind, the Miko knew her efforts were in vain; because for every inch she managed to gain, the angry demon at her heels seemed to gain a foot.

“You’ve denied me for far too long!” The monster’s voice growled behind her, far too close for comfort. “I will have you!”

Y/N palmed the small nichirin knife tucked safely within the deep pockets of her hakama pants, and wildly she wondered whether it was possible to decapitate a demon with such a small blade. Perhaps the Water Pillar should have left her a sword. After all, a sword could not really be that different from a broom, and she’d walloped her fair share of handsy drunkards and would-be thieves with the cleaning tool.

If she lived through the night, she would tell him as much the next time she saw him.

Y/N’s musings did nothing to help her avoid the root of an old tree that jutted out from the earth, snarling around her ankle and sending her flailing to the forest floor. Angry tears of frustration clouded her eyes. Although she knew these paths like the back of her hand, that knowledge did her little good in the dark, as she fled for her life.

Scrambling up to her feet, Y/N caught sight of a pair of eyes watching her from the brambles, dark and inky.

A crow. The image of a certain Hashira flashed before her eyes, as Y/N recalled the way that the members of the Demon Slayer Corps used crows to communicate.

Perhaps this crow was so affiliated, and she was desperate enough to try. “Please!” Y/N begged, sobbing as the crow stared down at her with those black eyes. “Giyuu!”

———

The night had been unusually peaceful for the Water Pillar.

His ambling patrol around his territory’s perimeter hadn’t revealed so much as a whisper of demonic activity. But the absence of any conspicuous threat did not mean his guard was down; his eyes remained sharp, his ear finely tuned, listening for any shift in the wind, any sign that something was amiss and required investigation —

A sudden rustle of leaves sounded from his right, and Giyuu’s hand moved reflexively for his blade, bracing against its hilt in preparation. A small shadow burst from the canopy above him, its wings flapping wildly. He recognized it instantly as the crow he’d assigned to watch over the Shrine — to watch over her.

“Demon attack at the Mountain Shrine!” The crow squawked, circling above him frantically. “Demon attack! Go now — quickly!”

He hadn’t hesitated to turn sharply on his heel, furiously making his way toward the Shrine. He broke through the line of trees at its edge in record time, and even he’d been taken aback by the chaos that had broken out.

“The honden is on fire!” the old woman cried out to the Pillar as he swiftly landed among the chaos unfolding across the shrine grounds. “The girls were still doing their evening duties – but then another fire was started near the granary!”

“My crows said a demon had made an appearance,” Giyuu’s eyes carefully scanned the terrified, frantic faces of the Shrine’s residents, his hands braced against the hilt of his sword. “Has anyone been hurt?”

The head Priestess stared at the Water Pillar in muted horror. “I have not seen – but I haven’t taken any headcount of the girls to know –”

A piercing cry from near the south gate of the Shrine cut the old woman off, and both Priestess and Slayer whipped toward the sound. A girl, no more than nine, was half-running, half-stumbling toward them, frightened tears streaking down her face.

“Komatsu!” the old Priestess blanched as she caught sight of the small apprentice’s busted, bloodied lip. With a sob, the young girl flung herself into her elder’s arms and clung tightly to her. “What on earth –?”

“Sister Y/N!” the girl called Komatsu wailed, and Giyuu felt himself go cold. “Granny – th-that man – he’s a monster!”

The head Priestess paled in recognition. “Susumo?” Giyuu’s gut clenched at the name. The old woman knelt before the girl, her hands clutching wildly at her slim shoulders as she shook her lightly to recenter her. “Komatsu, was Susumo the monster?”

The young girl nodded. “He was so – hiccup – fast! I didn’t even see him!” She only cried harder. “And t-then Sister Y/N – she grabbed the coal pan and dumped it on him until he let go.” Komatsu trembled as she lifted a shaking hand to wipe at her cheeks. “A-and then she t-told me to r-run –”

THe old Priestess caught the girl’s quivering chin in her hand and forced her to meet her eyes. “Where is Y/N, Komatsu?”

Komatus’s eyes were wide with fear. “She ran,” she whispered. “Into the woods – b-but Granny – she was bleeding –”

The Shrine’s Priestess turned to the Slayer, ready to beg him to follow after the demon and her apprentice, but the Water Pillar was gone. For a brief moment, she feared all hope was lost; that they’d been abandoned and non one would be able to save the young Miko – her heir – from whatever horrid fate awaited her at the ends of Susumo’s crazed, brutal claws.

She caught a flurry of movement right against the dark line of trees that snagged her attention; a flap of the edge of a mismatched haori, and the glint of a blade being drawn, its wielder already furiously making his way into the shadowy depths of the forest.

The Priestess exhaled and clutched her trembling young trainee to her chest. As she soothed the shaken young girl, the old woman prayed the Water Pillar would not be too late.

–

She was fucked; well and truly fucked.

Y/N had no idea how long she’d spent sprinting furiously through the forest, but she knew she was quickly running out of stamina. Worse, it seemed the demon on her heels knew she was slowing, and was now playing with her. But even his patience seemed to be at its wit’s end; for a sudden sharp blow to her back sent the Miko flying several feet forward until she slammed against the uneven, rough terrain of the forest floor.

Y/N gasped for air that would not come as she tried to push herself up. Crawl! Her mind begged her body. Crawl, damn you!

A dark chuckle from behind sent every hair on her body standing straight on end. A hand locked around her ankle and flipped her over until she was nearly nose to nose with the demon crouched over her. “Got you,” he sang, and the moonlight glinted off the sharp edge of his fangs as he grinned.

Her fingers found the handle of the knife the Water Pillar had gifted her in her pocket. With a determined grunt, she pulled it free and plunged it deep into the meat of his shoulder, praying furiously to any god who would listen that she might have hit an artery so that he would bleed out.

The demon loosed an enraged scream and fell away from her, hands blindly fumbling for the blade.

No longer pinned beneath him, Y/N scrambled back. Her hands scraped against the broken brush and pebbles below her in her desperate attempt to put distance between herself and the demon rising to his feet ahead of her, snarling. As he began advancing toward her, Susumo gripped the knife she’d buried in his shoulder and with a grunt, he wrenched it free and tossed it carelessly to the side, right along with the last shred of any hope she’d had of making it out of the woods alive.

The demon’s mouth curled into a cruel, savage grin, the moonlight glinting off his long, wicked fangs. “I’m going to enjoy this,” he growled, saliva dripping down his chin as his nostrils widened to scent her blood and her fear.

This was it; there was nowhere for her to run, no weapon she could try and protect herself with. There was nothing she could do; she was going to die, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.

Just as Susumo drew upon her, close enough that she could smell the rancid, pungent odor of rotted meat on his breath, he stumbled back, startled.

One moment the demon was standing mere inches from her, ready to devour her whole; the next, he was sent sailing back, his body smashing into the trunk of a nearby tree with a sickening thump!

A blur of dark matter soared over the Miko’s head toward the monster. Susumo barely had time to stand before the shadow converged on him once more. There was a flash of light — the moon reflecting off metal — followed by a dull thud. The shrine maiden’s heart lodged in her throat as she watched the head of the former village drunkard roll across the forest floor before distingrating, his body following soon after.

She was nearly hyperventilating as the shadow turned to face her, but the pall of the moon finally illuminated the face of her savior — her Water Pillar.

“G-Giyuu,” she stuttered, her eyes stinging with unshed tears of relief that washed over her all at once.

But Giyuu did not respond, his lapis eyes narrowing in on the dark stain spreading across the white of her kosode. Y/N cowered at the cold, unbridled rage that contorted the ordinarily stoic Hashira’s face as he began to shake at the sight of her blood. In a flash, Giyuu had closed the distance between them and knelt down by her side, gripping her wounded arm in his hand as he tried to pull her tattered sleeve down and inspect her wound.

“Tomioka — Giyuu,” she pled, trying to wrench her arm from his iron-like grip. “Please, it’s not that bad —“

“Did it get you anywhere else?” Giyuu demanded harshly, and the authority underlying his tone made Y/N fall silent for the first time since she’d known him. “Did it -“ the Water Pillar hesitated. “Did it touch you anywhere else?”

Y/N was trembling, and the Hashira’s hand around her arm tightened. “Ah!” She winced. “No, I promise, Giyuu, it’s just a flesh wound, I’m fine-,”

“You are bleeding. You are not fine.” Giyuu snapped back. “You could’ve been killed, or turned, or -,” the Water Pillar began to hyperventilate, and it shook the young Miko to her core. The Water Hashira was normally so unflappable, so stoic, that his panicked anger frightened her.

“-So do not tell me you’re fine,” Giyuu’s rant continued. “Not when you could’ve — not when I might’ve failed — not again --”

She was at a loss for what to do as she watched the raven-haired man struggle to form words. Vaguely, she recalled the way the Granny-Priestess had once explained to her that when someone panicked, they needed to regulate their breathing, and there were many ways someone could help force another to breathe properly…

Stomach fluttering, Y/N’s free hand came up to grip the fold of the Water Pillar’s haori. Giyuu’s incessant rambling only ended when her lips urgently pressed against his own, his eyes going wide. A heartbeat or two passed and then the Miko pulled away, her eyes serious as she stared at the stunned Water Hashira.

“You need to give me a sword.” She told him, earnestly, her face blazing.

———

Giyuu helped her back to the Shrine, though the Miko found herself needing to bat off the Water Pillar with a stern reminder that she’d only sustained a small arm wound as he’d tried to scoop her up into his arms.

The Swordsman had been rather subdued the entire journey out of the forest, his eyes curiously wide and dazed right until the pair breached the tree line at the edge of the Shrine’s property. The moment they stepped into open ground, they were swarmed by the tearful, relieved faces of the Shrine’s inhabitants. Words of gratitude to him were woven through worries over the Miko’s arm wound as they made their way across toward the small infirmary which, thankfully, had not been touched by Susumo’s fire.

The honden itself was still standing; though the flames had finally been subdued, smoke still curled up toward the sky, blocking any view of the moon or the stars.

The head Priestess waited for them outside the infirmary. Though her face was grave, Giyuu could spy the relief shining in her eyes. He stood numbly by as the Miko and her master regarded each other warily for a moment, before the elder Priestess reached forward and yanked her charge forward into a fierce embrace.

“Reckless girl,” she chastised gently against the side of Y/N’s head. “Thank every one of the gods that you’re safe.” The old Priestess’s eyes found those of the Water Pillar. “And thank you, Lord Tomioka.”

Y/N was promptly escorted inside to have her wound examined and stitched. Despite the old shrine keeper’s gratitude for his aid in saving the young shrine maiden, that thankfulness apparently did not extend to permitting him inside the infirmary with them, and for good reason. For under the Elder’s withering glare, the Water Pillar realized that Y/N’s treatment would require her to be stripped of her kosode, leaving her exposed and bare.

As unwilling as he’d been to part from her, the thought of witnessing the Miko undressed and vulnerable had been enough to temper his urge to look after her, if nothing else because the mental image of her in such a state flustered him to no end.

Though, he supposed his bewilderment also had something to do with what had transpired between them in the forest.

Kissed him; the shrine maiden had kissed him.

His fingers drifted to his lips. They still felt warm where they’d been graced by hers, and he swore he could still feel the softness of her mouth from where it had brushed against his.

He needed to talk to her; he needed to know what the hell she’d been thinking, kissing him like that.

But as shocking as the Miko’s kiss had been, there was something else, something far heavier, that weighed on his mind.

She’d nearly been killed. By a demon. On his watch.

He should’ve apologized; he should’ve begged for her forgiveness for letting her come that close with death. For letting her get wounded because he hadn’t been fast enough.

I was concerned for you, he wanted to tell her. I thought I would be too late.

No; concern didn’t cover it; did not do near enough justice to his true emotions upon learning the Miko had fled into the dark forest with a hungry, loathsome demon hot on her trail.

He’d been scared; terrified; almost beside himself at the possibility that he’d be too late and find that she’d already been reduced to the beast’s meal,

He’d been scared he’d never again see her smile or hear her laugh, and that had terrified him more than anything. For it was the memory of both that soothed his anxious nerves each time he startled awake from visions of his dead loved ones, demanding to know why they had died in his stead.

He’d feared that he would have to add her face to those he saw when he slept — the faces of those he’d failed to protect, who’d died for his sake. He’d been terrified of seeing her image in painstaking clarity, just as he saw the faces of his sister and Sabito every morning.

He did not know what to do with them, these confusing feelings, so abundant and intense that they’d welled up within him and threatened to spill over. He couldn’t name them, let alone begin to untangle the knot they’d formed within his heart. All he knew was that every one of them were inextricably tied to her.

His shrine maiden.

His.

—

Y/N’s arm ached, but it had been properly sewn and bandaged, and there was work to do before she could settle in for the night; and so, she found herself helping her peers with cleaning up the courtyard from the debris of the night’s events.

Truthfully, she'd been grateful for the distraction. Occupying herself with cleanup meant she did not have to think about what she’d done in the forest. But then Granny Priestess saw her trying to heave away broken wood with her freshly stitched arm and Y/N found herself forced to abandon her fellow trainees as the old bat smacked her upside the head and squawked about how she was going to break her stitching and complicate the healing process.

The Miko tried not to pout as she retreated, opting instead to grumble over the old woman’s dramatics as her arm stung and her ego throbbed. When she finally returned to her sleeping quarters, exhaustion slammed into her, making her limbs heavy and leaden. Unable to quite rally the energy to crawl into her futon, she slumped against the doorway of the room, her head and her heart a tangled mess of emotions she couldn’t quite name.

What she’d felt the moment the Water Pillar had stepped into the moonlight had been more than mere relief that he’d managed to save her life for the second time. She’d felt safe, so unbelievably safe that the forest itself could have been on fire and she wouldn’t have been afraid; not as long as he was there with her.

Something between them had shifted; that much was clear. In truth, things likely had begun to change the moment she repaired his haori, and she’d admitted to him her deep-seated loneliness and lack of belonging.

She only hoped he felt the change, too.

—

Much to Y/N’s chagrin, autumn was quickly giving way to blasted winter.

Though, the Miko hadn’t been able to fully resent the rapid shift in the seasons; repairs at the Shrine had consumed nearly all of her attention, and as Granny’s heir, she was expected to contribute to its reconstruction more than any other trainee.

That expectation meant Granny left the task of figuring out how to finance the necessary repairs entirely to her young protege. Y/N had spent all of two days agonizing over ways to raise the necessary funds when she awoke to find a mysterious sack of money that had been left on the doorstep of the honden. Inside had been an amount more than generous to cover the cost of repairs from the fire, with a hefty remainder that could be put toward other necessary improvements to spruce the Shrine up, and perhaps restore it to its former glory.

No note had been left with the money to indicate the identity of the Shrine’s benefactor. But amid all the excitement of her peers at the thought of being able to afford materials and laborers to assist with the more difficult aspects of the Shrine’s refurbishment, Y/N had spotted a familiar crow perched high in a nearby tree.

That position had afforded the bird with a perfect view of the money sack, allowing it to silently ensure it fell into the proper hands. But repairs had finally slowed, and Y/N now found her days returning to normal. Almost.

What was not normal was how agitated she'd become in waiting for his return.

Another week passed without any communication from the Water Pillar, and the Miko had grown desperate for any sort of distraction. She found herself one late, autumn morning passing the time in the Shrine’s garden hut. She was pretending to be searching for tools that would help her prune the wilting Shrine garden when something grazed against the small of her back. Startled, she turned and was greeted by familiar, unruly raven hair and a pair of deep azure eyes.

“Giyuu,” his name slid easily off her tongue, and suddenly she could not remember why she’d called him anything else.

A ghost of a smile graced his lips. “Hello, Y/N.”

A poignant silence followed, and her cheeks grew hot. "Don't mind me," she said quickly, turning her head away from him as she pretended to organize stray gardening supplies. "I am only just now finishing my tasks for the day."

Though he remained silent, she became acutely aware of the way Giyuu’s eyes followed her as she tried desperately to keep herself busy, to avoid having to meet that piercing, discerning stare.

“I did not get a chance to properly thank you after the turmoil of that night,” she said casually. Nervously, she hoped that his heightened senses did not alert him to the way her heart fluttered in her chest, or how her stomach flipped in her gut. Her nails dug into her palms as she lifted her head to meet that unnerving, fathomless stare.

But the Water Pillar had already closed most of the distance between them, having moved so silently she’d not heard him, despite even the creaky, uneven slatted floor of the garden hut. “How is your wound?” He asked softly, his hand skirting up the outside of the arm Susumo had wounded. “Has it healed?”

It took a great amount of effort for Y/N to remember how to keep her breathing steady. But she forced her lips into an easy smile as she rucked up the flared sleeve of her kosode to reveal her bicep. “It will likely scar,” she admitted, her fingers lightly tracing over the three, angry red marks that remained imprinted on her skin, though they’d fully scabbed over. “I consider myself quite lucky, all things considered.”

“Why did you do it?”

The Miko ducked her head, willing the sheet of her hair to fall and conceal her mounting blush. She did not need to ask him to clarify; she knew after what he was asking.

But she feigned ignorance all the same. “I don’t know what you mean, Tomioka-sama –”

“Don’t call me that,” and even though she refused to meet his eyes, she could sense his irritation at her avoidance. “We’re well past such formalities, Y/N.” Giyuu stepped closer to her, his cerulean eyes melting into something more akin to the midnight blue of the evening sky. “You kissed me. That night.” The Water Pillar’s hand glided up the arm that Susumo had injured, caressing softly over the healed skin beneath the sleeve of her kosode.

“I-I did no such thing!” Y/N sputtered, though her reddening cheeks betrayed her. “I was only attempting to help you calm down — you were panicking, and inconsolable.”

Giyuu’s responding smirk only served to irritate her more. “Should I thank you then, Y/N?” His hand slid from her shoulder to below her chin, his delicate fingers curling to tilt her head up towards his, as he closed the distance between their bodies. “Should I show you how grateful I am that you were able to assuage my worry?”

Y/N tried to focus on anything but the feeling of Giyuu’s breath — warm and enticing — against her face as he leaned in close. “You had no reason to worry; I was completely fine before you showed up.”

“Fine,” the ravenette scoffed, his grip on her chin tightening slightly. “So fine that you were bleeding and about to become that beast’s snack — or worse.”

“But you saved me, did you not?” Y/N whispered, unable to stop her eyes from dropping to the Water Pillar’s sensual, soft-looking mouth before rising once more to meet his punishing gaze. “And then I helped you.”

Giyuu’s second hand brushed against her waist and the shrine maiden thought she might leap out of her skin. “You did,” he conceded, the corner of his mouth quirking up in a small, half-smile. “Though I apologize that you needed to do so — I suppose I become a little over-zealous when things that are precious to me are threatened.”

Even if she could have thought of some witty remark to throw back at him, those words surely would have been blocked by her heart as it lodged in her throat.

Things that were precious to him. She was precious to him.

“So I’ll ask again, Y/N,” Giyuu whispered, and his nose brushed delicately against hers. “Should I thank you for your assistance?” The fingers beneath her chin stroked her jaw. “Should I kiss you?”

She fought to suppress the excited shudder that licked up her spine. “Yes, Lord Hashira,” she breathed, and her stomach turned cartwheels as Giyuu’s gaze dropped to her mouth. “Perhaps you should.”

“Who am I to deny the request of a priestess?” Giyuu murmured, and then his lips were moving against hers, warm and soft. Y/N’s fingers flew to clutch the Water Pillar’s rocky biceps beneath the soft cloth of his haori, anchoring him against her. The hand that had gripped below her chin slid to the side of her face, tilting her head so that the Water Pillar could have better access to her as he pressed his lips harder against hers.

Y/N moaned into his kiss, wanting him closer, impossibly closer to her than he currently was.

Giyuu broke away from her once, though he kept a hand on the back of her neck to keep her in place. “What are your duties today?”

Y/N’s fingers curled around the front of the Water Pillar’s haori, her forehead resting against his. “None of import.” She gave him a sly smile. “No one will miss me if I am gone for a few hours.”

Giyuu returned her smile with a tiny smirk of his own. “In that case,” he tugged her hand and he began to lead her towards the grassy overlook where they’d spent a great deal of time talking and learning one another. “I could use your assistance.”

–

Y/N hadn’t greeted the sunrise with the intent to neglect her shrine duties, but she couldn’t say she regretted how she ended up spending the day.

They spent the day resting on the hillside overlooking the shrine grounds, rolling back and forth upon the browning grass as they kissed each other again and again.

“You weren’t wrong, that day — right after we met,” Giyuu gasped against her lips as they broke apart, the blush on Y/N’s cheeks a sure match to his own. “I do not find you captivating.”

Y/N’s eyebrows furrowed. Her mouth parted, a protest on her tongue when Giyuu surged forward, his lips brushing against her neck. The Miko’s words choked off with a squeak as the Water Pillar danced his lips to the hollow of her throat, his tongue flicking out once right where her heart pulsed wildly.

“I think you are utterly transfixing; enchanting,” he breathed against her skin. “You have cast a spell over me that I do not want broken.”

“I find it hard to believe anyone could wield that sort of power over a Hashira,” Y/N’s voice was high pitched as Giyuu’s lips made their way back to hers.

In the back of her mind, Y/N wondered if his words were motivated purely by his physical desire for her. It would not have surprised her if he was only so taken with her because he longed to be touched; held. Like him, she’d gone much of her life without intimacy from anyone. She could not blame him for seeking it from someone so willing to give as she.

“But you are not just anyone, not to me.” was all he replied, his lips moving softly against hers once more. “You are…everything.”

Y/N’s breath caught in her throat. The Water Pillars words, dripping like honey from his lips, were only sweetened by the fervent sincerity of his eyes as he pulled back to gaze into hers, so deeply, she felt as though he could see every thought in her head.

She wondered if he lowered that piercing, discerning stare, whether he’d be able to see straight to her heart, too; see how it bore his name.

Even though her breath guttered in her throat at his words, her heart clenched painfully in her chest. The idea that she’d attached more meaning to their relationship than he, that perhaps she’d overestimated her value to him made her tense, made her want to push him away and —

“You’re distracted,” Giyuu murmured against her lips, brushing his nose against hers. “Your thoughts are loud.”

Her fingers caught the front fold of his haori, fiddling idly with it. “There is nothing for you to repay, you know. You do not owe me your time or your attention. I know the Shrine is simply a part of your designated patrol. I understand if its convenience is the only reason —”

A single finger pressed itself against her lips, quieting her. “You think and talk too much.” The ravenette chastised. Her mouth parted, a protest forming on her lips, when he cut her off again. “Ah ah,” Giyuu silenced her with his lips, his tongue flicking out to skim along her bottom lip. Above her, he shifted and allowed his weight to fall against her, pinning her beneath him. Reluctantly, his mouth broke away from hers. “It is my turn to speak.”

“I do not come to the Shrine because it is easy,” Giyuu’s lips brushed hesitantly against her jaw. “Nor do I come here out of any preconceived obligation to repay your kindness.”

He pulled back to study her, panting and flushed beneath him. As his eyes slowly combed over her, Y/N felt a strange knot pull and twist in the depths of her stomach. “There is only one thing that brings me back here, no matter how exhausted I am after weeks of endless missions; no matter how often certain junior Corps members pester me to train them.” His eyes narrowed at the hollow of the Miko’s throat, exposed by the way her kosode had shifted as the pair of them rolled around the grass. Curious, Giyuu leaned down and pressed his lips firmly against it.

And then he did the unthinkable; the Water Pillar moaned, ever so softly, against the fluttering of Y/N’s frantic pulse. The sound, so rich and full of need – of want – washed over her and drowned out all other thoughts, all other higher reasoning from her mind. INstead, the Miko was left with nothing but the sharp urge to press her thighs together, an unknown heat beginning to pool in her most sacred area.

“Do you know what that thing is, Y/N?” He whispered against the soft dip in her throat, his breath hot as it fanned across her skin. “Can you guess what it is I cannot stay away from – could not, even if I desired otherwise?”

His fingers dropped to the collar of her kosode, tracing lightly over its crisp, white fold. “When I close my eyes in the mornings, it is your face I see,” he murmured. “It is your laugh I hear in my dreams; your scent I find myself longing for when I awaken.”

The Miko shivered as his index finger traced from her collar up her throat, over her chin until it came to rest on her bottom lip, gently stroking over its curve. “It is you I seek to turn to remind myself that there is still good in this world – good still worth protecting. Why is that, Y/N?” His eyebrows furrowed and he seemed almost earnest in his question. “Why is it that my mind refuses to be occupied by anything but you?”

“Because I vex you,” she said softly, eyes wide and locked with his. “Because, try as you might, you’ve never been able to fully fit me into a box as you have with others.”

Giyuu shook his head. “Vex me?” He tsked at her. “Perhaps once that was true. But now? I desire you in ways I can hardly understand, and it drives me mad.”

Her breath hitched in her throat. “What are you saying?”

“I think I’ve been rather clear,” and instinctively, Giyuu rolled his hips against hers, desperate to relieve some of the friction mounting in his groin. “And it’s that I want –”

But the Miko did not get to hear what Giyuu wanted; not as he was drowned out by the screeching cry of a bird from high above. Only, this bird was not the dull, graying crow she’d come to associate with her Swordsman.

“I thought your crow was older?”

The Water Pillar frowned as he turned to look up, his eyebrows drawn together. “That’s not Kanzaburo — that’s one of the Master’s —“

“CAW,” the bird circled above their heads in narrow, rapid turns. “Lord Tomioka! Return to headquarters immediately!”

Giyuu’s jaw clenched. “Can it not wait?”

Y/N, however, only gaped up at the bird flying above them. “It talks —?”

But the crow only cried again, “Emergency meeting at headquarters!!

With a short, frustrated exhale, Giyuu rolled to the side of the Miko and rose, but not before he extended a hand and helped lift her to her feet.

He gingerly brushed some loose grass from her hair. “I’m sorry.”

She only shook her head as she reached to adjust his haori, righting it in his shoulders. “It’s your duty, Giyuu. I understand that.”

He scowled back up at the bird still circling above them, bleating a refrain of “Emergency! Go now!”

“I’m not finished with this conversation,” Giyuu said plainly, a frustrated hand working through his hair. Though his annoyance was plain as day, it fell away as he looked back to the Miko at his side, his gaze softening. “Nor am I finished with you.”

A single finger reached under Y/N’s chin and lifted her head toward him so he could brush another kiss against her lips. “I will come see you – soon.”

With a shy boldness, the Miko rose on her toes and gave him one final kiss, and Giyuu’s hand tightened where it rested against her waist. “I’ll wait for you, Lord Hashira.”

———

December, 1915

Y/N cursed at the ancient priestess who insisted on using only gas-powered lanterns rather than the newer, much safer, electric powered lights that other shrines had begun using.

“We are an esteemed shrine dating back hundreds of years,” the old crone had simpered, “Tradition has kept us going this far!”

Y/N hadn’t helped her cause by asking whether tradition or spite was what kept the hag from dying off and finally leaving her in peace.

And that was how the young Priestess-to-be found herself stomping through the snowy grounds of the Shrine, forced to light each and every lantern by hand using a match and oil, utterly by herself.

She knew better than to levy such an obvious taunt at the old woman, but admittedly, Y/N hadn’t been in the best of moods as of late.

Giyuu had not returned since that day on the hillside, when he’d kissed her silly and told her he could not stop thinking of her. It was as though he no longer existed; even the crows at the Shrine were no more, having all disappeared one morning before she’d awoken.

As the weeks passed, the weight of his absence had grown heavier, threatening to beat her into the ground below.

But Y/N had done her best to hold her tongue over the last weeks as her anxiety mounted, and Granny should’ve known that — so really, it was her own fault if she’d taken offense to the Miko’s barb.

She grumbled and cursed under her breath as she trudged toward the small garden hut standing at the furthest edge of the Shrine’s grounds — her last stop of the night. She shoved past the old, rickety door and braced her merrily flickering, hand-held lantern out before her, bathing the small hut in a warm, orange glow.

All was silent and quiet within the small storeroom. The air was cold, though the slatted walls of the hut offered some protection from the howling, snow-dotted winds outside. Determined to complete her task and return to the comfort of her warm futon, the Miko fumbled around one of the store shelves for a small can of oil.

“It’s you,” a quiet voice startled her from behind, and Y/N nearly dropped the lantern clutched in her hands.

But she did not feel afraid as she recognized the calm, soothing cadence of the voice, that voice that belonged to the one person capable of making her blush.

The one person who held her heart.

“It’s been a while, Giyuu. I was wondering when I’d see you again.” She turned and saw the raven-haired man standing in the doorway of the garden hut, his face characteristically neutral, though he seemed tense, even more so than usual.

Instantly, she moved toward him. “What’s wrong?”

His eyes tightened, and the darkness which swam within them betrayed his aloof facade. “Things have changed quickly in my world,” he began, and she saw his fists clench at his sides. “We believe the demons are preparing for war — and so we have been as well.

“War?” She repeated softly, her step faltering. “I hadn’t realized the demons were so…organized.”

Giyuu nodded. “One creature is responsible for all demons. He is the orchestrator; he is the one we must kill, and we believe the opportunity to do so is drawing nearer.”

The monotonous cadence of his voice fell away as he quietly added, “That is why I haven’t been able to return — we’ve been training. This battle — it may start at any moment.”

He made like he wanted to say more, but he stopped himself, pressing his lips into a tight line.

“And?” She prompted gently, taking a solitary step toward him.

“He hesitated, and she spied how his throat worked to swallow. “And I do not know when I will be able to see you again. After tonight.”

Y/N watched him for a moment, her eyes searching his. “When you say you don’t know ‘when’ we will see each other again,” she began, cautiously. “Do you mean ‘if?’”

Giyuu’s answering silence said more than any words could.

For a moment, the Miko could not remember how to speak, not as she felt the organ in her chest splinter into a thousand, mismatched pieces.

“I just wanted to see you,” the Water Pillar struggled to swallow around the growing lump in his throat. “One last time.”

She could scarcely breathe.

He was leaving and he might never return.

Leaving to go try and put an end to the scourge of demons that plagued their world. It was a noble thing to do; sacrifice in its purest form.

But she hated it.

She was filled with such a deep melancholy that it nearly brought her to her knees. As the Water Pillar turned to leave, Y/N couldn’t stop herself as she reached for him, her arms encircling him as her hands locked over his front, stilling him.

“Giyuu,” she said thickly, her face pressed into the back of his haori as she willed the tears in her eyes not to fall. “Giyuu.”

He turned in her grasp and looked down at her in awe, a finger rising to brush the errant tear that had escaped down her cheek as he held her gaze.

The flame within her lantern flickered as Giyuu softly grazed his lips against her own, Y/N’s arms weaving around his neck to hold him close to her.

His hands were gentle, if not a little uncertain as they found her waist, but once they came to a rest against her, he pulled her close, arms winding around her middle and holding her securely against him as he deepened the kiss. She moaned softly into his mouth, her hands tangling in his hair as she opened up for him, his tongue gliding alongside her own until she was left breathless and wanting.

Vaguely, the Miko was aware that he was walking them deeper into the garden hut, allowing the old door to thud shut behind him, and the thought of not returning to her plush futon suddenly did not seem like such a loss.

Giyuu’s hands returned to her face, thumbs stroking softly along her cheeks as he broke their kiss to brush his lips against her eyes, her nose, and forehead. Y/N’s hands parted the Water Hashira’s haori from his shoulders as Giyuu’s fingers dropped to her collar bone, sliding beneath her kosode, and grazing her bare shoulder.

“You have been my most treasured encounter,” he whispered, and she felt her heart seize in her throat, tears threatening to spill anew from her eyes.

A year’s worth of interactions had all led to this moment, but it was not the satisfying payoff of the tension and longing that had been steadily building between them.

This was a goodbye.

Because it was likely that the Water Pillar would not survive the impending battle; but neither did he want to leave this end untied.

She had known, deep in her heart, that this affair had been doomed before it had ever begun, but that hadn’t stopped her from falling for the kind, brave, selfless man now kissing her like she was his entire world anyways.

She would not get to have him in the morning, so she resolved to give herself to him for the night.

Giyuu’s hands eased her kosode from her shoulders, exposing her to the cool air within the garden hut. His warm hands, however, worked to chase away any chill that spread across her skin as he ran his palms over the curve of her shoulders before sliding down to rest on her bare waist, his long fingers grazing just below the curve of her breasts.

Her own fingers trembled as she fumbled with the buttons on his uniform shirt but in time, she’d worked them open and Giyuu broke their kiss long enough to let his shirt drop to the floor beneath them.

The two stood there for a moment, chests rising and falling rapidly, as they looked at one another, half-nude and vulnerable. The shrine maiden and the slayer knew that they had come upon a precipice, and if they stepped off that ledge, there would be nothing to break their fall.

Y/N made the first move, taking a tentative step towards the Water Pillar as she trailed her fingers lightly up the beautiful, sculpted ridges of his abdomen, relishing how warm he was beneath her touch.

Giyuu shivered beneath her fingertips as the miko’s hand came to a rest against his sternum, marveling the way his heart thundered beneath her hand. “Are you certain?” He breathed, his face was impassive, but his own uncertainty was betrayed by the slight tremor in his voice. His hand rose to gently cup the side of her face, his thumb ghosting over her bottom lip.

She reached to grab the Pillar’s free hand and brought it up to rest against her sternum, mirroring her own hold on him so that he could feel the steady drum of her own heart — and how it thrummed for him. “Yes,” she whispered. “I’m yours, Giyuu.”

Once, she had believed the Hashira incapable of expressing anything other than cold aloofness. she’d not been able to comprehend the subtle ways with which his eyes could signal his mood; how they darkened when angry, or how the outer corners turned up, almost imperceptibly, when he was content.

But she had long since learned to read him, and so, her stomach fluttered at the way the raven haired man’s gaze heated with both adoration and desire — for her.

Giyu brushed his nose against hers affectionately before bringing their lips together once more, his kiss growing fervent as her hands slid up to tangle in his ebony hair. Y/N gasped into his mouth as she felt Giyu bend down, his hands gripping firmly under her thighs as he lifted her up, forcing her to lock her legs around his waist. Her lips parted, and Giyuu’s tongue slid seamlessly into her mouth.

Her lover locked one steely arm firmly around her lower back to support her as Y/N felt him lower them to the floor to lay her down, the Water Pillar’s free hand coming to brace against the back of her skull, to protect her head from thudding back against the wooden slats of the hut floor. The Miko steadied herself, prepared for the cold bite of the dirty hut floor to nip at the bare skin of her back, but she was only settled against something warm and soft; something that smelled distinctively of the Slayer panting above her.

Her fingers dropped to her side and grazed against the familiar fabric of Giyuu’s haori; his most prized and cherished possession, spread out beneath her to protect her from the cold ground, a makeshift bed against which she would let him take her and make her his.

He withdrew his lips from hers to sit back, his cerulean eyes tracing over every inch of her, from the way her dark hair spread out in a soft halo around her, to the blush staining her cheeks. His eyes darkened as they lowered to her bare chest, at the way it rose and fell jerkily as Y/N struggled to control her breathing.

Giyuu’s long, slim fingers reached out to trace along the top of her scarlet hakama pants, his finger tips just grazing along her ribs and the underside of her breasts.

“I’d never known such -,” He covered his struggle for words by pressing a sweet kiss against the hollow of her throat, a soft gasp escaping the Miko at the unfamiliar sensation. “Such beauty,” Giyuu’s lips trailed down to skirt across the ridge of her collar bone. “Not until I met you.”

His face was against her sternum, pressing kisses as he trailed his lips down her skin. “I am sorry I could not give you more time.” His voice was soft, softer than even she had ever known. Before she could respond, Giyuu’s mouth hesitantly brushed against the stiffened peak of her breast, and Y/N’s mouth fell open with a soft cry.

Azure eyes flashed up to meet hers. “Is this — is this okay?”

The Miko's eyes fluttered shut as she nodded, unable to trust that she could hold her voice steady if she spoke. Her fingers weaved their way through the Pillar’s thick, raven locks, and she grazed her nails against his scalp in encouragement.

Giyuu grunted softly at her touch, and he leaned forward to suck more of her soft mound into his hot mouth, teeth grazing lightly against her nipple as he explored her.

“Oh,” she moaned, her thighs inadvertently pressing together as Giyuu’s tongue and lips worshipped her bared flesh, licking and sucking and nipping at her in his devotion.

“Beautiful,” he murmured against the soft, sensitive skin of her breast. “So very beautiful.”

He repeated the movement again and again before he traced his mouth across her sternum and began lavishing her other breast with the same fervor. Her hands fisted in his hair as she mewled for him, enamored with the feeling of his hot mouth latched around her. He gave her more and yet it was not enough; every pass of his tongue over her stiffened peak only amplified the ache between her legs, only made the emptiness she felt more pronounced.

A breathy, whining and needy moan blew past her lips in time with a reflexive buck of her hips against his.

The ravenette pulled off her breast with a start, his eyes bright and his cheeks flushed as he gazed down at her in awe. “Do that again.”

“W-what —?” She pushed herself up on her elbows to look down at him, her chest heaving.

“Tell me what to do,” Giyuu’s breath was ragged though his fingers continued trailing down her sides, seeking out the ties securing her bottoms around her waist. “Tell me how I might help you make that sound again.”

“I –” Y/N squirmed beneath the intensity of his gaze, her thighs rubbing together to stifle some of the electricity she felt between her legs. “I want you to – I need you closer.”

Her eyes drifted to the bulge that had formed between the Hashira’s thighs, and she felt her heart skip in her chest.

Giyuu pressed his groin against hers and ground. She gasped at the spark of pleasured friction the movement stoked between her thighs, and her eyes flew to meet his, only to see they were as wide as hers.

And just as hungry.

Her hand gently cupped his face. “Closer. Please.”

He pressed his cheek into her palm and with a soft groan, his fingers quickly loosened the fastenings of her bottoms and then he was pushing them down her hips and over her legs, discarding them carelessly to the side. Giyuu sat back on his knees and let his eyes roam her, now fully bare and laid out beneath him.

When his appraisal of her finally reached the thatch of curls between her thighs, the Water Pillar loosed a shaky breath. She had half a mind to cross her legs, to conceal the most intimate part of her body from the raging fire of his gaze as he studied her, but she forced herself to remain relaxed; open.

One, broad and calloused hand stretched tentatively out to run along the outside of her hip and down her leg, before smoothing back up in the inside of her thigh. His eyes flicked once to hers, and then he leaned forward and brushed delicate kisses down her abdomen, over her hip and along her thigh. He continued his descent as he slowly pushed himself back from her, and once he imparted one last, sweet press of his lips against her ankle, he rose.

The flickering light of the lantern cast shadows along the alabaster of his skin, further accentuating how the muscles of his torso and abdomen flexed and shifted as he worked to free himself of the remainder of his clothes. His eyes did not leave hers, not even as his hands found the buckle of his belt and tugged it loose, and Y/N found herself free falling into their depths.

The ravenette dropped his belt to the floor, and then his fingers were at the waistband of his trousers, pulling and fiddling with their fastening. At last, Giyuu freed his lower half from the confines of his uniform pants and stepped out from the puddle they made at his feet.

Y/N’s breath hitched in her throat as her eyes raked over his beautiful form, so lean yet solid and muscular. Her cheeks burned with a renewed blush as her gaze followed the small, dark trail of hair beginning just below his navel, and down between his hips, where the evidence of his desire stood proud.

Her throat went dry. He was large — the flared head of his tip nearly grazed his navel, and his width was a little more than two of her fingers. Her thighs clamped together nervously, as she pondered how on earth she’d be able to accommodate him.

Giyuu noticed her hesitation, and a faint dusting of pink spread across his cheeks. “I have never -“

The shrine maiden shook her head. “Nor I,” she whispered, though the knowledge that this was as new to him as it was to her helped ease the clench in her stomach. For all her nervousness, the Miko could not ignore the heat and longing which burned within her as she lifted her eyes back to his. She found her muscles softening as she saw the same fire within those cyan pools she’d come to love. Y/N laid back against the floor — against the comforting soft of his haori, and let body relax, her legs falling open to him.

She held her hand out to him, beckoning, “Come back to me, Giyuu.”

The ravenette did not hesitate as he returned to her, covering her body with his own as he pulled her in for a heated kiss, the weight of his hardened length resting heavily against her hip as he settled between the cradle of her thighs.

Y/N moaned into his mouth, instinctively rolling her hips against him, desperate to feel closer to the man who had claimed her heart before she’d realized anyone was capable of holding it.

Giyuu groaned, softly, against her as she repeated the movement, breaking their kiss to look down at the flushed Miko threatening to drive him wild with her silken touch. As much as he was desperate to feel her — every part of her — he knew what they were about to do would not be nearly as pleasurable for her as it would be for him.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” the Water Pillar’s eyes were stormy, a tempest of competing desire and pain at the idea of causing her even the slightest discomfort raging within him.

Y/N brushed her lips against his once before trailing along his jaw, pausing only to suck softly as the soft spot beneath his ear. “I am only ever undone by you; never hurt.”

He moaned softly, lowering his head back down to reclaim her mouth firmly with his own, his lips beseeching her to let him consume her.

She was only too happy to do so, parting her mouth so that his tongue could slide in and dance languidly with hers, as he reached between them, gripping hold of his aching length and positioning himself at her entrance.

The first brush of his hot, velvety tip against her folds broke their kiss, both gasping at the new yet intoxicating feel of the other’s most intimate area.

Giyuu braced his free arm by her head, his fingers stretching to run comfortingly through her hair, as he pressed his forehead against hers. “If it becomes too much, just tell me, and we can stop.” His voice shook ever so slightly as he waited for her signal, the ache in his groin becoming nearly painful.

The Miko grazed her lips against his throat. “Don’t stop.” She murmured. She hitched her legs higher up on his hips, angling herself so the trembling man above her would have better access to her.

Slowly, so very slowly, the tip of Giyuu’s length began to push into her, and Y/N felt herself temporarily forget how to breathe. Above her, Giyuu’s eyes squeezed shut in a concerted effort not to sheathe himself within her in one stroke.

“Y/N,” Giyuu panted, unable to stop the shaky moan that fell from his lips as he sunk into her warm heat that wrapped tight, so impossibly tight around him.

The shrine maiden winced at the unfamiliar and slightly uncomfortable sensation of being slowly stretched and filled by the Pillar. She felt as though she was a wave, crashing and breaking and parting around a rocky shore with every inch gained by the press of his hips against hers.

Giyuu hardly had a quarter of himself seated within her when he felt his head brush against a thin barrier. His eyes opened to look down at the Miko, panting beneath him, her eyebrows pinched in slight discomfort. When she noticed he’d stopped, she peered up at him through her thick eyelashes, her cheeks flushed.

The hand Giyuu had held at his base to help guide himself within her lifted to grip her hip, her legs relaxing as his fingers massaging soothing circles into her flesh. Giyuu removed his forehead from its resting place against hers and he buried his face into the side of her neck as he pressed his body flush against hers. The hand he’d used to brace himself found hers, and he lifted to rest above her head, his fingers twining tightly with her own.

“I’m okay,” she whispered, pressing a sweet kiss against the shell of his ear. Giyuu nearly shuddered at her words, and he pressed his hips forward, his cock finally breaching that thin, inner barrier to the rest of her welcoming heat.

Y/N cried out at the bright spark of pain that flared through her as Giyuu claimed her as his own, but the Pillar held her steady, pressing open-mouthed kisses against her neck.

A hitched gasp blew past Giyuu’s lips as he became fully seated within her heat, her core gripping him like a vice. He panted against the sweat-dampened skin of her neck as they both adjusted to the sensation, her nails digging harshly into the skin of his back as she waited for the discomfort to subside.

Giyuu pulled his face back to look down at her, the hand he’d had on her hip rising to cup her face as he brushed his lips across her cheeks and eyes.

“My beloved, are you all right?” His breath came hard and fast as he panted, the growing friction between where they were connected becoming hotter, more demanding the longer he remained still.

Y/N’s eyes slowly opened to meet his, he felt her relax as he kissed her, slow and gentle.

Her lips broke from his and she nodded, shakily. “You can move — just hold me. Please.”

Giyuu let his full weight fall against her as he wound an arm tightly around her waist, his other hand tilting her face up so he could kiss her fiercely, eager to show her what she meant to him when his words otherwise failed to do so. As she opened up to him, tongue flicking out shyly along his lip, Giyuu rolled his hips experimentally against hers.

Both the shrine maiden and the Pillar cried out in unison as Giyuu’s movement stoked an intense pleasure where they were joined.

It was like a spark of flame had ignited between her legs before shooting up to her belly, making her insides clench and pulse.

It was addicting, and, judging by the way the raven haired swordsman above her hissed, he’d felt that jolt of electrifying pleasure, too.

“Oh,” Giyuu moaned as he began to move atop her, his cock sliding in and out of her heat as he worked to set a pace. “You feel – this is –” his stutters broke off into ragged pants that melted into broken moans with every movement as he found his rhythm.

The grip he had on her hand tightened as he pulled back from her neck in favor of watching her body jolt and bounce with each of his thrusts.

His head dropped down to study how his length, now coated in something shiny, appeared with every long draw of his hips out before disappearing back into her warmth.

He threw his head back. “Heaven,” the Water Pillar groaned out, a tendon throbbing in his neck as another cracked moan slipped free from his throat. “You are heaven.”

Shallow thrusts turned deeper, more purposeful, as the Water Pillar settled into his tempo. Each push of his hips opened her up more, bit by bit, until Y/N’s limbs liquified and she was left moaning and whimpering in time with his movements.

One particular thrust made her cry out, caused her legs to reflexively tighten around Giyuu’s hips as something hot flared deep within her stomach.

“M-more,” she managed, her voice tapering off with a squeak. She needed to feel that spark again, wanted to feel that jolt of electricity that made her stomach clench. “P-please — ah!— Giyuu —“

With something between a moan and a growl, Giyuu angled himself to thrust deeper, his weight pushing her hips back from the floor. Her legs were forced to hike higher up his waist, her ankles locking instead against the dip in his spine rather than his backside.

The new angle meant that Giyuu was able to hit at a spot that sent a bolt of lightening between her legs, and she could feel herself tighten around him.

The combination of her walls fluttering and pulsing around him and the strange fullness she felt was both overwhelming and exhilarating. She did not think she could stand to feel empty again; to not feel him consuming every inch of her.

Gradually, the small garden hut was filled by the sounds of their pants and moans, weaving together to form the melody of a song meant only for them.

Giyuu began thrusting harder, and soon, a dull clap of skin began to reverberate off the hut’s slatted wood walls, adding a steady beat to the rhythm of their pleasure. Though the air inside the hut had been nearly as frigid as what lay beyond its door, both the Miko and the Slayer found themselves coated in a thin sheen of sweat that made their skin glisten in the faint, orange glow of her lantern.

Above her, the Water Pillar was as lost in his pleasure as she. Guided purely by instinct, Y/N arched her lower back away from the floor until her breasts were flush against his sternum, desperate to feel that jolting spark between her legs.

She felt the walls her of her core clench tighter around Giyuu’s length with her movement, and he answered her with a deep growl as his arm cinched tighter around her waist.

Deep; he was so deep within her, that she wondered whether he might reach her soul before they had to part.

Giyuu’s thrusts quickened, the base of his groin grinding against that sensitive spot between her thighs that had her wanting more as she moaned, her thighs squeezing the Hashira’s hips.

His head was thrown back, his eyes tightly shut as the most beautiful sounds of pleasure Y/N had ever heard poured from Giyuu’s mouth.

“I — fuck.” He growled as one arm tightened around her waist to the point of pain, the other grabbing her hand to bring it to his lips in a futile attempt to stifle the sounds lilting from him like song.

His name fell from her lips like a hallowed oath and Y/N’s legs fell to the side, allowing Giyuu to chase the crescent of his release, as hips pistoned into her with wild abandon.

“Y-Y/N,” her black-haired beauty of a lover grit through clenched teeth, a bead of sweat rolling down his temple. “My treasure, I-I’m gonna-“

The Water Pillar buried his face into the side of her neck, cradling his groans into her throat, and Y/N could feel his length twitch within her.

As Giyuu’s hips slammed into her one final time, so to did the realization that she loved this; she wanted always to be this close to him, wanted always to be unable to tell where she ended and he began.

She loved him.

But the bitter truth was that she’d never again get to hold Giyuu the way she was right then, legs wrapped tightly around his waist as she felt something warm gush through her, a pleasured groan, so beautiful and husky tumbling from the Hashira’s lips as he pressed a sweet kiss against her collarbone.

She would not get to love him past this most sacred rite.

If she were honest, she’d likely never again experience this intimacy with anyone, for as long as she lived — for how could anyone else ever possibly compare?

She supposed she’d been doomed to never hold onto the people who were meant to love her since the day she was born. She should’ve known better.

But as the roll of Giyuu’s hips into her heat slowed, and his labored breaths eased, Y/N could not find it within herself to regret it; to regret him.

Because, fool though she was, she loved him.

Giyuu collapsed against her, his face nuzzling into the crook of her neck as he came down from his high, still buried inside her as the two panted.

Her hands moved of their own accord to card through his raven hair, fingertips massaging his scalp as his breathing slowed, his breath adding further moisture to the already sweat-dampened skin of her neck.

She wished they could remain like that always; that the dawn creeping over the horizon would not herald forth the sun, and they could stay on the floor of the garden hut forever, wrapped in one another’s embrace. She desperately wanted to memorize the tempo of his heart as it beat steadily against his chest, the vibrations of which she felt against her ribs. Such a beautiful melody, it was, and yet it filled her with such despair to know she might never again hear its sweet song; that it might cease playing forever, the moment Giyuu resumed being the Water Pillar once more, and walked through the shrine gates for the last time.

But Y/N had never had anyone she could call her own, and as much as she loved the man nuzzling her neck as he whispered sweet nothings against her skin, he’d never been hers to keep.

“My beautiful, beautiful Y/N,” Giyuu murmured, kissing his way up her throat to her lips. “Are you alright?”

She held his lips for a moment before breaking away, letting her eyes roam his face, and she nodded. “Are you?”

To her utter surprise, the Water Pillar chuckled softly, his laugh breathy and his smile heartbreakingly beautiful. “Yes, my treasure. I am more than alright.”

He brushed a kiss against the tip of her nose. “After all, I am with you.”

———-

He’d brought her against his chest and they’d laid there together, simply staring at one another, trading soft kisses as Giyuu traced a finger over every feature of her face at least twice.

If he was to die, he knew his last thoughts would be of her, and he wanted to be sure he’d committed every last detail of her face to memory.

Soon, far too soon, the deep indigo of the night sky was broken by the first, watery rays of morning light, and both the Miko and the Slayer knew their time was up.

The lovers dressed quickly, their backs to one another as both steeled themselves for the goodbye they could no longer avoid.

And now, that time had come. Though it was Giyuu who walked to his likely doom, Y/N felt as if she was embarking on her own death march as the pair drew near the towering Shrine gate. Perhaps she was; after all, he would be taking her heart with him, and she was unlikely to get it back.

Y/N did not know whether to lean in and kiss him, one last time, or whether such a display of affection would only scratch at the gaping, open wounds they now bore on their chests, where their hearts had been.

Giyuu, apparently, did not know what to do either, so the two only stood there beneath the Torii, eyes swimming with emotions neither could bear to voice.

There was a beat, and then the two moved toward one another, drawn together like magnets as they locked themselves in a tight embrace. Giyuu’s hand cupped the back of her skull as Y/N pressed her face hard into his shoulder. Her fingers dug into the fabric of his haori, desperate to keep him rooted to her — to life, safe and away from demons.

But he couldn’t stay; she knew that. And so, with a deep inhale in a desperate attempt to memorize that mahogany and citrus scent of his she so adored, Y/N pulled away. She made to step back from him entirely, to put distance between them, but those warm fingers caught her under her chin, tilting her head up to face him before his hand slid to cup her cheek.

The emotion swimming in the azure depths of his irises threatened to chisel away at the lock she kept on her own. Tears burned in her eyes, but she would not let them fall; she would not make this harder for herself — for him — than it already was.

“If you do not hear from me, leave the mountain. Go to the city, and do not go out at night. Keep your dagger and wisteria on you at all times, even when you sleep,” Giyuu’s eyes were serious, the hand on her face holding her in place. “Live, Y/N. Grow to be an old woman. Die only from age.”

The shrine maiden closed her eyes as she willed herself not to cry. “And if you win?”

Giyuu hesitated for a moment and Y/N knew better than to ask him to make a promise he could not keep.

“Send a crow, if you can.” She whispered, feigning a small smile. “It would be nice to not be afraid to go and gather night-blooming herbs.”

The Water Pillar nodded, his hand smoothing through her hair one last time as his lips pressed against her forehead. “Thank you, Y/N.”

She didn’t need to ask what for.

She hoped she’d never forget the way he said her name; the longing and the breathless passion that dripped from every syllable, and the way it sent shivers down her spine.

Giyuu broke away from her and set off towards the east. Y/N watched until he was nothing more than a speck on the horizon, before he disappeared entirely.

He did not look back.

————————

He hadn’t trusted himself to look back at her, though every fiber of his being had screamed at him to turn around and behold her beauty one last time. But the Shrine Maiden had become his largest weakness, and Giyuu knew if he’d looked back, he would never make it back to his estate; to the Corps.

And if you win? She’d asked him, and he hadn’t been able to form the words of the answer he’d so desperately wanted to give her.

Because while Giyuu Tomioka never made promises he couldn’t keep, that did not mean he didn’t hope. Right then, more than anything, his greatest desire was to win this war; win it, and come back and tell Y/N that she no longer needed to fear the night.

In any other life — if Giyuu had been any other man — there would be no question as to who he’d choose to spend the rest of his days with.

And so, Giyuu thought as he forced himself to march forward, his eyes burning, if he made it out of this war alive, he would go back to the Shrine and tell Y/N of their victory himself.

And perhaps she’d then allow him to make her his wife.

Keep an eye out for Part II to see if Giyuu comes back and makes good on his promise!

COMMENTS, REBLOGS, AND LIKES ALWAYS APPRECIATED!

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2K notes · View notes

caramelcal · 11 months

Note

Hi, I love your story!! I wanted to know if you can do a when theo is jealous and leave hickey to fem reader. If your not comfortable that’s fine thank you 🤭.

LOVEBITES AND POTIONS

word count: 1.4k

a/n: hiya lovely! thank you for sending a request<3

warnings: fem!reader, no house specified. jealous!theo. boyfriend!theo, playful allegations of cheating/going on dates with others. hickeys.

"Hey, y/n!" A voice called out from behind you, halting you in your movements.

It was a Friday, and you had just left your last class of the day, ready to relax over the weekend with your boyfriend, Theo. That's where you were heading right now; to his dorm.

Well, until someone called out from you.

"I'm glad I caught up with you," The voice said as you turned around, eyes catching onto Zacharias, a Hufflepuff boy in your year, and your potions partner.

"Hi, Zacharias," You gave the boy a pleasant smile, trying to be as nice as possible. You held your books in your hands in front of your chest, looking at the boy who seemed a little out of breath.

"Hi, um-" He started, scratching the back of his neck as his eyes cast away from you for a second, "I wanted to talk to you about our potions project."

You looked at him with a small smile, urging him to go on as he took a deep breath. Tons of students bustled around the two of you, loud, excited to get off to their dorms or hang out with their friends, and although you wanted nothing more than to run to Theo's dorm, you were patient with the boy in front of you.

He seemed nervous.

"Well, I was thinking we could get a headstart on our project, maybe tomorrow in the library?" He proposed, his eyes looking pretty much everywhere but your face, "I mean, I really need a good grade on this project, and I know that you like to..."

Zacharias continued, but you zoned out a little as your eyes caught on to a particular group of Slytherin boys. They all joked about, pushing each other, and just acting generally boisterous. Not a single one of them wore their robes, all claiming to be far too cool for them, their ties loosened and white sleeves rolled up.

Your eyes caught onto the familiar tall figure of your boyfriend as he laughed, his blue eyes catching onto yours as you smiled, getting a smile in return. His friends all started to notice you too, riling Theodore up as boys do when they saw the look in his eyes.

"Y/n?" A hand gently brushed against your shoulder, drawing your attention back towards Zacharias, his eyebrows slightly drawn, and a slight redness in his cheeks.

"That sounds like a good idea, Zacharias," His face brightened a little, "but I can't do tomorrow, I have plans with my boyfriend, sorry."

"Oh."

"We can start on Sunday though? How does that sound?"

A small smile makes its way back onto Zacharias' lips as he nods, "Yeah, that sounds good."

Before you can respond, however, to work out times or anything, you hear a call from behind you, "Y/n! C'mon! We don't have all day!"

Your head whips around, hearing Draco shout after you to get you to hurry up, only to realise all of the Slytherin boys are staring at you, waiting for you to come with them. With a smile, you turn back around and say your goodbyes to Zacharias, before practically skipping over to the boys.

Your eyes don't move from the tall blue-eyed boy, your arms thrown over his shoulders as you reach up and peck him on the cheek. His eyes don't quite meet yours, focusing on something behind you as his hands snake possessively around your waist, a kiss being placed on your forehead.

Then, you're whisked away to the Slytherin common room, and soon enough, Theodore's dorm. The door shuts behind your boyfriend as you place your books down on his bedside table, and he wastes little time pulling your robe away from your neck and down your shoulders, slipping it off your body.

"I missed you," You spoke quietly as you turned around in your boyfriend's hold, your hands going over his shoulders and curling into the hair on the nape of his neck.

Your head is on his chest, breathing in the scent of his cologne and cigarettes, eyes closing at the comfort it brings you.

Theo hummed in response, pulling back a little as he picked you up with ease, placing you down on his bed as he sat beside you, facing you.

His lips soon find yours, his hand sitting around the back of your neck, keeping your lips firmly on his as his thumb caresses your hair away from the side of your neck. His free hand pulls at your tie, then unbuttons the top two buttons of your shirt, moving the fabric to free the side of your neck.

Then, his lips latch onto your neck, near your jaw, and the second you feel him suck and his teeth lightly graze over the skin, you know exactly what he's trying to do.

"Theo, lower. Those marks are going to be visible above my uniform."

Yet, he doesn't stop. In fact, he seems even more eager to mark up the side of your neck when he hears those words tumble from your lips.

"Theo."

He pulled away a little, but you could still feel his soft breaths against the bare skin of your neck. You looked down at him with a quizzical look.

"Why are you doing it so high?"

He avoided the question, his hands pushing your hair back once more as his eyes cast back down to the skin of your neck, "You excited about your date with your little boyfriend?"

"I didn't realise we'd planned a date this weekend."

"I'm talking about your other boyfriend," He quipped back sarcastically, before his lips made contact with another spot on your neck, littering what you can guarantee are going to be countless dark bruises along your neck.

Your eyebrows furrow at this remark as you try to piece together what Theodore could possibly be talking about. What other plans did you even have?

"Are you talking about Zacharias? He's just helping me with our potions project," You informed your boyfriend, your hand coming up to grab at the strands of his soft hair once more.

"Tell him to leave it, I'm better at potions anyway. I'll help you," Theodore bargained, without his mouth moving away from your neck.

He wasn't wrong. Theodore was brilliant at potions, but regardless of that, it was your and Zacharias' project, not you and Theodore's.

"Wait," A subtle smirk came to your lips as you began to piece together what was happening, your hand pushing Theo away from your neck, "Are you jealous, Theo?"

You held him in such a way that he was unable to attach his lips to your neck to continue his attack, your head tilting a little as you waited for a response.

Theodore rolled his eyes in response, mumbling, "No."

"Are you sure?" You pouted a little, raising an eyebrow at the way his eyes were cast to the side, not looking you in the eyes. His hair was a little messed up, and a small pout had made its way to his lips, too. He crossed his arms over his chest, almost comically, as if he was a child in a huff.

"That puff has nothing on me," He mumbled cockily, making you laugh softly as you moved your hands from holding him back. Not skipping a beat, Theo latched his lips back onto your skin, on the opposite side now.

"Stop," You laughed a little, "Snape's going to have a heart attack if he sees these."

You had absolutely no doubt that these were going to be a pain in the ass to hide. Even with your hair down, it was going to be a real struggle. With how many Theodore had left too, you knew the chances of you being able to cover them with makeup was going to be difficult, too.

"Hope the puff does, too," Theodore mumbled almost childishly.

"Don't be jealous, Theo," You spoke softly, your hand coming up to play with his hair once more, your other hand rubbing his back, "You know I'm yours."

"You're right," Theodore responded, pulling away from the last hickey he made, then pressing a soft kiss against your neck, now littered with marks, then your jaw, then your lips. Finally pulling back, his blue eyes meet yours, a smile coming to his face as he surveys his work, then your face, "All mine."

#theodore nott x reader #theo nott x reader #theodore nott x you #theodore nott x y/n #theo nott x y/n #theo nott x you #theo nott x reader x draco malfoy #jealous!theodore nott x reader #jealous!theodore nott #jealous!theo nott #jealous!theo nott x reader #theo nott #theodore

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yanderenightmare · 4 months

Text

TW: NSFW, noncon/dubcon

fem reader

Thinking about massive beefcakes again...

Big, brawny warriors who're carved with both muscles and battle scars – who still have some blood on their hands they couldn't bother washing off before claiming their pretty little war prize.

Oh, but he's so gentle with you. No threats on his lips, just a smile as he lets his large hands do all the talking – that, and the bloody axe he left leaning against the wall of your humble hut. So big, you wouldn't even be able to carry it if you used both hands.

And speaking about needing to use both hands...

You straddle his lap while working his massive cock – trembling as you wrap your fingers around the base, one hand stacked on top of the other, fingertips curling around his shaft – unable to reach around it while rubbing over fat veins that pulse beneath your soft touch.

He coos at you – tells you you’re doing so, so good for him, how he’s going to reward you real soon – how he won't hurt you so long as you do what he wants.

Oh, and you're so scared – so very scared of those large scathed paws holding you steady at the hips as he rubs his thick manhood against your stomach – throbbing between your ribs – a good measurement for how far inside he would try to push.

There’s just no way you can possibly cram all of that inside you, is there?

You hadn't even noticed you were crying. Fat tears slip from brimming in your eyes, sliding down your cheeks and splattering on the hair of his broad chest.

He told you to breathe, and you realized you’d been holding it in. He told you to relax – but tears only kept falling when his hand reached under to cup your scared little sex – his calloused fingers a strange type of friction on the lips of your pussy, ticklish in a sense, sending energy splurging through your core.

Oh, but ain't you just the sweetest little thing. “You’re so wet, baby~” He hummed, voice thick with heat as his finger slid playfully through the slick pooling from your slit.

You whimpered at his teasing, and he hushed you – cooing at you while his fat fingers started prepping your tight little hole for him with a thumb rubbing over your clit – still nothing harsh – just grazing the slit, letting your body know to prepare itself for him.

You almost wished he would just push you down, tower over you, and do it all swiftly – because you weren't sure just how much of this your poor heart could take. You heard its pitter-pattering in your head, felt it drum in your fingertips, in your toes, thumping where his hands were taunting your tender flesh – petting the silk as it wept for more.

You felt something curl – coil – wind like an adder in your gut along with butterflies. Soon, glossing his entire hand with arousal.

You heard the chuckle as he filled you up with one of his digits – long and thick with muscle, bumpy at the knuckles as it eased inside you – swirling around your velvet walls, all wet and fluttering for him – then followed by another – still with his thumb drawing sweet circles into your swollen clit, making you clench around the two fingers tightly with an ever-so-sweet moan spilling from your lips.

He groaned at the sensitivity – the stimuli and response at his fingertips – how impressionable you were for him. So sweet and pliant – knowing you were but a sheep caught on wolf claws.

His eyes were heavy-lidded, a sloppy grin showing teeth as his lips brushed up your collar with wet praise – his tongue hot as he licked up your throat with warm breath ever so very intimately – puffing like a hound as he bit your earlobe playfully, letting you know with thick rust, “I think you’re ready to take me.”

Oh, how he loved the way you tensed – knowing he had you completely in his palm – hooked right on his fingers – and soon on his cock.

BNHA – Bakugou, Deku, Kirishima, Enji, AFO, All Might, Mirio

JJK – Sukuna, Toji, Kenjaku

DS – Doma

HxH – Uvogin

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yesimwriting · 5 months

Text

thinking about bestfriend!felix who's known for being touchy within his social circle, so when he holds your hand as you walk around campus and leaves giggly kisses against your cheek, your jaw, your neck after a few drinks, you think nothing of it.

especially because it comes up in conversation from time to time. everyone that hangs out with him regularly enough has at least one story: felix smoothed circles against my back until i fell asleep on the bathroom floor after a party; he's kissed the top of my head twice; i've never seen him end a hug first.

and you've seen things--at parties, while studying, while out with friends in general. so you genuinely have no reason to think there's anything strange or different about the way he treats you, and neither does anyone else.

at first.

one night, when you're still new enough to felix and his world that you feel extremely out of place at a party that he invited you to, he calls you over to where he and his friends are sitting. you walk over to them, greeting everyone politely before moving to take the available space next to felix.

he grabs your wrist before you can actually sit. you're confused, but given little time to react. felix mumbles an absentminded, "c'mere" before pulling you towards his lap. it's a little flustering, but you sit, because that's just how felix is.

okay. normal enough. conversation continues. no one thinks twice about it. farleigh thinks it's a bit of overkill, but just assumes it's a combination of alcohol and maybe an attempt at laying the groundwork to hook up with you a little later in the night.

then, someone asks about potential vacation plans over break and farleigh brings up an inside joke from the last trip he and felix went on. it's casual, but it's clear that felix is supposed to say something.

farleigh looks over in time to see felix holding one of your hands to his lips. alright. still not the most egregious display of platonic affec--felix takes his time pressing kisses to each of your knuckles.

it's not just the gesture. it's the way felix watches your reaction through his lashes and the amount of care in his focus. as if you're the only one in the room. there's a patience there that's practically devoted.

maybe farleigh had it wrong. he thought you were just one of those platonic friends that felix would cart around for a few months before getting bored. maybe it's more romantic, or at the very least sexual.

then felix's eyebrows draw together. "you're cold." you start to say that you're fine, but before you can get the words out, felix is holding both of your hands between his.

in the beat that it takes farleigh to recover from the slightly nauseating display, the rest of the group has gone quiet. they're all watching felix dote on you like you're the reason for the moon hanging in the sky. annabel whispers something about the "unsuspecting".

farleigh eventually tries again, directly stating felix's name. he finally looks up, a little confused, as if coming out of a trance. farleigh repeats his earlier comment, finally getting a reaction from felix. the group recovers because while the moment had been almost uncomfortably intimate for something so casual, this is far from the first time felix has started (casually) seeing an 'outsider'.

some time passes and you finish your first drink. when felix notices, he asks if you want another. you tell him that you don't mind getting your own, but felix is insistent. you stand so that he can get up.

a part of you wishes you could have found an excuse to go with him. the gesture, in theory, is nice, but without felix's protection, being left with his friends feels like he's thrown you to the wolves.

annabel, a little tipsy and now curious asks, "so, how long have you and felix..." she trails off with a knowing look.

you kind of get what she's implying, but it feels like too random and too unfitting of an assumption to be accurate. "oh, we've been friends since around right after syllabus week, felix ask--"

"no," she shakes her head, "i mean--" she tries again, this time asking with precise language.

your face grows a few degrees warmer. "oh." the slight laugh that follows the syllable is too genuine for it to be you playing coy. "no, it's not--we're friends."

friends. you genuinely believe it. annabel fixes you with a tight lipped smile that makes something in your stomach knot.

you decide that her question must have been prompted by you sitting on felix's lap. you've also heard enough stories about them to assume that they have an on again off again, sort of thing, and because you really don't want to make an enemy of her, you try to justify it, "that was just--you've known him way longer, he's just like that."

oh my god. he's fooled you. completely convinced you that that's normal. before annabel can really react, felix comes back. he hands you your drink and kisses your cheek before sitting down next to you. he doesn't ask you to go back to where you were sitting before, but he does keep a hand on your knee.

----

some bestfriend!reader concepts ft oliver

another bestfriend! felix blurb :)

bestfriend! felix and reader basically dating

#kind of want to write more bestfriend!felix at some point #saltburn x reader #saltburn imagine #felix catton x reader #felix catton #bestfriend!felix #jacob elordi #jacob elordi x reader

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critterbitter · 6 months

Note

I'm wheezing over Ingo and Litwick's dynamic jgjbjjxjsjwkfiisiq and TYNAMO FITTING INTO EMMET'S SCARF IS SOOO CUTE!! Love how you draw the little sbubby bois, their conductor themed outfits are soo freaking cute!!!

I have so many thoughts when it comes to them it’s insane. Glad you like the characterizations!

Here’s a quick one shot under the cut, as a treat for making it this far.

Emmet finds Tynamo three months before Ingo meets Litwick. Ingo has some thoughts.

Ingo and Emmet are part of a pair.

If Emmet is the fuck around and find out, then Ingo’s been relegated amused damage control. This has always been the case, right up until Emmet found tynamo. Then suddenly, it’s “wow emmet, you’re so responsible!” “Golly gee Emmet, what do you mean you don’t want to go exploring the cave systems after dark?” “Gee whizz, what do you mean curfew for your eel puppy?” “Why in Reshiram do you get to have a whole pokemon three months before we agreed to get starters, and i don’t?”

Ingo doesn’t say the last part. He’s a bitter world-weary twelve year old languishing about the unfairness of the pokestray distribution system, but he also loves his brother. Emmet found an injured tynamo in chargestone cave and decided to help— tynamo decided to stay. It’s every child’s film plot. Ingo being a grouchy gengar makes him objectively a terrible friend.

Oh dragons, is Ingo a bad brother?

“Ingo!”

Speak of the cold, and he shall enter. Ingo swings his whole body around to better brace for the flying tackle.

“Emmet!”

“I am emmet! You are sulking.”

Ingo clicks his mouth closed and tries not to sulk harder. He fails.

“You are not being verrrry convincing, brother dearest.”

“I do not have any idea what you are going on about,” Ingo’s traitorous mouth blurts. “Be convinced I love you and am not planning dastardly plots.”

Do not think about getting a ground typed starter. Do not think about getting a ground typed starter.

Emmet shoots him a judgemental look from under the brim of his hat. Ingo glowers back, and slowly starts leaning forward, smooshing Emmet under his weight.

“Ttttell me why you look like a crushed joltik.”

“Keep this up and you are going to be the crushed joltik.”

Anyways, Emmet is becoming more bold by the day and even actively discussing electric types with the new girl in elementary prep, Elesa. Ingo thinks she’s cool, but she flinched when he blurted a once again too loud greeting so he’s… letting that cool off. They definitely don’t have anything to talk about beyond pokemon, and Emmet and her already have pokemon. Ingo feels a bit left out.

Caught in the ennui of not having a blitzle or tynamo, Ingo slips as Emmet rolls out from under him. The two go down in an ungraceful tangle of limbs.

“Tell. Me. What’s. Wrong.” Emmet gently slaps Ingo’s face like a ripe oran berry. “You want to tell me sooo badly. Ooh.”

“Emmet- aurgh. Gerroff’”

“I don’t speak denial.”

Ingo gives up. His entire body deflates. Emmet, not expecting the sudden loss of spinal infrastructure, slides sideways and knees Ingo’s lungs.

Ingo wheezes. “I’m sulking because you were crushing my spine.”

“Tell me the truth.”

Uh oh. Ingo studies Emmet’s face. It’s the same one he looks into the mirror with, but marred with concern and self consciousness. Ingo made Emmet worry. He’s not just a bad twin. He’s the worst.

“You are Emmet.”

“I am Emmet.”

“You have Tynamo.”

“Tynamo’s charging at home.”

Smart ass! Emmet knows what Ingo means. And by Emmet’s smug grin, Emmet knows too.

Ingo struggles to explain that Emmet has Tynamo, and Elesa, and… that’s only two other individuals. He is truly the worst twin in all the land. Emmet gets two new friends and Ingo’s being an infant about it.

One day, Ingo will have his own pokemon partner and team— but right now, Ingo only gets to have Emmet.

Ingo feels this is an unfair trade equivalent, but he does not want to say it in a way that sounds rude, so he stalls.

Emmet has no such prefunctures. He squints at Ingo, who avoids eye contact and squirms. “You are… jealous?” He tilts his head in visible confusion. “What?”

Ingo covers his face with his hands, defeated.

“You arrrre jealous!” Emmet cries, bewildered. “Why??”

Ingo lets out an unintelligible wheeze. Emmet remembers he still has a knee on Ingo’s chest, and hastily sits back.

“I don’t want to be jealous,” Ingo finally bursts. “I am very happy for you Emmet! You and Tynamo are a winning combination!” His voice cracks embarrassingly. Emmet doesn’t flinch at the volume, even muffled under Ingo’s palms. “I don’t want to be a bad brother being jealous.”

“You aren’t a bad brother, Ingo.”

“I am. I am angry that you found your starter and I haven’t. I’m sad I interrupted your schedule with my inane demands. I have made you feel like you did something wrong. I apologize.”

Peeking between Ingo’s fingers, Emmet’s face falls. Ingo wants to be struck by a giga impact rather than face this. He would rather be a dusty imprint. Where is Uncle Drayden’s Haxorous when you need her?

“Ingo, Ingo listen to me.” Emmet’s hands dart forward to settle Ingo’s shoulders. The pressure is grounding. Real. This is where Emmet tells Ingo he’s being stupid.

He hears Emmet exhale.

“I’m sorry.”

Wait, that doesn’t sound right. “Pardon?”

“I wanted to train Tynamo as my conductor, and I left our two-car train unmaintained.”

“Pardon??”

Emmet looks uncomfortable and sad. It makes Ingo uncomfortable and sad. “Yesterday night. When you wanted to go to the caves. For our weekly charting. I said I’d rather help Tynamo.”

Oh. Yeah, Ingo remembers that. It had stung. “You are not obligated to say yes,” he protests. “In fact, you should say no more. You always say yes.”

“Yes.”

“What did I just say.”

“No. You’re my brother. I left you out.”

Ingo slowly puts down his hands. His face still feels warm, but he feels less scared. Now he just feels embarrassed. He can’t help but let out a meek plea slip. “Don’t go where I can’t follow, Emmet. Please.”

“I would never! We are going on our pokemon journey together, yep yep. You, me, tynamo, and whoever your starter will be!”

The two sit there on the side of the dirt road. Emmet’s declaration sounds like a dangerous promise. Ingo realizes at that moment he would do anything for his brother, who’s his best friend and confidant and world, starter or no starter. He opens his mouth to tell Emmet that.

“Wwwwwait. You are trying to go back to the caves. Ingo! Are you trying to find a starter by yourself!?”

Never mind. Emmet’s gone for his soft underbelly, and Ingo’s in pain. “Emphasis on trying,” he mutters instead. The joltik are not interested in him. The local tynamo swarm fled. A curious drilbur had sniffed him once, turned up its nose, and then trundled into the wall.

“…ah.”

Nothing had felt right for Ingo— too scared, too judgemental, or too uninterested. He’s starting to accept that maybe none of the pokemon in this town area match his truth or ideals.

Emmet was quiet for a long time. He had his thinking face on, so Ingo did not interrupt. He took the time instead to look up at the sky, watching the giant puff of clouds drift by. A plume of swabloo lazily inches their way across the horizon.

A shadow falls over Ingo. Emmet dusts himself off, and helps drag his twin to his feet. The two sway, clasping hands.

“We’ll ask Uncle Drayden,” Emmet decides, and Ingo is enthralled by the sheer truth of that statement. “He’ll let us use the subway! And you can look elsewhere, for a starter who is ideal for you. Wwwwith me and Tynamo, instead of by yourself.”

“Truly?” Uncle Drayden is a scary man.

Emmet nods. It’s easy to talk to Emmet— he just says words that Ingo would spend hours ruminating on. “I am verrrry persuasive.”

“You mean staring at him from the corner until he cracks?”

“Brother, you know me so well!”

Ingo cant help but laugh. He still feels guilty and bad for feeling envious, but a world with emmet by his side is significantly less hostile. Emmet’s hand is warm in his.“Thank you!” He cheers, startling himself with his volume. “Bravo,” he tried in a quieter tone.

“Bravo!!” Emmet replies, pointedly louder. Ingo squawks as Emmet pulls him off balance. “You are my brother! We’re going to find you a starter!”

Ingo tugs back just as fiercely. “Bravo!! We are going to harass Uncle Drayden into letting us board the train!”

Emmet leans with his whole body, dragging Ingo into the fulcrum of his centrifuge. “BRAVO! YOU ARE GOING TO HELP ME WITH TYNAMO’S TRAINING!”

Ingo digs his heels in, and then stumbles. “BRAVO, I, what?”

Emmet looked distinctly patrat-esque. “We’re in this together, Ingo. No backing out now.”

Ingo thought about it long and hard. He gets to see his brother get electrocuted. But he will, also, most likely, get electrocuted.

(Tynamo is Emmet’s starter. But maybe, it can also be Ingo’s friend.)

But brother say brother do, and Ingo’s probably obligated to run damage control if Emmet decides to, say, shove a fork into an outlet for Tynamo to snack on.

(Emmet fucks around. Ingo finds out. Even two steps apart with new people between, this is the way of their world.)

“Alright,” he crumbles. When they step this time, they step in sync. “We do this. Together.” (Enjoy this? Here's the link to the rest of my rat crimes.)

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katiexpunk · 1 month

Text

Scarlet Haze - Part 2

Pairing: Joel Miller x fem!Reader | W/C: ~6.2K | Rating: 18+ Minors DNI

Series Summary: Life in the QZ was fairly predictable. That was, until Joel Miller showed up on your doorstep covered in blood. Since then, you've helped him more times than you can count. Now it's his turn to return the favor.

Series Warnings: SEX POLLEN. SEX POLLEN. SEX POLLEN. Set in the TLOU universe in the Boston QZ. Buckle the fuck up for a lot of filthy, feral smut. Check chapter warnings for specifics. This series will follow them through current day.

Chapter Warnings: Canon-typical violence. Blood. Sexual tension. Bloody knuckles/wounded Joel. Flirting. Alcohol. Male masturbation. Voyeurism. Pearl Jam. Drug-seeking behavior. Medical references. Crying. Hallucinations similar to a drug high. Euphoria. Damsel in distress trope. Pet names. Praise kink. Begging. Unprotected P in V. Oral (female receiving). Fingering. Use of daddy. Age gap (make it your own!). No use of Y/N. Reader has no physical descriptions. Let me know if I missed anything!

A/N: Surprise! It's here early (probably the only time you'll be glad something came early). Part 2 as part of my contribution to @morallyinept's Flora and Fauna Challenge. Part 3 coming 5/19.

Part 1 | Masterlist | Read on AO3 | Notifications

“And in that moment, I swear we were infinite.” ― Stephen Chbosky

Joel Miller is a bad man.

It wasn’t always this way – there was a time when he thought he was good, kind even, a gentleman through and through, just like his momma raised him to be.

But those days are long gone. Nowadays, the things he does are far from decent.

What he’s doing right now tops the list.

He should avoid it. He knows he should.

Whatever this feeling is, it’s entirely alien to him—like a cocktail of a thousand potent drugs coursing through his veins, igniting an instinctive physical response. His heart pounds furiously, and a searing heat prickles his skin. He feels lightheaded, probably from the blood rushing anywhere and everywhere except for his brain.

He tries to reason with himself that he can wait— he should wait. Wait for you to wake up, do your typical doctor business, pull out a magic pill or some bullshit, and you’ll both be well on your way.

He should wait. A good man would wait.

But then you started whimpering.

Fucking whimpering.

It was soft, just a whisper; he almost second-guessed it, but then you said his name clear as day, drawing him closer to the edge of control.

“Joel, please,” you moan, spread out on the dusty sheets, lost in a daydream he wishes he was part of, totally unaware of your actions.

He palms himself through his denim, hips titled forward as he sits on a wood chair that he’s not all too convinced can bear his weight after years of abandonment, but he could give two shits about that right now.

“Yes, oh god, yes, just like that,” you moan again, your hand inching closer to your center, chasing friction of any kind. He wonders if you’re wet right now, how sweet you must taste.

Fuck it.

If he's destined for hell, he might as well make it worth the trip.

He unhooks his belt and yanks down his zipper, forcefully pulling his pants down to bunch around the muscular expanse of his thighs

Heavy cock in hand, he takes a second to admire it. It’s a fat, healthy one with a little curve to the left and a prominent vein running up the side. He’s a blessed man – in this regard, anyway.

He rises to full attention, and his hand rises with it, thick, strong fingers just about meeting his thumb as they curl around him. He savors the first proper stroke, the shift from teasing to relief.

He’s so fucking hard. He’s not sure he’s ever been this hard.

His skin feels like velvet wrapped around steel. Even at the end of the world, hell, even before it, he’s not sure touching himself has ever felt like this.

As the edges of his vision begin to soften and blur, he focuses on you. He empties his mind into thoughts of you and only you – how good you’d feel, your tight cunt wrapped around him, creaming on him as you chant his name like a prayer.

Fuck.

His head falls back to lean against the wall, eyes tightly shut, his hand still working as he conjures up images of you bent over for him as he watches his cock slide in and out of your wet heat.

It feels like his whole system has been turned on, his body flooded with adrenaline, the frantic thud of his pulse in his ears now palpable against his palm, too.

Just then, you blink open your eyes, and the remnants of your daydream evaporate like a mist in the morning sun. For a moment, you’re unsure where you are, the room spinning gently in your haze.

The last thing you remember is being in the flower field with him, and now you’re on a bed that hasn’t seen a warm body in over a decade. How did he?

You drop the thought when you feel the air, thick with a heavy, sweet scent that tugs at the edges of your consciousness. You feel hot, every nerve ending tingling uncomfortably. Breathing feels difficult, each breath deep and labored. It’s as if your lungs are struggling under a heavy weight, a need you can’t quite pinpoint.

Your gaze slowly shifts from the ceiling to the corner of the room, and that's when you spot him.

Sunlight streams through the grime-streaked windows, casting beams that light up the swirling dust in the air. As your eyes adjust, the details come into sharp focus, cutting through the haze in your mind like a knife.

Oh. He’s —

You must still be dreaming; you must. There’s no way this is happening.

Your stomach flutters and flips, enough physical proof that you see what you think you do.

You take a moment to admire him, his cock, the glistening precum that’s gathered at the tip of it, the soft groans coming from his chest. The way his thick neck is angeled back perfectly presents his Adam's apple and the nape of his throat.

You adjust to prop yourself up slightly.

"Joel," you coo, his name dripping from your lips like nectar from a flower.

He pauses at the sound of your voice, and time suspends for a moment. If he weren’t so fucked out, he might think to stop what he’s doing, might even feel embarrassed that he was caught.

But right now, part of him wants you to watch. When he tilts his head up, you’re staring at him with a look he can’t quite place, but holy fuck, you’re beautiful.

Seeing your own lust-filled eyes, knowing you're watching what he’s doing to himself, consumes him.

“See what you do to me,” he groans, holding your stare as he fucks his fist, jaw slack and balls tight.

It’s so intense. He’s intense.

“Wanna see you,” he rasps, and you’re more than happy to oblige.

You work to undo the buttons of your jeans, desperate to touch yourself – dazed and dizzy.

You haven’t even touched him and you’re already cock drunk, tipsy with the need to touch him. You can’t stop it, not even if you tried. It feels like this moment was always meant to happen, and everything in life—the good and the bad — has led up to it.

Feeling a sudden surge of boldness, you stand to walk over to him, but the floor rushes up unexpectedly. As gravity claims you, a different kind of pull—a magnetic force you've felt since the night you met him—lingers in your mind.

You think you hear him call your name as the ceiling swirls into shades of red, patterns like a kaleidoscope painted behind your lids, and you’re living that night again before you can be sure.

++++

Boston QZ, Fall 2022

The bar's dim lights hardly penetrate the thick air and despair that seems to stick to everything inside the QZ. You shove open the heavy metal door and step inside. The noise—a mix of wood chairs scraping against the ground and low conversations—briefly spikes before settling as the door thuds shut behind you.

It's been a long, tough shift at the clinic, leaving you feeling bone tired.

The bar—if you can even call it that—has a worn appeal. As your eyes get used to the dimness, you head straight for the counter.

The bartender, a middle-aged guy with a scar trailing down his cheek like a tear track, gives you a quick nod in greeting. “Hey, Tom,” you greet him with a tired smile. “I’ll have a chardonnay.”

Tom chuckles, wiping down a glass with a rag that has seen better days.

“Doc,” he nods. “Best I can do is beer. Got a fresh batch that’s more hops than rust this time.”

“Sold,” you laugh, settling onto a stool and pushing him one of your ration cards. “Make it a cold one, if you can remember what cold feels like.”

Your eyes drift across the bar as Tom turns to fetch your drink. That’s when you notice him—a rugged man nursing a beer, his presence almost as worn as the leather jacket hugging his broad shoulders.

His knuckles are raw, the skin split, and a dark bruise blooms around his left eye. It’s an impressive shiner that catches your attention more than it probably should.

You lean slightly on the bar, the wood cool under your arms, and a half-smile forms on your lips when you catch his eye. “You really should have someone check that out,” you say, nodding toward his hand, the flirtation in your voice unmistakable.

His eyes assess you momentarily, weighing your words, maybe even your presence here talking to him.

He curls his right hand into a fist, the skin tight and pale over the knuckles. “This?” His voice, rough as gravel, carries a hint of nonchalance. “It’ll heal eventually.” As he speaks, his words stretch out with a slow Southern drawl, wrapped in a weariness you can almost touch.

“Must have been quite the fight,” you remark, accepting the beer Tom slides in front of you. “Or a really stubborn door.”

A trace of a smile tugs at the corner of his mouth.

“Something like that.”

“You know,” you continue, sipping the beer and finding it surprisingly not terrible, “I’m pretty good with stitches and less good with doors. If you ever need a hand…”

His dark eyes flick back to you, pausing on your lips, “I’ll keep that in mind.”

You sip your drink, the corners of your lips twitching upward slightly. Turning to face him fully, you let your eyes roam over his features, openly appreciating the chisel of his jaw and the facial hair that covers it. He’s handsome.

He doesn’t ask for your name, but the silence feels like an invitation. Leaning a bit closer, you raise an eyebrow playfully. "And you are?" your voice lilts at the end, lingering on the anticipation.

"Joel Miller," he says, his voice a deep rumble that cuts through the bar noise. His handshake is firm but careful as if he's mindful not to hurt despite the roughness of his hands.

"Joel Miller—I like that," you reply, holding his gaze a little longer than necessary, your hand still clasped in his. You gently turn his hand to inspect the battered knuckles, not having to work hard to imagine the sting you know he feels.

A shout from across the bar catches your attention; your friends are waving you over. You turn towards them, but he continues to look at you. When you turn back to him, he drops your hand quickly, almost like you burned him.

"Well, Joel Miller, I guess I'll see you around," you say with a hint of promise.

He nods, “Maybe so.”

As you walk away, you feel his thoughtful, dark, and hungry eyes still fixed on you.

The intensity of his stare sends a shiver down your spine as you move toward the laughter and warmth of your friends waiting at a table near the back.

You feel the pull of curiosity that makes you want to look back, but you don’t.

++++

Later that week, you’re pulling a late night at the clinic.

"Fuck," you moan, bringing your hands to your temples and rubbing them slightly. You're exhausted. When are you not?

You don't have a clock in the clinic, but you know it's probably close to curfew. Every cell in your body tells you to go home, but you ignore it. At least you have the peeling paint and the constant drip from a leaky faucet to keep you company.

You’re restocking a shelf in the lobby when the front door slams open violently. A man staggers in, his eyes bloodshot, clothes tattered, and reeking of what you don’t even want to know. You straighten up and quickly reach into your coat pocket, your grip finding a scalpel from earlier. Using your thumb, you work to remove the cap and position it between your fingers should you need to use it.

"I need some meds," he growls, slamming his fists down on the reception desk. "The strong stuff, now!"

"Sir, I need you to calm down," you say, trying to keep your voice even despite the adrenaline surge. "I can help, but first, you need to tell me what's wrong."

"Listen here you little bitch, I don’t need advice; I need fucking pills!" he bellows, his voice echoing off the walls. Suddenly, he lunges over the counter, grabbing your arm with a firm grip.

You struggle to pull away, but he’s too strong. You try your scalpel, but he slaps it away. Panic spikes as he twists your arm behind your back and slams you against the counter. Pain shoots through your shoulder, sharp and blinding.

Just then, the door to the clinic bursts open with a force that makes the entire room shake. You barely have time to register the figure rushing in, his movements fast and determined.

And then you see him.

Joel Miller.

His expression is set in a hard line, eyes pinpointing the man pinning you down. Without a word, he grabs the man by the collar and yanks him away from you. The man flails, trying to swing at Joel, but he’s too quick, too angry. He lands a solid punch to the man's jaw, sending him reeling backward into one of the shelves.

"You okay?" he asks, turning to you with concern etched on his face. His hands are still clenched into fists.

Breathing heavily, you nod, rubbing your bruised arm. The pain is sharp, and you know you'll be feeling it tomorrow, but you’re relieved to be free from the man's grasp.

"I think so?" you manage to say, trying to steady your voice as you back away from the counter to put some distance between yourself and the now-groaning figure on the floor.

Joel’s eyes find the man as he slowly picks himself up, giving him a warning glare that promises more if he tries anything again. "Come in here again, and I’ll make sure a broken jaw is the least of your worries," he threatens. Is he always this intense? The man, clutching his jaw and mumbling curses, stumbles out of the clinic.

Once gone, Joel turns back to you, his expression softening. "Let me look at your arm," he says, gently taking it in his hands, his touch careful as he examines the bruising.

“Playing doctor today, are we?" you tease with a smirk.

Joel's chuckle rumbles low and warm, melting some of the tension from your shoulders.

"I'm not, but you could've fooled me," he replies, his touch light as he examines your arm. His eyes hold a soft concern that seems at odds with his typically rugged exterior.

“Didn’t know you were a doctor.”

"Do a lot of women at the bar tell you they’re good at giving stitches?" you quip, watching his reaction.

“Alright, smartass, point taken," he teases, releasing your arm. You gently massage the sore skin.

"How did you know I was in trouble?"

Joel leans against the counter, his brow set as he watches you rub your arm.

"Let's just say I've got good instincts.”

"Instincts, huh?" You say, stepping closer. "I suppose next you’ll say that it was just my luck that you happened to wander by when you did?”

His eyes lock with yours.

"I think you're lucky I came when I did," he agrees, his tone serious now.

"Yeah," you agree, a wave of gratitude washing over you. The clinic is suddenly quiet, and you both look at each other momentarily. Everything suddenly feels heavy.

“Too bad there’s no lottery anymore—I could've used some of that luck earlier,” you joke. Stupid.

Joel shakes his head, eyes still scanning your face, perhaps looking for injuries you hadn't mentioned.

"Really, you should be more careful," he chides. "It’s not safe to be out here alone this close to curfew."

"I usually manage fine," you assert, trying not to let his concern make you feel like you can't handle your job. "Tonight was just... unexpected."

"Doesn't mean it won't happen again. You should think about having someone here with you during late shifts," Joel suggests, his voice low and insistent.

You consider his words, knowing he's right, but it’s also not like people in the QZ are lining up to care for people who aren’t themselves.

Joel seems to read your mind. "Just promise me you'll be careful," he says, stepping back, giving you space. His eyes still hold that fierce protective glint.

"I promise.”

Joel nods once, satisfied. "Good.”

You give him another small smile and think he sees the thank you behind it.

He nods again, eyes lingering on you for a moment longer before he turns to leave. As he walks towards the door, you watch him go, feeling a mix of emotions—appreciation, relief, and that same magnetic pull from last night.

“Joel?” you call out, halting his steps. “You like whiskey?”

Joel turns, a curious arch lifting his brow as he shifts from his reserved demeanor.

"Yeah, I like whiskey," he replies. "Why, you offering?"

A playful smile dances on your lips.

"Maybe I am," you say, considering for a moment. "How about a thank-you drink? My place isn't far."

For a moment, Joel just looks at you, assessing.

"Lead the way, Doc,” he says, his voice carrying a warmth you haven’t heard before.

++++

You unlock the door to your unit, stepping aside to let him in. "Make yourself comfortable," you say, gesturing vaguely towards the living room. Joel nods and walks through the threshold. As he passes, you notice that he smells slightly sweet and smoky, with a rich, woody undertone.

He takes a seat on the worn couch that’s a carry over from the 80’s, it creaks under his weight. He settles back, his knees spreading wide, and makes himself at home.

Heading into the kitchen, you rummage through the cabinets before finding an old bottle of whiskey. You don’t own any glasses.

You call out to Joel, "I hope you don’t mind sharing with me." You unscrew the cap, take a swig directly from the bottle, and feel the warm burn of the alcohol as it slides down your throat.

You cough. “It's not great, but it’s the best I’ve got.”

Carrying the bottle back to the living room, you pass it to Joel with a playful wink. "Your turn," you say, watching him take his swig with an approving nod. He takes a moment to assess the bottle; not bad for decade-old Tennessee whiskey.

As he drinks, you walk over to a shelf cluttered with various knickknacks and pull out an old battery-powered CD player. Rifling through the modest stack of CDs you’ve traded more ration cards for than you care to admit, you pull out the one you're after and slide it into the player.

As the first chords of Pearl Jam's "Alive" reverberate through the room, Joel's head swivels, his eyes lighting up with recognition. "Holy shit. Pearl Jam?" he says, his voice tinged with surprise.

"You know ‘em?" you respond, settling beside him on the couch.

He looks at you with a you’ve got to be serious look.

“Yeah, darlin’, I know ‘em. Pretty sure I was listening to them before you were even born.”

“Oh please,” you laugh, gently elbowing him in the ribs as you snatch the whiskey bottle back. “I’m not that young.” “Pretty sure I’m old enough to be your daddy,” he looks at you. You’re not sure who moved closer, you or him. You feel the solid warmth of his thigh pressed firmly against yours, sending a spark through you.

You turn and look up at him through your lashes.

“Is that what you want to be?” You feel a little thrill as you watch his pupils dilate, and his jaw tightens.

You take another swig from the bottle, and his eyes linger on your lips and the shine from the amber liquid on them. “My daddy,” you emphasize the word daddy with a suggestive tone. His hands flex on his thighs. You can tell he’s holding back, trying to maintain composure. He blushes a little; you notice.

Your words hang in the air. You decide to go easy on him. For now.

“I’m just fucking with you; that’s not really my thing,” you lie. You take another sip from the bottle, and you feel the alcohol coursing through your veins, your cheeks warming from the combination of the whiskey and his burning gaze. Your muscles feel a little gooey, and your bones feel lighter.

“All yours, cowboy,” you say, passing him the bottle. His left-hand kitten kisses yours as he grabs it, and even though it was just a brief touch, you still feel it afterward. You bring your free hand to his resting on his thigh. His knuckles have started to heal, but scabs still linger.

“You gonna tell me how you got this for real this time?” Your fingers gently explore the rough texture of his skin, tracing the prominent veins that stand out beneath. He clenches his hand into a fist, looking at you with an intensity that suggests you don’t want to know.

"Alright Miller, keep your secrets then," you murmur playfully, leaning in so your side body is pressed against his arm. You gently pluck the bottle from his grasp and set it aside on the table. Sliding onto his lap, you straddle him, your thighs framing his sides.

“Wh – what are you doin’?”

"If you won't tell me, the least you can do is kiss me," you suggest, your fingers weaving through his hair, using it to tilt him up to look at you. His eyes flicker to your lips, and his hand cradles your face as you inch nearer. His thumb brushes softly across your bottom lip, sending a shiver down your spine. His touch wanders, trailing from your neck to your waist, each movement charged with tension.

Suddenly, he shifts, flipping you onto your back with a smooth motion. Your back hits the cushions and a small oof escapes your lungs. Your thighs are still bracketing him. The pressure of his hips against your center makes your insides flutter.

“You’re a needy little thing, arentcha?”

Mhmm, you moan, cupping his face, trying to pull him closer to you. The hardness you feel pressed up on your hips makes you a little desperate.

God, you’re perfect, he thinks. So warm and willing, making it so easy for him.

You’ve been fairly obvious in your flirting with him. He hasn’t been with a woman in a while, but he sure as shit wasn’t born yesterday. A voice in his mind tells him this might be the liquor talking, not you. Or worse, he thinks you might feel like you owe him something for helping you out earlier.

He wants you, but not like this.

"I think you're a little drunk, darlin'," he whispers, his voice low and teasing. He leans in, his breath warm against your skin, noses so close they touch.

“So what if I am?” you giggle.

“Kiss me, Miller.” His eyes fall to your lips.

You close your eyes, expecting a kiss, but instead, he plants a tender kiss on your forehead.

"I should go," he murmurs, pulling away and standing up. "Get some sleep," he adds, his voice mingling with the music. Before you can reach for him, he's out the door, leaving you wet, tipsy, and confused.

By the time Joel returned to his unit, the ache in his jeans was almost too much to bear.

He fucked his hand twice that night, once to the thought of how you felt on top of him, your hips rocking into his, and the other to the thought of what your lips might feel like pressed against his.

He wanted to kiss you. He wants to kiss you.

And while his cock might have other thoughts on the matter, he’s never been one to take advantage. Joel knows he’s a bad man, but he’s not bad enough to do that to you.

He’s done many hard things, but walking away from you at that moment might be near the top of the list.

++++

You feel his fingers on your forearm, gently tracing up and down on the skin there when you open your eyes. He’s sitting on the bed next to you. His voice, a heavy mix of concern and warmth now, steadies your spinning world. You try and sit up. What the actual fuck is happening? Wasn’t he…just?

"Hey, take it easy," Joel murmurs, guiding you gently back against the pillows.

As you settle, the dizzying spin of the room slows, and you're met with Joel's intense stare. He's studying you, his eyes flickering with a mixture of unease and something deeper, something unspoken.

"You okay?" His voice is a soft murmur, barely rising above the whistle from the broken window across the room.

You nod, but your heart feels like it’s going to pound out of your chest —not just from the disorienting fall, but from the closeness of him. The magnetic pull you've felt since the beginning is more palpable now, impossible to ignore. You blink away the last clouds of your dizziness and focus on him. His shirt clings to him, damp with sweat; his usually neat hair begins to curl at the edges, and there's a tightness in his expression that mirrors the pain you feel.

You’re aching, not in your muscles or bones; no, it’s deeper than that. It's like the pull of a wave threatening to take you under tow.

"Yeah, just,” you sigh. “Joel, I feel so weird," you manage to say, your voice barely a whisper. “I’m so hot,” you say, and admitting it out loud overwhelms you.

“I know, baby, me too,” Joel responds softly, his hand brushing lightly over your shoulder,

He’s so sweet and tender. The nickname lingers in your mind and plays on a loop.

Baby. Baby.

Warmth spreads up from your chest, a burning sensation that lodges behind your ribcage, familiar yet overwhelming. Tears start to prick your eyes, and before you can hold them back, they stream down your face.

You're crying now, not just from the discomfort but from everything—the closeness, the concern in his voice, the way he keeps calling you baby, and the deep ache it all stirs within you.

“Stupid fucking flower,” you say through your tears.

“What’s that now?”

“In the field—the flower, the colorful one I showed you. I didn’t know what it was at first, but then I remembered reading about it in a book about herbal remedies.”

“And you think this flower has something to do with what’s wrong with us right now?” he questions.

“I don’t remember what it’s called, but I remember reading a warning about it –”

He doesn’t say anything; he just looks at you, patiently waiting for you to finish your thought.

“The flower,” you sniffle. “Well, the sap and pollen of the flower, I should say, have some strange side effects if ingested or put into the bloodstream…”

“Go on, baby.”

There it is again. Baby.

“It causes extreme arousal, light-headedness, and a shit ton of other things I don’t remember.”

“Oh. Well, that explains –”

“Yeah,” you cut him off, already knowing what he wanted to say. You use the back of your hand to wipe away some moisture from your face, but there’s no point; you still feel the tears falling. You close your eyes and try to will the discomfort from your mind.

“It's okay, darlin'," he murmurs, "I’m here. We'll just let it run its course, alright?" His arms envelop you, drawing you tightly against the solid warmth of his chest. Gently, he cradles the curve of your head in his hand, the rhythm of his heartbeat steady against your ear. You open your eyes, and through your wet vision, you look down and see that he’s still hard.

“Joel, I –” his hand floats to the column of your neck, holding you to look at him.

“What do you need, baby?”

“I need you to fuck me.”

Shit. No going back now.

“I can’t do that. We’re not in the right state of mind. I don’t want to take advan–”

“Joel, please,” you say through your tears.

He looks at you like he’s at war with his mind and body; your desperate doe eyes stare back at him.

His cock twitches.

He’s been in pain ever since you hit the floor. He couldn’t bring himself to finish after you passed out again. How could he? He was too worried about you. Every fiber of his being was screaming to cum, but the concern he held for you overrode it all.

“Joel, I’m begging you,” you plead.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, yeah—yes. Joel, I need you,” you respond quickly, already moving to drag the unbuttoned jeans off your body. He’s still unmoving, and his body feels like molasses—viscous and sluggish. You’ve rid yourself of your shirt when you command his attention again, “Joel!”

“Fuck, yeah – okay,” he takes off his shirt, and you help him with his buckle. He undoes his jeans once more while you make quick work of removing your bra and underwear, leaving yourself bare in front of him.

“Lay back, baby, need to taste you.” You do as he says, letting your knees fall to the sides until you’re spread open for him. He comes to his knees on the bed, the mattress groaning under his weight.

“God damn, darlin’ — could cum just from lookin’ at you like this,” he says, stroking his cock. You thought he was big when you saw him in the corner, but seeing him this close, really seeing him, is another story.

He collapses onto his stomach between your legs, his breath warm against your skin. Gently, he presses his lips to the tender flesh of your inner thigh, delivering a playful nip that sends a shiver through you.

“Wanna taste you – you have no idea how bad I want to taste you,” he groans as he breathes in your scent, the tip of his aquiline nose bumps against your clit. You’re so keyed up already, a dripping mess for him, your aching clit just begging for a bit of attention.

He runs a finger through your drenched seam, your juices dripping onto his thick digit. He licks his finger, then shoves it into his mouth so he can taste every drop. He clamps his eyes shut and groans. “So fuckin’ sweet, baby.”

Joel spreads your legs wider, giving him full access to your pussy. He plants a soft kiss on the top of your mound and then gently parts his lips, allowing his tongue to lick through your dripping folds.

“Please,” You cry, with one hand gripping the worn fabric of the bedspread and one tugging on his messy curls. His beard scratches the sensitive skin of your pussy as you grind your hips into his mouth.

“I’ll take care of you, baby, don’t worry, ‘m here,” he whispers before returning his attention to you.

Your vision fills with glittering spots while he expertly alternates between flicking his tongue and sucking on your clit. He’s keeping a steady rhythm, on the slower side, you think, but you can’t be sure; your sense of time is fully warped.

He picks up the pace, your fingers cramping from their death grip on the fabric. You feel your peak approaching. It feels different, like euphoria injected straight into your veins.

Joel senses your approaching release and pushes one of his thick fingers into your wet heat.

“Fuck, you’re tight,” he mumbles against your skin. He picks up his pace and then adds another finger, one your greedy cunt happily accepts. He hooks them slightly so they’re pressing against the spongey spot inside you that you can never seem to reach yourself.

“Come on, baby. Wanna feel you.”

His eyes flicker up to meet yours, and then tension inside you releases all at once, snaps, and hurtles you into another dimension.

As if the cosmos has poured all its beauty into a single moment, the wave of your orgasm breaks—an explosion of white light, pure and cleansing, sweeping away all that came before, cooling the fire raging inside of you.

Joel works you through it, his fingers keeping a steady rhythm as you come down, coated in a gentle rain of shimmering particles, bathed in a serene and growing peace, and you catch your breath.

“I’ve–I’ve never felt anything like that,” you pant, “That was amazing.”

“It was pretty pretty to watch, too,” he tells you, rising between your legs. His hand comes to his cock again, holding it by the base. He’s furiously hard, the tip of him drooling, the color of it a deep, rich shade of violet.

“I need you, baby, so fuckin’ bad,” he tells you, voice wrecked.

You spread your legs open a little wider for him, bringing your hands to your knees, spreading your glistening cunt open for him.

“She’s all yours,” you coo, and he’s on you. He arranges himself above you, his forearms taking the brunt of his weight, yet the impressive heft of him presses down, enveloping you in his presence. His broadness looms, an expansive canopy; he eclipses your view, and all that exists in this moment is him. You wrap your fingers around his midsection, and he lines the tip of himself up with your wet and waiting hole.

“You’re mine,” he tells you like it’s a fact, not a statement, as he pushes his hips forward and buries his cock deep inside of you. He pauses, giving you a moment to adjust. There’s a dull sting, but it quickly dissipates as he pulls out of you slowly and then thrusts forward again. The slow drag of his cock against your walls, the tip of it kissing your cervix, sends you into a frenzy.

“Faster – ah shit, harder –” you moan and he begins to ravage you without mercy, kissing and nipping at the razor edge of your jaw, the tip of your chin. Your moans are muffled against his skin, cries of pleasure that rise in pitch with each thrust forward.

“Mmm, you’re so warm,” he huffs and moans above you as he fucks away at your tight core. “Feels so good, not gonna last long like this. Tight little pussy’s choking me too good.”

The familiar, odd sensation washes over you again, that strange mix of feeling both insubstantial and overwhelmingly heavy. It's as if you're simultaneously a feather, drifting weightlessly, and a boulder, rooted deeply and immovably. This feeling lifts and anchors you, leaving you floating between reality and a dreamlike state.

You focus on the feeling of his thrusts.

Back and forth.

In and out.

Back and forth.

In and out.

You’re drunk off it, off him.

He snakes his hand behind your body to grab your ass for extra leverage, allowing him to slam into you harder, his hips thrusting against yours. The thatch of dark hair at the base of him rubs up against your swollen clit. You feel like you’re getting fucked into near unconsciousness, your eyes heavy and half-lidded.

“Joel,” you moan, your voice barely above a whisper, “I’m so close, oh my god, please.”

Joel’s eyes roll shut as you wrap your arms and legs around him tightly, holding on for dear life as he fucks you like a man possessed.

“That’s it baby, beg for it,” he tells you, and you do.

“Pleasepleaseplease,” you cry out, “Daddy, please.”

“Jesus, fuck,” Joel groans as he feels your walls clamp down on him, your orgasm gripping you like a fever.

“Good fucking girl,” he praises.

Tears once again stream from your face, this time from pleasure, as he splits you open even more.

He repositions, bringing your knees to your chest, holding them together with his strong arms as he continues to push in and out of you.

The tension builds, a gathering storm within him. Every nerve seems to tighten, coil, ready to spring. His world narrows and blurs until there’s only you and the tight feel of your pussy around him.

“Gonna come,” he tells you, and his thrusts slow.

His breath catches, and he quickly pulls out of you. Then, the release comes— your legs fall to the sides again, and a spray of his cum lands on you, hot thick ropes of it drooling from his cock.

He’s floored by relief, pleasure radiating through his body. It's like watching the sky split open with light after a storm—vivid, raw, and beautifully clear.

The aftermath is quiet, a soft descent back into himself, marked by a satisfying stillness.

He drops to the bed beside you, and you both stare at the ceiling, breathless, nothing but prey ensnared in a web of desire. He looks at you, his deep brown eyes now soft and satisfied.

“So…Daddy, huh?”

Part 3 - Coming 5/19

A/N Continued: Okay ngl, I am down so bad for these two. If you are, too, I would really appreciate a comment or a reblog. Your feedback and interaction really are so special to me. Tags: @syd-djarin @endlessthxxghts @thereaperisabitch @caramilena @promptly-mercy @alex-does-art-things @swankyorange @ayishahislost @bensonispunk @doblasftcisco @lizlil @pigeonmama @sullyselena @deansimpalagirl @theelectricmind @pedropascalsbbg @laramc-02 @elegantduckturtle @rainbow12346 @senoratess @eff4freddie @auteurdelabre @yxtkiwiyxt @javipispunk @reedrchards @miller-n-morgan @sawymredfox @casa-boiardi @punkshort @pastawench @survivingandenduring @aspecialgreenie @puduvallee @moel-jiller @sheepdogchick3

#joel miller smut #joel miler x fem!reader #joel miller x reader #sex pollen #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller x you #joel miller the last of us #pedro pascal character #pedrohub #pedrostories #joel miller #joel miller fanfic #jettsflora&faunachallenge

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hee0soo · 10 months

Text

Always

Request: Yes please, if you can maybe make a behind the scenes after bangchan got angry at the staff during a vlive , there is a video of it, I've been wondering what it would be like after the vlive and who would calm him down ? by @sclassstay

Disclaimer: this fic is written and copyrighted by ©hee0soo on tumblr. do not rewrite or repost on any other plattforms without my permission.

You knew that something was wrong as soon as the door to the green room opened and Chan came walking in, the members following him like little ducklings following their mother.

They were silent for once, which made the alarm bells inside your mind go off, blaring at you loudly. The fact that none of them dared saying much more than a few hushed greetings in your direction was heavily alarming!

It just wasn´t normal! Stray Kids wasn´t known as one of the most chaotic groups for nothing! There was a reason for that such as appearing on other groups live streams without actually appearing in it or the staff jokingly saying that it was like a kindergarten most of the time when they were together!

And the fact that Chan, the patience in person might you add, looked like he was ready to punch whoever entered the green room next, had you raising your eyebrow at the leader.

Chan removed the chain the stylists had put around his neck quickly, throwing it on the table with a little too much force than necessary, staying dead silent when as he sat down on one of the couches prepared for them.

Face strained, mouth set in a hard line and lips pressed tightly together, his eyes were glaring at something only he could see while his fingers were fidgeting around in annoyance.

You turned to Felix, questioning him silently about what had set this off. As far as you knew, he went out of the room joking around with the others. A stark contrast to the now seething posture he held!

The younger Aussie looked back at his leader, carefully studying his expression before turning back to you, whispering quietly.

“Staff was really unorganized today, repositioning everything and everyone while the Live was already running and all… At one point they asked Hyunjin-ah to plug I one of the monitors but he didn´t know how and instead of helping they just left him fumbling. Hyung was really pissed at them…”

You nodded slightly, glad for the little updated from the deep voiced dancer!

“Seems to me like he´s still mad,”

Felix hummed at your words, sitting down in one of the chairs and grabbed his water bottle from the table in front of him.

“Hmm, you´re right but talking to Hyung now could be fatal for us.”

The innuendo in is words had not gone over your head and your head back to look at your boyfriend.

Deciding how you wanted to do this, you got out of your chair, put your phone which you were still holding onto from before, in your back pocket and went over to your boyfriend.

The leader acknowledged your presence with a small glance but ultimately went back to glaring at the wall. He had started to fumble with the bracelet Felix had gifted him a few months ago to distract himself, not wanting to accidently snap at you.

“I´m fine,” he grumbled, chewing on the inside of his cheek, lips pursed.

“I believe you. Doesn´t mean I’m not worried about you…”

Keeping your voice gentle, you grabbed the hand that was playing with the bracelet, drawing small patterns on the exposed skin of his arm.

Chan’s face melted just the tiniest bit at the soothing touch and turned his head to face you.

“No need for that but thank you,”

Humming once more, you brushed a stray strand of hair out of his face, admiring him for a moment but never stopping the ministrations of your finger.

“I always worry about you baby. Comes with being in love with you.”

Closing his eyes, the corner of his mouth twitched a little. Chan didn´t know how but he could feel his anger start to dissipate the longer he looked at you.

“Don´t start acting cute with me!”

“Why? Because you know it´s working?” not being able to hide the smile on your lips, you quickly pressed a kiss to his cheek, making his face and ears turn red.

“Who said it´s working huh?”

At that, Minho, who had obviously listened to what was being said on your end of the couch, snorted loudly.

“Oh please Hyung! y/n barely sits down and you go all soft just because they are next to you! It IS working!”

The leader grabbed the cushion next to him with his free hand and threw it at his eldest kid with scarily accuracy.

“Oh don´t be like that, it just means you looove me!”

“Hmm sometimes…” he shrugged, amusement replacing the last bit of annoyance.

“YAH Christopher!” you screeched, pinching his side.

“I´M SORRY, I’m sorry! Of course I love you!”

“Ya better!”

Sulking, you turned away but Chan had other plans. Grabbing you around the waist, the leader pulled you on top of his lap, giving him the chance to wrap his arms entirely around you.

You could feel him nuzzling his face in your neck, breath fanning over your skin ever so slightly, causing you to shudder.

“I mean it you know…” he whispered into your ear and you smiled.

Of course you knew that, but it was still nice to hear it.

“And thank you, for always being by my side.”

Another kiss was pressed your skin. Turning your head to see him better, you put your lips on his before pulling away again. It was short and chaste but none the less carrying everything you wanted to tell him but didn´t have the words for so you whispered a simple but loving, “Always!”

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strangersteddierthings · 7 months

Text

Beg You to Love Me

"I'm surprised you even remembered, Harrington," Eddie shrugs, hoping he comes off as aloof as he wants to, instead of shaky and unsure like he feels. He was sitting atop the picnic table, arms behind him trying to look as unaffected by Steve's presence as he can, but he's been thrown for a loop ever since Steve emerged from the woods instead of Robin Buckley, like he was expecting.

"Of course, I remember. I- I've never forgotten," Steve whispers, head down and fists clenched at his sides. He looks more like a child being wrongfully scolded than a man defending himself.

The words pull a scoff from Eddie, though. Never forgotten? What the fuck ever. "Right. Something to hold over me, then, if I'd stepped too far out of line? Mutually assured destruction?"

Steve's head snaps up and he looks horrified, which Eddie will admit to almost believing. Steve doesn't seem like the type to join the drama club but his acting's pretty fucking good. "What? No! I would have never- I would never have said anything about us to anyone."

"Right. Sure. Of course. Your own reputation to think about there."

Something like hurt flashes across Steve's face before it frosts over. This is the face he's used to see on Steve. Cold and distant. "I- whatever, man. I don't even know why I thought..." but Steve doesn't finish his sentence. He just shakes his head and turns his back on Eddie, heading back the way he came.

He doesn't know why that sparks a rage from deep within him. "Yeah, that's right. Tuck tail and runaway again!"

"I ran away?" Steve shouts back, turning sharply on his heel to glare at Eddie. "You think that I ran away?"

Eddie just spreads his hands to the empty clearing as if to say 'look at all this room around me you've never occupied'. "You weren't here, were you?"

"Because you told me to not be!" Steve stomps back to Eddie but stops a couple yards away.

"Like fuck I did," Eddie argues back, because he didn't tell Steve to go away. He'd told him-

"'If this isn't good enough for you, there's the fucking door.' That's what you told me," Steve quotes, "I thought it was pretty fucking clear what you wanted."

"Yeah, I fucking thought it was clear what I wanted," Eddie snarls, lunging from the picnic table, closing those last few feet to get into Steve's face. "Yet here we are!"

"Don't act like this is my fucking fault. Like you weren't the one who forced it to be my fault. My decision-"

"Yeah, it had to be your damn decision! You were dragging it out-"

"-because you were too much of a coward to do it your-fucking-self-"

"-acting like you were. Acting too good to actually slum it with the trailer trash-"

"-so of course I made the choice that was best for me. Because I deserved more-"

"-like what I had to offer you would never be good enough for the goddman King-"

"-than just being your hookup when I wanted to be-"

"-like I wasn't good enough to be your friend, much less-"

"-your fucking boyfriend!"

The contrast of this sudden silence that falls following their screaming match that ends with identical sentiments is jarring. Eddie feels wrong-footed and lost. Confusion and hurt mixing in him that he can see reflected on Steve's face.

"What?" Steve is the first to break the silence, drawing into himself. Arms crossing to hold himself at the elbows as he takes several steps back, as if to be able to see all of Eddie will clear the confusion he's feeling.

Eddie just stares back, slack jawed for a moment. That's. What. No, wait. Really, what? "What what?"

"You- you said 'if this isn't good enough for you, there's the fucking door'. How was I- I thought you- you were breaking up with me!" Steve cries, "you. You said that to make me pick, because you knew I wanted more and you didn't. That's- you were breaking up with me!"

Eddie's in just as much disbelief. "No, you broke up with me! I said if this isn't good enough but, like, I meant if I wasn't good enough. And you left! You walked out because I wasn't good enough to be with you!"

Steve looks stricken and he claws harder at himself, sort of folds into himself like he's going to be sick. "No. No no no, that's- then that means I- it's all been my fault. No no no no."

Eddie stares wide-eyed and frozen as Steve talks to himself. Eddie kind of feels nauseous. There's no way that this is possible. That these last two and a half years of heartbreak have been because of miscommunication. That they both thought the other was breaking up with them and neither actually wanted to.

"Why didn't you- Why didn't you say something?" Eddie asks.

Steve laughs at that, sounding a bit hysteric. "Me!? Why didn't you! I wasn't- I wasn't going to beg you to love me like I had with my parents. You were the one who told me I shouldn't have to do that!"

Yeah. He had. When Steve had broken down and cried on his bed, in his arms, wondering what it was he had done to lose his parents' love. Eddie told him it wasn't his fault, never would be, and that he would never need to beg for love from someone who does love him. It was the same advice Wayne had given him when he'd taken Eddie in.

"I already thought you were wanting to break up. You were being so distant, I thought..."

Steve sucks in a deep breath and nods, "Yeah. Yeah I was. I was scared of scaring you away. Of being too much. Because I- what I felt for you was a lot. I was afraid I'd chase you away if I continued to be so clingy. I pulled back, to reign it in but. Fuck. Fuck!"

Eddie drops to a squat. His legs feel like jelly and he can't keep standing. He squats and looks down so his hair becomes a curtain separating him from the reality of the situation, if only for a moment. Fuck is right.

He's spent his junior and first senior year being pissed at Steve. Hurt by him and what he thought happened. And it's- if Steve's being honest, it's all been for nothing. If they both wanted a deeper relationship, they could have had it. They might still be boyfriends if Eddie hadn't been so wrapped up in his Munson Doctrine. He'd been convincing himself Steve was embarrassed of him, and was working on breaking off their- whatever they were. But he hadn't been.

He's thought such terrible things about Steve over the years. God, what has Steve thought of him over the years? No. He doesn't want to know, actually. That's not what he cares about right now.

He lifts his head to see that Steve's plopped himself onto the ground, sitting cross legged, elbows on his knees and head in his hands.

"Steve. Steve!" He calls Steve's name out until he looks up, looks at him, "why'd you come out here?"

He laughs again, slightly less hysterically, and he's shaking his head like he can't believe what he's about to say. "I. Fuck, I was coming out here to beg you to love me."

"No you fucking weren't!" his tone is filled with disbelief.

"I was," Steve repeats, sounding amused and heartbroken at the same time. "I really, really was. Graduation's coming and I know you want to get out of Hawkins the second that happens and I'm. I was running out of time trying to get you to notice me again, so I was going to beg."

Notice him again? As if Steve doesn't haunt his every waking thought. As if he doesn't dream of Steve every night while his eyes seek him across the halls and in their few shared classes like he's the goddamn night sky and Eddie is a sailor lost at sea needing the north star to guide him home. Eddie's never not noticed him, and he thinks he has to come out here and beg? "When someone loves you, you don't have to beg."

"Yeah, I know," Steve sighs, defeated, which lets Eddie know that Steve does not, in fact, know. He looks away from Eddie, down to his lap.

Fuck, it's like every fantasy Eddie's had of them making up and then making out has been handed to him on a silver platter and he's blowing it. His words are too vague, too easily misinterpreted. Again. He falls forward on to his knees, hands catching him so he's on all fours like an animal. "Steve. I mean it. You don't have to beg."

"I get it, Eddie," Steve huffs, not looking at him. Not actually understanding.

Eddie starts to crawl the distance between them. Steve looks up then, probably to see what the fuck Eddie was doing with the shuffling sounds and the chain on his belt clacking. Eddie watches Steve's eyes go wide, mouth dropping open to a small 'o'. "See, the thing is, Steve," Eddie says, pulling himself up to be just on his knees to shuffle the last few inches closer. Steve leans back to keep his eyes on Eddie's face, which opens his lap up. "You said you know, but I don't think you do." Eddie brings his hands to rest on Steve's shoulders and Steve lets him. "You don't have to beg." He uses his hold on Steve's shoulders to balance himself as he swings a leg wide, to straddle Steve, then shifts his weight to repeat the process with his other leg before settling himself into Steve's lap. Steve's hands land on his hips and Eddie isn't sure if it's intentional or a reaction to Eddie plopping himself in his laps but he's going to believe it's the first one. "You've never had to beg with me."

Steve sucks in a sharp breath and then he collapses into Eddie. Steve's hands on his hips slide up and pull him into a hug, as close to Steve's body as he can get, while Steve shoves his head under Eddie's chin, into the junction of his neck and shoulder and breaths him in like it's the last breath Steve will ever take. "We're so stupid."

"Yeah," Eddie agrees, as he lifts one hand to hold the back of Steve's head while the other drops to rub soothingly at his back. "Yeah, we are."

They sit in the dirt, the closest they've been since that summer between '81 and '82. They should probably talk about. They're going to have to, if they want this to work. Full sentences with no hidden meanings, even though the thought of that kind of vulnerability makes Eddie skittish. It's going to be difficult, but it'll be worth it. Steve has always been worth it.

Eddie wants to say 'I love you', just to get it out, in the open, and not just implied, but there's a different first step to take. One that's actually a little easier. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Me too," Steve whispers, "I'm sorry. I should have-"

"Shut up," Eddie cuts him off, voice quiet and soft as he can be. "This is, and I cannot stress it enough, a we situation."

The huff of laughter on his skin from Steve feels like the start of something. A new beginning, a start over. A re-do.

A goddamn miracle.

Later, they'll drag themselves apart and up. Make it to the back of Eddie's van in the school parking lot to talk. Going to either's house feel too much, too soon. Their big fight happened at Eddie's home, and Steve's house isn't warm enough for the kind of comfort they want to share.

They'll have a talk. Filled with long pauses, stumbling over words and fears and insecurities because this is the hard part of a relationship. Getting it all out in the open so they can learn if they'll even work. The fear that they aren't going to be compatible anymore looms but doesn't deter. They both want a second chance, to give it a real shot, by the end of that first talk. But taking it slow.

They'll discuss what went wrong the first time (diving in without talking about anything certainly played a big part) and how to avoid that.

But that's later. Right now, Eddie just holds Steve, and Steve holds him back, and it certainly feels like the beginning of something good.

@i-less-than-three-you @nburkhardt @afewproblems

#steddie #my fic #this is just Miscommunication The Fic #hurt/comfort #steve harrington #eddie munson #robin buckleys the mvp for setting up the meeting by lying to eddie #shes going to demand a thank you gift for giving them the time to talk #and eddie WILL send her a whole fruit basket

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